Ambush on the Eastway

Quicklinks

Tensions are high

Surprise Attack!

Round 1 - Eastway Ambush

Round 2 - The surrender

Aftermath - Snow and Decisions

The Giant Falls

Player replies

Tensions are high

Fizz's sharp eyes dart from tree bandit to tree bandit as the party speaks to the two toll takers. Even his enhanced hearing can't pick up the conversation, but he really doesn't like the fact that the party is in range of those crossbows with no knowledge of their location. Thinking quickly, Fizz silently slips into a good position to attack the crossbowmen that are targeting his friends. Finding a cluster of branches to hide him from view, Fizz shifts back into gnome form, and quietly prepares a couple of spells to eliminate the shooters.

He waits. One twitch of a crossbow string will be enough.

Spell reaction ready - Thorn whip

Azalie listens quietly as the bandits make their proposition. She allows herself a flicker of amusement at being called pretty, but there is no world in which she’s going with them.

She remains perfectly still, aware that Mellon might spook and take flight if startled. As long as he stays close, they remain melted into the snow. He’s still such a young bird.

Out of the corner of her eye, Azalie notices Fizz shifting into position, his small form resolving into the familiar blue gnome. Taking his lead, she begins to reposition, angling herself closer to the northern sniper. She moves slowly and deliberately, scanning the area. There are always others.

She slips to within a few feet of the northern enemy, bow at the ready, an arrow already notched. She waits, poised for whatever might go wrong.

Adrenaline hums through her veins as she holds her breath. This is exactly the kind of exercise she’s been missing. A tussle before noon always gets the blood moving.

Mutt presses his back against the wagon wreckage he had been hiding behind. He sees the giant emerge from the tree line through a crack in the splintered wood and curses to himself. Seeing Azalie creeping into position, he decides to try and keep the bandits' attention as long as he can. He shouts at the bandit's leader from behind cover and tries to keep all the bandit's attention fixed on him.

"I can see why you lot would want to keep things simple. Based on the looks of you, simple is about all your minds could handle!"

Mutt shifts to behind cover and readies his crossbow. "As much as I respect a good money-making situation like what you lot have going on here, you caught us at a bad time. You see, we just finished killing off an ancient beholder and his legion of undead. That's bad news for you for two reasons. One, we're low on supplies and coin. Truth be told, I wouldn't give you the steaming pile of yellow snow I'd pissed upon, but besides that, the second reason is that we just lost a good friend of ours and we're really looking for someone to take it out on. You may have a giant, but we have a halfling with a teddy bear, so I'd turn around and go back to whatever rank hole you crawled out of if I were you."

Orin lets Mutt's words hang in the air while he stays very still near the broken wagon. Eyes moving, mind working.

No obvious casters, Orin notes. That simplifies things.

The giant’s presence complicates everything else.

Orin shifts his weight and shuffles enough to keep his line of sight clear, inching toward the wagon. Preparing.

The wards around him are already in place and his attention turns inward, rehearsing the snap-response of a Shield spell should the world suddenly decide to come at him very fast. At the same time, he measures distance, angles, and timing, quietly selecting a target among the visible bandits.

Orin glances once toward Mutt. Just a brief, steady look of confirmation. I’m with you.

Then his gaze returns to the half-orc as the giant looms behind him, waiting. He says nothing. He lets Mutt keep their attention.

He trusts that the silence behind the trees means their allies are exactly where they need to be.

Mutt’s words hang in the air longer than they should.

The half-orc doesn’t answer right away.

He studies Mutt again. Then Dorf. Then Orin.

For the first time, something like doubt crosses his face.

“You don’t sound scared,” he says slowly. Not accusing. Curious. “Most folks are, once they see him.”

The human beside him shifts his spear, eyes flicking once toward the trees. A quiet, questioning glance.

The half-orc exhales through his nose, almost amused.

“Huh.”

A pause.

Then his expression hardens, the uncertainty curdling into something meaner.

“Well,” he says, rolling one shoulder, “we were just going to take a toll.”

His eyes slide back to the wagon. To the illusion. To the road.

“But a dead party gives us everything.”

Somewhere in the woods, a crossbow creaks.

That is when it happens.

The half-orc opens his mouth to say something else—

And the moment stretches just long enough for someone to decide how this ends.

