4 adventurers walk into a ruined catacomb complex. 3 of them arrived not but a week ago, and were eager to get their ears wet. One of them had been inside the complex before, and knew what awaited them. unholy horrors that wielded what's best described as pseudo-magic; taking up the axeblade where such tricks failed them.
One adventurer was a bounty hunter of some small fame, known for hunting down exclusively soldiers and other trained killers; failures of the state, he called them. He excelled at close quarters combat, but kept a hook handy in case the occassional speedster got away from him.
A second adventurer was a lawman, an ex-bounty hunter turned warden. He took his 2 dogs with him everywhere, and when he heard the stories about walking bones he chuckled as he prepared his travel-plans.
The third fresh adventurer was a jester; a bard with a perchant for stabbing hecklers. Considered a criminal and outlaw by many, this man was good at both show and tell; talking and walking, as it were.
The veteran that was to accompany them was a fath healer. Not known for her powerful magic, she relied upon her trusty mace and holy touch to see her through any particularly tough fight. Because of her past experiences, she developed a distrust of the place, but her money was in there, so she went.
Inside, the party is immediately ambushed by a group of skeletons. The very first fucking move is a goblet of black viscous liquid to the face of the healer; a critical attack that sent her spiraling into an abusive rampage. Charging foreward to smash with her mace, she is quickly ganged up upon and dispatched, leaving the recruits to fend for themselves.
Having rekilled the skeletons with otherwise minimal injury, the crew debated briefly whether or not to leave. The deciding factor was their impending dismissal if they came back empty handed and the shining and gleaming of the goblet that skeleton had held in its hand. They would press on.
Further in, a second ambush. Concentrated covering fire took out the dogs of the warden, leaving him hopeless at the hands of armored skeletons. The jester tried to save this man's life, but wound up only taking a wound. The fight over, the surviving bounty hunter and jester decided that their objective was but one passageway away; and then they could leave. Traveling down the hallway, they spot a trap on the floor. The bounty hunter, being the most familiar with traps, tried to disarm it, only to have his arm loped off at the elbow. Screaming and mowling, the bounty hunter died within minutes, leaving the jest with a masochistic laughter that echoed off the barren and broken walls into the closing darkness . . .
darkest dungeon.
The jester survived, btw, to complete the mission