Session 2: The Cave and the Crocodile

"The Cave and the Crocodile" was the second session of Campaign 1. In the depths of the Needlefang Cave, our heroes fought through enemy after enemy on the hunt for the goblins' prisoners, teetering on the brink of death more than once...

The Darkmantles
In the cavern, the party attacked the darkmantle on Cedric Goodfellow's head, but their strikes carried through to Cedric. John battered the creature, but knocked Cedric unconscious in the process. As John finished the monster by hurling it against the cavern wall, a second darkmantle latched on to Arashi's face. Malaxus attempted to peel it off, but failed. John resorted again to pummelling, knocking Arashi unconscious and successfully removing the darkmantle. Though John and Malaxus tried to destroy it, the creature belched out magical darkness before escaping into the upper reaches of the chamber.

The party took a short rest to recuperate before climbing a rubble-choked tunnel to the west. Arashi made it to the top, but John's failed acrobatics caused the rubble to collapse, injuring both. Cedric took it upon himself to scale the collapsed debris, attach a rope to a stalagmite and aid his hirelings in reaching the top.

The Eating Cave
The party followed the glow of a campfire and chittering of goblins into the 'Eating Cave', where a burly bugbear by the name of Mongo presided over four goblin underlings turning a boar on a spit. Malaxus attempted to sneak up on the bugbear, the glow of his blade gave him away and Mongo lashed out with his morningstar. John pummelled the bugbear to death, allowing Malaxus to rush to the stairs and engage the goblins making their way up. Cedric was struck by a goblin arrow, knocking him down, and Arashi unleashed a thunderwave that blasted three goblins to their deaths and the last into the campfire, where he was finished off by John. Malaxus looted the dead bugbear to find a flask of gobsgog (which he gave to John) and a potion of healing on his belt, which he poured down Cedric's throat, reviving him. Before this, however, he swiped Cedric's Writ of Commission and, following Cedric's revival, read it aloud, informing the party of their mission: to assist Cedric on a mission to Correnwald on a clerical endeavour.

The Chieftain's Cave
The party crossed a bridge into the penultimate chamber of the cavern: a wide cave where the Chief of the Needlefang Tribe (Spittlebrick) held court atop his pile of loot, accompanied by his shaman (Ragvort) and pet albino crocodile, watching a trio of goblin triplets performing around a campfire. Malaxus' second attempt at a stealth kill was foiled by the wary shaman, who dragged him across the ground with a lightning-fast thorn whip. The party focused their efforts on Ragvort, who used one of the triplets as a shield to absorb Arashi's fire bolt. The second fire bolt, however, caught the shaman in the head, killing him.

Panicking, Spittlebrick threw a makeshift bomb into the fray, knocking Cedric and Arashi out, while Malaxus was attacked by the crocodile and caught in its jaws. John, the last man standing, crushed the crocodile's head with his boot and rushed up the pile, intimidating and beating the chief into submission. He looted his loot pile, finding two potions of healing to use on the gravely-injured Cedric and Malaxus, before using his last serving of gobsgog to revive Arashi - luckily, Arashi was able to withstand the potential poisoning effect of the brew and awoke.

The last thing John found in the loot pile was a letter with a wax seal depicting a swamp tree. The letter was addressed from Chancellor Luther Maldrud to the chief, and alluded to a plot between the two to harry travellers on the road.

The Party

 * Arashi Fulgar
 * Cedric Goodfellow
 * John
 * Malaxus

New Characters

 * Mongo †
 * Cardinal Rassian (mentioned)
 * Chief Spittlebrick
 * Luther Maldrud (mentioned)

Deaths

 * 1 darkmantle
 * Mongo - sat on by John
 * Several goblins - killed by the party
 * Ragvort, goblin shaman - killed by Arashi's fire bolt
 * 1 albino crocodile - crushed by John