Gameplay

Grif the Kobold from the Keeper of the Keys meets the adventures as they cross a bridge into The Smithy. He expresses happiness that they found their way to The Smithy after the attack. They give him a summary of what they did. Eventually Griff tells them he will take them to meet Kontak Tekar (head kobold mechanist of the Keepers of the Keys) to repair Ariana’s key.

As they walk around they see steam and multicolored smoke bellowing out of various workshops. They head towards the hill at the middle of the city where the Citadel of the Keys is situated. As they walk to the citadel they see mechadron caravans and celestials bargaining with fey over goods.

Archmage Alana (human) has her villa at the citadel. As the team arrives, they see an ancient brass dragon landing on a tall tower within her villa.

Kontak’s workshop has tons of kobolds, gearforged, and dwarves working on creating tools and arcane weapons as well as keys. Ariana can understand draconic so she hears them cursing as they drop various things while working. Kontak meets with the party and agrees to fix the key. Advises them to visit the marketplace and get kitted up.

They first head into an Item shop run by purple Tiefling with a black cat familiar. Someone shows up wobbling around. Jackal is suspicious and quickly opens the trenchcoat to reveal 3 kobolds and they run out. The team buys a few supplies, but none of the magical supplies.

Afterward they visit an Armor/weapon shop run by dwarf where Jackal sells his light crossbow and buys a heavy crossbow.

As they leave the shop they hear a voice call out “I found you, you ugly beast!” A bearfolk dressed in wizard robes in front of them turns around and says in a deep voice, “You talking to me?” It’s the fey hunter from Zobeck who has tracked Jackal here. She shoots an arrow at him and the team begins to fight. About a minute into the fight a Destroying Angel joins the fight. He was sent by the Servants of Nidhogg to attack Appaluna. The fight is quite chaotic and Appaluna deals the most damage, but Jackal deals the killing blow to each, including beheading the fey hunter with his axe.

They go to sleep and the next day head to the workshop. After they get the key, they need to take it to get blessed at the Clockwork Temple of Rava. A tin flitkith who works for Little Timmy shows up and gives Ariana and Appaluna each potions of superior healing as a thanks for sparing him when they found him in the airship. There Holdevar (human), the Queen of the Labyrinth blesses the key.

Appaluna asks Hodevar about the Servants of Nighogg and Holdevar says a scout will return with information on the whereabouts of the cultists within a week.

Since they have a week before they can find out the information, Jackal yanks the key from Ariana’s hands and opens the portal. The team steps through and emerges into a forest.

GM Thoughts

At this point, I “know” how the rest of the story will go. Or rather, as I heard Sasha Baron Cohen once speaking about his process for Ali G, Borat, and his fashion designer character, I have an outline of where the story will go, but the other humans will define the details. I think it matches quite well with the experience of being a GM. So I have outlines for the last 3 planned sessions and as each week comes closer I outline the details. I do this for 2 reasons: First, to not get overwhelmed. Second, because it seems to be best practice advice from various Game/Dungeon Master guides and YouTube videos that it’s folly to plan too far in advance in case the players take you in a different direction. As I was working on the details for this session, I was re-reading about the fey hunter and saw the detail that they never give up once they have a quarry. So I decided she would be the inciting incident in the battle. Experimentation with multiphase battles is why the dark angel joined the fight rather than being a separate fight in the same session. We are jetting towards the end and I cannot wait to see what the kids think of the conclusion.

• Tales-of-the-Valiant