They stumble upon an abyssal dragon

This play report is coming super late.  On the heels of today's adventure, actually.  So it's going to be even more brief than usual.  At least, that's what I told myself.  ;)

The party picked up two new PCs:  Sam and Arick.  Sam is a human wizard raised by gnome tinkerers.  Arick is a rogue... but I can't remember what race he chose.  Yeah, that's why you don't wait 7 days to post about your session of D&D, folks.

West was playing the tiefling warlock Akmenos.  He couldn't make it.  So, I told the party that some time ago, he wandered into the dungeon area below castle Steel Keep, where lies a pool or well of liquid flame.  Indeed, sorcery!  So went Akmenos' flame tongue sword which is the most powerful magic item the party has.  As DM, I provided a way for the PCs to retrieve the sword... a large, red, demonic claw rose up out of the fire, clutching Penelope (the sword's activation word / name).  In exchange for passage into their world, the demon would give them the fiery blade.  Even though there were 8 players, no takers.  Ah well.

Afterwards, Kildrak the dwarf had a vivid dream of a treasure horde to be found somewhere below the tree of life.  Drained of loot by castle upkeep, taxes, servants, extravagant parties, and general repairs, the PCs went after this visionary treasure.

Also, Lilah met with a messenger from her father (or possibly her mother) - note to self: nail down the backstory specifics at character creation, not weeks later - who gave her an amethyst necklace with magical powers.  I totally flubbed the messenger's introduction.  Who knows, perhaps the messenger was really, really nervous and socially awkward?

I came up with a cavern area loosely based on something I found in some book somewhere (Ah, specificity!) and set about coming up with interesting encounters.  As the title of this blog post would show, the adventurers came across a dragon - black.  However, not like a black dragon.  This dragon was as a moonless midnight, soaking up any illumination near it.  A dragon of the abyss!

There was also a really cool trick / trap / weird thing I created for one area of the cavern - a floating skull with ruby red eyes illuminating a large portion of the cave... but not the shadows just beyond!  Dead bodies were piled before the skull.  The PCs really wanted to investigate but put that cave on the back burner until they could explore the rest.

Since this was a "dungeon" I came up with, there was some good old fashioned science-fantasy.  Three "ice people" were talked about by some telepathic violet fungi.  These were cryogenic sleepers (three of them) housed in transparent cylinders.  Waking them was easy, but they had been asleep for thousands of years.  Now what to do with them?  So far, the PCs are having them tag along.

Finally, the dragon again.  There was talk amongst the players of just charging right in and attacking.  Staying impartial but still wanting to give them a clue as to the terrible danger, I told them that if they attacked it, I wash my hands of responsibility, i.e. PC death.  Wisely, they kept exploring instead of charging the abyssal dragon.

I'll leave you where I left them, exploring the outer edge of a cavern covered in spiderwebs.

VS

p.s.  However, I am stoked about the plethora of grid maps I purchased at my FLGS.  $150 worth of flat, plastic terrain.  Doesn't sound too exciting but it laying it out on the kitchen countertop... it looked awesome.  Using it in today's game with miniatures should really put the session over the top.  Especially since last week (the one I wrote about here above), there wasn't a lot of combat and I think a few of the players felt there should be a wee bit more.  Today, there will be more!