Table of Contents - A handy way to check out my articles by topic
My most recent Guides:
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
You can reach me at: powerscorerpg@gmail.com

Tuesday, February 7, 2017

Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 35 - Storm King's Thunder


Episode 35: Fee, Fi, Fo and Fum

On Reddit, they made a really nice index of the episodes right here.

No Anna this week! We do have a special guest star, Satine Phoenix from Maze Arcana, the show where they play through an Eberron campaign. For me, that’s about as good a guest star as you can get.

That said, it’s just not the same without Evelyn.

The Party

(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard 
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Satine) Lafaria - Dryad
Hooty McHootface the owlbear is part of the party now. Strix actually rides around on him as if he was a mount. She has to sort of lie down on him, as he moves in a weird way and can’t be ridden like a horse. She feeds him lots of waffles.

The group are about to head out into the wilderness with Zog, the dwarf on stilts. They'll be helping Zog deliver a message to a citadel. The journey will take about 20 days.

As he packs for the trip, Zog drops some stuff. He has a giant diamond. It’s worth at least 1,000 gp. Hmmm…. Diath can use that for his resurrection power! The group gets all bug-eyed, but decides to play it cool for now.

The crew travels for a week without incident. During the nights, they let the owlbear sleep in the hut. Strix needs him for warmth. Murderbot is still a good buddy of Paultin's. I guess Murderbot stares at them while they sleep.

During the second week, a huge windstorm hits. Evelyn is separated from the group. She was riding on Mourning Glory and was enjoying the splendor of nature when… poof. Chris says this is his way of explaining her absence. I like that better than the old “she’s there but doesn’t do anything” gimmick, but it gets weird if players miss a lot of sessions.

In my games I ended up just not worrying about it, saying they didn’t “log in” for that session. When you keep a PC around as an NPC, all kinds of bad stuff can happen.

The Dryad

The heroes come upon a hill with a tree and a cave. The group messes with the tree and suddenly Lafaria, a dryad appears. This is Satine's character.

She asks them why they are damaging her tree. Strix and Diath are freaked out, and they run. Eventually the group befriends her, sort of. They’re still creeped out.

Zog is shocked when he finds out that Strix is a female.

Lafaria lets the group sleep in her cave. Giants are coming. The dryad wakes up the group and warns them. They can feel the earth trembling as the giants get close.

A giant bellows, "I smell the blood of a human!"

The group takes a look. One giant is twice as big as the others. She sends her three underlings toward the cave.

Paultin tells Murderbot to get ready to kill. Wow, murderbot vs a giant.

They are hill giants. The big one is female screaming for food. Her name is Fum. Hmmm I guess the others are Fee, Fi and Fo.

Paultin tries to convince the giants that the heroes aren't a filling meal. The giants decide to eat the tree instead. The tree is Lafaria’s home and she is not too happy about that idea. The group goes to battle with the giants.

Hill Giants

The dryad has the tree pick up Strix, who launches off a fireball. The owlbear attacks a giant.

They should have a race between the owlbear and Mourning Glory. How fast is an owlbear? Would the owlbear even understand it was in a race?

Hootie bloodies the giant. Hootie gets hit for 38 points! He's almost dead!

A giant tries to push over the tree. Paultin casts fear on Fum and she fails her save. She flees, but her husbands are still fighting. The group is quite amused that all of the males are her husbands. This is part of the hill giant storyline in Storm King.

A giant drops Diath, big time.  Poor Diath is about to start making death saving throws.

The chat alerts the group that Murderbot hasn't gone. Chris says that Murderbot is just hanging out next to Paultin. It never fails in D&D… everyone forgets the NPCs and animal sidekicks.

A giant bites Lafaria for 12 points. Murderbot fires a dart into a giant's butt and kills it.

Diath rolls a death save... natural one! That counts as two failures. One more and he's dead for good. Strix misty steps over to him and tries a heal check to stabilize him, but she rolls a 5. Uh oh. She stuffs snow in his mouth. Doesn't help.

As the battle rages on, Diath rolls another death save.. eep... he rolls a 14! Strix tries to stabilize him again. Fails. Wow. Zog actually comes over to help. Zog does it! I don’t know why, but I kind of felt like Diath should just die. That was the story the dice were telling.

I know they’d be stuck if he died. Could someone at the citadel raise dead? Probably. But Jared might have to sit out for a portion of the session, which is a bit lame I guess.

Wow... Lafaria goes down. Paultin goes down!! Both making death saves! It's just Strix and Zog versus two hill giants. No... Zog is down! It's just Strix!

She tries to scare off the giant with thaumaturgy, creating a shadow demon bigger than it. She rolls really bad.

She should run into the cave, the giant can't get in there...

Oh no. She is hit. 16 damage. she's still up! She lets out a hellish rebuke. The group is pining for Evelyn.

It staggers back. Murderbot fires a dart into it.. kills it! The other giant flees, trying to catch up with his wife.

Lafaria is about to die.. she doesn't go by PC rules. I think she rolled a natural 20 on a death save but she didn’t pop up.

Lafaria rubs sap on Strix's head. She utters a weird phrase: “Hellstroth dons his elven crown.” Strix has gained a boon - the power to polymorph. She can cast the polymorph spell on herself a few times. That should be fun. She could assume the form of an owlbear!

Overall

Fun show. It was fun to see the groups fight some giants. They were pretty much in over their heads.

I always like how Chris doesn’t always have his monster mindlessly attack. They have goals. The giants wanted something to eat, and when they decided to eat the tree, they shifted their focus to that.

No show next week!

No comments: