City of the Dead, Session 7: Slow Heading Back Out

We played session 7 of my D&D game The City of the Dead on Friday night. It was delayed from a week earlier when one player had a bad work schedule and I was still marginal from a long-running cold. And even this Friday, things went slowly. The group moved slowly and didn't manage to get back to the actual City of the Dead.

What did they do instead? First, they finished up with training and bookkeeping stuff in the home city of Durendal. That wound up taking over 90 minutes. I was frustrated by that because I'd invested a lot of effort in trying to streamline this aspect of the game. See my blogs from recent weeks on What's Your Role-Playing Game About?, Taking it Easy with Encumbrance, and "I Know a Guy. Tony."

The net-net of it for Friday night was I packaged up all the bookkeep-y things the PCs might want to do in town and presented them as menu choices. For example:

• Everyone wanted to train up for a new level, but you were short on money for expenses from the loot you sold. However you have 3,000 Denarii in the group hopper. You can pull 800 out of there, then everyone's trained. Fair?


• You decided you'd give the fancy suit of armor recovered from the dead caravan to Uncle Keyevan as a return on his lost investment in the caravan. You debated whether to give it to him now or later. Giving it now puts you in his good graces now, smoothing the path for you to go back out there. Giving it later... really has no benefit. Consider that Keyevan will soon be aware you've come back with 1,000s of Denarii of loot plus a few magic items, and will be suspicious why you're holding out on him.


• You might want to scribe some spell scrolls to help with the most dangerous part of the mission you know is coming up. (I proposed this because the players hadn't thought of it, and I know they will ask to ret-con it— "Oh, we totally would've scribed scrolls in town before leaving!"— when the big combat starts 3 days later.) Here are 3 spells that would help: A, B, and C. Here's the cost of making each. Which do you want to make?

...But still this took what felt like forever. On every choice, on even these simple, boiled-down, yes-or-no, A-or-B type choices, the players hit the skids and went into a tailspin of analysis.

Perhaps the problem was none of them (and there are only three) had a strong opinion on what to do. It was that dreaded, "I don't know, what do you want to do?" loop. I ended up being the one prodding them, "Gang, we're spending too much time on mundane stuff. This is designed not to be a hard question. Pick an option and let's move on."

I suppose I could have made it go faster by simply telling the players what they do instead of giving them even simplified yes-or-no, A-or-B menu choices. That approach really rubs me the wrong way, though, as it removes player agency. I've played in games like that, where, in the name of simplification and streamlining, the GM skips over all the prep choices and says, "Okay, you're here at the stairs to the dungeon, going down." I hated that. But it did forestall the players from going into a tailspin of analysis.

Keep reading... the group finally heads back out and is ambushed on the road!

City of the Dead, Session 7: Gnoll Ambush!

After session 7 of my City of the Dead D&D game got off to a slow start with the group agonizing over simple prep choices in their home city the PCs finally hit the road to the City of the Dead. Even that went slowly. But that was partly my fault. It was my fault because instead of fast-forwarding through the journey by telling them, "You make a 3 day trek under deteriorating weather conditions of late autumn, arriving at the edge of the haunted ruins of Graymount just before noon on the 3rd day," I included an encounter on the road. A gnoll ambush!

The group was traveling the long-abandoned old trade route to Graymount in its usual formation. Herran, the scout, was out front by about 60', using his skills to watch for trouble. Trouble could be changing weather, a fallen tree, a hungry bear larding up for winter, etc. Herran, the ranger, was the best prepared to spot and triage any of these possibilities. Though it also put him in the position of greatest risk.

Herran's player is out right now, so I told what happened next most on the remote stretch of long abandoned roadl from the perspective of the rest of characters, peering ahead through the lightly falling snow to follow their scout. Astrin was heading up the rest of the party. She saw a flash of movement on the road ahead. It looked like Herran's horse suddenly jumped sideways and fell over. And Herran was yelling. The snow and the distance muffled his voice but it definitely sounded like "Help!" And... "Ambush!"



No one knew what the nature of the threat was yet. But it was obvious something bad was happening. Terence, the cleric, had the best initiative roll, thus the chance to act first. Terence's player just stared at his character sheet, unsure what to do. It was a sad repeat of the analysis tailspin from the first half of the session.

"You can delay," I proposed. Delay is an official combat move in the D&D rules and a solid choice in a case like this. It means he just waits for someone else to act first while holding the prerogative to jump in after anyone else's turn. But he objected. He wanted to go first even though he was completely unprepared to choose an action quickly. I let him stare at his character sheet, lost in analysis, a bit longer before telling him, "Terence delays. Who's next?"

Astrin, the paladin, acted next. She spurred her horse to close the distance to Herran, as clearly he needed help. Upon arriving closer she saw that Herran's horse was on its side on the ground, tangled with a rope around at least one of its legs. And Herran was hanging upside down from a rope snare in a tree! It was a trap!



