The Rune Under Water

Murder at Ronegarth

2011-07-30T23:25:00.009-04:00

Image from this site. Reminded me of Storm Bull...

The heroes returned to Ronegarth via Horn Gate, where they dropped off the women of Black Rock, to find the small settlement in a state of excitement. The famed trader Biturian Varosh was soon to visit Raus Fort with his caravan, bringing with him exotic goods such as the poor settlers of Weis Domain had not seen for a very long time.

Soon the fort began to fill up. First to arrive were the Thunder Bison, a warlike branch of the Bison People. ToXaraya’s dismay, they were led by Moharo Blessed-by-Waha, to whom Xaraya had been engaged at birth. Moharo expressed great delight at seeing Xaraya again, and complemented her repeatedly on her beauty, the fullness of her bosom and the length of her leg, much to the chagrin of one Karnyne Widehips, who, it transpired, was Moharo’s current fiancee. Moharo repeatedly made lascivious advances to Xaraya, suggesting that even though she could no longer be his wife, having no tribe, she could enjoy a privileged position as his most favored concubine. Xaraya rebuffed Moharo on every occasion. With the Bison was Kagrunner, a Storm Khan and warrior of renown. He insulted every warrior in the Fort, including Grom, who bridled and looked forward t a chance to duel the bully.

Next to arrive was the Lunar Provincial Survey Team led by Hazphar Pharates, who proceeded to flirt with Xaraya in front of Moharo. He said he had news for Duke Raus of Rone, who came out to meet Hazphar, whom he greeted like a long-lost nephew. Hazphar told the Duke that Stalethia the Moondancer was on her way to the fort. The Duke immediately smiled with delight – a smile that soon turned into a rictus of terror as he realized the implications.

Next to arrive was a mysterious stranger from the Far East, Hu Bao Yi, who was looking for Silver Whispers Descending and his dragonewts. The Tailed Priest told our heroes that he was looking for “the Dragonfriend,” who he was sure was here right now, but not yet (once again, the party were mystified by something SWD said). Over the next couple of days, the party observed him practicing his weird oriental combat styles with the dragonewts. Skye was particularly interested in his scimitar-like sword, which the priest called a Katana. Xaraya took the opportunity to learn the rudiments of the Kralori language, and was eventually able to learn that Hu (whose name meant “timely rain”) had obtained his weapon from the School of Celestial Defense in Lur Nop in Kralorela, but that such fine weapons were not given easily to foreigners.

Next to arrive were a dozen newtlings, led by Flysnapper, emissary of Quicktail, lord of Five Eyes Temple and the Reverend Cho’och, Priest of Zola Fel, his negotiator. It seemed that they had a grudge against Duke Raus and spent much of the next few days in heated discussions with the Duke.

Also arriving were a troop of baboons, led by Tsetse, their warrior champion, and a pair of Morokanth brothers dressed like traders, called Creechkol and Kra’hatcha, who kept trying to trade with the various parties at Ronegarth but always seemed to come off poorer. Soon afterwards Chaku Ironspear turned up, with the ten awakened herd men the characters had left with him a while back. The party decided that they should go to Rabbit Hat as freeholders. Another Agimori had also arrived, but this one had very strange clothing and a thick accent. He called himself Amur An Zed and was looking for help of an as-yet-unspecified nature that he hoped to find at the market.

Another lone stranger was a man clad in black hoplite garb, most unlike the hoplites of Dara Happa that formed the backbone of the Lunar military. He called himself Harmo, or Harmodius the Stepson, a member of a mercenary band from far-off Refuge, who was looking for a desert trader who might help him find who killed his partner. He was hoping that Varosh was that trader.

The day before the market a delegation from Sun County arrived, led by the beautiful but stern Lady Vega Goldbreath. Among her honor guard was a very strange sight – a baboon with shaven skin, painted yellow, who called himself Melo Yelo. Tsetse’s baboons teased him mercilessly, but his soldierly demeanor stopped him responding. This added another factor to the already combustible mix of Lunars, Bison warriors and Duke Raus’ men. Kagrunner in particular continually insulted the Lunars for worshiping chaos, the Yelmalions for being led by a woman, the Agimori for being “ground men,” Grom for following a cowardly god and everyone else for whatever crossed his mind at the time. Tensions were running extremely high and the Duke ordered Daine and Xaraya to be on guard for violence.

Eventually, Biturian and his caravan arrived, with his wife Norayeep of the Flower Bison, his shaman Idrith, and his warrior guards The Five, supposedly the last survivors of a tribe destroyed by the Lunars. Biturian seemed upset to see the Yelmalions, while Kagrunner seemed to have encountered The Five before and ridiculed them as losers. Biturian, however, set up camp professionally.

Finally, as the Duke’s guests were enjoying a pre-market feast, A lone horsewoman arrived. As she flung back her traveling cloak, everyone gasped. She was a short woman, clad in scarlet and silver, barefoot, with a pile of silver hair secured by jade pins. Heavily tattooed, she was nevertheless of surpassing, exotic beauty, perhaps second only to the healer Marcilla in Grom’s eyes. She swept in to the tower, but soon emerged on the arm of Duke Raus and took her place at his side for the feast. This was Stalethia, and she entranced every male present – and many of the females – when she danced for the crowd at the Duke’s request. Even Hazphar stopped flirting with Xaraya for the evening. Kagrunner got wildly drunk and insulted everyone present. The baboons disappeared completely. Finally, Silver Whispers Descending portentously announced that something terrible was about to happen and that he would Futurequest to find out what. With a Tailed Priest standing in the center of the feast area surrounded by Beaked Warriors looking klanths at anyone who came near, the feast broke up in subdued fashion.

Xaraya chose to stay up to keep an eye on things. Early in the morning, she heard a scream from over by Biturian’s tent. She roused Grom and Skye and they went to investigate. They found the body of one of The Five, slain by an axe. The other members of the Five soon appeared, demanding vengeance, although Norayeep soon calmed them down. Xaraya found tracks, and followed them to the West rampart of the fort, where they simply stopped. Grom started asking questions. It soon became apparent that Kagrunner was nowhere to be found. A naked Hazphar was found sneaking back to his tent. One of the Five said that he saw Stalethia creeping around the Bison yurts. A bizarre sequence of events saw the Morokanth brothers paying Xaraya for giving her the information that Kargunner was last seen arguing fiercely with Chaku, who refused to say why. The baboons were nowhere to be found. Varosh announced that some items had been stolen from his stash – mostly amber necklaces and iron spearheads.

Harmo the Stepson revealed that he had advanced scouting and offered to help look to Kagrunner and/or the baboons. Moharo was found sleeping naked through the commotion in his yurt, but Karnyne immediately accused him of sleeping with Xaraya, slapping her and kneeing Moharo where it hurt. Xaraya decided to go searching with Harmo and a couple of Raus’ men, while Grom continued his investigations. Skye threw up her hands and went back to bed.

Grom managed to get Hazphar to reveal that he had been enjoying relations with someone when the murder occurred, but discretion forbade him revealing who. He also discovered Kagrunner’s helmet in Lady Vega’s tent. She was at a loss to explain why. Hu Bao Yi’s katana was missing. The newtlings told Grom a variety of things:
*One of the Duke’s mercenaries threatened to kill Kagrunner last night.
*The short painted female mated with Kagrunner and killed him.
*Kagrunner attacked one of the survey team.
*The red moon people, fire worshippers and the Duke have reached a secret deal to hunt nomads and newtlings alike.
*This market was a trap! We will never leave here alive!
Grom left the newtlings more bewildered than before, although the Zola Fel priest did tell him that one of the newtlings, Longtongue, had gone missing.

Xaraya and Harmo searched the ramparts, and found tracks of a large Cliff Toad above where the previous tracks had stopped. Thoughts of a lycanthropic toad started going through Xaraya’s mind. They followed the tracks to near the river, where they found the headless body of Kagrunner. His head had been removed in a single swipe. The katana was found nearby. Who could have decapitated a Storm Khan in one go? At this point, a lycanthropic toad seemed like the least of their worries.

