Session 19: Berserk!

The players hexcrawl for trouble, and find it!

Session report for July 25, 2024. Three players adventured for 14 days.

Characters

Bard the Stout, level 3 fighter
Mustacha, level 3 ranger
Stacks, level 1 assassin

We only had three players tonight. Bard suggested they take advantage of the ranger's tracking abilities to locate monster lairs in the wilderness and the others agreed. They hired a baker's dozen of men-at-arms and plotted their course.

fierce warriors

I thought it would be helpful to come up with a couple of rumors to give them a little direction. First, there has been renewed activity around the megadungeon - it seems one of the orc tribes has been seen coming and going. This rumor was a consequence of the events of the Geat Pig Hunt.

Second, a Fenrir patrol went missing up north. This one came from the domain management rules on page 93 of the Dungeon Masters Guide. Since we hadn't played for almost 3 months I rolled a random encounter check (1d12) for each intervening week and got one encounter: men, berserkers, in lair. I randomly determined which hex they appeared in and gave them the rumor.

Third, the Captain of the Guard offered a job for Mustacha. If they'd do some exploration and mapping for the Lord, they would be paid 60 gold per six-mile hex mapped out. And if they ran into monsters or armies they couldn't handle, report the information.

The party headed across the river and northward into the forests to map territory and find the lost patrol.

On the first night, their campsite was approached by bandits. They abandoned camp and fled back across the river. They retraced their steps in the morning. Mustacha tracked the army northwest to where it had camped the previous day and found a sizeable army of 150 bandits.

The mercenaries hesistated. "We- we aren't going to fight them, right?"

The party doubled back and followed the bandit's trail to where they came from. On the fourth day of the expedition they left the forest and entered scrubland, where they came upon an old battlefield. The bandit trail continued north, and there was another trail - a smaller group of men had gone deeper into the scrub land.

They were running low on food on the fifth day, so they returned to the fort to rest and restock.

After another two days getting lost in the forest, they returned to the battlefield in the scrubland. They followed the smaller party's tracks east into new territory. I opened my DMG to Appendix B and used the same technique I used the last session, generating hexes until we all discovered the berserker lair.

There it was, nestled between hills and a freshwater pond - a semi-permanent encampment with 20 berserkers and according chieftains. Bard stepped up to parley. Reaction: unfriendly. The berserkers see weaklings and are not interested. "Leave our lands or else," they said.

The berserkers taunted the players and Bard challenged them to a duel. They obliged as a matter of honor. First, he slew a berserker in a single blow. Then, a subchieftain challenged Bard. A tense duel followed. Bard used his ranseur's disarm maneuver to mitigate the berserker's ability to attack twice per round. Bard fell to the berserker, exactly at zero hit points - after bringing the level 6 warrior down to a mere 4 hit points.

The berserkers claimed Bard's unconscious body and sent the party away with a ransom demand: 400 gold pieces before seven days.

Stacks and Mustacha returned to Fort Fenrir. They made their report to the Captain of the Guard and showed their map in progress. The mercenaries dispersed without Bard to lead them.

Lord Fenrir promised a patrol to wipe out these twenty warriors. Mustacha led two dozen men, including a level 6 patrol captain and a level 4 fighter (Bastion, working as a patrol-for-hire in his downtime), back to the berserker camp. They marched right up with lit torches and spears, intending to burn the encampment to the ground.

The berserkers met them just outside the camp. The two armies clashed. Mustacha helped the infantry while the patrol captain (controlled by Bard's player) fought the berserker chieftain and Bastion fought the other subchieftain. Stacks avoided the melee and dashed into the berserker camp.

After a few rounds of combat, the Fenrir infantry were wiped out by the berserker's superior attack. The captain slowly lost his duel while Mustacha cleaned up the remaining berserkers (they have less than one hit die so he made 3 attacks per round).

Stacks raced around the camp. He discovered Bard and the subchieftain recovering from their duel. He got the jump on them and splattered the berserker's head with a morning star.

Outside, the captain fell. Bastion fell. Mustacha finished off the berserker chieftain and became the sole survivor.

The only treasure he found was 4000 copper pieces. He left the camp disgusted. Later that night, he was joined at camp by Stacks and Bard.

THE VANQUISHED
20 berserkers
1 level 6 fighter fallen in battle
1 level 6 fighter assassinated by Stacks
1 level 10 fighter

20 light infantry
1 level 6 fighter

Bard, wounded and out of play for a week
Bastion, wounded and out of play for a week

THE SPOILS
a few gold pieces from the pockets of the dead bandits

THE SCORE
Bard (fighter level 4, E): 20 xp
Mustacha (ranger level 3, E): 2016
Stacks (assassin level 3, E): 687