Let’s Play Dragonbane! The Lantern of Solitude, part 4

Gil and Warren face a thorny mission. Nature bites back.

Table of Contents

Everyone’s favorite frog duo in the Misty Vale, originating from Three Ponds, continues their adventure!

Before heading to the next mission, I returned to High Cradle to rest. Turns out a demon can be quite a challenge. Who knew.

I spent 7 silver coins for a large room. Our heroes are well rested and ready to go.

Resting, however, increases the Campaign Threat by 1. Not great, but it was necessary.

Note: I was running into a problem with traps and overall damage outside of combat. A trap that could potentially kill Gil doesn’t even scratch Warren due to his armor. He’s very tanky, and Gil is made of glass. This is fine for combat, but not for roleplaying. So I’ll reduce the environmental damage, and I’m ruling that traps ignore armor protection.

Finally, Gil and Warren head into Thornvault, where twisted groves and thorn-choked hollows bar their way. The place is now devoured by the green the druids once tended.

“Vines answer trespass with blood. And deep within the briar’s heart beats a fragment of the Lantern’s light.”

Waypoint 1: Rootway Arch

“A low arch of intertwined roots marks the vault’s entrance. Pale blossoms hang overhead; the ground below is webbed with hair-trigger vines.”

Campaign Threat: 2/10
Mission Threat: 1/6
Threat: Enchanted vines come alive to strangle you. Use EVADE or suffer 1D6 Damage; if the vines successfully strangle you, then a successful STR test is needed. If you fail the STR test, then suffer an additional 2D6+2 Damage. After which, the vines will release you.

Action + Theme: Forsaken + Shortcut
Action + Theme: Reduce + Corruption

There’s a shortcut here that makes me bypass a Waypoint in this place overrun by a verdant corruption, but I have to find it.

Gil and Warren will search the room together, getting a Boon.

2d20 Spot Hidden (10, Boon): 18, 19, fail.
That sucked. I’ll push the roll, and Warren will get Dazed: 1, 5, Dragon!

Worth it. Now they have to cross the vine-laden ground.

d20 Gil’s Sneaking check (14): 20, Demon!
3d20 Warren’s Sneaking check (6, Bane x2): 20, 3, 16, Demon!

This is cursed. Vines wrap around their ankles, slowing their progress. Barbed tendrils lash at them as they traverse.

Mission Threat: 2/6
d3 damage: 3
Gil’s HP: 10/13
Warren’s HP: 14/17

I was gonna increase the Threat by 2, but I reduced it due to the previous Dragon result.

Gil found a wide crack in the wall and called Warren. “There’s an opening here, but I don’t think we can fit.”

Warren investigated it as Gil looked for something to use. Warren leaped headfirst into the crack, destroying the wall. He got up coughing dust, wobbling on his feet. “Now we can.”

“When people say ‘use your head’, it’s usually a figure of speech.”

I’ll skip the unknown Waypoint 3.

Waypoint 2: Whisperbush Clearing

“Low shrubs hem a quiet glade. Their leaves murmur despite the still air, some say that they hear the voices of the ones they have lost call out to them by name, but no one is there.”

The new passage leads them further into the green until they get to a clearing surrounded by shrubs. A soft breeze blows, swaying the undergrowth. The rustling turns into a familiar noise.

Clang. Clang. Clang.

They froze, then looked at each other.

“The Frog Bell!”

The familiar ring deepened, desperate, urgent. The terrible realization struck like a demon kick: a threat loomed over Three Ponds again. Whenever humans drew too near, the Bell tolled, calling the knights of the Greenleap Order to arms.

Gil could almost see Warren and the other knights scrambling across lily bridges, forming ranks in their moss-green armor. His heart raced.

Warren will make a Beast Lore check to identify the treacherous bushes.

d20 Beast Lore check (10): 1, Dragon!

The rolls are wild this session! Warren not only identifies the trick but also knows how to counter it. Gil gets a Boon.

Warren frowned. There was something wrong with the ringing. Maybe it was the tone, the cadence, or even the volume. He reached down to brush his hand against a trembling shrub. His frown deepened into a grimace.

“These are whisperbushes,” he said, rising and waving at the greenery. “They scour our minds to use a memory against us.”

Gil sniffed and wiped his eyes. “Three Ponds is safe, then. It sounds so real!”

