Dungeons and Dragons ("DnD"): Hoard of the Dragon Queen: Episode 1 Part 1 Adventure #7
Date of Session: July 7, 2019 (10pm to 12:30am)
Number of Players: 4
Legendary Hero Menos (Dragon-born Paladin)
Kai-tick, the Kin-slayer (Aarakocra Rogue)
XerX, the “X” Archer (NOBLE Half-Elf Ranger)
Bubby, the God-Child (Aasimar Cleric)
The Hero’s Journey continues! The new home-brew arc has begun, loosely based on the official campaign book, Hoard of the Dragon Queen. I chose to exclude the original content from the campaign in favor of my ideas and to balance out the numerous flaws. As Hoard of the Dragon Queen was released prior to official 5th edition rules being finalized, it suffers as the DM has to do extra legwork to correct the flaws.
Enough, jargon. Let’s pick up where we left off.
After the Enforcers’ first major defeat at the hands of Mas O and Mirna, the team decided to hold a funeral for their fallen comrade, Kenji. Menos prayed and struck his sword into the ground as respect, asking for forgiveness in his prayers I’m assuming. Kai-tick hit the ground a lot and cried. XerX silently grieved, but was satisfied to have separated from the 9-2-5. Bubby looked sad and comforted his Genie, Vin over the devastating loss.
Kenji bid farewell to his friends, declaring “9-2-5”, and went back in line to enter Second Hell. He was content and wished everyone good luck. Afterwards, the Enforcers began to move on and talk about primary objectives: find the Dragon Eggs and Menos’ legendary sword, the only thing that might be able to defeat his brother. After talking it out, the Enforcers made their choice: to go after the next Dragon Egg before Mas O and Mirna reached Greenest.
Their reasoning: it would take Mas O and Mirna days—perhaps weeks—before they reach the small village across the Sword Coast. Using the power of Vin the Genie, the Enforcers would arrive in seconds. But, the Blue Dragon terrorizing the town worried them greatly. After their past two deadly encounters with Young Overlord, the group immediately agreed that fighting another dragon was not the best idea.
Planning out what to do, Bubby (team leader) makes the wish to bring everyone along to the outskirts of Greenest. Vin’s power works like the HM Fly from the Pokemon RPG video games: he can only teleport to where they’ve been before. Also, Kai-tick wanted his new fancy armor adjusted… he didn’t like it being so heavy and more buffs. He was a selfish player, but that actually enhances the fun strangely enough.
Anyways, the wish is granted. The Enforcers are transported to the outskirts of Greenest, a town centered in a grassy meadow. The fires, the screams, and the dead are all signs of the chaos. XerX used his “sensing power levels” spell (I forgot the actual name) to figure out how many enemies are in the "doomed town”. Suffice to say, there were loads of foes attacking the people and the buildings.
Shortly afterwards, the group decides to enter town, where they run into immediate trouble. A small family (man, woman, two children: Boy and Girl) are trying to escape from one dozen Goblins. The woman, with a shield and broken shield, stays behind to defend her family. Our heroes help the man, Kurt Swift, and their two children. Menos, riding on his trusty Axel Warhorse from Find Steel Spell, rams into the Goblins to aid the woman, Lina Swift.
Kai-tick and XerX, drawing their arrows, attack them from a distance. Bubby takes care of Kurt and the two children from danger. Combat was overwhelmingly one-sided, except Axel suffered severe wounds from the Goblins’ sword attacks. The grateful family asks who their heroes are, and Menos introduces them as the Enforcers, the greatest heroes of the prophecy.
While talking in the middle of the chaos (background music was village pillage), another dozen Goblins and an additional dozen of Kolobolds also arrive to mess with the Enforcers. They want Genie Vin from Bubby to grant their wishes. Our heroes wondered their next move, as Kai-tick offered to stall the small army while everyone else escaped. The Enforcers debated this, but then another hero made his LOUD entrance.
Zora (100% based on Asta from Black Clover), childhood friend of XerX’s, made his presence known. He made fun of XerX and told the Enforcers to go on ahead to the Castle Keep. Then, Zora reveals his dirty grimoire and pulls out his Demon-Dwelling Sword, a weapon exclusively created for him from the book. Zora vows not to die until he becomes the Captain of the Eldrich Knights (a dream shared by XerX), and battles the two dozen Goblins / Kolobolds.
Bubby makes a wish to Genie Vin, and the Enforcers (+the Swift Family) are taken to the outskirts of the Castle Keep, wanting to hide themselves from the Dragon. Upon closer examination, Bubby recognizes this specific dragon as he studied the multiverse history. Terrorizing the Castle was none other than the legendary Blue Eyes White Dragon, one of the deadliest dragons across dimensions. Everyone cowered, especially Kai-tick. Menos wanted to break the wall into the castle, but that would mean the noise would draw the Blue Eyes (and a gaping hole for enemies to venture into…) to their current location.
Kai-tick volunteered to fly up to the Castle’s rooftop with the two children. His reasoning was that he’d get the children inside first, hoping the dragon wouldn’t notice him. Sadly, this plan did not go to plan. After a failed stealth check, the Blue Eyes engaged with the Kin-slayer, where he encountered a woman standing on top of the dragon.
