Our heroes choose a new direction in the campaign, but will they choose goblins, undead, or dinosaurs?

When last we left our heroes, they had escaped the Yuan-ti temple, rescued a dozen NPCs, and saved the life of their ally and patron, Undril Silvertusk. Unfortunately, they managed to lose the other half of their entourage, whom have been captured by a nasty tribe of goblins called the Batiri. Now the party faces a major dilemma.

The rescued NPCs want to get in the boats and go home to Port Nyanzaru. Undril, the patron who paid for said boats wants to continue on to her destination at Camp Righteous. And then there is primal desire to rush off and attempt to rescue the missing members of the expedition; the not-likely-to-return PC, Miche, the two tabaxi guides who have spent more time lost in the jungle than found, and the three Chultan porters whose numbers have dwindled down from six.

After some great roleplaying, they reached a decision. Faroul and Gondolo (guides also rescued from the temple) will lead the Nyanzaru resident back to Port. But they will need two boats, more than half of the rations and supplies, the only water barrel and two of the tribal warriors, whom have pledged a year of service to the players. This will leave our heroes critically short on supplies, so we’re back to rationing food again. Don’t tell my players, but these problems will all be solved before too long.

With little fanfare, we bid adieu to this gaggle of dead weight NPCs. The players were keenly curious to see if this group survives the trip back to Port. I promised to roll a full random encounter list for these guys. We’ll have to wait and see how they fare. They do have two strong tribal warriors to defend them. The best part of this goodbye was watching my player try to instruct these two in gibberish sign language how to find Meepo’s warehouse and wait for them.

Next, it was rather simple to convince Undril to allow the group to go on a detour to track down their lost party members. They had just saved her life, and she is always down for a rescue operation. She is a cleric of good after all. My goal was never to make effects of their decision difficult. I was just curious to see which course they would choose. This is exactly how I would choose, but I was prepared either way. So, the party chose goblins; I’ll just save the undead and dino paths for another day.

Turns out that Martic is actually a better tracker than any guide anyway. Had Martic just been travelling through the jungle, he would have rolled with disadvantage due to his unfamiliarity with the terrain, but since he was following a trail and this is a ranger’s main schtick, I allowed him to roll normally. He never lost the scent and was able to successfully track the Batiri goblins back to their village for over 40 miles.

Naturally, the journey was not free of all encounters just to break up the monotony and drag out the sessions. Usually, I’ve been pretty faithful to the random dice to pick my encounters, but this time I chose these three encounters. First up was a mantrap, another plant unique to Chult I used to reinforce the sense that the very land is trying to kill them here. This carnivorous creeper is not very dangerous or interesting by itself. But we can try to fix that.

To make the mantrap interesting (and more of a trap) I had two of these sadistic shrubberies working in conjunction, placed about 60 feet apart. Using their tremorsense, they waited until the last party member passed by the first plant, which then releases its poison spores. This worked and the last player (Gwen) failed her save and began walking in a trance toward Audrey III. (Little Shop of Horror fans will get the reference.) When the group realizes that Gwen is missing and turns back, Audrey IV releases its spores, hoping to hit the first player (now the last player turned around) of the group. Then these plants can enjoy their feast while the rest flee in terror.

Unfortunately for me, that player (Roland) made this save, so the party was all together as they watched Gwen get engulfed by this giant Venus Flytrap. From there, it was a simple task to beat the crap out of the poor plant until it wilted away and belched out their cleric. Then, because my players hate me, they went back and killed the other wretched weed as it pathetically tried to crawl away at a dismal five feet per round. Here they also found the half-eaten remains of a Batiri goblin, and another tribal mask. They were still on the right path.

Up next, they discovered a grisly scene. Based on the tracks, one of the captured porters had tried to escape, got recaptured and was then tied to a tree. The unfortunate victim was then covered in honey and abandoned to be devoured by ants and other insects. All that remained was his bloody skeleton still tied to his arboreal abattoir. This deliciously gruesome detail of the Batiri is mentioned in the book, but your players will never discover it, unless you take the time to showcase it. Moving on.

My third encounter was just meant to introduce a new complicating faction to contend with here in Chult, but it proved to be so much more. The Flaming Fist, a military group from Baldur’s Gate far to the north, have set up an outpost in Chult and are basically acting like a band of brigands, plundering the land and demanding tolls from any hapless explorers they can find. To do this, the Flaming Fist has decreed that anyone travelling in Chult must possess a charter, which can only be purchased from the Flaming Fist fort located three days east of Port Nyanzaru. Anyone caught without a charter is forced to forfeit their possessions, a death sentence in this inhospitable hell.

