next session, puppies
(I apologize, but this will make no sense to people who aren't huge dorks like me)

I am DMing Keep on the Shadowfell for our gang. D&D4E is a fun game in general, but Shadowfell is rather dry, with flat NPCs, a next-room-next-monster rhythm, and a general absence of wow.

Here's an example: (SPOILER WARNING) the module includes a spiffy poster-sized battlemap of a dragon tomb dig, complete with a skeletal dragon curled round some treasure. Very nice stuff. The associated encounter requires that the party prevent an Orcus cultist from ... retrieving a semi-magical hand mirror that was buried with the dragon?

Zzzzzz.

In my own private Shadowfell, the Big Bad Undead Daddy is digging that dragon skeleton out so he can frikken REASSEMBLE and ANIMATE it into a howling reptile death ghost. I decided to use this as my troubleshooting encounter, the one I would bust out if the party got into more trouble than it could handle.

Last night, they totally got owned by Irontooth. But instead of TPKing them, I drugged the four survivors up and sent them to join the involuntary labor force at the bone dig. Then I told them they had to individually choose between rolling on an escape skill challenge or a sabotage-the-ritual skill challenge. And they couldn't dither about it, because all the while, the dread cold-lightning radiance of the surrounding abyssal thickets would be leeching away their souls.

(Thanks to John Harper for his cool continuing-damage skill challenge rules)

I think the guys were a bit rattled by Irontooth, because only one of them was tempted to be a hero and try to screw up the ritual. The rest organized a fast escape into the wilderness. That night, while they huddled against the spring chill, they saw a blaze of light from the direction of the tomb and heard the unholy shriek of something ancient and terrible being reborn...

Damn, this is fun. I just hope that no one feels abused. The Irontooth encounter was rough, and the undead dragon might have looked like me doing a victory lap. So yeah, next session, puppies.