Thug Muggers in the Sewers 1/14/24
Table Talk:
From “A Winter Solstice Gift for any player that finds it….” Brooke was able to give me some applesauce, so Ari gets one more permanent level 1 spell slot.
“I know that there's no stopping Wild, the bound and determined future equilibrist. All I can tell him is, ‘Kid you better know your tools damn well!’, and, ‘There’s no trick, to living life defying death. The trick come in earning a living, getting the crowd to hold its breath.’”
🐗🕷️☠️🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿🫐Chapter 5: Losing Friends and Making New Ones
🐗🕷️☠️🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿🫐Chapter 5: Losing Friends and Making New Ones
Just south of the city gates, in the Manajory, two equilibrists are dancing on the high wire. They’re practicing a new routine in the dead of night to be ready for their starring act tomorrow evening when the crowd will gasp in amazement, secretly hoping they fall.
In a sudden flash, their 18 year partnership is gone. With no warning or cause, Elizabeth gives a sudden hard shove and wraps her ankle in the line. When Wild falls from the wire with a look of panic in his eyes, she tumbles backwards and hangs safely from her ankle, laughing at his broken and twisted body.
After the thump, we move away from the maniac murder-laughter of the funambulist and into the clown tent, in a partitioned ‘room’ we see a sad clown. A young woman wiping off makeup in a tiny cracked mirror crying to herself. We watch her sob as a cloud of mocking words hangs over her. The echoing words of hateful children bounce across her ears as she sobs and paints on a crooked smile, trying in vain to get it right this time.
A little while later and back in the city, in Clerkstreet, the metal shrieks as the hinges of the grate scrape together, then the end slams down with a bang as Sorin pulls it shut. From behind a tree and a bush, the Thug nod stalks over to the grate.
The Thug pulls out a small oil can from their thieves’ tools and whispers to it. They pump some oil on the hinges and brush the gap with the back of a feather quill, nodding in satisfaction.
The Thug lifts the sewer grate and it rises silently.
The Thug looks around then spider-walks into the hole. Before tugging down the grate, they cut three pieces of hemp rope into fist sized lengths and line them along the lip of the grate edge. When the Thug closes it the only soft is a tiny muffled fumpf.
Just before the opening to the first level of the sewers, the Thug casts Shadow, and then the Thug gets ready to jump.
We are in a very simple rectangular room, and we are immediately struck by how cramped it is. We’ve been spoiled by the open air of the city, and the larger hallways on the second level of the Sewers, not to mention the caves. But now we remember how small and cramped this first level was, with each hallway only being wide enough to go single file most of the time. We look around and see a hall going east, a hall going west, and a hallway going south with a turn-off to a room close by. As Bostra begins to ask if we’re going down to the next level, Ari’s bow shrieks and she turns right before the thump. Then we all turn to look into the center of the room as the half orc Thug power lands at the base of the lander.
He throws the brick-camo cloak back over his shoulder and laughs a big dumb villain laugh. “Where’re we going little rabbits? Heh heh heh. This is gonna be fun!” Then he pulls out his maul.
Lets see if we still remember how to play Dungeons and Dragons, everybody roll initiative.
Bostra is up first. With an expression somewhere between homesickness and boredom, he steps into the corner and out of the way.
Ari is fast on her feet, drawing her blade and thrusting forward with a nat’ 20. She stabs under the giant Thug’s arm, then pulls back in a fast dancing retreat. As she backs away, she drags the true edge of the blade along his sleeve to open the cloth, and tilts the point to run deep into the muscles of his arm (giving him 18 damage and disadvantage on maul attacks).
The giant boorish brute laughs a dumb hearty laugh, “That’s not nice! Heh heh heh. Don’t bite now little rabbits.”
As Ari draws back, Rae jumps in. She lunges forward, driving the butt of her staff into the brute’s shoulder, knocking him back for 8 damage. Then she drops a hand and raises it quickly in a fist connecting with the Thug’s smug face for 3 more damage. She turns a fast spin to back hand him.
But, the Thug catches her hand in mid air. He laughs again like this is the best birthday he’s had in years, then swings the maul out. Rae moves to dodge, but it was a feint. Now with her off balance and still in his grip, the half orc slams his head down into her face as he pulls Rae close before letting go. Rae takes 8 damage and dances back, her arms flailing for her staff.
