My First Real Encounter – Mansion Approach

Once the party had left the inn they set off in the same direction the undead were heading, Hogar quickly picked up the tracks of the skeletal steeds which were to his surprise were heading in towards the mark Eilian the Old had placed on their map. Based on their current speed Hogar deducted that they would arrive at the estate in 2 days.

Nearly two days later

Nearing the estate the party approached the edge of an orchard of twisted and gnarly trees, Glen quite rightly pointed out that they used to be plum trees but no fruit had grown on them for sometime. About 150 feet in front of them the trees thicken and seeing pass them was difficult. Form this blackness out rode 3 skeletons on skeletal horse back all holding longbows and a Wight sat upon large decaying wolf. The Wight spoke to the party as if he was right in front of them and not 50 yards away and said
“Are you lost strangers?”
Vicrael being his over zealously courageous self advised the wight that they were in search of Silverkin Mansion, and that they wanted to pass. After a few retorts back and forth the wight said to his companions “Kill them we have enough for now, I will warn our Lord”, as he rode off back through the orchard.

Initiative is rolled

Hogar and Diefenbaker, who were stealthily moving though the foliage instead of using the tracks acted first and moved into a closer position behind a rock. Rodney who was not at all fazed by the undead before him headed straight up the tracks to confront the skeletons and fired off a magic missile, somewhat erratic behaviour for a controller. Each of the archers shot an arrow towards Rodney thankfully for him only one hit. The rest of the party then moved up behind, with all but Vicrael out of range they either advanced further to strengthen their defences. Vic did get a shot off against one of the archers and jinxed him with his arcane words. The archers then circled behind the trees for cover while waiting for the party to act. The party advanced closer and Hogar from his position within the tress managed to designate a horse as he quarry and shot a couple of arrows its way. Glen charges behind the trees and holds one of the mounted archers back with a series of blows. But the other slips past him, arcs around the party and targets Vicrael with two arrows, both of which hit and leave the Lord in a bloodied state. 


The party quickly saw that the steeds were giving the archers a big edge and with all the horses in the open began to focus their attacks on them. Eligos transformed herself into her guardian form and destroyed a horse with the help of Hogar's bow, Minron aided by Rodney's scorching bursts took out the second and Glen almost single hand killed the third. With the arches fallen from their steeds and nearly all bloodied they took a few finals shots at Glen, Eligos and Minron but to no prevail and soon were reduced to piles of bone.

Hogar took a quick look around the area while the rest of the party dressed their wounds. He found three gems in the satchels worth a total of 280 gp. 


DM Points

Monsters: 3x Skeleton Steeds (level 3 skirmishers) & 3 x Skeleton Archers (level 3 artillery).  900xp - Level 3 encounter

Map: H1 Keep on the shadow fell "Road Map"

This encounter originally was going to use the Wolf pack template, but as I had some mounted skeletons on skeleton horses I wanted to use these models at some point in the adventure. Also wanted to see how mounted combat worked as this is something as a group we had not tried before so it would give the party a new challenge.

The mounted monsters worked really well, having artillery mounted on skirmishers gave the archers lots of mobility, being able to move 8 squares and shift 8 without provoking an opportunity attacks made the marks of the defenders, of which we have 3, a lots less powerful. Also it gives the archers a good way to move to advantages positions to use their encounter powers, as our Bard found out! But as soon as the mount was killed the archers, which had lots of freedom, were left isolated and were very easy to pick off. It was good having all the monsters the same for this encounter as I wanted the first encounter to be quick as we had done a lots of role-playing at the start of the session as characters had switched over. But if I were to use mounts again I would mix them up with some soldiers or brutes to act as a foil. I think putting an elite on a mount would also work really well. Also having the level of this encounter 1 less than the party meant that spending the xp on the steeds meant only three attacks per round for the monsters, so not a great damage output.