Game Session Five, Part Three.
There's something that I left out last time. The players' battle plans were actually quite ingenious, in that they planned something that I had considered, but figured wouldn't happen. And i figured it wouldn't happen because they didn't have any explosives to blow the bridge. But then...
The players wanted to blow the bridge, but weren't sure how. It seemed impossible, and after discussing it with Dar Gremath, they had no explosives to use. However, they realised something. They had spent a few nights at the Mallard Inn before, where they were served some fantastic ale. And that means that the Inn must have a supply of alcohol. Wonderfully flammable alcohol.
They purchased as many barrels as they needed to cover the bridge from the Inn, then placed them along the bridge. I didn't want to ruin their fun, and I was enjoying this, so let them plan it all out properly, lead a trail back to behind the barricade and then use a torch to light it. And they did. Once the first of the Iron Circle rabble was about to reach the barricade, they lit the bridge. Explosions all along the bridge were enough to kill all but one of the rabble and leave the few more powerful enemies bloodied and ready to be slain from a distance.
And so that's how the battle went. The odd thing was that while Varis the paladin and Torrin the warlord simply sat there for most of it, Merric, Vale and Reverence, being the rogue, wizard and warlock, who all have ranged attacks, were able to wipe out the enemies, and had quite a good time.
I'm not sure if it counted as a success or a failure in terms of being a good battle for the players. They were incredibly happy when they blew the enemy to pieces, but then it became a case of attacking at range and waiting for the elves, who arrived after enough rounds had passed (more rounds than it should have been, since I wanted to at least get the enemies to the barricade, but they had only just made it when I decided it was time to have the elves come in) and 'saved' the day.
But it was then that the heroes were told by a rebel scout that they were needed, as the bullywugs had arrived and were headed towards the stables, where the innocent were hiding. Leaving the barricade, the players left enough soldiers to continue the fight and headed north for the stables. Dar Gremath ran past them, shouting a few words of encouragement, and they continued through the town square, where they were confronted by two tar devils, a dark adept, two cutthroats and (plucked straight from my new Monster Vault) a rather large ogre. The players are level 4 at this point, so I chose a nice level 6 ogre that had a chance of actually killing one of them. He started the battle with his encounter power that left the warlord (if I remember correctly) bloodied immediately.
The players were in uproar (and Vale was quite annoyed with me) and they were worried about this guy. Merric could't seem to get round to flank him and the others seemed to miss repeatedly. Varis stepped in to take a hit that was directed again at our warlord, Torrin and the team was losing health fast. This wasn't helped by the fact that the cutthroats were attacking at the same time, the dark adept healed the ogre halfway through and the two tar devils were grabbing the players with their nets and restraining them where possible.
I thought they might be in trouble, but the ogre fell and they were much more comfortable (although it was still a tricky fight ahead of them) at the end of session five. Which was a really fun session.