The Adventurers Odd
Diabolically Despicable Dice … of DOOM!
When we last left our heroes, they had just fallen into a dark hole. With no apparent way out, they decided to …
“Are we really doing the whole ‘Last Time on’ blah, blah, blah thing?” Bob the Rogue taps his foot impatiently as he stares at the ceiling. “Let’s just get on with it.”
Fine, if you insist. Bob the Rogue inches the door open further, ready for anything that might …
“Uh, I would like a recap,” Jorge the Monk interrupts, confused as to where he is or what’s going on. The whole point for the recap being he just joined the group.
“What was that last part? I couldn’t hear it over this annoying whining sound that is coming from the ceiling.” Bob the Rogue cups a hand over his ear to mock the pretentious voice in the sky.
Varonis the Wizard walks up to Jorge with his arms out wide. “We fell through the desert floor. Bob fondled a locked door for half an hour. Then we saw two people camping in the hall out that door.” Varonis shrugs. “Now you’re caught up.”
“Alright guys. Sorry I’m late.” Jorun the Paladin wakes up from his slumber and notices the new guy in the room. He draws his sword and says in as commanding a voice as he can muster, “Who are you and how did you get here?”
“Relax dude, he’s a player character,” Bob says without any note of concern. “Why should I be concerned? It’s not like we are about to have a player versus player fight here.”
“You could at least try to RP it a little” Jorun holds out his arms, pleading with Bob.
Bob walks nonchalantly up to Jorge. “Fine, whatever.” Bob then raises his arms high above his head and says in a loud voice. “You. Look. Trustworthy.” He then gestures both arms towards the northern door. “Let us go and kill things. Together.”
“Sure thing, mate.” Jorge gives Bob a thumbs up.
“Are you happy now?” Bob glares at Jorun.
“Ecstatic.” Jorun raises his hand to his face. He feels he’s doing that far too often lately.
*****
Bob once again returns to the door. Peeking outside, he can see three humanoid figures sitting around a campfire.
“Whoa.” Bob steps away from the door and looks up. “Hold on here. ‘
Three humanoid figures’ you say? I thought there was just two.”
You got a new member in the group. I had to up the challenge somehow. Besides, you still outnumber them.
“Look, fighting our way out of the dungeon is not a good idea anyhow. We have nowhere to retreat to.” Varonis speaks some words and the light on his staff fades. “I say we sneak past them.”
Bob looks at Varonis sideways, then gestures at the heavily armored paladin with both hands. He waves his arms up and down as if he was trying to fan Jorun. “Unless you can manifest some full plate roller skates I don’t think sneaking is going to work out so well.”
“So what do you think we should do?” Varonis crosses his arms and taps his boot.
“Um, guys?” Jorge raises a hand and says, “How about we try to sneak past them and if they spot us we fight them?”
Everyone looks at each other for a moment. Jorun sheathes his sword and breaks the silence. “That sounds good to me. Three to one; sneaking is the plan.”
Bob the Rogue, oddly enough being the only one opposed to sneaking lets out a dejected sigh and says, “Well, let’s roll the dice.”
Jorun restrains himself from covering his face with his hand.
*****
Bob and Varonis lead the way into the hallway. Jorun takes extra precaution in each step to prevent the layered metal plates in his armor from striking against each other. Once everyone is in the hall, Jorge follows behind, stomping his feet and shouts, “Why is everyone walking funny?”
Bob stops dead in his tracks and whispers as loud as he can to the ceiling. “Nope! No way! That did not happen!”
Well, how else do we explain the stealth checks? Jorun rolled a twenty, Jorge rolled a one, and after all the modifiers are applied Jorun’s result is still twice as good as Jorge’s.
“Yes, but that still doesn’t make Jorge a complete idiot.”
So, how would you explain a barefooted man in light clothes being louder than a knight in plate armor?
“Perhaps my spell to manifest full plate roller skates worked after all?” Varonis answers meekly.
“Actually, I was okay with ceiling man’s explanation.” Jorge interrupts the exchange. Everyone in the group turns their head slowly to face Jorge and stares at him, mouth agape and eyes wide. “What? I thought it was funny.” Jorge pauses for a moment, then shrugs, “What’s wrong with playing along?”
“It’s not like it matters.” Orc A turns around from the campfire and draws his ax.
“We could hear you in the other room,” Orc B adds as he stands up to face the adventurers and Orc C joins him.
“Ummm …” Bob the Rogue tries to quickly come up with a plan. “No, you didn’t.” The sound of rolling dice echoes down the hall.
“We did hear you.” Orc A answers with certainty.
“No, you didn’t.” The sound of dice echoes down the hall, again.
“Yes, we did!” Orc B answers with more certainty.
“No, you didn’t.” The sound of the dice rolls echoes louder than before.
“You do know that the difficulty of selling a bluff increases each time you fail to sell it,” Orc C states in a matter-of-fact manner.
Bob pauses, and then says, “No, it doesn’t.”
Orc B turns to Orc C and says, “You know what, I don’t think the difficulty does increase.”
“I was certain it did just a second, ago.” Orc C scratches his head and turns to Orc B. “Now, I’m not so sure.”
“Of course, the difficulty increases. It only makes sense for it to increase.” Orc A jumps in.
“And you didn’t hear us in the other room.” Bob tries to add.
“Don’t interrupt!” All the Orcs shout together, and then they carry on with their discussion.
Jorun motions to the rest of the team to continue down the hallway. They stop at the first door they see. Bob goes through his routine of trap-checking and prays that the door will open. Fortunately, it opens without any trouble. The whole team piles into the room. The ramblings of difficulty classes fade as the door closes behind them.
“Alright, I just have one thing to say,” Bob says as he points at the ceiling. “You really named them Orc A, B, and C? Really?!”
It was a trash mob, I’m not about to name every enemy you’ll encounter.
The team rests for a moment as they gather their composure. Jorge breaks the silence by asking, “How much XP for bypassing the trash mob?”
Re: D&D Snippets II: The Snippetting
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