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After helping the half-orc settlement Gjohammer fend off invaders, uncover another slaad imposter, and disable a device designed to create a portal to another plane, the Doubley-Doos have returned to the road. Equipped with new magic items from Representative Mawt as a thanks for their help, the party has decided to help reunite their new goblin companions with the rest of the Rockmore tribe.

The first two days of travel were very quiet, with one exception. On the second day of travel, they heard cries for help. They discovered that someone had dug a large pit in the road and a human couple had fallen in. They said they were robbed, but they never got a good look at their robbers. The party helped the couple out of the hole and after learning they were only a day’s travel to Gjohammer, the couple decided they would head there for the time being.

On the third day of travel, the Doubley-Doos stumbled into a trap of their own. As the road caved in under them, Shelby and Dormin were both able to narrowly miss the trap, but Shump wasn’t quick enough and fell into the pit. They heard someone shout for them to hand over all of their money and leave. The voice was strange, like someone with a high voice trying pretty unsuccessfully to make it sound deeper. Shelby drew her sword and challenged them to a fight, which clearly spooked the unseen assailants. After arguing amongst themselves, they just demanded the Doubley-Doos leave. As this discussion was happening and Shump pulled himself out of the pit, Dormin scanned the trees and realized that their attackers were goblin children.

Their friends from the Rockmore tribe stepped forward and agreed to speak to the kids, who revealed they and their parents were fleeing north to escape the armed conflicts in the south. They were trying to get more money to help their parents. Shelby, once she realized there was no threat, tried to get them to accompany the rest of the party — they could all join the Rockmore tribe — but their goblin companions pointed out that the Rockmores aren’t the only tribe against the Shrillbeast clan and these goblins probably were traveling with a tribe of their own. Instead, they decided to leave the goblin children some food and money to take back to their parents.

On the fourth day of travel, on an otherwise beautiful day, Shelby suddenly felt herself slammed sideways by an unseen force. Whatever this invisible entity was, it continued attacking her relentlessly. Shump raged, his newly emerging magical energy suddenly flared and he found himself able to read everyone’s thoughts. From the invisible entity, he could hear one mantra, repeated over and over: “Kill. Shelby. Shellstrop. Kill. Shelby. Shellstrop. Kill. Shelby. Shellstrop.”

The goblins fled, hiding among the trees while the party did their best to fight back against the invisible attacker. After some time, and a lot of struggle, Shump struck the entity with his axe, and it seemed to explode into a gust of wind. Dormin and Shump were baffled by the events, but Shelby revealed that after leaving her homeland, Ortuk, to travel abroad, she found herself studying at the House of Ymos — a monastery specializing in tranquility, balance, and healing. She tutored under Master N’Took until he was killed in the night by a dragonborn assassin. She fled the monastery and has been traveling ever since. She eventually learned the assassin’s name was Durrinn Kramankandir, but she never learned why he was sent after Master N’Took. She fears he may have tracked her down after all this time.

They decided to press on and ensure their goblin friends are reunited with the Rockmore tribe, and finally found themselves at the gates of Opal Town as evening was approaching.

The first thing they noticed was how much more heavily fortified the city had become since Shelby and Shump had last visited. High wooden walls had been built around the city, and actual uniformed guards stopped them, demanding to know their business with these goblins. When Shelby started explaining, they heard a familiar voice shout for the guards to stand down. Uther, the man they’d fought alongside during the first goblin raids, came out to greet them. Although initially suspicious of the goblins, he gave them the benefit of the doubt after Shelby and Shump vouched for them.

Inside, the change in Opal Town was even more apparent. The population had grown significantly, and even more notably, there was a large presence of Hearing House guards, with Uther apparently now among their ranks as well. It appeared Opal Town had become a military fort or outpost due to its central location in the south.

Uther led them through the city, catching them up on some of the latest news. He arranged for and paid for their rooms at Ristin’s Inn, and suggested they hold a little party at the Splintered Cask in their honor — they’re viewed as heroes among the locals for helping during the goblin raids.

While Uther arranged for the rooms with Ristin, one of the maids bumped into Shelby and slipped her a piece of paper that simply read, “Don’t trust him. He lies.” Shelby requested the maid help her set up some “special accomodations” in her room and was able to clarify that it was Uther who shouldn’t be trusted. Before she could say anymore, Ristin called her back downstairs.

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I’m not a fan of random encounters. Someone rolls on a table to see whether you get attacked each time you rest, and then rolls up a random enemy based on the environment to spring on you, all with the purpose of wearing your character down and expending resources. I appreciate the game rational behind it — increasing the difficulty by making players plan and manage things a bit more — but it often feels like intentionally wasting time. I enjoy a high drama combat, and even the occasional fun monster, but I’m far more into roleplay and story. I like to use combat to fuel story and narrative beats, not just as a cudgel to keep the characters from resting.

That said…they had five days of travel to go from one city to the other, and I didn’t want to just handwave that time. So I made up some random encounter tables, but with a catch. Each random encounter was either a glimpse at the impact of the war on the region, or a seed of a possible future adventure. That’s how they ended up meeting Yzzod, the gold dragon — I was blocked on actual plot progression and came up with a random scenario. But that ended up playing into everything as well.

I’ve wanted to start digging into character back stories a bit more for a while, but the goblin story has become much bigger than I originally intended. So I wanted to start seeding some post-war threads for everyone, and Shelby hadn’t really had anything specifically tied to her in the goblin arc yet. Dormin and Shump both got magic totems and possession storylines, but poor Shelby has felt a bit neglected.

Humorously, the idea started from a random encounter generator. I was on Kobold Fight Club, generating random medium fights, just to see what I got, and when I saw “Invisible Stalker,” it sparked my interest. The more I read, the more perfect it sounded, and it played perfectly into the backstory that Steph provided me a year ago.

As for the goblin kids? I want to continue to reinforce that not all goblins are aligned with Klaas. One thing I haven’t figured out a way to work in effectively are goblins that don’t fall on either side of the line — that are pro rebellion, but dislike Klaas messing with dark magic. Or are anti-rebellion, but don’t necessarily disagree with what Klaas is saying. Not all goblins that are anti-Klaas are pro-Hearing House or pacifists, but that’s been an unintended implication based on the NPCs I’ve introduced. I hope I can work a bit more nuance in sometime soon.

When I realized their next two potential quests led them right through Opal Town, I got really excited. Shump and Shelby going back seemed like such a fun way to mark how much time has passed both in game as well as out. It’s been around 8 or 9 months, and things have definitely changed. Exploring the impact of the war on this little town will be interesting, and I get to play some old NPCs again.

Regarding the Goblin Rebellion arc, I want to make sure this doesn’t become some protracted, stagnant thing, and I especially don’t want them to just ping from quest to quest to quest with no time to stop and breath. I’m trying to figure out a way to give them some down time in the near future. Something that doesn’t seem ridiculous given the threats they’re facing, but some reprieve where they can just have fun since they’ve been going pretty hard for a while.

I’m very much looking forward to 2020! My next campaign diary will be about the holiday-themed adventure I played with my family for Christmas.

Until next time!

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