My group had encountered the Flaming Fist once before and it was deliberately brief and misleading. Way back in Session 2, they rescued a sailor that had been shipwrecked and nearly murdered by some sea hags. The fact that this “sailor” was wearing fancy breastplate adorned with Flaming Fist regalia was ignored by my players. They travelled with this man for five days, and although I kept him in a near comatose state the whole time, they never tried to revive him or even learned his name (he has one, it’s hilarious). As soon as they arrived at Port Nyanzaru, they dumped him with the harbormaster, then forgot all about him and the Flaming Fist. It’s time to remind them.

As the party is tracking their friends, they hear the sounds of somethings travelling through the jungle making no effort to be stealthy; and they’re getting closer. Shortly, another group of adventurers comes crashing out of the jungle. This new group is an odd mix. One is clearly a knight although definitely not the one they rescued, another is a priest in lavish robes, and the third is a well-equipped scout. But the remaining seven “guards” look like thugs or mercenaries at best. Despite their rough appearance, they don’t appear hostile. Yet.

The knight speaks, “Well met, travelers. I am Sir Gadriel of the Flaming Fist. How have you been faring in this exhaustive arboretum?”

Roland the paladin, who usually does the speaking for the group sheepishly replies, “Uhm, Fine. How are you?

“Excellent. May we see your charter please?”

This brought about a flurry of conversation amongst the players. “What the hell is a charter?” “I don’t know. Do you know?” “No!” “What do we know about these guys?” “Nothing.” “Didn’t we rescue one of them?” “Maybe, did we get his name?” “No!” “What do you mean, no?” “Why didn’t we get his name?” “Who cares! What the hell is a charter?”

Roland put the question to the knight, who now had her hand on the hilt of her sword, “Of which charter, specifically, do you speak of?”

“The charter granted by the Flaming Fist out of Fort Balurian, which allows you to explore and plunder the vast treasures of Chult, the recently annexed territory of Baldur’s Gate.”

Gwen tried to be witty, “Oh, that charter. Our companion Miche has that charter on him, but he was captured by goblins. In fact, we’re going to rescue him right now and get it back.”

Unmoved, Sir Gadriel replied, “I’m sorry, but you are in non-compliance. You do not have the charter on your person at all times. Non-compliance requires that you forfeit all your possessions. Hand them over please.” There was no persuasion check.

“But we didn’t know.”

“Ignorance of the law does not provide immunity from its punishment.” Roll Initiative. These guys are dicks.

The fight was pretty difficult. These Flaming Fist are nearly identical in power to the party and they outnumbered the players. My knight could smite like the paladin, my priest had guiding bolt, et cetera. It was quite fun to smack the players with the same crap that they have been slapping me around with for the past 5 months. Of course, eventually the players prevailed. Sir Gadriel was dead. The priest was dead. Quick aside; the best line of the night came when Gwen said to the priest, “Every cleric prays to meet their god. Here, let me help you,” as she delivered the killing blow. Everyone was dead, except one lowly “guard” and it was Roland’s turn.

Until now, every combat has been a “no quarter” fight to the finish that ends when one side (my side) is dead. So, I was taken aback when Roland used his turn to say; “Throw down your spear and surrender.” Given the carnage all around him, this seemed like a pretty good proposition for this nobody NPC and I was curious to see where this would go. He surrendered. Roland continued, “What’s your name?”

He had no name. He was supposed to die. I blurted out, “It’s, ah, Grum, sir.”

“Well Grum, how’d you like to work for us instead?”

And that’s the story of how Grum the nobody became the first of several hirelings that would soon join the ranks of the new Society of Stalwart Adventurers. BTW, this name for the group that I collectively call my players is also borrowed from The Ring of Winter and is the league in which Artus Cimber, a major character in that novel and this adventure, belonged. Stay tuned.

Finally, at dusk on the fifth day, our heroes find the Batiri goblin village. But is this the right village? Are our friends still alive? Will Grum betray the party? Will the DM ever begin the death curse and start the actual adventure? Tune in tomorrow, same Bat-iri time, same Bat-iri channel.

Hey! I’m not a jerk. I was only kidding. Although the real session did end here, and I did make my players wait a week before they found out. But you get to enjoy another double session recap.

So, let’s talk about Yellyark and the Batiri goblin tribe. I love the unique ideas that these goblins and this village try to bring to the adventure although none of them are very practical or easy to run. First, the war masks lend an air of creepiness to an otherwise comical monsters. I love these masks but I just wish that the book provided art for more than the four seen in the Batiri stack picture.

