Scheduling starts to get difficult as the year winds down and approaches the holidays. So, I’m glad we were able to get together for another SBotLL session!

In these Campaign Diary posts, I talk about the campaign I play in and how our most recent session went!

What’s SBotLL?

SBotLL is the campaign I play in! It’s been running for over three years now. There are two parties: one on the surface and the other in the Underdark. I play on the surface squad as the elf bard Finnith, with my two friends playing the dragonborn rogue Nala and the tiefling ranger Allora.

Recap

Last session, the group got some disagreements sorted out. Finnith and Allora learned about the dragonborn clans’ secret: each clan leader has a pact with one of the demon lords. But anyone who calls upon their pact’s power will surely disrupt the delicate peace between the clans. Hence the problem with the power struggle in Nala’s clan.

But, the group has more pressing concerns. A dangerous winter storm is coming, and they need to return to the Amastacia manor. The group decides to begin travelling as soon as possible to try to beat the storm’s approach. They manage to reach a town a few days away from the manor and spend the night there.

During this session…

That night, Nala asks Finnith to cast dream. We resolved part of this last session, with her conversation with her father, the current clan leader. Next, she talks to Amuulqalo, a dragonborn warlock. Amuulqalo accompanied the party for a while before leaving to take care of something related to his patron, and he is part of a different dragonborn clan.

Amuulqalo reveals that someone is causing trouble for most, if not all, the dragonborn clans. They’re stealing vital components used in the ritual to summon a demon lord. There’s some larger plan going on here… but the party is on the other side of the continent from him. There isn’t much the party can do right now besides be aware of the situation.

The next few days are dedicated to travel. The action picks up again on the final day of travel, the day the party is supposed to reach the Amastacia manor. Allora’s bow of warning wakes everyone up in the morning, because there’s a huge, six-legged lizard coming towards the party.

With a blast of icy breath, Finnith and Nala lose around half of their hit points. Allora assesses the situation and tries to figure out why this creature is attacking the party. She notices that it actually isn’t looking at them—it’s looking at a magic item they have, a crystal that keeps fires lit. Allora scoops up the crystal and gives it to the creature, and it eats the crystal and seems to calm down.

The frost salamander (I later figured out what it was) approached each party member and sniffed them carefully. Allora and Finnith stayed still, but Nala hissed at it. So it used its ice breath on her. Nala failed the save and got knocked to zero hit points. She was completely frozen, and on top of that, the salamander broke off her right wrist and hand.

After the frost salamander left, Finnith and Allora were able to unfreeze Nala and get her stable. But all of her equipment was frozen, and she’s missing her hand.

Unfortunately, the party has to keep moving, so they quickly pack up and continue travelling. The snow falls heavily on them as they travel. And, at last, they make it back to the Amastacia manor!

Tiers of Play

Our party is hovering around level 12 right now. We’re in a different tier of play than we were at level 6 or so. With our characters’ connections to other parts of the world, we’re going to have to choose our actions carefully, since we’re powerful enough to make larger-scale impacts.

It’s taken us a long time to get to this point, and we still have many levels left before we’re at maximum strength. This higher-tier play gives us really interesting problems to deal with—we’re more powerful than ordinary people, but we still have plenty of limitations!

We’re starting to deal with monsters that can do a lot of damage and/or cause extremely debilitating effects. As our characters grow more powerful, we have to up our game as players, too!

Downtime

Our DM has told us that our characters will have a couple months of downtime before the next arc. This hasn’t really happened before in the campaign. I hope we can get some helpful information out of this downtime period! On the other hand, I’m excited to have some roleplaying scenes that aren’t in the middle of an important mission.

How does your campaign handle downtime? And what do you think of the different tiers of play in D&D? I’d love to hear your thoughts!