D&D Game 3: Vikings!

Jorund, your plan appears impracticable in view of what the others are planning to do, apart from the “throw hammers” part. However, casters can usually see what they’re doing through the rank in front of them.

Ivar seizes the opportunity to Bless himself and his comrades as it must be cast before battle is joined. Ulf, Bjarni and Jorund launch a volley of missiles at one of the larger owlbears, it collects no fewer than four arrows but is still going. Jorund’s hammer glances harmlessly off it. Osvald looses off another Flaming Sphere hoping it will be more use in these confined quarters.

Thus provoked, the angry critters charge. Ivar looses off his javelin, dropping the wounded owlbear with marksmanlike precision. Ulf and Bjarni again hit twice with their bows, felling a second “adolescent”, and Jorund’s second throwing hammer catches another one dead centre above the beak. Choosing his moment well, Osvald catches the onrushing group in a Colour Spray and four of the smallest randomly chosen fall unconscious. The injured one attacks Ulf, beaking him for 5 damage - he is now down 19. The largest left attacks Jorund, clawing him twice for 7 (down 20) and one of the small ones claws at Bjarni, easily repelled by his shield and armour.
Both berserkers go berserk, seeing there are still plenty of foes and they are taking damage, but Jorund holds back the Aspect of the Storm.

Thinking quickly, Osvald rolls his Flaming Sphere over the unconscious owlbears for maximum effect. It is not big enough to do full damage simply by sitting it in the middle of them. Ulf slays the creature before him with one blow of his mighty poleaxe. Bjarni fences expertly with his, Jorund smites his with both hammers and (amazingly) it is still going…! Ulf gets clawed and bitten by the onrushing “juvenile”, it tries instinctively to hug him but is too small to do so effectively. He takes 9 damage anyway for a total of 29. Jorund easily ducks the creature fighting him but Bjarni is saved only by a reflex parry with his shield. Ivar, seeing Ulf getting badly beaten up, touches him with a 10-point Cure Light Wounds to leave him a mere 19 in arrears.

Osvald reverses the direction of his Sphere putting the finishing touches to the unconscious owlbearlings, and it then goes out. Ulf hits his new opponent - a mighty blow by most standards, but a mediocre one by his - Bjarni misses, and Jorund spreads his wounded foe over quite a large area. Bjarni is the only party member to suffer a counterstrike and that a mere scratch for 3 (down 15). Both berserkers have fresh foes by the end of the round and Jorund hits his hard, but not quite hard enough.

Ulf disposes of his last foe, Bjarni trades blows with his and feels that one more hit point is not a bad trade for killing it where it stands, at that. He is now down 16. And in a blur of total carnage, Jorund and his owlbear exchange five successful hits between them in a vicious hand-to-claw struggle that sees the creature slain but Jorund taking a further 10 from the little varmint (down 30). Then, to his everlasting joy, Osvald plants his long spear in the way of the last onrushing juvenile and drills it cleanly through the heart. Even wizards get lucky sometimes - besides, it’s the weapon that he wields on the fighter’s To Hit table. :slight_smile:

Whereupon the Bless lapses, the exhausted Berserkers come out of their rage, none of them quite falls over, and you are in sole possession of a largish chamber which makes Woolverton town square smell like a perfumier’s. A little judicious exploration reveals a still smaller chamber with a floor carpeted with rushes, although they have a farmyard stink to them. In there you can see three very small owlbears about the size of young bear-cubs, some shards of eggshells, and two large eggs. There is also a raised platform in there about three feet off the floor and made of wood, about six feet square with a slightly raised edge all around. Watching the hatchlings, you are able to see that they are no threat to you - their claws are undeveloped and their beaks don’t appear to be fully hardened.

I didn’t explain very well - sorry!

Also I hope I’m visualising this right - it’s always hard for a DM to describe everything the players might want to use.
I assumed that

‘the cave narrows to a tunnel just barely wide enough for a full-grown owlbear, which leads down to an underground stream running through a small chamber’

meant that we could stand 3 abreast in the small chamber, on the opposite side of the stream from the Owlbears and shoot them, then switch to weapons and block them getting to the casters.
(I got muddled about the openings…)
I further assumed that casters could cure us by touch, or cast spells past us (three Fighters don’t form ‘a wall of flesh’), or prod with long weapons.

Maybe we have to let the DM describe the combat, based on what we would like to do…

Ooooh! It’s happened while I was typing! :o

Ooooh, owlbear babies!