Harmo noticed that the tracks continued to the river. As he was investigating, a huge tongue emerged from the river and struck him. Xaraya raised the alarm and Grom and his men started towards the river. Harmo and the mercenaries started into the river while Xaraya cast Project Sight. She discovered a newtling riding a toad under the water. As one of the guards collapsed with glazed eyes she realized the newtling must be a shaman. Harmo sliced the toad’s tongue off the next time it attacked, leaving it a race to disable the shaman before he and his fetch dragged everyone to the spirit plane. Xaraya was able to use magic to disable the newtling before Harmo and eventually Grom slew the toad.

They dragged the newtling to the bank, where, after unsubtle “persuasion,” it told them what had happened. The newtling, Longtongue, had been sent by Quicktail of Five Eyes to cause war between Duke Raus and the Thunder Bison. While they had initially planned to kill Karnyne and frame Xaraya, the excesses of Kagrunner had provided a better option. Kagrunner had killed one of the Five in a drunken rage, then staggered off. Longtongue had summoned a Traskar, an awakened Cliff Toad, and had stalked him on the ramparts before having the Traskar entangle him in its tongue and swallow him. They came down to the river, where the Traskar vomited up the Storm Khan, whom Longtounge’s fetch then destroyed on the spirit plane while Longtongue beheaded the body with the katana, which he had obtained from the thieving baboons.

After further investigation, it transpired that Stalethia had seduced Moharo. Karnyne, on seeing this, had sought out an all-too-willing Hazphar for the night. Kagrunner had clumsily attempted to seduce Lady Vega, who threw him out (he forgot his helmet), making him so angry he killed the next person he met. Chaku and Kagrunner had been arguing over Kagrunner’s behavior, nothing more. the baboons took advantage of the Fiver’s death to raid Varosh’s stash before fleeing (they were never found).

With embarrassment extremely high all round, the newtlings left with Duke Raus’ formal declaration of war in their possession. Biturian cast his Create Market spell and the market began. The party were able to acquire some useful items, particularly armor. In return for clearing up the mystery, the Issaries priest gave the party his copy of The Journal of Federang Sandpiper. The Bison riders left to head for Moharo and Karnyne’s wedding, with both extremely annoyed with each other, and Xaraya for that matter. As the Lunar survey team left, Hazphar warned Xaraya to keep an eye on Stalethia. Biturian was forced to admit that this was his most eventful market since his own wedding.

RuneQuest Comes Home

2011-07-16T09:22:00.000-04:00

It has just been announced that Pete and Loz, the team that brought us Mongoose Runequest II/Legend have acquired the license to produce RuneQuest 6, in collaboration with Moon Design. Here's the announcement:

We are delighted to announce our agreement with Issaries Inc, allowing The Design Mechanism to produce a new edition of RuneQuest and supporting supplements. You can read the full Press Release by clicking on the link to the right.
The way all this will work is as follows:

The Design Mechanism will be producing the sixth published edition of RQ for an early 2012 release.
We will be publishing the core rules and all future supplements in partnership with Moon Design. This allows us to call upon their resources for a wide range of things that would be too costly for us to develop singly.
Working with Moon we also have access to Glorantha, meaning that RuneQuest material for both Second and Third Age Glorantha will be not just possible, but a reality.
Work on the 6th edition of the rules has begun but the hard work will be between September and December as we prepare for the release. More information on the actual release date will be given nearer the time.

We're anticipating RuneQuest fans will have a lot of questions, and so we've prepared an FAQ sheet that should address most queries - see the 'RQ FAQ' PDF document link on the right. However, we also have our discussion Forum here at thedesignmechanism.com and will be establishing a dedicated RuneQuest forum over at Moon Design.

This is fantastic news. Third Age Glorantha, it seems, will be supported once again. I expect the rules system to be a further significant improvement on MRQ2 (which was pretty close to perfect, but has some issues that only really come out after repeated play, like the charging rules), so color me excited about this one. Best news of all is that there will be an Open Licence.

Mongoose Matt's Statement on the Future of "Wayfarer"

2011-06-01T20:24:00.000-04:00

Is here.

I think the most important point is this:

We have been asked whether we will make Wayfarer OGL. This will be a decision made later but, at this time, we are leaning towards it. However, I don't think it will be the usual OGL/logo licence combo, as messing around with SRDs is very time-consuming for us. If we go ahead with this, it is more likely to be a case of everything in the core book range is ripe for picking, just stay away from the setting books - aside from using a 'Wayfarer Compatible' logo, there will be nothing to sign or register for. Just pick up the rules and use them.

If that's the route they follow, I think this excellent system will survive. The approach they are leaning towards is refreshing too - there's been such confusion over the status of the MRQ1 SRDs following the end of the RuneQuest license that it will be good to have a, dare I say it, more libertarian approach.

I am now confident that RuneQuest will survive as a living game system.

Heroic Abilities for Magic Specialists

2011-05-25T22:08:00.005-04:00

Normal service is resumed with some Heroic Abilities for TGFKA* MRQ2, aimed at spell users, courtesy of Chronos:

Efficacious Caster
Requirements: POW 16+, Spellcasting skill 90%+
Hero Points: 12

Magic flows efficiently through your practised fingers. Reduce the cost to cast spells by 1 magic point. This ability is passive; you do not need to expend a magic point to activate it. However, you cannot reduce the MP cost to cast a spell to below 1.

Relaxed Mind
Requirements: POW 16+, Spellcasting skill 90%+
Hero Points: 10

When not stressed, your mind easily attunes to the magic that surrounds you. Double the rate at which you regain magic points. However, if you encounter a stressful situation such as combat, magic points are regained normally during the hour in which the stress occurred. This ability is passive; you do not need to expend a magic point to activate it.

Spellslinger
Requirements: INT 16+, Spellcasting skill 90%+
Hero Points: 12

Your facility with magic makes you able to cast spells quickly under pressure. Reduce the number of CAs to cast spells by 1. You cannot reduce the number of CAs to cast a spell to below 1.

For example, Urgath casts Bladesharp 3 on his greatsword. Normally, this would take 2 CAs, but since he is a Spellslinger, it only takes 1 CA to cast. Next, Urgath attempts to cast Disruption 2 on his opponent. Even though he is a Spellslinger, it still takes the minimum 1 CA to cast.

Clear Minded (for Sorcerors)
Requirements: INT 16+, Spellcasting skill 90%+
Hero Points: 8

Double the critical range of the player's spellcasting ability for the purpose of determining whether the spell is cast at no MP cost.

Comments welcome!

*The Game Formerly Known As

UPDATE: Some very valuable comments after the jump from Deleriad:

In general:
* the abilities are irrelevant for divine spell casters (spells don't cast MPs) and spirit magicians.
* "Passive" heroic abilities were removed from RQ1 because they tended to devolve into d20 style feats. Putting them back in is one of those things that tends to lead to bloat, complication in play while players deal with lists of abilities and also makes them less "special" because they are always on.

The abilities listed seem fine but not especially heroic. There is no cinematic moment of use about them. To my eyes they look gamist. As an example of a different route these are ideas partly inspired by the list. These are off the top of my head so are not properly thought through yet. They also try to reward mages who go beyond the normal magic skills.

Blood Potency. POW 16, Resilience 90%, Hero Points: 10
Duration: 1 spell
When you invoke this ability the spell you are casting has its Magnitude increased by half-again (rounded up). Immediately after the spell is cast, you lose one level of Fatigue.

Spell Slinger. POW 16, Spell casting skill 90%. Hero Points: 8
Duration: 1 spell
The spell's casting time is reduced by 1 Combat Action. This ability can be used multiple times on a single spell. If the casting time would be reduced to zero Combat Actions then the spell can be cast as a reaction to another character's action (like Countermagic) but still requires a single Combat Action.

[Runic] Connection. POW 18. Runetouched [rune]. Lore (Rune) or Grimoire (linked to rune) 90%. Hero Points 12.
Duration: instant
The character must be runetouched and choose a substance linked to that rune. Once per day the character may touch that substance and spend 5 minutes of total concentration attuning to the substance. At the end of 5 minutes the character regains all their Magic Points, including the one spent to activate the ability.

