Quasqueton, Lower Level

The adventureres have expanded (slightly) on the Sleestaks' map, completing the level.  For your edification, here are two versions of those updates.

Qausqueton, lower level

[terramariae version]

Qausqueton, lower level

[lacumagna version]

Session 15 report

Adventurers Present

Bilbo - hobbitish rogue

Hugh Kha-Rez - draconian barbarian

Mossmullet (Ungart) - dwarfley cleric

Orsek Ungart - dwarfley barbarian wizard

Red Shpee - elfin rogue

Wilfred Fizzlebang - gnomic paladin

First we searched the forbidden room, and then went to the next room on the map.

It was the room of water, and it had a pool of water and debris. The water was crystal clear, and appeared to be harmless, but very cold. After Orsek got close enough to the debris, he realized they were skeletons. We defeated the skeletons, surviving with but a scratch.

We went to the “Howard” room next, which split into several paths. Wilfred and Hugh took some dry paint and plaster from a room with paintings of the original inhabitants of Quasqueton. We also found mining equipment and some zombies. We fought the zombies, smashing them to bits.

We went to the spider room next, burning away webs. We found a passage leading to talking spiders. We fought the spiders, smashing them to bits.

In the next leg of the dungeon, we found a strange glowing rock. Red remembered a rumor that this would give us wishes, so we each put part of the rock in our mouth, and made a wish. None came true, but Bilbo became more dextrous, Wilfred’s short sword became more powerful, Mossmullet disappeared for a short time and Hugh Kha-Rez didn’t change at all (ha!). Very little happened to the other characters. As we traveled, we found very little down the path we took, so we turned back to take an extended rest in the painting room.

Party Experience Gained
Combat:  86 each
Exploration:  120 each

Down and Almost Out [session 15]

Adventurers Present

Bilbo - hobbitish rogue

Hugh Kha-Rez - draconian barbarian

Mossmullet (Ungart) - dwarfley cleric

Orsek Ungart - dwarfley barbarian wizard

Red Shpee - elfin rogue

Wilfred Fizzlebang - gnomic paladin

The adventurers continued their exploration of the lower level of Quasqueton, this time making good speed and covering the remainder of that level.  First up was the room with the pool of water, which proved relatively uninteresting other than a 15’ deep pool of icy-cold water, and a pile of indiscernible refuse on the other side of the pool from the entrance.  Only a narrow, acrobatically-challenging ledge led past the deep pool, and so the unarmored Orsek shimmied across to explore.  Unfortunately, what he found on the other side was 5 skeletons, who roused themselves to slay the lively dwarf.  Naturally, they screamed a shriek of 1,000 dying babies as they did so.  But Orsek survived the undead onslaught, and burned their boney bits to ash with his Burning Hands.

The adventurers next braved the rooms of the Humans (Howards?), where they discovered a small warren of carved-wall rooms, a staircase leading up to the upper level of the dungeon, and 6 zombinoids.  This undead challenge proved more difficult than the skeletons.  Each time the cursed rotters got knocked down, they just sprang back up again.  The unfortunate situation might have continued indefinintely until the inevitable demise of the living, except that first Orsek and then Bilbo managed the well-placed headshots necessary to actually achieve a full zombie kill.  Thereafter, the group was able to decapitate the downed corpse-critters before they could revive.

The group decided to do some more lower-level exploring before heading back up the stairway, so the next encountered the giant spiders’ lair.  Actually, they also located a giant emerald laying upon the passageway floor before that.  But they next creature-encounter was a passageway blocked by sticky spiderwebs.  Cobbling together some torches from the ruins of mining equipment back in the zombie room, the heroes put the spiders’ protective webs to the torch.  The (apparently intelligent) spiders cried out their dismay by saying “Here they come!”  This interesting revelation didn’t overly faze the party, though.  They still immediately began killing the articulate arachnids.  Except for Orsek, who decided that a spider-ride was what was needed from the pony-sized creatures.  Successfully jumping upon one’s back, he managed to ride it up to the cavern ceiling, before the spider caught a nasty Chill, and shattered into ice fragments.

A very odd rock was the next encounter of interest for the group.  A large, glowing magical stone, the rumors of which proved to be inaccurate, although not completely untrue.  Instead of granting a wish to a person who breaks off a chip and places it in his mouth, the magical stone simply did random, magical things to that person.  Bilbo got a dexterity boost, Mossmullet got teleported to another room, Fizzlebang’s shortsword was magically enchanted into a +1 sword, Orsek got a charisma boost, and Hugh Kha-Rez was temporarily rendered an idiot by the magical boulder (we did actually notice a before-and-after difference).  If there was an effect on Red Shpee, they did not notice it.

Having determined that the magic glowing stone had given away all the buffs and bonuses that it would, the party explored a couple more empty rooms, and then headed back toward the stairway.  They encountered some leftover goblins on the way, but handily defeated them without incident.  Bedding down for the night in a relatively enclosed space near the stairway, they all gave thanks that they’d survived yet another day in the depths of Quasqueton.

Next session:  Up and at ‘em!

Party Experience Gained
Combat:  86 each
Exploration:  120 each

The Sleestak Map (Quasqueton, lower level)

The adventurers got this crude map from some friendly sleestaks on the lower level.  The crudeness of the drawing / writing is solely due to the difficulty sleestaks have holding pens in their claws.  It has nothing to do with the fact the DM was in a hurry...

[click to embiggen]

Player Maps (so far)

Here are the two levels of Quasqeton that the players have mapped.  They're rather incomplete, but i'm chalking that up to the darkness and dankness in which they were made.  It's totally not just that we can't keep track of stuff...
 

Quasqueton, lower level

Quasqueton, upper level