This is a recounting of a D&D session last night that is worthy of legend. Sit back, hold on, get a big bowl of popcorn and try not to widdle your knickers

The Background

So, I have started up a Zoom D&D campaign April 2020, something to take our minds off of what was happening in the real world. It has been fun reusing my DM skills and watching a group of people who hadn’t played in a long time – including one brand spanking newbie, go through the world that I have pretty much been making up on the fly.

The party currently consists of

hobbit thief, a gnomish cleric, a human wizard, and an elven fighter, all in the 7-9 level range

There is also a NPC thief- Louise (who traditionally has been extremely unlucky in combat situations) and just recently a human – Melaine a young girl who is learning to be cleric.

The Story

The party is riding on to their destiny and they stop for the night to rest as any party would do, they are in a clearing about 100 yards from a river. They are in a valley between two very high mountains. It was the middle of the night and the two NPCs – Melaine and Louise are on watch. All is peaceful until a largish group of Orcs come tromping through the forest making a whole lot of racket.

Melaine, being young and somewhat skittish, casts a light spell on a rock and throws it in the direction of the noise. The rock lands and suddenly the three orcs at the edge of the clearing get two eyefuls of sunshine, they squeal and start stumbling out into the clearing. The other 10 orcs think “SHIT, I think I forgot to turn off the stove, I should go home and check”.

Meanwhile, Louise, who so far has not been able to hit the broadside of a barn with a handful of rice, goes full berserker. She pulls out her short sword, starts roaring incoherently and charges.

Next round, the party awakened by the incoherent roaring gets up and looks around. The fighter goes “Huh, orcs.” He pulls out a fire arrow, fires it right in front of one of the blinded orcs and promptly goes back to his bed roll. “They are just orcs, not worth getting upset over”

Melaine casts an entangle spell on orc and successfully stops it from being a threat. The wizard casts a cantrip to amplify his voice and in his best orcish bellows “WHO DARES TO DISRUPT MY SLEEP”. Unfortunately his best orcish it came out as “Hey dudes, chill out”. This did not have the desired effect, you win some, and you lose some.

Louise, who is totally hyped up on adrenalin reaches one orc who was desperately trying to run away. She swings her sword and rolls BOOM natural 20. This was a backstab attack from a thief so the damage is multiplied by 3 and then by 2 for the natural 20. She could have done 48 damage. Fortunately for the orc, she only did 18. Unfortunately for the orc, it only could take 10.

Louise 1, orcs 0.

Back to Melaine. Seeing that her orc couldn’t move she approaches casting Charm Monster on it. She wants to be friends. Cue the wizard, now pissed that his first plan didn’t go off as expected decides to cast Magic Missile. This spell is very quick to go off, somewhat unlike Charm Monster. Just as Melaine is getting close, the orc acquires three golf ball sized holes in its head. Someone should have stayed in bed this morning.

Wizard 1, orcs 0

Now, I am sure you are wondering about the third orc. This is where it gets serious. The third orc finally gets its eyesight back to see a hobbit rushing at it. Now, if I was an orc and saw a small thing rushing at me with a blade I would run away, wouldn’t you? Well orc turned around to run away and ran into a tree.

Tree 1, orc 0.

Slightly stunned, the orc stumbles back a step, mutters the orcish equivalent of “fuck” and sees the berserker formerly known as Louise approaching, at speed.

Louise swings her sword BOOM natural 20 again. I didn’t even bother to roll damage.

Louise 2, orcs 0

Then the party went back to sleep after they helped Melaine clean the orcs brain matter off of her face.

And then there was the dragon, but that is another story for another time

#DungeonsAndDragons