Here we are then! The first entry for Tall Tales from the Tabletop, our look into the humorous, ludicrous and bizarre things that have happened within AMoG member’s games! Today’s anecdote is brought to you by AMoG founder Mike, from the time he ran WotC’s Storm King’s Thunder for a group of 5. For those who haven’t played the adventure module, we’ll keep the plot spoilers to a minimum, but here’s a general overview set the scene.
The king of storm giants has gone missing, and with his disappearance, the Ordning (a ruling hierarchy of giant-kin) has been shattered. Now vying for power, territory and wealth, the remaining leaders of giants have started infighting. This civil war is beginning to spill out into the small folk’s realms and drags the party into a winding adventure to re-establish the Ordning and discover the fate of King Hekaton.
It’s my party, we can die if we want to
Making up this story’s adventurers, is a mischievous and cosmically haunted Bard, a compassionate Druid, an underhanded but idealistic Rogue, as musclebound Fighter and a chaotic, oft aloof Warlock. At the time this took place, the Druid and the Warlock had just come into some pets. The Druid having rescued a small bear cub from a questionable pet seller and the Warlock now the proud owner (father?) of a Hook Horror pup that he’d inexplicably incubated from an egg himself.
The group had made their way to the great bastion of Waterdeep, along the Sword Coast and were trying to uncover some nefarious plot enacted by a local thieves guild. The animal companions were still new to the party, literally joining them (or hatching) at the latter end of the previous session.
A Lesson in Gravity and Pet Ownership
So, on to the story. We join the party as they’re witnessing the arrest of the Rogue for other plot related reasons. He’s currently being carted off by the Waterdhavian guard and the party members are protesting this, trying to free him with persuasion checks and bribes. The guard are having none of it, and have shackled the misadventuring Rogue. They begin to lead him away and a rearguard forms a defensive line to stop the party from intervening.
Seeing their friend taken away and with no further recourse available, the Druid decides their best hope of springing a jailbreak is to Wildshape into a giant eagle and carry the Warlock on her back to the city keep, free the Rogue and escape in the clouds.
So she does. Warlock climbs aboard and they go off soaring through the sky, with their aforementioned animals tucked safely into the Warlocks pack.
At this point, I, the DM, remind them that Waterdeep is the equivalent of a capital city and the keep is heavily guarded. This doesn’t dissuade them and the Eagle-formed Druid continues her flight.
From behind the DMs screen, the players hear dice rolling. Back in Waterdeep, ballista bolts start flying from the outer defensive walls. As, y’know, in a world where dragons exist, a sky-based assault isn’t the most unlikely of things to occur.
With deft skill, the Druid takes a 3ft long bolt to the face and her Wildshape drops. The would-be rescuers are now freefalling from 100ft in the air towards a very hard, very cobbled town square. The two young animal companions, in their panic (as you would, being less than a month old between them and being defiantly terrestrial creatures) pull themselves free from the bags and join our heroes in their impromptu skydive.
With the need to touch solid ground, the Warlock casts Dimension Door (we play it as it literally opening a magically created door from location to destination) directly below them in their flightpath, with its egress on ground level, opening as you would a regular door.
A great idea! They’ll fall through the open door and emerge, correctly oriented, on the ground and spare themselves a brutal death as they invent Extreme Base Jumping. WIth some degree of luck, the plan works and they manage to enter the door, Warlock, Druid, Bear then Hook Horror.
Exiting the door however, is a different matter. They, if you’ll recall, were travelling at almost terminal velocity. And passing through a door didn’t change that. So they explode out of thin air into the cobbled plaza, skidding painfully to a halt as their momentum comes to a stop.
4d6 force damage (as per the ‘occupied space’ ruling in the spell, that we also used as the ‘ooops you’re moving too fast damage’) and both party members are battered and bruised on the floor. Their new wards however? It’s not a good prognosis. Both small animals have ceased being.
Springing into action, the Druid uses both of her 5th level spells slots to cast Reincarnate (with an amended animals chart) and bring them back…. As a goat and a raven respectively.
I will never run games the same again, after spending a good 20 minutes in hysterics at their sheer panic and attempts to save themselves from gravity then immediately having to somberly narrate the grisly deaths of two innocent animals, whose lives were cut tragically short by the same gravity.
In better news, there’s currently a goat roaming free in Waterdeep with the personality and instincts of a bear….
Written, edited and published by Mike Hearnden
Mike is the founder of All Mana of Games and can be found at @stormtroopereffect on Instagram or @stormkoopa on twitter. Alternatively, if you assemble meeple in a möbius strip and chant ‘Dice Goblin’ 14 times, he’ll climb out of the nearest dice bag. Summon at your own risk.
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