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| The Tower of Mezhag the Imposing |
My cousin was visiting for the weekend so we decided to play some D&D and my sister had agreed to join in as well for the adventure. This session would be different though, I broke out my Outdoor Survival game board and told my players that we'd be doing a hex crawl. First, they would gather rumors about an adventure site then they'd have to go out into the perilous wilderness in search of adventure where they would then be able to delve the dungeon and finally they'd have to make the journey back home. This would be a challenge for them since 1. they had never done a hex crawl before (and neither had I) and 2. their party consisted entirely of 1st level characters. With that said, I'll get into the details of the session now.
The adventure started like many others, with a party of adventurers meeting in a tavern where they could listen to the town gossip and find out where they might be able to score some treasure. The tavern was called the Bottomless Tankard and had a good reputation amongst the people of Dragonwrath, a human stronghold which dominated the Gryphon Vale. The adventurers learned about a mysterious tower that glowed blue in the night, which was thought to be the result of a precious gem known as The Moon's Tear.
The party consisted of 10 members - Sir Peter III (male fighter), Hag (female magic-user), Ermer'er (male dwarf), Vergaith (female cleric), Gotas the Uncanny (male elf), Amar (male fighter), Bonnie (male magic-user), Clementine (female cleric), Juni (male thief), and last but not least, Cherri (female halfling). So, with only a few coins to their names, the party left the safety of civilization and marched into the wilds. After 3 days of traveling on foot over grasslands and into the forest, the party reached their destination. They decided to scope the area out before getting too close and noticed that there were 4 orc sentries standing watch atop The Tower of Mezhag the Imposing. The halfling, Cherri, decided to get a bit closer to the tower and used her sling to launch a stone and distract a guard. It worked, which gave the rest of the party time to move up to the entrance.
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| Dragonwrath (left) and adventuring party (right) |
The entrance of the tower was an iron reinforced wooden double door. Hastily, the party entered. Upon entering the structure, they found themselves in a 10' wide by 30' long corridor that ended with another set of doors, similar to the entrance. This was an airlock. They made their way down the corridor when suddenly the ground beneath them started to break. Peter lunged forward, narrowly escaping the nasty fall into the now exposed pit trap. Amar and Vergaith were not as lucky. The two fell, taking 2 and 4 points of damage, respectively. The party then chose to drop into the pit and climb out the other way, with Peter using his rope to help his fellow adventurers get out of the 10' deep pit.
Not deterred by this minor setback, the party pressed onward. They reached the door and Gotas, Juni, and Cherri all listened at the door. Confident that they heard nothing, they decided to open the double door. The party was now in another hallway, this time with a few different directions to choose from. They chose to listen to the door to the east but didn't hear anything. They had been in the tower for an hour already, which prompted them to take a needed rest.
They moved on into the room and as they were searching, they heard the distant sounds of snorts and heavy footsteps. Immediately the party began to suspect that orcs had taken up residence in this tower. They were on edge. The elf, thief, and halfling decided to listen at the northern door and after deciding the coast was clear, took another rest before pressing on. After a few attempts, Bonnie was able to open the door which led them into another passageway. They came to a door and again, listened. This time they could hear soft groans and the metallic clanking of heavy chains coming from somewhere nearby. "Those sounds must come from the victims that were trapped here!" thought the adventurers.
The party opened the door, looked around, and saw a prison cell. A weak voice called out asking who was there. The party looked into the cell and saw a naked man, cowering and covered in bruises, chained to the wall. His neck had a metal collar around it and the chain barely had enough length to allow him to sit. The party asked him for his name and how he wound up in this predicament. The man, now identifying himself as Hargin of the Forgotten City, explained how he too had heard the rumors of a great and valuable gem known as the Moon's Tear and had tried to scale the tower in hopes of sneaking in stealthily. He, unfortunately, was caught by the 4 guards who knocked him out and locked him in the prison cell.
Juni took out his thieves' tools and tried to pick the lock on the barred door but the lock was clearly to complex for his skill level. He decided to slide the tools to Hargin, hoping that he might be able to pick his own lock as well as the door's. Hargin was successful in removing the collar around his neck but wasn't able to pick the lock on the door. Promising to return to Hargin, they tossed him a dagger and pressed on in the hopes of finding a key to free their newfound friend.
The party listened at the door to the east and entered the room. After searching it, they came to the conclusion it was empty and decided to keep exploring. After walking though a winding hallway, the party came across two doors. They listened at both and heard voices in each. The westernmost room had the least amount of voices as well as the sounds of a fire and bubbling liquid. They thought that this room must be some kind of kitchen and figured they would take their chances with the cooks rather than the larger sounding group in the eastern room. Unable to kick the door down, the party lost their element of surprise and were greeted by 3 angry orcs.
