The Edgy BLT: Phandalin Part 4

We started our next session the following week. Harriette passed out healing potions and Brose gave Laserie angry words for leaving them behind. The party investigated the cavern and found Klarg’s personal treasure chest and several wagons worth of looted crates. Investigating further, Brose notices that some of the boxes have a blue lion seal. Figuring they might be able to find the owner of the cargo, Torment grabs a couple boxes and the Edgy BLT plus Harriette leave the cave and return to their own wagon.

The party successfully delivered the cargo to Barthen’s Provisions and received their 10 gold. Harriette asked the party to check around town and see if they can get any information on what might’ve happened to Gundren while she speaks to the mayor.

The party goes to the local inn and listens in for interesting snippets and who to talk to about whats going on in the Town of Phandalin. The group notices a store with the same insignia as what was on the boxes in Klarg’s cave. They introduce themselves to the owner and tell her where she can find the rest of their cargo. The party then asks around and picks up the following quests:

A retired adventurer wants them to investigate an old well and the rumored undead.

A nun wants the party to find a banshee and ask her the location of an ancient tome.

A farmer asks the party to search for their friend in an abandoned town called Thundertree.

A job board asks the party to deal with orc bandits on the main town road.

The head of the Mining Guild and the mayor asks for the party to take down the leader of a local band of ruffians: the Felt.

And finally, Harriette asks the group to investigate the disappearance of a comrade in the town and to clear out a tribe of goblins that have taken residence in the ruins of Cragmaw Castle.

The Edgy BLT: Phandalin Part 3

Torment picks Brose off his shoulder and launches her after Harriette. Brose fucking nails the landing, gives the goblin leader the finger, and then flips down the cliff to stabilize Harriette. Laserie does the only thing she is confident in and casts Dancing Lights to distract the six goblins in the cave.

Torment begins to pick off the goblins that saved against the distraction while Brose runs to get back in the fight. The fight is incredible one-sided in favor of the Edgy BLT. Brose makes it back to the fight and screams the leader to death and Torment and Laserie easily dispatch the remaining goblins.

The party heals Harriette and begins questioning her. She’s an older woman, about 50, and a famous fighter and leader. She tells the party how she and Gundren were ambushed by goblins working for a mysterious figure called the Black Spider. Harriette’s weapons and armor were taken from her so Torment loots the fallen goblins and gives her a shortsword and shield, so she can at least defend herself.

Before the goblin leader died he told the party he was actually the former leader. A bugbear named Klarg was the head of this operation and the party needs to deal with him if they want to make the route safe and maybe get more information. Laserie ended up staying behind to look after Harriette just in case while Torment and Brose hunt down Klarg.

Klarg is in a makeshift throne room and guarded by a pair goblins and his pet wolf. Torment intimidates the goblins into leaving while they talk to the Bugbear. Words aren’t enough and they begin combat. Brose casts her first level 1 spell, Tasha’s Hideous Laughter and Klarg fails his saving throw and falls to the ground laughing. Torment uses this chance to kill the wolf and then Brose and Torment began yelling and slashing respectively.

Right as Klarg is on the verge of death, he makes his saving throw and then brings down a heavy mace on both Brose and Torment. Laserie’s player had fallen asleep so I decided that Harri would come to check up on them and while defending against Klarg’s attacks, manages to get Brose a health potion so she can finish him off. The Edgy BLT learned the hard way to never split the party.

The Edgy BLT: Phandalin Part 2

After surviving the goblin ambush, the party takes a moment to heal themselves and investigate the bodies of the horses and goblins. The neither goblins nor horses have anything of interest on them, but Torment and Brose do notice a bloody trail in the tall grass leading into the woods.

Laserie is indignant and doesn’t want to investigate further. Pointing out they are only being paid for delivering the supply wagon. After discussing it further, Torment and Brose point out that if their employer was kidnapped then there wouldn’t be anyone to pay them.

Following the trail, the party finds themselves by a shallow river flowing from the entrance to a large cave. Torment, conveniently knowing how to speak goblin, talks to a pair of guards and convinces them they are new recruits. The goblins allow them to pass, but again Laserie refuses to adventure further. Torment sighs and grabs the elf in a fireman carry. He got a nat 20 on his strength check and Laserie critically failed hers.

Once inside the cave, the party has a new problem. Brose can’t see in the dark. The party agrees using a light to give themselves away would be a bad idea, so Brose ends up riding on Torment’s other shoulder. The cave is fairly straightforward. They look down a side entrance and find a pack of chained wolves and figure they can be left alone. Further down, they encounter a goblin watch out. Again Torment convinces him they are new recruits. The goblin watch out directs them to the goblin boss down a side passage.

The goblin was telling the truth and the party finds themselves in a breakroom for the goblins. Inside is Harriette Redskirt, beaten and barely conscious. The goblins use her as a hostage, but Torment tries to talk them down. He fails to convince them and Harriette gets kicked off a small cliff. The group attacks in retaliation. 

The Edgy BLT: Phandalin Part 1

I'm using the pre-written adventure The Mines of Phandelver for introducing two of my players to Dungeons and Dragons and to ease me into DMing for the first time.

