(Howard Pyle, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
This is the second part of my series chronicling my solo D&D Misadventures in an old school style. This series is intended to not only be a fun example of how interesting solo D&D can be, but also an insight into my process. You can read the first part here: D&D Solo Play 01 - A Dance With Centipedes A log of a solo session of Dungeons and Dragons, where treasure and invertebrates abound.medium.com As with last time, I try to insert (potentially) helpful notes in italics, so you can follow some of my thoughts on what I did/didn't do in a scenario In terms of system, I'm using Whitebox: FMAG, a clear rearrangement of Original Dungeons and Dragons, with some house rules. You can read about my system for that here. Finally, if you want my advice on playing solo D&D yourself, then check out this post. Without any further ado, let's dive in.
The party consists of:
Dain - Fighter 1; 7 Hp
Lisbeth - Elf 1; 1 Hp
Lisbeth and Dain have just made it out from the dungeon, heading back to the fort. As they pass through the gates to reach the Dancing Priest tavern. The pair stores their gear in their rooms, reconvening in the common room. They share a meal and discuss their plans.
I hadn't sketched out the overall realm too much by this point. Because of this, I decided to grab the setting from a defunct campaign. The nuances will be revealed in time, but the most important information pertains to the game's "hub" or fortress, rather. Fort Reticence serves as a forward operating base for an excursion to reclaim the wilds (it's just Keep on the Borderlands with a bit of flavor from Cairn). This saved a lot of time, as the most important parts were figuratively (and literally) mapped out already.
"We have a significant amount of money now. So what can we do?" Lisbeth said.
"I'm not sure. It would be nice to have more people. Maybe we could pay some extra people."
"Well, there's ought to be enough people out there. We also need supplies. It shouldn't be an issue, but it's worth mentioning."
"I agree. We also need some rest. You don't look so good." Dain rips off a chunk of bread.
"I'll be fine," Lis stares out the window. It's twilight now, and some people filter in. A couple of people filter in, and Lisbeth watches as a few go up the stairs, and a small woman in chain mail speaks to the tavern-keep. Lis turns back to Dain. "We need to get some pitons, and some rope wouldn't hurt either."
They meet each other's gaze, and Dain shrugs.
The party sends the next couple of days resting, spending their time shopping and searching for extra hands. They've spent 40 gold for the following items:
- Bow + 40 Arrows, for Lisbeth
- 6 Pitons + a Hammer for group use
- 6 extra torches
After some brief searching, they find two other people who desire to team up, as well as another pair who were interested in the safety afforded by larger groups, so there are four new adventurers:
Elaria - Another elvish lady. Lisbeth can no longer claim a monopoly on long ears.
Mirena - Elaria's Clerical friend. She handles the paperwork (Get it?)
Harkin - an apprentice wizard. Don't get too attached, he's probably going to die immediately.
Seraphine - Another cleric who's on a holy mission to gain an excess amount of material wealth. Hmm… That doesn't sound right…
The party is now:
Dain - Fighter 1; 7 Hp
Lisbeth - Elf 1; 7Hp
Elaria - Elf 1; 7 Hp
Mirena - Cleric 1; 6 Hp
Seraphine - Cleric 1; 6 Hp
Harkin - Magic User 1; 6 Hp
I wanted to see how manageable running 6 characters was, and I'm pleased to report that it went great! Having to write dialogue for everyone… yeah, not my smartest move…
The marching order is as follows: Dain, Mirena and Elaria are in the front lines, with Harkin in the middle, and Lis and Seraphine flanking him on both sides.
This is pretty constant throughout this specific expedition at least. Unless I say otherwise, this is the rough orientation of the PCs regarding the challenges of the dungeon.
They arrive at the dungeon with little issue. Cutting a distinct figure among the heavily armored combatants, Harkin lights a torch, and the group sees the corridor from earlier. There's a door on the farthest side, and an opening to the larger chamber.
Dain turns to Lisbeth in the back row. "That wasn't there before, right?" Lis looks over his shoulder and shakes her head. In the corner of the hallway is the corpse of some unidentifiable humanoid. After witnessing this, the party makes its way into the larger chamber. They wander a bit within the radius of the torchlight, but no one sees anything out of the ordinary.
After briefly wandering about the room, they come to a door in the eastern side. "I'm going to see If I hear anything." Mirena goes up to the door and listens. Her face grows pale. "Oh gods, it's horrible…"
Dain sidles over to listen, putting his ear to the door and when there's this sudden otherworldly scream, a sound that no human could make, that comes from the door. Lisbeth quickly rummages through her bag, grabbing one of the pitons and the hammer, forcing the door shut as quietly as she can. They wait a tic before moving on. No more noises can be heard from the door, but everyone is on edge.
"I almost dropped the torch…" Harkin looks warily back to the door.
"Hey," Seraphine nudges him. "Don't look back… Just focus on what's ahead."
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine"
Lis watches this interaction quietly before commenting. "You two seem close. How long have you known each other?"
"Not too long," Seraphine looks at Harkin who shrugs. "We were both with the Guard for a time, and we met each other there. That was maybe two months ago?" Harkin nods in assent. "We've only been here a couple weeks, though. I'm just glad we were able to find some work."
"Dain and I were planning to register with the Guard when we got here. I guess we've just been preoccupied."
