Play report: OSE Session 3 (Tomb of the Serpent Kings)

1^st day of the second month of spring, Year of the Rat

Tomb of the Serpent Kings, ran with OSE, this time, I had no opportunity to use the Death & Dismemberment Table from Skerples' GLOG hack.

Player characters:

Lonya, Thief

Valbona, Fighter

Ziemko, Fighter

Hirelings:
Radzimir

The adventurers, approached by the innkeeper with two eager volunteers, previously arranged for a venture with a different group of fortune-seekers (RIP), entered into negotiations with the two and settled at a payment rate of 1 gold piece per week plus one share of the loot for each of the two: the fighter Ziemko and his buddy Radzimir.

They ventured forth in the early morning and had to spend the night in the wilderness on their way to the tomb. The party tried to camouflage and fortify their encampment the best that they could. Each kept their watch diligently throughout the night.

During Lonya's watch in the early morning, they were awoken by a mounted group passing nearby, engaging in foreign-sounding talk and clanking with armour. The adventurers managed to coax Radzimir into trying to catch a peek.

Soon enough, they heard loud shouting from the direction he went. Lonya and Valbona were less than eager to risk their skin, but Ziemko didn't want to hear anything about abandoning his friend. The armed group turned out to be Sarentian knights returning home from a holy mission to the Commonwealth. They were easily convinced that the party were not, in fact, bandits, despite Radzimir's appearance and sneaky ways. They conversed for a bit. The knights mentioned that they will be visiting the Dorian King's court in Kindzhyl-Altariy on their way East. Ziemko was enamoured by their tales about Sarent, the "biggest city in the world" and seemed to be interested in joining them in their travels, but was kept back by his current obligations.

Upon reaching the entrance to the tomb, the party encountered a pack of wolves that appeared to have made the first empty chambers their home. Using torches, they managed to scare the animals into one of the rooms and anxiously continued down, making sure that their rear guard keeps a lit torch in case the wolves followed them.

Upon descending into the tomb, they found the octagonal room with the pool smeared with rotting blood and fragments of meat, a bloody human skull was lying on the floor, together with three wet torches, and the mummified hand was in a different place than they have seen it the last time. The pool had notably less water than before.

(These are the remains of Priest, thrown into the pond during session 1. They were dragged out by the fungus goblins after the party neutralised the stone cobra guardian.)

They continued down, walking on the stone ledge, ignoring the barred stone door on their way to enter the first open corridor to the right. They also ignored the next turn to the left, which ended with a door with a visible metal lock and entered a square room. They immediately noticed that one of the floor tiles was missing, with darkness visible below. Lonya rashly decided to investigate and ended up almost falling into the pit trap. Afterwards, she used her crowbar to smash the surrounding tiles, dropping some, and uncovering that it is safe to pass, as long as you stick close to the wall. She made a lot of noise doing that. The party heard thrashing of what sounded like a chain in the distance.

For some reason they did not continue in that direction, instead they backtracked to the corridor leading South and had Radzimir open the door, which he accomplished easily - the lock was old and terribly rusted. The room beyond was filled with hot, foul air, had chipped and bloodstained stone walls and a pair of manacles on the floor. When Valbona was passing through the room, the manacles grasped her ankles, but she was able to easily free herself. The party throroughly demolished the corroded manacles.

Radzimir started to become anxious by the fact that he was the one who had to open all the doors, but was happily silenced by the promise of increasing his weekly wage to two gold pieces and convinced to open the door to the West. They heard a hissing sound from that direction.

The next room had a domed ceiling covered with images of proud snake-men and doors on each of the walls. They first investigated the Northern route, inside they found a fiery pit that seemed to be the source of the hot air and hissing sounds. The pit was surrounded by a stone ledge that lead to another door in the North-western corner.

Then, they had Radzimir open the Western door of the domed chamber. A broomstick suddenly sprung out and tried to push him back. He cut through it with his axe, some wet sounds were heard from beyond the door, followed by another broomstick emerging. Forcing their way inside they found a small humanoid on the other side of the broom. It looked sticky and dirty and mouldy, like a rotten potato. When Ziemko attempted to parlay, it told them to follow the way to "the King" and did not look back, despite their shouts. They passed near rows of cutlery-based pole-arms and entered the dirty earthly caverns, stepping over beetle shells and other detritus. They were lead to a place where eight other "potato-people" surrounded an enthroned figure dressed in leather armour, it had a seemingly-alive snake-man head affixed to its neck with sticks, on its neck hanged a broken cross, a straw emerged from above its sternum, its left hand grasped a dagger and the right had three silver rings on its fingers. The "King" had a crown of cutlery and trash. A golden snake-man statue was standing in the corner of the room.

The King

(The King of course being the remains of Priest with the mad mummy snake-man's head stuck on top of his neck.)