“Please make them stop, Gil. They’re mocking our home.”

Gil nodded and took out his lyre.

2d20 Performance check (14, Boon): 12, 11, success!

Gil plays a tune to harmonize with the whisperbushes. Their tolls slowly turn into a soothing rustling. Mockery gives way to reverence. The murmurs become an homage to springtime in Three Ponds, reminding them of home.

Silence descended on the clearing. They could smell rain in the marshes of Three Ponds.

Gil and Warren pressed on, their hearts filled with bittersweet homesickness.

Damn those bushes! How dare they depress our heroes?

We’re skipping Waypoint 3.

Waypoint 4: Cursed Spring

“A shallow spring lies perfectly still; your reflection ripples with every breath. Slick stones ring the water like stepping discs.”

Let’s see what’s up with that spring.

Description + Focus: Forgotten + Weather
Action + Theme: Swear + Trade

A spring lay so still that its surface could be confused with glass. Gil leaned over it. An old frog stared back at him. The sky in the reflection was dark as lead, and lightning speared through the heavy clouds. A booming thunder echoed.

d20 Intelligence check (14): 3, success!

Gil will help Warren identify the meaning of the spring.

The old frog was a Weatherkeeper, a forgotten order of druids sworn to nature. The ancestral oath with weather spirits lingered in the spring, kept by a dark energy. Warren approached, feeling the hunger of the pact.

2d20 Myth & Legend check (10, Boon): 7, 18, success!

Thunder boomed, leaving Warren’s ears ringing. “An oath was broken here,” he said. “It longs for renewal.”

“I hope that’s all it wants,” Gil said.

The reflection raised its hand. A voice entered their minds. “Metal for Earth. Greed for Fortune.”

The spring demands gold to seal the pact.

How many gold coins?
d6: 1
Well, the die has spoken. Does it want anything else?
Oracle: Extreme no.

The coin hits the water, scrambling the surface with a thousand ripples. When it stills, the storm has ceased, and the reflection is gone.

The oath is sworn.

Are they Weatherkeepers now? I don’t know, but it sounds exciting!

Waypoint 5: Unknown

The Lantern of Solitude has a few tables to roll for unknown waypoints. I realized I haven’t used them yet. Let’s do it now.

Area: Broken stairway
Contents: Glass fragments
Environment: Rolling mist
Oddity: False reflection
Danger: Cursed whisper

They go up a twisting stairway. Broken glass littered the floor, reflecting the canopy and sky in warped fragments. The stairs end in scattered platforms suspended over a pit of mist, the drop below hidden.

Warren moved carefully, his armor weighing him down. Gil jumped the platforms with ease, laughing along the way. Warren gritted his teeth and struggled to keep up.

“You slow me down, Warren,” Gil said as he left him behind. “It’s time we went our separate ways.”

The glass cracked beneath Warren’s boots as he quickened his pace, but Gil was too fast. Warren was too stupid and clumsy and inept to follow him. With watery eyes, he saw Gil disappear into the mist, finally free of his burden.

d20 Intelligence check (10): 17, fail!
Mission Threat: 3/6

Warren fell to his knees, head down, and punched the ground. Tears dripped onto the glass shards. Gil left him. He knew it would happen someday.

—

As Gil came up the stairs, a rolling mist overran the rooftop. It seemed to sigh as it engulfed Warren up ahead. He held his platforms to follow him. “Warren, wait for me!” he shouted, but there was no reply.

Gil moved on, the strange mist cast moving pictures in front of him. They reflected his life as if he had never waded into the water to defend Warren. As if Warren had never found him after he left the merchant’s house in terror.

He looked happy, traveling the world with a group of friends, playing to large crowds, discovering wonders, gathering riches.

You could be free, a voice whispered. That awkward-leaping burden is not yours to carry.

d20 Intelligence check (14): 14, success!

“Free?” Gil couldn’t help but laugh. “I would be lost. Our burdens are shared, you foolish thing, and made easier because Warren bears them on his mighty shoulders.”

With that, the false image shattered into more glass shards. The mist opened up, revealing Warren up ahead. He was kneeling, and his shoulders shook.

d20 Persuasion check (14): 19, fail!
Mission Threat: 4/6

“Warren, there you are!” Gil called, smiling, but Warren didn’t respond. He got up and jumped across the platforms, too fast for Gil to follow.