Before Astrin could act further, arrows whizzed out of the forest around the road, targeting Herran, Astrin, and her horse. "It's an ambush," she could hear Herran saying clearly now. "Watch for a flanking attack!"

Indeed, the flanking attack came quickly. A frost fox bounded out of the forest and breathed an icy mist on Astrin and her mount. And from the rear of the PC group a big, beefy humanoid with brown fur and features like a hyena emerged from behind a tree.

"It's gnolls!" Duncan shouted. "And this one's big!"

Indeed it was big. Towering over 8' tall with muscular arms and a barrel-like chest, the beast facing Duncan drew a massive battleaxe in its huge right hand... and a smaller axe in its other hand.

The players knew what his meant even if their characters didn't. This was the boss gnoll. Its two-weapon attack style indicated it had NPC levels, most likely in the Ranger class. And it would have extra abilities, extra attacks, extra defense, and extra strength.

Fortunately for the PCs, unfortunately for the gnolls, this boss gnoll's tactic of attacking from the rear had just backfired. Because it was Duncan at the rear of the group. Duncan, the slow moving. Duncan the heavy fighter. Of everyone in the group, the one best prepared to go toe-to-toe with a brute, absorbing the damage and dealing it back even harder, was Duncan.

Duncan swung down from his horse in a fluid motion that belied the bulk of the plate-and-mail armor he wore, and drew his massive sword with a two-hand grip.

"Do you know how happy I am that the big guy chose to attack us from behind?" he asked no one in particular.

The boss gnoll didn't know it but his average life expectancy had just dropped to 6 seconds from now.

In the middle of the group Terence came out of the tank and cast a protection spell on Meraxes, the wizard. With the group's fighters committed to combat at both ends of the scene she'd need the protection. Staying in the middle with combat at either end worked for her, though. She stayed astride her horse and whisked a barrage of Magic Missiles at the frost fox. Nearly dead, the fox let out a yelp and retreated into the woods.

At the front of the ambush scene Herran freed himself from the trap, but not before Gnolls emerged from the woods and dropped their bows to attack him with battle axes. They had him surrounded, and he was still prone. He fought from the ground, whirling around like a turtle with two wakizashi, but couldn't connect with a blow. The penalties for fighting from the ground were too stiff.

At the back of the scene, Duncan quickly had the boss gnoll on the ropes. Before he could finish it off, Meraxes came through with another spell. Two tongues of flame shot from her fingers, scorching the gnoll. It fell to the ground, its charred body still smoking.

Meanwhile Terence cast a spiritual weapon spell. A warhammer made of pure energy sprung from his hand, flew toward the front of the group, and whacked one of the gnolls surrounding Herran. Astrin, now free of the ice fox, strode in and finished one off. The other gnoll fled, along with one of his compatriots who was still working his bow from cover behind a tree.

Running Away? Let's Get 'Em!

I mentioned that Herran's player is out right now. We're playing his character as something of an NPC. When Herran's player was in the game, though, he played Herran as a hot-head. See, for example, Fool Around and Find Out from Session 4. Thus all of us at the table agreed, "What, the monsters that set the trap that ensnared and embarrassed Herran are running away? He'd chase them!"

So off into the snowy woods Herran rushed, leaving the rest of the group behind.

"Oh, shit," Astrin said/thought, "He's going to fall into another trap. I'd better go with." And so she rushed into the woods after him.

Astrin caught up with Herran, following tracks in the snow, and talked him down from his rage. (Note: Herran's not a barbarian, so rage isn't a class feature. It's just a personality quirk. 😂) They returned to the 3 PCs on the road to at least form a group plan.

The group decided Herran could have his revenge— but with sensible limits. Herran and Astrin would go together and hunt for not more than 30 minutes. Meanwhile, the other 3 party members would stay in place on the road. Duncan, Terence, and Meraxes together would be plenty capable in case the gnolls circled around for another attack.

Astrin and Herran didn't find the fleeing gnolls but they did find the gnoll party's camp. In it was a bit of crude gear plus a small sack of coins. "Coins? What do gnolls use coins for?" they wondered. "Especially Genidian (human) coins?"

The PCs on the road checked the bodies of the two gnolls defeated there. Duncan assessed that the big guy had nice armor and one nice weapon. Both he and the little guy had coin purses, also with more Genidian coin. And one had a potion bottle with crude printing in a foreign language on it.

"I have a spell to read languages!" Meraxes's player pointed out. "Better yet," I noted, "You can use your Decipher Script skill instead of casting a Comprehend Languages spell." Meraxes rolled her skill check and BAM! 23. Success.

"Oh, this is one of those dog-barking language," Meraxes realized. "It says 'Heal'. Except it's written H-E-E-L."

