[Dragonbane] Mirth & Mayhem in Vegas

Every January, my 1990s Philadelphia gaming group holds a reunion in Las Vegas. We hang out, give ourselves meat-sweats at Fogo de Chao, and run RPG one-shots. This year I decided to a session of Free League Publishing's Dragonbane core set that I bought back in August from Milwaukee's wonderful Old Guard Games. I loved the look of Dragonbane (the stunning art of Johan Egerkrans), and the rules promised precisely the sort of experience I like in a fantasy RPG: characters who aren't zero-to-hero pushovers at the start but who nonetheless have to struggle to survive as they make their picaresque way across settings like the core set's Misty Vale sandbox.

Although the game comes with a nice slate of pre-gen characters, I had my friends create characters so that we could see how character creation played out. The party consisted of a halfling thief, a human wizard, a wolfkin hunter, and a mallard knight named Sir Waddleton of Pondsborough. I ran this motley bunch through the core set's introductory scenario (which let us test-drive the combat rules), and then I skipped ahead to "Trollspire," the dungeon that many in the Dragonbane community recommend as a starting point. I don't want to spoil the details of the adventure, but I can say that the party succeeded in making away with the treasure.

The highlight of the session was watching Sir Waddleton valiantly try to maintain his dignity as he was insulted by a variety of humiliating traps. Mallards have a kin ability that gives them advantage on key rolls (in Dragonbane terms, they get a boon) at the cost of going berserk à la Donald Duck (they gain the Angry condition, which gives them disadvantage or a bane on Intelligence-related rolls). With each new metaphorical slap in the beak, Sir Waddleton grew redder and redder in the face ... until he finally snapped:

It was truly glorious to behold.

The lowlight of the evening was the extreme failure of the wolfkin hunter's twenty-sider. This die, which I was told routinely rolled low in the player's 5E Dungeons & Dragons game, turned out to suck just as badly at Dragonbane: faced with a roll-under rules environment, the die proceeded to generate results of 17+. It wasn't much fun for my friend to roll so poorly so often, but there was a certain sadistic glee in the die's cursed consistency.

The tagline for Dragonbane is "mirth & mayhem roleplaying," and this one-shot lived up to that bill-ing. (It's hard to resist the duck puns.) I'll definitely be finding an opportunity to run Dragonbane here at home, hopefully for my son and his friends. He has promised me that their party will be all-fowl, and I can't wait.

2016: What a Year (and It's Still Not Over)

It's been a long time since I last updated this blog—nearly a year in fact! The Spring 2016 semester turned out to be just as labor-intensive as the Fall 2015 semester, and then my mother broke her right hip at the end of Finals Week. Summer 2016 was thus devoted to figuring out where my parents were going to be living (end result: in my house for 75% of the year) and then getting their stuff sold and/or packed for the move. I've only just been able to get back into the office, well over a month into what was supposed to be a research leave.

But ... my parents are settling in, my wife and kids and I are adjusting to the 50% increase in the size of our household, I'm starting to get work done, and I'm still gaming:

Barbarians of Lemuria

My Thursday night group is playing BoL whenever we don't have a sufficient quorum for Supers! Revised. The character I'm playing is a Mythic Edition update of Quaris the Fallen, the Legendary Edition character who was the subject of the very first post on this blog. It's a nice change to be playing a BoL hero instead of their opposition for once.

Supers! Revised

Our Supers! Revised GM (also the BoL GM) wasn't feeling the vibe with our Earthside campaign, so he retired it (along with Brute Squad, my duplicating brick hero, and a newer character, the arrogant Sasquatch geneticist Big Thought). The new campaign is set in outer space, and my new hero is a tribute to Hal Clement's Mission of Gravity Mesklinites:

"Legs," as his teammates call him, is a sentient millipede the size of a mastiff. His already substantial strength and toughness (he's a heavy-worlder) have been amplified by an ancient ritual, so all of his many limbs pack a powerful punch.

Uncharted Worlds

I've been doing a great deal of science fiction reading for the last several months, and my thoughts turned to SF gaming as a result (aided and abetted by the Supers! campaign). A little research into available, rules-lite SF TTRPGs turned up Sean Gomes's Uncharted Worlds, a Powered by the Apocalypse system that occupies (for me) a happy medium between traditional RPGs and the more thematic, story-driven games that epitomize the PbtA ludosphere. I was actually able to play in a G+ Hangouts game while I was closing up my parents' house at the end of August, a one-shot that ended with my shady astrophysicist activating an experimental hyperdrive and (with the aid of a roll of snake-eyes) killing the entire party in the process. Huzzah! I'm now thinking of how to go about running an UW campaign of my own ... I hope to post more along these lines soon!

Escape from Satarla! [Barbarians of Lemuria, Actual Play]

As close as I'm ever going to get to an image of three Satarlan
sky-boats battling it out (detail from Gino D'Achille's cover
to  ERB's Swords of Mars).

The heroes barely had time to take in the sight of their rescuer when one of her underlings reported a pair of approaching sky-boats. She called out to Gallius: "Now it's time for you to show me why I went to the trouble of breaking Satarlan law to rescue you—get this boat out of the city!" Gallius didn't hesitate, rushing to the helm and setting the boat in motion. Ralak found the boat's arbalest and aimed it at the pursuers. Koth slumped onto the deck; the wound he had received from the jemadar in the Great Arena was not as serious as it had initially seemed, but he was still losing blood. The mysterious woman called out to one of her companions as she moved to assist Gallius in operating the ship: "Zedrek, tend to the big one's injuries!" Clad in the humble garments of a street priest, Zedrek began to clean and dress Koth's injury.

Zedrek of Lysor, Servant of the Twenty

Attributes: Strength 1, Agility 2, Mind 2, Appeal 0
Combat: Initiative 1, Melee 2, Ranged 0, Defense 1
Careers: Farmer 0, Priest 2, Physician 2, Beggar 0
Boons: Detect Deception, Healing Touch, Savant
Flaws: Cloistered (a variation on City-Dweller), Landlubber

"That's a nasty cut, friend," the priest said in Koth's native Festrelian, "but I think I can keep the scarring to a minimum."

Meanwhile, Gallius was weaving his way around Satarla's numerous towers, trying to put more distance between the heroes' boat and those of the pursuing Satarlan Sky-Navy. Suddenly one particularly high minaret appeared in the boat's path. Cursing, Gallius had to turn back toward their enemies to avoid crashing into the building. At the same time, the arbalest's string broke, knocking Ralak to the deck. (The heroes' players had just rolled two Calamitous Failures in a row.) Enemy bolts struck the boat, killing one of their rescuer's party instantly and damaging a flight vane. The ship began to lose speed—until a now bandaged Koth put his back to the task and singlehandedly bent the vane back into place.

Gallius swiftly regained his equilibrium and threaded the sky-boat through a particularly twisty maze of streets. The pursuers fell behind, eventually losing track of the stolen craft. Gallius was then able to fly the ship out of the city and into the Jungles of Qush. They anchored the vessel in the canopy; while Koth and Ralak covered the fuselage with camouflage netting, the mysterious benefactress revealed some magical talents, casting a ritual of concealment to help hide the ship.

When she was finished, she turned to the heroes and identified herself as Sharangara of Oomis, a collector of rare antiquities. "There's an ancient artifact of the First Age that I want, and I need a sky-boat to get it. Which means I need a sky-pilot, and that's where you come in, Gallius." "Where are you going," the suspicious pilot asked, "and what exactly is it that you're after? Don't tell me it's some hideous weapon that will melt our flesh and send our souls screaming to hell!"

"It's nothing that dramatic, my friend," Sharangara answered. "It's a small cauldron in the shape of a bird. The ancient records call it the Kartal, which my friend Zedrek here tells me is Yggdari for 'eagle.' It may have mystical powers, but it may also just be a beautiful relic of a better age. Whatever it is, I want it for my collection, and I'm willing to reward you all handsomely for assisting me."

"What sort of reward?" asked Ralak. "To begin with, once we have the Kartal, I'm more than willing to turn this vessel over to Gallius. He can sell it to one of Satarla's rival cities, or travel around in it himself, whatever he desires. The rest of you will get more than enough gold. What do you say?" Gallius answered: "I'm intrigued, but you still haven't said where we're going to find this Kartal."

"In the Flying City of the Winged Men, somewhere over the Axos Mountains. You're my pilot, and Zedrek is my translator—he's one of the few Lemurians who speaks Windsong, the language of the Winged Men. Before we can bargain with them ..." "You mean rob them," Ralak observed with a smirk. "... bargain with them," continued Sharangara, "we have to find them. And I think that the wizard Jesharek Jool may be able to help us with that."

"Jesharek's tower is somewhere in the heart of the Qush!" exclaimed Ralak, "We'll be lucky to find it, and even luckier to leave it in one piece. Can't we take a safer path to the mountains? Say, Shamballah?" Sharangara shook her head: "If you want to risk getting scooped up by a Satarlan patrol or shot down by Tyrusian guards, sure. Flying straight north through the Qush will have its dangers, but it's a faster path, and I have some ideas about how to bargain for information with Jesharek."

The heroes agreed with the plan, and everyone settled down to sleep. It would be an early start for the flight north through some of Lemuria's most deadly jungle, and they needed to be sharp for the journey.

Gallius the Gladiator [Barbarians of Lemuria, Actual Play]

I know this isn't Lemuria, but it's still an arena, a six-legged beast,
and a guy doing the Harryhausen with a spear. A.k.a., "win."

My 13th Age campaign at the FLGS fell through once again—seems like Pathfinder and 5E have cornered the market on D20 fantasy in Urbana. But I was prepared for the flop, pulling out Barbarians of Lemuria's new Mythic Edition after I only picked up a third player this past Thursday. I was interested in seeing how the Mythic Edition rules changes shook out in play, and I also wanted to stick with a low-prep game.

The three players were more than willing to switch systems and launched themselves into character creation. Here are the heroes they generated:

Gallius of Satarla

Attributes: Strength 0, Agility 2, Mind 1, Appeal 1
Combat: Initiative 1, Melee 0, Ranged 1, Defense 2
Careers: Thief 0, Sailor 1, Soldier 1, Sky Pilot 2
Boons: Alert, Friends in High Places, Keen Eyesight
Flaws: Braggart, Greed

Koth the Festrelian

Attributes: Strength 3, Agility 1, Mind 0, Appeal 0
Combat: Initiative 1, Melee 2, Ranged 0, Defense 1
Careers: Hunter 1, Mercenary 1, Slave 2, Gladiator 0
Boons: Born Athlete, Sneaky, Strength Feat
Flaws: Fear (Whips), Illiterate

Ralak of Malakut

Attributes: Strength 0, Agility 2, Mind 2, Appeal 1
Combat: Initiative 1, Melee 1, Ranged 1, Defense 1
Careers: Thief 2, Spy 1, Noble 0, Herbalist 1
Boons: Deft Hands, Savant, Silver Tongue
Flaws: Hunted (Tyrusian Nobility), Obsession (Sorcerer-Kings' Formulae)

The heroes began play in a cell under the Great Satarlan Arena (sound familiar, BoL veterans?). Gallius was there because his superior officer caught him dallying with said officer's daughter. Ralak had been arrested for kissing a noble woman whilst trying to hide his face from the agents of the Tyrusian nobility. And poor Koth, he had been sold to the Arena management to cover his recently deceased master's debts.

