I...kind of went back on my promise to not propose a D&D game and thought, since this is the Christmas season and we brought our team back together, why not kick one off, especially since my brain is so beaten up by work that I need to relax?
Thank God both of them were free on December 22. However, I had schoolwork and, while it was tough and mind-numbing, this upcoming D&D game gave me the motivation to finish it and have some great conversations with my Japanese students while my friends were still busy.
I didn't really prepare for this game seriously and I didn't want to subject my players to a fight from the start since the evil dwarves we encountered last year were as noteworthy as your average video game mooks. As such, instead, I intentionally made the dwarves disappear with no explanation and froze the Sword Coast, as well as the team, in time and made them awaken from what felt like a coma.
I took inspiration from YandereDev's "organic gameplay" philosophy, as well as some D&D videos saying that the players should have the freedom to make decisions rather than having them heavily influenced by the DM, so I made my own character, LT, lose his memory temporarily. After all, this official D&D adventure, Dragon of Icespire Peak which comes with the Essentials Kit, is designed to be open-world.
Telnior, Aby's sorcerer, remembered that we were supposed to go back to the town of Phandalin to inform the townmaster that the midwife on Umbrage Hill is safe. Unlike LT, Telnior did not feel as much of the coma-like state.
As for YoSquid? He wasn't participating for some odd reason, but I didn't want to waste time since I treated this game as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, so I instead played around it and made YoSquid's elf fighter still in a coma.
Last year, on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being serious and 10 being funny, LT was 2, Telnior was 6, and YoSquid was 10. I should've asked earlier what was Aby and YoSquid's purpose for playing the game, and now I realized that they appreciate humor in D&D, so I tried to make LT into a 5. As such, after trying gentle ways of waking YoSquid up, we went increasingly more ridiculous, such as shouting at him or making fake monster noises. After all, I gotta transfer my real-life voice acting skills too.
We gave up trying to wake him up in the wild, even after tagging YoSquid on Discord. I felt like trolling, so on the way back to Phandalin, I made the team hear rustling in a bush. Telnior threw a stone at it and a human male voice yelled, "Ow! What was that!?"
Two wandering hunters came out of the bush and were suspicious of the team carrying what looked like a dead elf to the naked eye. Telnior responds negatively by calling them "imbeciles" and saying YoSquid is being his usual self. I went for lighter-hearted humor by making LT do a "tribal dance".
Telnior later followed up by asking what the hunters were doing and who they're affiliated with. I got lazy so I just made them nameless wanderers. Telnior responded coldly to their follow-up question by also saying we were wanderers too.
I then made the actual wanderers give us a kind goodbye. "May the wilds protect you," they said.
Upon arriving at Phandalin, Aby asked me if he has any spells to cure YoSquid of his extended coma. I explained that there is no cure; this is a case of "YoSquid is not talking in real life". (In retrospect, I should've added the suffix -itis which is used for inflammatory diseases like myocarditis, tonsilitis, and...ringpostitis.)
Shortly after Telnior joked about torturing YoSquid and LT joining in, YoSquid suddenly announced that he's back after doing an errand. We represented it in-game as YoSquid suddenly waking up from his coma so LT and Telnior were shocked.
After a barrage of insults from us like calling YoSquid a "sleeping beauty" or saying he wouldn't wanna sleep on a rock as hard as his skull, we took a proper rest in the inn.
After waking up, I decided to restore LT's memory to get the team back on track since Telnior remembered to return to Phandalin and, y'know, we want our quest payment. LT's a rogue with a hoarding disorder, after all. I also joked that the townmaster is protected by plot armor when YoSquid asked if he's still alive since we last played over 400 days ago.
Before going out of the inn, I paid homage to the recently released Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl and joked "I'll fine you 69,420 gp (gold pieces) if you're late!" LT then successfully jumped out the second-floor window after a 16 on an Acrobatics check as LT sprinted to the town hall. Telnior reminded LT that LT was supposed to pay...and yeah, I forgot about that. Oh well. I'm trying to not make LT perfect for the sake of roleplay.
I rolled another Acrobatics check to race to the town hall again...but only got a 9 while Telnior and YoSquid got 20 and 16, respectively. Wow. It's their lucky day.
YoSquid made a dice roll out of nowhere to determine whether or not he will interact with the townmaster. I played along; he got 1 and I got 17. I asked Telnior and he chose to do it reluctantly without doing a dice roll.
I made Townmaster Harbin Wester an extremely cowardly man, hence why he keeps his office door shut and thinks whoever knocks on his door might kill him. He started the conversation with "AHHH! Who's there!?"
YoSquid unexpectedly replied, "Your worst nightmare. GIVE ME YOUR CREDIT CARD SO WE WON'T HURT YOU." So much for "not socializing."
LT had enough of YoSquid fooling around and this is an important conversation, so, while Telnior talked like a normal person to the townmaster, LT grabbed YoSquid and shut him up after a 15 on a Strength check against YoSquid's Armor Class of 14. (I forgot the grappling rules.)
After Telnior introduced the team, YoSquid somehow broke out of my grip with a 17. Yeah, he's the lucky one in this game.
Unsurprisingly, YoSquid kept telling bad jokes. When describing our encounter with the midwife Adabra Gwynn, he said, "Didn't we rob 'em and steal all their loot and cash?"
When Telnior delivered the actual news of Adabra being safe, YoSquid said, "Oh thank you, nice mustache man. And your gold, credit card, passport, and a membership Star Wars card." I know this is medieval fantasy but this joke is just so weird and funny that I played along.
Telnior went physical as well and slapped YoSquid with an attack roll of 17. YoSquid tried to slap back but he only got a 7 which is less than Telnior's Armor Class of 11. Aby then replied with this GIF of a Falcon Punch:
After some more jokes and insults like YoSquid wanting to sleep just a few in-game minutes after waking up, the team looked at the bulletin board for more quests which read as follows:
Dwarven Excavation Quest. “Dwarf prospectors found ancient dwarven ruins in the mountains southwest of here, and have been working an archaeological dig seeking treasure and relics. They need to be warned that a white dragon has moved into the area. Take the warning to them, then return to Townmaster Harbin Wester to collect a reward of 50 gp.”
Gnomengarde Quest. “A clan of reclusive rock gnomes resides in a small network of caves in the mountains to the southeast. The gnomes of Gnomengarde are known for their magical inventions, and they might have something with which to defeat the dragon. Get whatever you can from them. If you bring back something useful and don’t want to keep it for yourselves, Townmaster Harbin Wester will pay you 50 gp for it.”
We reached a fairly quick decision. Telnior simply wanted to rescue the dwarves while YoSquid wanted the gnomes' treasure, so LT broke the tie with a more logical approach being the lunatic tactician he is: the dwarves are isolated so they can easily hide from the dragon while getting the gnomes' treasure might actually allow us to stop the dragon threatening the Sword Coast.
YoSquid thinks this treasure might be a cellphone. I was a little confused at first but also played along with it since, #1, Genshin Impact has guns; #2, smartphones in my Urban Fantasy game idea are the modern-day equivalent of wands, able to literally hack people's bodies by genetically modifying them or glitching their internal organs, among other things.
Aby then asked to stop the game here after a solid 1 hour. Both Aby and YoSquid had fun and I did too, honestly. My brain was tired at this point, especially since I had students to teach afterward. We gladly ended by greeting each other "Merry Christmas!"
Thank you again to you two for completing my Christmas. I hope you, as well as my readers, enjoyed your Christmas too.
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