# The Chronicles of Nolenor – Play Reports #6 and #7
Real date: 9/24/17, 9/30/17 In-game date: September 8th, EY632
## PCs:
Ambrose (Warrior – Fighter now L2)
Asher (Footpad – Thief now L2)
Imric (Medium – MU L1)
## NPCs:
Gruk – (Barbarian – Fighter L1)
## Hirelings:
Thom (torchbearer)
Sturdoon
Rolgrim
In our last session, the party defeated the Hobgoblin chief and
returned to Frostmark. They recovered for a week, enough time to
allow Imric to craft a sleep scroll, and set out again to the caves
in a cold, light rain. The journey to the caves was uneventful, and
this time they took a different approach, sneaking up from the south
just after nightfall. They spotted two caves they had not seen
before, shrouded in trees but visible due to lit torches at each
entrance.
The activity around the caves seemed much higher than during the day
– each entrance had five guards, a mix of Dwarf and human, some with
crossbows. Imric decided to sneak a bit closer and expend his spell
repertoire all in one go, he cast sleep on the guard positions at
each entrance in turn. One (human) guard they left alive and
attempted to interrogate, but the fellow would not cooperate (DM
Note: terrible reaction checks) and Asher killed him after he tried
to flee.
The party decided to enter the east cave, inside they followed a lit
tunnel past a few branches to a large door. Ambrose tried to open
it, but it was stuck and required a few tries. Unfortunately, the
noise altered the room's occupant, an Ogre who was preparing
dinner. When the door finally opened, the Ogre was ready. He rushed
Ambrose and killed him in one blow with his large mace! The front
ranks of the party let loose a volley of arrows and rushed the Ogre,
cutting him down without any major injuries to the remaining party
members.
A search of the room revealed three large, iron-bound chests, lined
up in a row in the west corner. Asher examined the floor around the
chests and noted the flagstones oddly discolored. He tested his
theory that the floor was trapped by throwing a heavy bit of debris
on the floor in front of one of the chests. When he did so, a large
chunk of stone fell from the ceiling onto the chest immediately
below it, scattering the chest contents – gold and silver
coins. Imric found a small depression in the nearby rock that when
pressed with a pole, resulted in an audible 'click', and sure enough
another test revealed that this disabled the floor triggers. In the
other two chests the party recovered a good quantity of gold, some
gems and a finely crafted lockpick set. They gathered up what loot
they could and returned to town, Ambrose's body in tow.
## Referee Notes:
I handle stuck-door checks by having players roll once, if they fail
I assume the door eventually opens, but with effort and noise
(unless they explicitly tell me they are trying just once). In this
case the Ogre heard the attempts to open the door, and was waiting
in front of it to see who was interrupting his dinner. A failed
surprise roll for Ambrose the fighter was all it took – he had six
hit points, and was killed in one blow of the Ogre's mace.
The players discovered the falling block traps purely by searching
and testing – remember my thief class does not have an explicit
'find traps' skill, anyone can find traps. It makes my job as
referee a bit harder – I have to make sure I provide adequate clues
and descriptive hints. So far this seems to be working well.
