The Copper Piece Gang

D&D Session Summary

This session opened in Fallcrest after the party’s recent successes had noticeably improved the town’s mood and reputation. Businesses, townsfolk, and local contacts were suddenly much friendlier, and the group was even handed Potions of Vitality as gifts. Rae’s contact also offered to make experimental items for the party on credit, which gave the session a nice small-town heroes getting recognized start before things turned weird again.

The real problem came from Elara. The party learned she had been urgently asking around for them but had not been seen in several days. People also knew she had recently been seeking treatment for unusual wounds, the sort caused by augmented or unnatural animals. Other clues suggested she had been asking questions about the Feywild and its connection to the mortal world. That sent the party looking for more information, first in town and then toward Toreena’s grove on the outskirts.

Toreena confirmed that Elara had been visiting her and bringing strange medicinal components that did not seem to belong to the normal world. Rae recognized them as being tied to the Feywild, which strongly suggested that a fey crossing had opened nearby. Toreena then used a druidic rite involving the gathered components and Rae’s connection to the area’s subtle magical lines. Through that ritual, the party was able to identify the likely location of the crossing about a mile to the south.

As the group headed that way, the natural world around them became more intense and more hostile. Plant growth was thicker, sharper, and more aggressive, and the area felt saturated with unnatural energy. That led them straight to Elara, who was camped near the crossing and looked like someone who had been barely holding a bad situation together. She explained that something on the other side of the crossing was opening it from the Feywild side rather than waiting for someone on this side to trigger it. Creatures had been slipping through and heading directly for Fallcrest every time.

Elara also explained that she had already been fighting these incursions mostly on her own, using trained predatory animals to help repel creatures coming through the crossing. She had survived encounters with things like displacer-beast-like predators, but only just. She had also managed to contact Zevron and Dragos at one point, and they had confirmed that something serious was going on, but they could not stay to solve it themselves. That left the problem squarely in the party’s lap.

Before the group could make a full plan, the crossing started to activate again. They rushed toward it and found signs that something had already come through faster than expected. The party spotted falling leaves and other unnatural motion overhead, which tipped them off that this latest creature was airborne and already heading for Fallcrest. So the whole group sprinted back toward town by whatever means they had available, including one very practical decision: if there is a trained bear nearby, someone is absolutely going to ride the bear.

The thing that came through was a blood-raged harpy, though the table also jokingly treated it like some kind of dire rabbit horror. Either way, it was extremely dangerous because of its shriek. The scream was strong enough to leave townsfolk bleeding from the nose and ears and to seriously disrupt the battlefield. The fight turned into a race to bring it down before it could kill civilians or lock the party down with sonic punishment.

The party managed it, but not cleanly. Krovuur played a major support role by putting down a blessing that helped keep townsfolk alive while also helping control the fight. Zarnak charged in with Nucky riding along, which is exactly the sort of image a D&D campaign should preserve forever. Nucky attempted one of the most ambitious ideas of the session by trying to use his harp to counter the harpy’s shriek with resonant sound. It did not work. In fact, it backfired badly enough to make the situation worse. Still, the group eventually knocked the creature down and finished the threat before the town got wiped out.

After the fight, the session shifted into recovery and planning. The party dealt with deafness, bloodied civilians, and general fallout from the harpy attack. They also finalized some new magic item choices, talked through paragon path plans, and took a short rest. Most importantly, they now had a clearer picture of what needed to happen next. The crossing itself was the real problem, not just the monsters coming through it.

With time to breathe, the party asked Elara more detailed questions about the Feywild side. Her description made it clear that the place was beautiful but dangerous in a constant, exhausting way. Everything there was amplified. Plants were sharper, rain could sting, insects were bigger, animals were more aggressive, and even harmless-looking things could become threats. She stressed that the place rewarded caution and that no one should keep watch alone.

Rae then used arcane knowledge and his connection to moon-linked divine power to study the crossing more carefully. He determined that the crossing was being manipulated by a moon ritual on the other side, one designed to amplify lunar power and force the boundary between planes to thin more often than it should. The ritual was not natural, but rather an unnatural manipulation of a natural lunar phenomenon. That also meant it could be disrupted, reversed, or destroyed.

Better yet, Rae realized he might be able to influence the crossing from this side. Instead of simply waiting for it to open, he could potentially push back or counter it. That gave the party its next concrete objective: go into the Feywild, find the ritual site, and wreck it hard enough that the forced crossings stop.

By the end of the session, the campaign had clearly shifted from local defense to proactive intervention. The party had moved from being town heroes reacting to monster attacks into the group that now needed to cross into the Feywild, find whoever was tampering with moon magic, and shut it down at the source.

Quick Recap

• Fallcrest was more lively because the party’s earlier actions had improved the town’s mood and reputation.
• The group received Potions of Vitality and new item opportunities before the real problem surfaced.
• Elara had been searching for the party and had been dealing with strange wounds and Feywild-related clues.
• Toreena helped identify nearby Feywild components and used a ritual to locate a fey crossing south of town.
• The party found Elara near the crossing and learned that something on the Feywild side was forcing it open.
• Elara had already been fighting off creatures from the crossing with trained animals and barely surviving.
• Another crossing event happened while they were there, and something flying got through ahead of them.
• The party rushed back to Fallcrest and fought a blood-raged harpy whose shriek devastated townsfolk.
• Krovuur helped protect civilians, and the party eventually brought the harpy down.
• After the fight, Elara described the Feywild as beautiful, dangerous, and far more aggressive than the mortal world.
• Rae determined that a moon ritual on the other side was amplifying lunar power to force the crossing open.
• The session ended with the party preparing to go into the Feywild and destroy the ritual at its source.