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"Okay, is everyone ready to begin?" Ralsei asked those around the elliptical-shaped table in the center of the palace in Castle Town. The darkner was running his first D&D campaign for his lightner friends as a Dungeon Master and had studied the rule systems for hours upon days, forwards and backwards. He was hoping everyone would have a great time and helped prepare their characters ahead. They would be playing the latest edition and their characters would all be starting out at Level 5.
"Let's do this!" Susie exlaimed enthusiastically.
"Excellent" Ralsei laid out his large map of the fantastical universe filled with models of buildings, obstacles, and various significant locations, along with some figurines of the party's characters and NPCs.
The fluffy boy set the scene of the campaign, "You all find yourselves wandering carefully, entranced deep within the misty, enigmatic forest. Earlier in the day you were assigned to seek out treasures in unexplored locations. Your end destination is the mountain pass on the other side of the woods, but while you're here be on the lookout for other items along the way. Try to stay alive and keep alert for any opponents."
Kris, playing the party's rogue, asked to make a stealth check to scope out the areas ahead of everyone else. They succeeded the check and were able to make it most of the way through the forest unseen.. until a swarm of trolls and their Troll King blocked the way, ambushing the party.
"Roll initiative!" Ralsei exclaims.
"Aww man, we were so close" Dess bemoaned, ensuring her ranger was placed appropriately far back and within prime aiming position.
Kris went first, slashing with their scimitar at the troll in front of them and Susie's barbarian. They rolled a critical hit and were able to apply sneak attack, dealing enough damage to one-shot the creature, eliminating an enemy from the count.
"Nice, starting strong!" Ralsei cheered.
Susie went next. Her character stomped over to the trolls surrounding Noelle.
"I'm gonna go into rage 'cause these guys are pissing me off" the dragon huffed. She had two attacks with her hammer, the first one missed but the second one was able to hit on the leftmost troll dealing a significant amount of damage, but still standing. "Heh, bet 'cha can't take me out!"
Ralsei accepted this challenge. The remaining trolls acted on a turn. Two of them jabbed hits at Susie, but missed some and the ones that did hit didn't take much health from her. The other two went for the weaker, squishier Noelle, lowering her health and nearly knocking her out.
Fortunately, the doe was able to go on her next turn. Her sorceress casted Rime's Binding Ice, forming a cone-shaped flurry towards the enemies and causing them to be frozen in place. She was able to deal cold damage to all the creatures, wilting multiple down at once and taking out the second troll, allowing her to back up for safety.
"Alright Berdly, you're next" Ralsei prompted.
The blue bird sat up tall and proud, "My artificer is going to aim for the Troll King, he's first going to put up his Steel Defender to make a powerful Rend attack. Then he's going to attack twice more with his thunder-infused halberd dealing epic gamer DPS" he remarked haughtily as he dealt the first few blows to the miniboss.
"Berdly, why do you always pick the most complicated characters to play?" Noelle rolled her eyes as she snickered.
"Be glad I didn't multiclass. I had a min-maxed hexadin ready to go until the DM said it wasn't allowed."
Ralsei stared blankly back at Berdly, "It's important that each party member has a balance and fair share in contributing to the quests" he reminded.
The Troll King's turn was next. Angered by the damage taken, the enemy took three attacks, two at Berdly with the poisoned staff, poisoning his character, and one bite at Noelle, knocking her down. The table gasped at losing one of the members.
"Quick, Azzy, heal my little sister!" Dess shouted in urgency.
Asriel's cleric was next, far of reach from any of the trolls or the Troll King. He took the Dash action to sprint closer to the party and used his bonus action to cast Mass Healing Word, bringing up the sorceress and healing the rest of the wounded players to near max hit points.
Dess was next. Her ranger launched two arrows with her longbow at the Troll King, with one succeeding and rolling high on damage. The miniboss was starting to look weaker, but still needed a few more powerful hits.
The turn order circled back around to Kris again. They ran up slashed again with great precision at the Troll King, dealing some more sneak attack damage as the allies were next to the enemy.
It was Susie's turn to aim at the trolls in attempt to knock some more smaller ones out, however both of her attacks missed.
"Damn, today must not be my day" the purple girl grunted in frustration.
The remaining trolls had a turn. They all targeted Kris this time, with all attacks hitting. Kris used their Uncanny Dodge reaction to weather some of the damage.
Noelle decided enough playing around and used her Fireball spell, targeting the remaining enemies and the Troll King, dealing just enough damage to kill them all.
"Woohoo, good job Miss Fire and Ice" Susie winked. Noelle beamed in flattery while blushing intensely.
"Congratulations adventurers!" Ralsei celebrated. "You all gained some experience points and powered up to Level 6. You loot the enemies and find a few hundred gold pieces and some magic items that may come in handy later. As the fog clears up as you approach the end of the forest, you see the mountain pass from afar. Near the base of the mountains you find a band of wizards gathered around a circle. Perhaps you will be able to talk to them for advice next session" he leaves the story off there for the day.
"This was super fun, thanks for arranging this Ralsei" Noelle complimented. The rest of the group followed in thanking the darkner as they finished sipping their tea.
"I'm glad everyone enjoyed it" he smiled warmly. "Now, when should we meet next to continue the campaign again?"
"Um.." the blonde doe hesitated, "I think I have track practice next week, sorry."
"We also have some group projects due soon" Berdly chimed in.
"Ah, yes, the classic scheduling conflicts. No worries, we'll keep in touch" Ralsei waved farewell to his friends as they traveled home to the Light World.