The broom-guardian climbed on the King's lap and blew into the straw that stuck out of his neck. The airflow enabled the snake-man head to "speak", it seemed to be complete gibberish, but the guardian "translated". The party learned that the creatures were assailed by what they called "the goo", which was apparently unkillable. They impressed the potato-people when they told them that they killed one already (meaning the black pudding). The adventurers impressed them even more with the idea of throwing "the goo" into the fiery pit to destroy it.

(A good way to deal with the skeleton jellies for sure. Should they actually encounter them later.)

The party inquired on the exact number of "goos" inhabiting the dungeon, but the potato-people seemed to be arithmetically challenged. They determined that there were less goos than potato-people, at least. In the meantime, most of the creatures lost interest, some started using the golden statue as a backscratcher. Upon enquiry on other creatures living in the vicinity, the potato-people got agitated again and mentioned "the monstrum", which "turned to stone". Despite troubled communication, they ascertained that it was not the stone cobra-guardian, but possibly some sort of basilisk. The party managed to negotiate a deal: they would slay "the monstrum" and leave it to be eaten by their "translator" in exchange for the golden backscratcher.

The adventurers also asked about the origin of the King - they learned that he was found in a pond above. They speculated that perhaps the pond itself was the source of this strange people.

The broom-guardian showed them the way to the "monstrum". Past some haphazard "farms", up some dirty stairs lied a stone door. Recalling old-wives tales about basilisks, they prepared a small mirror to reflect any petrifying effects and opened the door into a large hall filled with columns and shadows, inside they heard faint breathing and saw realistic stone figures of spiders, bats, and potato-people in various states of fragmentation. After the party scrambled into the room, hiding behind the columns, and made sure to look down on the ground, Ziemko started feeling slow and heavy, so the entire party escaped in much haste.

They experimented a bit by tying Ziemko with a rope and having him bring petrified creatures outside of the room, dragging him back as soon as he stopped moving, speculating that perhaps the room itself had a petrifying effect and the breathing could have come from magical nostrils on the wall or something. However, bringing the petrified creatures out of the room did not, in fact, de-petrify them. During the investigation, Ziemko managed to catch a glimpse of a giant lizard with a crocodilian head, some kind of visor and collar attached with a chain to the chamber's ceiling. The mirror did not seem to have any effect on the creature.

The party decided to go back to town, perhaps to stock up on oil to burn the entire chamber with the creature in it. On their way out they cursorily investigated the room  to the West of the fiery pit but found nothing flammable within to use in their plans. They also considered the barred stone door next to the chasm, but abandoned it as well, wary of activating any traps so close the abyss. The wolves inhabiting the first chambers of the dungeon apparently left, as there was no sign of them.

On their way back to Tor's Field, the party spent their night in Beaverton, one of the villages on the way. They were gladly given hospitality by one of the peasants, Tom, together with his wife Jadzia, in exchange for company and tale. The adventurers were wary not to disclose too much of their exploits (they do seem to be terribly secretive about everything they are doing, perhaps not to avoid other adventuring parties venturing into "their" turf, but they sure do sound suspicious to everyone they talk to...) and in turn inquired about any monsters known to exist in  the vicinity, especially of the petrifying type. Apparently the area has been plagued by attacks of troglodytes, but these did not match the description o anything that the party encountered, despite their suspicions about the potato-people. They learned that the troglodytes can use natural camouflage to blend in with their surroundings but emit a nasty oily smell, thus are often first smelt, rather than seen. They also apparently were incapable or unwilling to engage in any negotiation and would attack people on sight, using primitive weapons (non-cutlery based). The local ruler, Horka Gabriel, was known to offer the prize of 5 silver pieces per troglodyte head to curb this menace.

(Getting to know about the local monsters seems like a good idea)

The party also inquired about the general area, which, they learned, used to be covered with Swardonian realms, until all of them were conquered by the Onioner invasion (the Onioners being known, of course, for their prominent, onion-shaped headdress). The Ononers, who call themselves the Dorians, have been the rulers hence.

Additional note: The session was unfortunately cut short by real-life considerations. I rule that any party that does not make their way back to civilisation on the end of the session shall be considered lost in the wilderness and probably dead, so the players had to leave the dungeon sooner than they might have done otherwise (if there was more real-life time to continue, that is).

Play report: OSE Session 2 (Tomb of the Serpent Kings)

19^th day of the first month of spring, Year of the Rat

Tomb of the Serpent Kings, ran with OSE, using the Death & Dismemberment Table from Skerples' GLOG hack.

Player characters:

Lonya, Thief

Urpert, Thief

Valbona, Fighter

Lonya the Fighter

Another group of adventurers, having been sold a supposed treasure map from a mysterious old man, prepared to venture out of the town of Tor’s Field. Unbeknownst to them, the old man has been plagued by horrific dreams. The only thing that soothes his mind appears to be luring people to a location in the Northeastern wilderness with those damned maps.

Having asked around town, the party learned of a previous group of miscreants who, after venturing into the same general area, returned with various cryptic items, before meeting various abrupt and violent ends. Prior to dying however, they seem to have enlisted the help of an acolyte (still living), who, in the end, did not decide to pursue the same adventuring lifestyle. They met him outside of the palisade of the decaying town, in the surrounding fields and orchards, peppered with ruins of the town's former... mediocrity. Beside a collapsed church, in the town’s cemetery, the acolyte was busy burying the remains of two adventurers. He relayed their story and gifted the party what looked like the map of the inside of a tomb, before immersing himself in prayer for these poor souls.

They arrived there the next day, finding a set of ransacked rooms, and a smashed stone door with a stone slab lying on the floor. Upon entering further, into a large chamber filled with rotten grave goods and scattered bones they saw a clay statue of a snake-man, surrounded by fragments of clay, to his left, laid a snake-man skeleton. Lonya disturbed the remains by trying to scatter the bones with her foot, in an attempt to prevent it from being animated later on and endangering their rear. The attempt animated the skeleton, leading to a quick fight, from which the party survived unscathed, while the snake-man ended scattered.

Not willing to leave any possible accursed dead undisturbed, Valbona knocked on the remaining statue, which erupted in a rain of clay fragments, unsurprisingly revealing another skeleton inside. The party escaped into the outlying corridor, hoping that the blessed light of day may have an adverse effect for the enemy. That did not seem to prove true. In the ensuing scuffle, they did, however, manage to lodge a grappling hook into his ribcage and pulled him down to the ground, leading to his demise.

(They started trying to use the environment to their advantage and being more creative in combat, which was a welcome change and worked well in the end. Too bad they didn't think of springing the hammer trap on the skeleton.)

Disappointed at the apparent lack of treasure, the group ventured deeper, encountering a vile statue, that they investigated thoroughly. Founding no way to interact with it, they dove into the hole at its base and entered a corridor flanked with statues of snake-men warriors. Remembering that they’ve been informed that one of these statues was moveable, they decided not to investigate it further.

They entered an octagonal chamber with exits on every side, multiple snake-men statues bearing various implements, a pool of black water in the middle, and a smashed mummified hand near the pool (unfortunately I forgot to mention the blood that must have been there, since that is where Priest bled out to death during the previous session). They carefully approached the pool, but nothing emerged from within.

Then the party started investigating the surrounding doors, starting with the wooden ones to the Southeast. Inside they found a small room with rotten beds, shelves, piles of scrolls in an unknown language and a gold and emerald icon depicting a Snakeoid figure. They quickly pocketed the icon and some of the scrolls.

Next, they investigated a stone door to the North, which they moved without much hassle using Lonya’s crowbar. Inside they found collapsed rubble, with a small hole which might have enabled them entry, if it weren’t for a furious snake-man skeleton aggressively trying to attack anything that came close. They decided to forego this route for now and sighed with relief when the skeleton stopped making noise after losing “sight” of them. They attempted to make sense of the various implements that the statues around the octagonal room are holding regarding the rooms and their contents, but they find no logic or reason connecting the two.

Opening the elaborately carved doors to the East and seeing ominous-looking stars leading down, and walls covered in reliefs of snakes “performing indeterminate movement between the sky and the ground”, they decided not to venture deeper just yet.

Then they decided to enter the room to the Northwest. Inside, on the wall, a circular shape glittered with the light of their torch. Upon noticing a raised tile on the floor, they apprehensively rolled a large stone from the collapsed corridor on the floor towards it and hid outside. With a deafening sound, a bolt of lightning shot from the room, destroying the wooden door to the Southeast. They entered the room, crawling on the floor and avoiding the pressed tile and stone. The adventurers expressed worry that the dungeon seemed to be causing them to behave like snake-men. Inside the room they stuck close to the walls, waiting for another lightning to shoot, it did not. Then they carefully took the electrum disk from the wall, being careful not to touch it with their skin, and only manipulating it through a bag. They expressed heavy disappointment that the sarcophagus in the room is empty.