Mental Potency. INT 18. Spell casting skill 90%. Hero Points 12.
Duration: 1 spell
The critical chance with the spell is doubled. (This cannot be used multiple times on one spell.)

The idea is to ramp up the drama and special nature of the abilities so that invoking them is memorable. If you want to add these to the blog please feel free to do so.

Bargain...of Sorts

2011-05-24T22:16:00.001-04:00

The first domino in the chain of Runequest 2 becoming Wayfarer (golly, how I hate that name!) has fallen. All MRQ2 products are now on deep discount at DrivethruRPG, including product bundles.

So, you can get all the Gloranthan products in PDF for under $30. Same with the core rule books.

What a bargain! Or at least it would be if I hadn't spent, by my reckoning, about $150 plus shipping for a mixture of books and PDF for the core rules, and about $180 plus shipping for the Glorantha books (I got the limited edition Abiding Book) - ALL SINCE JANUARY 2010!!!

This is the second time Mongoose has done this to me. At least with MRQ1 I'd only got about half the collection and completed it with the bargain books Mongoose sells by Ebay.

Yet having read this from the great Dave Morris, I'm now concerned that buying the discounted books on Ebay might be doing the creators a disservice.

If you want to pick up these great products now, you should do so at these prices - at least the creators will get something from that, I imagine. I'm more and more convinced that Wayfarer will be an orphan system at best. Noted RQ forum inhabitant PrinceYrkoon has some interesting thoughts on this here.

PS Akratic Wizardry is also covering this - and is about as optimistic as I am. Same with Newt.

MRQ2 RIP

2011-05-23T21:14:00.000-04:00

This morning, Mongoose Publishing and Issaries Inc announced the mutual termination of Mongoose's license to the Runequest and Gloranthan Second Age properties. The Game Formerly Known As Runequest 2 will become Wayfarer (and I have to say that is an awful choice). Gone are the handsome A4 leather-bound editions. In their place will be pocket-sized rulebooks at a much more affordable price. All the promised expansions like Monster Island appear to have been canceled apart from the potentially brilliant Age of Treason (which, from what I've seen, looks fantastic). Mongoose will send the next 6 months selling off existing stock, it appears. The reason for the split appears to be simply disappointing sales of the Gloranthan line, and a feeling that Glorantha's undeserved reputation as "weird" has been holding back sales of the generic books.

Meanwhile, the authors of the MRQ2 rules, Loz Whitaker and Pete Nash, have both been hired by Issaries/ Moon Design to write new Gloranthan publications. Mongoose's loss is Moon Design's gain. The timing of the Moon Design announcements, we are told, is coincidental.

What does this mean for MRQ2 fans? I fear it means an orphan system. The reaction of the RQ Gloranthaphiles has been one of dismay, while those who like the system but who have nothing invested in Glorantha have been sanguine, but regret the loss of Loz and Pete. I think there are three possible outcomes:

1. Mongoose is serious about the system becoming a generic rules system. They release it under the OGL and allows outside publishers to use it (they are apparently considering this option). In house, Age of Treason is a success and other writers of the caliber of Loz and Pete are commissioned to produce great material. The system reaches its potential.

2. Mongoose releases the system as promised, but without the OGL. It withers on the vine and is canceled after a couple of years and some half-hearted new releases. The system is orphaned.

3. The promised Wayfarer system never materializes. The system dies.

I think at the moment it could go any of these ways, but I fear Newt is right when he suggests that people aren't going to shell out again. Mongoose has expended significant amounts of goodwill in the way they have handled the system. In my opinion, release of this excellent system under the OGL is the only way to regain that lost goodwill.

But I could be wrong. Perhaps Glorantha and the Runequest name were truly albatrosses around the neck of the system, but given where Loz and Pete have ended up, it suggests that the game designers don't think so.

What does this mean for the fanzine, which I've been doing feasibility work for over the past few weeks? I don't know. We've picked a name - Impale! - and assembled an editorial team, and even got some content being written, but if the system is to be orphaned I'm not sure whether the project is worth us investing time and money in. I'll be seeking assurances from Mongoose about this. Otherwise, there are other options.

We d100 gamers live in interesting times...

An MRQ Fanzine?

2011-04-29T20:38:00.001-04:00

I'm taking the first step, and have official blessing for it, to develop a Mongoose Runequest 2 (and perhaps other d100 systems) fanzine. In many ways, I want to develop a Tales of the Reaching Moon for the new millennium! You can read the details and offer to contribute at the Mongoose Forum, but here's the post in full:

I mentioned elsewhere, and have the go-ahead from Matt to develop, a Fanzine dedicated to MRQ2.

At this early stage, my immediate concern is to put together an editorial team. So if you're interested in helping to develop this product, please PM me. Being part of the editorial team would require one article or piece of art as a contribution per issue, or contribution in kind like copyediting or layout. As the initial release schedule I have in mind is quarterly, this should not be too big a commitment.

My model for the fanzine would be the excellent OSR fanzine Fight On!, but I'd suggest a rather more organized set of regular content. This is an example of ideas for the regular content:

Runerites: (in honor of the great White Dwarf column) New rules ideas or general concepts
The Coliseum: new monsters
Foes: Fully developed NPCs with tactics and motivations
Plunder: Magic items, unique or generic
Elder Secrets: New spells and magical abilities
Cults: Fully developed cults
Blood and Souls: Specific items for the Elric setting
God Willing: Specific items for the Deus Vult setting
Major Arcana: Specific items for the Wraith Recon setting
Njallsaga: Specific items for the Vikings setting

I still haven't ascertained whether this could include Glorantha, but I'll work on that.

In any event, if I can get enough interest in this, I will go ahead and work out the business side of things. I imagine the first issue at least will be free to download to gain interest, but there will be costs and those will need to be addressed. Having said that, I'm an MBA so I should be able to deal with that.

The main thing however, is to assemble an editorial team. Please PM me or post here if you're interested.

The other thing we'll need is a title. Very grateful for ideas for that!

Finally, I understand some of you may be skeptical. I don't think this thread needs that. I can be skeptical enough about the realities of this to kill it if necessary. So positive contributions only, please!

Martial Arts Combat Maneuvers for Mongoose Runequest 2

2011-04-23T20:10:00.004-04:00

One of the recognized shortcomings of MRQ2 is that there isn't really a good way to reflect unarmed Martial Arts. Here's one idea, to allow a special set of combat maneuvers to those who are trained in a Martial Arts combat style. I'd be grateful for any comments or critiques.

Break Neck (Critical Only) – On a successful attack to the head only, the attacker may undertake an opposed test of Brawn skills with the defender. If successful, the attacker immediately inflicts a Major Wound on the defender’s head [Note – this is a devastating attack, and hence is difficult to inflict – the attacker must get a critical hit, hit the head and win a brawn v brawn opposed test]

Choke – in the event of an attacker establishing a grapple to the head or chest (see p.92), the attacker may choose this combat maneuver to attempt to asphyxiate the defender. The defender must make an opposed Resilience roll against the original attack roll or start to asphyxiate (see p. 54). The defender must continue to make resilience checks every round against the original attack roll or take damage, until they slip free or the attacker drops the grapple.

Jump Kick – using this combat maneuver the attacker may roll 1d10+10 for hit location rather than 1d20. No grapple may be established. EDIT: In addition to damage inflicted, the attack also counts as a Leaping Attack (p.91) but may affect targets up to the attacker's SIZx2. The Opposed Test is the defender's Evade vs. the original attack roll.

Slam Tackle – this combat maneuver is a variant of Bash useable only on an unarmed charge. The effects are as Bash except as follows: the defender must make a difficult Athletics skill test to avoid falling prone (hard if knocked into an object), and if the defender does fall, the attacker falls with them unless they succeed in an Acrobatics check. The attacker may establish a grapple, as usual.

Spin Kick – using this combat maneuver, the attacker delivers a devastating kick attack. The attacker may roll 2d3 plus Damage Modifier for damage. No grapple may be established.