As heroes, our protagonists were not going to become fodder for the games. They staged a breakout, relying on the mighty strength of Koth (and the insanely good rolling of Koth's player). First Koth lifted the metal grate locking them in their cell. Then Koth used his bare hands to rip the locked door to the prison chamber off its hinges. Ralak had freed the other prisoners in the prison chamber in the hopes of generating maximum confusion. Gallius broke legs off a chair to serve as clubs for Ralak and himself; Koth opted instead to use the chamber door as a weapon.

In the ensuing melee with the Arena guards, Koth took out nearly all of the opposition with a boxcars-driven Legendary Success: he simply bulldozed them into the walls with the door. Ralak and Gallius had much more trouble with the single foes they ended up dispatching. Rather than fight more onrushing guards, the heroes fled to the right ... and thus into the open floor of the Arena.

The guards chuckled, sealing the Arena gates and opening the passage to the beast pens. As the crowd roared for blood, a hideous jemadar launched itself at the heroes. Koth tried to ward it off with his trusty door, but the beast raked him with its claws (10 of Koth's 13 Lifeblood were lost in a single blow). But Ralak and Gallius made amends for their mediocrity in the battle against the guards. Seizing spears from the sands of the Arena, they threw themselves at the jemadar. Rallak scored a Legendary Success, hamstringing the beast and forcing it to a standstill. Then Gallius threw his spear at the jemadar's skull, striking it right between the eyes for a Mighty Success that brought it down.

Celebration was brief: the Arena guards began to approach the heroes en masse. In the open space of the Arena floor, they would be able to form Hordes and overwhelm the rebellious trio. But just then the shadow of a sky boat fell across the heroes, and a rope ladder was tossed from above. The heroes seized this unforeseen opportunity and scrambled up the ladder to the deck of the now rising sky boat. There they encountered a woman clad in the robes of an Oomisian merchant. "Now that I've freed you," she said, "we can discuss how you'll be showing me your gratitude."

BoL plays just as smoothly in its Mythic incarnation as it did when I ran this scenario using the Legendary rules. The new Initiative rules (which look very much like the Initiative house rules I developed back in 2010 but with the advantage of not requiring NPCs to roll) worked without any hitches, and I was particularly pleased with the new Damage rules for weapons: the impromptu clubs were easy to peg as 1d6L weapons, and Koth's door was a 1d6 weapon (it had the heft of a heavy 1d6H weapon, but lost the H due to its unwieldy nature). The players also appreciated the ability to buy a third Boon by way of picking a second Flaw; they felt this made for more varied heroes. All in all, I'm pleased with how the game is handling in this latest version.

In a week's time, the heroes will find out just who the mysterious benefactor is ... and what he wants from them ...

[Supers!] Brute Squad

Last night I started playing in a Supers! Revised campaign at my FLGS. I knew going into the game that I wanted to play a brick, but I was having trouble coming up with a concept that worked ... until a thesaurus search turned up "brute." Suddenly the light bulb went on: "brute" leads to "brute squad" leads to "brick with the ability to duplicate himself."

In other words ...

With this mental breakthrough, my character came together in a flash. Here are the stats for Brute Squad, a former henchman trying to make it as a hero:

Brute Squad

a.k.a. Andrew Irons

Resistances (7D)
Composure 2D
Fortitude 4D
Reaction 3D
Will 2D

Aptitudes (4D)
Athleticism 3D
Fighting 3D

Powers (12D)
Armor 4D
Duplicate Self 4D
Super Strength 4D

Advantages (1D)
Is That Your Best Shot?

Disadvantages (-4D)
Enemy (Wise Guy)
Obligation (Parole Officer)
Social Hindrance (Disreputable)
Social Hindrance (Ugly)

Competency Dice (2D)

Backstory
Andrew Irons grew up on the wrong side of the tracks. He didn't have many options in life, and his brutish looks didn't help him win friends and influence people. A crappy job in an unsafe factory exposed him to a bizarre chemical solution, granting him the typical brick power suite as well as the more unusual ability to duplicate himself. His newfound abilities made him particularly attractive to the villain community, and "Brute Squad" found himself working as a henchman to a number of different bad guys. But his heart was never in his villain work. In fact, when his last boss, the super-genius crime lord Wise Guy, ordered him to execute a captured superhero, Brute Squad not only refused to do the deed but turned on Wise Guy as well. After serving a shortened sentence on account of his face turn, Brute Squad tried to find legitimate work for a man of his talents. But this ex-con is having trouble finding anyone who trusts him: will he stay a hero, or will he fall back into a life of crime?

Actual Play: Free RPG Day, 2014 Edition

I took part in this year's Free RPG Day celebration at Armored Gopher Games, my FLGS, and the event was an overwhelming success: five games, all of which ran with full tables, and a quickly depleted stack of free RPG materials. Since I was both a player and a referee this year, I thought I'd throw together an actual play post describing what went on.

