Game Report - Stupid tents

Our heroes, after leaving their encampment, head west, continually walking towards the Salt City. While traveling down a beaten road, they notice a figure running towards them from the south. It’s a dragonborn wizard, who politely asks for their assistance with some kobolds that he conveniently lead their way.

It’s a mounted troop of kobolds, three slingers atop three dire rats. They quickly are attempt to surround the players, only to be thwarted with some well-placed tactics. After all kobolds have been killed, Riley, the dragonborn, goes around stabbing the kobolds, making sure they are extra-dead. Seems our NPC has a bit of a vendetta against kobolds, and had recently raided the kobold excavation camp to the south. He asks the PCs if they were interested in killing some kobolds. They agree, and head south, with the dragonborn handing off a sword hilt shaped like a devil’s face to the warlock as payment for their help.

They come across a primitive camp around what appears to be an impact crater, with a small tarp over an indent in the ground, a few tents, and a couple of kobolds standing around. The dragonborn fills them in to their surroundings, saying the tarp appears to protect their pets, a festering mass of rats and beetles. Upon hearing this, the wizard decides that he’s going to fricassee whatever is under there, and casts burning hands under the tarp. The rest of the party head towards the mass of tents.

Once the players are in motion, a kobold standing near the impact crater panics and unintentionally flings itself over the crater, dying in a mess on the ground 70 feet below. The other kobold who was standing around runs into the nearest tent to hide. They discover that the tents mainly cover holes leading into a dungeon, and in the crater, there was a small cadre of kobolds hanging out with a shadar-kai. (The shadar-kai are a ‘dark’ race of humanoids from the shadow plane who listen to too much Marilyn Manson.) After making these discoveries and knocking all the tents over...just in case...a kobold surrounded by rats and a kobold with bugs in a cage showed up. The kobold with bugs threw his cage at the fighter, who was noticably bothered, and the rat master sent his minions against the party. Despite these annoyances, the PCs managed pretty well.

They went down the hole and defeated a couple of kobolds, pigeon fodder, and entered a cavern to chase down a cowardly kobold. They come across a room full of fire beetles, and, not considering them a threat, all clumped together in a 3x3 space. Once they did this, the fire beetles all breathed fire on them, knocking out Riley and a PC. Another player also took a nap from a dark one snooping about stabbing people in the back. Eventually a well-placed acid arrow cleared out the room and they finally took a minute to reflect. They decided that they wanted to see this to the end, but not that night, so they merely took a short rest. They will pick up in the same place next week.

Lessons learned: There is not a lot of room at that little table. I was constantly struggling to find space; on the other hand, it was good to be right where the board was and be able to tell what was happening at all times. It’s a give and take. Also, having a cool location helps the experience a lot. It feels a lot better than a big empty room with monsters in it.