Session 6 - The Hunt for Orcs

General Summary

Date: 13th, 14th, & 15th Day of Mirtul 1491 DR

---

The Party:
Aether – Level 3 Human, Circle of the Moon Druid
Duncun – Level 3 Human, Champion Fighter
Kailo - Level 3 Wood Elf, Kensei Monk
Xavien - Level 3 High Elf, Necromancer Wizard

Report:

The Party now refreshed from a night of rest, in their rooms at Stonehill Inn, meets with each other in the second level hallway of the inn. They knock on Sildar’s room and after a moment of no response, Duncun decides to kick down the door, only to find the room empty. The party then decides to head downstairs where they find the common room, for the most part, empty. They are greeted by the innkeeper, who informs them that Sildar Hallwinter left a message for them that they should meet him at the Townmaster’s Hall at their earliest convenience. Our party breaks their fast on a nice hearty meal of eggs, bacon, bread, & cheese, with some ale to wash it down then head down to the Town Hall.

Upon their approach to the townmaster’s hall, they see a board outside the building with a notice posted – “REWARD—Orcs near Wyvern Tor! Those of a mind to face the orc menace should inquire within.” Remembering the dwarf Lanar’s laments about how he hasn’t worked his claim in a tenday because of orcs the party takes the notice and enters the hall. Inside they find Sildar Hallwinter who greets them and introduces the party to the townmaster Harbin Wester, a very fat old man. The party inquires about the Redbrands - hoping to be rewarded for their clearing out of the band the night before. Harbin responds that they are “just a mercenary guild and not all that much trouble.” To this, the party asks if he had hired the Redbrands to which he says no. The group informs Harbin and Sildar that they have slain the Redbrands to which the townmaster beings to pale and look concerned. He asks “all of them?” to which the party responds yes. Our heroes then begin to suspect Harbin Wester of some misdoing from his reaction and after some questioning, Harbin expresses that he simply wants no trouble and asks if they are doubly sure that they eliminated every last one of them for he does not wish for the Redbrands to retaliate.

Seeing that Gundren’s Goons and Townmaster Harbin’s conversation is not going well he waves the party aside to speak with him to which he thanks them for handling the Redbrands as he has heard from the townsfolk the trouble they have been causing. Sildar then confides that, besides coming to Phandalin simply to help the Rockseeker brothers, but also that a fellow member of the Lords’ Alliance named Iarno Albrek had come to the town a few months back, and had disappeared near the manor shortly after his arrival. Hearing from the party that the Redbrands hideout was underneath the ruined manor he asks if they had seen any evidence of him describing the man as short, dark-bearded human wizard in his thirties. The party all look at each other upon hearing this and tell Sildar that Lord Albrek was the leader of the Redbrands. Xavien then pulls out the letter from the Black Spider to Iarno and hands it to Sildar to read, as he does so his look of disbelief turns to one of anger. He asks if they had slain him as well and when they respond affirmatively he sighs and expresses his disappointment as he would have liked to have taken him back to Neverwinter to face judgment.

Sildar then tells the party that it is of the utmost importance that they find Cragmaw Castle and Gundren Rockseeker as he and his brothers are the only ones who know the location to Wave Echo Cave and he is growing concerned that something bad has happened to Gundren’s brothers as he learned that they have not been into town to resupply. With that, the party tells him they have a plan and show him the goblin Droop and say that he may help lead them to the castle. Sildar nods in agreement and urges the party to slay the Cragmaw tribes chief and he will pay them 500 gold. He then pays them the 50 gold he promised them to help him get to Phandalin and another 200 on top for taking care of the Redbrands. Before the party leaves, they then inquire Harbin about the orc trouble to which he explains that travelers have reported trouble with a band of orcs to the east and he will pay out 100 gold if they are willing to flush out the band who have made camp somewhere near Wyvern Tor.

Our party makes their way back to the inn to gather their things and find Lanar at a table being served his “breakfast” of ten shots of whiskey and a mug of ale to wash it down. Duncun asks Lanar if he would be willing to show them where he saw the orcs. Lanar is hesitant at first but after some discussion about how the party wishes to rid him of the orcs and perhaps a misunderstanding on Lanar’s party thinking that they will serve as his bodyguards while he works his claim excitedly agrees and leaves to gather his things returning with all his mining gear. The group then hits the road and after a day of travel down the Triboar Trail, they pull off the road and make camp. Kailo takes the first watch and hears one of the bushes rustlings, but other than that notices nothing else of note. He wakes Xavien from his trance and tells him that his watch is up and mentions that he heard some rustling in the bushes. Xavien takes to watch and after some time hears rustling in the bushes that Kailo pointed out, and paying closer attention to the bushes since Kailo brought it to attention, thinks he notices the reflection of some eyes in the bush. He walks up closer to investigate and sees what appears to be a goblins face in the bush. Xavien then calls out in goblin if the guy wants food or anything. To which what Xavien thought was a goblin stands up and is almost as tall as him and responds in goblin “I want you.” To this Xavien rushes back to camp and wakes everyone up telling them he saw something that looked like a goblin but wasn’t a goblin in the bushes.

