Actual Play: No Humans Here – Session 2

I have recently began playing my first D&D game! While I’ve been RPing for years I never managed to try it out, but after watching some Critical Role I redoubled my efforts and found a game. The campaign is something I play with coworkers every two weeks, we are starting out with a published adventure “The Lost Mines of Phandelver” to bring us to level 5. After that we hope to move on to a custom campaign. I joined late so the actual plays will start from Session 2.

Here is our cast of characters:
Kairon – Tiefling Paladin – Follows the Triad
Wenner Youngblood- Halfling Warlock – Fey Patron (mechanically – patron is actually the spirit of Neverwinter Forest)
Alliser – Half-Elf Bard
Thormak – Half Orc Cleric – Light Domain – Priest of Lathander
Mizallion Volknaar – Dragonborne Barbarian (me)

In the first session Kairon, Wenner and Alister had just accepted a job to help escort goods from the city of Neverwinter to the town of Phandalin. During the journey they were ambushed by goblins who kidnapped their employers: a dwarf named Gundren and a human named Sildar. The rest of the survivors stayed behind to guard the caravan while the three adventurers tracked the goblins to a nearby cave. Within which they found the a half-orc cleric named Thormok locked in a cage. After freeing him they explored the cave and found a group of goblins to ambush. After taking the Goblins out they stopped to strategise. This is where the second session began.

The party had taken a few hits in the previous fights. Wenner in particular was seriously injured. However, there was no time to rest in the middle of this Goblin cave. After some discussion the group decided to keep on going and save their spells for battle. They spotted firelight dancing from a cave nearby and muffled voices – luckily it seems whomever was there had missed the sounds of the earlier battles. Alister stealthed in to look around; inside he saw 2 goblins, a large wolf and a bugbear. The goblins were rifling through some recently pillaged goods while the bugbear was petting his wolf. “Klarg know you a good boy. Yes he does! Yes he does!”

In order to even the odds Alister decided to try a prank. He used the arcane arts to send a message to one of the goblins – in his best female Goblin voice he whispered, “Hey there big boy, why don’t you drop your sword and come over here.” While the voice was convincing, the goblin was highly confused and started a ruckus. Klarg snapped at the goblin “Klarg getting angry, shut yer gob!” Alister felt this was the best he could do and turned to stealth back to the group, however he tripped in the dark which alerted the Goblins to their presence.

Klarg was the first to react, he rushed forward to check the cause of the noise and upon seeing the invaders ordered his wolf to attack. Thormok and Kairon rushed up to meet Klarg in battle while Alister tried to get out of range of the menacing creature. Wenner called upon the gifts received from his patron to cast a sleep spell in the room behind Klarg, successfully putting them all to sleep and giving the group the upper hand. It turned out the upper hand was sorely needed – Klarg immediately knocked Kairon unconscious but luckily, he was saved by Thormok’s last remaining heal. Wenner darted behind Klarg and took on the menacing Fey appearance of his patron in the hope of frightening the bugbear, but he succeeded only in drawing his ire. Klarg put Wenner down right as Alister rushed forward and stabbed him twice in the back, while doing so he mocked Thormok in an attempt to inspire him to fight harder. Kryon and Thormok took advantage of his distraction and attacked, successfully getting the killing blow. Kryon raised warner with lay on hands and they moved on to clean up. After this was done they executed the sleeping wolf and one of the goblins, whom they tied up to interrogate.

Bleep, the goblin they left alive, was extremely helpful after seeing that they had defeated Klarg. He informed them that Sildar was still captive but Gundren had been taken away to Cragmaw Keep at the command of someone called the Black Spider. This is where their leader King Grol resides. Once they had gotten what they needed Thormok executed the evil creature. Alister searched the pillaged goods in the room and found a chest along with some produce in crates bearing a crest of a lion’s head in a shield, identified as belonging to a Waterdeep merchant guild. Thormok was pleased to find an iron skillet, potatoes and oil in the goods and promised to cook the group some food when they were done. Inside the chest Alister found some healing potions and a small sum of silver which he distributed with the group.

