Friday, May 17
Thursday, May 16
|
Dungeons & Dragons Encounters is a weekly organized play event for Fourth Edition Dungeons & Dragons. The scenarios are presented one encounter at a time in sanctioned events and together present an unfolding storyline divided into seasons
Season 0: These early Encounters were short stories broken into four weekly encounters Be Careful What You Wish For
Week 1: Surviving the Storm / Salvage in the Storm Week 2: Elemental Assistance / Banishing the Hive
Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week 10 Week 11 Week 12 Week 13 Week 14
Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week 10 Week 11 Week 12
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Over sixty years ago, a group of bold adventurers calling themselves the Silver Company delved into a mysterious tower that appeared in the ruins of Castle Inverness. The result was tragic. Now, six decades later, an ambitious young cleric named Aldus Splintershield, seeking to make a name for himself and his clan, has organized a group of settlers to found a new town in the ruins of Castle Inverness. The heroes have been hired by Brother Splintershield to help ensure that the caravan reaches Inverness safely. Session 1: On the Road The caravan departed from Hammerfast. Along the road, the heroes met several important people, such as Brother Aldus Splintershield and the half-orc caravan guard, Malgram. When the caravan attempted to cross a small stream, it was attacked by stirges, which the heroes fought off.
Somewhere along a rough road through the Harken Forest, the heroes are assigned to guard Faldyra, an elf wizard and scholar traveling with the caravan, who wished to gather rare herbs known to grow in the area. During their brief expedition, the heroes stumbled across one of several encounters: a carnivorous plant, a goblin ambush, or a pack of hungry drakes. Session 3: Scouting the Tower Brother Splintershield asked the heroes to investigate the ruins of Castle Inverness before the settlers move in, to ensure that no danger lurked inside. In addition to learning more about the mysterious origins of the castle ruins, the heroes stumbled across a pair of ochre jellies that had taken up residence inside the castle’s still functioning fountain.
With the ruins of Castle Inverness cleared, the pilgrims moved inside the walls. Shortly before Brother Splintershield began a cleansing ritual to defend the area against evil, the broken tower at the center of the ruins shimmered and appeared to become whole. At the same time, undead attacked. The adventurers boldly defended Brother Splintershield against the onslaught of undead threatening to disrupt the ritual. Once the ruins were sanctified, the heroes were confronted by the ghost of Salazar Vladistone, who railed against them for keeping him from visiting the now-warded grave of his wife.
Several months have passed. The heroes and the town of Inverness have flourished. However, when rumors began to circulate that foresters from Inverness have gone missing, the heroes investigated, discovering a mysterious Abyssal plague.
The heroes continued to explore the Harken Forest, searching for the origin of the Abyssal Plague. While investigating a strange corpse, several phantom soldiers appeared and killed Brother Splintershield, breaking the sanctification of Inverness. With the wards destroyed, the town was now vulnerable to attack.
The heroes rushed back to Inverness to ensure the safety of the town, which they discovered to be already under attack. After sneaking past phantom sentries, the heroes helped Malgram get many of the townsfolk out safely, dispatching a number of Phantom Brigade soldiers in the process.
While searching for the missing wizard, Faldyra, the heroes came into direct conflict with the ghost of Salazar Vladistone. During the ensuing battle, the party realized that Vladistone could not be destroyed in his current form. Faced with no other recourse, the heroes rescued Faldyra and escaped from the burning ruins of their village. As the adventurers departed, Vladistone warned that he will have his revenge on the heroes.
...
Throughout the adventure, the characters do the bidding of three drow leaders who are working together: Priestess Ash'ala Melarn (the third daughter of Kynill Melarn), a wizard named Hoshtar Xorlarrin (a cousin of House Wizard Ravel Xorlarrin), and Ro'kolor, an agent of Bregan D'aerthe.
Under the orders of these three leaders, the adventurers undertake a journey to a long-abandoned drow outpost said to be located on a site charged with primordial energy—a kind of power that can feed Lolth's Demon Weave.
The characters battle Underdark monsters on the way to the lost outpost. They also encounter the badly injured survivors of the last party sent to the outpost, who reveal that one of their number betrayed them and left them for dead.
A group of svirfneblin ambush the adventurers, and the gnomes reveal that they were forewarned of the characters' approach.
The adventurers reach the outpost and find the treacherous drow who betrayed her allies and warned the svirfneblin about the characters. She is a priestess of House Faen Tlabbar, but also an unwitting pawn of the Jaezred Chaulssin, attempting to sabotage the efforts to claim the site's power for Lolth.
While promising to investigate the treacherous priestess, the triumvirate sends the adventurers on a new task. They have learned that a group of rebellious wizards is holding Hoshtar Xorlarrin, one of the adventurers' patrons, captive in the ruins of the House Srune'Lett compound, and they send the characters to help.
The adventurers reach the Srune'Lett ruins and find the building where the wizard is being held. They're greeted by young members of the Council of Spiders, who attack upon realizing the characters are a threat to the council.
