The Broken Lands Session 1

We had our first session of the online Broken Lands game a while ago. Picking from the list of Adventure Hooks that had been provided the party set off for the Tower of Birds.

The Party:
Vanuatu the Vegan (Magic-User 1)
Twig (Thief 1)
Elu (Elf 1)
Buzz (Dwarf 1)
Plus two porters to carry torches and caged chickens in and hopefully treasure out.

The Adventure (aka there will be light spoilers below):
Tower of Birds by Gabor Lux in Fight On! #2
I made a few minor changes - statuary was changed to being statues of Pazuzu and I added Spectral Ravens to location #9 and toned down the laser damage (however, the party never made it to this room).
I also mis-read the map and swapped locations #7 and #8.

What Happened:
The party was dogged in driving towards the top of the tower driving a squawking and flapping chicken in front of them up the stairs (in most dungeons this would have resulted in MANY wandering monster checks).

In the final encounter Twig, the thief, sprinted for the huge gem while the other party members battled the Bird Monsters. He was able to grab it and throw it to Vanuatu the Magic-user (who was back at the stairs) before being slaughtered by the Bird Monsters (he had the magic sword and pegasus helmet). Buzz the Dwarf was also killed. Elu the Elf and Vanuatu (scooping up the gem) made a hasty tactical retreat and hauled ass after the fleeing porters (leaving behind the chickens).

The Tally:
Killed 2 Bird Monsters
The Blood Egg
A sword with a golden pommel
A small statuette of Pazuzu
A small sack with 34 gp
The pegasus helmet and a magic sword remained behind with the fallen.

2,035 XP for the two surviving party members.

What Worked Well/What Didn’t Work Well:
I tried to set up two cameras on my end - one for my face and my viewing (my laptop) and one to show the table, combat maps, drawings, etc. (my phone). However, my lack of technical know-how prevented me effectively setting this up. We defaulted to me just swinging my laptop around to show what I wanted. Also, instead of using the table map I just sketched a lot on scrap paper and held them up to the camera.

Prior to setting out, one of the players asked about a library to do some research about the Tower. I was unhappy with how I handled it.