Roll for initiative.

Fizz and Azalie: Because of your positioning and concealment, you may each take one surprise action now, before initiative order begins.

This window is immediate. If you do not take a surprise action now, you will act normally on your initiative count.

Everyone else will act in initiative order as normal.

Current Time: 12:45 PM

Date: Firstday 11, Ches, 1742

Temperature: 21°

Current Phase: Combat

Surprise attack!

The Ambush Breaks

For a heartbeat, the road holds its breath.

The half-orc’s last words still hang in the air when the woods answer first.

Azalie, from below the branches

Azalie ears prick at the mention of a dead party. She hears every word but the goblin above her hasn’t noticed the arrows pointed from below.

A sideways smirk shows as she steadies her stance. Drawing her flame arrows, still unnoticed. Without hesitation she releases both charred arrows.

The goblin never knows it’s over.

Two flaming arrows tear upward in perfect silence, punching through fur, bone, and breath in the same instant. The arrows, striking with a critical hit deal 36 damage! The tree shudders as the goblin’s body goes limp, heat flashing once before vanishing into the snow below.

Azalie is already there.

She catches the falling weight, eases it down, and lays the body into the drift without a sound. No cry. No warning. Just absence where a threat used to be.

Then her focus shifts.

Her breath slows. Her jaw tightens.

“Mark…”

The word is barely more than a thought, but the magic answers.

An arcane sigil flares briefly against the giant’s massive back, invisible to him but unmistakable to her. Vulnerable. Chosen.

She looses again.

Two more flaming arrows slam into the giant’s flesh, fire blooming against grey skin as the magic bites deep. The impact rocks the brute forward a step and this time, there is sound.

A roar—raw, furious, and shocked—rolls out of the treeline as pain finally registers.

Snow explodes around its feet.

Fizz: The Whip Snaps

At the same instant, the forest betrays another predator.

A vine lashes out from the shadows, fast and cruel, wrapping tight around a half-orc’s throat. There’s just enough time for a startled grunt before the magic yanks hard.

The half-orc is torn bodily from his perch, branch cracking as he’s ripped free and slammed into the snow below in a tangle of limbs and breath. The impact knocks the wind clean out of him, leaving him gasping and stunned, eyes wide with sudden understanding. He takes a total of 12 damage from the vine and 5 damage from the fall, 17 total.

This is not a toll.

This is a mistake.

Chaos Realized

For a split second, no one speaks.

Then everything happens at once.

Bandits shout in alarm, spinning toward threats that were never where they expected. Crossbows swing wildly, bolts loosed too late and aimed at shadows that are already gone.

The human toll-keeper staggers back a step, eyes snapping to the half-orc choking in the snow, to the giant bellowing in rage behind him.

“What—?” he starts.

The giant answers for him.

It rears up fully now, branches snapping as it lumbers forward, fury replacing patience. The ground trembles under its weight, its club dragging through the snow as it searches for whatever dared to hurt it.

Somewhere nearby, Whimsyweft gives a sharp, discordant twang—no melody, just tension made sound.

The ambushers finally understand.

They are not the hunters.

They are surrounded.

Initiative is rolled, combat has begun.

Current Time: 12:45 PM

Date: Firstday 11, Ches, 1742

Temperature: 21°

Current Phase: Combat

Round 1 - Eastway Ambush

Mutt is first to act, stepping forward with mockery sharpened into a weapon. Locking eyes with the Half-Orc Bandit, he jabs with a grin:

“Was your big, dumb friend supposed to intimidate us? The day we all met we killed a giant! You might say it’s what brought us together in the first place.”

The insult strikes deep. The Half-Orc takes 6 psychic damage and stumbles, cursed with disadvantage on his next attack.

Hidden in the trees, a Human Crossbow Bandit spots what he believes to be Azalie.

“It’s a surprise attack!”

he shouts, firing his bolt — only for it to pass harmlessly through her illusion.

Nearby, a Half-Orc Crossbow Bandit, dazed from an earlier fall, shakily raises his Thunderstrike Crossbow. firing with disadvantage. Even so, the bolt strikes Orin, dealing 11 lightning damage — absorbed entirely by his magical ward.