(L to R) Ka-Boom, Primal, Lawman, Freeze-Tag, and Co-Opt

My stint at referee came first: starting at 11 a.m., I ran a session devoted to Hazard Studio's Supers! Revised game. I had a six-hour time slot, so I opted to let the players create their own heroes instead of using pre-gens. Since Supers! Revised is not yet in print (due to hijinks beyond Hazard's control), I had to rely on the single PDF copy on my MacBook hard drive. This created something of an information bottle-neck, although I was able to make copies of the extremely helpful Character Creation Guide provided in the back of the rulebook. It didn't hurt that the nature of Supers! Revised as a game doesn't necessitate frequent look-ups to build a character: not only does the Guide list all Resistances, Aptitudes, Powers, Boosts, Complications, Advantages, and Disadvantages but the game's relative simplicity means that dice devoted to a given Power are a more or less transparent indicator of the character's ability with that Power. (There was some fiddling with the rulebook to ensure that characters' Power dice matched up with their hero concepts, but nothing like I experienced the one time I tried to referee a Champions character creation session.)

My five players came up with the following supers:

The Lawman - Western sheriff descended from a long line of law enforcers. Carries his ancestor's six-shooter (a weapon that fires ghost bullets) and badge (affording him mystic protection from harm).

Freeze-Tag - Bounty-hunter with the ability to teleport to his quarries and stop them in their tracks with a paralytic touch. (The name was my suggestion to the player, but the powers pairing was his—and so wonderful that I will be stealing the character for use as a campaign NPC.)

Co-Opt - A hero whose powers are all about taking from others (co-opting their metahuman abilities with Power Steal and their skills with Mimic Aptitude) and then sharing them with himself (by cooperating with his duplicates). He also had Super Speed but rolled poorly with it all session, causing the other players to dub him "Worst Speedster EVER."

Ka-Boom - A skilled fighter whose primary power was her BFG. It went "KA-BOOM" when fired (natch).

Primal - A robot able to morph into any size animal form contained in its data banks.

I then tested the heroes' capabilities by running them through a fairly straightforward scenario, Hazard's Scene Stealers: Black Ice. The team found itself in hot pursuit of Cold Kill, a notorious super-villain who was in the midst of hijacking an armored truck. The chase was more or less a cinch for the players: Freeze-Tag kept teleporting from block to block to keep up with the truck, Co-Opt relied on his super-speed, Primal turned into a silver-maned stallion and carried Lawman on its back, and Ka-Boom ... well, I let her pick from the list of commandeered pursuit vehicles contained in the scenario, and she chose the ice-cream truck.

Cold Kill was definitely outnumbered, although he did nearly managed to put down Lawman and Primal with his wide-angle ice blast. (The ice-cream truck was totaled by the same blast. You served Ka-Boom well, Mr. Softee!) The team then more or less beat him down with a minimum of fuss. Unfortunately for them, the arrest was complicated by the on-site crash of a private plane ... and the arrival of Rio de Sangue, a contract killer who wanted the briefcase possessed by one of the passengers.

(Rio's nom-de-guerre led to much mocking by the heroes: "His name is Rio, and he dances on your glands ... Oh, Rio, Rio, you have got a severed hand!")

As a 35D villain, Rio was much more of a challenge for the team. His numerous super-abilities (including his hellacious 5D Armor) made it difficult for them to get in a decisive blow. On the other hand, Rio was equally outnumbered. Once Primal realized the armor's weakness (it didn't protect Rio's head, something Primal discovered when it shifted into condor form and tried to scratch out the villain's eyes), he got the rest of the team to start taking called shots. Rio attempted to escape by flying away, but Primal shifted into pterodactyl form and took him down. Cue end credits!

Everyone had a great time playing Supers! Revised; the only real complaint came from a few players who realized mid-scenario that they should have built their heroes differently to get the effects they wanted (and even these players agreed that they were talking more about fine-tuning than a completely misleading ruleset). My one regret as a referee was the massive beating my solo villains took as a result of serious outnumbering; I probably should have given Rio some minions as back-up to occupy some of the heroes and minimize the ganging-up effect. But then I didn't anticipate five players! (There was much less attendance for at the Gopher's 2013 Free RPG Day event.)

After a break for dinner with my family, I came back to the store for the second session of the event. This time I was a player in my friend Dave's Dungeon World event. Dave was running a scenario based on Mike Carr's Dungeon Module B1: In Search of the Unknown. He had tried to run the adventure the previous year but had insufficient players show up (i.e., just me). He had even tried to run it at home for me and another friend, but a TPK in the first encounter and a lack of time to start over had deep-sized that attempt. Hope springs eternal, though, and Dave offered the scenario again at this year's event. As mentioned above, he made the right call, ending up (like all the other games this year) with a full table.

I'll let Dave have the honor over at his blog of describing what transpired at the table. But I will note that I had a blast playing my swashbuckling Elf Fighter (who wore a fake mustache in the finest Fairbanks-Flynn tradition). Perhaps my crowning glory was the moment when I checked for traps by the corpse of a dead halfling thief onto a pile of treasure. There wasn't any trap, but I did manage to wake up the chimera who owned said treasure ...

Thanks to the Gopher staff for hosting Free RPG Day, to my players for showing up and indulging my desire to run Supers! Revised, and to Dave for sticking it out and finally getting to run his Dungeon World adventure!

