Play Report: Death Love Doom [LotFP]

I have been writing these play reports for my online Labyrinth Lord group, set around the City-State of the World Emperor. Since I spend so much time on them, I thought I'd share them here for everyone to peruse. This session actually took place last year, before we switched to online play a few months ago. This weekend we're also returning to Land's End - the fun never stops.

As one of my players said the other day: "your world has more shit to do than the real one right now!"

*****

2nd-12th Meadowlark, 4433

Characters

Aladar IX, M-U 1
"Sir Karavon" aka Tullius Jr, fighter 1
Lothos the Undesirable, elf 1
Eric Withakay, cleric 1
Meep, dwarf 1
Veigar Thricescarred, fighter 1


Leaving Drydale
(see last session)

After their torchlight exhumation, the gang re-interred the corpse of James Blake with a mocking note, taunting whoever might come searching afterwards for his journal and The Great Devourer.

"Meet on the 10th of Blackmoon in Viridistan. Under the Grand Red Statue, look for the man with twelve lit candles."

After recollecting their previous adventures, they decided to follow up a lead at the port of Targnol a few days travel away:

"The rich merchant Philotheos Sten hasn't been around lately. His large estate lies on the edge of town, and nobody has been seen coming or going for several days. Some fear the worst while others remark on the man's riches, accumulated through a lifetime of trading. A few thugs are going to case his place soon. You might be able to beat them to it and see what kind of loot is lying around!"

The port of Targnol was a sprawling mess of crumbling wooden buildings packed with Imperial sailors on leave, dockworkers, merchants, thieves and cutthroats. Notable buildings included a grand temple to Thoth and a mysterious black pyramid containing a sleeping sorceress within a glass coffin. The town offers a standing reward for anyone who can reawaken this mysterious ebony-skinned woman.

Not having an interest in that, the gang met with a local contact of Two-Faced Humphrey's (he had business back in Viridisan, and couldn't accompany them). The man was a sullen and scarred Viridian named Komang. He gave them some basics, and a few trips around town asking questions filled in the blanks:

- Philotheos and his family hadn't been seen in two weeks, but there had been no surge of activity suggesting they were moving house or taking an extended vacation. The current theory was sudden illness or foul play of some kind.
- Old Graham's Gang, a strange and mysterious crew of all-child thieves from the capital about whom rumours have swirled for years, were casing the place. They planned to raid it for valuables the next night. Komang offered to put the party in touch with them, but this offer was declined.
- Philotheos kept no personal guards, for he lived on the edge of town in a rich area patrolled by (notoriously lazy) Imperial troops.

The party pooled their money and bought a wagon and two horses. On the way up to Philotheos' mansion, Eric and "Sir Karavon" drove while the rest hid under some straw in the back, hoping the "knight" and priest would discourage prying eyes or nosy guardsmen.

As night drew down they pulled into the driveway and approached the great mansion. Disdaining to explore the large grounds, "Sir Karavon" knocked on the door and getting no response, opened it. A distant weeping could be heard, but no foes presented themselves.


Charnel Mansion

The party entered the lightless home and progressed through a set of double-doors into a large parlor and dining-room. The place was trashed. Plates and vessels broken, splashes of blood everywhere, and the source of the weeping: a young Viridian girl strung up to the chandelier, her innards hanging out in a bloody mess!

In terrible shape as she was, the girl regained some lucidity after being released from the chandelier. She told them her name was Ariel, and related a strange story:

“One night after dinner, Father told everyone that he had a very special present for Mother. It was a very pretty necklace! But then a big monster and two smaller monsters came out of the necklace! And the big monster told the smaller monsters to get the lovers, and they jumped on Father and Nanny Alba! Then Mother and Grandma started yelling at Father, and everyone ran away! Then Grandma came to get me... and now I’m here.”

The child's injuries were quite severe and the party wasn't sure if they could help her. In the meantime, they explored the dining room and parlour, spotting an oil painting of a newlywed couple with a copper nameplate that read:

Philotheos Sten and Domitilla Sten. Married Sunstrong 17, 4423

Mounted on the wall above the painting were two fine-looking crossed falcatas that looked functional enough. The group took all these items and left Ariel for the moment to continue exploring.

The two other rooms on the main floor turned out to be Philotheos' office and a conservatory. The centrepiece in the conservatory was a grand harp, and three statuettes of dark blue & yellow marble rested on the mantelpiece: a dragon, eagle and nymph. The group took all of these and loaded them into their cart.

In Philotheos' office, Lothos rifled the great oak desk and found stacks of business papers - deeds, shipping manifests, etc. He pocketed a stack to peruse later, along with a fine stiletto in one of the drawers. The group was drawn to the large, shining silvery cube in the back corner which turned out to be an advanced combination safe! Three number-wheels ranged from 1 to 20. After giving it some thought, they fetched the painting of the Stens' wedding-day from their wagon. Guessing that 17 and 8 were important (Sunstrong is the 8th month of the year), they tried a few combinations until hitting upon 17 - 8 - 1. The shining door swung open and revealed Philotheos' hidden fortune!

It was at this time that Lothos thought to consult the mysterious ancient tome in Eric's possession. Pricking his finger, he wrote on the pages in blood, describing the party's situation and what they knew. Oddly, the book had a ready answer! This disaster was likely caused by the gift Philotheos gave his wife. The book identified it as The Necklace of the Sleepless Queen. It was created long ago by someone called the Dead King, to destroy all love in the world.

Perturbed by this news and not wanting to meet Ariel's sadistic grandmother or the "monsters" spawned by the necklace, the party elected to start the mansion ablaze and retreat safely with their wealth. Aladar IX used his Unseen Servant to carry a torch around inside the house while the others barred the door to prevent any aberrations from escaping. They waited until flames were visible from outside, then rode out of Targnol full-tilt, their wagon full of loot.

Return To the Immortal City

On the road home, Lothos consulted the strange blood-drinking tome again, learning its name: Pheldrazash. It claimed to know many other secrets, and was willing to teach him and Aladar IX a spell that would expand their knowledge for free: Call to Familiar Spirit.

Two days' travel from Viridistan, the party approached the Great Wall: a colossal structure a quarter-mile high and 200 feet thick, built by the ancients in the dawning days of the world for reasons unknown to men. Approaching the eastern entrance, called the Moon Gate, they met a farmer on the road who told them a strange tale:

"Not too far from here, a brand-new building has sprung up overnight! It's a great structure in a bizarre foreign style, red stone and dark wood with a peaked black roof and pointed square towers, set back from the road on the edge of the Elsenwood. Travellers say it simply appeared one day with no signs of construction, no work crews, and certainly no negotiations with the elves who make the woods dangerous for honest Imperial folk!"

After hearing that rumour, the gang pressed on towards the City of Spices, glad to be home after their bizarre and harrowing journeys. To move their ill-gotten loot, Lothos travelled to the Otherside district where many of his elven kinfolk live in ghettos, segregated from the larger city. His cousin Darius said he "knew a guy," and a meeting could be arranged at the Plaza of Dark Delights that night. The sullen, cloaked Viridian who met Darius & the party was eager to buy most of their loot - his eyes lit up with greed at the sight of the gold trade bars. He wasn't especially interested in the painting, but kicked in a bit of silver for it as part of the whole deal.

Thousands of silver richer than they had ever been before, the party cast about for something to spend their money on. Someone had heard of a pleasure palace for the rich in the exclusive Cliffside district, called The Sign of Olive & Lotus. Anything could be had there for the right price: fine liquor, exotic foods, high-stakes games of chance, tantalizing companions and strange drugs.

Once again installing "Sir Karavon" in the front of their humble wagon, the group rode up the gates of Cliffside, waving their stolen deeds in the guards' faces. Suitably cowed by the presence of a knight who owned such property, they opened the gates. Following the main Cliffsedge Road, the party espied a beacon in the night. A lone tout, signalling late-night revellers down to his place of business, which turned out to be the very establishment they sought!

The Sign of Olive & Lotus was built right into the side of the cliffs, accessible only by narrow, ancient stair carved into the living rock. The view of Trident Gulf during the day is said to be unparalleled. Checking in cost a princely sum of 200 silvers per person per night, for the cheapest suites and a berth for the horses and wagon! The group was led through sparkling marble hallways by a mute eunuch wearing only a sash of gold lamé. Over carpets made from the skins of striped tigers and snow-white northern wolves, past doorways trimmed in gold leaf with smiling silk-clad houris the party reached their rooms.

