Thread by @Shadumura

Yeah um.... two characters almost died tonight.
We went against two minibosses. Without a healer.
AND THE MONK GOT K.O.'d before the fight started.
3/2 Death saves on both Fighter and Monk [pass/fail].
And my dice were screwing me at the end, often botching rolls & to reroll.

So, tonight's session of "Quentin's Undead Adventures":
The party opens the gate to the orchard, and come across a zombie by itself! Holg got a firebolt off and galas finished it off before having too much trouble. As we explored the orchard, Galas cut down every scarecrow.

By the time we reach the southeast end of the orchard, we came across dead bandits and crossbow bolts embedded in an uprooted tree. A loud voice called out, accusing us as bandits and the dead bandits rose from the dead. More Zombies! Quentin held while Galas punch & stabbed.

Holg sets one on fire and it began to spread. Quentin uses his Action Surge to stomp out the fire before the whole orchard went up, and kept holding the line, getting occasional sucker punches from the zeds. Galas slowly killed each one while quentin killed one.

Eventually, the group of zeds all go down and at that point, Quentin was hanging on by a thread of hp. Short rest for him. We continued from the orchard into the center, where a large building with the apple press for making cider was in. First room had alchemist stuff & notes.

Before that, a poltergeist was levitating casks, crates, apples and more in the air, then disappeared with a shriek. Stuff fell to the ground. When we came out, the poltergeist came back, next to holg. She takes a swipe at him and nearly takes him down to 1 hp.

Galas comes up and tries to double kick the poltergeist. rolls a nat 1, which made the kick hit Holg. He still stands, due to half orc feature, still keeping him at 1hp. Quentin comes up and attacks the ghost. The ghost then picks up and flings holg into the wall. Downed.

Galas disengages with ki point, going to Holg to try to stabilize him while I tried to hold the ghosts attention. Missed with warhammer. gets picked up and flung into wall, next to holg. 3 damage. Pride hurt more. Ghost comes up.

By now, Galas is trying to stabilize Holg while death saves were being made. Holg stabilizes but the ghost is upon galas. Galas turns to the ghost and between him and quentin, finally take it down with it making a final scream.

At this point, Holg was out cold for a few hours so Quentin and Galas kept him safe. Holg wakes up with 1 hp and the 3 go to investigate the other rooms. Holg and Quentin found a room with crates that weren't interesting. Galas came into a sort of bedroom, with more notes.

He takes the notes and it's a to do list, that mentions locking up experiments to keep from children. Galas looks around in the disheveled room while Holg and Quentin come in. Galas can't find the keep for the footlocker but Holg takes out the key they found off the dead body.

Prior to the zombies, the group found the original orchard caretaker. He had a robe of useful items and a brass key. Holg took both, with the robes going into the pack for later.

The footlocker unlocks and 5 potions and a sack of something were inside. Holg looks at the potions and each has a label: +, x, ^, v, and a fire symbol. Holg drinks the +. It's healing potion of apple cider! He restores some health. He bags the rest and we go back to main room.

The press has more notes on it, this time how to operate the press and what ingredients were needed. Quentin tries "Press". Some sounds, nothing happens. Quentin tries "Mix". Some sounds, nothing happens. He stops Holg from pulling "Pour", realizing there's no cask for the cider.

To the side, 3 of the 10 casks of cider were found, along with crates of apples. We noted it and head outside. We try the first building and it's a stable. A horse was frantically beating against the stall door, and it became obvious that it's been hungry and thirsty.

Galas gets some apples from the nearby orchard and feed it. Then, he empties his waterskin in the pail hanging from the stall. The horse eagerly accepts the food and water, and Galas rolls decent on animal handling. He tames the horse. There's more, in the stables:

A cart that can hold 12 casks of cider, 6 empty casks and 3 casks of cider. Tools and lids for sealing the cider casks. And some hay. The group leaves the horse in the stall and goes to make it to the next building, on the other side. This is where things get ugly.

Galas, by this point, is very paranoid with scarecrows. Several attacked us earlier when we got here. So he goes to cut off the heads on these ones, like the others. Nothing happens. Then, he notices the bodies. He rolls low on perception while holg rolls decent.

As the 3 talk about the dead bandits, two large trees become awakened and proceeded to ambush the monk, knocking him down in one surprise attack. We were now down a person and its just the fighter and wizard, with the wizard barely at half hp. With Galas down, the trees come.

They come for Quentin and his shield barely holds off most attacks, but not every attack. He takes several gashes while holg firebolts the trees. It's very effective but takes a lot of effort to even bring one down. At this point, Quentin is down to single digits on health.

Meanwhile, Galas has been making death saving throws during this battle:
pass... fail... pass... fail...
Finally, he passes a third time, becoming unconscious.
By now, one tree has fallen and quentin is holding his shield with two hands. His warhammer strikes miss every time.

Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang.
Each time, the tree hits the shield, Quentin digs his feet deeper in the dirt.
Through sheer luck, he has been able to hold off this last tree for several turns.
Meanwhile, Holg misses several firebolts while hitting a few others. No trees lit on fire.

Finally, Quentin's luck runs out. He calls out to holg to finish it off, right as the lumbering tree strikes one final time, bypassing the shield and quentin goes down.
In a final act of desparation, Holg uses magic missile. At level 2. The tree shatters.

Holg rushes to Quentin, seeing Galas sleeping but okay now that he's stabilized. Holg tries to press on the wounds to stop the bleeding as death saves were made...
Pass..... fail.... pass.... fail....
Pass.
All 3 had barely survived.
Holg drags both sleeping heroes back to Press.

After closing and locking the double door to the main press building, Holg ritually casts Alarm, ensuring nothing will come close -- without warning. By now, he suffered a level of exhaustion, having to drag both heroes so far. Several hours pass. Quentin wakes up first.

Quentin wakes up with a startle, looking around as he realizes he's back in the press building. He looks to holg, resting, and then turns to galas. Galas was out cold for another hour. Quentin, thinking back to quick methods of waking up a person, gets his waterskin out.

He proceeds to wake up galas by pouring water onto the face. It works. Galas is now up and by then, Quentin slumps back into the corner. He grounds out,"Mind watch... need... sleep..." as he brings his shield up like a blankie, curled up in the corner. He was done for today.

Meanwhile, Galas is startled away by being effectively waterboarded in some degree. He seems better from his slumber than quentin was, and then proceeded to go outside. He gathered apples and water with his waterskin, and goes to feel his new horse.

During holg's attempts to drag his unconscious allies to the apple press building, he passed by the open door to the stable. Upon seeing his new master being dragged away, the horse became hysterical once more. Now, when Galas comes to the stables, a loud whinny is heard.

The stall door was swung open, having been beaten to open by the horse. To Galas' right, the horse comes leaping from the apple orchards, probably having had it's fill of apples. He greets Galas with a pounce and Galas proceeds to guide it back to the stall.

After that, he makes several trips back and forth, getting water for it and getting apples, so it won't go hungry nor thirsty. He returns to the apple press and sits down. The group had barely survived four encounters, two with hard minibosses. And they finally... long rest.

And that's how the group reached level 4. And in the next session, they will likely make a trip back, get some damn healer's kits and potions, and return for a second round of hell. Having no healer SUCKS.

@threadreaderapp unroll