Orin moves into position. Calmly, as if the battle hasn’t yet touched him,

Orin’s ward shimmers and cracks as it takes the brunt of the crossbow attack. Trusting his art to protect him, he doesn’t flinch…He casts Hold Person at the crossbowman — but the enemy resists the spell’s grip, shrugging off the effect with a snarl.

Fizzbum  darts through the brush and takes his shot.

Sneaking up carefully behind the Human Crossbowman. he whispers to himself. With a deep breath, he stretches his arms and claps with thunderous force. The Thunderwave erupts, blasting the bandit from the treetops — he takes 12 thunder damage, then crashes to the ground, taking another 5 fall damage for a total of 17. The bandit lands prone.

Before fading back into the forest, Fizz grins and activates his Vanishing Charm, Grasping his charm in his hand, Fizz bobs his head once, and promptly disappears into the shadows of the forest. Hidden again, he prepares his next strike.

Meanwhile, Dorf unleashes a storm of fury. Entering Rage, he moves into striking range of the Half-Orc Bandit and lets loose with a blinding combo of Reckless, unarmed attacks:

1. A hammering punch to the jaw – 11 damage

2. A backfist that cracks more teeth – 11 damage

3. A brutal elbow to the nose – 9 damage

4. And a finishing hook to the temple – 11 damage

After a few swings, Dorf really starts letting loose, all his pent-up rage from Uptharr’s death exploding with punches and kicks on the Half-Orc. The Half-Orc staggers, barely standing, bloodied and stunned.

From the woods, the Hill Giant storms forward, roaring,

“Little human! Me smash!” and slams his club into Dorf for 30 damage, halved to 15. He raises the club again — “Me smash you to GOO!” — and smashes Dorf for another 24, halved to 12. The ground trembles under each hit. Dorf reels but refuses to fall.

The Human Bandit flanks Dorf with a poison-tipped spear.

“You should have paid the toll, fool!”

he growls, landing a strike for 15 damage, halved to 8. Then:

“We will bleed you like a stuck pig, midget!” — and he hits again for 8 damage, halved to 4.Dorf, iron-willed, shrugs off the poison with a successful CON save.

From her cover, Azalie sees the giant towering over Dorf.

“Go to sleep, you ugly fuck,”

she whispers, loosing a fire arrow and a sleep arrow. The poison takes hold — the Hill Giant stumbles and collapses with a CRASH, taking 12 damage from the fall.

Relocating across the field, Azalie lines up another shot.

“No one calls my friend a midget.”

She fires two fire arrows at a Human Bandit, both hitting for 12 fire damage total.

Nearby, Mellon, Azalie’s blood hawk, circles high above, scanning the chaos, ready to strike.

From a hidden perch, a Goblin Crossbow Bandit suddenly appears, cackling:

“Aah a wizard! Me shoot!”

The bolt slams into Orin’s side, dealing 10 damage — his ward finally broken.

Back in the melee, the Half-Orc Bandit, reeling from Mutt’s earlier insult and bleeding from Dorf’s blows, attempts to retaliate.

“You picked the wrong group to stand up to, maggot!” he growls — but Mutt’s vicious mockery takes hold, and his swing goes wildly off-course, missing Dorf and accidentally smashing the Hill Giant for 6 damage.

He tries again, spitting blood onto the snow:

"A halfling with a teddy bear huh? Where your bear, little one?”

— and this time, the warhammer connects, slamming into Dorf’s face for 7 damage, halved to 4.

Finally, the Human Crossbow Bandit who had been blasted from the tree earlier rises from the snow, dazed but defiant. Spotting Azalie among the trees, he grins:

“The Elf! She’s in the woods!”

He fires and scores a hit, landing a crossbow bolt in Azalie’s arm for 9 damage, ending the round on a sharp note.

End of Round One

Current Time: 12:45 PM

Date: Firstday 11, Ches, 1742

Temperature: 21°

Current Phase: Combat

Round 2 - The Surrender

The battle shifts. The fury, the fire — it’s all begun to turn.

Mutt reloads calmly, firing a flameburst bolt that punches into the shoulder of the Half-Orc Bandit, scorching flesh for 8 fire damage. Without a word, he steps forward, hands already weaving the air.A golden thread of magic wraps around Dorf, restoring 9 HP, and Mutt’s eyes remain cold and alert.

From the trees above, a Human Crossbow Bandit takes aim at Orin.