With a bit of privacy for the first time in a while, Lothos and Aladar IX ignited the special incenses and herbs they had previously brought and each cast the spell that would summon a spiritual helper to their side: Call to Familiar Spirit.

This done, the gang prepared to party as only those in the Immortal City can...

Enemies Defeated: 

none

Treasure:

3 blue & yellow marble statues
1900 copper coins

633 silver coins

10 gold trade bars

a mound of gold & silver jewellery - necklaces, rings, bracelets, etc

portrait of Philotheos and Domitilla Sten, in frame

Ornate grand harp (planned to sell later)
fine stiletto (Lothos)
2 decorative falcatas (Lothos and Meep)
stack of Philotheos' documents, deeds, etc (Lothos)

Land's End Town Map

Once a staging-point for Imperial military ventures in the region, the town has since shrunk to a fraction of its former population, only farmers and fishermen. Almost all current residents live north of the river in newer adobe buildings, leaving the decaying army barracks-blocks on the south side alone. These decaying buildings can be had for cheap by outlaws, adventurers, eccentrics, and others with a few coins who make it to the last station before the edge of the world.

 The guys have been based out of this town for the entire campaign. After scouring the internet for a small farming village with a river going through the middle (seemed like it would be an easy thing to find...) with no luck, I decided to draw one myself. Came out half-decently I think, thanks to some internet tutorials - enough to fool my players into thinking I downloaded it from somewhere.

You'll notice there is no 7 on the map for "Home." That's because my players haven't picked out which house is theirs yet. Gotta make em do that before we play next, but I'm still working on the next ultra nasty dungeon, which will be a bit complicated and is taking me a long while. In the mean time, enjoy my hand-cramping digital artwork.

*****

Play Report: No Salvation For Witches! [LotFP]

The kickoff to my (currently online) Labyrinth Lord game based around the City-State of the World Emperor was last Halloween, when I ran an ostensible one-shot for my regulars and some of their friends who had never gamed before. 

I wrote this report up for all of them to read, and may as well share it with you folks here. Now that we're making progress in this campaign, you can expect other fun material forthwith. 

I also included what I thought would be a fun campaign kickoff, combined with NSFW - the adventure idea at the back of Kelvin Green's Forgive Us, called "Death And Taxes." Mixing these adventures together went pretty well, and of course I had to add in some of my own ideas as well. Later play reports will show that the PCs, in classic fashion, have not pursued ANY of the leads discovered in this session.

*****

NO SALVATION FOR WITCHES

1st Meadowlark, 4433

Characters

Aladar IX, half-elf M-U 1

Tullius Jr, human fighter 1

Lothos the Undesirable, elf 1

Eric Withakay, human cleric 1

Avala, human elementalist 1

Two-Faced Humphrey, human spy 1

Funeral For a Friend

The characters met at the funeral of James Blake, an old army buddy who died under mysterious circumstances. They assembled to pay their respects on the way to Drydale Priory where longstanding rumours suggested heretical activities and/or valuable treasure.

A neighbouring farmer was the only other attendee. He was confused that Bishop Gray hadn't sent at least a junior priest to officiate and worried about Blake's missing 11-year old daughter Deotina. He also mentioned a group of tax collectors had been asking questions, and asked the group to find out anything they could. A search of Blake's home turned up little except his old Legion gear and a scrap of paper torn from his diary about the taxmen. There were signs someone had packed and left in a hurry.

At the caravanserai, the party found human bodies everywhere killed and mutilated in the most horrible ways. The only two people left alive were a terrified, useless traveler named Arrerand and the concussed woman Naniela, who was beyond his power to help. She mumbled and raved about "red lights in the sky... the dancing woman with skin of diamonds" and clutched her bleeding head wound. Eric healed her injury and she became more lucid. The two helpless travelers were interrogated about the tax collectors and recent events but didn't know much. The party sent them on their way.

The priory itself was unreachable, covered by an impassable dome of lambent red light. Leaving it for the moment, the group proceeded to Drydale for clues and found the citizens in the middle of a witch trial! Leading the event was a thin, intense man named Kynnakon. Four women had already been killed and a fifth cried upon the scaffold, pleading for mercy. At the back of the village, a strange glow similar to the red dome could be seen.

Thinking quickly, Eric stepped in and engaged the man in a discussion about witches and their verification. As a man of the cloth his words carried weight on these matters and he convinced the crowd to disperse. Without his mob, Kynnakon was less confident. He released the "witch" Mertysa to the party's care and told them a strange story: six women had passed through towards the priory a few days ago armed and armoured, dressed in strange clothes. Since then all their livestock had died and they blamed witchcraft.

Lothos circled around the village to investigate the red glow. A small red sphere floated at head height, softly glowing. While the townsfolk were distracted he took it in his cloak and rejoined the group, who departed before the crowd's temper could change again. Returning to the priory, the small red sphere crumbled into dust, sympathetically bringing down the giant glowing dome and allowing entry. Unluckily for the elf, the sphere destroyed a few of his possessions as it vanished from the world - including his spellbook!

Inside The Priory

The party entered the grounds, avoiding the church for now. Searching the outbuildings revealed a succession of horrors - women giving birth to mutated children, a man and woman fused together while still alive and a puddle of fast-moving scarlet bile.

Outside the baths, they were greeted by an imposing figure - Sir Karavon, a knight in gleaming white plate mail. He demanded to know their business and claimed to serve the cause of Mistress Orelia. After all his tough talk, battle was inevitable. Lothos sustained a terrible blow from Karavon's greatsword but the group felled him together and stripped the body.

The group had had enough of these horrors. They barricaded the infirmary full of aberrant children and set the roof on fire. While they were debating their next move, Kynnakon arrived on the scene leading a small torch-and-pitchfork mob. The group took up ambush positions, Tullius Jr slipped inside incognito as Sir Karavon while Eric addressed the mob, whipping them into a witch-hunting frenzy.

Inside the church was a whirl of activity: dozens of peasant women dancing in a mad frenzy guarded by five heavily armed foreign women, overseen by two robed & hooded men and an ice-pale Avalonian sorceress in a red sash. Orelia called out to "Sir Karavon," asking the knight for a report. Tullius Jr indicated the angry mob outside and mobilized the warrior-women to battle, remaining indoors at Orelia's side in case of emergency.

Battle was joined in front of the church! The Five Bishops (as they called themselves) guarded the door in a wedge formation, bravely meeting the mob's charge. What they weren't prepared for was the party's vicious ambush: Humphrey ran up behind one for a backstab while Aladar and Lothos peppered them from a safe distance. The Bishops couldn't withstand this assault for long and began a fighting retreat into the church. This turned out to be a mistake, as the mob charged in and held the door open! Things began to happen very quickly. Tullius Jr showed his true colours when he struck Orelia by surprise with his greatsword, nearly killing her in one strike. Retaliation with her magic wand did not have its intended effect. Two-Faced Humphrey ran around to the back and climbed up to a window for a surprise attack. Eric began smashing windows which allowed Lothos, Aladar and Avala to take up firing positions.

In a deft use of magic, Aladar used his Unseen Servant to snatch Orelia's magic wand right from her hand before she could use it again. Tullius' greatsword finished her off after that. With magical support from Avala's earth elementine, a diving attack by Humphrey and a magical grasping fist from Aladar, the two robed figures were destroyed and revealed to be only the flayed skins of men animated by Orelia's witchcraft.

With all opponents defeated, the mob began dragging the dancers off the platform and the party felt the beginnings of a tremor run through the building. Thinking quickly they fled the scene just in time for the church to come crashing down in a blaze of light and magic, killing or wounding all inside! The rubble began to burn, but Eric and Humphrey dragged over a tub of water from the baths, buying everyone time to sift the wreckage, rescue a few townsfolk and recover some valuables and the mysterious book they originally sought.