13th Age: Wyrd of the Wild Wood, Chapters 2-3

The last thing henchman Drogan saw before he was ripped in two.

I ran a group through the second and third chapters of "Wyrd of the Wild Wood" tonight. Attendance was low again: Sundays really do just bring out the board gamers. But we decided to persevere and go ahead with just two PCs. I augmented the group's numbers with a suggestion from the Google+ 13th Age community, giving them a panther animal companion reskinned as a human fighter henchman. If the players had rolled better, I think "Drogan the Fighter" would have been a bigger asset to the group. Unfortunately, while the players were rolling low all night, I kept rolling high. Given that the party consisted of two adventurers and a wimpy henchman, I tweaked numbers when necessary. This was especially the case with the "feral halfling" fight: the original number of "feral halflings" and "halfling madminds" appearing in the encounter was too high, guaranteeing some TPK action. But even with the correct numbers for a party of 2.5 adventurers, we felt that the "feral halflings" were too potent by half for level 2 mooks: their poison dart attack did both damage and "dazed (save ends)" on the first attack and then knocked targets "unconscious (save ends)" if they failed their first save against the poison.

The other fights went better . . . well, for certain values of better. The dark elf wizard found a ring of defense in the ruins of a blue dragon lair. Good. But in taking the ring he triggered the lair's magical defenses. Bad. The adventurers cleverly used a "Ray of Frost" ritual to cross a gaping chasm by constructing an ice bridge, and they deftly avoided the dangers of the Swamp of Flame Spurts (with its perilously close-to-copyright-violating Vermin of Unusual Size). Good. But the gnome rogue didn't see the otyugh in time and came within a single hit point of being swallowed alive. Bad.

The deadliest battle was the one with the emaciated owl bear. The creature was too much for a pair of adventurers and their henchman. So when it rolled a natural 20 on its attack against the henchman, I ruled that the owl bear treated the henchman like a strongman treats a phone book. The hungry creature got to return to its lair with half a henchman and the adventurers got to live to fight another day. Owl bears in 13th Age are creatures of respect.

I'm switching the game to Wednesday nights starting October 9th. We'll see if going head to head with the D&D Next Encounters crowd allows us to seduce a few folks to the 13th Age Side of the Force.

13th Age: Wyrd of the Wild Wood, Chapter One

(The adventurers confront monsters disguised as dice.)

Today, as part of the Gamer Gathering celebration at Armored Gopher Games, I ran the first chapter of "Wyrd of the Wild Wood," the second in an ongoing series of organized play adventures for Pelgrane Press's 13th Age. The following characters made appearances:

Captain Nagal, Tiefling Fighter

One Unique Thing: "I'm the sole survivor of the Perilous Host, a mercenary company sworn to the service of the Crusader."

Icon Relationships: Crusader (Conflicted) 2, Diabolist (Negative) 1.

Backgrounds: Mercenary Captain +5, Nursemaid to an Ailing Mother +2, Hunted and Persecuted +1.

Gral, Human Paladin

One Unique Thing: "I occasionally gain glimpses of people's souls."

Icon Relationships: Crusader (Conflicted) 1, Emperor (Conflicted) 1, Priestess (Conflicted) 1.

Backgrounds: Courtly Upbringing +2, Fought for the Crusader +2, Student of Myth +2, Wandering Theologian +2.

Kadüm, Half-Orc Barbarian

One Unique Thing: "I'm the bastard son of the Orc Lord."

Icon Relationships: Orc Lord (Conflicted) 2, Lich King (Negative) 1.

Backgrounds: Black Dog Mercenary +3, Basic Imperial Training +2, Thieves' Guild Muscle +2, Banished to Abandoned Outpost +1.

Stick, Gnome Bard

One Unique Thing: "I'm the world's tallest gnome."

Icon Relationships: Crusader (Negative) 1, High Druid (Negative) 1, Orc Lord (Negative) 1.

Backgrounds: Has Performed in Every Slum in the Empire +5, Used to Life on the Road +3.

The adventure began on the floating island of Darkskye, a former magic crystal mine turned into an imperial prison. Gral and Stick were on Darkskye as investigators for the Priestess's Committee on Prison Reform (Gral because he believes in the Priestess's work, Stick because he had stolen the High Druid's stash and was trying to get as far away from the Wild Wood as possible); Captain Nagal was serving as one of the prison guards; and Kadüm was a prisoner (with a secret mission to mess with the Lich King's black market trade in Darkskye crystal dust).

Gral and Stick were asking Kadüm questions in Captain Nagal's presence about conditions at the prison when a powerful explosion shook the island. The floor of Kadüm's cell split open, nearly sending the half-orc falling into open air; only the quick reflexes of Captain Nagal saved him from disaster. Gral and Stick dove out of the way as a portion of the cell's ceiling collapsed onto the interview table, crushing it. The party decided that the best bet for survival was to stick together and make their way to the top of the island (rather than being crushed inside its bowels).

As they moved through the tunnels comprising the prison, they enjoyed scenes of disaster and madness. The explosion had supercharged the island's crystals, causing them to warp anything they penetrated. In one case, this meant a group of prisoners and guards from the mess hall. Transformed into hideous mutants, the unfortunate souls attacked the party. Doubly unfortunate because they were swiftly slain by the adventurers.