With the Thug turned away, Sorin takes his shot. “ʜɔuoƚ ||iʜɔ”. He speaks the words and opens his hand. In a dimension we can’t quite see, a part of Sorin’s soul moves out, extending through his open palm in a disjointed jagged arm. It uncurls a clawed fist and rips a chunk out of the soul of the massive Thug.
Sorin shouts at Akris and the flying snake obeys. He flies forward and spins, whipping the barbs of his tail into the neck of the enemy for 2 damage. Then with the partial Haste spell still coursing through him, he bites at the half-orc's face for another 3.
Cypress and tZulèe back into a corner. Cypress can tell (with a 14 perception) that something about this situation is off. This guy seems too sure of himself. He’s completely surrounded, and still laughing. Cypress thinks back to the letter on the last Thug they killed… he readies Poison Spray, but only if the Thug attacks him directly.
In the darkness around the ladder pipe above, someone drops something sticky and sharp, then fires off a poisoned bolt.
Ari, take 9 damage, and make a Con save for me.
Brooke: “What!?”
Nope, that fails, take an additional 1 poison damage, and make a Perception check.
…
Yeah, you have no idea what that was, but it hurt. Aaaand we're back at the top of the order, so it’s your turn.
Brooke: “And since I can't see whatever it was, I’m guessing I can’t use Hellish Rebuke on it.”
I’m gonna say, no. Because the spell requires you to point at the target, i’d interpret that to mean you don’t necessarily have to see it, but you do have to be aware of it. And you're not. So what are you gonna do?
Brooke: “I’ll swing at the Thug again.”
Brooke, Looking down at her dice: “Or I guess not. But, I am going to move to stand in front of Bostra and block him from getting hit.”
Rae is back on target and strikes out again, her staff cracks against the Thug’s weakened shoulder, and this time her punches land with solid hits for 20 damage over all.
The giant brute laughs at our heroes, and flexes his shoulder back into place. “Very good little rabbits! Very good!” He readies an action and the DM starts a short countdown.
Remembering that he learned Haste earlier tonight in case of exactly this, Sorin casts the spell on Rae.
Cypress watches the Thug's arms shaking with laughter and notices the gash Ari drew on his arm is starting to heal, stitching back together and … and becoming hairy!? What the fu-
Countdown’s up.
The laughing Thug throws his Maul at Cypress and bends over almost doubled. We’re in bullet time now as Cypress’s readied spell triggers. The Poison Spray stops the giant mallet in the air, just inches from their face. It drops to the ground. The Wereboar rears back. When he does, he lets out a ferocious roaring war squeal. The Wereboar charges! He rushes Sorin. Rae tries to use her new Sentinel Skill reaction. She attacks, but the Thug is moving too fast! He rams his tusks into Sorin for 12 damage, and with a strength check, he picks up the wizard and carries him off.
The Wereboar Thug uses his full movement to carry the wizard down the hall, into the next room, and push them both into the slippery (Mario-style) sewer pipe.
Wow… that was a lot in one turn of combat.
…
Ari, take 5 damage, and make a Con save for me.
Brooke: “What the hell!?”
Hey you passed, that’s half damage so take an additional 5 poison damage, and make a Perception check.
This time Ari sees as the Thug hiding behind the Shadow spell above, drops something and retreats. She points up and casts. Even with disadvantage from holding onto the ladder, the hidden Thug saves and only takes 17 Damage.
Rae looks up, then looks at Ari.
“Go get wizard boy, I’ll guard Bostra.”
Rae nods and sprints off with literal Haste. Her movements are a blur as she runs down the hall, into the mechanical room, and one-handed-parkour-jumps into the pipe. She comes out the other end with her staff at the ready, and swings. But it hits the wall, in the confined corner they're all wedged into (disadvantage for the confined space). Ashley gives up her last point of inspiration, and Rae’s staff bounces off the wall, and hits the Wereboar full on for 7 damage. Then she punches for another 5, and uses her Ki to unleash a Flurry of Blows for 7 more, knocking the Wereboar prone.
So in this tight space, he’s going to have to fall on one of you, both of you make Dex Saves and the lowest gets a Wereboar on top of them.
The Wereboar laughs in delight as he bounces off the wall and flops hard on top of Rae, “Awe, silly little rabbit, do you want a hug? Were you lonely without me? You came to find me and play!” He squeals piggy chuckles and rolls over on top of Raelle-the-Cushion. Then he pulls out a health potion and literally eats it. The glass crunches in his tusks as he chortles and chews, but Rae and Sorin are too angry to be intimidated.
Akris comes flying out the pipe and rolls a crit’ whipping the laughing Thug with his tail.