Exhumation

The smoky priory grounds were visited by a new group - the much-talked-about tax collectors! Their leader was a turbaned Viridian named Irmugar, sent by the Padishah to investigate rumours that Blake had stolen or unreported wealth. They seemed not to know he was dead. The party convinced the taxmen to take the peasant survivors back to Drydale - Irmugar indicated Tullius Jr and agreed the situation was well in hand with a "Knight of the Cockatrice" present. But something else he said got the group thinking...

The adventure ended where it began with the party exhuming James Blake by torchlight. Inside his coffin with his body was a locked oak box. Prying it open revealed a battered knife in an old scabbard, a locket containing a single golden hair, Blake's diary and a strange leatherbound book called The Great Devourer.

Eric meanwhile was perusing the blackened tome he had found in the rubble and touched its faded pages with his bloodstained hands. They blossomed into fresh crimson runes and symbols, while words formed in Imperial: "Greetings. Whom do I have the pleasure of addressing?"

ENEMIES DEFEATED

Charles & Gwendolin
the scarlet bile
Sir Karavon
"The Five Bishops"
Orelia Woolcott
2 animated skin guardians

TREASURE

Sir Karavon's white plate mail & greatsword (Tullius Jr.)

Assorted armour, weapons and ammunition from the Bishops (various)

Orelia's ivory-tipped magic wand (Aladar IX) and red sash (Tullius Jr.)

A mysterious blackened tome (Eric)

Blake's diary (Aladar IX)

The Great Devourer (Lothos)

Locket with a golden hair (Eric)

Silver drinking horn, carved with runes and studded with garnets, slightly scuffed (640 sp)

A silver-gilt radiated brooch ringed with amethysts (1200 sp)

Solid-gold decorative phallus (800 sp)

Treasure value: 2640 sp

Each character gets 440 sp and 490 xp

*****

Don't worry - more Land's End material is in progress. Honestly the biggest obstacle to my blogging is that I'm gaming more often than I'm used to! It's a great problem to have, but one I was unfamiliar with before now.

E6: Overleveling yourself for fun & profit

I haven't been blogging as much of late because I've spent all my time prepping for our online q-teen game in the City-State of the World Emperor. I have a big pool of players and it's a lot of fun, but we are playing more frequently than I'm used to! As the game develops I'll eventually have a backlog of material that I can share, but for now I am focusing on the most immediately useful stuff.

Here's a post I've been thinking about for a while, as I look to the future of the Land's End game:

What Happens After 6th Level?

Epic 6: The Game Inside The World's Most Popular Roleplaying Game.

Go read it, I'll wait.
Back?
Good.

This modification to the core of 3.x/d20 is the only way I will consent to playing damned Mathfinder. It allows me to chop, flog and edit the system to my heart's content without fretting overly about the rules not working consistently across all 20 levels. If it works with normal humans and 1st level characters, a modification will probably be fine at level 6.

The party just reached level four, and I have to start thinking about how to handle the PCs reaching level 6. More feats will be necessary, obviously. But I think the fun of E6 will be attempting epic-level stuff. Killing legendary monsters, stealing the golden fleece, things that heroes of legends do. When all you get is one fireball, you'd better make it count. How else can the players make the best use of their power in the game world?

First of all, the core tenets of E6 won't change:


Six Hit Dice
It doesn't matter how many cool abilities you have - falling off a cliff, being swallowed whole by a dragon or chopped up by a motivated mob of lowly orcs are all deadly. That doesn't mean you can't take feats like Toughness to get more hit points, of course.


BAB +6
Feats could give situational bonuses and modifiers, or allow fighters to chain up to feats that require a higher BAB. But the whole idea is that the best swordsmen in the world are only a certain degree above a normal human.

Look at it this way: a 0-level peasant with a +5 sword (a godlike weapon, impossible for normal humans to make) is almost even with a 6th-level master armed with his old campaigning sword. I love that symmetry.


No Generalized Power Increases
Bonuses after 6th should improve specific aspects of the character, not upgrade their overall power level. Anything that increases a character's power across multiple dimensions (like lycanthropy increasing hit points, attack bonus, armour class, etc) should come with stiff drawbacks or be only situationally useful.


Extraordinary Results Require Extraordinary Effort
Not a core tenet of E6, but it flows from what I'm thinking about. Taking your allotted feats after sixth level is the natural order of things. Spending a feat or two to take abilities from a prestige class or something takes extra XP, but no extra work.

PCs who want to go above and beyond need to go on quests, consult sages, spend money, peruse forgotten tomes, take risks, utilize lost treasures, risk sanity loss, etc. in addition to gaining the required XP. All the good player-directed adventuring sandbox stuff that I try to encourage!


A Dangerous World
It should be obvious, but things ramp up at this level. Not as dangerous as your standard level 1-20 world - after all, part of the E6 magic is that the ecology of the game world can be at least a bit fucking comprehensible. The world nevertheless needs dreadful monsters that can't be defeated readily in a straight-up fight. Why bother opening up the Necronomicon and risking mutation & madness on the off-chance your wizard can make all his rolls and learn Finger of Death - unless you really need it to kill the dreaded Sludge Dragon of the Drowned Lands and your solitary 3rd-level spell won't cut it?

Players that reach 6th and become "epic level" might think they have no need to take risks. Epic 6 should be more like finishing an apprenticeship: a license to take on bigger challenges, and a sign that your initial 'adventurer puberty' of rapid learning and growth is over. Development now takes hard work.

Epic Problems require Epic Solutions.

E6 POWER-UP METHODS

Finding The Weird Stuff
The most basic option. The epic-level dungeons in Land's End are plentiful: the Tomb of Abysthor, catacombs beneath the lost city, serpent-men ruins, other dimensions, crashed alien... well, I've said too much already. All of these ultra-dangerous dungeons are crammed with as much cool shit as I can fit, and none of it is available anywhere else in the setting. Balancing that out are brutal traps and hordes of tough foes. Most of these locales are optional, extremely hard to find/get into, or both.


Magic Item Creation
A classic of high-level play. In E6, level limits on feats still apply. Based on the feat requirements in the PF core rulebook, 6th-level casters can create scrolls, potions, wondrous items, wands, magic arms & armour. Rods, staves & rings are beyond mortal abilities completely (LotR anyone?).

Of course some items in each of these categories are beyond a 6th-level caster anyway. A +2 enhancement bonus and a handful of special properties (distance, merciful & thundering) are all the magic weapons a 6th-level enchanter can create. This is perfect for me - even aligned weapons (axiomatic, etc) are beyond the PCs' ability, as they're products of extraplanar energies.

If the PCs want even better magical gear, they need to pick up the various lost relics & demon-haunted weapons throughout the landscape, grappling with their personalities, properties & curses.

Of course the long & more fun way is available also. Through mighty deeds, the players may create weapons normally impossible for mortal 6th-level heroes, and these weapons will hopefully pass on into song & story after their adventuring careers are over, where a more straightforward sword +2 created by choosing a feat and spending money (yawn....) will not.


Covenants
You all know how much I love Dark Souls and Warhammer!

Entering into a pact with one of the ruinous powers usually helps out. For a while, anyway. None of the PCs are Lawful, so it seems pointless to even detail the benefits those entities would grant. Instead, I'll work up more chaos patron tables for Abraxas, Tsathoggua, Jubilex, maybe a few others as the setting demands. If the PCs want to sign on with the forces of darkness, that's fine with me (they aren't too far off as of now).

Meanwhile, some ancient beings survive from the times before mankind. If they could be bargained with, perhaps their secrets can be learned (this is a subset of Finding the Weird Stuff). For example, the sorcerous giant Nibolcus (see The Man From Before) knows magics long lost to the world. At what price would he take on a new student?

Mutations
I mentioned a giant mutation chart in an old post a while back. Very difficult to control, but maybe a "potion of beneficial mutation" (or an updated version) could be found or created that would limit the number of really harsh effects. Probably too risky for the fearful players in my game, but might come up as a desperate gambit or side-effect of something else. The Metamorphica will come in handy here.


Night Hag
Wouldn't give your witchy PC more levels, but upgrades your Hit Dice and give you more spells at the cost of stat & alignment change, some new vulnerabilities, being cast out of polite society and having to help your coven with various tasks. The process for this will be similar to lichdom - an esoteric ritual known only to few. There is a witch in the swamp attempting this right now, maybe she can be persuaded to give up her secrets? (also see Witchy Wednesday)


Lycanthropy
Easy to contract, hard to get rid of. We know the rules. The dread forvalaka roams the wilderness, so the changing disease could be contracted during the normal course of the game if the PCs aren't careful. The weakest form of transformation probably. It's hard to control and comes with serious drawbacks (I'll be using that chart in the AD&D DMG) but it could be narrowly useful for a fighter or barbarian who needs an edge from time to time.


