The Copper Piece Gang

D&D Session Summary

This session picked up with the party still inside the Scarlet Citadel after a short rest, trying to recover from the increasingly stupid amount of danger they had already survived. They explored a recently used room built for two large occupants, complete with a heavy armor rack, a table, and two strong chests. The first chest was opened cleanly and turned out to be a solid haul: gold, copper, gems, and a beautifully carved soapstone horse head. The second chest was trapped, because of course it was, and opening it launched poison darts nasty enough to melt parts of the ceiling and floor. Inside, though, the group found more silver, a potion, a scroll, and a bead of force, which immediately became one of the most useful items they had seen in a while.

From there, the party focused on a strange brass-clad iron door marked with dwarven forge symbols: a horse, flames, and a hammer-and-anvil motif. They figured out that the decorative sections were actually separate mechanisms. The horse head matched the horse symbol, but they wisely decided not to jam it in immediately and instead kept exploring. That led them through more barracks, a kitchen and pantry area, and a disgusting shaft clogged with bat guano that clearly dropped straight down toward the lower bat-infested level. Zarnak blocked the shaft with a barrel, which feels like exactly the kind of solution adventurers come up with when they are tired and not interested in one more surprise.

Then things went bad.

The party opened another door and got charged by the biggest dire owlbear they had seen yet, with a dire badger also in the room for extra annoyance. The owlbear grabbed Zarnak, threw him into the room, and effectively cut him off from the rest of the party. Zarnak made the desperate choice to go for the hole leading downward, hoping to escape rather than get torn apart where he stood. He missed the hidden ladder, fell a full hundred feet into the bat caves below, and somehow survived, though only barely. It was one of those moments where the plan was terrible, but every other option was worse.

Back on the upper level, the rest of the group had to react fast. Krovuur tried to crack the owlbear with a huge attack but could not drop it. Nucky then used magic to banish the owlbear temporarily to the Feywild, buying the group just enough breathing room to come up with a rescue plan. Rae used the newly found bead of force at the exact spot where the owlbear would reappear, trapping it in a magical sphere the moment it came back. That bought precious time and kept the monster from immediately joining the mess below.

Meanwhile, Zarnak was unconscious and dying in the bat caves, with dire bats already swarming him. Krovuur used the arrow slit to line up a teleport into the force-sphere area, and the group committed fully to the rescue. They jumped into the shaft, used feather fall support where possible, reached Zarnak, and pulled him out while trying not to stir up the many other bat swarms lurking overhead. The owlbear, trapped in the force sphere, got turned into a bizarre flaming hamster-ball nightmare after interaction with Krovuur’s fire effect, leaving it permanently on fire without actually solving the giant murder beast problem. The party got Zarnak back up the ladder, retreated through the door, and slammed it shut behind them, leaving the badger and flaming owlbear on the far side.

At that point, the dungeon had officially become more dangerous than fun.

The group took another short rest, joked about Nucky’s ongoing pants-related misfortunes, and reconsidered whether pushing deeper was still a good idea. They explored another trapped hallway filled with arrow traps, poison spear traps, and a collapsing pit trap lined with poisoned stakes. The whole section made it painfully clear that this level of the dungeon had been built by someone who did not merely want intruders dead, but wanted them humiliated first. The party managed to survive the corridor, collected some of the poison spears, and figured out that at least part of the trap layout had probably been used intentionally by fleeing enemies to lure them into danger.

After all that, the group circled back to the dwarven forge door puzzle. This time they paid closer attention. Pressing the horse head into place did not trigger the door, but it did reveal subtle clues. The flame symbol looked slightly darkened, as if scorched. The anvil symbol looked shinier than the rest of the door, as though it had been struck repeatedly. Rae used his dwarven-made dagger as an arcane focus and managed to sense the door’s magic more clearly. He realized the flame part likely needed actual fire, and the anvil section responded to impact, but his dagger pommel was not enough force to complete it. The party began to understand that the door required literal, physical actions tied to the symbols rather than just matching the carved piece.

By the end of the session, the group had done a lot without technically solving the biggest problem in front of them. They looted treasure, nearly lost Zarnak, saved him in dramatic fashion, learned that the deeper levels were packed with traps and poison, and got much closer to understanding the forge door puzzle. They were clearly at a crossroads: either retreat to town, gear up, and come back smarter, or stay and keep poking the dungeon until it finally won.

Quick Recap

• The party explored a room for two large occupants and looted two heavy chests.
• The first chest held coins, gems, and a carved soapstone horse head.
• The second chest was trapped with nasty poison darts but also contained silver, a potion, a scroll, and a bead of force.
• They found a dwarven forge door marked with horse, flame, and hammer-and-anvil symbols and realized it was a multi-part mechanism.
• Exploring farther led them to a kitchen, pantry, bat-guano shaft, and then a room with a giant dire owlbear and a dire badger.
• Zarnak got separated, fell into the bat caves below, and barely survived.
• Nucky banished the owlbear temporarily, and Rae trapped it on return with the bead of force.
• The group jumped into the shaft, rescued Zarnak, and escaped while trying not to wake more bat swarms.
• The owlbear ended up trapped, flaming, and still very much a future problem.
• After another short rest, the party pushed through an awful trap corridor with arrows, poison spears, and a poisoned pit.
• They returned to the forge door and learned that the symbols likely required literal actions: the horse piece, fire, and a hammer-like strike.
• The session ended with the group closer to solving the door puzzle but very aware that the dungeon was trying hard to kill them.