Throw (attack and defense) – a combatant may use this Combat Maneuver to throw an opponent in a powerslam, judo throw or other such maneuver. The combatant defending against the maneuver must succeed in a test of Brawn against the original successful attack or parry or be thrown 1d3m, taking falling damage if appropriate. The thrown party will be prone unless they succeed in an Acrobatics test.

Found Items

2011-04-21T22:40:00.000-04:00

The Golden Rhino of Mapungubwe - could easily be a Found Item!

Found Items were a curious form of random additional "treasure" found in early Runequest scenarios. In each room description, there was a percentage chance of a Found Item that could be revealed by a Spot Hidden roll in a full search of the room. Some of the items were useless, some powerful, but all intriguing.

For instance, two of the Found Items from Snakepipe Hollow show how the flavor of the typical table:

"4. An arm of a small statue. The arm is 30 cm long, magical and made of copper. The arm is very old and is heavily tarnished so that it is totally green. If the arm touches the bare skin of a person with a disease, it will cure him. The arm can only cure 1 disease per week and after curing 4 more diseases, it will have used up all its power and it will fall to pieces."

"15. A shredded leather jerkin, covered with old blood."

Each of the Found Items could be an adventure seed or plot item in its own right. Do the Chalanna Arroy Sisters revere the statue arm? What statue did it come from? If it can be identified, would restoring the arm to the original statue have extra magical effects? Who did the jerkin belong to? What happened to him? Is it a warning? And so on.

So here is a table of Found Items for Openquest, designated as Open Game Content under the Open Game License, reproduced below under the break.

A rusted and pitted iron sword blade. It radiates faint magic. This was once a magic sword like the Holy Sword of Zunder, but it has been buried and ill-treated long enough that the magic has worn off. If it is cleaned and given a hilt, it will act as a brittle long sword, doing 1d8-2 damage and has a 25% chance of breaking on a successful parry. It will, however, store up to 4 magic points if filled.
A bag of beans. If cooked and eaten, they are exceptionally tasty. If planted, they will grow into Kuragu plants, sacred to healing cults. The leaves of the Kuragu plant will automatically stop bleeding when used with the Healing skill.
A pamphlet written in an obscure dialect of a local language that describes some interesting techniques for unarmed combat. Anyone studying it for a week uninterrupted can add +10% to their Unarmed Combat skill.
A well-folded, magnificent, silken woman's dress, of the latest style, worth at least 1000SP. It has a small cut in the back that could have been made with a knife, but there is no blood, nor any sign of whoever was wearing it.
Three tiny gold figurines - a rhino, a stag and a polar bear. They appear to be worth 100SP for the set, but a critical Trade roll will reveal them to be of exceptional interest to a collector who, if she can be found, will pay 10,000SP for them.
An ornate-looking bronze helmet with a horsehair plume. The helmet is strongly reinforced, giving +1 Armor Points to any armor suit.
Half a bronze breastplate, obviously from the same armor set as the helmet in 6, but cut in half by a remarkably clean blow.
A map of the surrounding area, in great detail, but about a hundred years out of date.
What looks like the fossilized remains of a large octopus, wrapped around an impossibly old harpoon.
A strange wooden bat, actually an implement used in an Elvish game not unlike cricket.
A human finger, clearly bitten off.
Two brass coins, each worth a quarter of a Copper Piece.
Seventy-five marks carved into the wall, as if counting the passage of time.
A skeletal hand protruding from the earthen floor. Digging deeply enough will reveal a full skeleton reaching out of the ground. It is unclear, except perhaps to a critical Natural Lore roll, whether the skeleton was buried like this or whether it was trying to dig its way out.
A terracotta pot, sealed with a set of a magical symbols. If opened, there is a rushing sound, but all it contains is a bunch of rocks.
A set of very heavy shackles and chains. All the shackles are locked. There is no key.
A wolfskin cape.
A velvet pouch in poor condition. Inside are what looks like pulverized gemstones.
A note written on human skin. It discusses a plot to assassinate someone who has the same name as one of the party.
Inside a broken statue head is a gold-plated tongue. If used to replace the tongue of someone who has lost theirs, it will allow them to speak again. The recipient can speak 1d3 additional languages but may no longer speak the words of sorcery spells.

OPEN GAME LICENSE

Version 1.0a

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15. COPYRIGHT NOTICE

Modern System Reference Document Copyright 2002, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Bill Slavicsek, Jeff Grubb, Rich Redman, Charles Ryan, based on material by Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, Richard Baker, Peter Adkison, Bruce R. Cordell, John Tynes, Andy Collins and JD Wiker.

System Reference Document Copyright 2000–2003, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, Rich baker, Andy Collins, David Noonan, Rich Redman, Bruce R. Cordell, based on original material by E. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

Classic Runequest Dungeon Format

2011-04-19T22:56:00.001-04:00

When Runequest was at its height under The Chaosium, before the disastrous link-up with Avalon Hill, I always thought that the "dungeon" adventures had the best format of any of the modules out there, whether from TSR, Judges' Guild, Games Workshop or any of the others. Every room or encounter area had a set format, and it was so well-designed a GM could basically run the adventure straight out of the shrink-wrap, although in most cases this would have missed the really cool things about the work. Paul Jacquays adopted it for his Judges Guild Runequest adventures like Hellpits of Nightfang and Duck Tower. For the sake of those who haven't come across it before, here it is.

Each room description is organized as follows:
INITIAL DIE ROLLS: This determines the occupants of the room. Most Chaosium dungeons were living places, with the inhabitants moving between rooms, catching up on the latest news, going for a meal or sleeping. So the initial die rolls would determine where the inhabitants were. Most GMs that I knew did these in advance to work out what the inhabitants were doing. Earlier rolls took priority, so a monster/NPC could not be in two places. Occasionally, the roll would have some special happening in them (for instance a room that had spirits in it might have the spirit attack someone the instant they set foot in the room, but would otherwise be peaceable until attacked).
FIRST GLANCE: This told the players what they knew about the room the first instant they set foot, like dimensions, obvious features and, in a cave for instance, what sort of rock the room was carved out of.
CLOSER LOOKS: This would include all the significant elements of the room beyond a first glance, some of which, it was noted, could be misleading or unimportant - and boy, did people fall for those.
EXITS: By listing the exits from the room, it was easy for a GM to keep the players informed without drawing a map for them or anything. Several of the Chaosium dungeons were mapping challenges. They would also note where any keys were located.
HIDDEN SPOTS: Chaosium Runequest 2 had a specific skill for Spot Hidden items. This section also indicated how long it would take for one person to search the area, and also the chances of a Found Item being there (I'll come on to Found Items later).
TRAPS: Being old school, traps were common in Chaosium dungeons. This section would describe the trap in full, including any mechanics and how to circumvent it.
DENIZENS: Whatever monsters or NPCs live in the room, if they aren;t of the meandering type normally favored.
TREASURE: What it says on the tin.
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES: Anything that didn't fit in elsewhere went here.

As said, I think this format worked really well. I'm currently designing a MRQ2 dungeon - which I don't do very often - and I'm using this format, remembering The Alexandrian's excellent description tips too. So I've added a section under closer looks simply called "Three Senses and Two Cool Things."

Pavis Campaign: Muriah and the Mistress Part II

2011-04-18T23:11:00.000-04:00

(GM note: I didn't take good notes during this and the next few adventures, so apologies that they aren't as detailed as the previous recaps)

Our heroes realized that not all of the vision had been accounted for in their expulsion of the broos from the Vilnar headwater caverns. They discussed the visions with Leotychidas, Homophilus and Cleombrotus, who said that all clues pointed towards a village called Black Rock, on the western outskirts of Sun County. The party marched through the heat of Fire Season to the village, moving through dead fields, a deserted village and past up dried up streams. At Black Rock they were greeted as emissaries of the Count by the village headman Fethal, a former Sun Dome templar, and his cocky son Varloz. They pronounced a feast in honor of the visitors that night, and Fethal insisted that the militia would drill for the visitors the next morning.