Vampirism
So far there is one vampire in the setting, a hold-over from a bygone age. Trapped in a lead coffin, it has been waiting for centuries, hopelessly mad. Letting it out is probably a big mistake... but in a land covered in perpetual clouds, being a vampire might not be so bad? Increased stats, undead immunities and some great special abilities make this transformation a great move in a setting with very few high-level clerics. This option is open to PCs, but then we'll have to mess with templates and it will be a real fiddle-fuck. And of course the trapped vampire might just kill them all.



Lichdom
There are a few liches in the region. Mostly they are happy to kill anyone they see, but one of them can be negotiated with. Prying his secrets will be a serious challenge but it could happen. Certainly this would lead to some great immunities, better hit dice and perhaps some more spell slots - I'll have to give it some thought, and dig up PF's stupid rules for templates.

Vagelis Petikas

Other Undead
Servants of Orcus (see link above) might be turned into skeletons, zombies or ghouls up to 6th level, or perhaps wights if they have a great deal of experience beyond 6th. There are other undead in the wilderness that might strike the players and transform them - shadows, ghosts, etc. Still, this is more of a fail state than anything the players will likely aspire to. If they do get transformed, I will offer them the option of continuing play as an undead character with all the relevant drawbacks or relegating the unfortunate to NPC status (possibly a new villain).


Brainstormer/Fuse Meister
Sort of like special cases of lichdom. These two are much more difficult to make work as PCs, and perhaps I'll leave as antagonists, unless someone is really that crazy!


Destiny
As I said back in this post about the black pyramid:

"Ivory Tablets: One of the many long term sub-sub-subplots of the campaign. My attempt to fix the stupid Deck of Many Things into a powerful divination tool & force to rewrite one's destiny. Created by the high elves 5000 years ago. The individual "cards" must be assembled and brought to the shrine of Divine Providence deep beneath the Lost City where the Chthonic Elves dwell. I haven't decided what each card does yet, but I really dug myself in deep with this one. All the major arcana and 4 cards from each suit, for a total of 38!"

Well, luckily Mithril & Mages pointed me in the right direction. Dragon Magazine #77 has rules for an expanded Deck of Many Things based on all the tarot cards. Awesome! The powers aren't annoying things like "dead" or "gain 100,000 xp," rather stat changes (I'll rule that this can increase above normal maximums), strange events in one's life, saving throw modifiers, gaining tremendous wealth or losing all your money, getting pranked by magical creatures, etc. Very cool stuff and if the PCs ever assemble the deck (a tall order indeed, considering where a few of the cards are kept!) they can try their luck with it.


*****

[EDIT: I forgot about the cards! Getting back into a setting you haven't looked at in a few months can take a bit of work...]

As you can see there are plenty of options for the power-hungry player character. Whether they take any of these, well... that remains to be seen. My next move is to seed clues, hints & fragments pointing towards these options throughout the world. Off I go to do that, and write up some more big dungeons. Excelsior!

Keying my Hexcrawl

In a comment on the last Land's End play report, GFC wrote:

[... I'd love to read more about these factions, and your process for prepping these richly detailed hexmaps. Looking forward to reading more play reports!]


*****

Thanks for the commentary, GFC!

My hex-stocking procedure is painfully slow and perhaps not worth emulating. After playing music for 20 years and D&D for closer to 25 (wow!), I have learned a little bit about my creative process. The best bloggers that I read seem to be able to create their own settings top-to-bottom (or nearly so), while I will always be using a lot of existing material, and perhaps stitching it together in an interesting way if I'm lucky.

When I do dream up something creative & interesting, it tends to come damnably slow. Nevertheless, I have fumbled along despite these handicaps and built Land's End in the following way. I hope it may provide some help in your own games.

My basic ideas are not too far from Blair's classic How I key a Hex Map.
There are tons of other guides on the basics of hexmapping out there for those who are new to it, so I'll just leave this starting point here for those who might be interested: Hexcrawl Resources at Ars Phantasia

Almost two years of exploration

Starting Out

I began with a mental picture of the campaign setting: a "lost world" cut off from civilization. The adventurers leaving known territory and mapping brand-new lands, scattered with the remains of former empires. I wanted an aesthetic of cavemen, lizardfolk, swamps and jungle ruins. That suggested locations, terrain & possible encounters to start with.

In two years of play, my group has travelled halfway across my 8.5"x11" paper map of six-mile hexes on the long axis, and three quarters of the way on the short axis. They have by no means seen everything within that area, either (as you can see on the map above). I usually only have 20-ish hexes stocked that they haven't been to yet. Just enough that I have my bases covered if they take a wrong turn. I come up with new locations quite slowly.

What helps is that travel in jungles & swamps is slow - the players can't get far in a day even at light encumbrance (they take pains to never get weighed down with too much stuff) so I only need a few extra hexes stocked in any direction. They often revisit the same adventure locations multiple times for various reasons (strategic chokepoints, stocking up on resources, landmarks and paths through the jungle, to say nothing of repeat dungeon delves). The region is small but has become dense with connections and history.

See: Shallow & Deep Wilderness Sandboxes


Grab From Everywhere

I have praised d4 Caltrops before on this blog. A huge number of my hex locations are from his "100 Wilderness Hexes" document. This thing is fantastic, so check it out. Many of the hexes interconnect with each other (especially the swamp hexes), which adds further layers of adventure possibility. I have taken many of these and spun them into a whole game session, or connected them to something across the map for my players to go check out.

See: 100 Wilderness Hexes

You might have a few modules gathering dust on your shelf that you'd like to include on your map. So far I have added the The Tomb of Abysthor, The Spire of Quetzel and a few two-pagers from the excellent Trilemma Adventures compendium.

Modules aren't just useful for saving time. Each one added to your setting can be spun off into new elements if you put a little effort in. Using The Tomb of Abysthor for example, I reworked the included wilderness locations into larger, more detailed locales. I created more NPCs for the cult of Orcus and the Tsathar, spread them around the hexmap, added them to the region's encounter tables and gave them new lairs, dungeons, motivations, things to do, equipment & treasure, etc. All of a sudden, a single dungeon module has added a new layer of texture & meaning to the world. Even if they never set foot inside, the players will get involved with the dungeon's factions and NPCs one way or another. Do this for three or four modules and you should have a whole campaign's worth of material in no time.


Random Generation

Sometimes you get stuck, and that's OK. Judges Guild is here to help: go get the Wilderness Hexplore Document. Compiled based on material from the Ready Ref Sheets and elsewhere, it amounts to a complete random wilderness stocking system. I don't use it that way exactly - I roll on it for ideas when I can't think of anything. It gives just enough detail to jog the mind into doing something new. You might also try the Tome of Adventure Design, some of the tables at the back of the DMG, or another of your favourites.


Example

I was stocking the Drowned Lands (the great swamp at the centre of the hexmap, where the lizardmen live) and after 20 or so hexes, I felt a bit gassed. I opened up the tables and this is what happened:

Rolling on the feature table on pg. 8 gives a result of 7 - Temples & Shrines. I roll for the temple's size & shape (an obelisk of metal), age, number of followers, type and number of leadership, treasury (very important for PCs), the type of shrine (a holy statue), defensive measures and traps, effects of defiling the shrine, the deity's sphere of influence and plenty of other things. Occasionally results need to be tweaked to fit the system (there are no 11th level clerics in Land's End!).

Rolling for the deity's appearance resulted in these traits: goddess; elf; alien; wasp wings. That sounded familiar, so I dug through the Book of the Damned (one of the few Pathfinder books I actually like). I found the Oni Daimyo pictured below, whose divine portfolio matched some of the random table results and gave me more useful details. Jumping back & forth between various books like this really works for me.