“I’ll take out the wizard! He’s in the open!”

But the bolt goes wide, thudding harmlessly into snow.

A moment later, the Half-Orc Crossbowman tries again.

“Got him!” he shouts,

loosing another Thunderstrike bolt. But Orin’s Shield spell flares, and the crackling shot deflects off a shimmering arcane wall. He doesn’t flinch.

The warding shield was instinctual, reflexive, Orin murmurs, casting Mirror Image. Three illusory copies of himself flicker into place, circling him in a blur of shifting forms as he advances across the battlefield.

Elsewhere, Fizzbum Lilypad is already moving. With a flick of his hand, a Wind Wall erupts across the snowy clearing. It howls like a storm, slamming into the Half-Orc Bandit with crushing force — 17 bludgeoning damage, and that’s the end of it. The orc is lifted from his feet, limbs flailing, and then thrown to the ground, lifeless.

“Get up, Mr. Dorf,”

Fizz whispers urgently, casting Healing Word at a higher level. 11 HP surge back into the battered halfling. Hidden in the wind, Fizz watches the others.

Dorf Thimblerigger, bloodied but burning with fury, launches into another devastating combo.Fists flash in a storm of violence:

• First strike: 11 damage

• Second: another 11

• Third: 11

• Final punch: 9

Tiny fey voices cackle with delight as Faerie Fire sparkles around his target, cheering him on from the Feywild.

The Human Bandit reels under the onslaught, his jaw broken, nose shattered, cheek split open.

The human bandit staggers backward under Dorf’s last punches, boots skidding in churned snow. Blood runs freely now, dark against the white, his spear slipping from numb fingers.

He looks past Dorf.

Not at the party.

At the trees.

At the space where the giant should be standing.

It’s still there.

But it isn’t moving.

Something inside him breaks.

Then he drops to one knee.

Then both.

Hands rise slowly, palms open, fingers shaking more from shock than cold.

“Enough,” he says hoarsely. “That’s— that’s enough.”

His eyes flick between Dorf, Mutt, and Orin, then dart toward the woods, as if he can feel eyes there even now.

“This wasn’t meant to go like this.”

He swallows hard, breath hitching.

“We weren’t supposed to fight like this.”

Behind him, the forest changes.

Fizz sees it first.

The surviving crossbowmen don’t shout. Don’t signal. Don’t even look back at the half-orc’s body or the giant lying in the snow.

They scatter.

One melts deeper into the trees. Another drops from a branch and runs low and fast, abandoning position without a second thought.

No covering fire.

No loyalty.

Just flight.

Back on the road, the bandit lowers himself fully to the ground, shoulders hunched, voice quieter now. Careful.

“You think that thing’s ours?” he says, nodding once toward the sleeping giant without looking at it. “It ain’t.”

A bitter laugh slips out of him, sharp and humorless.

“It was already here when we found it. Hurt. Starving. Mean as winter.”

He looks up at the party again.

“We just made sure it stayed that way.”

He shifts, wincing, but doesn’t try to rise.

“Food. Warmth. A direction to stand in.” A pause. “You’d be amazed what listens when it doesn’t have choices.”

His gaze drops.

“We’re paid to keep the road bleeding. That’s all. Not to die on it.”

Another breath. Slower now.

“You kill me, and you get a quiet road for a week. Maybe two.”

He looks back up, meeting Mutt’s eyes this time.

“You let me live, and I can tell you where the bleeding spreads next.”

Azalie moves fast, cutting one off with a fluid sprint and a hard grip.

“And where do you think you’re going? Leaving behind a wounded comrade? I should end you just for that.”

She grabs the Human Crossbow Bandit by the collar and yanks him down.

“Or do you see yourself as a coward?”

No answer.

The Hill Giant snores loudly, still asleep, belly rising and falling with unnatural calm. It doesn’t stir.

Dorf, finally stopping his flurry of blows, stands over the kneeling bandit, panting. He watches the tree line, knuckles cracked and slick. His eyes flick to the sleeping giant, just to be sure.

Orin approaches slowly, watching the treeline too. Crossbowmen could return. They don’t.

Azalie approaches the scene, still grappling with the crossbow bandit. She shoves him forward into the snow, still holding his arm.

“Mutt, what do you want me to do with this coward? He was leaving his friends behind.”

Azalie waggles the bandit towards his direction.

Mutt warily stows his crossbow and fetches a length of rope from his pack, no one moves to interfere... He approaches the surrendering bandit and gestures for him to hold his hands out. (Assuming the bandit does,) Mutt binds his hands and proceeds to bind his feet as well. He takes a moment to remove any weapons the bandit has near him and searches him for any that might be stashed. Satisfied the bandit can’t attack them or run off, Mutt gestures to the bandit to hold on a moment.

He reaches into his bag of holding and pulls out several haunches of cooked meat. He hands them to Dorf and nods towards the giant.

“In case he wakes up and is hungry.” Mutt looks back to the bandit and smiles patiently.

“Now, how you and I have a nice little conversation? You were telling me about how you’re being paid to keep these roads unstable. By who and why?”

The bandit winces as the rope tightens, but he doesn’t resist. His hands shake now that the fighting has stopped, adrenaline draining out of him in waves.

He looks at Mutt for a long moment, measuring the smile, the calm, the fact that everyone around him is still breathing because they chose to stop.

“That’s the thing,” he says quietly. “We ain’t important enough to know why.”

He swallows, throat working around pain and fear.

“We get told where to stand. What roads to hurt. When to look the other way.” A humorless snort. “When to bring back people instead of coin.”

His eyes flick, involuntarily, toward Azalie. He looks away just as fast.

“Easthaven,” he says. “That’s where the orders come from. Not a name... A place. Dockhands don’t ask questions. Taverns don’t hear things they’re paid not to hear.”

He shifts in the snow, wincing as blood seeps through his furs.

“Someone there’s got coin. Real coin. Enough to keep bellies full and mouths shut. Enough to make monsters useful.”

He nods once, small and bitter, toward the sleeping giant.

“That thing didn’t know what it was doing. Just knew where food came from… and where it was supposed to stand.”

A pause.

Then, more carefully

“You start pulling on this thread, you won’t just find bandits. You’ll find guards who don’t look too close. Merchants who lost cargo but somehow didn’t lose profit.” His eyes meet Mutt’s again. “People who sleep real warm for a place this cold.”

He exhales slowly, breath fogging.

“I don’t know the top. I swear it. We don’t get names...But I know the edges. I know which doors not to knock on.”

His shoulders sag.

“You want the road safer? Tie me up and turn me in. Maybe that scares the small fish.”

A longer pause.

“You want to know why things are getting worse?” He gives a tired, crooked smile. “Then Easthaven’s where you should be looking.”

Behind him, the giant snores again. Loud. Oblivious.

The forest stays quiet.

Waiting.

Next Steps:

The fighting has stopped.

The choices have not.

You currently have:

• One surrendered human bandit, bound and talking

• One captured crossbowman held by Azalie

• A sleeping Hill Giant, fed but still dangerous

• Multiple bandits escaped into the woods

Please respond with:

• What you do with the prisoners

• Whether you secure, bind, interrogate, or kill

• What precautions you take in case the giant wakes

• Any immediate questions you ask the bandit

• Whether you attempt pursuit, restraint, or withdrawal

Combat is over, for now.

Treasure Found

You take inventory on the items that the bandits were carrying. Nothing special but a few noteworthy items.

The fallen crossbow bandits were carrying Short Swords +1 that are lightly magically enhanced

The Half-Orc carried a Frostguard Warhammer +1, bearing the markings of Brynstroth, filed down but not completely erased. The runes were worked away in haste, not care.

The Human bandit had a lance, with Drow markings. The tip is infused with …a toxin that likely incapacitates its target rather than killing outright.

The bandits were wearing warm winter clothing, and hide armor, none of it worth the weight of carrying it. Modest protection.

They had some coin that you divide up, and a few interesting trinkets.

• Hemp Rope

• Manacles

• Hemp Fabric

• Playing Cards

• Gems

• Bandit Road Order Token, carved from wood and worn smooth by use, etched with notches or symbols. Its purpose is not immediately understood.

Current Time: 12:50 PM

Date: Firstday 11, Ches, 1742

Temperature: 21°

Current Phase: Exploration

Aftermath - Snow and Decisions

Aftermath – Snow and Decisions

The wind settles.

For the first time since steel met flesh, the road is quiet.

