Shadowdark Thracia 6
Players: Zema Zafat Strabon Issakra
Recap:
Party began by deliberating on which entrance to use in the dungeon. Through ZZ’s scouting, the main entrance (Area A) seemed to be heavily guarded by beastmen. ZZ scouted the rest of the perimeter and found yet another, extra hidden entrance, a hole in the ground that went very deep.
Not wanting to accidentally get initiated into the cult, the party decides to try their luck with the hole. Using a mirror and some iron spikes, the party created a wind-chime esque object and tied it to the trees, using it as a means to distract some of the beastmen nearest to the hole.
Issakra made his way down first, holding his torch tightly while he descended. He found his way onto the platform on 1-23. ZZ and Strabon followed. Strabon went last and covered the hole with some shrubbery to conceal it.
The party spend some time in the room using their retrieved map from the last delve to fill out the missing details on their map before they could decide on a course of action. Unfortunately for them, they took too long in doing so and a cultist religious procession made their way into the room, carrying 3 prisoners (two human peasants and an Elf woman).
Issakra quickly doused his torch and slung a rope around one of the pillars. He and the rest of the party descended the rope just barely, to get out of sight. The religious procession was not a short affair though, and it seemed like it would take a while. ZZ, who was positioned at the top saw the cult perform sacrifices by pushing prisoners off the edge into the roaring waters below. The cult started by sacrificing a human. The party did not wait to find out what else would happen in the procession and began to descend, Issakra first, lighting a lantern when he got low enough.
At the bottom of the rope, Issakra found himself dangling over an underground river. He immediately caught the attention of the lizardmen camped along the west bank. He could smell the human being cooked and saw the new corpse of the cult’s sacrifice being hacked to pieces and roasted over some coals.
When ZZ descended he called out to the lizardmen in ancient Thracian to ask if he could speak to Gruk. Gruk came forth and asked ZZ how he knew his name. ZZ explained they had met a lizard hunting party and learned of this camp from them. Gruk, keen to find the resting place of the immortal king, offered the party safe harbor at his camp, but requested that they tell him details of the immortal king’s whereabouts should they stumble on any. Gruk suspects the Immortal King can be found within beastman territory, which prevents him and other lizardmen from searching, since they want to maintain their agreement with the beastmen.
Shortly after this interaction with Gruk, the party could hear the Elf woman falling down from level 1. ZZ quickly cast web on the water to break her fall. With some luck he was able to cast it just in time. The Elf woman was saved and released from her binds by the party. Issakra spoke to her in Elvish to calm her down. She joined the party as an Elf Thief. Her name is Sylara.
With Sylara rescued, Gruk showed the party a corridor that would take them north up to level 1. As they made their way through it, the party encountered another Gnoll outpost, but were able to get the jump on the Gnolls. Strabon kicked the door in and ZZ cast sleep, leaving only 2 Gnolls and a human slave awake. Strabon, Issakra and Sylara promptly ended the lucid gnolls. ZZ and Sylara then slaughtered the sleeping ones, looting them for arrows and silver.
Strabon took in the human slave, Grassus, who only spoke Thanian. Grassus followed the party.
When they made their way out into the next room, they surprised the guard stationed out there and disposed of him quickly. They cleared the garbage piles on the floor and discovered a trap door, but did not open it to see where it would lead, instead opting to make their way up to level 1.
As they crossed the area below the great chasm in level 1 (area 2-20) they saw the rotted body of Flint, who fell to his death last week. ZZ debated taking his belongings, but did not want to alert the gnoll guards at the other end of the room, who did not notice him yet. As such the party quietly made their way back up to level 1 via the north staircase.
When they reached level 1, they quickly enacted ZZ’s plan to blow up the dead end hallway in 1-1. The explosion blew a hole into room 1-27, but caused all the bats to storm out. The cultists ran to investigate the explosion from room 1-27 but got distracted by the bats swarming out towards them. Gnolls from Area A also made their way down into Area 1-1, but were hit with ZZ’s web spell, and hit again with the remaining guano bomb ZZ had in his pocket, obliterating them.
The party quickly ran in to room 1-27 and looted the begemmed statue of Athena, carrying it out of the dungeon and back to Minos.
Party earned 7 XP this session, and gained 200gp worth of treasure along with 136 sp.
Companions gained: Sylara (lvl 1 Elf Thief) and Grassus (peasant)
Thoughts:
A very enjoyable session that felt like we crammed a lot into 2 short hours. Players finally managed to enter level 2, though they did not initially plan for it. There was a random encounter that happened to line up perfectly with the specific room they were in: the cult procession that were heading into 1-23. I did rule that they would have the sacrifices with them, because it just makes the encounter more interesting that way.
Basically, peak D&D for me amounts to a lot of Indiana Jones esque spelunking. You have your ancient crypts, your traps, your treasure, and your nefarious factions all vying for power/relics. This session had all of that. Good shit.
As I have said before, I think smaller groups get way more done in these short sessions. Having 6 players feels crowded and a bit of a slog. It’s not terribly often that I have that many players show up, so I suppose it’s fine to keep it as an upper limit. I could run Thracia for 2 players, I think it would still be fun.
I also am open to players having multiple PCs participate in a session. I don’t see why it is a problem, other than maybe being a bit hard to juggle for the players who opt in for that, but if they don’t mind I don’t see why I should, especially if it is to round out the party. Shadowdark doesn’t really do hirelings, so maybe this is a better approach that works for this particular system.
I bring this up mainly because Sylara, the Elf, is included in this dungeon as a potential PC replacement. In the DCC version she is statted as an Elf (through race-as-class) so a player could opt to have her be their replacement PC should theirs die. Otherwise rescuing her turns her into an NPC companion.
I don’t mind NPC companions in the short term, but I do find it incredibly annoying to run an NPC companion alongside the players especially if they don’t have an agenda. I am much happier letting the player take them over. If Caverns of Thracia included any specifics on this Elf woman I might feel differently, but since she is such a blank slate (not even named) I think it is fitting to let her join the player character pool.
One thing that is gnawing at me is a bit of concern regarding how players will explore the dungeon further than level 2 and make it out in the span of 2 hours. That might not be my problem to deal with, if anything it can be a puzzle onto itself worth engaging with, just like the factions guarding the main entrances, but I will keep an eye on this going forward.
Realistically, I can’t go beyond 2 hours per session so we’ll have to come up with something else. An “escape the dungeon” table is a band-aid solution and also a fail-state. It is not to be relied on as a means of getting out.
That said, making it out of the dungeon proves to be just as interesting as going down! Leaning into that part of the adventure is worth it. It makes mapping matter and discovering shortcuts feels euphoric.