Putting it all together I get this basic hex info:


Hex 0612 -TEMPLE OF INMA - Obelisk of unknown metal, surrounded by 40’ walls adorned with tallow candles & reed torches. 23 chthonian elf worshippers inside, led by triumvirate of priests (Cle 2nd, 4th, 4th). Statue of goddess Inma, "The Empress of the World" has three eyes, four arms, alien features and wasp wings. An obscure demoness of blood who bestows wealth on worshippers when appropriate sacrifices are made. The temple is rich and fanatical.

Ceremonies: Regularly at dusk (all - public, lizardman blood), midnight (high priests - public, platinum) and dawn (high priests only, copper). Special ones - a month of fasting and prayer, the longest day of the year, goddess’ “day of death,” death of a high priest. 


This only leads to more questions. Who built this place? What is the obelisk actually made of? What do Inma's worshippers want with treasure, anyway? Where do they get the coinage for their sacrifices? Why risk death at the hands of lizardfolk? Are the clergy isolationist hermits, or will they deal with the outside world? How are relations with the lizardfolk who (at least nominally) control the whole swamp? Are they apostates from chthonic elf society, or does Inma have a place in their larger pantheon? How will they react to the PCs: as allies, enemies, potential sacrifices or something else?

Answering these might result in a dumb adventure location or something fun & memorable. The effects might spiral outwards and change any number of things in your game world. I don't have it all figured out yet. The important thing is that I now have something I wouldn't have made up myself, and I can flesh it out and see where things lead. The setting just got slightly more complex, more textured.

The Wilderness Hexplore Document is quite wide-ranging. It could just as easily have given me a ruined bridge; a sunken canoe guarded by giant frogs; or a castle with a samurai and his djinn servant (I have rolled all these before). Adapting & reskinning the results to my game world is always an enjoyable exercise that expands my thinking about the setting and fills in details that I otherwise would never have included.

Putting it All Together

This is where two DMs with the same raw material might run completely different games. Remember that aesthetic I mentioned earlier? I think of it as a filter. Everything I use from a module or blog, everything I roll on a random table - it all gets filtered through my own view of the setting, tweaked a little bit until it gels, and then set down.

There is no strict hierarchy or step-by-step procedure to follow. I like to bounce around between all these options as the mood strikes me. When I get stuck, I change my approach and continue. At a certain point you have to trust yourself to make the connections, to adjust elements to fit into a larger structure that only you can see.

See: The Dirt Cheap Sandbox

I hope these examples are useful. Read the links, because those guys usually say it better than I can. If I missed something, let me have it in the comments!


*****

It's funny to be writing about my wilderness hexcrawl while I'm neck-deep in keying a gigantic city sandbox for a different game with some new people. It's proving to be quite the unfamiliar challenge!

And now for a bit of classic '90s gaming music.

Random Monster Generator Shootout 6 - Blogosphere Rabbit Hole Remix!

So I stumbled across this somehow.
Probably on MeWe, where I follow some cool kids.
If you use it too, add me eh?

From that link I checked out several different monster generators on a few blogs, including some linked from the comments. Here is what I discovered:


*****

BUILT BY GODS LONG FORGOTTEN
Monster Remixes - links are on the right side of that page

Released as PDFs, one for each monster category (as delineated by Sham here). These are wild. I really wish they were compiled in one giant pdf document, but they were written years ago so what can you do?

Each one consists of a single page. They basically strip apart the traits, characteristics & special abilities of a particular category or flavour of monster, and spread them out across a series of tables. Each one is different, and the formatting & layout are all over the place. Let's look at the categories:

-"Beasts" of Fey Woodlands: animals with fairy tale abilities
-Humanoids of Fey Woodlands: elves, pixies and the like
-Dragons, Dragonesques & Chimera: an odd one, dragons share a page with grab-bag mixed animal shape beasts
-Esoteric Animals: random mundane animals with strange abilities
-Gorgons, Lycanthropes & Gargoyles: any monster that turns you to stone, or changes shape
-Humanoids: people-types, where they lair, what they look like and some of their behaviours
-Humans: for determining the size, composition and traits of a human fighting force
-Slimes, Molds and Jellies!: just like it says
-The Otherworldly: elementals & similar beings
-Undead: you get it

Let's have a few examples.

ESOTERIC ANIMALS
Type: cat
Size: large, horse-sized (3 HD)
Number: small group (d10)
Esoteric Trait: holding or touching one confers immunity to petrification

Well, that's an odd one...

UNDEAD
Form: corpse, child
Descriptor: bandaged (d8 damage)
Attacks: Mob, affected by normal weapons (-2 HD); Summons rats 3/day (+1 HD)
Vulnerabilities: magic, wood
HD: 3
AC: 5
No. Appearing: 3d6

This is good! A pack of bandaged-up children's corpses that can summon a horde of rats! Very Silent Hill. Perhaps they have a hive-mind and are treated as a single creature? Creepy.

DRAGONS, DRAGONESQUE & CHIMERA
Type: Chimera
Body: Big Cat (d8 damage)
Tail: Dragon (+1 AC, extra attack)
Wings: Yes
Trait: Headless Toothy Maw (swallowed if hit, or damage if body too large to swallow)
HD: 5
AC: 4
Attacks: 2*1d8
No. Appearing: 1d4

A great cat with a dragon's tail & wings and a fanged mouth instead of a head? That sounds hella gross and pretty cool. I am imagining a great cat-version of the Gaping Dragon from Dark Souls. I imagine it might be able to swallow a halfling whole, but not a human. Still would make a great abomination for the heroes to fight!

I must say that these really exceeded my expectations! A little recombination of familiar elements can yield cool results, and I would happily use these monsters in my game. If I had a complaint about these generators, it would be a matter of scope. The undead table will only give you undead, the slimes & molds table will only give you slimes & molds. The tables seem to only include possibilities that already exist in the monster books, and few (if any) new additions by the author. You won't find an undead monster with a breath weapon or an ooze that can drain levels. Also, these pdfs are laid out a bit crudely and are sometimes tough to parse, if that's important to you.

Having said that, the results you get are pretty damn cool. If you want a lightning-fast generator that'll give you a monster blending familiar elements in a new way, these will do that.

How Many Rolls: Lowest is 3, most common 5, highest extreme for one of the pages is 14.
Would I use these in the middle of a session: Yes. The upside of using familiar elements is the short learning curve. If I needed a monster was just a bit different (instead of completely crazy like what the RECG turns out), I could easily turn to these tables.
Variety and Reusability: Limited variety. But the reusability is good, as you can mix these basic elements together extensively.





SAVE VS. DRAGON
d30 Generators - there are quite a lot of them. If you just want the monsters, better to go to the post on DIY and dragons linked at the top, which links the monster generators individually.

This guy has a TON of different generators. Mr. LeBlanc also wrote the d30 Sandbox Generator (which I quite liked and perhaps should review some day soon). For now, we'll stay on topic with the monster tables. LeBlanc has done so many of these, they are all small one-page affairs but each one is a really nice-looking pdf, laid out cleanly and professionally. Far better than I could do in a month, and he seems to knock them out in a day! I found 29 of these one-page monster generators in a few minutes on his site.

They seem to take a few forms. For humanoids (bandits, elves, dwarves, berserkers, goblins, gnolls, things like that) there is a standard layout. The first table is "Group Background/Descriptions," with motivations and organizational cues for the group, like "explorers: lost as a result of a dwarvish prank" or "tribal unit/thugs: seeking slaves." This is a good start. Then we have "No. Appearing," which doubles as a leader/champion generator. Then "Arms/Armour/Mounts," which offers a bit of variety (orcs with flails riding dire wolves, or orcs with axes & crossbows? etc).

This is a basic template which is departed from in some cases: the orc page has an "Orc Tribe Name" table (like "vicious bone" and "baneful axe"), the berserker page has a "Celebrate Victory By..." table. These add some welcome colour if you're stuck trying to think of something.

Other creature types have completely different generators. Generally the less humanoid the creature is, the more different its page. I approve of this. The Sea Creature Generator comes with nice little pictures to illustrate various aquatic body shapes, and an old woodcut in the corner of some great beast smashing a ship. The Fiend Generator is the only two-page entry, and looks fun. Let's try a few:

BERSERKERS
Group Background/Description: transporting captives to use as slaves
Celebrate Victory By: cutting off opponents' hands and feet
No. Appearing: 20
Additional Fighters: 2 1st-level, 1 2nd-level, 1 7th-level subchief
Motivation: bloodlust
Weapon: polearm

Huh, that's quite detailed! I'll wager this would add some excitement to your "(3d10) Men, Berserkers" on the standard encounter table. Maybe the party comes across them just as they're be-handing a few victims and tying up the survivors as captives? Or maybe they carry the severed hands of their victims on big garlands? Either way it's going to be harsh!