The group made their way towards the last remaining cavern, led by Kairon and Thormok. Alister sang a mocking song about the “Holy Boys going to battle” as they walked, stopping as they neared their quarry. In the final cavern they found a group of goblins and near death Sildar chained up by a Goblin wearing some sort of makeshift crown. The group were bloodied and out of spells at this point and needed a way to get the upper hand again. This time, Kairon and Thormok opted to scare the goblins by causing a tremor and making the fires grow bright with thaumaturgy before they attacked. As the Goblins cowered in fear they attacked.

Kairon and Thormok led the charge again, while Wenner and Alister hung back. They struck two goblins down quickly before the crowned goblin managed to regroup his followers. Alister threw a dagger at a goblin and missed, then moved closer in the hopes of getting better luck at melee. Wenner tapped into his gifted powers to summon an eldritch blast in the form of a cloud of razor-sharp leaves, only to aim high and miss the targets. At this point Thormok received a blow and fell, but luckily Alister was close by and armed with a healing potion. In the previous session Thormok had saved Alister after he had been downed by wolves, so Alister muttered “Now we’re even” before pouring the potion into Thormok’s mouth. At this point the tables began to turn, Wenner summoned a sharp blade of grass as his Eldritch bast and decapitated a goblin, while Kryon defeated his quarry too. The Goblin king, seeing that the battle had turned, grabbed Sildar, held a knife to his throat and demanded to be let go.

There was a tense stand-off as the party tried to figure out how to protect Sildar. Alister took the lead and convinced the Goblin that they would let him leave, however Thormok interrupted, stating outright that the Goblin would of course be killed. Luckily, he had also realised that he could use his divine powers to save Sildar should anything happen so the threat was of no concern. They quickly dispatched the goblin and stabilized Sildar. Immediately an argument broke out about why Alister seemed to be willing to spare the goblin. Alister tried to explain that he was planning to trick the goblin and interrogate him, but the party were still unsure of his intentions.

Bruised, bloodied, exhausted but victorious. The party left the cave and made camp outside. Thormok cooked the potatoes as promised and the party retired to rest after their ordeal. During the first watch of the night however Kairon and Alister spotted a stranger approaching the camp. The stranger announced that he was no threat, he had smelled the food and spotted the holy symbol on Kairon’s shield and was hoping that he could share their camp. Kairon demanded that he approach and out of the forest stepped a large White Dragonborne. The stranger introduced himself as Mizallion Volknaar and thanked them for their hospitality. In payment he offered to take a later watch.

In the morning, while Thormok prayed to the rising sun, Sildar finally woke from his wounds. Kairon, Wenner and Alister introduced him to the new arrivals and spoke to him about what had occurred over the previous day. Sildar revealed to the group that Gundren and his brothers had come across a map to Wave Echo Cave. In this cave lies a mine known as Phandelver’s Pact. This mine was once operated by a group of Gnomes and Dwarves, it contained rich veins of minerals as well as some sort of magical energy that local wizards were investigating. At some point in history the mine was raided by Orcs and its location lost. The group asked Volknaar and Thormok if they would be interested in helping track down Gundren and the map. Thormok, being a priest of Lathandar, felt it was his duty to liberate the mine from evil Orcs. Volknaar said that the mine rightfully belongs to the people and would gladly help prevent a corrupt King from controlling it. Sildar asked if the group would first escort him to the town of Phandalin, offering to pay them 50 gold for their trouble. The party agreed that they would go to Phandalin first to gather supplies for the assault on Cragmaw keep.

Kairon and Thormak stayed behind to burn the bodies of the dead and cleanse the cave while the others brought Sildar back to the caravans. On arrival they saw Harris, one of the other caravaners, standing watch next to some recently killed Goblins. Alister asked if there had been another attack and believed Harris when he joked that he had woken up and found the corpses like that. They introduced Volknaar to Harris and began to wait for the “Holy Boys”.

At this point the session ended and we levelled up to level 2.