Introduction

I previously posted some warts-and-all email summaries of the ‘Curse of Strahd’ DnD 5e campaign I ran in 2017-18, the ‘Tomb of Annihilation’ campaign I ran in 2018-19, the ‘Out of the Abyss’, a campaign I ran in 2020, the ‘Phandelver’s Pact’ campaign I ran from 2020-21, the ‘Shadows over Saltmarsh’ campaign from 2021-22, and my current Pathfinder 2e campaign, ‘Vaults of Otari‘. CoS was the first campaign I sent summaries to players by email after each game (I was a bit lazy prior to that), which is why I can use them for this column. Now, I post summaries to Roll20 after each session.

Here are the session summaries from my first Dragonbane campaign which I started running in 2024 after buying the Dragonbane Starter Set. It includes adventures from that set, plus homebrewed content. We recently finished the campaign, after 38 sessions!

I apologize in advance for the writing in these summaries – they’re a bit raw, and not fancy at all (I didn’t have time for fancy writing when typing them up late at night after each game lol). Some will be more detailed than others.

Steve 🙂

Spoiler Alert: This summary contains spoilers for the adventure The Fallen Halls, available on DrivethruRPG at https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/526801/draakenslund-adventures-4-the-fallen-halls

Session 27 – The River Wild & The Fallen Halls

During the night, the ghost of Kris the bold halfling visited Kalgrim, dwarven hammerthrower. Kalgrim was a bit blasé about it all at this point. “Why don’t you visit someone else, I didn’t even know you that well,” he lamented. The halfling ghost pointed at his backpack (previously hers) and her old treasure map, which Kalgrim had found in the pack.

The next day the party decided to do some foraging and hunting. Stripes (the newly diminished catfolk animist) wandered off one way into the woods, looking for mushrooms, but was distracted by strings and things. Bastonn the wolfkin hunter stalked the woods in the opposite direction, killing a fox.

In the meantime, Kalgrim sharpened blades and Zog the ogre mentalist built the field kitchen (which looked like an upended BBQ when compared to the instructions). Archmaster Aodhan the elementalist pored over his books, attempting to learn a new spell.

Suddenly the tent filled with black smoke, surrounding the mage. Red eyes appeared in the smoke, announcing to the surprised Aodhan that it was a demon come for his soul. Aodhan attempted to fight the shadowy demon with a gust of wind, but it simply reformed its body. Meanwhile, outside the tent, Zog thought he heard something. When he glanced in through the open flaps he saw Aodhan calmly reading his grimoire, so the ogre returned to his job.

Aodhan fire blasted the demon and it responded by enveloping him in darkness. Zog finally realized what he was seeing from outside was an illusion, and buffeted his way past an invisible wall of force into the tent. There he confronted the demon but was unable to affect it with his punches. Kalgrim joined in, but his hammer hits were also ineffectual. Aodhan fire blasted the demon again, and the flames set the tent alight. Light streamed through the burning hole and the demon screamed. Zog grabbed the tent and pushed it over, exposing the demon to the full rays of sun, while Aodhan finished it off with a fire blast. The tent, unfortunately, burned up.

Stripes and Bastonn arrived back in camp, noting the destruction. The stories about what had taken place varied. Eventually Zog cooked the fox and the party settled down to their morning meal.

Packing up camp, they headed southeast along the river as rain pounded down, making their way to the cave marked on Kris’s treasure map (about 60 kilometers away). Finding a narrow place to cross (merely 30 meters), Stripes tried to leap across some rocks over rushing rapids. She fell in, and Bastonn leapt to the rescue, racing downstream and saving the kitten by climbing out on a heavy branch and dragging her out of the water.

The party joined them, and they strung up a rope across the river and all made their way across. Aodhan wasn’t strong enough to fight the current, but Zog pulled him out of the river. Aodhan crossed on Zog’s back (quite a feat as Zog was very afraid of the water, having never experienced crossing a river before). Soon the entire party was on the other side. Unfortunately, they had forgotten about their little red wagon, which contained their supplies and treasure.

Kalgrim and Bastonn went back across. Kalgrim made a raft, and once they had loaded and tied the wagon on top, the two adventurers hauled it back across the river. On the other side, the remaining party members (all spell casters) taught each other some magic tricks and set up camp.

With everyone settled for the night, Kalgrim once again experienced a visitation from the ghostly Kris during his watch. By this point he just rolled his eyes.

The next day Stripes led the party out of the wooded hills onto the plain. They witnessed a scene of carnage – a wagon train had been destroyed, detritus scattered across the grass. Two survivors shakily informed the party they had been attacked by two giants, who had kidnapped twelve of their fellow pioneers and the supplies. They promised the party a share of the supplies (which suited them, because they were all running low on rations).

They easily tracked the giants to a set of huge iron doors in a cliffside. Zog pushed opened one of the heavy doors, and Stripes cast light on the ogre’s belt buckle. The party moved inside, with Kalgrim recognizing the 6-meter high halls as dwarven in origin. As they mounted some broad stairs, Zog spotted a rift to the north with lots of strange, gray-green plants clustered around it. To the north was another set of iron double doors.

Zog opened one of the doors, finding a long room with a water trough, filled with patches of the same green-gray plants they observed earlier. He made his way through, but as he passed the plants sprung to life, stretching out their vines which wrapped around his legs. He pulled himself free, but as he did a huge worg emerged from the shadows. The creature was almost devoid of fur, with moss, plants and vines growing from its body. Zog charged the beast, but was once again captured by the surrounding plant vines. The vines dragged the ogre’s face back to one of it’s horrid flowers, from which a stamen was thrust into his mouth. Zog spat out the glop it ejected into him, but the Worg sent vines of its own to truss him up. Kalgrim was also caught, but freed himself.  

Aodhan summoned a salamander (called Sal), who gleefully rushed around the room burning the plants. Stripes brought down lightning strikes to blast the Worg and the surrounding foliage. Bastonn fired arrows, but realized he was not a good archer – he missed his spear (previously broken in the monster Rotgaug’s stomach). Aodhan finished off the worg with a fire blast, but Zog and Kalgrim were both restrained by vines again. Both were dragged down towards the wretched flowers…