These battle stacks as written may seem intimidating but they severely weaken their effectiveness. And the village has a terrific gimmick but is difficult to play properly. Plus, the village is so remote and there is no hook to entice the players to come here.

For the battle stack, the book states that only the top goblin attacks (with advantage due to the pack tactics ability). This is a huge missed opportunity to make these walking totem poles truly terrifying. I allow every goblin in the stack (except the bottom) to attack. Finally, the lowly goblin is now a force to be reckoned with. Place a couple four-goblins stacks (and their six attacks per round) up against your best fighter and watch him flee or die.

As for the village, first you have to get your players there, then you have to get them into the center of camp to spring your trap. With Aidan dropping out of the campaign to DM another, I was able to use the loss of his character as the hook to drag my players away from the river and into the jungle to find him. Assuming your inability to kidnap a player for weeks on end, here are a few other methods you could employ.

You could have a Batiri raiding party shadow the group, then during a nighttime raid have a goblin steal a critical item. I would use the player map given by Syndra Silvane, most players are very protective of that map and would do anything to get it back. Maybe you could move the village closer to the player’s path and have them hear tribal drums nearby, hoping that natural curiosity will cause them to investigate. Or, if the players happen to visit Camp Righteous first, you could have them follow goblin tracks that lead back to Yellyark. Finally, you could have a merchant prince hire the PCs to broker a peace treaty with the Batiri to stop raiding the outskirts of town. In this case, I would move Yellyark closer to Port and set up a few skirmishes in Old Town prior to this job offer.

But now that my players are here, how do I lure them into the center of the camp? The book makes it nearly impossible to sneak up on them. There are so many ways to trigger an alarm and alert the whole tribe, but this also alerts the players that they have been discovered. I didn’t think of this at the time, but instead of having goblin sentries hiding using camouflage, I would have it so that as the party approaches the camp, they see totem poles planted as a warning to trespassers. As the party walks on, you could say that the totem pole faces seem to follow them as they pass by. Of course, these are Batiri battle stacks just waiting to spring an ambush after the group is surrounded. But I didn’t think of this and just allowed them to sneak up to the outskirts just as nightfall blankets the camp.

The book tells us that 24 fighting goblins inhabit this camp, but gives no indication as to where exactly. I tried to spread them out so that should the players attempt to murder them all, they might succeed if they can do it quickly and quietly. I have two or three goblins in each tent, including two by the fire near the supply hut and three by the fire guarding the prisoner cages. Speaking of prisoners, our heroes can see that the two tabaxi guides and the two remaining porters are locked inside the cage. There is no sign of their missing companion, Miche. Our heroes will have to search each tent to find him. Or perhaps there is another way to gather some intel on the camp.

You’ll notice that I placed a lone goblin by the shore of the stream, doing a little nighttime fishing. The players can easily see him. I thought it would be interesting to place this one here, all alone. This goblin happens to be the runt of the litter, and is picked on by the other goblins. I even had the goblins at the supply hut throw rocks at the runt when he walked by, to illustrate this. Perhaps the players could capture him and roleplay some information out of him. Perhaps this goblin could be convinced to help the players. Perhaps this goblin might even join the party as a local guide. Nope. Our heroes snuck up on this pitiful pipsqueak, murdered him and threw his body in the river.

Back at their vantage point, the players discuss who shall go sneaking around the camp. This would normally fall to Martic since he is the naturally stealthy character. But for some inexplicable reason, Thames the noisy, clanking dragonborn is tasked to skulk around camp and find Miche. Okay, they did have a reason for this. Should Thames be discovered he could cast misty step and teleport away from danger.

As Thames crossed the threshold in the village proper, I described how the ground of the camp was covered in vines, moss, and leaves that provide a sort of carpet for the camp. I also described that the canopy over the camp is very thick; you can’t even see the sky and dozens of vines and tendrils drape to the ground, probably to climb into the trees. It looks like a tree or trees has been pulled over the camp to give some shelter from the elements. I felt it important to describe these peculiarities of the camp, but then I  immediately soothed their suspicions with some plausible explanation. If I had not provided any description, then this trap would just be a dirty trick I pulled by not giving my players any chance to uncover it. Fortunately, my players took my description at face value and never asked for a perception check and their passive score wasn’t high enough to detect anything unusual.

Thames did surprisingly well sneaking about, ignoring ants, peaking into each tent, finding several goblins, but no Miche. He avoided the slightly larger tent in the back, marked with (plain wooden) totems, guessing it to be the hut of the goblin boss. In the last tent of the camp, naturally, Thames found Miche, alone and unguarded, but he wasn’t exactly the same.

