Pushing through the jungle, underbrush gave way to overbrush, the sun could not be seen, and it was impossible to tell the time of day. We grew aware of the night only because it went from dark to pitch black, and rather suddenly. Quite often, we waded ankle to knee deep in water, slipping on an algea covered bottom. We would find trees with wide branches to huddle up into at night, and begin our journey as soon as we could see each others faces in the morning.
On the first day, we were accosted by a giant bear with bone-like scales on its back and other areas.
Encounter 1: Dire Bear
Using the terrain to our advantage, we were able to surround it and take it down with little damage to ourselves. Our Cleric healed it and it headed away from us rather than attacking us anew. By the end of the day we found a nice dry spot of land under a huge oak tree. As we prepared camp in the near pitch blackness, we felt the vines awaken and begin attacking us. My Wizard's light was the only light we could fight by, so we fought back to back until we gained an advantage.
Encounter 2: 1 Vine Horror SpellFiend + 1 Dryad
Encounter 2+: On turn 5, the fight was joined by 5 Vine Horrors
The following days were mostly uneventful, but as we approached the edge of the Forest land, we sighted a Dragon flying through the treeline. Unable to resist, we followed it to its lair and laid an ambush for the Dragon.
Encounter 3: 1 Young Green Dragon
Fantastic fight, but we all survived (Though we lost the Paladin somewhat early on, the Cleric was able to keep him from death's door). We had a nice warm cave to sleep in that night, and a fantastic hoarde of treasure. We found enough supplies to allow me to cast several Ritual castings of Enchant Magic Item and create Amulet's of Protection +1 for all of us. This gave everyone time to warm up their chilled feet, dry out their armours, and generally catch up on days of travelling.
2 nights in the cave, and we re-began our journey, into a swamp area past the jungle. If the map was right, this is the swamp the temple was located in, all we had to do was find it. The swamp was a nasty place covered with spiderwebs and mud that would try to suck you under. Where the webs were thickest we encountered the creatures responsible for them, we'd walked right into their trap.
Encounter 4: 6 Ettercap Fang Guard
We were lucky on that, and rather than continue trying to hack our way through webs, we decided to try fire. Dragonbreath cleared large areas at a time, but was harder to come by than our torches. Problem was, this led to creatures coming to investigate...
Encounter 5: 1 Ettercap Webspinner + 3 Ettercap Fang Guard + 1 Bloodweb Spider Swarm
We were tired, weary and hurt after that fight, but we pushed on, burning the webs down until the swamp before us cleared. Before us we saw an unbelievable site. A hut set into the swamp background, made of hardened mud, with smoke coming from above... Knocking on the door, we were met by the most horrendous sound as the door opened to the ugliest woman man has ever laid eyes upon.
Encounter 6: 1 Howling Hag + 7 Dire Rats
Seemed that the hut would go to waste otherwise, so we decided to camp within until morning, since some of us really needed to rest up from the day's combat.
The next few days were uneventful as we walked through the Swamp, looking for any sign of an ancient temple. We had a feeling we were getting close though when the darts started to slam into our armour, and the arrows pegged the ground around us.
Encounter 7: 3 Greenscale Hunters + 3 Greenscale Darters
The attack helped us figure out the location of their encampment, and soon it was us doing the ambushing instead of the other way around
Encounter 8: 1 Greenscale Marsh Mystic + 3 Blackscale Bruisers
No sooner was the last of the Blackscaled creatures down, and we were being charged by more creatures....
Encounter 9: 8 Greenscale Hunters
Once that battle was over, we saw the lizard folks only from a distance, they seemed to want nothing more to do with us, and besides, the pyramid temple was in view, breaking the horizon. Warily, aware of all the eyes upon us, we edged our way to the temple to find something somewhat.... familiar.
Encounter 10: 1 SkullLord + 20 Decrepit Skeletons.
Wow, we'd gotten powerful. The SkullLord seemed so much easier this time, and the skeletons were no resistance at all. We pushed open the tall wooden doors to the wall surrounding the Pyramid, they closed heavily behind us as we advanced to the skeletal guardian statues ahead. Only... they weren't statues, and they weren't friendly.
Encounter 11: 2 Skeletal Tomb Guards
Finally, we made our way into the temple, a hallway laid ahead, and before we could take another step, our Cleric warned us that the walls weren't right. Too many holes. Thankfully, our Warlock seemed to be able to assist here, as he was made aware of the trap.
Encounter 12: 1 Elite Poisoned Dart Wall.
Seemed to be able to assist also seemed to mean, die-trying. The wall shot him dead in his face, and the Cleric spent a great deal of time trying to stop the poison and revive our Warlock before we could progress further. Fortunately, activating the trap also de-activated it, so there was no further problem for now. We stepped back outside and decided to rest an evening before going further. Setting up watches, we prepared to fight our way through the night. But the night was quiet, and come morning, we were ready. Sadly, the GM wasn't, continued tomorrow.
I don't recall what all we got, but I do clearly remember some of it. The Green Dragon's hoarde allowed me to make the Amulets, and the Cleric found a Holy Symbol of Life +1, as well as his Exalted Chainmail +1, and I got to have the Lightning Longsword from the corpse of the SkullLord. I practically discarded by wand at this point as I never wanted to be without my sword.
Tags: Dnd 4e 4th Dungeons Dragons Module
