Holorar & Hobgoblins (D&D mini campaign overview)

Information for the future: Rapala is practically a modern mech made out of fish. It has a fish cannon which can shoot up to 1 fish per second. It's very large, dense, and strong. It can easily crush interlopers beneath its slimy feet. It wields a spine sword along with its fish cannon, and provides vague tactical advice to its subjects. This god is favored by soldiers.





A mini campaign connected to Dank & Dark that starts in the dwarven city of Holorar. Holorar has abundant mines, underground fields, above ground fields, orchards with orchids, etc. It's a pristine city with plenty to offer. The party already knows each other, and went to attend the flumph's opera show in the grand mess. The grand mess is a dining hall of massive proportions, with masterful engravings along the walls, and evenly-cut tiles on the floors supporting the well-made stone tables and chairs. After the opera, the local baron will approach the group, offering them a job.

This job will be to clear out a troublesome bandits in a nearby encampment on the surface. This encampment is actually a few tents outside of a fortified cave. Though the cave isn't deep, it's controlled by a sorcerer with special scrying orbs set up around the cave. He'll know immediately when the players arrive, and won't assist his men. If the players decide to kill all the bandits, especially if they torture and then kill any other bandits, the 6th level sorcerer will summon a water elemental and fight the players with all he's got. If they do show mercy to the bandits, then he'll give himself into justice. The sorcerer knows about the impending siege, and planned on leaving a single bandit with the town to tell them while the rest of the camp fled to greener pastures.

The baron will emphasize that he wants prisoners to face justice, and not corpses that were denied it. If the players fail this, the bandit camp fights will be harder as the bandits fight for their lives, not just their freedom. Not just that, but the Baron himself will repremand the players. This is just to discourage further murder hoboing.

A few days later, either preparing for the siege or doing hard labor as punishment, the invading Hobgoblin warparty will come, led by Chief Chaf and backed by Lord Captain Ung'Ko.

Kill bandits: Without the preparation and added manpower, the hobgoblins will decimate the city with seige engines and superior military tactics. They will quickly cut through the city's population while putting the rest in chains. The players will likely either die in combat or get cornered by a bunch of hobgoblins yelling "surrender" in dwarven. Should they surrender, they will also be put in chains.

Mercy: The city would have brought out their own machines of war and barricaded the gates and reinforced the walls as preparation. Drills would have gone through for the archers on where to fire and how, the soldiers would have drilled on how to defend against people pouring in through the gates, etc. The fighting would take longer, and an evacuation would take place once it was obvious that the city would fall regardless. If the players don't participate in the evacuation, the same situations as detailed above will be the likely outcome. Except this time, they might get a chance of meeting Chief Chaf and his elephant.
If they flee, they will be going through caves that will eventually lead to Therlarn's fist. But unfortunately for them, a week into the journey, they are surrounded by a bunch of Kuo-Toa that yell at them in a confusing language that they can't understand. If the players resist, the civilians will pay the price and quickly get tranquilized/killed. A priest will cast sleep on the party after the first round of tranqs. After both, then the soldiers will move in to kill those strong enough to resist. Those that were knocked out by either a non-lethal attack, tranq, or the sleep spell will be sacrificed as an offering to the Kuo-Toa god, Rapala.

Rapala will then order all of the Kuo-Toa to leave, aside from the priests. While Rapala is shouting, the players will find that they can understand him in their native tongue. The priests will be made to stand aside, after giving the players simple Kuo-Toa weapons of their choice, and are forced to face Rapala, likely getting ROFLSTOMPED BY A GOD.

This is the unfortunate series of events that awaits the party. If they somehow kill the Kuo-Toa raiding party (30 strong) they will reach Therlarn's Fist, and for another non-standard game over they can just leave the country instead of helping against the siege, or even dealing with the bandits. I might as well quit DMing if the party fucks off like that, and I'll send an abominable yeti their way for their trouble.