Gameplay: The Conquesodores, part one.

The Conquesodores

GOB Mini-Con 2018: Recap, part one.

For the Mini-Con I had my daughter, John, Jen, Jim (he was present for the second half), and Bob present for the adventure. I ran it in two parts. The full team consisted of Mhambi a Wanderer kit Druid, Wilhemina Bugel an Illusionist specialist Wizard, Berrina Gembiter a Breachgnome kit fighter, Sir Robyn the Brave an Errant kit Paladin, and Bob ended up playing two PCs. First was Daniel Reid an Explorer kit Ranger and Khenbish a Scout kit Thief at the start of the second half.

The first part involved getting out of the town of Claus Canyon unseen, taking out the Red Eye ogre tribe, and the Mouldbreath goblin tribe worg-riders and archers surrounding the town and keeping anyone from leaving before Cheesus arrives to convert or kill everyone there in three days time. The Conquesodores sent an ogre to make the demand and he walked out of the town. When a shepherd stepped outside of the short palisade demarcating the edge of town he burst into a pillar of flame. When his wife came out to him she was hot with a great many arrows and then burst into flames. At this point the town went a little bit crazy.

The party spoke to the refugees from further out in the countryside about what happened to them and Wilhelmina convinced two men to follow her as bodyguards. Daniel went to the highest point in town to try and survey the archer nests. Mhambi went and calmed the animals at the stablers and found that they were uneasy about the worgs surrounding the town.

When everyone met at the temple of Erron of Solitude (Goddess of Adventurers, Justice,and Vengeance) they exchanged notes and decided to go talk with the undertaker and his son. The undertaker's son, Boy (a priest of Beowa the Resurrected), showed them a secret mine tunnel that the undertakers use to haul the bodies to the canyon for internment.

After exploring the old mine tunnels they avoided a trap set near an entrance at the bottom of the canyon and set an ambush nearby for any ogres that might come. They waited patiently and we're able to get two ogres. Berrina had followed the others quietly and was able to take out an ogre with a couple of martial arts punches. Her loud kiai yell attracted more attention from the rest of the ogres camping in the canyon. Mhambi used her special whistle to call for her black leopard, Ingwe. This also called the attention of the worgs that were back around the town.

By rearranging their ambush to allow Berrina to be the focus they were able to bottleneck the ogres. Berrina held the ogres at bay with her superb karate training while Daniel fired arrows into their forces and Wilhelmina distracted them with accurate depictions of more forces flanking the ogres.

While they were dealing with the ogres Mhambi pulled back to cover the rear as worgs attacked from behind. Using her bond with nature she called upon the land to hold the worgs fast. She used the Umbulali Onkulunkulu (a +2 hunga munga) to kill as many goblins and worgs as she could until the ogres were taken care of. Berrina washed through the grasping underbrush to fight the worgs and the goblins.

As the others were busy with them Daniel used his special Explorer powers to interrogate the last remaining ogre to get an accurate idea of the Conquesodores full forces. Unfortunately the offer was not very bright or well informed, he could count to a score but no more. The did get information of where the forces were located though.

Berrina and Daniel climbed opposite canyon walls to get to the two nests of goblin archers. Berrina had no trouble clearing out the goblins from the small cave they were hooked up in. Daniel had a slightly less easy time, but found some unusual arrows. The goblins had some flight arrows with ceramic heads packed with some kind of alchemical powder and a fuse coming out of the base. Using these and his own arrows he covered the rest of the party as they snuck around to fight the remaining goblins from behind.

By the time the rest of the party had cleared out the third of five nests, Daniel fired the special arrows at the last worg patrolling between the nests. The pillars of flame coming from the arrows distracted the fifth nest as the main group took out the fourth one. Now that Daniel knows what the arrows do he used them on the fifth nest of archers. Aiming for the center of the group he accidentally blows up all of the arrows that group was carrying. This conflagration starts a massive fire in the tall grass the rest of the group is in.

The rest of the party is running away from this massive wildfire as fast as they can when they realize it should have already engulfed them. Unbeknownst to the party the goblins were carrying a special item that housed a fire elemental. The wild fire only gave it more fuel to power it.

Setting that there was something to punch Berrina turned and ran back to fight the elemental. From his perch Daniel rained down arrows into the elemental with his bow, Heartwyrm giving the sheaf arrows the power to hurt it. Mhambi was throwing her weapon at it and Berrina focused her Qi to damage the monster. After she did some significant harm to the elemental it focused all of its fury and attacks at her. With its first strike against her, it nearly killed her and Wilhelmina had to force a Topaz of Vitality into Berrina's mouth to save her. Unfortunately Berrina's clothing did not survive the flames. With the party busy fighting the elemental, they didn't notice a lone worg-rider running away to where the main body of Cheesus’ forces were at.

Once the fire elemental was taken care of the party went back into town and the first half of the adventure was over.