She claimed to be “Mas O”, the alleged brother of Menos and villain wishing to collect the Nine Dragon Eggs. This confused the hell out of Kai-tick, but he was too terrified to question the gender swap as he tried to protect the kids. Kai-tick does YELL very loudly to alert the Enforcers of the immediate danger, which they managed to hear and decide quickly to… use the distraction to enter the Castle Keep.
Kai-tick is on his own versus the Blue Eyes White Dragon and “Mas O”. She jumps off the Blue Eyes and makes several hand signs declaring “Summoning No Jutsu”, and materializes three Owl Bears onto the roof. Oh yeah, Kai-tick tried to escape and open the door but found it was locked, trapping him and the children outside. The battle goes one-sided.
As the Blue Eyes prepared to finish Kai-tick off, Zora appears with his Demon-Dwelling Sword. “Mas O” flinches at the sight of the dark blade and vanishes alongside the Blue Eyes White Dragon in poofs of smokes. However, the three Owl Bears remained to cause trouble. Once again, Zora wants Kai-tick to escape with the two children down to the entrance. My ability to put my players in serious near-death matches and then saving them at the same time is quite the insanity. Sometimes, I think I give too much mercy, but it’s all for the sake of the story.
Kai-tick (barely alive) and the two children meet up with the Enforcers inside the Castle Keep, feeling safer without the Blue Eyes around the entrance. Zora joins them shortly after he takes care of the Owl Bears up on the roof. This story keeps getting weirder and weirder. Definitely anime-styled type sessions, and that’s one-hundred percent fine with everyone at the table.
The Kin-slayer is appreciative of the save and theorizes “Mas O” might be afraid of Zora’s unique weapon. He questions Zora on the nature of his Demon-Dwelling Sword, but he doesn’t really offer any useful information other than it’s super heavy. Zora annoys Kai-tick to no end with his loud talking. XerX is happy to see his friend/rival again, but does not show it openly (the silent Role-playing moment).
The Enforcers + Zora meet with the owner of the Castle Keep, Governor Nighthill. He is an old human, heavily bandaged, and walks with a limp and cane. He begins to question the new guests but gets side-tracked by Lina and Kurt Swift along with the two children, who are hugging Kai-tick. Menos is baffled and wonders if Boy and Girl are brainwashed.
After all this, everyone gets back into business. Governor Nighthill explains the sudden appearance of the Blue Eyes White Dragon and Killer God (female “Mas O”). The terrific duo brought with them an entire army (bandits, cultists, goblins, kolobolds, etc.) to the looting of Greenest in search of the White Stone of Legend, which the Enforcers believe may be the fourth Dragon Egg connected to the Blue Eyes White Dragon. I love writing the name, “Blue Eyes White Dragon”.
Governor Nighthall tells the Enforcers of the White Stone’s current location: The Sanctuary nearby the secret passageway. It is where he last hid the ancient item. However, the Enforcers (well, Kai-tick) believe Mas O has already taken the stone (theorized Dragon Egg) for themselves. But, Governor Nighthall wishes them to investigate anyway, at the very least to save the townsfolk left in the building.
The Enforcers agreed to the mission and use the secret tunnel underneath the Castle Keep to make their way back outside to avoid being noticed by the hundreds of mobs raiding the town. The underground sewers, however, would have its own challenges.
Zora, being loud as hell, kept annoying Kai-tick to no-end. This player does get annoyed easily by the NPCs. But, in this case, Zora is interrupting the team’s stealth to avoid foes, as his raw loudness draws the attention of dangerous rats. Swarms of Rats. The rodents crawl all over everyone as they quickly notice their rabid nature. Zora immediately begs for mercy.
The team gets into formation and clean the sewers of the swarms, making their way to the end of the tunnel. However, Kai-tick ran into a problem: the exit was too narrow as only one person at a time could fit and crawl. The Rogue is claustrophobic and cannot finish the journey. The rest of the Enforcers + Zora, except Bubby, don’t care about this and leave him behind. Kai-tick decides to use this opportunity to “train”, as he learned from Zora something important: a former member of the League of Whispers is in the town of Greenest and a current captain / master. Zora uses both titles interchangeably. Kai-tick wishes to meet this “Captain Leon” because nobody can leave the League alive, making his existence somewhat impossible.
Moving along in the main story, the Enforcers (without Kai-tick) + Zora get dumped into the river. As they converse about Kai-tick being left behind and the game plan to escape Mas O’s Blue Eyes White Dragon (if they encounter it again), two dozen enemies (Gobs & Kolos) arrive wanting to steal the visible Genie Vin. Another battle breaks out:
XerX fires his arrow to kill four enemies in a straight line, Bubby uses Inflict Wounds to kill one Goblin from the inside out, Menos TRIED to slice three Goblins, but rolled a 14, one number short 15… the number he needed to kill them all. However, Zora swooped into action and finished those enemies for Menos, feeling quite proud of himself. That was until XerX mentioned he killed more Goblins than Zora (4 > 3). Zora cries in pain.
Thus, we have reached our cliffhanger. Feels good to play D&D again after a month long break. We are halfway through episode 1 of the new campaign book, and it’s been a ton of fun so far. I changed a lot of the book’s encounters and story to fit my own, but based on the reviews I’ve seen on Hoard of the Dragon Queen… I feel like I did the right thing. All the players are happy, too. Fun Fun Fun!