At the feast, the party noticed some strange things. Grom noticed that the youths of the village were unruly and uncouth, particularly for Sun Domers, although he was distracted by an attractive young widow. Xaraya noticed that there were few young men, as opposed to teens, and that Varloz spent much of the time leering at her. That night, Leo and the other Domers were asked to sleep in Fethal's hut, while the unbelievers were asked to sleep outside. Suspecting something was up, Xaraya, Skye and Grom split up watch duties. When Grom was on watch, he was approached by the young widow, bearing her child with her. She said her child was sick, and she needed to take her to the Earth Temple, but wanted a strong man with her to keep her safe. Grom agreed, because there was something threatening about the place. They proceeded to engage in increasingly affectionate conversation. After she left the child with the crone at the Earth Temple, she asked Grom to retire with her, but Grom, though tempted, refused.

The next morning, Grom and Leo supervised a drill session. They declared the Black Rock militia in severe need of discipline and proceeded to start knocking it into shape. While they were doing that, Xaraya, Skye, Homophilus and Cleombrotus searched for information, with Varloz acting as their guide along with two militiamen. They found the crone in the Earth Temple had lost her wits, although she did try to show them writings in a language no-one understood. Climbing the rock slide to the waterfall above the town, they found a shack that housed the village shaman, a woman who seemed compltely and utterly terrified by something. Xaraya tried reasoning with her, but failed.

Looking from the top of the cliff, they spied a pool and barn in the distance. Remembering the presence of a pool in the vision, the party insisted on going to investigate, despite Varloz complaining that it was just some fields and a barn. Xaraya called Grom to join them, while Homophilus went back to join Leotychidas in training the militia. They made their way along the cliff top and down to the barn area. Varloz looked more and more agitated. After Grom opened the barn, they suddenly came under magical and missile attack from hidden opponents in the grain fields. On top of that, Varloz and the militiamen turned on them and shut the barn behind Grom, locking him in. Varloz killed Cleombrotus with what was obviously a magical spear. Skye faced off against Varloz while Xaraya dealt with the other militiamen. Grom failed to reach the barn skylight, so took the simple expedient of ripping down planks from the barn wall and made his way back out.

Eventually Skye killed Varloz, who had failed to control the magics of his spear (and took the spear for herself), while Xaraya and Grom finished off the other militiamen. They then turned their attention to their hidden assailants, by firing burning arrows into the fields. The assailants fled, and the party noticed they looked like children. The children were fast, and made off over the plains to the southeast under cover of the smoke. The party managed to find tracks and followed them.

After a while, they lost sight of the children, and then lost the trail. Recovering it, they found that the children appeared to have been picked up by a band of Sable riders - Xaraya's tribal enemy. Continuing on, the party indeed encountered a band of Sable Riders - a Lunar provincial survey team, headed by a charismatic young officer named Hazphar Phraates, and an Iron Centurion named Dalmades. Xaraya and Hazphar, a sorcerer, proceeded to flirt, while Dalmades and Grom sized each other up and agreed to duel the next time Dalmades visited Ronegarth. Hazphar revealed that his command had indeed come across children in the plains, and out of charity had taken them off to the southeast, where they appeared to know some settlers. Hazphar did not know where they had gone precisely. Despite their mutual attraction, Xaraya was sure Hazphar was not being totally level with her.

Reaching what seemed like a dead end, the party decided to return to the barn, which they explored. They found a horrific sight, with mutilated corpses hanging in the barn and evil phrases carved into the roof. They also found a series of pouches that Xaraya recognized as fetishes - including a male testicle and a lock of hair that Xaraya realized had been taken from the shaman in a ritual of spiritual castration. They also realized that the pond had been artificially created by a small dam of rocks, and that this had caused the drying up of the fields and stream below. They removed the dam, and as the pool emptied, they discovered a skeleton of a young teen.

First, the party returned to the shaman. With her lock of hair returned, she seemed to gain in spiritual strength, and was able to speak. She revealed that the village was beset by a particularly evil and chaotic spirit, one that had carnal power, that had tortured her, taken her spirits and killed her fetch. The shaman was too weak to help, but begged the party to destroy the spirit.

The party girded their loins and set back for the village. There was no-one to be seen. The party first explored Fethal's hut, where they found more obscene carvings and a blood-stained dagger stuck in the roof. Skye secured the dagger in her bag and the party searched the other huts. They found cowering woman after cowering woman, most of them pregnant. One of the women was the widow Grom had met the previous night, with her baby, but she looked much less attractive than she had. Questioning revealed they were all pregnant by the same male, but it was not Fethal or any other man the party knew of. The women were all terrified of "The Mistress" above all.

The decided to explore the Yelmalio temple next. As they filed over the bridge in the center of the village, Fethal and his men came out of the temple in battle formation, while Skye felt something moving in her bag. Skye looked, and found a tiny naked woman attempting to pull the dagger out of the bag. When Skye moved to pick up the woman, the tiny figure grew in size to twice the height of any of them. Grom swung his sword, hit the woman in the head, and, miraculously, she disappeared. (GM note: critical hits against unarmored, even if mystical opponents are extremely useful)

Fethal's militia fired bows ineffectively. Xaraya responded using her new legendary ability of Deadeye - and skewered Fethal through the eye. Another healed him, but Xaraya promptly did it again! Others had been brought down by Skye's missile fire and Grom was closing, looking like an Avatar of Humakt the God of Death. The rest of the militia fled, but Xaraya found Fethal was still alive and conscious, though dying. Fethal confessed that he had brought the curse upon the village by killing young girl by the pond in his youth. She had returned as a vengeful spirit, and had mastered him, and the rest of the town, killing the men who resisted and fathering a gaggle of children from hell, Varloz being the first. He then expired.

The party entered the temple, where they found a bound and gagged Homophilus, and a naked Leotychidas, crucified above the altar. Homophilus revealed that the Mistress had spent hours writhing with Leo, who was now exceptionally weak. They rescued their friends, and went to the Earth Temple. By careful interrogation of the crone, they were able to ascertain that she had a blessed shovel, which would put angry spirits to rest by proper burial. Using the shovel, they buried the skeleton they had found. The shaman said that she believed the spirit had departed.

The party was left with a village with no men and a host of pregnant women, likely carrying chaotic children inside them. They resolved to take the women to Horn Gate, where Skye believed the healers could remove the chaos inside them safely. As they left, they burned the cursed village and marched back to Ronegarth full of regret and sorrow at what had befallen the people of Black Rock.

Nga!

2011-04-15T20:53:00.000-04:00

I've been delving back into Tekumel recently, searching for inspiration for my version of Glorantha's Kralorela. I find the "vanilla" canon version of Kralorela pretty boring - it's far more Gloranthan China than the Lunar Empire is Gloranthan Rome or the Sartarites are Glornanthan Vikings. I'd much rather my Kralorela echo the themes of Tekumel - decidedly oriental, but also decidedly weird. My Kralorela is limping to the end of a long period of stability, and so the decadence of Tsolyanu seems most appropriate as a model. A very distant model, I hasten to say - there's enough of canon Kralorela in there to make it recognizable - but I want to evoke the sense of alien wonder in Lur Nop that new Tekumel gamers get when they first set foot in Bey Su or Jakalla.

To this end, I'm running a couple of characters through the solo adventures released by TOME a while back. I've never played them before and I'm loving them. Character generation, especially for the priest, was a chore, and I can see why Gardasiyal bombed as a rules system. However, once I got to crack open the actual adventure book, Coming of Age in Tekumel, I was hooked again. I'll write up my characters' adventures here soon.

All this is a prelude to saying that there's a new Tekumel blog out there. By my guest and check out The Eye of Joyful Sitting Among Friends. I'll be checking in there regularly. In the meantime, you can get Sandy Petersen's unofficial conversion of RQIII to Tekumel here. I might jot down some notes for updating the rule set to MRQ2 here.

