Last Night's Dungeon Crawl Classics Adventure: Spine Eaters from Hell!

The sad demise of Kragrock Hornhelm the dwarf miner and Jamril the animal trainer.

In our continuing Roll20 Dungeon Crawl Classics funnel adventure on Monday evening, the vengeful townsfolk of Coverdale pressed their pitchfork and torch assault on the Tower of Cyclopentaxor.

The overland map

Having slain the baby-headed rat demons creatures that were infesting the basement storeroom and having burned their nests, the party discovered a chamber with a trapdoor in the floor.

The Tower Cellar

Suspended from the ceiling directly over the trapdoor was a mysterious blue sphere, and similar pale white spheres were suspended over each of the four doors to the chamber.

The battle map

Kragrock Hornhelm, the dwarf miner, bravely strode forth and grasped the iron ring of the trapdoor.  As he began to raise the portal though, the blue sphere dropped from the ceiling, sprouting eight pointy legs and a fanged trunk as it fell.  With uncharacteristic agility, Kragrock managed to roll out of the way of this descending horror and sprang to his feet with his trusty pick ready for battle.  Sadly, the creature was quicker than Kragrock and speared him through the chest with its fanged trunk, spraying Kragrock's compatriots with dwarf blood and fragments of dwarf spine.

Kragrock buys the dirt mine

The party swarmed the beast and managed to defeat it without taking any more serious damage (my dice had gone seriously cold after killing poor Kragrock).  Jones the halfling chicken butcher, wielding the obviously cursed blade that had been transforming his body into something distinctly non-halfling, managed a critical hit and immediately doubled over, his body wracked by yet another transformation.

The cursed blade

Flush with victory, the party almost failed to notice that the white spheres above the doorways had begun to descend.  Gripped by indecision about whether to go though the trapdoor or to engage these new foes, the party hesitated until the white sphere were just above the doorways.  Jamril the animal trainer was the first to act, striding confidently toward the sphere nearest to him with his weapon drawn.  Unfortunately, Jamril's attack had little effect, and as the sphere neared chest height, a fanged trunk emerged from its smooth surface and tore through poor Jamril killing him instantly and once more showering the party with bits of spine.

And the other spheres continued to descend...

Thus ended another glorious evening.