19 October 2018

Just after Kais warned the others of the flying, buzzing things outside, Bree's eyes suddenly started glowing bright white. It became apparent that this enabled her to see through the darkness, as she informed the group that there were seven of the creatures, and five seemed to be chasing/hunting the other two.

The things took off down the cave, and the group took the chance to hurry across the rope bridge to the first stalactite. There we found three drow. One seemed to be the commander of the others, and he cast a Darkness spell in the room. Bree made short work of that, blasting the commander with lightening from her fingers. Shortly thereafter, one of the drow had the misfortune to drop his sword, which Jimjar picked up and in one swift move ran the drow through, bringing him to an immediate and very messy end. Autun wrapped his chains around the throat of the second, and as the drow continued to struggle, simply snapped his neck. The commander, badly injured by lightning blasts from Bree, a sword blow from Kais, a bite from Ezri who had transformed herself into a wolf, and - worst of all - egregious insults from Caius, met his end when the Quaggoth (who may or may not be a polymorphed elf) ripped his head from his body with its claws.

Meanwhile, Ront (the orc) and the drow who was our fellow prisoner were tangling with an escaped Quaggoth. After Ront bashed it in the teeth a few times, the drow managed to Alpha it back into its cage and lock it back in. One of the NPCs said something about the "demons" having gone by again, but they seemed to completely ignore our group.

As the fight was clearly nearing its end, Jimjar crept up the ladder to look for a way out. What he found instead was the armory, and all the prisoners' weapons and armor. He was still gathering his belongings when Kais followed him up the ladder, and called everyone to reclaim their gear.

In addition to our own belongings, we found:

 2 chain shirts
 4 studded leather armor
 6 shields
 2 bags of pitons
 6 short swords
 10 daggers
 6 hand crossbows
 20 cases of 20 bolts/case
 2 bags of caltrops
 (I recall something about some rope)
 a bunch of hairpins (fished out from between the teeth of the elf-Quaggoth)

Our backpacks were there, but our personal items (including clothing) were not. Stool reported seeing Ezri's magic stick in the next stalactite over, so we headed that way. Peeking through the door, we saw a statue of a giant spider, a female drow (named Asha) and two other drow. Application of Faerie Fire revealed an additional medium creature in the room. Asha did not succumb to the Faerie Fire, but the other two drow did.

Autun was readying his weapon to bash down the door, and Kais held up a hand to wait a moment while he tried the doorknob...

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I assume that any PC who wants this stuff can have it, and we will ignore the fact that stuff captured off the drow's prisoners would be in all kinds of random sizes. I also assume that this is the gear to split among PCs, and the NPCs have their own stash of gear that they split.

Kais has leather armor and would like to upgrade it to studded. He would also take one of the hand crossbows + a quiver of bolts, and one of the shields. He would also like to have a couple of the daggers. (There may be more daggers to go around, depending on whether the ones on the bodies of the drow downstairs are counted among the 10). He will certainly take a bag of caltrops, but it's also fine if someone else wants them.

He will also keep the hairpins, at least until he gets his proper tools back. He will happily let someone else have this stuff if they seem to need it more than he does. Except the hairpins (although Jimjar probably already "lost" the one given to him to free the other prisoners). The group should take ALL the rope, as we might need it in the "lift". It can stay in the hallway during the next fight though.

Comment from the DM

This all seems accurate to me except for one small thing: while Sarith and Ront did send the quaggoth back to the den, they would not have been able to lock it in had they tried - since the quaggoth are slaves, not prisoners, their den has a door, but it's not a prison cell and does not automagically lock.

Since the extra gear you found is intended for rank and file drow soldiers, it's probably at least configurable up to a point, so if you're a medium-sized, non-giant humanoid, the armor can be made to fit. Since Autun probably prefers his own set of chainmail anyway, that means only Bree (who is small) can't wear the drow armor.

Weapons and shields and such you can simply use (as long as you are proficient with them). For spell casters, keep in mind that you'll need a free hand for a focus, holy symbol or any somatic or material spell component (if the spell requires those - if it only needs verbal you're good), and benefiting from a shield does require you to hold it, so weapon + shield + casting is often not an option (but you can let the shield hang from your arm so you can grab hold of it as an object interaction (of which you get 1, each turn in combat) and get its benefits.

Bow use and crossbow use both require two hands as well, so the same goes there. You can't hold a shield and use a bow at the same time. Also note that crossbows (unlike regular bows) require loading.

The NPCs all have their own gear back and tend to prefer to use that, but they may need some of those extra bolts if they run low (everybody starts with 20). Note: after a fight you can spend a minute searching the battlefield and get 50% (rounded down) of your used bolts / arrows back.

I'd appreciate it if you made a good-faith attempt to keep track of your resources such as ammunition, torches and rations (obviously), but unless things start feeling really off, I won't be checking.

On a mildly related note: I watched Thor Ragnarok last night. It was a funny flick and I had a quiet giggle when he had to put his armor on without the benefits of a shirt. Guess you are in good company