The prison continued to spiral out of control, and the adventurers were lucky to reach the island's top. When they did, they discovered that they were falling out of the sky above the Wild Wood. A stand of particularly tall trees stood within jumping distance of the lurching island, offering a means of escape. Before the party could take advantage of this fact, they found themselves facing a golem formed from the living crystals of the mines. Backing up the golem were a small hoard of crystalline minions. Things looked grim: the golem was laying into Gral, nearly beating the paladin into unconsciousness, and the other adventurers had suffered greatly from the razor-sharp storm of crystals swirling around the creature. But then Kadüm became a whirling dervish of death, destroying all of the minions and laying into the golem with his axe. The other adventurers rallied, making short order of the golem.

But they had no opportunity to celebrate their victory—the walls of the rainwater reservoir located on the island's surface crumbled with another lurch of the island, and a torrent of water rushed toward the party. Their only hope was the stand of trees. If they could leap over to them, then they would avoid the rushing flood and certain death by drowning.

Of course, every single character failed the DC 15 skill check needed to safely jump into the trees.

So the session ended with the party being swept over the side of Darkskye, plummeting to the Wild Wood below. Nothing like a good old-fashioned cliffhanger!

Some of the OOC highlights of the game: (1) the interview with Kadüm revealed that the Darkskye prisoners routinely dined on sky lobsters—caught with nets by flyers and cooked in delicious cloud butter; (2) barbarians are rough on mooks; Kadüm managed to crit his Whirlwind attack on the crystal minions for a total of 55 damage, singlehandedly wiping out all 10 mooks in a single standard action; and (3) a high-Charisma paladin can really lock down a big bad with Smite Evils.

I also felt that the simplified combat ranges of 13th Age (nearby and far away) worked quite well in play. As the photo at the start of this post indicates, we used minis for each PC and dice for the monsters. We didn't track exact position on a map, but used the minis and dice to indicate which combatants were engaged with one another. Everything else was "theatre of the mind."

I'm looking forward to running Chapter Two next weekend! Thanks to Pelgrane for a great game!

Beyond the Wall Blogtest: My Dwarven Adventurer's Raw Numbers

Everyone in the Beyond the Wall blogtest has agreed to first present the results of our playbook dice rolls and then to discuss those results before generating final character descriptions. Handling the process this way will also help us to collaborate on the village map and NPC list (rather than having to back away from decisions made in isolation).

Brett has already posted his dice rolls for his Would-Be Knight; Henry has done the same for his Self-Taught Mage. What follows are my results for my Dwarven Adventurer.

According to the playbook, my character has the following stats before any dice are rolled: STR 10, CON 12, DEX 8, INT 8, WIS 8, CHA 6.

The first set of tables answer the question "How did you come to the lands of men?"

In this section, the first subquestion is "What is the history of your clan?" I rolled an 8: "They have always worked the deepest mines, mining the richest veins of precious metals and gems." The mechanical bonuses for this result are +2 STR, +2 CON, and Skill: Mining. This subquestion comes with a map icon, indicating that I get to add a location to the village map. Since my character is from out of town, this decision is a bit tougher than the ones the human characters' players have to make. Perhaps there is a jeweler in town or a goldsmith who purchased the minerals dug up by my character's clan?

The second subquestion is "What drove you from the lands of your people?" I rolled another 8, getting the tragic result of "Your hold was destroyed by goblins." My STR gets another +2 bonus; my CON, a +1. Was my character the only dwarf from the hold to survive?

The final subquestion in this section of the playbook asks "When you left your own people, you found it difficult to live with humans. However, the other characters became your fast friends. Who else became your friend?" My roll of 3 on this table turned up a rather strange result: "Most humans found you too strange, and were frightened of you. You spent much time alone." Since this subquestion is supposed to generate an NPC for the list, it seems counter-intuitive for the playbook to produce a result that provides no hook for generating an NPC. My inclination is to roll again, but I thought I would consult with the group first about doing so. The mechanical bonuses for my roll are +1 CON, +1 INT, and +1 WIS.

At this point, I'm done with the first of the playbook's two major questions. My character's abilities are now as follows: STR 14, CON 16, DEX 8, INT 9, WIS 9, and CHA 6. He also has Skill: Mining.

Becoming a Level 1 Warrior, the character gains the class abilities Weapon Specialization and Knacks as well as a craft skill of my choosing. Since the specific nature of my class abilities will be decided by subsequent rolls on the tables, I initially thought that this skill would be as well. But that doesn't seem to be the case. Since the character came from a precious metals mine, I decide to make this skill "Goldsmithing."

Now I move on to the playbook's second major question: "What have you learned on your adventures so far?"

The first subquestion here is "How do you plan to build your hoard?" My roll is a 4, "You hold in your memory the location of the entrances to several lost elven tombs and plan to take their faerie gold." The mechanical benefits are +2 CON and Skill: Trapping. Can anyone say "plot hook for the GM"? I thought you could!

The next subquestion is "Like all respectable dwarves, you bear the weapon of your fathers. What is it?" With a roll of 2, my ancestors' weapon is apparently "A short but broad blade of heirloom steel." I get +3 CON and Weapon Specialization (+1 to hit, +2 to damage) with the short sword. I'm also supposed to add a building to the village map. Since this entire table is all about weapons, my choices here seem a bit limited: blacksmith, armorer, guardhouse. I'll take votes from the rest of the group.

(I'll also note that my character has run afoul of Beyond the Wall's maximum in-chargen ability value of 19. After these two tables, his CON should be 21—but it can't, so I settle for the 19 and hope I don't get another CON bonus.)

