Session recap

Session 2 D&D Session: Death House Ritual Chamber ###### Session Overview - Party explored the lower levels of Death House and discovered a ritual chamber - Encountered 13 dark apparitions chanting "One must die!" demanding a ritual sacrifice - Major combat encounter with a shambling mound creature ###### Combat Encounter: Shambling Mound Battle - Party entered a 40-foot square ritual chamber with murky water, stone altar, and refuse pile - Dark apparitions appeared when Jables stepped onto the ritual dais, chanting demands for sacrifice - Shambling mound awakened when party stepped off the dais - Party learned shambling mound is resistant to fire, heals from lightning damage - Multiple party members knocked unconscious during battle due to lightning damage from the mound's engulf attack - Iridel went unconscious twice during the encounter - Party used healing potions and Lay on Hands to keep teammates alive - Combat ongoing at end of session ###### Key Tactical Moments - Jables used Shield of Faith for 21 AC, successfully dodging many attacks - Gray landed critical hit with silver arrow for 26 damage - Party coordinated familiar's Help action to grant advantage on attacks - Used Bless scroll to enhance party's attack rolls and saving throws - Iridel used Sacred Flame and healing spells to support the party ###### Loot and Items Acquired - Smoky crystal orb worth 25 gold pieces (can be used as arcane focus) - Retrieved three silver arrows from previous shadow encounter - Gold ring (25 gold value) found on skeleton in prison area - not taken due to caution - Cast-off chain shirt (medium armor) - cannot be used by druid - Four healing potions distributed among party ###### Important Game Mechanics Discussed - Death saving throws and unconsciousness rules clarified - Character dies if damage exceeds double their max HP - Potions can be administered as bonus action in 5.5e - Familiar can take Help action independently on its own turn - Shambling mound's engulf ability imposes grappled, blinded, and restrained conditions ###### Character Status - Iridel: Currently unconscious, has been knocked out twice - Jables: Bloodied, using Lay on Hands and spell slots - Gray: Healthy, maintaining distance with ranged attacks - Shambling mound: Bloodied and heavily damaged - The party escaped from the house using a hole in the wall created by Iradel. - Upon getting outside, they all fell unconscious ###### Exploration Notes - Found secret passage between prison area and ritual chamber - Iron portcullis with switch mechanism discovered - Room contains relics and oddities in cubbies (determined to be worthless) - Natural cave alcove contains the shambling mound - Party previously cleared most other areas of the dungeon Move everything over to this new virtual tabletop, which is what we used to play online a lot. But Eric let me use his account to make this right here. And as you can see, it's a tool that allows me to actually have lighting and control vision, I guess, a bit more accurately. Make doors, make walls. So I'm not just removing boxes. And one note, it also allows me with my WAC to actually move. That's pretty sexy. Yes. And if anyone, I guess everyone with a laptop here, technically I could invite and y'all could run this on your laptop. I could make you your own person and you can move it as well to control your own visual perspective. But we're not there yet. You're not there yet. But yes, y'all would find yourselves still after this long rest hanging out in these groups. What would y'all do? A lot of the cryptos. Because we did a couple of double backs a little bit. We went one direction and saw that there was a room, and went back another direction and saw there were more rooms. We definitely did. I get to give myself an inspiration. Because I'm a human. When we get a long breath. Yep, yep, humans are OP that way. They should still have their inspiration. They gave them when we did some singing. Some instrument playing. Singing. - Body burning? - Well around the neck. Um. I guess I need to give Jables the ability to see. Yeah. Yeah, so I need to cast it on an item. Because it is worn out. It is... 20 foot radius and dim light for an additional 20. I got 20-20. So I did put the light in here correctly. So I'm doing 20 foot dim or 20 foot bright. We immediately editing the scripts in order to continue to explore. I think so. I think that was our plan. We really just needed the rest because we needed to like... We needed the health. Yeah, we needed the health and all that kind of deal. We've just backed around a little bit, you know. That was hot. I think we go to the right. To this way? That's my boat. Yeah, I know that. Because it was the other direction we went first, right? Yes. Yeah. Yeah, because this is where we went up and we just kind of looked and we were like, nah, let's turn back for a second. So yeah, I agree. Let's go this way. So as you come right about right here, I'm just using this thing. Everyone give me perception. Oh, I didn't bring my dice. I forgot to get mine out. Oh. 14 14 still not bad. 17. 17. So collectively, Jables and Iridell are going to notice that this room, like many of the other rooms, seems not to have been used in a very long time. It seems rather dilapidated as well. Gray is going to kind of also notice that the silence is very pronounced in this area. Other than, of course, the chanting that you've been hearing as you've been coming down in this dungeon, like this kind of rhythmic chanting that you can't really discern the direction from. But other than that, you're not really hearing the noises of other individuals. But you would find yourself in this room, which is a room with a wooden table and chairs. It seems to be like a meek living quarters. Tell me where you guys would go. Seems pretty open for the most part. You see a couple little doorway areas. Yeah, as you-- So which one would you want to look? I assume this one first, right? As you go and inspect this little alcove, you would see a moldy pallet. Yep, and you would see something similar in all these little alcoves, moldy straw pellets. Okay, so definitely. Kind of over there. If there were certain quarters above, these would be more like certain quarters maybe or something. That's my initial thought. Yep, and these cultists were not living ladders lives. What's around the corner? Because that was the whole thing, yeah. Yeah, so I guess this looks more like a... Yes, so, yes, this would lead you to another room if y'all are just continuing on. Yeah, I don't see any reason to really inspect any of it right now anymore. So as you guys would head in this room, you would immediately see a well in the middle of this larger room. And everyone give me a perception check once again. That's a six. 24. Damn. Something's