Next, they entered the crudely carved room to the Northeast, and upon hearing squelching sounds from the stone coffin, prepared a plan ofaction. After a lengthy deliberation on the possibility of baiting the potential enemy to be zapped by the lightning trap from the Northwestern room, they abandoned that idea. They were not sure whether the electrum disk that they took was necessary for the trap to activate. Instead poured oil around the sarcophagus (again thinking creatively), Valbona braced to push the lid off and Lonya stood with a torch prepared to burn whatever emerged. As soon as it opened a bit, a black pseudopod shot out, grabbing Valbona’s hand. She managed to break her hand out, but not without sustaining painful burns. The adventurers hastily exited the room after Lonya threw the torch on the oil. A blob of black jelly pursued them, emitting a horrific sound while passing through the flames. They did, however, have the advantage of speed, Lonya and Urpert escaped to the upper level, while Valbona remained, trying to bait in to fall into the black pool. She succeeded and rising black water washed over her boots as the creature fell. She called for the rest of the party to come back down. As they were descending to join Valbona, the monstrous jelly emerged out of the water but was promptly put down by the steel of her axe. They investigated the scorched room from which the jelly originated but found only clay jars and copies of goods.

When investigating the Southern room, they found only an unfinished chamber with various mining and masonry tools scattered around. They took the tools to the Northern room and threw them through the hole at the unruly skeleton until he stopped moving, then used the remaining tools to clear their path. Inside, they found various golden funeral trinkets, Urpert also took the axe previously wielded by the animated skeleton.

I love this amazingly legible map.

The party then entered the corridor to the Southwest and smashed one of the clay snake-men warriors standing there. Finding neither treasure nor foe, they left the rest undisturbed.

Having apparently exhausted all other routes, the party decided to venture down the stone stairs, without performing any prior investigation. Upon stepping on the third stair, Valbona activated the trap – the stairs turned into a smooth ramp, and she slided down into spikes below, somehow managing to survive with only a flesh wound. She found herself in another octagonal room, this one had a huge stone statue of a humanoid figure with a cobra-like head wielding a huge sword, the walls were covered in various old and mostly decayed shields. The thief was shocked upon seeing that the stone figure started to approach her but managed to escape it into a narrow path overlooking a dark chasm on the other side of the room. She heard a swooping sound but did not look back and managed to avoid falling off the slippery stone ledge. She heard the statue stomping away (the ledge was too arrow for it to follow) and sat down in the dark, shaking with fear.

Meanwhile her comrades tried to fix a rope to safely descend down the ramp to aid her. The ramp, however, soon turned back into stairs, so Urpert tied the rope around Lonya’s waist instead and had her walk down the stairs (avoiding the third), while she carefully prodded the stairs in front of her. No other stairs turned out to be trapped.

As soon as the cobra guardian, now also bearing a shield, noticed them, he approached, but they were able to easily avoid him, as he did not fit up the stairs. Shouting over the foe, hoping he did not understand Common, the adventurers coordinated a plan to bait him to approach the slippery stone edge of the chasm and throw him down there using ropes. Shenanigans ensued. Valbona narrowly escaped doom while running on the slippery ledge multiple times. They did not manage to do it exactly how they planned, the guardian turned out to be too heavy to push/pull him. However, when the statue leaped near the ledge to attack Valbona, who was taunting him and throwing stones, he did slip and fall into the chasm. Valbona escaped the same fate, but her ribs got cracked by the impact of the stone guardian's leap.

(I was glad to see that they did not even think of fighting a huge stone enemy head-on.)

The party decided to recuperate in the octagonal room formerly occupied by the cobra-golem. They dragged down the beds from one of the rooms above to start a fire and get comfortable. Before they managed to do that, they were startled by chittering sounds and creepy laughter coming from the direction of the chasm. They ruled to rest in town instead.

(Death is a quick teacher, after the previous session they were markedly more cautious and creative, both with traps and with enemies. They also seemed to have consistently good rolls throughout the session.)

The travel back was uneventful, in town, they found callers roaming the streets with handbells, and people gathering at the chapels. It was the day of Resurrection.

Lonya went straight to the local wizard and, upon introducing herself as “Tulia Rostfhausen”, tried to sell him the emerald snake icon, he was interested and greedy, but suspicious. She was unwilling to name the source of the treasure, so the wizard brushed her off, openly citing fear of the local ruler as the reason for his unwillingness to make business before being aware of exactly the kind of risk he is taking.

She then roamed the streets, saw wanted notices promising 500 gold pieces for the head of a local bandit leader, named as “Bloody Henry”. She inquired a bit about this figure (she learned that they call him Henry-who-does-not-close-his-eyes) and about the local ruler also.

(I will be dropping various hooks for other opportunities of adventures throughout the sessions, so they should have no right to complain about only venturing into the one dungeon, but they seem to be ignoring them so far - the dungeon seems to be adventure enough for them.)

Valbona also visited the wizard and paid him to have the scrolls translated.

They waited for a week, until Valbona’s ribs healed and for the wizard to translate the scrolls. They turned out to be mad ravings of dead kings, desperately calling to their descendants, describing visions of dark eternity. One name seemed to pop up throughout the texts, “Baltoplat”, described only as “the demon of the deep”.