Every year for the last five years, I’ve been hosting a Dungeons & Dragons Christmas adventure wherein the players either experience something Christmas related, or save Santa, or something like that.

Past adventures have included Christmas of the Dead (1st), The Evil that Stole Christmas (2nd), Santa vs. The Mind Flayers (3rd), and An Elder Evil Carol (4th).

This year…

Manger Danger!

Basically the local theocrat needs to confirm whether or not an ancient prophecy about the birth of a new king or god is valid. She sends the adventurers to follow a star to the location and report back to her.

As they journey through the desert they encounter each of the Magi. Each magi has a different motive for traveling to where the star is directing them.  One was an atheist who was inspired and wants to worship this new deity, another doesn’t what the child is but feels that he is important, and the third one wants to kidnap the child for the Easter Wizard King to be used as a weapon in an impending battle against an infernal invasion.

Yep.  D&D.

So, they locate the child and do battle with the “evil” Magi. It was a battle that IO made just a little too tough for them.

1. The half-orc barbarian was charmed the entire time. Useless!
2. The tiefling sorcerer kept getting attacked and was always on the threat of death. Useless!
3. The dwarf cleric couldn’t hit worth a damn and ran out of spells. Useless!
4. The dragonborn Paladin was smiting left and right, but didn’t have enough attacks. Useless!

Fortunately, the sorcerer was able to put a bunch of the thugs to sleep, but the evil magi was still able to trap everyone in a web, snatch up the kid, and beat an expeditious retreat! The paladin runs to a camel and dashes after the magi. He lances the guy straight through (he only had 5 hit points left after the barbarian hit him once), but fails to lift him up and the kid goes flying.

Fumble!

The paladin dives off the camel catches the kid and tumbles to safety.

After all this, they received a vision of first born children being slaughtered in the area.

Now they have to decide either to turn the kid over to the government, protect this child, or go about their own merry way.

In conclusion

I hope the players decide to play again, as it would be nice to get back into a D&D campaign.

The cast of characters: