Kelpsprot Session 5

Castle Kelpsprot is my Dungeon25-ish project: a science-fantasy capsule game megadungeon designed for HUDless play. For background, see my first post on the project.

Session Five

Morning of the 5th day of spring, year 4201

Castaways:
Lady Harlowe, Hapless Heir
Professor Archibald Bandersnatch, Windblown Balloonist
Rodrick, Discarded Reconstruction
Sir Imago, Remarkably Errant Knight

	This session	All time
Real world time played	1½ hours	~8½ hours
In-game time elapsed	1½ hours	~Two days
Rooms discovered	7	40
Denizens met	3	26
Castaways slain	0	0

Highlights

• The party retrieved soil from planting boxes on the third floor near the atrium. They placed the soil into a stone potted plant (part of a statue) and poured in some fresh water. This opened a passageway to a courtyard with a tall tower adjacent to it.
• Nearby they found a wide stair that they followed up to the third floor, establishing connections between the three levels accessible from the atrium.
• On the way, the found an empty camp guarded by a stork-shaped gargoyle named Slatebeak. They learned that four other stewards had also gone missing in the Shallows.
• The hall containing the stewards’ camp had huge stained glass windows in the north wall. Beyond them, the party caught a glimpse of the central court for the first time. The court spans at least a couple of acres.
• The party also stumbled upon a statue of a cat with fish bones at its feet. They offered the statue fish from their bucket, and a cat apparition appeared. The apparition turned up its nose at their offering, declaring that it was “sick of mackerel.” The party established that the cat desires rare fish or fish it hasn’t tasted before, such as lion fish or clown fish.
• The party visited the other stewards’ camp on the first floor, where they met a gargoyle named Gneissfang. Harmony led the party through the stewards’ camp to Cousin Klaus, a sixteen-foot tall stone head that projects from a wall. Klaus is missing an eye and desperately wants it back. In exchange for the return of his eye, he will grant access to the stairway in his throat.
• Cousin Klaus: “Do you have any idea how uncomfortable it is to have spiders crawling around your eye socket?”
  Rodrick: “Yes, actually I do.”

Reflections

• This was a very talky session. The party spent most of the session conversing with castle denizens (most of them statues). That said, they learned a lot and covered a fair bit of ground.
• The reveal of the central court was exciting! The players had no idea how large it would actually be. It extends just over 300 feet from north to south and an unknown distance to the west. The castle surrounds it on all sides.
• A new player joined this session, and onboarding a new participant when the other players had so much more knowledge of the castle and plans in place proved a bit challenging, but he was an excellent sport about it. In future sessions, I’ll invite new players to join a little early so I can bring them up to speed somewhat.