Sorin has had it with this boarish oaf (teehee), and he lets off a barrage of Magic Missiles.
When the sparks clear and our eyes adjust back to the darkness, the Wereboar is unmoving, and Cypress’s head is poking out of the pipe.
They look down at the Thug and roll a high medicine check. Something is DEFINITELY wrong. He’s dead alright. Dead as dead can be, with no breath and no life left in his mad piggy little eyes… but his heart is still beating. Cypress can feel his pulse and see the beating squirts of the blood in his open wounds.
As we look at this in horror we hear Ari scream in our ears with the Sending Stones. Then, through chattering teeth, she stutters, “She… She t-t-took Bostra!”
Yup. While we were distracted by the big one, the little one dropped off the ladder, cast Hold Person on Bostra, Commanded Ari to, “Cower in fear, mortal!”, then picked up the paralyzed royal gnome and ran the other way.
Ari shakes herself upright and lets the rage burn away the fear, then chases after the Thug.
Rae grunts and forces the body of the dead brute off of her. Then she uses her increased movement and a push from sending out her Ki behind her, to Dash all the way back to Ari and the Thug dragging Bostra.
Sorin follows fast behind, but stops in the room with the pipe-ladders when something catches his eye. He peers down and sees the traps.
Akris’s demon blood is up though, and he speeds on catching up with Ari and Rae even as his partial Haste ends.
See, both of the Thugs got two actions per turn. The assassin on the ladder did shoot poison bolts at Ari for two turns… but also dropped some nasty surprises onto the next ladder while everyone was distracted…
Cypress?
Nymbus: “I wildshape into a Giant Wolf Spider and chase after them with tZulèe on my back.”
… I love this game!
Let's change perspectives now, and rewind.
She’s followed the plan well, but she’s been hit. She knows they saw her, so it’s time to move. He should have taken at least one of them out of here by now, so it’s as good a time as any for her part.
She drops.
She looks around fast. Head on a swivel! Three gone! Even better.
She casts and the filthy idiot cowers, just like she should, before her betters. Grab the other one and run.
She drags her captive down the hall but she can hear the other one get up. Then she can hear more running footsteps, and flapping… and claws. ‘It’s fine, he took 3 of them out of the room, it’s just the one left!’
She risks a look behind her. The half demon is charging at her with horns lowered. The monk is catching up so fast she’s blurring and her staff is literally flying overhead. The winged snake is flying in the middle with fiery eyes full of murder… Then something crawls up the wall behind them. Running up the ceiling towards her is a Giant Wolf Spider. Its body takes up most of the roof and riding on its huge back is a wooden gargoyle with sharp grinning fangs.
The Thug baseball slides into the room, letting go of Bostra and cocking her crossbow as she rolls into a corner.
Ari comes into the room, bow drawn and firing, but the Thug rolls a crit’ and when the bolt (16 damage + 2 poison [18 total]) slices Ari’s leg, it buckles and her shot goes wide.
Brooke: “Wait, wait, wait! I just remembered, I have Uncanny Dodge!”
Ari comes into the room, bow drawn and firing, but the Thug rolls a crit’ and when the bolt (16 damage + 2 poison [18/2=9 total for Uncanny Dodge]) slices Ari’s leg, it buckles and her shot goes wide.
Brooke: “Phew, okay!”
Rae is done with this! She comes in swinging with her own critical strike! Then punches the Thug again! And before she’s done, Rae summons her Ki and releases it in a burst of Stunning Strike. Pushing her Ki into her opponent's nervous system to cause their body to seize up.
Sarah: “So they need to make a Constitution saving throw.”
Funny thing about that… they can’t make saves when they’re dead.
Sarah: “Wait, so you mean?”
Yup. Your first ever Stunning Strike, and you wasted it on a corpse.
Cypress gets into the room and sees the corpse. Then Wild Shapes back, and looks arrow. They notice a few red bricks along one wall and make a mental note.
Alright Sorin, it’s the last action before we leave initiative, what’re you doing?
Ashley: “I got a crit’ on Firebolting the trap on the ladder.”
Perfect! I’m so glad you did.
Ashley, panicking: “Wait, what? Why!?”
Sorin watches as the little arrow of magic flame hits the trap head on. “Yes,” he pumps his fist in the air. Then the first sack starts to smoke. “What-”
The sack, wrapped in barbed wire explodes. It knocks off three ladder rungs and drops the lit match onto the sack beneath it. The second sack, wrapped in barbed wire explodes.It knocks off three ladder rungs and drops the lit match into the darkness below.
