Enter the Tower

I would like to start today by wishing a fond farewell to Ctrl-Alt-Del. In the incarnation that we know it Ctrl-Alt-Del has run its course and its author is going to be taking it in another direction. It has been one of my favorite web comics for a long time now, and I will miss being able to take a short break during my work day to relax with some of my favorite characters. I look forward to seeing what Tim Buckley does with his reboot, and I wish him nothing but success in the future. But for now, to paraphrase Loren L. Coleman in his novel Endgame, "God save Ethan MacManus..."

For those of you who don't know what I am talking about, you can find out all about it in the archives here....  http://www.cad-comic.com/

Ok, so I am a bit late with this update from last Wednesday's game, but holidays have a way of screwing everything up that way. So here we go with the first of what will likely be another multi-part update....

...As the door is opened the party is consumed by darkness, and as the light returns to the world they find themselves inside the tower, and the door behind them has disappeared. Having no way to go but forward the party goes down the long hallway, where they find a lumpy form under a blanket. Waking the being they discover a human in heavy plate. When questioned the human replies that he was also trapped inside the tower and had not yet ventured up the stairwell. The party being short front-line fighters immediately accepted his offer to join them, bringing them to believe that their group was now complete. The newly joined member of the party leads the way upstairs into the unknown.

I would here like to point out that the new party member that joined in during this session was an addition that I as the DM was not aware of until the minute that the session was starting. For future reference, you should always give your DM/GM at least a days notice, more is better, when bringing a new player into a game. This is something that the DM/GM needs to prepare for to make sure proper encounter strength and treasure levels. (Player Hint #1.... Yes I am doing Player Hints now as well, I know I know, I am that awesome)

As the party ventured through the multiple levels of the maze-like tower they encountered.... well not much actually.... Tip for DM's out there, dungeons be they maze-like or otherwise need to have consistent amounts of enemies, otherwise your players will get bored, which is what happened in our session on Wednesday. (DM Hint #8) I was so thrilled with my construct of the Master's Tower, that I overlooked the fact that by some possibility it was possible to avoid all of the encounters, thus leaving you with a simple tower that just took forever to walk through. To my dismay, and through random chance, the players found this "Perfect path".  When the complaints started I did what any good or even mediocre DM would do.....I agreed with the players. I called an immediate break, told them that they had successfully ventured through the tower, had them meet with the Master of the Tower, who gave them their plot items, and then let them get back to the main plot. I know what I am passing on to you now, if you are the DM and your players are not happy, you will not have a game. Never try to press a bad situation as a DM, unless you are 100% sure that whatever comes next will pull your bacon out of the fire. Because it is a much better idea to let the players skip what you learned to late was a poorly designed dungeon, then to force them to play it out and piss everyone off. (DM Hint #9)

After leaving the Master's Tower, the party, now permanently one man stronger, got back on track with their main quest of locating the King's exiled brother. Successfully navigating through the desert the party finally came upon the Greenstone Monastery, where the King's brother was sent all of those years ago.  As they came upon the massive structure, they knocked upon the gate, and after simply asking for entrance the gates opened before them. Finding themselves in the middle of a beautiful set of gardens, both vegetative and zen varieties, they were guided through them in all of their beauty and to the monastery itself. They asked to be taken to the Abbot, and with no argument they saw him immediately. It was as they walked into his study that they saw the spartan lifestyle of the brothers lives here at the monastery, as the room contained little more then a kneeling mat, a side table which held a single cup and a a pot of water, and a large window overlooking the gardens. When questioned the Abbot informed them that the King's brother, who had served well during his time as a brother of the order, had been kidnapped a mere two weeks previous to their arrival. He informed the party that he had brothers out searching for him and his captors, and that they would be back soon. Accepting the Abbot's help, the party decided to remain at the monastery and await the brothers' news. While awaiting the brothers' return each of the party members took advantage of the monasteries isolation meditation chambers. It was here, while meditating in a place where time had and senses had no place or meaning that the party all had visions of their futures, visions of normalcy shrouded in despair. It brought them all to a low point, especially as they had no idea what these visions pertained too. Soon enough though the brothers returned and the party memer were brought out of their isolation. With a clue as to the king's brother's location they set off for South Vale, a suburb of Vale, the capital of the nation of the same name. Arriving in South Vale, the party began their own search each attempting to find information using their own unique skill sets. Three of them confirmed information which matched and brought the party to venture the two day trip into the Capital.

That is where the session ended for the night. The party leveled, partly due to their conquests in the tower, and the successful information gathering.....partly because I felt bad that the Tower was a fail and that they missed out on all of the XP that they either bypassed or was skipped by me. Another thing that a DM has to know is that sometimes you have to give a little to get a little. I know that the tower flopped, and I wanted to make it up to my players, so I thought that it would be an appropriate apology.

Once again apologies for the late post... I will try not to let it happen again. I just found out a hilarious story about a friend of mine, so look out there might be a bonus post tomorrow. Until then.... well.... may your characters be swift, and your DM's generous.

-Eraser