The adventurers reach the inner chamber of the council's compound, where they learn that the Council of Spiders has been deceived. Hoshtar Xorlarrin is indeed a captive, held by a shadowy assassin who has killed two other, more senior members of the Council. The assassin thanks the characters for starting the war in earnest, but they kill or drive him off and free Hoshtar. Hoshtar explains what the Council of Spiders is and what the assassin was up to.
At this point, the characters have learned three key facts: A group of defiant priestesses (represented by the Faen Tlabbar priestess in the Shobalar outpost) seeks to undermine all attempts to create the Demon Weave in order to hold on to their own power. The Council of Spiders seeks male representation on the Ruling Council. Somebody (represented by the assassin) is trying to provoke this tension into open civil war.
The characters meet with the three drow leaders and help each one decide what position House Melarn, House Xorlarrin, and Bregan D'aerthe should advocate and support. All three groups might lean one way, or the groups—and the characters who belong to them—might fracture. In any event, the threat of the assassins and the possible outbreak of war is the top priority.
Depending on the outcome of the previous session, the characters might still be operating as a group (if all three leaders chose the same direction) or separately, but they are all going after Valan Jaelre. The factions all want to see him brought down, but each also has a secondary goal that will prevent the characters from wholly cooperating.
The adventurers enter the cellar complex where Valan Jaelre is thought to be hiding, and they face another priestess manipulated by the Jaezred Chaulssin. Depending on the outcome of the previous session, they might enter separately or together.
In the innermost part of the complex, the characters finally confront Valan Jaelre and other shadowy minions of the Jaezred Chaulssin. They must determine among themselves how to achieve their secondary goals.
Adventure Background Deep in the darkness of the Demonweb Pits, Lolth has been spinning a web of deceit, treachery, and ambition—but the time has come to fight back against her Darkening! Lolth's goal—to seize control of arcane magic, a domain that has lain vacant since the death of Mystra a hundred years ago. Under the advantage of her Darkening, Lolth’s servitors hope to help complete her ascendancy to her new role as Goddess of Magic. Can Lolth be stopped? War of Everlasting Darkness is a Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game adventure designed for the D&D Encounters official play program. This season is something new for the D&D Encounters Program—an exciting mini-campaign designed for play at your local Wizards Play Network location and an opportunity to playtest elements of the next edition of the Dungeons & Dragons rules. The season takes characters from levels 1-8.
The characters gathered in the village of Quaervarr, under the eaves of the Glimmerwood. Setting off together, they investigated rumors of a mysterious wandering phantom bound to a ruined fortress deep in the forest. Just as the characters lifted the curse, however, a sinkhole opened -- and from it, a stream of darkness poured upward, slowly growing to cover the sky.
Orcs from the Spine of the World were attacking the village of Winter Edge. The village elder asked the characters to approach and parley with the orc King Obould in Dark Arrow Keep. After years of peace, why had the orc tribes begun another war in civilized lands? While negotiating with the orcs, the characters could see that the king was having difficulty keeping his subjects from succumbing to the bloodlust that was the way of things before the first King Obould.
A horde of orcs has spread across the Glimmerwood and the Moonlands, while their raiding parties reach as far as Silverymoon and Everlund. In response to Obould's position on the war, the characters travelled to inform and seek aid from the dwarves of Mithral Hall. However, orcs were laying siege to the dwarven defenses...
A bumbling dwarf mystic named Axelcrantz informed the characters that they must obtain a magic relic lost in the Underdark—a relic that will play an important part in the thwarting of Lolth’s plans.
Axelcrantz performed an augury, revealing that a key to breaking the magical darkness that hangs over the Marches lay in the Fell Pass, where drow work to raise an undead army. The adventurers had to protect Axelcrantz from orc patrols and restless spirits as he traveled to the apex of Fell Pass to perform a ritual that can banish the darkness. However, the drow waited in an ancient fortress located in the pass. They had no intention of allowing their undead-raising ritual to be thwarted.
In the Fell Pass, the characters uncovered information telling them that the town of Nesmé was on the brink of being overrun by trolls, and Silverymoon would be next. Forced to dwell beneath the constant shadow of the Darkening, the people of Nesmé have succumbed to hopelessness and have little chance of defending themselves. The adventurers had to reach the town, help direct and assemble its defenses, and prepare for the assault.
As Lolth’s Demon Weave nears its completion, the magic of surface-dwelling spellcasters begins to falter, even as the drow are empowered. As the magical wards protecting Silverymoon fall, the characters followed another of Axelcrantz’s visions to the svirfneblin city of Blingdenstone. There, on the shores of the Darklake, they helped overcome devils to open up the trade routes without which the Silver Marches would fall.
Armed with the treasure, knowledge, and power they have acquired in their adventures around the Silver Marches, the characters travelled to the ruined drow city of Eryndlyn to confront Tsabrak Xorlarrin, the powerful wizard responsible for the darkness that covers the land. But were they prepared to face Danifae, the avatar of Lolth? The key to their success lay in helping a reborn Mystra seize control of the Demon Weave and restoring her tattered Weave. |
Recent ActivityPopular Pages |
