The Slaying Stone - Sessions 4-6 and Act I Wrap Up

28 May, 2026

It's been a minute! I'm going to wrap up our group's experience with The Slaying Stone, give some thoughts on how it went and how Tactiquest is going. My author's notes is that I'm writing this 3 weeks after the conclusion of this "act" and am now 2¹ sessions into Act II. Given how long I've let this backlog build up, I'll probably just do a campaign retrospective once all that is done. So! A quick recap:

Session 4

The party finds themselves in the end of our excursion into Faerie. They navigate to the end of the storybook, a cottage on a hill. After a conversation with the door and confirming they know the owner's name, the party begins investigating the space for signs of life. They briefly find it in the form of animated equipment and a study with a gleaming magical mirror. Through it, they speak to Drusus, the Witch of Olukral Woods who has sicced the gnomes upon Gorizbad to find the Slaying Stone. She did this to spite the imperial seer Treona, because she is hateful. She is mildly inconvenienced by the death of her gnomes, offers the same job to the party, tells them a bit about the Stone, and then lets them rummage through her things and gets them a scroll to go home. The party uses her magic cauldron to craft some consumables before heading home with their rescued kobold, Beyard.

Once back on normal land, the party brings Beyard back to the kobolds. However, they are first interrupted by guards - Hu-Jat himself would like to speak to the party tonight at the hot springs. The party meets with the kobolds again, returning Beyard to his people, and the mage they spoke to earlier is here. Speelock asks the party to avoid telling Hu-jat that the gnomes are dealt with and, if they can despose Hu-jat, says he can have the party talk to someone that knows more about the Slaying Stone. The session ends with the party deciding to split - the Scoundrel will head off to Hu-jat's manor to investigate herself, while the other three will meet and tell their story to the despot. Also it's a full moon tonight!

Session 5

This was a chaotic session! First, the party came to Hu-jat and told their whole story, which was compared to Camay and Hu-jat's own investigation. Notably, the party 1. did not explain they were connected to imperial agents, 2. told them that the gnomes were not an immediate threat, but were not entirely dealt with, and 3. did not connect themselves with the kobolds at all. As a result, Hu-jat and Camay believed their stories and assumed the Faerie portal was connected to a strange witch. Meanwhile, the Scoundrel went to the mansion, used the party's last scroll of Find Slaying Stone, which failed to locate it, and returned to the party.

Upon reconnecting at the springs, the party turns to find the mansion has caught fire. Hu-jat's militia goes to put it out alongside the party's bruiser, while the other three chase after militia members told to "go to the temple" when Hu-jat blamed the kobolds for his mansion burning. That trio successfully KO's some goblins and prevents them from releasing the werewolf they met in session 0. Hu-jat, in his frustration, decides to go to the stables, grab his pet drake, and sniff out the problem himself. Camay finds gnome dust in the mansion; the bruiser is asked about gnome dust and states it could be the work of gnomes; Camay realizes they're making a huge mistake at the temple and rushes to stop the werewolf attack.

All of our major players reconvene at the stables. The trio of the party attempts to jam the lock of Shredder's cage, which Hu-jat shatters. He finds himself pinned in conversation between the bruiser and the rest of the party, rejects their offer to be helpful monster hunters in the city, and decides that they're connected to the Empire trying to foil his rule. A fight ensues; however, with only Shredder, Camay, and a poor stablehand named Gerald by his side and not his militia, Hu-jat is knocked out beneath Shredder and loses what dignity he has.

Session 6

Camay is told all about the party's true exploits in Faerie and their maneuvers around the city in the last few hours. Hu-jat asks to be killed to save face, but the party refuses and tells him there is a wide world out there for him to find a new place in. Hu-jat lays under Shredder and disappears in the night while the party rests with the kobolds. Speelock makes good on his promise and leads the party to the true leader of the kobolds - Tyristys, a firey dragon who lives beneath the hot springs. She thanks the party for their help in overthrowing the existing militia in the city and says she will claim it for herself, still under the banner of the Monarchy. When it comes to the Slaying Stone, she tells the party about it - it is an egg of the Monarch from their time as an imperial slave, warped and twisted by alchemy to become a living weapon. She is unwilling to let it be destroyed, as it would disrespect the soul within, nor is she willing for it to be used. She asks the party what they would do with it, and they all answer that they would kill something inconsequential like a deer. Feeling like she cannot trust the party to not backstab her, and with the hope that she can provide the Slaying Stone herself to the Monarch to earn their favor. Tyristys offers an alternative - if the party can bring her the head of Kiris Alkirk to free her from the potential of a noble trying to reclaim her city, she will trade it for the Slaying Stone. The party refuses, but is happy to work with Tyristys in the future.

From there, the party spends time in Gorizbad as it comes under new management. Hu-jat is nowhere to be found - many believe he was eaten by Tyrsistys. The militia is disbanded and many goblins leave Gorizbad for better opportunities, but still many stay under the banner of the new dragon. Treona, the original quest giver, is sad that the party failed but accepts that it is found and safe with Tyrsistys. The Earth Priest spends time learning about the local area and looks into healing Kiris Hoyt of his lycanthropy, the Bruiser is employed by Tyrsistys to train the kobolds, the Bard works to rebuild her inn, and the Scoundrel returns back to roads in search of new strange and odd artifacts. ²

Thoughts

This is the only thing I've been able to run that made me happy to keep running it. Super thankful for the play group I got and for all of them sticking around for Act II. In many ways, having a successful game like this has done a lot for my confidence and ability to run more games!

Roses

• Really happy with the small, contained sandbox. The system fought me on occasion but attrition was maintained, everything in the box seemed fun, players were even like "We could go to the mansion... but I want to see everything there is to see first!" which is the biggest compliment I could get. Maybe that means I was too nice on the attrition but there are much worse problems to have.
• Loved playing all of these little characters. Drusus, Hu-jat, Camay, Treona felt like very natural voices to me. There were some characters that I fell back on ol reliable "nervous Little Guy" but I'm getting better at improvising and roleplaying.
• Snappy combat, interesting tactics, the DM side is very simple and the player side seems simple too with some build complexity for those sickos. Task resolution is so simple that I can put all my brain into making Choices Interesting. In many ways, Tactiquest is a good game for me to practice all of the things that I want to improve on, and either handles or elides everything I don't care for. Onwards, to a diceless revolution!

Thorns

• I found Session 5 to be incredibly overwhelming to run - obviously! It's a big climax where 3 different factions are interested in very different things, and I'm trying to accurately simulate someone being given lots of conflicting information and his own biases. Trying to figure out a better way to simulate things like this, as I had a really fun time post-game, but I'd like a way to put the mental load of that type of thing on paper rather than all up in my brain.
• The conclusion of "yeah no the dragon does not actually want to give this up" felt very anticlimactic but also... fine? The party seemed unbothered - they could've fought her for it and chose not to, they decided it was safest in the hands of Tyristys, and they were happy to disappoint the other Slaying Stone seekers. It's hard to Just Prep Better for a negotiation like that but. Hey. I ran it better than what the 4e module wanted it to be!
• I relied (and still do rely in act II) pretty heavily on the knowledge of the two game authors for actual system related things. On one hand, awesome, less overhead for me. On the other, it does feel like I'm not doing my job if I don't have the rules in my brain. Another issue with it is that, while the setting is fully in my brain, I am ceding rulings to the coauthors pretty often so that they can have Playtesting Thoughts. Is this good? Is this bad? I don't know! But sometimes it feels like I'm driving a car but I'm not allowed to change my own oil.

#playreport