FIENDS
General Form: ape-like
Size: medium
Base HD: 5
Visage: stretched
Body Shape/Muscle: skeletal, +0 HD
Body Surface/Density: hairy/bristled, thin (+1 AC)
Back/Wings: crested, insect-like
Appendages: 2 short arms, 6 long legs
Hand/Arm Features: animal-like talons
Foot/Leg Features: octopus-like suckers
Head: goat-like
Head Adornment: grotesque spine
Eyes: amber, multi-faceted
Ears/Mouth: trumpet-like, gaping toothed
Special Abilities: immunity: acid, electricity; electric breath; gas breath; regeneration; paralyzing touch
Talon Damage: 1d8
Bite Damage: 2d4

What...

the...

FUCK.

I love it! This can go on the shelf with Appendix D, which I reviewed in the very first edition of RMGS! This monster is very difficult to picture, which is honestly what I want in a demon generator. I will 100% use this, guaranteed. Top tier. Seal of fucking approval.

How Many Rolls: Many are only 3 rolls. Some only 1. The most complex might have 5 or 6, except the Fiend Generator which has 15+!
Would I use these in the middle of a session: Fuck yes. Not the Fiend Generator though, it's in a class of its own.
Variety and Reusability: Well. If you have stuff like Berserkers, Goblins and Orcs on your encounter table, there is simply no reason not to use these! Having said that, these tables don't really 'interlock' like some random monster generators in a way that would give you 13,000 possible results or what-have-you. What they can do is add variety & interest for those bog-standard monsters on your encounter table that we're all used to. Go check them out!




OLD GUARD GAMING
The Unexpurgated Dragon Generator

This blog has been around for a long time, and I never came across it. It's really good. I'm just going to quote Palmer at length here:

"...I make a distinction between monsters (species in the Gygaxian Naturalism tradition), and MONSTERS (unnatural unique creatures which don't have to follow the rules of Nature). I employ both in my own Greyhawk, and my players can never be certain just what the hell they're up against in any given encounter. It adds spice to the game and checks the overconfidence that leads to complacency and boredom. Dragons especially seem to get over-defined in the game. Ancient and medieval dragons were extremely varied in form. Like elves and goblins and such in myth, they were rarely described in the same way consistently.
A randomly generated dragon will bring to your game some of that fear of the unknown which was the norm for people before the reign of technology."

That's what I'm talking about. This generator randomly determines age, size, hit dice and attacks like you'd expect. Also there are tables for special attacks & defenses, unique breath weapons, colours, special motivations and other strange things. I'll just show you with an example:

Int: very

AL: lawful

Age: adult (5 hp/die)

Size: enormous

AC: 6

HD: 11-14
Move: 9 ground/24 flying
Attacks: 2
Damage: 2-12, 2-12
Breath Weapon: cone of sound (1-8 dmg per hit die, save or be deafened permanently)
General Characteristics: construct
General Form: serpentine, bipedal rear legs, forearms, wings
Primary/Secondary colours: red, black
% in Lair: 10%
Speaking: Yes
Magic Use: No
Sleeping: Yes
Purpose or Obsession: to accumulate treasure
Allies/Minions: a non-dragon mate (the dragon is capable of breeding with other creatures!)

Wow, what to make of this one? A construct dragon with a monstrous mate? Perhaps it's a fleshly dragon-golem of some kind, created or commissioned by its mate for companionship, like the Bride of Frankenstein? Maybe a robo-dragon that found another robot to team up with, and they're building a new monstrous "child"? I could just throw this thing at my players, or I could sit down and explore the possibilities. Seems like there is a whole adventure or two in here if you want it. Awesome.

How Many Rolls: 26-32!
Would I use this in the middle of a session: Hmmm it's pretty long. It wouldn't be my first choice under time pressure. If I needed a dragon that quickly, I'd use stock stats and roll on a few of these tables to turn it away from the norm just slightly.
Variety and Reusability: Well... you're going to get a dragon. But since dragons are normally all the same, I'd say you could reuse this basically forever!


IN CONCLUSION

I thought this series had run out of steam. I'm glad to be proved wrong by folks releasing cool things on their blogs. No glossy books or fancy production values (well, LeBlanc's pdfs are a bit fancy).

If I could only pick one favourite, it's a toss-up between LeBlanc's Fiend Generator and the Unexpurgated Dragon Generator. Obviously the utterly bizarre multiplicity of demonic forms is a topic very close to my heart. But that dragon generator, man... it's a thing of beauty. The fact is that I will use almost everything I looked at today (except the orc generator, because I don't have orcs in my campaign setting!).

Just go out and download 'em, okay?


*****

Well this has rambled on for quite a while. Time to relax!!

Play Report: Return to Land's End - Catching Up

OKAY, OKAY.

I should have learned by now not to say "next, I'm going to..." because my plans are instantly upended. The new drop-in, large-party city game set in the City-State of the World Emperor has been put on hold, for obvious reasons. Instead we've been playing in Land's End with my roommates while my brother joins in over Google Hangouts. We are up to session 18 or so, and things are getting really interesting.

I have been reading various folks throughout the blogosphere mentioning how important actual play reports are. I find them very hard to write, but I do like a challenge! I will say that it's great to have comprehensive summaries I can look back on in the future. I'll endeavour to bring us up to speed on the last year (!!!) of gameplay, by touching on the main points:

CAST

Vuk Thuul - wild half-elf serpent oracle, in search of his mysterious origins
Nahash - lizardman barbarian, cast out from the Black Wings for a crime he didn't commit
Liliana Vess - sylph witch, on the run from Imperial witch-hunters


THE WHITE TOWERS

The party explored partially buried towers built by the ancient snake-men. One spiralled upwards, the other downwards (on the inside) in defiance of all physical laws. The observatory at the top of this tower faced subjectively "down" into the sky - none of the party were brave enough to jump out and see what happened, although they got a demonstration later.

Many clues were found. The snake-men had computers made of metal, plastic and crystal, powered by glass spirit-bottles. (See the Stygian Library for more details.) Only some lucky rolls by Vuk Thuul to recall his dreams at the standing stone allowed interpretation of the language and controls, and he managed to type in a few questions. They learned of the long-lost Bright Empire, which once covered the known world, and several names for Vuk Thuul's mysterious infernal patron, Abraxas - "Cruelty of the Heavens," "Master of the Final Incantation," "The Fourth Way Through Immeasurable Darkness," etc. The library of metallic scrolls in the tower was described as a shrine to this very entity, but none of the scrolls were deciphered.

Wisely bypassing two or three altars to strange & forgotten gods of chaos, they came to a room with seven great sarcophagi. Each the resting-place of a snake-man champion of old. Some held monsters, like the necrophidius that nearly killed them all on the bridge in a tense end-of-session fight: Vuk Thuul tried to grapple it and nearly fell off the bridge, then Leliana cast enlarge on Nahash and the raging barbarian bull-rushed it over the side.

Others had treasure of immense value: like a colossal snake-man greatsword too big for human use, or the False Eye of Abraxas, an artifact which grants insight into the nature of things by allowing the user to view a realm of pure information. Nobody had the stomach for removing their own eye to make room for it, and so it rests in their house in Land's End, nothing but a strange curio (for now).

One of the sarcophagi was packed completely full of tiny spiders, spilling out over Nahash in a flood! While the PCs ran away, the vermin scuttled down the stairwell to the observatory and 'fell' out of the top, flying into the sky and scattering all over the jungle! Will this deed haunt them in the future, or indeed change the ecology of the jungle?

Yes.

The party killed the huge & hungry spider-women infesting the tower, but not without Vuk Thuul suffering immense CON damage from their acidic bites (this would become a theme in his life). This endeared them to the Caiman tribe, who could see his battle-scars with their own eyes. The caimans are their devoted friends now, and the party has been gifted some of the tarnished silver rings they wear.