Azalie steps forward, the Drow-marked lance catching pale light as she presses it toward the captive’s face.

“Where did you get this?”

Her voice is calm.

That makes it worse.

The bandit’s eyes flick to the etchings and then away just as fast.

“We don’t forge that kind of steel,” he mutters. “Came down from the docks. Crate marked for us. We don’t ask who packed it.”

Mutt doesn’t react at first.

But when the man mentions bringing back people instead of coin, something changes in him. It’s subtle. A tightening at the jaw. A stillness behind the eyes.

He manacles the second prisoner with quiet precision.

“We’ll have time to talk,” Mutt says lightly. Too lightly. “On the road.”

Azalie tilts her head slightly toward Dorf.

“Or we can encourage him.”

The bandit swallows.

Fizz wanders out of the trees like this was a pleasant afternoon stroll, brushing snow from his sleeves. He checks on Dorf and Orin with brisk efficiency, satisfied with their condition before drifting back toward the giant. He circles it carefully, keeping distance.

Still asleep.

Still massive.

Still dangerous.

Mutt looks at it too.

“We can’t leave him,” he says quietly. “If he wakes, someone else dies.”

The captured bandit shakes his head weakly.

“You think he listens to us now?” he says. “He listens to food. That’s it.”

Dorf has been quiet.

Too quiet.

His rage has ebbed, leaving behind something colder.

He stares at the giant.

At the blood on the snow.

At the road stretching east and west.

This fight didn’t fix anything.

He turns without asking.

Snow crunches under his boots as he approaches the sleeping bulk.

Behind him, the bandit realizes what is about to happen.

“Wait—”

Dorf swings.

The blade slams into the giant’s neck.

It bites deep. The attempted Coup De Grace scores a massive critical hit, dealing 30 points of damage in one massive swing!

But not deep enough.

The giant’s eyes snap open.

Its breath explodes into a wet, choking roar as blood pours down its chest. One enormous hand slams blindly into the snow, carving a trench.

The ground shudders.

It is not standing.

But it is very awake.

The prisoners scream.

The woods go silent again.

Roll initiative.

The Hill Giant is prone, severely wounded, and enraged.

Dorf, you get one more attack, and can act first in the round. You have Precious Equipped for this attack and you are not in rage.

Current Time: 12:55 PM

Date: Firstday 11, Ches, 1742

Temperature: 21°

Current Phase: Exploration

The Giant Falls

The Giant Falls

Dorf’s first strike lands like judgment.

The blade bites deep into the giant’s thick neck, splitting hide and muscle in a brutal arc. Blood sprays hot across the snow, steaming in the frozen air.

The giant’s eyes snap open.

A roar tears from its throat — confusion, pain, rage — as one massive hand claws blindly at the ground. The earth trembles beneath its weight.

It tries to rise.

It does not get the chance.

Dorf pivots, teeth bared, and drives his glowing war pick forward. The weapon ignites in his grip, flaring with brutal light as the point punches into the wound he just opened.

The pick sinks deep.

Deeper.

Then something gives.

The giant’s roar chokes off mid-bellow. Blood surges in a violent pulse, spilling over Dorf’s boots and into the snow. The enormous body convulses once… twice…

Then collapses fully, shaking the road as it slams down.

Still.

The only sound left is the wind.

And the heavy, wet drip of blood hitting ice.

Behind you, one of the prisoners stares at the severed head and the pooling crimson.

“…Well,” he mutters weakly. “That’s one way to handle it.”

The other prisoner swallows hard.

“Boss won’t like that.”

A pause.

“…But I ain’t complainin’.”

The giant lies motionless now, head nearly severed, steam rising from the ruin of it. Whatever simple, starving instinct had been used to point it at caravans is gone.

For good.

The Road Is Quiet

You stand hours from Easthaven.

Two prisoners.One dead giant.Several bandits escaped into the woods.

You have rope. Manacles. Evidence. Questions.

The road is safer — for now.

What do you do?

• Deliver the prisoners to Easthaven?

• Interrogate further here?

• Attempt to follow the fleeing bandits?

• Leave the giant where it fell?

• Burn it?

• Take proof of the kill?

The wind shifts across the Eastway.

Waiting.

Current Time: 12:59 PM

Date: Firstday 11, Ches, 1742

Temperature: 21°

Current Phase: Exploration

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