The Cult of Ehla (Outline)

2011-03-27T23:48:00.000-04:00

Description: Ehla is the Mother Goddess of Ehlaar. She gave birth to all the native species and her wisest children, the Demon Princes, ruling benignly over all of creation. Then Prince Vazo led his brothers and sisters in rebellion against their mother, imprisoning her in the Dreaming. Ehla's thoughts of escape and vengeance warped the Dreaming, turning it into the Nightmare Realm. She toiled in pain for thousands of years until, towards the end of the Time of the Outsiders, a Native hero named Shensta derived a plan to free her. Aided by the faith of ten thousand natives, she entered the Nightmare Realm through the City of Flying Silkworms. She freed Ehla, who exploded out of the Nightmare Realm and destroyed the City of Flying Silkworms, leaving a massive crater in her wake. She moved faster then the eye could see to the stars, where she took her place as the brightest star in the sky. Shensta founded the Queendom of Gla, which is the center of her cult as well as a political force. Ehla sends her goodwill to her worshipers across the continent and has regained her place as the most prominent God in the world. [Unbeknownst to most, Ehla has two aspects, Ehla the Creator and Ehla the Destroyer.]

Runes: Sky, Harmony and Fertility (Ehla the Destroyer has Darkness, Chaos and Death)

Mythos and History: Ehla created the world from a thought, then walked upon it. In the Valley of Gla, she lay down and birthed her twin firstborn, Prince Kazed and Princess Sarriad. Then she birthed many more Princes, then Sorgith, the First Man, and Frozin, the First Woman, plus the Mother of Trolls and all the Native animals. She reared them, as we rear our children and animals today, and brought life and joy wherever she trod. But the Princes grew jealous. Lord Vazo persuaded all his siblings that they should rise up and imprison their mother, so they could divide her power between them. Kazed and Sarriad remained loyal to their mother, and were slain by Vazo. The rebellious Princes dragged their mother through the world, creating the Pit of Lecrass, and imprisoned her in the Nightmare Realm, binding her four arms and two legs with links of each element (air, earth, fire, water, darkness and aether), such that everything had a stake in keeping her confined.

Central Myth: Shensta frees Ehla (Mythic Resonance 120%) - Ehla lay in the Nightmare Realm, bound by every element and able only to think. She thought of Shensta, who was born in the Valley of Gla. Shensta raised herself, defeating all manner of creatures that sought to devour her. She grew to womanhood and took the memory of Ehla throughout the Outsider empire. She converted ten thousand men and women, who gave their magic to Shensta, enabling her to enter the Nightmare Realm. She journeyed through the Mountains of Falling and the Plain of Hate, defeating the Lady of Disdain and the Forgotten Child. Eventually, she came across Ehla, and she talked to each of her bonds. She persuaded Aether and Darkness to help, and they became part of Ehla. She scared off Earth and forced Water to flee, while she fought Air and Fire, and defeated them. Now Ehla was free, she took Shensta in her hand and revealed her truths to her, then forced her way out of the Nightmare Realm, destroying a large part of the land, and made her way to the sky. Shensta woke once again in the Valley of Gla. Behaviors/Insights: Never surrender, conquer impossible odds, resist fear, conversion is the beginning of greatness.

Lesser Myths: Ehla confronts her Children (Mythic Resonance 80%) - Ehla realized her firstborn children had died, and went to find out why. She found Vazo and the others clustered round the bodies of Kazed and Sarriad and asked what had happened. All were cowed, and wept, and begged for forgiveness, all save Vazo of the Hard Heart. Ehla slapped him, and he yelped, and slunk away. The children laughed at him, but all the time they grew in hatred of Ehla, desiring her power. Behavior/Insights: Defiance, impose authority, face down the Demon Princes, love is balanced by hate.

Ehlaar the Destroyer only: Ehla Rends the Soul of Prince Cathris (Mythic Resonance 60%) - The Queen of Gla conquered the City of Cathris, and forced Prince Cathris to manifest. She and her followers bound the Prince, and sent his soul to Ehla the Destroyer. She breathed her Chaos Breath on his soul, and it was made flesh. Ehla ripped him with her claws and bit him with her fangs, swallowing the gobbets of his flesh and spilling his blood back as Blood Rain on to the city of Cathris. What remained of his soul she bound to her service.

To be continued...

Blank Cult Template for MRQ2

2011-03-27T16:47:00.000-04:00

(There isn't really a blank cult template anywhere, so I put this one together to help in designing the Cults of Ehlaar, and Third Age Gloranthan cults.)

Description: Put here what everybody knows about the Cult. It’s what a successful Culture check would tell someone about the Cult.

Runes: Greater Gods or powers have three runes, lesser gods two and minor gods one.

Mythos and History: Put here the basic mythology of the cult

Central Myth: The most important myth in the cult. It should have a resonance of 80-100% or above for a Greater God, 60-90% for a lesser god and 40-70% for a minor god. The resonance, remember, represents the difficulty of recreating the myth in a Heroquest. It may help to describe the behavior that will be forced on a worshipper as a result of the myth, as well as any rewards for mastering it.

Minor Myth(s): Greater Gods will have 0-2 minor myths and lesser gods 0-1. Minor gods will tend not to have them.

Nature: Put here who the cult appeals to and its social role, as well as attitudes to it from inside and outside the local culture.

Organization: Describe how the cult organizes and operates, the size of it temples and so on.

Membership: Put here any special requirements for membership and/or promotion to higher ranks within the Cult, beyond the standard.

Common Magic: List the common magic spells the Cult teaches its worshippers. A good rule of thumb is that the Cult should be able to teach any worshipper 6 points of magic, so variable spells can count for more than 1 point. Describe any special spells the cult teaches.

Higher Magic: List the cult’s divine magic spells (including new or special spells), sorcerous Grimoire(s) or examples of special cult spirits.

Gifts and Compulsions: Describe any special duties the cult imposes on its worshippers and any gifts and/or secrets the cult bestows. Some cults ill bestow random gifts or demand random compulsions, so tables may be used here.

Cult Skills: List the five or more skills the cut teaches or otherwise demands its worshippers learn.

Allied Cults: List any cults with which the cult has special relations, including any spells or other boons given it.

Enemy Cults: List any cults singled out for special enmity, together with any bonuses or penalties involved in interacting with the enemy cult.

Rules Framework: The Making of the Storm Tribe Heroquest

2011-03-07T16:06:00.001-05:00

Image from King of Dragon Pass: Buy it!

As indicated in the previous post, for each station the Orlanth substitute must make a choice of which of the three main Orlanthi tenets to follow: NCMYDA (No one can make you do anything), VIAAO (Violence is always an option) or TIAAW (There is always another way). To successfully complete the Heroquest, the player must succeed in demonstrating each of these tenets at least once.

I allowed other PCs to accompany the main quester as disembodied "spiritual advisers." They could augment the quester's skills with their critical range of the appropriate skill and cast magic where appropriate (sorcery at a -20% disadvantage owing to this being a divine quest.)

FMTSE = Failure means try something else (ie choose another option). In the event of failing all three options, the quester falls out of the Heroquest and suffers the Backlash indicated. Backlash effects are permanent until erased by a successful Orlanthi heroquest.

I ran this myth under MRQ1 rules. I'd put the Mythic Resonance at 60% to reflect the 6 stages, but it could be upped by the addition of more stages for more powerful questers. Each additional stage should reflect having to convince another skeptical god. Whenever a roll needs to be opposed, used 60% as the resistance, therefore, or more if you have added more stages.

This myth may be used by Orlanthi to achieve an objective that concerns community building, like ending kinstrife, protecting a defenseless village (by winning it a Wyter, for instance) or gaining/cementing a leadership position like Clan Chief or Tribal King. It may be undertaken by followers of Orlanth at no penalty, followers of other Storm Tribe gods at -20% penalty to skills and by non-Orlanthi who know the myth at -40%.

The Heroquest

Orlanth stands before Ernalda, who manifests as the most beautiful woman Orlanth has met recently (Orlanth’s choice). She tells him to make a tribe and become King so that he can challenge the Emperor.

Station 1: Doubting Wheel

The wheel is being pushed by strange figures dressed in wooden masks. It tells him he should not make a tribe and rolls towards him.

NCMYDA: Orlanth stands firm and discovers a net in his pocket. Successful throw will catch the wheel and shrink it down to tiny size such that he can put in his pocket. FMTSE

VIAAO: Orlanth draws his sword and must shatter it by inflicting 10HP of damage, overcoming 6AP. Each combat round gives the Wheel a chance to inflict bludgeoning damage: 75% att, 1d10 damage. Orlanth is wearing light leather armor in the HQ (1 AP). Failure means falling out of the HQ.

