We're doing another official Forgotten Realms module that was originally 2nd edition, these classics are fun! We're more used to homebrew settings so it's still a little strange, both for the players and our GMs. They really do plan for a lot of player actions.
We're in Watersdeep, city south of Neverwinter that's run by a secretive noble oligarchy established by some crazy wizard ages ago. I feel like he established the city to keep roaming monsters away from his tower. This is the city where one tavern has the Yawning Portal in the center, a mile-deep pit leading into a dungeon crawl. In 2nd edition there was even a stairway, and trolls would randomly climb up and throw stirges at people, but the Level 15 Fighter tavernkeeper apparently came to his senses and made the pit smooth. He still throws corpses in there after gang fights though.
We met Volo, yeah THE Volo, but he hasn't written his book yet. He offered us 10gp to find his missing friend. His tall, beautiful friend with flowing auburn hair and impeccable fashion sense, who lives with Volo but hasn't been home in a while. Since this module was presumably written in the 70's or early 80's, I feel like it's tastefully but really strongly hinting at something cute.
Anyway it turns out to be related to a major gang war, there's a captured princeling, and hints of a vast underground treasure horde which are "categorically untrue". We actually managed to treat the noble with some respect (fear, basically, the laws are very strict about interacting with nobles) and he's helping us out a bit. Not to find the imaginary treasure, but the missing young man (who is apparently good friends with the princeling as well).
Being a bard is awesome. I have prestidigitation, healing word, and social skills. -2 Int and a rustic background, but ditziness just makes me more credible! We managed to talk past two significant battles using a mix of intimidation and innocence, heehee.
In a stroke of accidental "genius", we even managed to combine two major battles by persuading the first group to lead us to the second. Resolving the first encounter gave us half XP, then we got full XP on top of that when we were forced to fight! involved fighting two balanced encounters at once but we pulled out a win, all according to kenkaku (we were fighting kenku)
Protip: If a kenku, parrot-like mimic birdman, begs for its life in one stream of voice, it's because it heard someone beg for their life. If it keeps cutting off sharply at the end, draw your own conclusion.
Protip: Leaving a murderous gangster with a half-orc barbarian isn't technically murder, and requires no morality check. Particularly if you and the paladin are checking out a totally cool secret door!
I hit level 4
Now the tough call:
Do I just take 2 charisma, bringing me to 20? Better saves for my spells like Faerie Fire and Hideous Laughter, and even better social rolls.
Or do I take Tavern Brawler because I was in a totally awesome bar fight with chairs flying through the air? I got a lucky +2 STR, and this bring me to +1 CON, and this way I could be completely unarmed with my lute - total non-combatant - but then kick people for only ~2 less damage than my rapier. Or hit them with random items! I think I've talked myself into it, and CON is always good.