"You should," Harkin chimes in. "I've had a good experience with them. Why don't we get that squared away once we get out of here?"
"If we get out of here…" Lisbeth's statement casts a pall on the group.
They make their way to the northern end of the chamber, which leads to a short passageway. It branches off to the east and west, but the easterly one leads to a dead end. The western side ends in a door.
"I'm going to listen again," Mirena carefully walks over, muttering some prayers under her breath. She listens at the door and gasps. She turns to the rest of the group. "I think I heard a creaking noise!" Dain and then Elaria listen at the door for a couple minutes, both hearing nothing.
"I don't think there's anything." Dain creaks the door open, and Mirena gasps.
"I Guess I was right. Mirena, you're not allowed to listen at the doors anymore."
The room looks like a large dining hall. Seemingly suspended in time, the tables, benches, and the tapestries on the walls are in immaculate condition. There are no immediate threats, but Elaria spots a door on the farthest side.
"We could probably sell these tapestries." Lisbeth inspects one of them Elaria comes up besides her, "Yes, but how would we move them?"
"Yeah… I guess I didn't think about that."
"You've got to consider these things."
While this happens, the rest of the party makes their way to the door at the further end of the room.
Dain briefly examines the door, before turning to face the rest of the party. "I'm worried that we've spent too long wandering. We've gotten lucky so far, but the longer we stand around, the more likely something nasty is going to come across us. We can't afford to be so methodical."
"I think we can afford a couple of risks, but we shouldn't make a habit of it"
Dain gets the attention of Lisbeth and Elaria, who come over. Everyone prepares for a fight as Dain creaks the door open.
Within the 10 x 10 room is a set of stairs spiraling down into darkness. The party debates if it's better to go down the stairs now, or leave it for later. They come to the conclusion that they'd rather play it safe and come down after they've explored the rest of the dungeon. The group starts to make its way back through to the main chamber.
"Dain, why are you here?" Mirena asks.
"That's a bit out of nowhere, isn't it?" Dain pauses. "I suppose the same reason as the rest of us. Money"
"I thought so. I guess I was just curious." She looks down.
The group reaches the door in the North east of the central room. "This is where we that treasure last time we were here," Lisbeth points out. Opening the door, they find that the room looks practically the same as before. Except for a lone kobold holding a box. It tenses up as the party walks in.
"Hey, what are you doing?" Lisbeth calls out. The kobold freezes and stays silent.
Elaria rushes forward making aggressive gestures, "Get out of here! Go, Scram!"
The kobold drops the box and starts running. As it does, it pulls out a sling and tries to fire a shot, but fails to hit anyone.
The box is unlocked. Dain opens it, smiles, then turns to show it to everyone.
The box contains 2 gorgeously cut sapphires, as well as an extra couple hundred gold in coins. 1200 Xp.
The fact that something like this can happen, that the restocking roll gave the exact same result as the last time, is one of my favorite things about basing D&D off randomization.
The party goes through the door to the west, the same that the Kobold ran through moments ago. They arrive in the room with the medium-sized barracks from the last expedition.
"Let's take a minute to rest. Dain and I stayed here for a while last time." Lis looks at the party, who concurs. They spend about ten minutes sitting and resting.
Just a quick note since this whole scene might seem bizarre. The rules from Old-School Essentials, which I use for dungeon-crawling, requires the party take 10 minutes to rest per hour they're in the dungeon. Otherwise, they get a -1 to attack and damage rolls.
After they pick themselves up and grab their gear, the group explores the southern passage, which has been unexplored so far. Elaria and Dain both try to listen at the door. No one hears anything, so they open the door and all file in.
"Hey, it's that Kobold from before!" Mirena calls out, when there's a sudden flash of steel, and she sees Dain quickly deflect a blow with his claymore. A figure in a black cloak is standing in front of the group, longsword in hand. Mirena, Dain, Lisbeth and Elaria are all momentarily stunned as the dark elf turns again to attack.
Rifling through his back, Harkin pulls out a flask. He rips off part of his cloak, lights it on fire and hurls it over the rest of the group. The dark elf jumps out of the splash of the oil, right as Seraphine muscles her way through the group and strikes at him with her mace. The blow glances off his armor, but Seraphine has distracted him enough for the front line to regain their wits.
Winning the initiative, Mirena delivers a strong lateral swing at the dark elf, giving an opening for Dain to make a hefty slice with his sword as Elaria jumps into the fight with her twin daggers. Each of their attacks hit home as the dark elf is quickly beat into a bloody pulp. Upon witnessing this, the kobold darts the southeasternmost door.
Immediately, the party bears down on the door. It seems as though it's being held shut, when all of a sudden, there's no more resistance. Dain bursts the door open, and it reveals a 10' wide set of stairs that leads down into the darkness…
Apologies for the rather long wait between the last episode and now; life happens.
I opted to lessen the amount of italicized notes. It makes for a better reading experience, and I kind of had things figured out by now. Let me know if this was the right decision.
A lot of my stuff has blown up on Medium lately, so I wanted a chance to say "thank you" to everyone who has taken the time to read my work. Thank you all so, so much. I try to respond to every comment, so do not hesitate to ask questions.
This blog is, and always will be, 100% human-generated.