TIAAW: Orlanth ignores the wheel and addresses those pushing it. Successful Inf/Orate roll persuades them to call back the wheel and push it elsewhere, to afflict another tribe (random roll 1=Plant Tribe, 2=Night Tribe, 3-6=Tribe-Not-Appearing-In-This-HQ; if afflicts tribe in HQ, they will be less effective). FMTSE

Backlash: Afflicted by doubt. Must make persistence test to back up any major choice.

Station 2: Yinkin

Yinkin the cat god is fighting with the plant tribe over the hunting grounds. Orlanth explains his wish to bring together his friends and relations to make a tribe. Yinkin says he might come to the moot if Orlanth helps him against Rustling Vines.

NCMYDA: Orlanth stands before RV and calls it a coward. He says that is seeks to invade Yinkin’s hunting grounds because it is afraid of the Emperor and the Fire Tribe. Successful Inf/Orate roll and RV slinks off to invade the lands of the Fire Tribe. FMTSE.

VIAAO: Orlanth fights RV, which turns into a standard Elf from the rule book or Vronkali from Monster Coliseum. He has as spells Heal 4, Speedart, Countermagic 2, Repair. They will start 30m apart and the elf will have its bow drawn. Yinkin will help (use a shadow cat's stats or a small panther if you don't have them). Defeat=fall out.

TIAAW: Orlanth bargains with RV over sharing the hunting grounds with Yinkin. RV will agree after successful Inf test, but will demand an exchange of items, with Orlanth giving one more item for each failed Inf test. In return, RV will give an Aldryami Lancet, enchanted to allow a human to use it. FMTSE

Backlash: Fear of elves (as demoralize spell when dealing/fighting with them).

Yinkin says he appreciates Orlanth’s efforts and may bring the Cat Clan to his moot, but he walks by himself and all places are alike to him, so he may not.

Station 3: The Knowing God

Orlanth finds the Knowing God, captured by the Stone Tribe (dwarves). He has been imprisoned in a cube of iron. The Stone Tribe look warily on.

NCMYDA: Orlanth recites a poem to the cube about how square things become round. With successful Orate roll, the Iron Cube’s sides bend, breaking the bolts, and freeing the Knowing God. FMTSE.

VIAAO: Orlanth needs to bend the iron bars. Brawn at -20% or smash through 2 bars each with 4AP/8HP, with appropriate damage to weapon. FMTSE

TIAAW: Orlanth recites a never-before-heard poem to the cube, which disappears on a successful Orate roll. FMTSE

Failure to release the Knowing God sees him carted away by the dwarves, but Orlanth can continue on.

If freed, the Knowing God agrees to make the Marks-on-Barks Clan part of the tribe, as long as it has fierce warriors.

Station 4: Vadrus

Orlanth comes upon his wild brother Vadrus, who has vowed to seek out Yinkin and the Cat Clan, and fight them.

NCMYDA: Orlanth challenges Vadrus to an arm-wrestling contest. Vadrus has the same stats as the Orlanth quester. Brute force opposed test. See below.

VIAAO: Orlanth fights Vadrus to first blood. See below.

TIAAW: Orlanth promises Vadrus wine, women and song at the moot. Successful Influence roll works. FMTSE.

If Vadrus bests Orlanth, he laughs at him and goes off to fight Yinkin, who will no longer show at the moot.

If Orlanth wins, Vadrus will say, “You have bested me, so I am obliged to do as you wish, Vadrus said, I will seek a foe other than Yinkin, and may even attend this confederation moot of yours so long as that accursed cat is not among the chieftains there.”

Station 5: The Moot

Orlanth and Ernalda stand before the moot. There are many other chieftans there, such as Issaries, Chalana Arroy, Humakt, Vinga, Elmal and others, but they are all squabbling. It appears Orlanth/Orlanth gave them contradictory promises. Orlanth must gain their attention. All tests are at -10% for each failure to have Yinkin, LM or Vadrus attend.

NCMYDA: Orlanth shouts loudly and recites a poem to them about the virtues of unity. Successful orate roll works. FMTSE.

VIAAO: Orlanth picks out a god to chastise. Whoever it is, Vadrus will attack Orlanth back. This will be a fight to unconsciousness. Failure means falling out of the quest.

TIAAW: Orlanth asks Ernalda for help, and she brings the Tribal Regalia. She brought the Chest of Torcs, with which he could gift the clan leaders. She brought the Hall of Understanding, where people would settle their differences by talking them out. She brought the Crown of Authority, which made people respect his sacral powers and pledge allegiance to him. This is an automatic success.

Backlash: Influence skill is halved.

With success, most of the clans agree to make the tribe, but there are still some who are stubborn.

Station 6: The Attack

The warriors of the Night Tribe come and attack the quarreling clans. Orlanth directs the clans in their defense and everyone fights together to defeat their common enemy. Orlanth must fight a massive troll, or (in my case) a savage spirit monster.

Spirit Monster

Characteristics

STR 3D6+6 (15)

CON 3D6 (11)

DEX 2D6 (7)

SIZ 4D6+6 (20)

INT 2 (2)

POW 3 (3)

CHA 2 (2)

Hit Locations

D20 Hit Location AP/HP

1–12 Body 2/12

13–14 Tentacle One 2/6

15–16 Tentacle Two 2/6

17–18 Tentacle Three 2/6

19–20 Tentacle Four 2/6

Weapons

Type Weapon Skill Damage/AP

Tentacle 60% 1D6+1D4

Special Rules

Combat Actions: 2

Strike Rank: +12

Move: 4m

Traits: Regeneration

Skills: Perception 20%, Survival 70%

Armour: Rubbery hide (2 AP on all locations, no Skill Penalty)

Regeneration

The monster can completely re-grow severed tentacles and flesh, restoring lost hit points in all locations at a rate of 1 point per round. If killed, it ceases to regenerate.

Losing to the troll or monster means complete failure of the Heroquest. All concerned suffer the equivalent of a major wound to a random location and lose reputation or renown, depending on what form of reputation system you are using.

In my Heroquest, the defeated monster became a Wyter of a local town after successful bargaining.

All taking part in the Heroquest may take an appropriate Heroic Ability if they have the requisite Hero Points and skills. Otherwise, they can raise any one skill by +5% for each success at a test. They will also gain reputation and succeed in whatever community-building objective they had for the myth.

Pavis Campaign: A Brief Interlude on the Hero Plane

2011-03-06T23:25:00.001-05:00

Illustration from the excellent King of Dragon Pass

Our heroes and the Templars returned to Ronegarth, to deliver the news that the broo who had poisoned the Vilinar had been dealt with, but there was no sign of their leader, the witch Muriah. The Duke took this news with equanimity, but was distressed by the news of what had happened to Weis. He took his leave of the party, saying he had much to think about.

Ronegarth had had some visitors in the party's absence. First was Jodred, a Sword of Humakt from Pavis. He interviewed Grom, whose deeds he had heard of, and consecrated him as an Acolyte. He reminded the new trainee priest that he had promised to bring the way of the sword to the trolls of the Gundahaak clan. Grom promised to get round to it.

The other visitors were far stranger - dragonewts! The party saw a Tailed Priest, standing on one leg, singing, guarded by two watchful beaked dragonets with klanths drawn and ready, while half a dozen crested dragonewts walked round him in a circle, occasionally switching direction. Daine told them that the priest was called Silver Whispers Descending (“no, I don’t know what it means either”) and that they came looking for the "fierce females of Fort Rone." Silver Whispers [SWD] had been standing like that for a day without moving.

Eventually, SWD stopped his song in mid-note and came over to the PCs. He looked at the women and said one of them was the one he had been dreaming about, but he was not sure which, as all humans looked alike to him. He grabbed each woman by the shoulders and let his dragon tongue flick all over their faces, something neither particularly appreciated. He sad that Xaraya is not the one but Skye was - a dragontouched woman, he said. At this point, Skye suddenly realized she had no fear of dragons and that she could understand some of what the other dragonewts were saying.

