Road Crew Report 3 Accursed Heart of the World Ender (spoilers)

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Meadhelm
Far-Sighted Wanderer
Posts: 29
Joined: Wed Mar 25, 2020 2:39 pm
FLGS: Level-Up games in hastings, mn

Road Crew Report 3 Accursed Heart of the World Ender (spoilers)

Post by Meadhelm »

The party started with 12 0-level commoners, and one 1st level halting (survivor from Portal Under the Stars)
Good turnout for players, I had 1 cancel the day of, but still had 5 players (not counting myself) so it was a good sized group.

Deaths:
Gorflagratior’s appearance in the temple: 4 deaths (one who drew the spear, and a single good stomp killing 3).
Mutant Deer: 0 (some damage though, but low Judge rolls)
Traitor templars: 0
Gorflagratiors hurled boulder: 1 (kerSPLAT! Went my IRL friend’s last PC, someone had all 3 of theirs though, so I asked them to give hime one and gave his other 2 characters a luck point)
Lord Featherstone and his men: 0
Accursed Heart: 1
Severed Handman: 1

Of course, Lord Featherstone will still want that spear, and who knows what will become of the severed Handman, could restore the essence, his essence of Gorflagratior???

This was a great funnel, a little more sparce with treasure perhaps, but that’s fine by me and the pacing was fun and easier to fit in a single session than Portal.

Some minor things I changed or chose as I ran it:
I allowed players the chance to sell their trade goods/livestock before leaving on the adventure.
I had them arrive at the temple the day before the ceremony (rather than let them fart around for 3 days)
Let them looky loo around the temple casually. One of them looked at the altar and identified there was a dagger and holy water, but no one tried to steal any of it, surprisingly) but they made use of the holy water and eventually the hide scroll to summon the servant of Askpaksjdfklj to grapple Gorf. During the panic of Gorf’s attack, those that want to take something from the altar, I had them make a luck check as they would be scrambling in fear (and none of them were specific about what to take after the dagger was taken) and if they failed the luck check I said they grabbed something other than the hide scroll.
I used the image for the demon snake in the Portal under the Stars VTT set for the goodly insect snake servant token (blown up really large of course.

Accursed Heart of the World Ender
Player Summary:
Every seven years, member of a secret order of templars go out amongst the people of the land in search of the lost lineage of the great King.
The hopeful commoners gathered for the ceremony, each of them being changed by the Curse of the First Gods as they failed to pull the spear, although some seemed more changed than others, as some had their hair change, others with bark like skin, one to hulking brute, and one to lizard man to name a few. Even the inordinately lucky halfling suffered from some premature crows feet and overgrown foot hair.
As the final candidate pulled the spear there was hearty cheers, shouts, and prayers! These were cut short however, as Gorflagratior was freed from his earthen tomb and burst forth, slaying the would be king as he was thrown into a pillar of the temple and crumpled.
In the melee which followed, the commoners inflicted significant damage to Gorflagratior as he Attempted to retrieve the spear. After he sent his heart to escape and summoned his armor, and proved he could squish several to death with a single stomp of his foot, escape seemed prudent.
While the altar's holy water proved efficacious, it was the animal hide with inscribed with a magical chant which bought them time to escape as a gigantic snake moth was summoned to grapple with the titanic fiend. At the snake moth's telepathic urging, the survivors quickly fled with the Seven Tree Spear to chase down the heart.
Mutated Pandaemonic deer menaced them in the forest, initially caught the now changed common folk by surprise, tolling their pound of flesh before they were quickly dispatched.
Further into the forest, many of the survivors realized some of the mutant templars were in fact stalking them! Having realized they were being followed, they took no chances and decided to instead to subtly maneuver themselves and then suddenly strike them. After slaying one of the templars outright, shouted threats and warnings managed to get the other traitor templars to flee.
As the party followed the trail out of the forest and up the hill... (Continued in part 2)

The trail led up a hill and into a cave, and Gorflagratior took revealed himself and hurled a boulder crushing Seaaver the corn farmer.
Once inside the party was confronted by Lord Featherstone's men-at-arms. After the party slew one of them, Lord Featherstone arrived and demanded the spear. The party refused but persuaded Lord Featherstone to let them pass, Featherstone arrogantly certain of their death.
Deeper in the cave the party found the beating, accursed heart of the World Ender. The vile creature spewed its acidic blood at them, slashed with its massive wings, but as it did so our heroes hurled the Seven Tree Spear at it, others picking it up to try and drive it home afterwards, only to eventually have the spear eventually became entangled in the halfing's armor. As the severed hand of gorflagratior began to advance from the rear, sandwiching the party in a pincer of doom, the party eventually drove the heart down to its destruction with pitchforks and hacked it apart with their swords.
The death of the heart sent the hideous hand-creature fleeing, having only claimed one victim from the rear, and a massive thump foretold of Gorflagratior's fall.
Catching their breath in the adjacent chamber, the party found Lord Featherstone's abandoned to camp to well supplied, and helped themselves to some of it, in total they found:
two week’s worth of fancy rations (for each character), including wine, pastry, and sugar plums,
seven sets of saddlebags,

85 gold pieces,
264 silver pieces, and
a detailed map of the valley around the Temple of the Sacred Bloodline.

Survivors:
Belzin the Elder, the Halfling whose apparent age belies his spritely feet and considerable luck(Austin) (he really doesn’t look that old however, but best not to argue about it…)
Rolnack the Toothsome, a squire turned warrior, so-called due to his second row of teeth (Sam)
Gorth the Platinum Haired, the rice farmer turned Warrior, whose billowing locks shine like silver (Patrick)
Amn’chaa Voidcrown, the elven forester whose hair is blacker than night (Steve)
Lenard Hightower, former mercenary turned Cleric, possessor of stunning good looks and charming personality (Scott)
And of course, Isegg The Turnip, former turnip farmer now a warrior whose plant like skin helps him recover with rest. (Scott)
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Group A game 2_2.jpg (169.21 KiB) Viewed 17125 times
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