The Hobbit - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 - Roast Mutton

Following a fairly busy night, Bilbo wakes up to find the dwarves were, in fact, real and, following breakfast, decided it was Bilbo's turn to do the washing up. All slept up, he seemed happy enough to busy himself with the mundanities again in his dwarf-free house before Gandalf shows up to get in some quality bothering. Every time this wizard turns up, it's golden and I'm only about ten percent of the way in. He chases Bilbo out of the door to meet up with the dwarves at the pub as he goes off about not having any handkerchiefs or his hat and what not. One of the dwarves ends up loaning him a hood before Gandalf shows up with a pipe and smokeables for Bilbo, what I can only assume is way too many handkerchiefs and no hat.

They get on their way with their little ponies and it goes well enough for a while. Bilbo notes the places they pass through vaguely and it's funny to think that he considers folks so different a few days out from Bag End when they haven't made it as far as Rivendell yet. He otherwise seems to be enjoying himself for a while before he gets down to the greatest British pastime - moaning about the weather - once it begins raining. They lose a pony and supplies to a river and Gandalf to his proclivities and opt to make camp. The dwarves seem poorly adjusted for camping in the rain and can't get a fire going - so they become pretty interested seeing a light in the distance. Wet dwarves can't get along so they fight about investigating it until they remember Bilbo has supposedly put points in Move Silently.

This leads into something that I can easily imagine in old school Dungeons and Dragons and might have filtered down in some way to how the game was played, especially with regard to Burglars Thieves. Just for funsies, I'll describe it through that lens so that I can be soundly annoying. The DM rolls for an encounter and thus 3 trolls are found. Fortunately, Bilbo succeeds at Hide in Shadows and overhears them arguing about having nothing but mutton to eat. Eager to prove himself, there's some talk of getting backstabs in before he decides to try his hand at pickpocketing. Alas, his skill is too low (and the trolls purse is an intelligent object) and he gets nabbed. The reaction roll is low but not "attack on sight" and so they argue about what to do with Bilbo. Eventually the dwarves investigate and each gets thrown into a sack, though not before a few get blows in. The trolls contemplate how to serve dwarf.

Realising the players are well on the way to a TPK has the DM PC, Gandalf, show back up. Through a fun use of Ventriloquism, he keeps the trolls squabbling until morning where the sun turns the trolls to stone. After this the party gets some ribbing over immediately fumbling before they find the lair of the trolls. The treasure hoard is pretty decent for their levels and they come away with treasure, provisions and a few potentially magical weapons before they're on their way again.

Very fun chapter that manages to mix some of the humour and whimsy well with the threat the trolls, who talk a pretty dark business whilst doing their best Eastenders impressions. Between this and playing a lot of roguelikes lately, Gandalf talking about knowing the nature of the weapons they find through looking at the runes upon them makes me think that the way to identify magical items in the original D&D was using the Read Magic spell. On the whole the chapter really feels like a blueprint for a random encounter as well and I'll be definitely be drawing inspiration from it in the future.

Genuinely my favourite thing has to be Gandalf managing to be a huge nuisance both by showing up and disappearing and ultimately being helpful in both regards. Grade A wizard, no notes. This time he chooses to clarify his comings and goings a little - scouting ahead for dangers before them but keeping an eye on them. I imagine he probably didn't anticipate them immediately wandering towards an unknown fire in dangerous country though.

Next time, a short rest.