“Hey, wait up!”

The mist must have entranced him. What could make him snap out of it?

d20 Performance check (14): 11, success!

Gil pulled out his lyre and played Bragat the Brave. He plucked the strings with urgency, and his voice strained to reach Warren as he leaped forward.

As the bright melody continued, Warren finally stopped and slowly turned around. He squinted his red-rimmed eyes, then shook his head. Shards broke all around him. He opened a smile. “Gil!”

Gil exhaled with relief. “You’re not getting rid of me so easily, pal.”

I’m glad that last check worked, because otherwise I was gonna have to separate our green buddies. This was a very fun waypoint!

Waypoint 6: Heartbriar

“A vast, pulsing briar of blood-red thorns encloses the shard at its core, vines flexing in time with your heartbeat.”

The Heartbriar, an enormous wall of red thorns and bramble, blocks their way, pulsing like a vein.

Gil poked a branch. It twitched.

“Don’t do that,” Warren says.

“Just saying hello.”

The lantern shard glowed in the center. As they stepped inside the maze-like room inside the briar, it lashed out at them. Barbed vines uncoiled from the Heartbriar to whip them.

d20 Gil’s Evade check (14): 10, success!
3d20 Warren’s Evade check (6, Bane x2): 4, 8, 9, fail! > d3 damage: 1 (HP 13/17)
Mission Threat: 5/6

The incoming vine cracked in the air as Gil dodged under it. Warren wasn’t so fast, getting whipped in the face.

They looked at each other and nodded. Warren drew his morningstar as Gil readied his lyre. They ran to opposite sides, avoiding the lashing plants by entrancing them and dodging, or by striking and parrying, both racing toward the core.

Each will have to pass 3 checks to reach the shard. The result will depend on what comes first, either 3 successes or 3 failures.

Gil will avoid the incoming vines by entrancing them with his lyre. Warren will strike and parry with his morningstar and shield.

Gil
d20 Performance check (14): 16, fail! > d3 damage: 2 (HP 8/13)
d20 Performance check (14): 6, success (1/3)
d20 Performance check (14): 18, fail! > d3 damage: 1 (HP 7/13)
d20 Performance check (14): 4, success (2/3)
d20 Performance check (14): 14, success (3/3)

That was a close call for Gil! Let’s see how Warren fares.

Warren
d20 Hammers check (15): 10, success (1/3)
d20 Hammers check (15): 18, fail! > d3 damage: 3 (HP 10/17)
d20 Hammers check (15): 5, success (2/3)
d20 Hammers check (15): 3, success (3/3)

Gil soothes the Heartbriar with his melody, but the brambles on the ground make him lose his balance and play wrong notes. The vines slashed at him, biting deep into his skin.

Warren avoided the flailing with his shield and parried incoming vines with well-timed strikes. The duo circled the core, getting closer and closer to the shard, until they could touch it.

“Now, Warren!” Gil shouted.

He dropped the lyre while Warren let go of his morningstar, and they both jumped for the shard.

The Heartbriar let out a shuddering sigh. Its brambles and plants waned and wilted.

Gil and Warren held the fragment in their hands, panting.

“Are you all right?” Warren asked.

“I’m fine. But I think I’m done with nature for a while. I feel like spending some time in the desert. Or maybe indoors, with plenty of stone underfoot.”

“Agreed.” Warren rose and helped Gil up. “The briar is just so belligerent. I’ll take a nice wet lily over that any day.”

“Ponds and reeds, am I right?” Gil asked.

“Ponds and reeds.”

And that’s it for today! I had a blast with this session. There was no combat, but I think we’ve seen plenty of action from our little guys.

I realized that I rarely roll for treasure or scavenges to search for useful things, so I think I’ll do that more often. But maybe it’s just working like that?

Skill advancements
Gil: Acrobatics, Awareness, and Bartering increased by 1!
Warren: Bushcraft and Sneaking increased by 1!

I’d love to hear any feedback or suggestions you might have about the adventure. If you’re just along for the ride wherever it goes, that’s awesome too!

Thanks for staying, and until next time.

---

Check out Dragonbane on the Free League site and wherever RPGs are sold near you.

The Lantern of Solitude is available on DrivethruRPG.

Just One Dragon is available on Itch.io.

Frog images created by Artcher.

Support the creators.