Game Report: It was a Monster Mash

The PCs found themselves in the exact same room, and started to look around. They found that there was limited correspondence between the people they just took down and the Order of Gold, making their mission a little suspect. As they attempt to leave the room, the room went dark and the following happened.

“As you prepare to leave, all light in the room guts out. All attempts to reignite them, magical or otherwise are worthless. An examination of the door proves it to be locked. After 15 seconds, you see eyeslits suddenly glowing red from where the machination stood. A guttural growling and whirling of gears can be heard. (Wizard: “Get behind the table!”) The heat in the room climbs greatly, and you can feel the moisture of steam against your skin. A sudden pungent odor of oil and copper hits your nose, and the ground beneath you vibrates. (Wizard: “Get behind the table!!”) You watch as more red lights pop into existence, outlining the shape of a noble red dragon head, its eyes darkening, its mouth slowly opening to reveal a vast oven fire inside. (Wizard: “Get behind the table!!!”) You prepare as the fire within its maw crackles and sparks, and you feel the immediate burst of hot air that heralds the blast of flame from the ancient device. The dragon's breath tumbles out of its metallic maw…

As the flames would engulf you, the light turns on, and all your senses immediate reject the illusion. The ground is firm, the air smells only of moss and old stone, you can only hear your allies breathing heavily, and the rusty machine still sits in the corner unmoved, its mouth closed. It is different though; it appears to be covered with a fine white powder, with blue circles around its eyes and its mammoth mouth traced in red. Also, perched on its nose is a pale man with dark long hair and piercing eyes, wearing a high-shouldered flowing cape of purple and a multi-zippered black vest with dark slacks, slyly smiling.”

It was a nameless vampire, there to invite them to a party, apparently. He was going to invite the people the party just killed, but seeing as they were “preoccupied,” invited the PCs instead. He also made it clear that this was a mandatory event, but they would returned to this very room in the exact same condition when it was over. Not seeing a choice in the matter, they agreed, and were transported to a grand palace with no windows deep in the city, and there were given a magically enchanted room to rest up in, getting eight hours of rest in only a couple, as well as getting a chance to bath, which they apparently leapt at.

Their host returned to take them to the party…where they discover the following:

“The grand ballroom is of the same stock as the other buildings you've seen in the city, but has been decorated in oranges and blacks with streamers and tables. Near the front of the ballroom is a small stage, where a band of a bassist, a keyboardist, a saxophonist and a singer play lazy tunes for the assorted crowd. The crowd itself is an odd bunch, as you appear to some of the few true humanoids. The rest are pale tall vampires, lycanthropes unabashedly in their half-wolf form, a few mummies, some sahuagins, and even a couple of flesh golems, one with a beehive haircut at least two feet tall. Your host escorts you to the snack table, which consists mostly of red punch and bat-shaped cookies. ‘I have some things to do, please mingle and enjoy yourselves. If you're looking for entertainment, there are siderooms set aside for various spooky activities.’”

So, they were attending a Halloween party, specifically a monster party, with all the Universal Monsters in attendance. The party chuckled, realizing that anything that happens here will most likely be harmless, and schmoozed. After a few minutes talking to other captive humans, they decided to check out the siderooms, starting with the pumpkin patch.

Here they found some monsters tykes, small adorable vampire girl, a mummy boy, a young sahuagin, etc. They are asked if they want to carve a pumpkin, and perform various checks to carve the pumpkins and gain the trust of the youngsters. They succeed pretty well (after a couple of miscarves that created some true monstrosities.) The station attendant gave them a trinket as a gift, an amulet to help them in battle.

They then go through the Haunted Hallway, where the station attendant puts on a stereotypical ‘vampire’ accent and explains the concept of the kiddie horror, and then tells them if they rush through the haunted area they would get a prize. So, they step into the first room, a typical Victoria bedroom, and instantly spot the trick, a fake body suspended by a room that would fall from the ceiling. Once they are all in the room, the body falls after the attendant says a lame pun, and then the noose comes to life and begins choking the cleric, while a haunt begins to torment the rest of the party...

The ruse is on, each room features some monster that pop out and harry the party. The next room contains a very fake graveyard with funny tombstones…and about ten zombies ripping through the Astroturf. The next room was a long hallway with swirling walls and a strobe light, and a quickling running through it. There was a mad scientist’s lab, and a stereotypically overflowing beaker produced an azure jelly. The final room was a desert with weird obelisks…which someone provoked a purple worm to appear. They ran like hell from the purple worm, and got out of the haunted hallway with plenty of time to spare, and were rewarded with an orb.

With only one last room to explore, they walked in confidently. It was the Hall of Horrors, with the old gag of having people touch “brains” and “eyeballs” when it was really cold spaghetti in jello and peeled grapes. The savvy wizard was apparently aware of the gag, and even tried to put one of the eyeballs into his mouth, only to find that it didn’t come loose…it was attached to something. Upon removing their blindfold, they saw that the “eyeballs” were in fact gibbering mouthers, and the “brains” was a gelatinous cube filled with cold spaghetti. Beyond a few acid troubles, and a few players being swallowed by the cube, they easily took care of the sudden threat.

They returned to the main hall to see the party rapping up, as the vampires gave out some costume awards, none to the PCs, and then their host came back and asked them if they had fun. They said they did, and that would be great…even though they were all individually expecting a trap. It’s true, there was a trap, but they didn’t see it coming. They were returned to the same room alive, but were accompanied by a number of monsters as well.

The PCs now found a fight with classic monsters on their hand, with a flesh golem, a mummy, a werewolf, and a sahuagin (Creature of the Black Lagoon) at their throats. They quickly took out the sahuagin before it could do anything, but found themselves a bit fearful around the mummy, causing some of their hits to miss. The flesh golem proved troublesome, hardhitting and capable of going on a tear that targeted everyone in the room. After they handled the mummy and the bite-furious werewolf, they still had some trouble crashing through the flesh golem’s hit points, but eventually had a turn of luck and managed to end it.

Exhausted, weary, and still a little giddy from the overly-silly party they had been to, they left the room…only to find the body of Riley, the dragonborn wizard, quartered into three pieces and hung on a rack, his entrails exposed, very dead.

Lessons Learned – The holiday session is always one of my favorite sessions, just because it lets me take a slight plot departure and throw in some tremendously silly things. I think this one was well-received, and I had fun lampshading what I find to be an obnoxious holiday. That said, there were some stutters, mostly caused by a wider range of enemies causing some party-to-enemy mismatches (gelatinous cube not strong enough, flesh golem too strong), and a few spoken flubs on my part. Chief among them is I failed to name the host...a mistake that I wasn’t able to recover. Otherwise, the players are really starting to understand the game and enjoy themselves, and I think this next weekend I’ll put some more plot into their hands, now that the Salt City’s stage is mostly set and they’re quickly approaching the paragon tier.