Report on my game: S2

Hey Guys!

To fill this community with some content, I´ve started a loose journal of my campaign here.
The group has one person extremely familiar with DnD 5 and the rest very new to TTRPG in general, their biggest experience being a 7 game Monster of the Week fewshot i ran them through before this. We play about 70-80% of the time on FVTT/Discord, some rare (special) occasions at my place.
Since we are all adult, I am lentient in campaign attendance. The group consists of 7 theoretical players, but typical sessions are anywhere from 3-5. I think I wouldnt want to play with many more in a session :) that said, for session 2 we had 5 in attendance.

Review of the cast

Garret Blackwood is a smuggler and roughian. He captained the fleet the players were on. OUT undecided, Human Fighter.

Limor Nightfall (absent today) used to be an angel, but descended onto the earth in human form to fight an evil cult. They are a necromancer that specializes in freeing undead spirits and guiding them to their god. Aasimar Necro

Lumis Elderdale is an elite spy from the imperial court. They have lost the inherent connection all elves share, instead feeling it with all other beings except the elves. Woodelf Monk

Martho Rolaun is a split personality (two players play this character). This seems caused by childhood trauma. They devoted themselves to the good gods and are now a Human Cleric.

Rook Finchley is a private investigator and blessed with the knowledge that they will win every dice game, although they lack the knowledge of why. They are oathbound to Zazel. Human Ranger

Zazel used to be a demon, but his invasion was beat back by the crusader. They were somehow bound to a human body and are now in hiding from the crusader. They wish to free the rest of their incursion force from a similar fate and exact revenge on the crusader. They also pulled some demon trick to make Rook lose a dice game, earning their oath of servitude. Human Rogue

Presession

This is short this time. We talked about whether the journal worked for them (it didn’t, there was no entry) but agreed that the infrastructure for it was ok, they had just forgotten.
I had also forgotten to give out incremental advance last time so we started with that.
I also opened a meme channel on our campaign discord, and that was a good move. They post memes about stuff in the game back and forth and it helps group cohesion I think.

Session

Since in the last feedback round (we use stars and wishes for feedback, will expand at the end) several players wished for more RP time and to discover their chars more, I did a soft retcon: I had ended last session on a cliffhanger for the next fight, but we decided that we would actually start play with an exploration RP scene.
The party is shipwrecked, their ship having been tossed around by a giant water elemental. Their ship had broken in half, and they are on an island with a mountain in the middle. They had scaled that mountain last session.

Now at the peak, they found the second half of their ship! They talked between themselves and explored the wreckage for a while, finding clues pointing towards other crew surviving and having left this spot. One player sneakily and carefully scouted the wreckage, some of it precariously hanging over an edge. They noticed a harpy and a weird goblin bat hybrid (already the second weird goblin creature on this island, smells like sideplot) having taken refuge here. A fight broke out, without surprise on either side because the player wanted to sneak on their whole group instead of just attacking, and some roll during that procedure turned out not so good.

We had an excellent fight against some fliers. The harpy and goblin bat I had scaled down to level 2 each, and I repurposed some stirges as vampiric bats. Players were 5 level 1. Two of the players, who are a couple, take turns playing the cleric character, so this session was the first for the person playing that day. The rest of them were very notably more proficient in playing their characters than during last sessions first encounter, so it went rather quick despite some technical difficulties. We just barely reached ED3. Everyone did some cool stuff. The ranger missed a bunch, but due to a reroll blessing by the cleric got in the last hit of the encounter.

After that we had another extended scene of them organizing a shelter out of wreckage and foliage, finding some wild mushrooms and herbs, exploring the half-ship over the abyss and salvaging some rum and a precious item, and talking between themselves. I was happy to see how their characters meshed and talked between each other!
The precious item was some resounding weapons, book of loot p. 21. A pair of a fine elven scimitar and excellently crafted dwarven mace, both contraband and part of the shipment intended for the Prince of Shadows. For now, they are in the fighters capable hands.

In the morning, we had a scene of them gaining overview over the island they are stranded on. There are 5 points of Interest.

A pitch black temple on a sister island. This is where the main plot about the evil chained god progresses. There are some old floats visible on the shores of this island, but it is too far to swim to., soplayers will have to build sth too or use magic or figure it out somehow.
To the north, a seemingly abandoned village with only young saplings around it, instead of the dense foliage abundant elsewhere. It seems people who lived there cut down the trees around their village, built floats and went to the temple. There will probably be 1 hermit NPC here, maybe an encounter too. Certainly more plot and hints!
To the east, extremely dense and colourful foliage. Patches of blueish, purple or pinkish trees. My idea for this is some kind of fey glade, maybe this can also be where the spliced goblins come from. Maybe an encounter with some plant monsters and of course plot info about the island itself and its purpose.
To the south, a rough and rocky shore, filed with wreckage from an old fleet. A player used an icon point to make it a crusader fleet! My idea is that it has some ghost sailors, magic items, maybe info on the personal quests and relations with the crusader a few chars have and of course, plot info (there is a pattern here, I know…it’s a little quantum ogres, but you gotta get to the plot sometime :D)
To the west, a patch of forest with absolutely no movement. No deer, no birds, no sound. I want to have the lair of a very strong monster here – maybe a basilisk, or owlbear or sth. Maybe a cub too. This is also where it turned out in play that the survivors had went.
Players decided to track the survivors, have them maybe build a boat while they checkout the temple. Some also expressed interest in going north or south respectively, so I think in the end we will visit most of the places.

I ended the session running an extended challenge (https://blog.artemisgames.co.uk/archives/875) which is a mix of skill challenge and montage designed to take resources like a combat would, instead of combat. The challenge was getting down from the mountain in one piece and finding the survivors. On the way, a mortally wounded third mate was encountered, along some giant scorpions. Chasms were vaulted, trees climbed, paths found, players fell down ravines etc pp.
We ended the session with them entering the small cave they now know some survivors hide in, and will pick up next session with (finally) the first NPC encounter!

After session

We did a round of stars and wishes (https://www.gauntlet-rpg.com/blog/stars-and-wishes) for feedback, which I like. It turned out the ranger player is not super happy with their character, we will see how we can accommodate them! They are very urban focused and in combat do great damage, but are rather simple.
After the session, the players remained in the call over an hour extra, talking among themselves and planning a social get together – excellent! I am very confident with this group. We will have a great campaign

As always, I´d be very happy to read your comments, tips and tricks.
Im especially keen on further advice on how to use the icon relationships better!