No Conclusion

[Golanthius]

I am writing a note to put this campaign to bed. The conclusion to the Avisarr was quite anticlimactic. The party was successful in banishing Draxorith, however due to the fact that the DM (me) was in the process of moving to another state, I did not have time to adequately prepare as I would of liked. I feel I did the party a disservice in the way I ended the campaign, as they really deserved better. After the escape from the Citadel, I basically had Demitrius (an NPC) do all of the "heavy lifting" inside the Banishing Chamber.

I am unable to get a summary of the conclusion.

The good news is, I am starting a new group here in Boise and I will get a chance at redemption. After we play a couple of one-off's to see if we "play well with others", I am going to start them on a new Avisarr campaign. I have everything from this last campaign ready to go.

I want to thank you all for reading these summaries and a special thanks to David for letting me put them in their own space.

When we start our new campaign, I will post the summaries on the board.

BTW - Our first one-off will be the "Last Gate". I really like this little scenario.

[tanis]

I'm sorry to hear the campaign didn't have a great ending, but I'm anxious to hear about your new group and their journeys!

[David Roomes]

What a strange coincidence! It so happens that something similar happened to me the first time I ran the Avisarr Campaign. I ran it back when I was in college and we ALMOST got it finished before the end of the school year, but not quite. We ended up having summer break and so there was a long 3 month gap. I  had to wait until the next college school year before I was able to play out the last two sessions. And, of course, several of the players were not available - for various reasons - for the grand finale.. the last session. As the new school year started, we set the date for the final gaming session, but only 3 of 7 players were able to make it. Only three! The final session was good, but still... it felt rather anti-climactic with less than half the group there.

It so happens that the young man in the dorm room next door was Mark Price. He was a new friend and he watched the final session as a spectator. Those of you who have been around Khoras for awhile probably have seen Mark's name here and there around the site - he's contributed various things to Khoras over the years, served as a good sounding board for ideas, and also influenced some of the graphic design of the site. After all these years, he and I are still the best of friends and we still discuss Khoras often. (Only just yesterday he convinced me to get back to work on the Seven Kegs short story...)

And it all started with that final, ill-fated session of the original Avisarr campaign. I ended up running it on other groups and I'm glad you are considering running it again.

Even though we both had a less-than-perfect final session, it still makes me happy that the campaign has been run so many times by different groups. Thank YOU for running it.

[Golanthius]

Okay, The new group started the Avisarr Campaign. We made it through three sessions before the party (including NPC's rescued from the dungeon) was obliterated inside Eramathan by the witch and her minions, only the cleric and an NPC thief survived.

Once they entered the castle through the sea cave, the party sought to confront and fight everything in their path. When they came across the gaming room, they kicked in the door and came face to face with 20 hostiles. An alarm was sounded which brought the leaders down from their meeting, this included Sethulga and Damerik along with a couple of ogres and some humans. Now the group faced off against 29 enemies and the battle began. Needless to say, it was a bloody and brutal battle and the party fought to the last man (except the cleric, whom ran for his life).

I wanted to update you on this and will let you know of any further developments.

[David Roomes]

Wow. Sounds like they got a little too confident. They marched into a castle full of baddies and were kicking in doors? Yeah, sounds like they were WAY over confident. And when they do get into a bad situation, it's surprising to me how often players forgot about the possibility of all-out retreat. It's like they forget that it's an option. I've had groups in the past do that. They get a little too confident in a string of successful battles. Soon they believe that "the DM wouldn't put us up against anything that we can't handle", when the truth is that it's entirely possible to be totally outmatched on that battle field. Sometimes retreat is the best option, but often players think in terms of Fight or Die as their only options.

I'm guilty of that in my current campaign. The current group hasn't had a real challenge and might be getting complacent. I might just have to toss them into a meat grinder encounter soon. The kind of battle where NPCs are dropping like flies and retreat is the only option. That could be fun and would snap them out of their complacency. Of course, any of my players reading this just soiled themselves...

[tanis]

XD

[Golanthius]

XD

Silly question - What does that mean???

[tanis]

Oh. Lol. It's an emoticon for heavy laughter. X is closed eyes, and the D is a grin. XD