One in a million spheres

In the present time the last of the melniboneans have long since died, some of their half-breed descendants rule a few isolated estates.

The adventure so far is one of Survival/Exploration, I might run a campaign and flesh it out as I go.

The area is temperate wilderness of hills and scrub forest with overgrown ruins and isolated small settlements.

the only PC race available is...

Half Melnibonean +1 Intelligence, +1 Wisdom.

+2 to Craft (alchemy), Intimidate, Knowledge (arcane), Knowledge (Million Spheres), and Spellcraft.

Deep Sight: functions as low-light vision and creatures with a wisdom score have a nimbus of light based on their wisdom (higher is brighter, in increments of 6).

+2 on saves versus enchantment spells and effects.

So far...

The manor of the small estate where the 1st level PCs are from was burnt to the ground by the human slaves. The heroes left the island in a rowboat with nothing but the clothes on their back and a suit of melnibonean platemail. Setting ashore on the mainland they headed out for the only other estate they knew of. The next day they awoke to a smiling man wearing poorly tanned leather armor leaning on a composite longbow. He politely asked for the ornate, extremely valuable melnibonean platemail and when the fighter went for his weapons, 5 arrows sprouted out of his back. The others just nervously smiled and let the bandits take the armor.

After a few days of travel carrying the fighter on his tower shield the party came upon the ruined estate, only rubble and a dilapidated manor house surrounded by a flooded garden remained. As they camped on the hill above, waiting for dawn to go explore, a half dozen humanoids rose out of the flooded garden and began shambling up the hill towards them. The party charged to attack and the zombies ate the brains of two monks and dragged the bodies back to the garden, the last two PCs were heavily wounded after killing four zombies and fled.

The survivors rested a few days and went back to explore but this time the four zombies attacking included their two former comrades. After dispatching them the fighter decided to stay outside and the last monk bravely waded across the flooded garden and climbed through a window into the manor. He crept around and upstairs he found three large boxes, one of which made a noise. When he opened the box a manacled, badly injured man was struggling to get out, then someone hit the monk from behind and knocked him out.

With the entire partied tied up and blind folded inside large boxes they got pretty discouraged, finally after much wailing and gnashing of teeth and complaints about the crappy DM the one PC with ranks in escape managed to untie himself, punch a hole through the box, unlock it and then release the others. As they stealthily crept about they couldn't find a secret door but did find the trap on the boarded up window, so down the stairs they went. They discovered a dozen or so traps, set some off the hard way and hid in various places around the manor as the mysterious 'put people in boxes' dude walked around looking for them.

At one point a few hours later, two PCs managed to escape from the house and saw a little girl still inside and actually went back in to get her. One managed to save the girl and other monk got caught by the bad guy again. Eventually the two trapped PCs managed to put their Craft (alchemy) skill to use and escape the house as well.

A few more people showed up, we ate some pizza, made some characters and then I put in the DVD that I had watched before I came over to DM...

... The Collector, they all decided that it was not cool for me to watch horror movies before DMing.

At this point the party consists of

monk 4

monk 3/rogue 1

monk 2/druid 1

monk 2/cleric 1

fighter 3

**Next the party fought a cave lion, and after barely surviving decided not to go into the prides cave to look for cubs to raise. A few days travel later they found a spring and met some tengus who took pity on the unarmed fancily dressed party and led them back to their forest village.

After casting comprehend languages the party was able to discern that the two tengu were about to embark on a ritualized suicide mission to retake the city they once dwelt in. The party decided to go with the doomed pair and at one of the cavern entrances one tengu lured out a dire tiger, sacrificing himself so the others could attack it, a crit and a stunning attack or two later they were victorious. Inside they crept around and found three blind humans turning spits over a fire next to a sleeping giant and after heroically murdering him in his sleep they found other human slaves. So they decided to take them back to the tengu village.

So now the players will make tengu characters if one of the heroes dies.