blocking my perception in this area. I must have had a really good sleep. You must have not had a good sleep. There you go. Jables is able to tell that this room is similar to the last one, but Gray is able to really make out the fact that each one of these tiny rooms does look like kind of more... There is five of those. Do we want to go ahead and check out each of these little alcoves again? I'm kind of interested about the fountain in the middle. The well? Yeah, we'll check that out first. Maybe get a little closer to the well. Maybe peer in. I rolled a six, so I'll be the one to look. I have no idea what's going on. So you would notice that much like wells that you're used to seeing, there is a bucket hanging out. Thank you. inspect something more specific about this well i was just curious about the condition of it and also maybe looking down let's see if we can see the bottom down there see the bottom you can actually Yes, you can. You also have light cast right now. Is it my turn now? It is. Not yet. You now have a smoky crystal orb worth 25 gold pieces. Nice. And you can use it as an arcane focus, but it's not magical. You gave me a life worth 25 gold pieces. Almost. Yeah, so I get all three of them. Nice, awesome. So I'm back to all four. They have survived the fight and now I'm back to this. Perfect. Good deal. Thank you for making those. I wouldn't have even thought about it. We pretty much cleared out everything in all of the other areas. That was really the only place left to go, I'm pretty sure. So we just need to make our way back that direction if we want to clear the rest of it out. They seem like fucking junk to you. So you and Jables would both see a secret door. I know I put that one in. Hey. You absolutely can. Um... Find the skeleton is in a tattered black robe. The only thing of value you would find on him is a gold ring on one of his fingers. With 25 gold. So... The chanting stops as you peer into this 40-foot square room. The smooth masonry walls provide excellent acoustics. Featureless stone pillars support the ceiling, and a branch in the west wall leads to a dark cave heaped with refuse, which is back here. Murky water covers most of the floor. Stairs lead up to dry stone ledges that hug the walls. In the middle of the room, more stairs rise to form an octagonal dais that also rises above the water. You would see an iron portcullis. Yeah, which has the backs of the door and that is that. Switch to the portcullis that you did not see on the other side. 11. 11. So Iridel is the one that really gets a good look at this naturally formed alpha. You'll be able to recognize this half-submerged pile of refuse as a shambling mound. Oh, 20. So what was yours again? Greg? 18. So y'all two, you're not able to really recall anything even though Travis recalls a lot. But you two... They're able to kind of recall histories, and, you know, the Shambling Mound is a very formidable forest creature that has a lot of health, naturally resistant to lightning. In fact, heals from lightning. I was thinking one to me, maybe just because I don't have any other way to heal and I'm far away from the main action a lot of the time. But then the rest for you guys to split up. I would also be okay not having one if you guys just want to split them both up. I think everyone should have one. Yeah. Okay. Then I would not put it on, even though I can see benefits and I can see that I could wear it. The moment that Jabil climbs onto the top of the dice, you guys are going to hear the chanting rise once more as 13 dark apparitions appear on the ledges overlooking the room. Each one resembles a black robed figure holding a torch, but the torch's fire is black and seems to draw the light into it. Where you'd expect to see faces are voids. One must die! One must die! One must die! They will chant over and over again. Hmm? They're going to say, "The end comes! Death be praised!" And the Shambling Mount is going to awake. No fucking shit. And start attacking you. I'm gonna use Bless. Okay. On the three of us. That's it for that. I don't really have any bonus actions to take, but I guess it would be the familiar, so I send it to distract before Jables' next turn to try to get him advantage. Actually, that works because you roll sneak attack anyway, so you'll take 10. So it'd be the two fives plus two. So it's 12 plus 14, so you deal 26 damage to it. The only reason I said for the over 20, I do have 21 AC right now. You are engulfed. So you are now pulled inside of the shambling mound. Yep. And you are essentially grappled. But this grapple is also going to impose blind and restrained. So what I'm reading for 5.5e is the familiar gets an action, a core combat action on the turn, like its own turn. that it can do help, deliver touch spells, dash, disengage, hide, and interact with objects. It can mimic, it does mimicry, has high mobility, flight and scouting, and just that there's no attack action. So based on my read, the telepathy is persistent and the Familiar gets its own action independent of the actions of, which is like how I've been doing the help actions. Going to take a little bit of damage on the start of your turn, Iridil, because you are inside of this thing. 17 lightning damage. Cool. Well, you're going to be making me death saves on the beginning of your next turn. Okay. So... I have it right here though. What is it? As bonus action, you can drink or administer it to another creature within five feet of yourself. The creature that drinks the potion gains 2d4 plus two. Nine, nine. It's bloody. It's bloody. If a plane could be bloody. In fact, it was bloody like an attack or two ago, but we're just going to gloss right over that. - When you go to zero, you start making death saves. Now, if there's an instance where, let's say for example, if you had five health max and you take 10 damage, Like turn, you like that. So like if you were to take 34 negative, since you have 17. Okay. I rolled two twos and like that's not looking good for you already. 2D8 plus my charisma modifier. Hell yeah. Eight plus seven plus three is going to be 18. Nice. Nice. Nice. Nice. Beautiful. I put my hand on him. I fucking heal him to full. I look over to the plant. I'm going to have to go back to that well. I don't really have much. I guess what I got is Sacred Flame, Dex save. It roll. Yes, it wants me to do it in real life. Three. Glancing blow. Half of three. And I'll lay on hands myself for my five. Okay. I'm still bloody, but... Exactly. I will go ahead and roll twice. Highest is 13. And then we're not blessed right now, right? Right. 13, unfortunately, does not... Yes, it was a six on one of them. Oh, my God. And then a two, so.

Review before next table

• Confirm open clues, NPC promises, loot, and next-scene intent.