"Text Me if We Die."
This guy is really pissing me off.
A few observations a month into our adventure.
- To quote our Senior Director, who finally joined us a couple of weeks ago: "Oh my god, will somebody finally make a decision already?" It turns out that roleplaying by committee--or, more accurately, by a committee of committees--is exactly as excruciating as that sounds. We took fully 20 minutes four weeks ago to decide our approach to the mouth of the dungeon we've been stuck in. Do we go in all together, directly? Send a scout? How deep does the scout go? Just a little way? As far as he can before it gets too dark to see? Wait, what do we do with our paload? And the two prisoners? Do we let them go? Take them with us? Tie them up? Kill them and impale their heads on sticks and lead with those and What in the hell is wrong with you and this torture thing you've got going on, Rob?
- It's fairly terrifying to have your party rather badly beaten up by four critters in the very first encounter, and then to find themselves facing ~16 more, plus 4 other critters that are bigger and meaner, plus that beast up top, over the span of four weeks--or 90 minutes in game time.
- No matter how much pizza you're stuffing into your face, when the whole party probably has fewer hit points than that guy, it's never fun to roll the D20, have it bounce of a copy of the PHB and come up 2 on a roll-to-hit. Or, as happened twice last week, to have the wizard hit with Ray of Frost, then roll...2 points damage. "The bugbear laughs." Gah.
- At least we avoided a trap that would have almost assuredly killed us. Barely. Only by means of another 10-minute, 8-person, 3-team negotiation. "I think we should go under the..." "Why would we do that? We're carrying this unconscious person and that seems dubious..." "But if we go the other way..." "What if we tie the unconscious person to our back..." (As it turns out, had we done that, the unconscious person and possibly a few others in the party would have been goners.)
- As of the end of last week, the elf wizard is unconscious at 0 HP, the human fighter is dying at -4, the dragonborn paladin is down to 3, and Roscoe the Legendary Halfling Rogue is the only character keeping the party alive. Roscoe is a killin' fool. Every party needs a Roscoe. Every office needs a Roscoe. I need a Roscoe in meetings with me. Armed with a shortbow. Just because.
Assuming the bugbear doesn't take down the remaining three party members this Friday and the human fighter doesn't actually die (good luck on the saving throws, team!), I am assured by the DM that we'll level up and find ourselves in our first non-dungeon destination this Friday.
Which would be nice, because we are most assuredly sick of things trying to kill us right about now and could darned well use some rest, healing, food, and practice at non-combat roleplaying.
Meanwhile, my Director tells us he played D&D with his kids for the very first time last weekend. OK, modified. OK, they fought with some imaginary monsters and rolled some dice for damage and death.
It's a fantastic start!
Meanwhile, my Director tells us he played D&D with his kids for the very first time last weekend. OK, modified. OK, they fought with some imaginary monsters and rolled some dice for damage and death.
It's a fantastic start!
:-)
P.S. The title of this blog is brought to you by the colleague who could not be with us last week because she was househunting, but knew we were potentially heading into a slaughter.
