D&D Chronicles: Shit happens… and then you die

1.

Poor Rhi — my ranger — is dead for good this time. (sniff)

She was taken out on a snowy ledge by three ghouls, which paralysed and devoured her without her even swinging a blow. My party tried to preserve her body in the snow, but Rhi showed up later as a ghoul herself and was decapitated.

I’d been playing Rhi since July and she had this really cool backstory that I never really got to use and she’d just made it to level 3… I’m officially in mourning.

Vale Rhi

Rhi was the infamous Dharian spy/assassin, Felharia, sympathetic to the persecuted Vahdrim mages. The trail of bodies she left in her wake down south caused the Lawbringers of the priests of Testerris to put a price on her head. She was lying low in the north under the assumed name of Rhiar to avoid the Testerris Lawbringers, and teamed up with a small group of adventurers to earn some coin and pass the time. Her prowess with the longsword was legendary. 

2.

Rhi wasn’t the only one to meet her maker last night. Our Level 3 Cleric, facing water orcs, misjudged the depth of the lake and plunged in wearing full chain mail armour. She sank like a stone.

The rest of the party watched in horror, then defeated the enemy and tried to rescue Pasquale to no avail. They hauled her dead body out of the icy water, and are now stranded in a snowfield on low hit points with no healing. They’re not in a good place.

I told you our DM was trying to kill us.

3.

On the upside, we gained a fifth party member — a young Paladin with impressive statistics. He acquitted himself admirably in his first session, taking the lead attacking role after Rhi’s demise.

4.

At the beginning of the session we did brave the vertical wind tunnel, after a few tests. It could have ended in disaster, but the five of us negotiated the chute without irreparable damage. It whooshed us up several thousand feet to the top of the Giant Steps we would otherwise have climbed for an estimated 10 days… a most excellent shortcut — although both routes turned out to be very perilous… which we should have expected given our DM is always trying to kill us!

We emerged from a tunnel onto an icy ledge, which wound around the mountain to a series of cascading valleys of ice and snow — which is where Rhi and Pasquale met their demise. Aside from ghouls and the water orcs the party battled a snow leopard. Their mission is two-fold: collect knowledge for the cleric back in town who spotted the cash for Rhi’s resurrection; find a suspected gemstone named after one of the gods…

5.

“Shit happens… and then you die” was the most apt inscription on my coffee mug last night.

I’m still somewhat numb.

I’ve rolled up a new character for our next session. I haven’t named her yet, or prepared a backstory, but she’s another ranger. I figure I’ll stick to the one character class while still learning how to play this game. The next session is in three weeks and will be rather interesting, I think.

Commiserations will be gratefully accepted. (sniff)