The Second D&D Tarak Campaign - Going To Save The Kobolds

Welcome to the ongoing saga of a Dungeons & Dragons campaign I ran a little while back. It started off using The Sunken Citadel module from the Tales From The Yawning Portal source book, but was then fitted into my Homebrew setting and moved on from there.

In the last post, the party were given a tough choice between saving some trapped kobolds and going to Tarak to tell the authorities in the capital about the orc invasion.

I hope you enjoy my D&D campaign write-ups, and the commentary I add to them. Questions, comments and feedback are welcome !

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Once they returned to their lodgings and could discuss the choices before them, the debate among the party members was fascinating to watch. There were strong opinions on both sides, and it was interesting seeing how sentimentality and honour fell on ones side, and hard-headed pragmatism on the other.

The arguments deployed were varied. Kerowyn was human and had effectively been put in charge of Oakhurst by the party when they deposed the previous mayor, Vurnor Leng (who was still being kept drunk in a cell, quietly rotting away semi-forgotten). So she owed them. Yusdrayl was the shamaness of the kobolds. When the party had invaded her territory's tribe her kobolds had overcome them; she could have killed them offhand, but chose to spare their lives, so effectively the party owed her.

What really swung it was that if the kobolds needing rescuing weren't saved soon, it would be too late. So the party decided to rescue the kobolds, and only then take the trip to Tarak.

As they set off the following morning, Yusdrayl told the party that the kobolds were holed up in the mountains directly south of Oakhurst. Their location could be found by spotting a great stone arch – they were in a small cave complex in the centre of it.

Getting to the cave complex took two days. Although I rolled for random orc encounters I added a modifier to reduce the odds if they were being discreet. Luckily for them they were being very careful and were able to hide from the few parties of orcs they saw in the distance.

When the arch was spotted, it was a great sturdy thing linking the twin peaks of a snow-capped mountain, bridging the saddle between them about halfway to the top. It bulged somewhat in the centre, but on either side of the bulge it narrowed down to about 30 feet wide.

Each end of the arch was a flattened and raised area where Orcs could be seen camped. They were sheltering under overhanging cliffs but a careful close look showed that they were clearly miserable. It was bitterly cold, with an icy wind and flurries of driving snow.

A close look (perception check DC18) spotted that the kobolds had built low walls across the arch a little way from the bulge, both on top and to the sides, with about 100 feet between them.

The orc camps were protected at the sides by palisades, crude and hastily thrown up. There were no gates, just gaps. Watching from a distance, the party estimated that each camp held around 120 orcs, plus a dozen or so orogs and at least one war-chief. It was a small relief that they couldn't see any worgs or obvious spell casters.

It was clear there were far too many orcs for the party to just storm one of the camps, kill them all and open an escape route for the kobolds.

They would actually have to come up with a plan and use some stratagems rather than applying their usual technique of charging in and killing everything that stood in their way !

Next time: No plan survives first contact with the enemy.....

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zakludick (74) 8 days ago

I am interested to see where they go from here!

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alonicus (69) 8 days ago

I deliberately set them up with a situation where they couldn't just rely on violence to get through 😁 Of course, a bit of violence would be needed, but it would have to be applied a part of a plan....

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lolzbot (71) 8 days ago

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zakludick (74) 7 days ago

But relying on violence is what they do best!

lolzbot (71) 7 days ago

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