The Campaign Diary
The Campaign Diary
The whole campaign in order, written plainly. What happened, who did it, and what it cost.
The record comes in two halves. The early campaign was never written up session by session, so it survives as a running summary, organised here into twelve arcs. From the Winterbole Forest onward there are dated session records, and those are much closer to a transcript.
Dates on the entries are the nights we played. Dates in the text — the 27th of Autumn, the 30th — are in-world. The two clocks run at completely different speeds. Between 24 January and 20 March, eight weeks of our calendar, the party covered five days: the 27th of Autumn to the 32nd. Consecutive sessions are usually consecutive nights, and sometimes the same night.
The same events, told by the people who were there, are in The Chronicles.
The calendar
Four months of ninety days — Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter — in weeks of five days. Midsummer and Midwinter are days in their own right, falling between the 45th and the 46th of Summer and of Winter, which makes the year 362 days long.
Worth holding onto when somebody in the record says a week. They mean five days.
The campaign opened around Spring 75. The last firm date in it is the 32nd of Autumn, about 138 days later — the back end of one spring, one whole summer, and a third of an autumn. Everything below fits in that.
Fallcrest to the Throne of Antlers
Into the Sunless Citadel Three missing Riders, a kobold queen's stolen wyrmling, an argument about mercy that is still running, and a sarcophagus under a burning tree.
Barrows and Caravans Positions with the Riders, a barrow that was not ours to open, and a young man at an inn in Harken whose fiancée had disappeared.
The Assault on Broken Spire Keep A ruined castle taken off the Iron Circle, a shrine to Asmodeus in the cellars, a hidden door to the Underdark, and the first time the sound hit.
The Search for Jaylin A locket, three scryings, an orc chief who talked, an underground sea that charges a toll in people, and a lesson about leaving horses unattended.
The Battle at the Portal Stormcaller through a Derro gateway as it opened, a duel that transferred a title, and a deep gnome who stepped out of a wall to explain what we had just stopped.
Fastormel and the Mist The thing from the sarcophagus has a town, a tower, and a name.
Midsummer and the Silver Ravens A festival with no attack in it, a resistance cell in a grove of standing stones, and an arrangement with a spider queen that the party paid in mercenaries.
The Troll Hunt and the Road to Rockhome Twelve trolls for an alliance, a blindfolded road into a city the size of Fallcrest, and goblins repairing the keep on someone else's orders.
The Septarch's Disappearance Purple ichor in an empty study, a courier dying in an alley, and a cipher that named the Lord of Mist.
The Shrieking Mire A vampire with a specific order about Agatha, a black dragon that landed inside the ring, and a contract with two signatures on it.
The Fall of the Spider Queen and the Battle for the Keep Araniax dead, a long walk in the deep, a bow that chooses, and two hundred Iron Circle broken against the party's own walls.
The Throne of Antlers · 25th–27th of Autumn Four tribes, one grey yurt set apart from the rest, and a chieftain's daughter setting out her two conditions for taking southlanders seriously.
The Winterbole and the Underdark
Agatha and Mira · 24 January A private conversation in the River Crow's yurt, a story about a badger, and two things she named that would carry weight with the chieftains.
The Road to Nenlast · 6 February A pseudodragon whose nest we camped in, a mist that moved with the things inside it, and the death of Jocelin.
The Winter Wolf at Nenlast · 20 February Dravona joins. A dozen figures standing on the lake bottom, a voice that said arise, and a howl that turned out to be a sentence.
The Pact with Gulthias · 6 March The whole party goes down except one. Four hours later a man in good clothes walks out of the fog and asks to talk.
Into the Underdark · 20 March A wall going up around Fastormel, a wight refused entry to the keep, and two fire giants carrying written orders about us.
The Sanctuary and the Old Ones · 3 April What the Way says is under the City of the Glass Pool, what it is building, and what it will do when it is finished.
The Behir and the Chain Breaker · 17 April A warhammer out of a hoard, and the behir found dead a few hours after it got away.
Chain Breaker and Outpost Crystal · 1 May A bulette sent home instead of killed, rations rotting on a failed prayer, and a fortified position taken for its larder.
The Depths of the Sunless Sea · 15 May An eighty-foot dive, a voice that said there you are, and a Mind Blast that put two of the party down.
The Derro Alliance · 7 August A mind flayer killed while Polymorphed, and a Derro wizard who gave his name instead of fighting.
The Audience with Muranekk · 21 August The rebel leader met at last, something worse than mind flayers named in the deep water below, a debt counted in bodies, and a thrall freed in front of the whole hold.
The Barricades at the Singing Stones · 4 September Three hours of one fight, fought under a rule that made it twice as hard — and the only derro who died were killed by their own side.
Into the Singing Stones · 18 September The barricades fall, nine derro walk away free, and the garrison turns out to have been a quarantine facing the wrong way — plus a hammer that hums at aberrations.