Icewind Dale
Today, we played the first session of our Icewind Dale Dungeons and Dragons game, DMed by my friend Jack! Here's a sneak peek at my character, Kaiakee, who doesn't have a colored ref yet. They're based off of a Northern saw-whet owl, and I've been putting off coloring them since the plumage is so complicated. Kaiakee is an aarakocra wizard who just finished undergrad at the magic academy and is now pursuing their graduate degree, in the Dale on a research trip for divination. They're hoping that the unpredictable nature of the Dale will make practice more challenging - at the academy, there's enough of a regular routine that it's hard to tell successful divination from successful guessing. They love explaining things in great detail and do so at every opportunity, regardless of how anyone else feels about it, and their main motivation right now is impressing their faculty advisor. The other party members are Victorio and Adair, who are both warlocks, Diatus, who is a paladin, and Følra, who is a cleric.
In our session today, the party met for the first time and traveled to the town of Dougan's Hole. There, after immediately investigating the Twenty Stones monoliths, an activity during which three different characters rolled 20+ information checks and Kaiakee delivered a long-winded and frantic impromptu lecture on the landmark, we found out that two talking wolves had been running a protection racket - demanding food and gold, and threatening to kill anyone who left the town if these things were not provided. Because Dougan's Hole was a very poor hamlet, the townspeople could not pay, and the wolves trapped everyone in town and kidnapped two teenagers.
Although the wolves, Koran and Kanan, claimed to be working for a frost giant who mistreated them and offered to betray him, we discovered upon following them to his house that he was already dead. The cause of death was unclear and we did not investigate because there was a mammoth in the way and we were more concerned with rescuing the kidnapped teenagers. We did, however, find some valuable remorhaz goo and take it back with us. We also found some kobolds - it wasn't really clear what they were doing in the house, but they offered to help us rescue the teenagers in exchange for being brought somewhere safe, and joined us on our journey. The teenagers were miserable but unharmed, so we rescued them from their cage and left.
Outside of the giant's house, the wolves expressed disbelief that the mammoth had not killed us and attacked. While the kobolds took the teenagers to safety, we engaged in battle with the wolves, who nearly killed Diatus but were defeated mainly through the use of a lot of debuffs. Diatus nearly died twice - once rescued by Kaiakee casting Silver Barbs, and once reduced to 1 hp and healed by Følra. We brought the teenagers and kobolds back to Dougan's Hole, and the teens reunited with their mother. As payment, we received Boots of the Winterlands, which went to Victorio.
Overall, it was a great game and I can't wait to continue it!