PUSHING SOUTH

Jeregosh, leader of the the Caimans told them about a great field of cairns & barrows to the south, and they travelled in that direction, completely missing it. Instead, they found a great silver tower on a hill, surrounded by a ruined curtain wall. It glowed and shone even under the clouded sky, flickering blue-green afterimages. They opened the grand doors and saw two great vulture-headed demons bearing polearms, who croaked "ahhhh... guests!" Immediately they slammed the doors shut and ran.

Wandering back to the broken stone road, they followed it west towards the cliffs. The land became grey and dead, even the dense jungle undergrowth thinning out. At the bottom of the cliff they found the great pit of bones, and entered the Tomb of Abysthor.

This didn't last long either, as the endless skeletons issuing from the Font of Bones inside eventually put them off exploring. They tried smashing, Mending, and casting any spell they could think of to shut it down, but wave after wave of skeletons drove them away.

To the north, they found a sacred cave inhabited by the hostile Wolf-totem tribesmen and slaughtered them all. Looted some nice gear, including a fossilized shark-jawbone mask which spews forth a black gas of confusion. What I wasn't expecting was for Vuk Thuul to go full fucking Colonel Kurtz and hang the Wolf shaman's corpse upside-down in front of the cave entrance, the mark of the demon Abraxas burnt into his chest!

What the PCs didn't know at this time was that this sacred cave was devoted to the demon of beasts, rage and hunting, called Droquatraxl. Is this the beginning of a new infernal power-struggle? We'll see...


DOWNTIME

They bought a house in town and dug a storage room out beneath it, using Mending to seal up the floorboards after placing their loot inside. After this they started spending more time in town, and I eventually realized the error of my ways in making this last-stop podunk town too conservative. I basically told the lizardman's player that I would start making the town weirder so that he would fit in a little better.

The first oddball NPC that showed up was Baridian, a scarred, taciturn monk devoted to a secret cult called the Postulants of the New Sun. He has gradually been attempting to recruit the PCs to his side, inviting them to the secret meetings he holds in town where he sits & preaches from inside a brazier full of hot coals! The players attended a few holiday festivals and met some of the Altanians who live a barbaric life in the hills and mountains. They recruited one named Bolgrim to come with them on their adventures, and let me tell you - Pathfinder is not set up to have classed & levelled henchmen following you around. The next one they hire is going to have stats of 11 across the board - I'm not rolling for them.

Later on they heard a rumour that a strange foreigner from up north wearing a holy symbol of Mitra was asking about Leliana, the witch. They concluded that he is a spy sent by Imperial witch-hunters. (That's exactly right.) They added a spiked pit trap just inside the front door of their house, and paid a boy in town to water their plants while they're away on adventures. Oh boy...


THE BLACK PYRAMID

Recently, the action has come fast & furious. Their alliance with the goblins dissolved after the greenskins' leader Guzboch found out who really raided his adamantine treasure-vault (the PCs did it of course). Who told him? It was Absalom Glop, the sinister & manipulative abhorrer the party released from a magical circle in one of the goblins' underground bases.

Pushing northeast along the river, they found a hermit named Idokan living in a cabin on stilts above the swamp. He seemed friendly enough for a half-crazed weirdo. He told them of the lizardfolk, the fearsome witches and other rumours of the swamp. He directed them to a black pyramid in the jungle to the north, having sighted black-robed fellows poking around it. This piqued the party's interest.

Many adventures were had in the black pyramid and mighty treasures gained. They defeated the fearsome death worm which lurked inside and looted some treasures of the old priests: The Sword of Eyes and a mysterious & magical black spear with unknown properties. When Leliana cast Identify on it she learned nothing, only hearing a phrase in her mind: "Our voices are open graves, through which the never-dead escape!"

A major clue concerned Vuk Thuul's mysterious patron Abraxas: as it turned out, those black-robed fellows were the cult of Yredelemnul, the bloated & hircine demon-lord of the dead otherwise known as Orcus. All initiates into this cult are taught elementary demonology, including the names of the greatest Chaos Lords: Yredelemnul, Jubilex, Tsathoggua and Abraxas! Now knowing his spells are granted by an entity unambiguously low in the infernal hierarchy, will Vuk Thuul start behaving even worse? We'll see.

The group learned this by interrogating a captured cultist on their second visit to the pyramid, but failed to pursue his co-religionists inside. This was a bit of a mistake. The remaining cultists have recovered all the loot the PCs missed on their first visit, and are now in possession of some good magic items and the Bone Key.

THE DROWNED LANDS

From the rickety cabin of the hermit Idokan, the party built a log raft and set out into the dark and mysterious swamps. The first strange location they found was a brass tower, 100' high, rising out of a patch of dry ground. Covered in alien scripts that proved unreadable but induced fainting & blackouts when the spellcasters tried read magic.

The party had a few fights here, including one against zombie lizardfolk that emerged sodden and rotting from the swamp water. These foes precipitated a full-scale retreat when the tiny white crabs inside one scuttled all over Bolgrim and almost devoured him right away!

They met some friendly lizardfolk and managed to parley, learning much of the situation in the swamps. Long ago, they were one unified society. About a generation ago, the last time human outsiders visited [1], they brought such strange ideas that the lizardfolk were divided politically and have never recovered. Since then they have formed into four tribes: Yellow Eyes, Black Wings, Purple Claw and Red Fangs. The Red Fangs have not been heard from in a year or more, rumoured to have been destroyed entire by the hateful, toadlike Tsathar. Paralyzed by factional differences, the tribes have not mustered a unified response to this threat.

THE GREAT CITY

Iron-Heel, the leader of the lizardfolk hunting party, urged Nahash to give up adventuring and join his people but the barbarian was having none of that. Nevertheless he brought the group to the Great City of the Yellow Eyes to meet their leader and see the tribe's power. Built on the edge of a great central lake in the swamps, this cyclopean stone city was not made by the lizardfolk. Its walls were raised in the ancient days of the snake-men and thousands of years later their former servants still live inside.

The gang were introduced to the aged warchief Far-Walker who seemed preoccupied with his own thoughts and his witch-doctor Murk-Watcher, whose magic can discern truth from falsehood. Murk-Watcher tested the tale of Nahash's origins, and he was careful enough to pass without revealing the entirety of his exile, imprisonment and escape.

Things seemed to be going well in the city until one more player revealed itself: Absalom Glop stepped from the shadows of Far-Walker's throne room, grinning its hateful grin! What designs does it have with the Yellow Eyes? It wasn't telling - only making cryptic remarks that incensed the players.

When they left the great city shaking their fists at Absalom's mysterious return, Iron-Heel entreated them to find the Red Fangs rumoured to still survive in the swamps, and introduce his ideas of pan-lizardfolk unification to them. This they are now attempting as they wander the desolate Drowned Lands, getting lost and looking for trouble!


*****

[1] - This was the original Land's End game, back in... 2012? Oh lord have mercy.

My group LOVES the swamps, and I do too. It's starting to get actually dangerous out there for them (which I like), and they really seem to like faction play and making alliances. I have a huge spreadsheet of factions and NPCs in this campaign, and most of them are based in the swamps.

As of this writing there are at least eleven factions of varying strength around the swamp, plus lone NPCs like the witches who basically are factions of their own. It's an interconnected web of relationships that I am still developing. Every time I don't know what to work on, I open up my spreadsheet and add a few things. This article on faction play has been a fantastic guideline for simple and gameable prep.

Also, these guys level up REALLY slowly! They are almost at 4th level. Maybe I am not including enough treasure, but that's easily remedied in upcoming dungeons.

This is my main jam when I need to get into the zome for Land's End:

[Guest Post] Late Medieval & Renaissance weapons & armour

[Phew, we made it! The longest and most complex equipment list of them all. I nearly went blind fiddling with the formatting for the tables in this one. I can't believe I forgot to add pictures to the last post in the series, so I'm going to make up for it with a ton of plate mail here. Having added pages of Steve's notes in the earlier entries, there isn't too much left to explain, I hope. Enjoy! - HDA]

Part 1 - Intro & Prehistory
Part 2 - Antiquity/Bronze Age
Part 3 - Dark Ages
Part 4 - High Medieval

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-RANGE: After reading the comments on the last post, I did a possible retuning of the archery ranges across the board. I went with flat 30/120 for one handed bows, 60/120 for two handed bows, as suggested. The “30” short range bracket can be simulated by the ideal ambush range, granting advantage only on surprise against targets within 30 feet. For any bow that gives us:
30 feet or less, advantage (if you have surprise)
60 feet or less, normal shot
120 feet or less, disadvantage

Obviously distance shooting would be way longer, especially for longbows. If you didn't read those links in the last post to Delta's archery breakdowns, do so now.

