Encounters Archives

‘D&D’ Encounters DM Report — ‘Sholla’s Dream’ Part II

January 30, 2015December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly

I continue to enjoy my return to the DM’s chair, and I hope my players are enjoying the custom adventures I’ve been developing to hold them over until the new campaign starts up in a few more months. Last week, my six players found themselves on the water. They are on a mission to intercept a caravan of cultists that will be arriving in Baldur’s Gate a few days after they are scheduled to arrive via the River Chiontharr that runs between Elturel and Baldur’s Gate. First, a small abandoned raft (with cargo still in place) was investigated — the party was attacked by a single ghoul and two zombies. The mystery starts. The next evening, the sloop almost collided with a large cargo ship anchored in the middle of the river. An investigation of the cargo ship provided some clues to a larger mystery yet to reveal itself. We wrapped up last Wednesday night’s event with the players fighting a wave of ghasts and ghouls on the top deck. While victorious, a few of the players were injured… and there were still two lower decks to investigate.

D&D Encounters DM Report — Sholla’s Dream Part I

January 23, 2015December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly

Wednesday nights are D&D Encounters sessions (for novice and veteran players) at Titan Games & Comics in Atlanta, GA (and at other locations around the globe), and for the last few weeks I’ve enjoyed my return to the role of Dungeon Master. Last week concluded a two-part adventure that had the players encountering a group of cultists hiding out in a cavern beneath a crypt where they were performing a dark ritual to strengthen a young black dragon. The players were successful in defeating the dragon and collapsing the only escape from the cavern after narrowly escaping a chase around a circular four-level ramp that led to the bottom of said cavern. RIP cultists.

This week, the players found themselves in the city of Elturel, hunting down Leosin, a monk who had given them an earlier mission to try and discover information on this new dragon cult. The players made their way into the city where they would need to find Leosin as well as the Order of the Gauntlet to receive the reward that was promised them when they defeated the black dragon and cultists.

D&D Encounters DM Report — Running a Chase & The Road to Elturel Part II (Conclusion)

January 16, 2015December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly

Last night as I was setting up my table for the night’s game, I began to receive some fun and interesting comments about my 3D creation for running the second-half of my mini-adventure, The Road to Elturel. Our game night coordinator, Topher, continues to call me an over-achiever. I can live with that. I’ve always tried to push myself to give my players a memorable game; when I was younger, I would create props and sketches to hand out at different points in a game. Now that I’m a bit older and wiser (and have a debit card), I’m finding I have even more fun and interesting ideas to toss at my players… such as the situation where my players found themselves tonight.

D&D Encounters Report — Digital DMing and The Road to Elturel Part I

January 9, 2015James Floyd Kelly9

For this week’s game, I chose to create a two-part mini-adventure that takes place on the road halfway between Greenest and Elturel. Given the cultists and a few other bad guys/creatures encountered in earlier sessions, I decided to try and create an adventure that would be loosely linked to the goings-on along the Sword Coast. Joining my table for the night were the following adventurers:

Essie – Human Fighter
Chi Tan – Human Fighter
Oenn – Dwarf Cleric
Rolann – Elf Ranger
Edaliu – Gnome Bard
Borax – Dwarf Cleric

D&D Adventurers League: Session 16 Report

December 7, 2014December 16, 2017Corrina Lawson

Four months! That’s how long I’ve been back playing D&D at the weekly Encounters session at Titan Games and Comics in Atlanta.

D&D Adventurers League: Session 16 Report

December 5, 2014December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly3

Four months! That’s how long I’ve been back playing D&D at the weekly Encounters session at Titan Games and Comics in Atlanta. My lowly level 1 sorcerer has survived and grown in power — he’s currently level 3 but has enough XP to hit level 4 with an extended rest. More spells! More Sorcery Points! […]

D&D Adventurers League: Session 10 Report

October 24, 2014December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly2

This week, I was fortunate to be sitting at a table when a brand new player, Ryan, walked in. He’d never played D&D before, and only understood basic concepts of levels and XP from the video games he’d played. It’s important to remember that the Encounters events are designed for new players; although almost everyone at my event has past experience with D&D, it’s still nice to see how a novice is welcomed and made to feel at home. We got him up to speed on the rules, provided him with a pre-generated character (a level 1 Halfing Rogue) and we had a good mix of combat and role-playing provided by DM Martin. When the night’s game was over, Ryan told us he’ll see us next week… a good sign that he enjoyed the night’s adventure. He tells us he’s going to create a custom character, too… can’t wait to see what he comes up with.

D&D Adventurers League: Sessions 8 & 9 Report

October 17, 2014November 23, 2017James Floyd Kelly

My apologies to those of you following along with my session reports for the D&D Encounters event. Last week got a bit crazy with some work-related items and I was unable to get the Session 8 report submitted. So… this week I’ll be catching you up on the events for Sessions 8 and 9 — these two gaming nights added to Session 7 make up Chapter 2 of the Hoard of the Dragon Queen.

D&D Adventurers League: Session 7 Report (Bonus: New DM Interview!)

October 3, 2014December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly

I’m still smiling over the adventure my group shared with Session 7 on Wednesday night. It was an amazing amount of fun that I’ll discuss shortly. This week’s gathering of players at Titan Games & Comics looked to about 26 players and four DMs — based on the noise coming from other tables, I’m guessing the other players felt the same way about this week’s adventure.

D&D Adventurers League: Session 6 Report

September 26, 2014December 16, 2017James Floyd Kelly

A lot of things happened during this night’s adventure… and after it.

D&D Adventurers League: Session 5 Report (PLUS: Bonus DM Report!)

September 19, 2014James Floyd Kelly3

For Session 5, our regular DM (Martin) was out, and in stepped Chris. I’d had Chris as a DM a few weekend back at Expeditions where he ran four of us through one of the five hour-long mini-adventures in the Defiance in Phlan story. Chris probably remembered my character as the sorcerer who decided to grab a handful of gold at a very poorly chosen opportunity, triggering a trap and causing some tense moments with my fellow party members. Won’t do that again. Lesson learned. Well, Chris stepped in for Martin and was forced to create a custom mini-quest on the spot. And he nailed it.

D&D Adventurers League: Session 4 Report

September 12, 2014December 13, 2017James Floyd Kelly8

I learned an interesting bit of news about the Encounters adventure I’m currently participating in with a bunch of fellow players — until this “episode” is completed (Another six weeks!) it will be very difficult to take a Long Rest. For those of you familiar with the new 5e rules, a Long Rest is needed to restore Hit Dice (used to heal up during a Short Rest) but more importantly… our party needs one to restore spells! Spellcasters only have a fixed number of spell slots they can use, and these slots aren’t restored without a Long Rest. This doesn’t affect cantrips, so it’s not like my Sorcerer is completely powerless, but it made a few of my fellow players and I squirm last night when we realized how many more sessions we have ahead of us before we can have our spells restored.

D&D Adventurers League: Session 1 Report

August 22, 2014December 13, 2017James Floyd Kelly4

Last night, for the first time in over 20 years, I got to play a game of D&D around an actual table with some new friends. It was all part of the D&D Encounters event that will meet every Wednesday (for a while). Players will be using the new 5th edition D&D rules (that include the Starter Set as well as the new 5e Player’s Handbook, Monster Manual, and Dungeon Master’s Guide) as they adventure in the Forgotten Realms. Wizards of the Coast has created an adventure that DMs in the Encounters event will be running across the country (world?) with a mix of both new and experienced D&D players.