Good-Night, Sweet Dwarf

In the ferocious battle with the ogres, Ulo Ironbeard, 1st level Dwarf, met his end.  He will be remembered with honor.

Lair of the Ogres

After a relatively one-sided battle with a group of sinister wererats in a damp, mouldy storage room, the party went south and east, arriving in the cave lair of a trio of sadistic ogres.  See the RPGnet thread for the details of the battle! (The "T" on the map indicates the spot where Tar Markvar attacked for a backstab against one of the ogres).

The Underground Lake

Here is a sketch of the underground lake where the PCs faced five nasty troglodytes that, fortunately, weren't interested in a fight (on the left you can see the tomb with eight coffins where we paused our last session):

Hallway of Grandeur

South of the hall of mirrors, the characters discover an ornate hallway completely out of place in this horrid dungeon.  It is richly carpeted, high-ceilinged, with rich oak panelled walls.  The effect is strangely claustrophobic as there are no windows in this hallway, a hallway that would otherwise belong in the mansion of a wealthy baron.  At the end of the hallway an oak staircase leading up . . .

Hexcrawl Jump Start

Even though my players have a ways to go yet to finish this ad hoc dungeon, I'm chomping at the bit to start planning out a hexcrawl once they leave. It will be a wide-open sandbox-style campaign, largely ad libbed. I surprised myself; I'm not any kind of an artist, but I think the map I doodled here actually looks okay. It's their village (Hommlet--no relation to the AD&D module; I just like the name) and a bit of the surrounding area. The dungeon they are presently exploring is "Valhavoc Dungeon"--they don't know this name yet, but "Valhavoc" is the magic-user who created this horrible place, a mere 1,000 years ago. Heh.

Catapult Cave

Here's "catapult cave", my brilliant name for this huge cave filled with rotted catapults, just north of the huge iron door:

There may be treasure within--the place is so huge and so dark, who can tell?--but it's swarming with zombies.  Far too many to fight.  The PCs will have to use magic (perhaps find a protection scroll) or stealth (risky though) to explore it.

A Requiem for the Fallen

Here in their honor I post the character sheets of our new campaign's two fatalities thus far, Trixie Hollow (1st level Thief) and Pipkin Bothimble (1st level Halfling).  May their deaths not be in vain.