The dice have been cast, we are at war. Or at least, that is what my character Lencio feels. This time around, finally one of our “rivals”, the “Ratters”, joined the “Beatles”. Making common cause with this fellow group was long on Lencio’s agenda. The new Ratter-Slash-Beatle was Galdramathur, a Lizardman! In addition to him, a cleric called Cairn joined us. Also with us: Joebold the Kobold! An NPC kobold porter.

Anyway!

Frogged

After Lencio had fired up the others that it was time to bring the war to the Hobgoblin’s home turf, we formed up and set out, confident to evade the known trap and surprise the evil Hobgoblins. Alas, we were surprised ourselves when the fat toads, hangry for want of fresh giant-flies, slammed into our front rank to devour poor Lencio and Eban!

Our heavy strikes took out two of them right away – alas only after their surprise round AND after them winning initiative – and even then, their morale held. After we finally hacked (Lencio, Obelix, Eban) and clawed (Galdramathur) them down, both front liners had suffered, and while our Lizardman devoured the fallen frog legs, Lencio needed a healing spell from Hubbub and Eban drank down our only healing potion… so we were out of healing even before we had entered the Hobgoblin territory!

At least we could harvest the frog livers, a key ingredience to breeding goblins, orcs, or hobgoblins, or kobolds. So we could deny these livers the hobgoblins and hand them to our kobold friends.

Assumptions in Architecture

We re-organised our marching order, with the two wounded tough-guys farther back, then moved on: Lencio had a theory, namely that the Hobgoblin headquarter must have more than one entrance, and he intended to use an alternative.

After Joebold fainted seeing some of his dearest friends slain and pickled in a barrel, we discovered first a rubble-blocked corridor (!!) and then a dead end (!!!!). This delighted Lencio, as he was sure a dead end could only mean one thing: A secret door.

We even found one. Alas, a small one. Only just large enough to let a hamster pass, possibly a proto-corridor to come? Be that as it may, we could not traverse it, but we were seen through it: A Hobgoblin spied the big human eyes on the other side and ran off.

Tom & Jerry

Lencio pushed the others hard: Time was of the essence. He expected the hobgoblins to come out of their heavy door in an effort to push us into a pocket here, without a chance to retreat. But he wanted to capitalize on that. He counted on the hobgoblins organising a strike force and moving past the frog-room, so if we were faster and hid in the frog-room, they may pass us.

Which worked out.

After the hobgob rapid response team tramped eastwards without noticing us, Lencio insisted we went west, to check if they maybe left their blast door open.

They had not. We were locked out.

But that didn’t matter: The strike team would return, probably in low spirits, and with their guard let down. The perfect moment to hit them. So we prepared a nice ambush.

Blood for the Blood God

With everyone hidden in nooks and crannies, we waited, and to Lencio’s sadistic glee the hobgoblins tramped right into the jaws of our trap. We fell on them with magic webbing, crossbows, and blades.

It was a right massacre! Lots of high damage hits, the optimal placement of the webbing spell, a successful application of hold person, and as a final touch: flaming oil to eliminate the two strongest strike team assets. It was any platoon commander’s dream come to life.

Joebold the kobold awoke from his fainting just in time to see the last enemies perish.

What now?

Again, Lencio had an answer: Those with heavy armor take a rest turn, the rest drags any- and everything out to the frog room that can be turned into value. He himself took the rest while the lightly-armored team members carried stuff.

After this rest turn, the hobgoblins had organised themselves and sent out another strike team to see what was keeping team 1.

We figured that it would be tempting fate to confront a second, alert hobgoblin team, and beat a hasty retreat. Thanks to a nice dice roll we evaded the threat and successfully returned piles of loot to kobold corners.

Keeping or Losing the Initiative

At this point, Hubbub, Gal, and Jette had to call it a day, and that meant we were seriously fewer. The question came up if we should set out again without them. Lencio said No to returning to the same area: “We have just poked the hornet’s nest. Now they are ready.”

But he saw another option to hurt the Hobs: Through kobold corners, we had a second attack vector, which was probably under-manned now that they were busy checking their north.

So the rest of us went down to the southern hobgoblin territory to pick up another quick win in their rear.

This did not go as smooth as the ambush before: Two guards saw us, and before we could stop it, one of them won initiative and raced off to alert the main force. The other one had his own crossbow and took Lencio in the chest, bringing him down to somewhat precarious 4 hit points.

Donald and Cairn slayed him with bolt and slingstone, and Lencio ordered the others to quickly pick up the body and take it back to kobold corners. It was only one single attack and retreat, but Lencio thought that we could not handle another encounter without risking losses.

Healing options?
No full magic, but some bandages (can stabilize, but not heal) and herbs (need a full turn to brew). We needed time, which we didn’t have here. So we returned “home”.

Know when to fold it

We could replenish a handful of hit points with herbal tea. In Lencio’s case, that got him up to 6. One more lion encounter and the odds would be terrible. So I called it done and gone, and we ended the mission.

Incredibly successful: We had conquered hobgoblin armor for Eban and collected 1300 coins in metal and body parts to raise Cairn to Level 2 and Gal to level 3.

However…. did I do everything right?
No.

Bossing people around, and why it is a problem

The careful reader will notice that Lencio featured even stronger in the above report than warranted by the fact that I play him.

During the game session, I was kind of pushy in getting the other party members to where I wanted them. I had a plan and I wanted it implemented.

I was, up to a point, aware that I was too domineering, so I actually made myself stop at three or four points to ask the others for their opinions. However, four times is not a lot in a game session, and before I posed this question I had already set the agenda and put my plan on the table, framing the situation the way I saw it.

In retrospect, my dominance was too forceful, potentially enough to spoil the fun of someone who may have had different ideas and didn’t get the platform to develop and formulate them, or to shape the session in another way.

We had two new players in the party, and the tempo I enforced might give them a wrong idea about our party’s play style, and about a hierarchy in the team that does not, in fact, exist. Depending on personality, some players may be put off by such behaviour and leave, or accept the pushy person as the agenda-setter. Both outcomes would be a failed state. This is a team game, so every team member should have the opportunity to formulate goals and ideas.

The only reason I was faster to formulate my goals and “drive” the session was because I had already chosen my goals a full week before the game. It felt important to me to win this. Yes, everyone got out of it with a ton of XP, with zero casualties, shiny coins and new levels … but still: It is not a sustainable or healthy play style and it is not my place to play the “boss”.
I will certainly take a step back and give my fellow players more opportunity to shine next time.

Cursed Carousing

To garner more XP and grow stronger, the GM gave us the option to spend gold for carousing. We could determine our own cost and risk in this, and there would be the potential for something going wrong, as excessive partying tends to do.

Eban boosted his XP with success, spending 40 gold for 40 XP… an fine fiesta.
Cairn pushed for 15 extra XP and Jette for 40.

Others were less fortunate:
Gal received extra XP but also got cursed, so she can now only walk backwards. We will need to find a remedy for this fast.
Hubbub spent 900 coins for her carousing festival and raked in 90 XP, but also drank something weird and — got turned into a kobold!
Rolling the XP for her new form she drew the short stick: She rolled so low for her new HP that he comes out with 4 HP at level 4!

We see: our problems don’t run out, and we are very good at getting into new ones.