Previously, I had worked out with Miche’s player what his fate would be. Whether Miche had taken one too many knocks on the head, or the result of some jungle fever, Miche had gone completely native. He was dressed in a loincloth, with leaves in his hair, and only communicated in grunts and gestures. He could still cook though and the goblins were using him as their personal chef. “Me no longer Miche, me now Tarzan the Gourmet.” Thames, who hates uncomfortable conversation, now had to spend the next several minutes trying to convince this idiot that he needed to escape with the scary dragon man right now. “No. Me stay with gobbo family and cook. Me good cook. You want taste?”

While this inane dialog was transpiring, the others snuck up to the cage with the other NPCs and worked out a plan to release them and kill their captors just as soon as Thames returned with Miche or all hell broke loose. Guess which option I’m hoping for.

Finally with promises to cook even more food for a new family, Miche/Tarzan agreed to follow Thames. As luck would have it, as they exited the tent, Thames finally failed a stealth roll and tripped loudly over one of the many moss-covered vines. As the group’s tinkerer, he landed with a clatter right in front of the tent he was trying to avoid. Out of the tent came three regular Batiri goblins and then the biggest, meanest, and ugliest goblin they’d ever scene. This is Queen Grabstab.

“What is the meaning of all this? And where are you going with my cook?”

Thames was at a loss for words. As DM, I waited several moments to see if Thames would come up with anything to avoid disaster. Everyone was frantically thinking of something, anything, to say. Grabstab grew impatient. “Kill the intruder!”

Gwen had an idea. The group had been hired by a Merchant Prince to uncover evidence of a new “god” that several tribes of grung, vegepygmy and goblins have begun to worship. They even knew this god’s name. Gwen stepped out from behind her cover and yells out to Grabstab, “Who dares to attack an emissary of Zorn?”

Ooh, so close. Grabstab was furious. “Zorn? Zorn! Our god’s name is Vorn, you heretic! Now die as the non-believers you are.” Roll initiative. The best thing to come out of this encounter is that my players now take much better notes.

I honestly don’t remember much about this combat. It was great, it was tense, players were spread all over the map and couldn’t coordinate any attacks, but I was just waiting for the right moment to spring my trap, so I wasn’t really paying attention. The problem is that none of my players are stepping into the trap zone. C’mon, c’mon, step into the camp…

Finally, the stars aligned and I could unleash my devious, if impractical, trap. The NPCs were freed, fighting the three goblins near the cages (and outside the Kill Zone). Thames was still stuck in the middle. Martic was on the edge of camp but in the Zone. Gwen had entered camp, was immediately struck by two critical hits and downed. Roland had to run in and revive her with his Lay on Hands ability. It’s now or never.

Grabstab yelled “Bree-Yark! Bree-Yark!” All the goblins stopped what they were doing and ran out of the camp. A few were cut down by opportunity attacks, but their sacrifices were for the good of the tribe. “Suddenly, you hear an ominous snapping of vines, twigs, and rope. At the back of the camp, you see a goblin swinging an axe into a tree. Give me a DEX save to avoid what comes next.” My players still have no idea what is about to happen, but I prefer to give my players some opportunity to avoid calamity, so I give them an extra saving throw. Incredibly, nearly everyone makes their save while Thames misty stepped out of danger. Only Roland,who had only entered camp to save his friend, failed.

“Everyone runs to the edge of camp and leaps to safety. Unfortunately for you, Roland, you trip over a vine which turns out to be part of an enormous net. As you lay tangled up in this webbing along with all the huts and dead goblins, the vines draped down from the trees are really ropes that close in upon themselves like a huge sack. The tree to which it was all tied, freed from its tether, acts like a giant catapult and flings the entire village, with Roland inside, miles to the east.”

Roland merely muttered, “Gods, damn it.”

Will Roland survive? What happened to the rest of the goblin tribe? Will Gwen ever call Vorn by its right name? Will Miche ever stop cos-playing like Tarzan? Tune next week. Same Bat-iri time, same Bat-iri channel. And this time, I mean it.

Next week, we find the final resting place of Yellyark, stumble upon a huge, delirious plot development, and nearly get killed by fog.

As always, no good deed goes unpunished, or unflung, and Game On!

And don’t forget to check out my Tomb of Annihilation Resources Page, filled with all the stuff I use to make this epic campaign even more epicier: My full Campaign Diary, plus Handouts, Maps, Charts, PDFs, Images, and more to use, abuse, or ignore at your peril.

And written specifically for this adventure, read my Explorer’s Guide to Chult to delve into all the legands, lore, history, religion, and culture that I used to bring even more life to this adventure.

Forget stuffy spellbooks and poisonous tomes, you want to read about fictional gods and made up histories.