Sorin stares down and the hole full of broken pipe and twisted metal and sharp lengths of barbed wire tangled all throughout. A brick crumbles out the wall and he watches it fall. “They're gonna be pissed.”
When he walks back into the room, Ari is looking at him with her arms crossed, “What happened?”
“What do you mean?”
Ari’s foot starts tapping, “I heard a noise, then you came running in here.”
“I was walking!”
Ari looks him up and down, “What’d you do?”
“I didn’t do anything! The Thug laid a trap on the ladder and it exploded!”
To be fair, Ari. That is extremely plausible, given everything that just happened. Oh god, i’m siding with Sorin now, what’s wrong with me!?
“Let’s take a rest,” Cypress says, poking the open cut on Ari’s leg. “You could use a chance to bandage up.”
“Ugh, fine.”
During the short rest, Ari uses 3 of her 5 Hit Dice for the day.
While Rae, Sorin, and Bostra are looking at maps, Cypress spends a few moments in compilation. Sorry, not like a religious Moment of Contemplation, just a couple minutes to collect his thoughts and think. Using a point of Inspiration that I gave them earlier, they roll checks on Religion and Insight. As they sit there scratching tZulèe’s head, the pieces start to click into place. The symbol Rae decoded on the paper was showing three of four sewers… three of four… three of four… one of four. What if the Rats were one of four. What if the cult was one of four, a cult and Thugs in each part of the sewers working to dismantle it. The thieve’s cant in the bath house that said Molemen, what if it was literal Mole-Men, a cult of Weremoles led by a Mole King. And the rumors of the Werebadger down by the farms… and of course a group of Wereboars now.
It all clicks into place as Cypress stares at the reddish camouflaging bricks and shudders. All of these Cults, but one true leader. Multiple bodies but one head down below. The graffitos in the city all had different things, “The badger was right”, “Eye of the Rat”, “Hail the Mole King”, but all of them had that same symbol. That weird monogram on all the notes and sermons. One head underneath, driving all these different bodies…
By their feet, tZulèe is melting. Sorry, melding* with a D. The gargoyle has put its back to the wall and spread its wooden wings. The bony bat-like finger lines on its wings are twisting, branching, and bending to line up with the seams in the brick work as it slowly sinks back into the wall. Half of its body appears to fade backwards as if through the wall, but in reality, it is just getting divided so thin and to be almost invisible as it spreads itself over and into the cracks in the wall.
On the other side of the room, Bostra points to a stop on the map, “There, that one should be just south of here. A little ways down that hall.”
Sorin and Rae look over their shoulders and nod.
“That way we have another way down if we don’t want to try to work past the ladder you blew up,” Rae tosses her hands in the air, “Sorry, that you said blew up.” Rae says, looking at Sorin.
“We don’t,” Sorin shakes his head, “I promise.” He ticks off points on his fingers. “I don’t know how many other traps are still down there. Most of the ladder is gone. There are spiky sharp poisonous bits everywhere. And the brick work around it is starting to collapse.”
While Sorin and Rae discuss it, Ari walks over to Bostra, opening and closing her mouth around an apology that refuses to come out.
Bostra looks at her and smiles a warm forgiving smile. “Don’t worry, it’s not the first time I’ve been kidnapped.” Then, with genuine humor, “Probably my shortest time being kidnapped though.”
Ari chuckles with nervous relief.
Cypress walks up to the group and points over his shoulder to where tZulèe is slowly detaching from the wall. “tZulèe says it can feel a Thug tunnel on the other side of that wall. It says it’s a short tunnel then a small room, there are several boxes and chests, but there's something big moving around inside.”
Ari rolls up her sleeves with an evil smile, “I’m still in the mood to square up against some more Thugs!”
Silence.
Ari rolls down her sleeves with a timid smile, “but I’ll go with whatever the group wants to do.”
A few moments later, Ari is sneaking down the Thug tunnel. With a 19 Stealth against the creature’s 16 Perception, she goes unnoticed. She turns the corner and looks up, then takes a few steps back and motions to Cypress, using simple hand signs to indicate “giant”, “spider”, and “up”.
Cypress nods, then casts Speak with Animals and steps around Ari into the entrance to the little room, the whole time being very conscious of their hands. Against every social instinct saying, ‘hands up means unarmed and non-threatening’, Cypress focuses on keeping them low to avoid giving the spider a reason to think he’s taking an aggressive stance. When he turns the corner, he smiles. There is indeed a Giant Wolf Spider in the corner of the ceiling, hanging down and looking at him, ready to strike.