Are they trainable?
What should we do with them? Seems cruel to kill them, seems more cruel to leave them to die on their own.

DM, I can’t take much more of this relentless excitement! I find myself longing for an Osvald tea ceremony. :wink:

Once again, Ulf is proud of all his comrades.

He gives a special grin of appreciation to Osvald ‘Owlbear Slayer’ (as he must surely now be known).
Now we know what Flaming Sphere is for - use it on Colour Spray victims!

Ulf thanks Ivar for saving his life at least once. :cool:
(Perhaps with these Berserkers in front of him taking such damage, Ivar needs to load as many Cures as possible?)

Bjarni, you hit the nail on the head. If someone can train Owlbear babies (or from the eggs), we must be able to make a lot of money!
I hope we can do that - as you say the alternatives are sad (and I add we can’t leave them to grow up to become uncontrolled killers…)

Jorund looks around and sniffs “Oooh . . . no smell good but Osvald smell great!! He much powerfull warrior” He walks around and collects his hammers “Me need to throw harder always bounce not many crunch” Finnally he walks over and sits on the raised platform using some of the rushes to clean the muck off of his hammers and looking around at the tiny owlbears “We need kill before they eat people” as he ponders this horrible thought another comes slamming into his mind. “Who make platform? . . . Why here?”

“No, Jorund! We must not kill these babies!” Osvald is proud to be accepted by his fellow Vikings for slaying the beasts, and for fighting to save their lives, but his eyes are misty, and his voice no longer just babbles. Osvald for once doesn’t have the words to express how he feels about the slaying of the juveniles. He feels ashamed for having to do it, but he knows he had to save his fellow humans. But that still does not make him feel satisfied about what he’s just done. “When we set out… I- I knew we would have to encounter big scary things, and we would have to deal with many dangers and fierce beasts… But… this i did not expect. I- I wish there were another way rather than what just happened here… There is no honor in trying to slay these babies, nor in the killing of their siblings. Though I know that it is best they were dealt with before they become a-dult killers… my heart does not warm to the thought of slaying these little ones.
Is there another way? Can we raise them or take care of them to perhaps NOT be a menace to others?”

Osvald for the first time has truly taken a life, and it was the life of a juvenile, not even an adult. He appreciates his Viking brothers’ gestures, but “Owlbear Slayer” is not a name that Osvald wants for himself. He goes over to the babies, to examine them and see how young they are.

“This is a VERY good point, Jorund. A very valid one. Did someone set these poor Owlies here for them to beset the nearby villagers, and eventually to their doom? If so, that person should be punished!”
Osvald begins to search around the cave for any clues or items that may indicate what this structure is doing here.

Ivar loaded Speak With Animals this morning- any chance that will work on baby owlbears?

Ivar will split his final four Cure Minor Wounds between Ulf and Jorund. It’s only 2hp apiece, but you do what you can.

Unfortunately none - they are not natural animals, and you would need Speak with Monsters. They don’t seem to be aggressive, or at any rate no more than a kitten is aggressive, and there is no real danger in handling them - the nip of their half-formed beak is a painful annoyance but doesn’t break the skin, you soon find.

On the platform itself there are some odds and ends - a pouch small enough to lift in the hand, that clinks when you lift it; a key (what would pass for a church key these days, but a suitable size for a house door); and a bag such as you might carry your lunch in.

Oh, and a search of the adult owlbears, now the fuss has thoroughly died down, reveals that one of them was wearing some kind of amulet around its neck - a not very valuable-looking piece of jewellery with an oversized leather thong to allow it to fit over the creature’s head.

Ulf agrees with Osvald that this is an excellent point. :slight_smile:

Would the platform protect the babies from rats or snakes?
Is it to keep the eggs from rolling away?

Osvald, the ‘nickname’ will not be used again.
Ulf gets almost drunk with excitement after going Berserk and of course it was intended as a compliment.
However there are a lot of raging Monsters and Evil people in the World, so you need to be ready to defeat them with both spell and weapon.
Let us hope we have many ‘tea moments’ too…

Ivar, your help is appreciated again.
It seems that your Curing power is strong, so every extra Cure helps us a lot.

So we have found:

  • a pouch (clinking)
  • a key
  • a small pack
  • an Amulet

Ulf suggests that we test this for magic (and traps?), then one of us carry this until we can all share it.
(DM, does the tracker qualify for anything, or will the grateful Town take care of him?)
He guesses the pouch is money, would like to find the lock for the key and hopes that one of the pack or Amulet is magic. :cool:

Osvald, there are tales of people who train really exotic beasts - in distant lands there are men who ride winged horses, and creatures still stranger, so the songs of skalds have assured you. You would be doing well to find an adept of such a craft in Woolverton or Pevensey, but perhaps a larger city would be worth considering.

