Benedict Cumberbat and Little Tiny Hugh Jackman Abs

The recap of this latest session has been delayed by work, sleep, and general laziness.  We had to meet a little earlier in the day, most of us had worked a lot that week, and many of us had a rough week in general, so about an hour and a half at the start of the game was spent de-stressing, leveling up (from last week), detoxing from life being generally tough, and shooting the breeze.  That led to a chatty and not overly focused session of gaming, which isn't bad in general, and honestly was what most of us needed (I think).  However, that means this is going to be a shorter than usual blog.  People leveling meant Aaron, Caelin, and Tracy got to pick their class specialties.  Aaron surprised me by picking Oath of the Ancients for his Paladin oath, meaning he's all about protecting life and light and liberty now, which I think will be a cool turning point for his character.  Caelin waffled over choosing between Necromancy and Evocation, but settled on Evocation, because she likes blowing things up.  Tracy picked Circle of the Moon so that her druid could wild shape better.  I look forward to what she is going to think up to turn into.

What we all hope Caelin will be doing in a few levels.

We started the session with everyone walking through the woods.  Tracy announced that the pet goblin dogs we picked up last session were named Sharpwizzle, Fizzlewrench, and Pepperrocket, which she evidently got from a random goblin name generator.  Because I decided that due to the scattered nature of everyone's mood we shouldn't go for a more freeform and loose encounter that I had planned, I announced that it was raining badly, and everyone decided their characters wanted to get out of the rain very much (especially Eric, because his character is shrouded in layers of carpets and cloths and he didn't want to be a wet blanket...badum tshhhh).  As a GM, I was kind enough to provide them with a ruined tower in the wilderness.  

This raised all sorts of questions, because a ruined tower in a storm at night is obviously a hook for a GM to do bad things to the players.  However, the rain was "really coming down hard, guys, and there is no sign of letting up," so they decided to go into the tower.  The top of the tower had mostly crumbled in.  Tracy used a spell to make a "scary noise" within the tower, which led to some good natured druids-are-all-hippies jokes about ghostly voices telling people to shave their armpits and saying Aaaaaannnnn Couuuulllterrrrrrr and Rrrrreeeppuuuuublicaaaaaans.  I told them that in response to the sound, some bats and a disgruntled owl flew out of the tower.  Caelin misheard me, and thought I said Benedict Cumberbatch flew out of the tower, and then found a picture of Benedict Cumberbatch's face photoshopped on a bat, which caused a lot of hilarity.

I am darkness!  I am the night!

Amid general joviality, they entered the tower.  The top of the tower had fallen in, so they descended to the lower level which consisted of a main room with a smaller room with a well, and a room that was mostly caved in off it.  They managed to get the Barrys (the taxidermized chimera heads) down the stairs in their wheelbarrow, and the party decided to poke around and make sure there wasn't anything that was going to kill them/treasure in the abandoned basement of a ruined tower.  Eric covered up the well after everyone joked about pulling a Pippin in the Mines of Moria and dropping a rock down it.  The rest of the party decided to break open a moldy box in the corner hoping to find...I dunno, rupees or something.  They found splinters, moldy grain, and a desiccated rat corpse. 

They decided to sleep, and Eric took watch because his character doesn't sleep.  This led to some jokes about what he does while the party sleeps (mostly about him braiding Aaron's dwarf's beard and whispering creepily).  He did none of those things.  Everyone slept around the baby fire elemental they'd "liberated" from the house they found Barry in.  Sal, the fire elemental, was named Sal, because it's the first three letters of "salamander."  Tracy likes naming things.  The goblin dogs slept piled up in a corner and smelled like wet dog more than usual.  The Barrys slept in the wheelbarrow by the stairs in case a quick escape was necessary.

Eric also evidently puts hair-bows in Aaron's dwarf beard too...

As people slept, Eric saw a set of eyes peer out from a crevice in the collapsed room.  He tossed a bit of bread at it, cast a spell of light in the room, and was greeted by about a dozen sets of eyes staring out from the rubble.  A bunch of Nuglub gremlins attacked, and got the drop on everyone as they started waking up, because Eric was yelling.  Brandie, being small, was grappled, and a nuglub started dragging her to the well room.  Another nuglub had done the same with a dog too, and the rest started attacking the party and trying to throw blankets over them to tangle them up.  I made the mistake of describing them as "little men with claws and big manes of black hair," which made Caelin think of little tiny Hugh Jackmans with little tiny abs which further derailed the game.  

Nuglubs look nothing like Hugh Jackman, just for the record.

People killed Nuglubs, Aaron started smiting, Brandie critted a nuglub like a badass, Eric cleared off a few that were coming down the stairs, and Tracy found out that she couldn't cast Entangle in places with no plants and decided to find a good florist to get some potted plants later.  Caelin is not a very wizardy wizard, and went full barbarian smashy smash with her quarterstaff, and it mostly paid off while the Barrys cheered them on.  Eric climbed the stairs to see if there was more out there, and saw something moving in the shadows.  It was a giant, centipede-ish creature that looked like a human centipede version of the critters they were fighting.  

Aaron even made me a picture of it.

It scuttled into the room on the ceiling, grabbed Tracy, then Aaron smote it, Brandie (riding Eric, because that's what happens when there is a gnome in the party) stabbed it, Caelin smashed some more Nuglubs, and Tracy got dropped then put a javelin through the Great Nuglub's face which killed it.  Caelin killed the last Nuglub, and they rejoiced in being alive.  Brandie found that she could worm her way into the collapsed room, and the other party members moved some rubble to get in as well.  They found dead, gnawed on bodies of of other travelers, a silver ring, a silver sword, and a lot of money.  Then we ran out of time, so we'll pick up later and hopefully be more on track.