This past session was a showcase of tactics. I still haven't decided if was brilliant tactics on the part of the players, very stupid tactics on the part of me as DM, or some average in the middle somewhere. Regardless of whether I screwed up or not, there is no denying the cleverness and just flat out luck of the players.

The initial setup was that the majority of the party was 100 (vertical) yards away from a khaasta ambush, and two (horizontal) miles from town. The remaining three PCs (having missing players last session), were back in said town. Rusteen, having grown bored while waiting for the rest of the group to get back from talking to squirrels, had decided to go out and try his hand at hunting on the World Ash. About a mile from town, he spotted a large group of khaasta who were watching the road from hiding, obviously planning an ambush for someone coming down the road. Correctly guessing that this was a trap for his travelling companions, Rusteen hurried back to town and gathered up Jack and Ginaea. The three then headed out and prepared to ambush the ambush once the rest of their friends arrived.

A good plan, but the players of the "reinforcements" failed to recall one critical piece of information - the travelling group was TWO miles from town, while this batch of khaasta was only ONE mile from town. Yep, these were two different groups of khaasta, one acting as reinforcements for the other. So, the rest of the session became me running two different combats at the same time.

So, back the bulk of the party, the five PCs quickly realized that they had a height advantage and attempted to make use of it. First, they dropped an empty keg and some caltrops on the khaasta and fired a few arrows and crossbow bolts, just to "get their attention". (Yes, this was Twig's idea.) Once accomplished, the lizardfolk attempted to parley with the PCs, claiming only to desire the return of the artifact rod (a.k.a "the Ugly Stick"). Twig did her best to verbally confuse and annoy.

In the meantime, just as the remaining three PCs were trying to decide if they should just take out the leader now, rather than wait for the ambush to be sprung, the other group of khaasta suddenly picked up and began moving - away from town. It was at this point that the three realized they were watching the wrong group. They also figured out that some kind of signal must have been received, and these lizardfolk were now speeding towards another group and quite probably the real ambush. So, Jack, Rusteen, and Ginaea took up pursuit of the pursuers.

Fairly straight forward to here, right? Well, this is where things started going wrong - primarily for the NPCs. After taunting the lizardfolk for a while, Twig promised to throw down the "rod". She wasn't about to do really do this, partially because she didn't want the khaasta to have it and partially because the real rod was currently down Rusteen's pants. Instead, she grabbed a random stick and poured a bottle of stolen beauty on it. This now very dangerous "beauty bomb" was then dropped among the raiders. This promptly distracted about a third as they began to fight over the stick. The group quick descended 100 feet and then dropped a second beauty bottle. With now fully half of the lizardfolk distracted, the group proceeded to climb along the trunk and slowly descend, trading missile fire along the way. Eventually, a few well chosen spells from Que (Grease, Web) and Dr. Fever (what else? - Obscuring Mist) incapacitated the remaining enemies and they escaped with causing only minimal deaths.

The smaller group of PCs went about it exactly the other way. Their first plan of action was to pick off stragglers with missile fire - from fairly close range, as rogues get their sneak attacks with missiles as long as they are within 30 feet of the target. They picked off 5 lizardfolk before being noticed. They took out a couple more before the other group had turned around and started to chase them. The three tried to run, but were quickly trapped within a Web spell. The khaasta then surrounded it, and made the same demands as of the other PCs - surrender the rod and we'll let you live. Apparently receiving Twig's plan telepathically, the PCs stalled for time until they could escape the webs. Of course, they immediately elected to fight the twenty-plus khaasta, even with being surrounded.

It was at this point that Rusteen's borderline kleptomania finally paid off. He told Jack about a magic wand he had picked up, and told him to use it - after the gigolo retrieved it from within Rusteen's pants. Having no idea what it did, Jack did what he does best - trust to luck - and activated it in the direction of the leader. The wand let forth a Color Spray and dropped some of the khaasta into unconciousness, opening a path to the leader. Rusteen quickly charged the leader and inflicted a mighty blow, causing her to retreat. The woodsman couldn't pursue as he was suddenly surrounded by a trio of the raiders. In the meantime, Ginaea and Jack tried to keep from getting cut apart. Ginaea failed. Fortunately, Jack was able to use the wand to good effect and drop all the lizardfolk and bind her wounds before she died (halted at -8 hit point). For his part, Rusteen managed to intimidate two of the three khaasta around him and kill the last before he died (left with 2 hit points).

So, overall, the group of five PCs killed three or four khaasta and escaped the rest while the group of three let three or four khaasta escape and killed the rest.

Finally, every one was reunited and returned to town. Twig informed some of the local high-ups about what was causing the problems with the ratatosk. Then everyone was finally in agreement to head back to Heliopolis by way of Sigil to finally complete Augustus' mission.

The other part of the plan is that Shazarr really needs to formally divide up the money gained from his sale of the pillaged artwork. Next time we'll probably fast forward a bit to finsih off Augustus' mission and get on with things.

Authored by: Ken Lipka E-mail me: krlipka@yahoo.com

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