On the third subquestion table ("What was your first big hassle amongst the tall people? The friend to your right was there with you."), I roll a 1: "You were waylaid by a pack of giant spiders near the mountains. Your friend burned their webs as they descended from the trees, and gains +1 STR." My mechanic bonus is a +2 to STR and the Knack: Defensive Fighter (+1 AC). The friend bonus is a good one, given that the player to my virtual right is Brett's Would-Be Knight; he can definitely use a STR boost. We've also learned that the village is near the mountains.

The final subquestion is "What treasure do you keep that first drew the other characters to you?" My roll of 5 gives me "An untarnished silver chalice," a useless CON boost of +2 (that's four points of extra CON down the drain, boo-hoo), and a "cup which purifies its drink." I expect that the other players met my character in the tavern where he routinely drank from his own cup, the one family heirloom he rescued from the destruction of his hold. An NPC creation is signaled here. Since I earned a cup from this table, I think the NPC has to be the man or woman who fills that cup with strong ale: either the bartender at the tavern or the barmaid.

At this point, I'm done rolling. My character's abilities are STR 16, CON 19, DEX 8, INT 9, WIS 9, and CHA 6. My skills are Mining, Goldsmithing, and Trapping. About as classic a dwarf as you could expect (albeit clumsier than most—was he injured escaping from the goblins?). Time for the rest of the players to make comments and suggestions, I think!

Beyond the Wall: It Takes a Crowd to Source a Village

One of the best parts of Flatland Games' Beyond the Wall & Other Adventures neoclone is the way that its character playbooks seamlessly merge character creation and setting creation: as the players generate their YA-fantasy heroes, they simultaneously build and populate the heroes' home village. I thought it would be interesting to go through this process publicly, and so I asked for some partners-in-crime over at the Google+ OSR community.

Our premise is that the participants' blogs are actually players sitting at a table and going through Beyond the Wall character creation. Each blog is "seated" to the right of another blog, so the character it creates will take part in another character's backstory (as per chart 6 in each Beyond the Wall playbook). In addition, the locations and NPCs generated by each blog will be combined into a single village map and NPC key.

Here's the list of participants, blogs, and playbook choices in the order in which they're seated at the virtual table:

+Rob Barrett of Vargold: The Wolf-Time is creating a Dwarven Adventurer.
+Brett Slocum of The Eye of Joyful Sitting Amongst Friends is creating a Would-Be Knight.
+Henry Wong of The Campaign Expanse is creating a Self-Taught Mage.
+Pearce Shea of games with others is creating a Witch's Prentice.
+Anthony Simeone of Once More Unto the Breach is creating a Young Woodsman.
+Mike Lizardi of Fear No Darkness is creating a Halfling Outrider.

Brett is to my right, Henry is to Brett's right, Pearce is to Henry's right, Anthony is to Pearce's right, Mike is to Anthony's right, and I'm to Mike's right. Playbooks were selected in reverse order (i.e., Mike got first choice, Anthony second, and so on).

Before we begin, I'd like to thank the others for agreeing to take part in this exercise. Look for the first character post soon!

My Character Got Stoned Last Night

The last few sessions have not gone well for my Fourth Edition mage Enric Crocker ("the Apprentice Who Lived"). Two weeks ago, he was down to his last death save courtesy of this recurring villain:

Yes, that's Loomis the Rat King, crazed rodent lord and plague of the Duchy of Boswin. He hit Enric with his "ratapult" (a slingshot that shoots rodents), knocking him down to -9 hit points. The timely arrival of reinforcements allowed the party's druid to stabilize Enric.

This week, the threat of death, while less embarrassing, was equally puissant. After tracking down a crazed peasant sculptor with a perhaps too uncanny skill at statuary, Enric was left alone by his compatriots to face this beast:

Alpha-striking with various dazing powers and action points was not enough to keep Enric from being bitten by Alis the Cockatrice. Even worse were his pitiful saving throws. In spite of a potential +2 bonus from his Delver's Leather Armor +1, Enric could not manage to roll higher than a 5. So "slowed" became "immobilized," and then, in a final indignity, a natural 1 meant "petrified." Dave the DM tried to console me with the information that Enric was now Resist 20 Damage and immortal, but I rejected his false sympathy—he's been trying to kill one of the party for weeks. Again the party druid saved the day, making his Nature roll with massive overkill to remember the bit of lore explaining how to cure cockatrice petrification. Unfortunately, the party now has a wagon-full of villagers in need of a Restoration ritual from Boswin's head cleric.

In the meantime, Enric has decided to hire a meatshield, er, henchman to guard his flank.

The Tower of Mad Mungus, Part Two

Last night my regular gaming group returned to the Tower of Mad Mungus, the latest adventure in our ongoing Fourth Edition D&D game.  Two things stood out about the session:

1.  DM Dave continued the theme of classic D&D monsters.  While we did fight Fourth Edition monsters like darkmantles and kruthik, we also encountered one of my favorite oldies: the piercer.  (The cut view of the piercer anatomy to the left is taken from one of my favorite Dragon articles.)  Even better: my character, dragonborn warlord Sergeant Kesek, ended up getting taken to -1 HP by a piercer!  (Luckily the eladrin wizard Tük-J'a Zephrus was nearby with a handy potion of healing.)  Best of all, though, was the group's subsequent encounter with a knight polymorphed into piercer form by Mad Mungus.  The ensorcelled knight's name was . . . wait for it . . . Sir Pearce.  Imagine a piercer talking with a British accent, and you've got D&D gold.  The session ended with Sergeant Kesek rigging up a perch on his back for Sir Pearce.  No doubt hijinks will ensue.

