Press The Beast

Devil's World Heroes Episode 25

I want to start writing abbreviated session reports each week to help with running our ongoing campaign Devil's World Heroes (DWH). This game is very famous: please enjoy following along.

Characters this session include:

Hirelings included Uruguay, Chrono, and Bonus. Friend of the party Samson joined for this session.

INSIDE DARKELF TOWER

The party entered a massive tower built into a tree; Darkelf conquered Elf Tower, renamed it and embedded it with the darkness of his own heart.

Two Elves, Graz Hampton and Elftilda, were discovered hiding behind a painting near the entrance. They were determined to be useless so Masketta punched Graz in the balls and then the pair were locked inside a closet.

To the north of the entry room a smelly ooze trickled out from beneath a door. The Slipper brushed his teeth with it, felt his teeth dissolving, and managed to clear the gunk before all his teeth fell away: now they've been reduced to pointed razor fangs. Nice for biting! The party opened the ooze door and saw nothing but darkness; bubbles formed along goo in the shape of screaming men then popped with a moan. They opted to go elsewhere.

Through a small window in the entry room, they could see a sleeping Chimera; using this knowledge they launched an ambush. The Slipper quietly picked a lock to allow the party to sneak up on the monster. Gestalt had consumed a stinging demon with a petrifying poison and managed to sting the Chimera, killing it instantly.

Nearby, they found a room filled with destroyed furniture and 4 Elf corpses, each with an armful of treasure. Gestalt attacked a corpse pre-emptively, only for a Wraith to fly out of its mouth and attack. Only magic weapons can hit ghosts, so the party had to send the three magic weapon users—Meatface, Masketta, and Expert II—up to dispatch them. The Wraiths are quite dangerous because they drain significant amounts of XP, but Gestalt and the party got away unscathed. After 2 Wraiths were killed, the other 2 retreated through the walls and continues to haunt the party. Spooky. After dispatching the ghosties, the party increased their networth significantly.

To the north, a spooky corridor was dotted with fleeing statues of Elves. The party immediately suspected a petrifier, and guessed it was likely a Gorgon. They looked another way, and found a cracked wall which they blew up with a bomb; this lead the same direction as the statue bodies. On the other side a great theatre opened up to them; the audience seemed to be running in terror, but they were frozen to stone.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE'S THE TEMPEST

On stage the actors were all stuck in place. It was a production of the Tempest, with Prospero, Miranda, and Caliban. The set had a large ship in the back, and complex scaffolding above to enable the raising and lowering of props and actors via cables and ropes. Gestalt delivered a roundhouse kick to the Prospero statue and snapped off its head, then was immediately attacked by Caliban: he wasn't frozen, he was merely a painted like a statue. From back stage, an iron plated Gorgon emerged and tore the wood up into a blast of shrapnel which knocked most of the party off stage. Battle ensued!

What followed was a fairly complex battle; Caliban climbed along the scaffolding and used his high mobility while the Gorgon tore up the battlefield and sought to use its petrifying breath. Samson, beloved ally voiced by Patrick Warburton, sacrificed himself by clinging to the Gorgon's horns when it sought to petrify the party which was largely knocked off stage in front of it. Hails of machine gun fire targeted Caliban up on the scaffolding, alongside Expert II's spectral grease claw; Hard Candy used a laser gun to blow up the scaffolding itself and knock Caliban to the ground. The party dragged down the Gorgon slowly while Meatface pursued Caliban. Because Meatface is heavily armored and exceptionally huge, Caliban was able to easily attack and retreat with risk—thus he ran up onto the pirate ship. Instead of chasing further, Meatface simply deadlifted the ship and rolled Caliban off to centre stage where Masketta was able to behead him.

The Slipper almost killed the Gorgon with a plunging attack but only dealt 1 damage. Barral Jr. stole the kill and everyone booed.

The two elf hirelings, Chrono and Bonus, made out throughout the fight; Uruguay assisted with machine gun fire.

Once killed, Caliban's monstrously muscular body deflated. "Damn fake natties," commented Masketta with an unknown expression beneath her mask. Then Slipper walked to the front of the stage, looked solemnly at the petrified Elves and Elfettes and said: "another day, another Devil."

I can see how writing these quick session reports is useful to help with keeping the game straight; it definitely doesn't capture the fun of the session at all. This one was an absolute blast to play, and our first true dungeon crawl in many sessions. With this many players, and especially online, the confines of dungeon crawling really help give direction and energy to play.

I will one day write up a guide to setpiece/boss fights, and the Caliban/Gorgon fight is another great example from this campaign. Both enemies were relatively simple in conjunction with the terrain pushed the party hard and created a number of interesting tactical decisions. This was the simplest "boss monster" yet and I also think it was the most fun at the table. Caliban's extreme mobility and the staying power of the Gorgon worked well in combination.