(Dnd 4e) The Plague of Sharadrim -- New Chapter: A Parting at The Temple

[TheMMMification]

Introduction
Hey there, I am attempting another solo campaign of Dnd 4th edition, starting from 1st level and ending at 30th level. If you're wondering what happened to Dirty Deeds in Noam, I had to abandon it, partially because I was getting unenthused with solo roleplaying and wanted to make time for normal roleplaying, but also because RPG Solo was turning it in directions I was not happy with. So why am I trying this again? I recently saw the first LOTR movie, and its fantasy action got me so excited that I wanted to make some of my own. So, here we go again.

Things will be done a little differently this time. So that way sessions will go faster, I only make brief notes of the actions taken during it. Then, I'll use these session notes as an outline to write the actual story, letting me expand on details and character thoughts afterwards. This will let me skip over uninteresting parts, and it'll discourage me from turning fights into a boring blow-by-blow. I'll also post my session notes along with each update, in case you're curious about my solo-ing process.

As of this introductory post, I have completed the prologue and the first chapter. I haven't actually gotten to the events of the first session yet, so the session log will wait until the next chapter. Anyway, let us now dive right in to the story of the Forbidden Temple of Hadra, and the endeavors made against its curse on the land. I hope you have a good time reading this!

Table of Contents
Prologue
The Four Gather
Messengers and the Environment
Drakes on the Chalice Road
Plague Reaches the Chalice
The Return to Zawastamankwo
Battle Against the Wretched Puppets
A Parting at The Temple

[TheMMMification]

I've released a new chapter, which goes over my first session of the campaign. Our party of four begins Chieftan Okonkwo's quest to deliver his letter to King Abdah: a request for protection from the undead wandering the steppe. A simple request, but not without its complications, as our party soon discovers in... Chapter 2: Messengers and the Environment

Also the session notes for this chapter, for those interested: link

[TheMMMification]

Update time! Here is the third chapter of the campaign, where I made the mistake of putting my characters in a tricky situation, and had to spend hours trying to resolve it. A lesson I've learned here is that if you want to make the party retrieve something from a creature, don't make that creature a spiretop drake since they can ignore opportunity attacks and can fly 16 squares in one turn. Let's see how our party solves this dilemma in... Chapter 3: Drakes on the Chalice Road

Also the session notes for this chapter, for those interested: link

[TheMMMification]

I've finished the next chapter. This adapts most of the third session, since the rest of it would fit better in its own chapter. Here our level 1 party finds themselves in a 4th-level encounter against 5th-level ghouls. How will they survive? Luckily, unlike last session, I was able to have a lot of fun with a difficult encounter. Now let's see how the party fares in... Chapter 4: Plague Reaches the Chalice.

Also the session notes for those interested: link

Lastly, I wanted to use minions to emphasize the ghoul's numbers (and because they're so much easier to manage), but for some reason DnD 4e doesn't have minion ghouls until the Paragon Tier. So I used Monster Maker to make my own Heroic-Tier minion ghouls. Here is their stat sheet.

[TheMMMification]

And now for the rest of the session. The action takes a backseat here as our party makes the return trip back home. But the day is far from over, and horrors still haunt the road! They'll discover a new threat in... Chapter 5: The Return to Zawastamankwo

Lastly, the session notes are here

[TheMMMification]

So it turns out that this fourth session also has to be split into two chapters. A lot of important events happened, some I couldn't glaze over, others that required to be expanded upon, and that's because it turned out to be the climax of this little quest the party embarked on. In this chapter, which was the meat of the session, they had many encounters, got a closer and more uncomfortable look at the dark forces plaguing Hadra, and reached Level 2. Find out what happens in... Chapter 6: Battle Against the Wretched Puppets

The session notes for those interested: link. Here you'll see that this session actually was a bit of a bust towards the end, because I kept forgetting to keep track of the ongoing damage made by one of the monsters in the encounter. With how much I was failing my saving throws, someone really should have gotten knocked out in that fight, but that's what happens when you fill five roles at the same time. At least I got some good writing material out of it.

Lastly, I made a few more monsters for this session. A couple simply represent small-sized zombies, while the last is an Elite version of the Blazing Skeleton, which is basically just the power of two Blazing Skellies combined into one. I went with this since having one big skeleton as the end boss felt more dramatic. The stat sheets for these custom monsters are linked below:
https://i.postimg.cc/Hk21T6zv/image-2021...181843.png
https://i.postimg.cc/KYpXM4dn/image-2021...181911.png
https://i.postimg.cc/JnHFHx3L/image-2021...182105.png

[TheMMMification]

After two weeks, here is the ending to Session 4. Why did it take so long for me to write it? Not only did I have a couple very important events occur in this moment, including the introduction of a new supporting character, but I had to expand a lot on these events because there was not much for me to work with in the session log. I basically left myself with a note reading, 'important things take place at this moment'. Anyway, rambling aside, this chapter returns us to our party after their near-death battle with the wildfire skeleton. Left with terrible burns and exhaustion, little hope remains of them being able to safely return to Zawastamankwo before the terribly dark night sets in. Find out how they survive in... Chapter 7: A Parting at The Temple

Lastly, here are the session notes, for those interested in that. There isn't much this time around.

Next time, the party will be at level 2!

[simonhard]

Personally, this is an exciting and incomprehensible game since I started playing it not so long ago and don't know much. Yes, of course, I found a guide dndguide.net where I found a character for myself. Namely, the druid and the question, do you think it's worth starting to play for him if I really don't know anything. Of course, my friends play more than I do, but they don't explain anything reasonable to me. I asked them if it was worth playing on it, and they told me to choose what I like. But I like everything, but no one has answered the question of what is better to take initially.