[This would - optionally - replace the range increments for ALL bow weapons. In the entries below, I have preserved the numbers as Steve originally sent them to me, for consistency with the previous weapon lists. -HDA]

-Repeating crossbows actually existed in ancient China. You can remove them to retain European flavour, or do what Warhammer did and make them the signature of dark elves, since hand crossbows only get you so far. If you want to make them simpler, just have them do a single attack for 2d4 or 2d6, each attack roll representing a short volley. Also, like the blowgun, repeaters were basically designed to employ poisoned bolts since they lacked some oomph, another reason the Drow flavour fits.

-The elephant in the room: while realistic, the reloading numbers on the crossbows make them basically unusable in actual play, or at least very inconvenient for dungeon crawling. A feat that lowers the number of turns to reload by 1 (to a minimum of 0) would be a welcome replacement for 5e's Crossbow Expert feat, which basically turns you into damn Legolas.

-I included brigandine as late-period scale mail. Same stats. It's basically just a breastplate that rattles, so it gives the stealth disadvantage. Instead of one full piece, it is made of segmented overlapping pieces riveted to the inside of a garment. If you hit a guy wearing it, it would feel like hitting solid steel but sound like you were breaking a glass at the same time.

Transitional armour

Late Middle Ages (14th-15th century) & Early Renaissance* (16th century)

Simple Melee	dmg	notes
Club	D4 B	light or versatile
Dagger: bollock, rondel, stiletto	D4 P	finesse, light
Handaxe	D6 S	light
Javelin, war dart	D6 P	thrown (30/120)
Mace	D6 B	-
Mace, footman’s	D6 B	versatile
Military flail	D6 B	-
Morningstar	D6 B	-
Peasant flail	D8 B	two-handed
Quarterstaff	D6 B	two-handed
Sap	D4 B	finesse, light, knockout
Sickle	D4 S	light
Spear	D6 P	thrown (20/60), versatile
Simple Ranged
Crossbow, assassin*	D4 P	ammunition (20/80), loading (4), light
Crossbow, hand*	D6 P	ammunition (30/120), loading (1)
Crossbow, hand-spanned	D6 P	ammunition (60/120), loading (1), two-handed
Crossbow, belt or lever-spanned	D8 P	ammunition (80/160), loading (1), two-handed
Crossbow, windlass	D10 P	ammunition (100/200), loading (6), two-handed
Crossbow, cranequin*	D10 P	ammunition (100/200), loading (4), two-handed
Hand cannon / culverin	D8 P	ammunition (10/40), misfire, loading (4), two-handed
Matchlock, pistol*	D8 P	ammo (20/60), light, misfire, loading (5)
Matchlock, arquebus / carbine*	D10 P	ammo (30/90), loading (5), misfire, two-handed
Matchlock, arquebus / musket*	D12 P	ammo (40/120), heavy, loading (5), misfire, two-handed
Shortbow	D6 P	ammo (80/160), str 11, two-handed
Sling (stone)	D4 B	loading (0), ammunition (30/90)
Sling (bullet)	D6 B	loading (0), ammunition (30/120)
Martial Melee
Battleaxe, horseman’s	D8 S/P	-
Greataxe, bardiche	D12 S	heavy, two-handed
Greatsword, claymore / zweihander*	D12 S/P	heavy, two-handed
Lance, heavy	D8 P	heavy, reach, two-handed on foot, versatile (D10)
-couched charge	2D8 P	heavy, reach, two-handed on foot, versatile (2D10)
Maul	D12 B	heavy, two-handed
Pick, horseman’s	D8 P/B	-
Pike	D8 P	heavy, reach (15 ft, cannot attack 5 ft), two-handed
Polearm, bec de corbin	D10 B/P	heavy, reach, two-handed
Polearm: halberd, poleaxe, bill, glaive, voulge	D10 S/P	heavy, reach, two-handed
Polearm, partisan / ranseur	D10 P	heavy, reach, two-handed
Shortsword, baselard	D6 P	finesse, light
Shortsword, cinquedea	D6 S	finesse, light
Sword, arming / side*	D8 S/P	-
Sword, long / bastard*	D8 S/P	versatile
Sword, estoc / tuck	D8 P	versatile
Sword, messer	D8 S	-
Sword, rapier* / koncerz*	D8 P	finesse
Sword, sabre/scimitar	D8 S	finesse
Warhammer	D8 B/P	versatile
Martial Ranged
Crossbow, light repeating	D4 P	ammunition (20/80), bonus attack, two-handed
Crossbow, heavy repeating	D6 P	ammunition (60/120), bonus attack, two-handed
Longbow	D8 P	ammunition (150/300), heavy, str 13, two-handed
Longbow, heavy / recurved	D10 P	ammunition (150/300), heavy, str 15, two-handed
Net	-	special, thrown (5/15)
Shortbow, recurved	D8 P	ammo (100/200), str 13, two-handed

Special weapon rules
Light: Ideal for off-hand use when dual wielding.
Versatile: May be used in one or two hands. Roll the next higher die for two-handed damage.
Finesse: May use DEX modifier in place of STR for attack/damage rolls.
Heavy: Small creatures have disadvantage on attack rolls.
Reach: Adds 5 feet to striking distance, unless more is indicated.
Ammunition/Thrown: A ranged weapon. The first number is short range (attacks incur no penalty), the second is maximum range, in feet.
Loading (x): Require the user to spend an indicated number of actions reloading the weapon. If the number indicated is 0 it can be fired once per round, but no more.
Misfire: These weapons fail spectacularly on a to-hit roll of 1 and cannot be used until fixed.
Bonus Attack: These weapons can make an additional attack as a bonus action, similar to the rules for two-weapon fighting.
*Early Renaissance: Add or subtract these weapons to taste, depending on the culture & technology level of your setting. Including them instantly gives you that WFRP feel.

Light Armour	AC	notes
Arming doublet	11+dex	-
Buff coat	11+dex	-
Padded jack	12+dex	-
Medium Armour
Mail shirt, bishop’s mantle	12+dex (max 2)	stealth disadvantage
Mail shirt	13+dex (max 2)	stealth disadvantage
Jack-of-plates	13+dex (max 2)	-
Brigandine	14+dex (max 2)	stealth disadvantage
Breastplate	14+dex (max 2)	-
Breastplate, mirror	14+dex (max 2)	stealth disadvantage
Coat of plated mail	15+dex (max 2)	stealth disadvantage, str 13
Half-plate	15+dex (max 2)	stealth disadvantage
Heavy Armour
Suit of plated mail	17	stealth disadvantage, str 15
Half-plate and mail	17	stealth disadvantage, str 13
Three-quarter plate	17	stealth disadvantage, str 13
Transitional plate	18	stealth disadvantage, str 17
Full plate	18	stealth disadvantage, str 15
Shields
Buckler**	+2	no AC bonus vs. ranged
Shield	+2	-
Pavis	-	3/4 cover when positioned

**Bucklers: considered proficient if proficient with shields, or with light armour and any type of sword

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Want to dig deeper? Here are a few informational links that ought to have you kids writing up your own weapon lists in no time:

Armour & Weapons by Charles Foulkes (pdf). I found this on the OSR links to wisdom wiki.
A Glossary of the Construction, Decoration and Use of Arms & Armour by George Cameron Stone. I have linked this before, but surely this is the most appropriate place to remind you all. Loads of pictures are included. If this doesn't get you excited to game, get your circulation checked.

As before, images are from Osprey Publishing. Go check 'em out.
Here is a nice piece on costs of medieval items. Weapons & armour are limited, but it's quite interesting and this article is as good a place as any to link it.
A huge article on early firearms. What is a matchlock, really? Find out here. Packed with references, links and pictures.

Matchlocks vs. armour: