D&D Encounters: Princes of the Apocalypse (Episode 5.2)

Inside the Great Hall at Riverguard Keep the heroes shared a meal with Jolliver’s men. Despite the merriment and hospitality being shown towards the PCs, they began to suspect that something more was going on in the Keep. After two servants warned the party of impending danger the PCs knew to keep their wits about them and be ready for the unexpected.

This week at Face to Face games we ran four tables with a combine 20 players. My group had two returning players and three brand new walk-ins brining us to the five-player sweet-spot. The group consisted of a Half-Orc Ranger, two Human Fighters (one archer, one melee), a Dwarf Cleric, and a Gnome Wizard.

Great Hall (#K16)

We began the session with a quick recap for the new players and told them to assume they’d been with the party the whole time. There were a few jokes about losing the three female characters from last week and having them replaced with much worse-looking male characters. With everyone up to speed the PCs had a chance to converse briefly before Jolliver joined the festivities.

Jolliver stepped out from one of the room on the second floor and addressed those in the Great Hall from the balcony above. He welcomed the newcomers and praised the great job all of the workers and guards were doing around the Keep to get the place fixed up. He promised an evening of celebration and plentiful beverages and the crowd cheered with approval. He also promised a night of high stakes gambling which many in attendance clearly approved of.

He called out to the PCs that one of his men found the book they were looking for. He suggested they go with his man to retrieve the book, pay for it, and then return with whatever cash they had left so they could join in the gambling. The PCs were a bit suspicious but agreed to leave with Jolliver’s guard.

Water Tower (#K9)

The Guard led the PCs past the chapel and towards one of the corner towers. He said that the tower was in disrepair so they were using it for storage for now. When they arrived at the door the guard banged loudly, calling out to those inside that they’d arrived. From inside the heroes could hear the sounds of movement.

A few seconds later the party heard the sound of door being unlocked. The Guard opened the door and quickly stepped inside. He then spoke in Goblin to the room’s occupants, but none of the PCs understood. The room was dark and the PCs couldn’t immediately see inside. Suddenly two large Bugbears charged out the door and attacked.

The Cleric and new Human Fighter stood shoulder to shoulder and stopped the attackers from getting past them. This allowed the ranged attackers to fire at the monsters without fear of reprisal. When the first Bugbear dropped, another threw a javelin from inside the dark room at the party.

Combat only lasted a few rounds but in the end the PCs killed all three Bugbears and the treacherous Guard who’d clearly set them up (at Jolliver’s command, no doubt). Thinking quickly they pulled the dead Bugbears inside the tower and closed the door. They waited a few minutes and when no one arrived to investigate the sounds of combat the party felt safe. They found nothing valuable in the room or on the corpses. Having taken a little bit of damage, the party decided to rest an hour before proceeding. The Human Fighter archer put on the guard’s uniform during the short rest.

Moored Keelboat (#K12)

Once it was dark outside the party slowly made their way to the merchant ship dock in the harbor. On the way they passed one wandering guard. He spotted the Fighter in the Guard’s uniform and simply nodded, fooled by the disguise. However, the Ranger’s chaotic tendencies took over and he tried to push the wandering Guard over the parapet and into the water. It didn’t go as smoothly as planned and it took the Cleric and Fighter’s help to keep the guard quiet while they knocked him out and tossed his body over the wall. Fortunately no one heard the scuffle.

When the PCs got to the ship they found two deckhands unloading crates. The PCs had previously been invited by the Genasi captain to visit the ship where they could purchase goods directly from the merchants and bypass Jolliver’s mark-up. The Fighter/Guard had an awkward conversation with the deckhands, arousing their suspicions, but when the other PCs showed the deckhands gold all suspicions were forgotten.

The deckhands offered the PCs cloth, foodstuff, and weapons. When the PCs examined the weapons they realized they were all silvered weapons. They couldn’t afford too much but they did manage to get a few silvered weapons. With the transactions completed and some rum shared by all parties, the PCs headed back for the Great Hall.

The Courtyard

The PCs walked and talked while they decided where to go next. They didn’t want to go directly into the Great Hall as they knew they’d be outnumbered and likely outmatched. They decided instead to try and get into the main building through a second story door accessible from the catwalk that ran along the wall.

They walked with purpose, the Fighter dressed as a Guard in the lead. The feeling was if they acted like they belonged no one would question their presence. It would have worked but the disguised Fighter continued to roll 1s on ever social skill check. This forced the party to fight a few guards along the way. To their credit they acted quickly and quietly and managed to dispatch the few inquisitors without anyone else noticing.

When the PCs approached the stairs to the catwalk two more guard accosted them seeing right through the Fighter’s disguise. The heroes decided not to be as subtly and went instead for quick kills. Once that was taken care of, they grabbed the Guards’ bodiues, and then bolted up the stairs and through the door.

Keep Guardroom (#K21)

The door to the Guardroom swung open and the three off-duty guards inside were bowled over as the Ranger and Fighter threw bodies at them. The rest of the party managed to kill the guards before they could grab weapons or call out for help.

The room had two doors. The one to the catwalk which the PCs just entered, and another that led to a hallway. The Ranger took point, and stepped out into the hallway. Across the hall a door was slightly ajar.

Old Library (#K19)

The room was dimly lit by a single candle. Inside they saw shelves that were sparsely filled with old books. A lone figure sat hunched over, reading by candlelight, his back to the door. The Ranger moved in quietly and knocked him out. The rest of the party quickly followed the Ranger and filed into the library, closing and locking the door behind them.

They quickly searched the room. Among the old books they found the Dwarven tome they’d been sent to recover. They also discovered a secret door behind one of the shelves. When they pressed their ear to the wall they could hear Jolliver talking to someone on the other side.

This was their chance. They could rush in through the secret door and attack Jolliver. It was payback for setting them up with the Bugbears. If they acted quickly enough they may even take out Jolliver before anyone else even noticed. Everyone lined up behind the secret door and got ready to charge in.

Lord’s Chambers (#K21)

The heroes pushed open the secret door and bust in on Jolliver and two Berserker guards. The Wizard ran forward and cast Colour Spray. Unfortunately, the three opponents were all too powerful to be affected by the spell. Realizing this, the Wizard quickly backed up and hid behind the better armored PCs.

Jolliver commanded his men to attack and they did. Only three PC managed to get through the secret door and into the room before the Berserkers rushed the entrance and stopped anyone else from coming through. This left half the party out of range.

The Cleric didn’t want to be left out of the fight so he ran full steam at the wall adjacent to the secret door hoping to crash through and make his own entrance. The roll was high enough and he did his best Kool-Aid Man imitation as he smashed into Jolliver’s room and joined the melee.

The Berserkers swung wild and recklessly gaining advantage, but giving up advantage in return. The party split their attacks between the two opponents weakening both but not stopping either one.

After three rounds and an arrow hit, Jolliver joined in the melee. He brandished no weapons, but as he approached the nearest PC his body began to transform. He became a half-man, half-boar hybrid. Jolliver was a Lycanthrope. In Wereboar form he charged and gored the party, but wasn’t able to hit anyone.

The archer Fighter was the subject of Jolliver’s attacks so he decided to go toe to toe with the boss. Unfortunately the only silver weapon the Fighter possessed was a dagger. For two rounds he stabbed Jolliver, doing some damage but nothing noticeable. After that he decided to disengage to a safer spot and use hit Longbow.

The rest of the PCs continued to split their efforts on the two Berserkers. The heroes hit often enough but they were getting hit just as frequently, something they couldn’t afford. The Cleric managed to keep the PCs on their feet by healing them as fast as they took damage.

The Wizard managed to get around the melee combat and sneak to the other side of the room. Once there he targeted Jolliver with Fire Bolt knowing that fire magic would do full damage. The rest of the melee combatants kept Jolliver locked down so he couldn’t retaliate against the Wizard.

Jolliver realized that things were looking grim for him and his men so he opened the main door and called for help. The next round Jolliver moved away from the door to lunge at a wounded PC. The Wizard used Mage Hand to close the unattended door and lock it. When reinforcements arrived The Wizard imitated Jolliver’s voice to give counter commands.

With no reinforcements getting inside, the Berserkers finally fell and all six PCs ganged up on Jolliver. Three of the PCs had silvered weapons so the fight didn’t take very long. None of the PCs were hit by the Wereboar tusks so there was no risk of contracting the magical curse.

Conclusion

We didn’t play out the rest of the session (we’d been at it for 3 hours of real time by then). Through narration we had the PCs convince Jolliver’s men to surrender or flee. A few put up a fight, but they were no match for the PCs, even in their depleted state. Some of the people at the Keep wanted to stay and fix up the old castle. Not all of Jolliver’s men were evil, so the good ones decided to do the right thing when the situation allowed them to do so.

Anyone at Riverguard Keep who was being held there against their will was released. Among the prisoners the PCs found the rest of the missing delegates from Miramar. After a long rest the PCs, the released prisoners, and the delegates all made their way to Beliard.

The PCs were hailed as heroes and justly rewarded for their heroics and noble deeds. The surviving delegates thanked the PCs for coming to their rescue and assured them all that the tales of their deeds would not be soon forgotten.

With the evil elements removed from the Sacred Stone Monastery and Riverguard Keep two of the powerful Elemental Cults were struck devastating blows. The PCs also learned of the duplicitous nature of the Knights of the Feathergale Spire and their affiliation to the Air Elemental Cult, so it’s likely that the locals would work together to see the evil elements of that group fettered out soon too.

Thanks to these heroes The Dessarin Valley area is now a much safer place. The Elemental Cultist were dispatched, and the frequency of strange elemental happenings was reduced to almost nothing once again.

So ends the Elemental Evil adventure path and season 20 of D&D Encounters: Princes of the Apocalypse.

Thoughts

With the conclusion of this episode I’ve decided that this is it for my table of D&D Encounters this season. We had very little consistency week to week as I always invited the new players to join my group. This led to a disjointed story with little motivation for new players. Better to end the long-term campaign and just switch to one-off adventures like D&D Expeditions.

This session was one of my favourites this season. I think it was a combination of factors including new players who were really excited about playing, lots of dangerous combat, and the knowledge that this was going to be the final session. I didn’t hold back and really gave the PCs a challenging session.

I encouraged creativity and doled out inspiration liberally, which always makes things more exciting. The PCs made some really good decisions and some really terrible ones, but in the end things worked out.

Despite Riverguard Keep being affiliated with the water cult, I really played down that aspect. With the exception of the Priest they encountered last week, it didn’t seem to make a lot of sense for the other NPCs and guards to have any outward indication of that connection. And since the new players knew nothing about the Elemental Evil aspects of the camping I didn’t see the point in bringing it up.

Overall I did enjoy the adventure and would certainly play it or run it again as a long-term home campaign. As the adventures progressed beyond Red Larch I found it became more and more difficult to incorporate new players. In part due to the story and in part due to the increasing level of the other PCs. But I’ll talk more about my thoughts on Princes of the Apocalypse in my Report Card article next week.

By now I assume most groups have also completed the encounter at Riverguard Keep. How did it go with your group?

Recounting Encounters Podcast

Listen to Derek Myers, Craig Sutherland, and Marc Talbot (from 20ft Radius) recount our weekly experience at D&D Encounters. We share the highlights from our respective tables and we talk about what worked, what didn’t and what we might have done differently. Find all episodes of Recounting Encounters on iTunes.

• Recounting Encounters – Season 20, week 11

Actual Play Podcasts

Each week we record our D&D Encounters session and make it available to you for download every week. These recordings are made in a loud, crowded game store so at times it may be difficult to hear everyone. Some language may be inappropriate for all ages, although we try to keep it as family-friendly as possible.

Visit the Dungeon’s Master D&D Encounters Archive for all of our ongoing weekly coverage as well as other great D&D Encounters articles and resources.

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