The setting is basically the dwarf Gundren Rockseeker, a friend and employer for the players, has found a map leading to the long lost mine of Phandelver. Wizards and sorcerors had worked together with dwarves to make a wellspring of magic for making various enchanted weapons and objects, but war had buried the entrance to the cave and the mine was lost. Brose, Laserie, and Torment have been tasked to escort and deliver a supply wagon to Barthen’s Provisions in the town of Phandalin. Gundren and Harriette Redskirt, a friend and bodyguard, ride ahead of the party and the adventure begins with the Edgy BLT a day’s ride behind.

As the party is leading the ox carriage, they spy a pair of dead horses in the middle of the road. After arguing who should go and investigate further, Torment decides to guard the wagon while Brose and Laserie go to check out the animals. Brose recognizes the horses as Gundren’s and Harri’s, but no one recognizes the situation as a trap.

Four goblins jump out of the bushes, two with shortswords and another two with short bows, and attack the bard and sorcerer. Brose takes an arrow to the shoulder and is dropped to 2 hit points and Laserie leaves Brose behind and she flees back and casts Chill Touch. It misses. Torment charges forward, hoping to rescue Brose, while Brose does what she does best: scream. Brose casts Vicious Mockery to the goblin that shot her. It looks stunned as its ears bleed and then it falls over dead. Laserie gets creative with the Dancing Lights cantrip and managed to distract the goblins long enough for Torment to murder the remaining two. The final goblin tries to make a run for it and Laserie somehow manages to hit him with a Chill Touch. The party’s first encounter ended with a victory.

Introduction to the Edgy BLT

After offhandedly mentioning to my friends I was in a Dungeons and Dragons group, they mentioned they had an interest in it, but not sure how to get into it. I decided to volunteer to to be their DM and then put effort into researching premade campaigns and decided to start with the starter set: The Mines of Phandelver.

So far we've had about five sessions, and the party is approaching level 5 and the climax of the story. I have ideas for my own homebrew campaign, but I still need to plan it out.

As for the characters, we have the B of the Edgy BLT, Brose. As in Rose, but with a 'B' or so I was told. Brose is a halfling bard and she is very good at her job. That job being screaming. Her instrument of choice is a magic megaphone instead of any classical instrument and she prefers using sound-based spells such as Dissonant Whispers, Tasha's Hideous Laughter, and Shatter.

Brose was fascinated with adventurers as a child and wanted to travel, so she put her mind to it and became..... a sailor. During one of her voyages, she found a pair of six-sided with skulls instead of sixes. She rolled the dice, and both landed on the skulls. Less than an hour later, pirates attacked. Fearing for her life, she ran for a rowboat, and not realizing it was the only one, fled by herself and watched as her crew was slaughtered. She eventually made her way to Neverwinter where she was recruited by Gundrun Rockseeker.

The L stands for Laserie and they are a wood elf sorceror. Laserie went for the wild magic origin instead of the dragon origin and we keep forgetting the wild magic surges, but we're starting to get better at them. Laserie's parents were killed when she was young and she was adopted into the priesthood of the Tharizdun, the most evil elder god that wants to destroy all planes of existence for fun. Despite her dark lord, which she is keeping a secret, she is surprisingly levelheaded except when it comes to her interest in necromancy.

Finally we have Torment, a tiefling paladin. Torment and Laserie share similar backstories of dead parents and adopted priesthoods, but Torment follows the virtuous path of Trithereon. Because of his demonic appearance, he was ostracized from most of his peers and his upbringing was mostly torment. The most non-violent way to get ride of the tiefling was to send him on a "holy quest" to prove himself.

Rise of the Dragonlords P1

Rise of the Dragonlords was a campaign written and DM'd by a friend of a friend and was honestly my first real DnD campaign since... boy scouts in 3rd grade? We didnt have access to the Player's Handbook, so we mostly just winged and it and it was fun.

 I played a dwarven cleric named Krumrum Aute and I was joined with Daeris, an elven rogue, and Vastraak Bearwrestler, an orc warrior. The setting was basically ancient dragons had been awakened and a cult in red cloaks were responsible. Krumrum “knew” a lot about dragons and the party decided to go to his home to get his notes on dragons. Krumrum had woken up one day, teleported miles away from the dwarven capital, Brackenwald, and had no idea about the rest of the Aute House’s fate.

On the way to Brackenwald, the party came across a town overrun by skeletons and decided to take down the necromancer behind it. After defeating John the necromancer (who had really bad rolls for a boss) the party discovered a cave and decided to travel through it as a shortcut to Brackenwald. In the tunnel, Krumrum comes across a mind flayer and strikes a deal. In return of allowing the creature to live, it would teach the dwarf the secrets of necromancy. Krumrum received a grimoire that would teach him the dark art as he completed certain tasks for it. The first, collect the head of a necromancer, the blood of a saint, and to defile a holy gravesite.

The party stopped in a city to rest and Krumrum found his first target for unlocking the book—the leader of a holy order of paladins. Krumrum attempted to convince the leader to give a vial of blood, and it worked, but not before Krumrum was forcibly exorcised of all ill intent and his physical connection to the book.