Second session report

With our 3rd session upcoming tonight, better get the write up of last week's game posted! (Before we forget all the details). 

Josh was sick or malingering, so he couldn't make it, leaving just Heather (Iommi the dwarf) and Nick (Ronson the M-U) to brave the dungeon alone.... well I let Nick run Josh's character (Bolin the cleric) as well (and he managed not to get him killed). Also, the party hired two 0-level torch bearer types to help out. 

That hireling hiring process took up the beginning of the session, played out at the local tavern, The Toothless Troll, in the small village of Acornloaf that is the home base of the campaign (for now).

Spending some gp on booze to attract the attention of the various ne'er-do-wells hanging out in the bar who might be interested in employment. They ended up interviewing two prospects: an out of work day laborer named Danth, who had no particular skills but seemed both eager and fairly hardy, and also a more educated type named Lert, who turned out to have once been a student in the clerical order of the god Uli. Both were hired, for a fee of 2 gp per day for Danth and 2.5 for Lert (who drove a bargain based on his possible prayer/healing skills), plus a small percentage of the treasure hall (coins only). 

Iommi and Ronson also spent some time talking to two other tavern patrons. Iommi bought a drink for a man known (for obvious reasons) as Skullface, and Ronson chatted up a rough-looking hobbit named Fingersnark. Neither had much to say about the nearby dungeon, but still made interesting conversation.

Then, the next morning at the hour after sunrise, it was off to the dungeon. Well, hour and half after, because Lert slept in. Once in the dungeon, the PCs discovered the same columned chamber with scary statue and flaming bowl of fire that the previous group of PCs had also found. From there, they went in the opposite direction, though, going west through a door into a hallway and another room, where having crossed through one archway, a heavy iron portcullis dropped from the ceiling blocking their exit. Try as they might, they couldn't budge it, so onward they went, further to the west, into a room where they met up with a half-dozen animated skeleton guardians with swords and shields! Fortunately, the cleric in the party, Bolin, was able to "turn" them. Several fled to the north, two more into one corner of the room where they scrambled and scratched ineffectively at the wall, and were soon destroyed by the PCs.

Next investigating the passage to the north, the party found themselves in an odd shaped room with some sort of winch mechanism mounted on the wall. Also a door to the north where presumably the fleeing skeletons had gone. Examining the winch, they speculated that perhaps it was connected to the portcullis. To test this theory, after turning it, they sent Bolin and Danth back to see if it had moved. Minutes later, Ronson, Iommi and Lert heard Bolin and Danth shouting for help, and went back to themselves to assist... The portcullis had indeed been raised, but oozing through (and blocking) that archway now was a huge, cube-shaped gelatinous monster!! Which the party decided to call a gelatinous cube. Somewhat surprisingly, they succeeded in killing it with nobody getting hurt. Danth even helped out with dagger and torch. Burning the gelatinous remains (stinky!) out of the way, the party found 100 gp and a bunch of trash inside the monster (adding to the treasure of swords and shields they had obtained from the skeletons).

Back to the winch room they went, where they listened at that door in the north. Hearing something that didn't sound like just skeletons... muttering weird voices and some sort of chanting or prayer. The party decided not to try to open this door just yet, and instead went back to the first room of the dungeon to explore in a different direction. The door to the north in that chamber (at which they couldn't hear anything) opened into a dusty, cobwebby room. A (unanimated) skeleton and another seemingly dead body lay on the floor. Ronson and Iommi went in to investigate, leaving Bolin to watch the exit and both the hirelings to shiver in the doorway.

Despite the cobweb clue, the PCs forgot to look up when they went in, and thus were surprised by the giant spider lurking on the ceiling. A battle ensued, the spider being slain but not before it bit Iommi, who failed her save versus poison and lapsed into frothing convulsions. But thankfully, a prayer to Uli courtesty of Lert seemed to have some effect and the unconscious Iommi didn't quite die (yet).

Treasure = 1 gp.

Time to leave the dungeon. However, Ronson insisted on dragging the giant spider's corpse out with them, so that he could try to "milk" it of its remaining venom. Which he did once out of the dungeon, with some difficulty, while Danth and Bolin carried the comatose, at-death's-door Iommi back to Acornloaf, hoping to find some healing help.

Next session: tonight!