RED OAK: Beyond the Mirror

[Longman]

The rumbling sound was coming from 2/5+, i.e, from the east side. Not a specific direction. Upstairs. most likely.

You all retreat into room 1 and close all doors from the inside. You wait and listen.

Yeah, you can hear things moving around in area 5. They sounds big. Not goblins or hobgoblins. Something much larger, maybe humanoid, maybe not. There are numerous footfalls, and various growling and breathing sounds - you'd estimate at least 3 creatures. It's hard to say.

Whatever they are, you think they are in area 5 right now, in the eastern part of it.

[Woe]

Ogres? Why can't it be goblins, easy and simple.

Ok, what noises do we hear from the western rooms, 7-9?

[Longman]

That way is more difficult to hear, because of the secret tunnel between you and the open areas.

Anna thinks she can hear something, the same sort of noise, in the western area. Freya thinks it's just echoing from the eastern side.

I'm going to cut the the chase a bit here - you now know there's some kind of goblin / hobgoblin presence on the upper levels. You have attracted their attention, probably during the mimic battle, and definitely when you have set off their alarm on level 2. In all probability, they have no idea who you are, or where you are coming from. In fact they probably think you are just other dungeon denizens, at this point. It's clear that they do not know about your secret area, which has stood in secrecy for many hundreds of years (you think). It's also clear they do not normally hang around on this level, which is abandoned, and seems to contain mimics and maybe other monsters.

It's possible they have sent down some larger beasts to check out the situation. Or maybe, whatever is out there now has just rocked up anyway, attracted to the noise.

Five minutes tick by and you can hear the beasts in room 2, briefly, and then they are going back into room 5. They sound big - ogre size is a decent guess. You cannot hear them talking, and their footsteps sound odd, and shuffling. Anna thinks she can hear the scrape of chains on the floor at one point.

You going to rush out and attack them? Or wait for the heat to die down?

[Woe]

I have no idea what to do!

"Ogres?" suggests Kilian in a hushed voice.

"Chained ogres?" amends Talin, also in a whisper.

"Chained ogre zombies?" says Freya playfully. The rest of the party glares at her. She shrugs, and goes back to listening.

(time passes, definitely quite a few minutes -- like 15-30 of silence before proceeding).

If nothing amazing happens, the party will try opening door #2. Once open, Freya and Anna will both listen for noises. If there's still silence, Freya is in front, checking for traps. Anna is next (30' behind), also checking for traps. The two dwarves are next, and Talin will bring up the rear. Missile weapons for all. Tiana is going to stay at the secret door for now. The party isn't going to go far -- first the passage to 3 (and Freya will sneak a bit further into the eastern passage to ensure no creatures are present), and then north so Freya can get a good look at what may be in 5.

Just to help me out with scale, it is 50' from the secret door near 2 and the door at 5?

[Longman]

The average dungeon corridor is about 10' wide in this dungeon.

Whatever they are, they aren't talking, and ogres do talk, so maybe zombie ogres isn't such a bad guess. They come right down into room 2 and hang about for a few minutes before leaving again.

Just to emphasize this, the secret doors look like this from the other side:



After your allotted period of 20 minutes the things are long gone, and there is no sign of any noise.

The party enters room 2, No traps, but there was a pretty obvious location to find a trap at the entry point into room 5, and you spot a tripwire there without even going down the passage Once again it is well hidden, it's just in a really obvious spot.

On exploring the passage to area 3, Freya finds no traps and no sign of creatures.

You going room 5 or room 3? For what it's worth, I do not subscribe to the "lower is tougher" school of dungeon design. The upper levels could be harder, here.

[Woe]

What kind of DM are you? I want to take the easy route, so let me know if I should be going up or down.

Freya will look down the hallway of 5. I want to know whether the zombie ogres are still around.

[Longman]

Freya does this - avoiding the tap she saw, natch.

There are no ogre zombies in the long room (5). Her tracking rolls indicate that they were, in fact, ogres, and they arrived via the west end of area 5.

Now what?

[Woe]

Anna, traps extraordinaire, will attempt to learn more about this trap. Is it another alarm, or something more deadly? If it is another alarm, she (with help from Freya, assuming she wants it) will attempt to disarm it. Most of the traps have recently involved things dropping from the ceiling. If it's another spore trap, that'd be great to relocate closer to the stairs. /evilgrin

Assuming that either goes well or not at all, the group will assume the standard formation for wandering through a trapped area: Anna first, checking for traps; then Freya, checking for traps; then Kilian, who will step on all remaining traps...

If Anna was successful at disarming the trap and feeling lucky, she'll attempt to set the trap back up by where the mimic once stood. That might cause a bit of confusion with the hobgoblins. Hopefully they think one of them did it. Again, /evilgrin

But, rather than heading back to 6 and upstairs, they'll stop near the 6 area and check thoroughly for traps. The new plan is 11 and 12, maybe find another way up to the surface. Before going any farther than 5a though, which way do the ogre traps go?

[Woe]

Wow! I forgot Abigall sets traps as a 10th level thief until just now. She really needs to get a better grip on her insanity.

[Longman]

She sets her own microtraps (mostly outdoors) but can't detect dungeon stuff. She could probably deactivate pretty well though.

It's an alarm trap. Anna tries deactivating it and fails, but you knew exactly where the metal object was so you (Freya) catch it. No harm done.

Talin gets into the tracking action and can't see much. Freya thinks the ogre tracks came from and went back to the west side of area 5 - probably up to room 11.

You are messing around trying to set it back up in the south doorway to room 6 and your 'set' traps roll is a miserable failure. It falls off the roof while you are trying to reset it. Anna fails to catch it and so does Freya, and Kilian. It falls to the ground and there is a loud clang noise, again!

Sorry - worst run of luck in recent memory - -

Incidentally, the hobgoblins / whatever they are obviously have some kind of tar or paint they use to stick objects and wires in place so they look a bit like part of the stone work. You have no such substance. This might explain your failure to set the trap properly.

What are you going to do? You could not hear any noise before you just made some yourself.