Cypress’s mouth opens and the magic flows around it to form ghostly chelicerae, fangs and endities. They click and chatter as his words come out in spider hisses. “I’m very sorry to have disturbed you.”
The spider oscillates for a moment with arms half up to attack and half relaxed. It seems confused and hiss barks at the strange new creature, “Why you here!? What want!?”
‘Right’, Cypress thinks and mentally readjusts, ‘simple and short, okay.’ Then he continues. “No harm. Not want you. Want what inside boxes.” and he slowly points to the chests on the other side of the small room.
The spider growls and shakes, but the annoyance does not seem to be directed at the little druid. “Boxes annoying! Boxes dumb! Can’t get in…” Then it raises its arms in a pose of dominant force, “You! You small! Get in boxes! You open for me!”
With a quick nature check Cypress nods thinking, ‘Of course, they’d be perfect little spots for babies, but you can’t get into them can you’. Then out loud he clicks. “Yes. Yes. I open boxes, but with friend. We make boxes empty for you.”
The spider backs up in nervous fear and flares its fangs out. “Trap! You say not harm! Trap! You happy leaf outside, friend deadly pain inside! Trap!”
“No trap. No trap. No harm. Friend no harm!”
The spider hesitates, keeping its forearms and pedipalp up, “Friend small like you?”
Cypress looks over at Ari and takes a minute to think, “Me small-SMALL. You big BIG. Friend small.”
The spider rocks from side to side as it looks from Cypress to the boxes. “Fine. But me stay over small friend. Watch and be ready if trap!”
Cypress nods, then sighs and turns to Ari. “It’s going to let us in, to get everything without fighting. But you need to move very slow… and it’s going to stay above you on the ceiling while you’re in here.”
Ari swallows back a loud gulp and nods. She moves slowly around the corner towards the room and follows Cypress’s instructions to keep her hands low by her side.
“Fangs! Fangs! Trap! Vindication! Trap! I Right!” The Spider prepares to attack.
Cypress thinks fast, ‘fangs, what? Oh, her horns.’, he motions to Ari to crouch as small as she can. He clicks and hisses to the Giant Spider, “No fangs! No attack!”
“Friend lower fangs now! Show respect! Last warning!”
Cypress can see the venom dripping off the spider's fangs and turns to Ari, “You're going to need to bend over, try to point your fangs- er sorry- your horns at the ground.”
Ari's eyes go wide but she nods after a moment, “Just… try not to think about me mauling you like that guy, okay?”
“Okay.”
And so Ari and Cypress are allowed to loot the room. Ari will have to move slowly with her head down and an 8 foot Wolf Spider hanging over her head, but it’s a win.
What did they find in the room? Find out next time in “Thug Muggers in the Sewers: spider food edition!” oops sorry, was the name a spoiler?
“Folks say ‘If life’s got ya down, if you wanna get your butt off o’ the ground, grab a hold of yer boot straps.’ Fine, who the hell stole my boot straps!?”
Table talk:
I think there were too many numbers and dice rolls in this summary, especially in the fight scene. And that’s with me cutting out about half of the ones i wrote in my notes. I think, just like it took us a bit to remember how to do combat in game, it’s gonna take me a bit to remember how to write combat in the summaries, and balance dice rolls with narrative structure.
The fight was a Challenge Rating: HARD at 4050 XP (¼ of the daily expectation). It lasted 5 total rounds of combat, and the players dealt a collective 143 damage, averaging around 30 damage per round. The Giant Wolf Spider was 50 XP for finding a peaceful solution.
I talked with the players after this session about how it went, and i’m really glad they enjoyed it and that it went so well. I had actually been very nervous about this session. See, originally I had planned to just have a tiny Thug fight and let them get back down to the second level right away. But this meant i had to get several new maps printed. Which meant going out of town to the printers. Well then, we had a snow emergency with sub-zero temperatures and i was stuck in town. So at the last minute i had to come up with a whole session that would 1) keep them from getting to a new area, 2) still move the story along, and 3) be entertaining and engaging. I still had to print a few from home for the small rooms, but the players tell me i did a good job.
Lastly, speaking of maps, I finally did something i highly recommend to any DM. I added a grid layout over my DM maps and labeled them all (1A, 2A, 1B, 2B, 3C, etc.) with labels on the back of the maps we use in session. This is making digging through the giant portfolio of them MUCH easier!