The party discusses a course of action seeing as how this creature did not pursue or attack Xavien immediately after being spotted. Aether tells them she can outline the creature and any others that may be close to it with a spell. She moves up thirty feet away from the brush that Xavien pointed out and casts Faire Fire where the figure then becomes outlined in a violet light. In response to this, the hobgoblin yells and charges out of the bush to attack Aether, at which point arrows begin to fly out of other surrounding bush onto the party. Droop faints in fear, and Lanar flees away from the attackers. Duncun, and Kailo spotting the shooters fire back downing more than half the ambushing party. Aether transforms into a wolf runs to attack one of the last two remaining hobgoblins. The hobgoblin trying to defend himself from the wolf yells in goblin to his companion to “slay the traitor” and beings to retreat. The other Hobgoblins let fly an arrow whizzing past Xavien’s head and Xavien hearing what the hobgoblin said turns to follow the arrow seeing that it has hit the already unconscious Droop. Xavien yells and runs to Droops aid seeing him bleed out on the ground, Duncun too then runs to Droop and yells at Kailo in desperation for a healing potion as he tries to staunch the bleeding. Wolf Aether chases the retreating hobgoblin and mauls him to death while Kailo rushes to Xavien hands him a potion and runs back towards the other retreating hobgoblin to get into range and shoots him dead.

Xavien feeds Droop the potion and the goblin awakens fully healed and asks what happened and why he is laying in blood. Duncun tells him not to worry about it and that he’s gonna be fine. Xavien then whispers to Duncun what he heard the hobgoblin say to kill Droop and that they need to be careful because the Cragmaws are out to kill him. Kailo runs to retrieve Lanar and Aether catches the scent of the hobgoblin and can tell that they came from the north – the direction that the Castle lies. She turns back into a human and searches the corpse finding a crudely drawn sketch of an elf with an eyepatch and a staff, with the writing “25 gold pieces for this one” and a symbol of a black spider drawn beneath it. She shows the party and Xavien removes his bedazzled eyepatch and puts it in his pack. Kailo returns with Lanar and Duncun is none too pleased the dwarf fled and blames him for the Droops near death. Duncun and Xavien take the wolf pelt and some of the beaver pelts to fashion some hide armor for Droop and the party then returns to rest.

Morning comes and the party breaks camp and makes their way further east down the road until eventually, Lanar takes them off to the south of the Triboar Trail into the hills. Tempers are high between Duncun and Lanar and insults are thrown. Eventually, by late afternoon, they make their way to Lanar’s claim and he begins to set up and start work. After some discussion on what to do with Droop, Duncun refuses to leave him with Lanar, the party makes their way up a hill to scout and notices some smoke off to the east. They then head out eastwards and eventually come across a band of three orcs. The party gets the drop on the orcs and easily takes them out. As dusk arrives out party decides to press on and find the orc camp only for Aether to get turned around and ends up taking them back to Lanar’s camp. With night upon them, the group decides to turn in for the night and begin again in the morning.

Morning comes and the party again discusses whether they should leave Droop behind with Lanar. Duncun refuses saying that Lanar will either kill his “son” or leave him to die. Even after Lanar swears he will protect Droop with his life Duncun insist that the goblin is safer with them. The party then attempts to make their way back to the bodies of the three orcs they encountered last evening and upon arriving back to the corpses Aether wild shapes into a lion and picks up the trail of the orcs and follows it until eventually the party comes to the mouth of a cave at the bottom of a ravine, with a lone orc standing outside keeping watch. The party is able to easily dispose of the Orc before he can sound an alarm and Kailo moves in further into the cave to scout. He comes some 40 feet into the dark cave and notices an ogre crunching on bones. Kialo moves out of the cave and tells the rest of the party. They get into formation outside the mouth of the cave as their plain is to lure the large creature out to fight. Kailo then moves into the cave until he can see the ogre and let's fly an arrow, then he beings hauling ass back outside the cave. Everyone hears the ogre scream he’s yell echoing throughout the cave, and as Kailo turns around sees the giant running towards him with the trunk of a tree in one hand waving it around like a club. Our heroes successfully lure the ogre out of the cave and are able to widdle him away until the large angry being is slain. However just as the ogre falls javelins begin flying out of the entrance of the cave onto our party….

Character(s) interacted with

Sildar Hallwinter - Member of Lord's Alliance
Harbin Wester - Phandalin's Townmaster
Lanar Leadbelly - Dwarven Miner
Droop - Adopted Goblin

Report Date

28 Oct 2019

Primary Location

Phandalin

Secondary Location

Triboar Trail