The first part of the session heavily featured roleplaying. I felt bad for Jason and Darla, whose characters were either not present, or not the focus. Jason had tried to interject Ansis earlier, but I was a bad DM and told him Ansis wouldn’t recover until the morning. I’ll remember to say “yes” in the future when one of my players expresses an interest in roleplaying.

Inspired by Justin Alexander, I decided to remix the kobold ambush encounter. Day once again took lead and pushed the closed doors open. The wyrmpriest hit her with acid energy orbs while the dragonshield and skirmisher closed. The rest of the party focused on taking out the skirmisher then the dragonshields, while the wyrmpriest blasted Day. She kept hollering at them to get rid of the wyrmpriest, which they finally did once Day was bloodied. Galin, Ansis, and Kiran went around and entered the courtyard through the hole in the west portion of the wall. The wyrmpriest fell, followed shortly by the remaining dragonshields.

Kiran spied some stairs north of where the wyrmpriest was stationed. Faint light could be seen at the bottom, some sixty feet into the earth. The group took a short rest, and looted the kobold bodies, before descending. The stairs ended in a large, square chamber with four pillars that held burning torches in their sconces. Three halls ran off from the chamber to the east, west and south. A lone goblin stood watch in the south hall, and began to taunt the PCs as soon as it saw them. Galin blasted it with a magic missile, and the creature took off running. Day proceeded cautiously, and noticed that the “stone” floor in the middle of the chamber was actually a sheet of canvas painted to look like part of the floor. From underneath it, she could make out the squeaking of rats.

The group avoided the middle of the chamber and headed south after the goblin. Another goblin appeared at the end of the south hall and snapped off a shot from its crossbow, followed by a similar attack from yet another goblin. The two goblins slowly retreated as the PCs advanced, until the party found themselves in a room with some bedrolls and two sets of doors, one each in the east and west walls. A fourth goblin opened the east door and launched javelins at the party. All the goblins kept some distance between themselves and the PCs (via goblin tactics) so they could use ranged attacks. Day managed to herd the two sharpshooters and the lookout into a corner, while Kiran–with some help from Gullyven’s lightning–forced the javelin-throwing goblin warrior back into the storeroom it came from. However, when Kiran chased after it, the goblin fled.

Once the goblins were defeated, Kiran and Day debated the merits between taking a short rest and pursuing the escaped goblin. Day reminded Kiran what happened the last time they pursued a fleeing enemy without resting. He conceded the argument, the party rested, and we called it a night.