Set your heart at ease concerning the younger owlbears you had to fight (a voice seems to murmur). Though smaller than adults, they were just as savage and fought with an unnatural disregard for their own lives. Blame, if blame there be, rests on the shoulders of those who made these creatures.

There are no egg-remnants on the platform nor any evidence that it served as a hatchery - the young ones on the rush-strewn floor seem barely out of their shell. And it is unlikely that any rat or snake would have lasted long in a place like this.

Guern had his pay from the Woolverton council, and he is even clearer after having seen the monsters that he would not have fought them under any circumstances - he can run a little better than the average man and he swears abundantly that he would have outrun these given a chain’s start on them. It would be lordly to gift him something out of your plunder, but he is owed nothing.

"I do have 2 Detect Magics, Should I use them on the items? We could know that much at least

As for that clanking device- it may have been used as a form of communicating with the older Owlies. I have heard of those who train dogs with such devices- the noise irritates the animal, and makes them either fearful or more aggressive. But the adults are dead right now, and so we cannot test that theory. But I think we should try to find the best homes we possibly can for these young ones right now. They should not have to suffer for the sins of their master."
((Osvald secretly hopes that perhaps they will be tamed and harmless, and that he would be able to care for one on his own. As he currently feels he should be in charge of their safety))

Osvald votes that if there are no more clues here, we try to return to town and rest up before we try to seek who left these Owlies here. And perhaps we can inquire about the shining hill as well. But first let us get some rest, and do some research about these objects.

Yes, Ulf strongly recommends that.
(DM, will one [COLOR=Blue]Detect Magic serve for all the items? What about identifying any magic found?)[/COLOR]

DM, is there any way to bring the young with us? How about the eggs - do any of us have skills in keeping the hatching process going?

Ulf agrees absolutely. And pending any disagreement, he will carefully look after the items found on behalf of the party.

“Ulf carry stuff good . . . I carry eggs, me no like bites. We should go quick to town so no more fight . . . Tomorrow we go baddie, but no stay here or baddie go here” Jorund puts away his now clean hammers and picks up both eggs.

Ulf suggests the eggs be wrapped to keep them warm.

The bag that clinks does so in the familiar manner of one containing coin and so on, and doesn’t radiate magic. The amulet does. Wizards and skalds have a level-based Identify ability as a class feature, but you’ll need some study time for that. The cubs are easily portable, if a mite wriggly - you’ll have to figure out how to feed them. If you can rig up some kind of a bag from what you’re wearing or carrying then the eggs will be easy to transport. Bjarni as head of his own settlement has some knowledge of both agriculture and husbandry. The lunch-bag-sized bag appears to contain the remains of someone’s lunch, now rather stale and mouldy. The key radiates a general air of unlocking the particular lock it was made for, provided the lock is kept oiled. :slight_smile:

As glee earlier said, sometimes the DM becomes aware that he has provided a misleading description. Osvald didn’t see a shining *hill * last night - he saw a gleam of light from somewhere up in the hills, as of some bright object catching the moonlight. You have come in something like the direction it came from.

With injured fighters and no healing spells left, Ivar is going to recommend that we either go back to town for the night or fortify the area and camp here. We can explore more in the morning.

It’s a ‘morning’s march’ back to town.
Ulf agrees with Osvald and Ivar that we need to rest and cure before fighting again. Here are the arguments for resting here or in Woolverton.

staying here means

  • no journey (carrying 3 wriggling cubs and 2 eggs) while injured
  • we can explore the cave more
  • we may be attacked by whoever built the platform

going to town means

  • we can hand the cubs/eggs over temporarily (later making a decision what to do with them) while we explore the area
  • we collect our reward sooner and can rest in beds

Ulf is content either way, but remembers that a voice seemed to murmur reassurance over killing the young Owlbears. He asks into the air for any comment…

Guern adds: “Ye must do as ye think fit, but I doubt there’ll be any wild beasts come near this place, reeking of *them * as it does. Bad news like that gets around, even among animals.”

I say we should head back to Woolverton, and get some rest- and perhaps I’ll have time to look at the amulet further, and we’ll be able to feed these Owlies then with some meat from there vs. trying to kill anything ourselves.

But yes, if Kim feels that resting here for the night would be wiser, I’m certainly apt to listen to that voice.