Friday’s session (Castle Zagyg) saw our group without the cleric. It also saw an eighteen round combat against a group of hobgoblins. To be fair, it was the entire lair of about 15-20 of them, all coming out to fight the foolish humans who in their initial parley told the hobgoblins that they were there for the treasure.

Yes, I hoped the party would run… and they did, eventually. Once the fighter was dying and could no longer be rescued.

They rested up and came back later… the hobgoblins had saved the fighter and were keeping him captive as a hostage. As the first hobgoblin peered around the door, looking to see what the returning adventurers wanted, the ranger shot a couple of arrows at him. The next thing the adventurers knew, the fighter’s corpse was shoved out into the corridor. Being somewhat depleted, they headed home to pick up Rich’s replacement PC.

He’s now got a paladin. I hope he takes better care of this one! (As Rich conducted the initial parley, the result was indeed partially his fault). The remaining hobgoblins had left their home and headed to the hills by the time they returned!

The next group of humanoids – gnolls – they met, they talked to. And they, by offering them the hobgoblin’s caves (now free), they got quite a bit of help. That’s one thing that you can have a lot of fun with in the Mouths of Madness, if you’re willing to take advantage of the feuding humanoid tribes…

Sunday’s session (Keep on the Shadowfell) found me with only two players as illness and a missed train trip had kept the other two players absent. It didn’t matter, they had Splug! (Now recast as a goblin rogue, and gaining XP). Greg had the dragonborn paladin and Nate the elf warlock. They did exceptionally well in a shortened (3 hour) session, dealing with the three challenges they came across.

I really, really, really love 4e’s scaling rules. The party was in danger from time to time, but they were able to overcome the challenges. One of my favourite moments was when Nate was using his warlock abilities to shift monsters around to pull a gelatinous cube off the paladin! That was cool… and the cube couldn’t see Nate as he was out of tremorsense range. (And Greg had marked it!)

Splug also used Deft Strike to attack while stealthed, and critted a hobgoblin boss for 23 damage. Yeah, he’s turning out a lot more heroic than his write-up in the adventure, but the players love him. I’m trying to work out how a “henchmen” or “cohort” would work in 4e. Giving him only one healing surge (as a NPC foe would had) doesn’t really work so well. Do I stat him up completely as an NPC?

I am giving him half XP, though, per AD&D. That will keep him about 2-4 levels behind the rest of the group; given 4e’s slower power curve as levels are gained, I reckon he’ll always be useful whilst not overshadowing the other party members.

That’s 6 sessions of KotS so far, we might finish it next session, or maybe not. I hope we’ll get a fifth player (Randy) for the next one, but we’ll see what happens.