Encounters Sessions Introduction

I've been DMing at Morningstar Games on Montgomery Crossroads for 6 weeks now.  For those that don't know, the makers of Dungeons and Dragons (Wizards of the Coast) has a series of games on Wednesday nights called the Encounters Series.  WotC provides a 13 week adventure broken into 13 encounters (one a week).  The encounters are streamlined and designed so that a new player can walk in and be able to play a game.  At the same time, experience players can do the same, or bring their own character.  All the rules are identical to a real game, its just the encounters are designed with time in mind.  Two hours, and your out.

Talking with the gang at Morningstar Games, we decided to exchange links and I would start commenting on the Encounters games. 

Now that the introductions are done, here's more on the story we are telling in this 13 week adventure.  It's titled "Beyond the Crystal Cave".  The back page was a fascinating history of the adventure.  This adventure was first published nearly 30 years ago in the UK.  Apparently that region of the world is not as fascinated by hack and slash as us American's and the original story rewarded players for avoiding conflict and using diplomacy.  From the same page, I also found a favorite quote on this page I shared with our players on Session 1, "The adventure is designed to be both amusing and irritating to players, though simply amusing to the Dungeon Master."  I love that.

From the DM perspective, this adventure was TOUGH to wrap my head around.  It got easier once I took this story one encounter at a time, but it is full of pairs of names all related to other pairs of names.  In trying to be brief I will summarize the story and names so far in Sessions 1-5.

Strange mists, winds, and creatures are now roaming the areas around the town of Crystalbrook.  The Crystalbrookers blame the fey (a reace of magic/natural creatures) in the nearby Sildaine Forest.  The fey, in turn, blame the Crystalbrookers for these problems and accuse them of practicing black magic.  This has been escalating for a year now. 

A final straw in this escalation causes the rulers of these two lands to attempt to come to resolution.  Lady Anya Tamora, ruler of Crystalbrook, finds her son Orlando missing.  On the same day, Lord Carric, ruler of the Sildaine Forest, finds his daughter Juliana missing.  They both suspect that their children may be lovers, but disagree on the specifics and intentions.  Count Varis Sybar, ruler of nearby Sybar, is called in to mediate and aid.  Varis searches for heroes to be his agents in this matter.  What do you know, several frequent Morningstar Games every Wednesday night at 6pm.who answered the call.