'The Orcs of Wyvern Tor' A Summary of Session 9 of Lost Mine of Phandelver
Summary of Session 9: The Orcs of Wyvern Tor
The Goudafellas found themselves outside Wyvern Tor, a small town hastily erected and seemingly under the control of a Half Orc Monk named Borabash the Wise. Our adventurers scout around the town, find an interesting cheese seller, looking to branch out and sell Orc Wererat Cheese to the masses of Amphicea. Braving the taste, and exploring further, our adventurers find out that Borabash the Wise is after something they have. Bowgentle’s spellbook. Seeking to use this to their advantage the Goudafellas seek an audience and find themselves infront of Borabash himself. After a brief conversation, and feeling completely out maneouvered, our adventurers find themsleves no longer in possession of the tome, guests of Borabash himself and awaiting ‘the party’…
Surprise!
Wowser.
Firstly they rolled AMAZINGLY well on their stealth roles up until Wyvern Tor … and when they got there … well my players completely surprised me. Or I surprised them… and then they surprised me and … just … it was awesome …
After arriving at Wyvern Tor our players set off to investigate and then went totally off piste! Exploring the town like they would anywhere else … even indulging in an exotic cheese tasting session. They then took the initiative and put themselves infront of Borabash. I honestly thought that they would just mill around, watch ‘the party’ I had set up and then sod off. Instead they ended up giving up one of their most precious magic items to him and becoming his guest of honour!
I had Borabash intimidate the players by killing a goblin in front of them … and they got the picture that they couldn’t out fight him at the moment.
Super fun session, one of my faves.
Prep
Given the randomness of the session my players barely used anything I’d prepped… sad times … I really wanted to do the ‘chase’ combat… depending on what my players do next session I think it seems entirely reasonable that they might be in for a chase :)
Also, session 10 would be my last before taking a few weeks off. Me and the family had a few things to deal with over the coming weeks and so I needed to take a break.
All in all these session would take me anywhere between 4 and 8 hours to prep for. A good rule of thumb appeared to be ‘double the amouunt of time prepping for the amount of content in the session’ if that makese sense, or:
- 2 hour sessions take me roughly 4 hours to prepare
- 4 hour sessions take me roughly 8 hours to prepare
This has left me feeling a little sad but a break is really necessary!