Terence snickered about how the canine-humanoids have potions of heeling.

"Sit, Ubu, sit!" I quipped. "Good dog."

Spoiling Raids

The group decided to take over the gnolls' camp. Dusk was rapidly approaching, so it was a wise move. The camp smelled like wet dog fur but there was already a fire circle and a shelter made of boughs there.

The group doubled its watches for the night, concerned the gnolls might return. That was wise because indeed they did. Gnolls can see in the dark (in game terms they have Darkvision, 60') so they had an advantage. They approached the camp from outside the range of the party's lights and shot arrows at the guards, as a spoiling raid.

Meraxes was one of the guards on watch. The gnolls believed she was a weak guard because she wears no armor and thus targeted her. Meraxes cast Light on a stone and threw it in their direction. "Make an attack roll," I asked, "Just to gauge accuracy." 23 again. Damn! It didn't just land near them, it actually hit one of them. She knew because she heard the yelp. With the gnolls now bathed in light, Duncan nailed one with an arrow from his bow. Realizing they'd lost the advantage, the gnolls retreated into the night.

The gnolls came back around for another spoiling raid after things had settled down. They believed Meraxes had just been lucky with her cast-a-spell-and-throw-a-rock thing. Well, she got lucky again. And this time Duncan was more prepared. With his bow at the ready he had time to fire twice before the gnolls could flee again. He dropped one and injured the other. And this time Herran snapped awake in an instant. He leapt to his feet and got off a shot, too. The second gnoll sagged to its knees, mortally wounded. Herran strode forward and finished it off.

A Grassy Gnoll Conspiracy?

As the group tallied up what they'd found from the gnolls they realized they had as many questions as answers. There were 4 gnolls, one of them elite, with an ice fox. The gnolls had set a trap here, on a long abandoned trade road. Why here, when there's no regular traffic? And while attacking in an ambush is on-brand for gnolls— character knowledge I conveyed with clue notes— setting a trap like that was extra. Between that and all the Genidian coin the gnolls were carrying (about 600 Denarii total) the players were suspicious the gnolls were hired— hired and given instructions where to find this group.

Hiking Coyote Hills Regional Park

On Saturday we hiked Coyote Hills Regional Park in Fremont. It wasn't quite our tradition of hiking on Superbowl Sunday— it was a day early— but the weather was surprisingly clear so we figured maybe we'd hike both Saturday and Sunday.

The drive out to the park is easy. We've visited a few times now. Sometimes we drive across the Dumbarton Bridge on CA-84. From that direction the turnoff for the park comes before you even reach I-880; basically it's as soon as you hit solid land on the east side of the bay. This time we drove up I-880 through Fremont because we wanted to stop for lunch beforehand along the way.

This Saturday the park was busy. We had to wait in a very slow line to enter via a payment kiosk. After that parking was scarce, but we were able to find a spot without having to circle.



We anticipated the hiking trails might be muddy so we packed boots in the car. From the trailhead things seemed pretty dry so we wondered if maybe we'd be happy sticking with our hiking sandals instead. A hiker returning to his car next to us heard us wondering aloud and urged us to wear our boots. "The trails are saturated," he advised.

Indeed there was a huge muddy area less than 1/4 mile in from the trailhead, right where a dirt tracked forked off from the compacted gravel. The photo above shows it. But ironically that was the only area of mud we encountered in over 3 miles of hiking.

We angled up the hillside along the fork to the left in the picture above. After a bit it turns hard to the left and goes up over a saddle between hills with views out over the San Francisco Bay. The best views, though, come as you climb the hills to either side. But before I share those views, it's... turkeys!

Watch on YouTube

There's a gaggle of wild turkeys that I believe live on this hillside in the park. They were here last time we visited, about 2 years ago, too. Though that time there were about 20, while now there are only 3. Maybe that's the difference between visiting before Thanksgiving vs. a few months after. 🤣

In the video you can see the steep climb ahead of us. That's Red Hill, the tallest of the Coyote Hills. The top is a bit shy of 300 feet elevation, which normally wouldn't seem like much— but these hills rise abruptly out of the bay at basically 0 feet above sea level. Standing atop it feels like you've climbed a mountain.



In this view from atop Red Hill looking to the north you can see downtown San Francisco and Oakland. SF is about 30 miles away straight across the water.

There are views across to the South Bay, as well, with peaks like Mt. Umunhum visible in the distance.



It's a great 360° view up here atop the hills. You're surrounded by the SF Bay on three sides, north, south, and west. To the east is... also the bay, basically.



These hills apparently used to be out in the bay. Man-made changes with dredging and levees have created some bits of dry land between the main part of the East Bay and this park. Though even right up next to the park (see picture above) there's not a lot of dry land.... Much of that yellow/brown you see mixed in among the water is reeds and rushes.