2.  I went completely paperless for this session, bringing only my dice bag, my Sergeant Kesek mini, my set of laser-engraved action point tokens, and my new 64 GB iPad.  I had uploaded the PDF version of Kesek's Character Builder character sheet to the iPad via the GoodReader app's ability to downloaded documents from my Dropbox.  (I also uploaded the Pages version of last session's notes and a PDF of the Fourth Edition Player's Handbook.)  When I needed to consult one of Kesek's power cards, I'd just enter GoodReader.  The rest of the time I was keeping track of initiative, hit points, healing surges, treasure, and XP with Penultimate, the most intuitive notebook app I've seen.  While I suspect that things will be even more efficient once iPhone 4.0 comes out with multitasking in the fall, I didn't have any particular trouble switching back and forth this time around.  The iPad worked like a charm!

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Barbarian-Themed Blog . . .

My Friday night group's Fourth Edition D&D game came back to life yesterday after a year-long hiatus.  The heroes (including my dragonborn warlord Sergeant Kesek) finally managed to make their way to the Tower of Mad Mungus, a supposedly long-dead wizard known for his uncanny experiments in hybridization.  The most significant aspect of the session involved the monsters we fought, a veritable honor roll of D&D standards: stirges, bulettes, and owl bears.  Although I've been gaming for nigh on thirty years (got the Holmes Basic Set for either my tenth birthday in 1979 or for Christmas later that year), I've never previously encountered a single stirge, bulette, or owl bear.  So label me honored to have at long last met these lovely animals, brought to loving life by miniatures.

Of course, I killed them and took their stuff.

Friday Night Campaign, Session One

On Friday night (the 19th), I ran the first session of my BoL campaign.  The set-up was the one I mentioned a few posts ago: having discovered new clues to the whereabouts of the lost city of M'lor, the alchemist Radam Tyl recruits a band of intrepid heroes to travel to the Jungles of Qo, locate M'lor, and return with whatever First Age knowledge survives in the city archives.  (The BoL rulebook identifies M'lor as a Second Age city, but that doesn't seem to jibe with its "lost" status—so I moved it back in time.)

Radam Tyl's recruits (and the players' heroes):

1. Dakar, a Valgardian swordsman whose brief career in piracy ended with him being booted off the ship and left to fend for himself in the port district of Zalut.  Played by Dave.
2. Daneel, a Shamballan gladiator who parlayed his success in Satarla's arena into a noble's title.  He has come to Zalut to investigate rumors of sorcerous interference in the Sartalan games.  Played by Brian.
3. Irryn, a dancer turned assassin who left her home in the Port of the Sea Lords to execute a contract on the magician Samaldran.  Played by Tim.
4. Segdral Darkstar, a Halakti assassin who has also been hired to kill Samaldran (albeit by a different client).  He and Irryn met while casing their shared target and agreed to work together.  Played by David.

The adventure began with the heroes' arrival at Radam Tyl's luxurious townhouse.  Each of them was met at the door by Tyl's most notorious creations: his uplifted dinosaur servants.  While these small dinosaurs did not prove capable of human speech (forcing the players to endure my dinosaur squeaks and hisses), they were able to mix drinks, serve canapes, and light dreamsmoke pipes.  Tyl eventually arrived and made his pitch to the heroes, sweetening the deal with several chests of gold and jewels.  (The heroes were also allowed to take whatever loot they wanted from M'lor, provided that they saved the scrolls they found for Tyl.)

With surprising alacrity (and almost no hard questions), the heroes agreed to the alchemist's plans and set out making preparations for their journey west.  They decided to first purchase passage to Parsool on a deep-water vessel, then travel via coast-hugger and river-barge to Malakut.  There, in the City of the Thieves, they would be able to hire the local guides they would need to survive in the Qo.

Their search for a ship headed to Parsool was twice interrupted, though.  They were first approached by one of Radam Tyl's rivals, the alchemist Sorsha.  (Tyl is a specialist in animal uplight; Sorsha's palanquin-bearers, slaves with their eyes sewn shut, pointed to her own interests in information acquisition and the pain centers of the human body.)  Tyl was apparently not the only alchemist to learn of the ancient document offering hints to M'lor's location, and Sorsha was eager to hire the heroes to serve her interests instead.  Irryn was the only hero willing to listen to all of Sorsha's offer, receiving a jewel-encrusted necklace for her "open-mindedness."

The second interruption was far less polite.  Daneel's investigations into sorcerous cheating had apparently earned him the enmity of the magicians involved, and they sent a team of thugs armed with enchanted daggers to kill him.  The thugs, confident in their numbers, attacked Daneel—and were promptly butchered by the gladiator and his newfound friends.  Irryn demonstrated her prowess as a kill-stealer, finishing off thugs Daneel and Segdral had worked hard to defeat.  Dakar's massive Valgardian greatsword needed no assistance in parting the thugs' heads and limbs from their bodies.

Cleaning their weapons, the heroes were soon able to find the ship they were looking for: Captain Tinray's Screaming Manta.  Tinray had made some bad trades in Zalut and was more than happy to take the heroes' gold with no questions asked.  Unfortunately, he also thought that the Manta was fast enough to outrun the storm that bore down on the ship several hours out from Zalut . . .