Owlbears Must Die!

My re-mixed, PDM inspired, version of B2: Keep on the Borderlands continues. It's acquired the name the "Wild North" campaign (like Wild West but turned 90 degrees)and this week my players surprised me by delving into a cave I was not expecting. 

This was our 4th delve into the caves. So far they've cleared out Kurtzman's Creepers, dipped their toes into the Mines of the Mutants (Caves D&E) and skirmished with the Hill Men in Cave F. Consequently, I was anticipating a stronger push into the left flank of the canyon to be the most likely plan or much less likely a probe into the Brugor or Rebel Caves to the right. 

I had not planned for them to plunge straight to the back of the canyon and assault Cave G, home of the infamous Owlbear. Nevertheless, I had an excellent little module to run for them. 

Players' diagram of the cave entrances

From the outset of planning this campaign, I had planned to replace the somewhat pedestrian owlbear nest from the original module with Logan Knight's grossly magnificent Sleeping Place of the Feathered Swine (PWYW on Itch.io). Bryce and Gus reviewed it back in the day, so you don't have to take my word that it's good. Nevertheless, I'll share my experience. It's been 10 years since this adventure was first published so I suspect a lot of people playing now, might have missed it when it arrived or forgotten it in the intervening years. 

I first ran it when it first came out in 2014 and it's innovative cut-apart, puzzle map became my standard way of presenting maps to players (my players are not the types to enjoy mapping themselves). It's probably influenced my DMing more than any other module I've run. Over the years, I've produced countless cut-apart maps for my own dungeons and other modules.

A glimpse of the exemplary puzzle map

I was excited to work this adventure into my new campaign (I live in a different city with a completely fresh set of players) and I had started planting seeds and hints, but I was in no way ready for the group to choose Cave G so soon. 

Previously, I had introduced the inciting character, the wizard Felix Longworm as the leader of a rival adventuring party. The player characters met them in the tavern (and took an immediate disliking). 

When the party decided to ignore all the closer caves and charge toward the far end of the canyon, I pulled the PDF up on my phone and ran the whole thing off my screen (I did pause for a moment to print the puzzle map). Most modules would be fairly challenging to run off a phone screen, but Logan's layout made it comparatively easy. I'd have preferred to have the whole thing on paper, but in a pinch it worked fine. 

Arriving at the mouth of the cave, the player characters discovered Felix, bedraggled and without his spellbook. He told the sad tale of how his party had been ambushed and mauled by monsters. He regaled them with the tremendous value of the sleeping monster's cysts and begged that they retrieve his spellbook, promising a reward in gold coins (which the party found to be insultingly low).  The party chuckled at his misfortune, but decided to dive in and harvest the dank cave's bounties for themselves. 

They fought their way through the Flesh Tumors, rescued Aspeth (an associate of Felix, gravely wounded and cowardly abandoned), retrieved the lost spell book (which they have no intent of returning) and battled the fabled Sleeping Swine after bungling their attempt to sedate it. 

Logan's lovely drawing.

Tragic death was the inevitable result. Two player characters were dropped by the enraged beast. Quick action with a healing potion saved the druid's life, but the ninja expired. 

Eventually, the monster was subdued, though the volleys of arrows, and the frantic sword slashes had left just one cyst unbroken to be harvested. 

It was a dramatic adventure and the party made it back to town, with a little treasure, wounded & crippled friends and great stories to tell around the hearth. 

I had a great time running this adventure and my players loved it too. I was a bit worried that it might be too nasty for a few of my players but they all enjoyed being grossed out. I'm so happy to have had a chance to run this again after all these years.