Languages

Toad is the common name for the Boggard language

• Aboleth (aboleth, skum)
• Abyssal (demons and other chaotic evil outsiders)
• Aklo (inhuman or otherworldly monsters, evil fey, serpentfolk)
• Aquan (aquatic creatures, water-based creatures)
• Auran (flying creatures, air-based creatures)
• Celestial (angels and other good outsiders)
• Ceratioidi (ceratioidi)
• Common (fetchlings, harpies, humans)
• Dark Folk (dark creepers, dark slayers, dark stalkers)
• Draconic (dragons, reptilian humanoids)
• Druidic (druids only)
• D'ziriak (d'ziriaks, fetchlings)
• Ei'risai (ei'risai)
• Giant (cyclopses, ettins, giants, ogres, trolls)
• Grimlock (grimlocks)
• Grippli (grippli)
• Gnoll (gnolls)
• High Melnibonean (melniboneans, wizards)
• Ignan (fire-based creatures)
• Infernal (devils and other lawful evil outsiders)
• Low Melnibonean (melniboneans)
• Maenad (maenads)
• Ophiduan (ophiduans)
• Protean (neh-thalggus, proteans)
• Sylvan (badger folk, fey creatures, plant creatures)
• Tengu (tengus)
• Terran (earth-based creatures)
• Toad (boggards, horkist and toads)
• Treant (treants)
• Undercommon (cloakers, dark stalkers, gremlins, gugs, morlocks, skulks, underfolk)
• Vegepygmy (vegepygmys)
• Xeph (xephs)

And if you can read invisible writing you can play one the secretive badgers that also dwell in the tengu forest

At this point the party consists of half-melnibonean monks and the fighter still pining for his lost armor

A lawful Good level 6 monk

A lawful Good level 5/1 monk/rogue

A lawful Neutral level 2/3 monk/druid

A lawful Good level 2/3 monk/cleric

A Chaotic Neutral level 5 fighter

**Back at the caves the party fought a dozen boggards and a giant one-eyed boggard named Randy. One ran away and Randy surrendered when he got to one hit point. After they tied up Randy and debated what to do next six more boggards attacked. Randy ran off when attacked by a party member and after finishing up the boggards they went looking for him. They found two more of the big one eyed boggards named Travis and Trit, they chatted with the party for a while offering to release 100 humans slaves in exchange for food. The party went back to the village to get some food.

Everyone was 6th or 7th level at this point

**Next session they went back to the caves with 50 pounds of live food, almost enough for 1 human (Travis and Trit said they would count live food as double its weight). A misshapen boggard with a huge lower jaw met them where Travis and Trit were and asked for the food, the party hem-hawed around and Big-jaw promptly fled into the darkness. They chased him for a while until they finally realized they were running in circles with no chance of catching him. Onward down the main tunnel they came to a large cavern with a set of ancient stairs leading upwards. Part way up the stairs they met a human lurking in the shadows who informed them that his people had killed the remaining guards and fled already.

Once at the top of the stairs a huge pair of double doors lead into the throne room where the party met their doom.

So now the party consists of 4 badgers

wizard/cleric/mystic theurge 3/3/2

cleric/wizard/mystic theurge 3/3/2

rogue/shadow dancer 5/3

fighter/rogue/bloodclaw master 3/3/2

the last of the half-melniboneans

fighter 8 (who didn't show up)

monk/druid/death delver 2/3/3 (the NPC, who obviously I should have sent with the last party)

and a tengu scholar

monk/rogue/wizard 2/3/3 (who also didn't show up)

**Everyone showed up this time and defeated Death Cart II and pals. The mighty (now 9th level) PCs led a procession of celebrating tengus back to their ancient home on the mountain top amidst the ruins of the once great city. Now all they have to do is make alliances with the townsfolk and escaped human slaves, eradicate/tame the wyverns, destroy the toad queen, stop the shoggoth tide and convince the librarian and torturer to help.

**The party lept off the mountain top ruins and feather fell to the ground so they could battle the toads that retreated into the depths back to their queen. And Brand the Forgotten and one of the badger mystic theurges are gone. The party is now 10th level.

Death Cart III will be a little bit different