"There's intruders! Let's get 'em lads!" the orcs yelled. Bonnie, being fluent in orcish, desperately called out to them. "We don't mean any harm!" The orcs, now confused that a human knew their language, paused, which gave time for Bonnie to speak more. After coming up with a lie about how she was raised by orcs and was only coming to the tower to rescue prisoners the orcs laughed at him. The orcs didn't believe him and besides, they had orders from their master to enslave as many beings as they could. A fight broke out and one orc was slain by Amar in a single blow with his sword. The other two quickly dropped unconscious as Bonnie cast his sleep spell.
Just as the orcs fell, the orcs from the other room came pouring out into the hallway. There were 6 in total. They decided to rush the party, now that the intruders were backed into a wall. Quickly, Bonnie called out in orcish. This, combined with the orcs seeing their companions fall in a single round of combat, made the orcs a bit more hesitant than usual. One orc pushed himself into the front of the group, announcing himself as Gujek the Cruel. He explained that he had direct orders from the master and intended on capturing the party. Bonnie, hoping to avoid bloodshed, pressured the burly orc into answering why he would serve anyone, least of all a human. After some discussion about power dynamics and hierarchies, Amar decided that he would challenge their leader. Grujek decided to honor the request out of a cultural and racial obligation of respecting strength.
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| Mezhag the Imposing casting Charm person |
Thinking quickly, Gotas cast detect magic and both Amar and Gujek began to emit a glowing, magical aura. Clearly Mezhag had enchanted Amar and Gujek into obeying him. The orcs, now outraged that their proud tribe was tricked into serving a lowly magician decided to side with the party in an effort to free themselves of their magical chains. Mezhag then cast phantasmal force and conjured up a minotaur. He ordered the minotaur and orcs to apprehend the adventurers but the orcs didn't listen. Instead, they surrounded the minotaur and chose to fight their master's creation.
Mezhag, knowing this could be the end, ran for his personal chest that was behind a curtain to get his scroll while the groups were busy fighting the minotaur. Amar and Gujek both followed their "best friend" in an effort to protect him. After a few rounds of combat, Ermer'er successfully hit the minotaur causing it to dissipate.
The magic-user, in a last ditch effort to regain control over his minions, decided to strike one down hoping to instill some fear into them. An orc was hit by a magic missile but shrugged it off, taking 4 damage in the process. Hag then cast sleep on the evil conjurer and his charmed companions. After they fell to the ground, the party beheaded Mezhag which broke the spell that was cast upon Amar and Gujek.
Somewhat ashamed but grateful, the proud orc Gujek thanked the party for helping free him of his curse. After some negotiation, the two groups decided that they would split whatever loot that belonged to Mezhag. The party searched the room and Mezhag's corpse. They found a scroll (magic missile) as well as a decent chunk of coin located in a trapped chest, which Gujek preemptively broke to avoid any casualties. The groups split the treasure evenly and then went to free Hargin who was quite shocked to see the orcs and adventurers working together. They also returned his equipment and because he was so thankful for being rescued, he gave the party his +1 dagger.
The group headed back upstairs and asked the orcs if they knew of any other spots to search within the tower. They mentioned 3 locations which they never were allowed to go. The underground catacombs which had proven to be too dangerous for the orcs and 2 other rooms that Mezhag the Imposing had considered to be his private chambers. The party decided to search those 2 rooms first before checking out the catacombs. The first room they checked out was had a door of iron bars but nobody could see into the room because a large curtain blocked their vision. A party member extended their 10' pole into the room and tapped the curtain. Suddenly, a nearly invisible giant spider dropped down and broke the pole. The thief threw some oil, hoping to hit the spider so that they might light it on fire, but missed. They decided to throw their torch in anyway and the curtains began to burn. The spider quickly hid away into the eastern corner of the room to break line of sight with the party.
Foolishly, the cleric Vergaith, stepped into the room hoping to quickly kill the spider and possibly find some hidden treasure. They had not yet found the Moon's Tear. Unsurprisingly, the giant spider leapt towards the holy woman and quickly killed her. The rest of the party, not wanting to meet a similar fate, chose to explore the second room. It was a library with several book cases. Due to accurate mapping, the party members noticed that the room's width would mean that a hidden room could lie between the library and hallway. They started pulling and moving the various books around until one finally triggered a secret door to open. Inside the hidden room was a chest which had a locked book. It was quite ornate and seemed expensive, most likely Mezhag's spellbook. In addition to that, the party had also found the famed gem that the locals had told them about. It was as beautiful as they had claimed. It's shape was tear-like and its color was a deep blue. They also found some coin which they gave to the orcs, deciding that the gem and spell were their half of the loot.
Not wanting to press their luck with adventuring in the catacombs after having lost a cleric, the party parted ways with the orcs and headed back into the wilderness. Hargin tagged along since he was incredibly wounded and preferred to get back to Dragonwrath in one piece, if at all possible. The party set out into the wilds but quickly got lost. They found themselves at a river and chose to follow it down a ways. After 8 days of travel they were able to make it back to civilization. They restocked on rations and headed to the Wayfarer's Inn to get some much needed rest.
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