The priest continued by saying that he had seen Skye's future and that she would be present at the Dragonrise. Unless she wasn’t. (Huh?) At this point a Crested Dragonewt tried to interrupt; SWD drew his klanth and beheaded him in one move. He asked, “Was that impatient? I must decide whether that was Right Action” and went back into his guarded trance.

Duke Raus then reappeared and said that he had been consulting with Daryli and Jodred, and they had come to the conclusion that Weis was such a sorry place because it lacked a Wyter. They had agreed that Grom should, if he were willing, perform a Heroquest, the Making of the Storm Tribe, to bring strength to the village and secure it a guardian spirit. As a Humakti, Grom was not ideal for the role of Orlanth, but with Xaraya and Skye supporting him in spirit, he might be able to finish the quest.

That night, a grand feast was held, a combination of wake for Lady Varna and a celebration for the victory over the broos. Lady Jezra had rather too much to drink and expressed affection to Grom, but he had eyes only for the unattainable Marcilla. After the feast, Grom stepped forward and everyone began the incantations to propel Grom and his companions on to the Hero Plane.

Daryli told Grom that there were three things to remember: No-one can make you do anything, violence is always an option and there is always another way. Grom would have to demonstrate understanding of each of these principles as he gathers the tribe. He also reminded Grom of the legend: Orlanth overcame the doubting wheel, then helped Yinkin against the Plant Tribe, freed Lhankor Knowing from the Stone Tribe, defeated Vadrus in a test of strength, gathered the tribe and made them listen to him, then led the tribe in battle against the Night Tribe, after which they all acknowledged him as King. With a final wish of good luck, Daryli faded from sight and Grom found himself on the Hero Plane once more.

Grom found himself standing before Ernalda, who looked uncannily like Marcilla, and the Earth Mother told Grom-as-Orlanth to form a tribe from his friends and relatives so that he could challenge the Emperor.

First Grom faced the Doubting Wheel. The wheel was being pushed by strange figures dressed in wooden masks. It told him he should not make a tribe and rolled towards him. Grom remembered that no one can make you do anything and found a net in his pocket that he used to ensnare the wheel, which shrunk down so far that Grom put it in his pocket and walked on.

Next, Grom found Yinkin the cat god fighting with the plant tribe over the hunting grounds. Grom explained his wish to bring together his friends and relations to make a tribe. Yinkin said he might come to the moot if Orlanth helps him against Rustling Vines. Grom remembered that violence is always an option and drew his sword. The Vines manifested themselves as an Aldryami warrior with a wicked-looking bow. Grom charged the elf and dispatched him quickly. The elf left behind a sharp "lancet" as the Aldryami spears are known, but Skye said she didn't need it. Yinkin said he appreciated Grom’s efforts and might bring the Cat Clan to his moot, but he walks by himself and all places are alike to him, so he might not.

Grom traveled on and found the Knowing God, captured by the Stone Tribe (dwarves). He had been imprisoned in a cube of iron. The Stone Tribe looked warily on. Grom considered trying to bend the bars, but Xaraya reminded him that there was always another way. Inspiration came to Grom to sing a song no-one had heard before. The bars of iron disappeared. The Knowing God agreed to make the Marks-on-Barks Clan part of the tribe, as long as it had fierce warriors.

Next Grom found Orlanth's wild brother Vadrus, beating the bushes, looking for Yinkin to fight. Grom asked Vadrus to attend the moot, but Vadrus told him to get out of his way. Grom recalled that no one can make you do anything and challenged Vadrus to tests of strength. Vadrus, it seemed, was of equal strength and skill to Grom, and although the challenge could have gone either way, Grom won. Vadrus agreed to come to the moot "as long as that blasted cat wasn't there."

Soon, Grom and Ernalda stood before the moot. There were many other chieftans there, such as Issaries, Chalana Arroy, Humakt, Vinga (Skye manifested as the Loyal Daughter), Elmal and others, but they were all squabbling. It appeared that Grom/Orlanth had given them contradictory promises.

Grom was tempted to beat sense into the quarreling gods, because violence is always an option, but he decided that there was always another way, and asked Ernalda for help. She brought forth the Tribal Regalia and adorned Grom with it. The gods stopped fighting and many of them bowed before the majestic figure of Grom-Orlanth, although Vadrus and others snorted.

At this point the Night Tribe attacked, accompanied by a great Hell Monster. Grom and Skye stood against it, with Xaraya adding magical support. They defeated the monster handily and it agreed to serve Grom however he wished.

This was the point where the Heroquest should have ended, but as Grom was born aloft by his tribe in celebration, a great dragon appeared. Somehow, the PCs knew that Silver Whispers Descending had entered the HeroQuest. The dragon looked at all 3 PCs, even the ones that weren’t really there, and they saw a fast montage of images:

A beautiful woman with leathery wings

A naked male vampire, with runes and grime all over its body

A wizard’s tower at night, with lightning behind it

Deep dark caverns, with a glistening forest of fungus

A black broo with a bear’s head, its fangs drooling

A small girl full of malice

A bubbling pile of chaos

The Lunar hero Vindrman Sol Veir, decapitating someone

The Lunar Coders, staring at them

The baby they found suddenly growing into a golden adult, a god

The Lunar governor of Pavis shouting at them

A gigantic cradle floating down a swollen river, bearing a gigantic baby

A severe winter, bringing snow and ice even to the plains of Prax

AWyrm’s Friend and a God Learner, staring at one another

A striking red-haired Orlanthi Queen (Grom recognized her as Kallyr Starbrow)

A ship rising up to the heavens

A vast Dragon’s head, rising up and breaking out of a hilltop, devouring a huge building

Shocked by this vision, the heroes returned to the feast at Ronegarth. Daryli soon announced that a spirit was present, and wished to bargain with its conquerors. Xaraya undertook the negotiations, and the spirit agreed to protect the village of Weis, serving as its guardian. The spirit showed signs of terrible spiritual wounds in the past, and Xaraya felt she recognized it, but could not say how.

GM note: the heroquest was taken bodily from King of Dragon Pass. I worked out other options for success and failure for each section, but curiously the PCs took the route that leads to success in the computer game in virtually every case! I'll post the Heroquest rules as I drafted them soon.

Pavis Campaign: Muriah and the Mistress Part I

2011-03-03T22:15:00.003-05:00

Broo picture via Deviant Art

Returning Lady Jezra to Ronegarth, our heroes discovered that further tragedy had befallen the Duke in their absence. The Duchess Varna had died suddenly of her illness and Marcilla was back from Horn Gate to stop it from spreading further. As Skye, Grom and Xaraya filed in to the Duke's parlor to pay their respects, they found it draped in black. Also present were three Sun County Templars, including their old friend Leotychidas. It transpired that the High Priest of the Sun Dome Temple, Gaumata the Strange had been sent a vision, about two twisted children that threatened to defile the Zola Fel valley. Gaumata was convinced that one of these children was active in the Vilinar area of Weis Cut and had sent Leotychidas to warn Duke Raus. Too late.

The Duke was not sure what to do about the Sun County delegation, but told the party that his scouts had found signs of Broos operating in the Vilinar headwaters and was certain they had something to do with it. Leo said that Gaumata was sure that one of the children was active in that area, the other in the remote village of Black Rock, and offered to help the party if they would also help him investigate the Black Rock area. The party agreed. Leo introduced his companions, Homophilius ("It doesn't mean what you think!"), a young scholarly type, and a grizzled old scout called Cleombrotus. The group paused only to consult with Daine and Marcilla. Daine was ill himself, and suggested a likely area for the investigations to concentrate on, while Marcilla gave the party medicinal herbs and treated linen gloves with which to handle Broo remains.

The party first paused at Weis, where one-armed Tarnak had ridden without stopping off at Ronegarth. The village was rank with the smell of rotting corpses and all the doors were shut except one belonging to an old woman. She told Xaraya that Tarnak had shut himself up in his hut and had not been seen out since his return. At her most conciliatory, Xaraya persuaded Tarnak to open up and let her in. Tarnak told her that he was now merely half a man, and had no chance of winning Jezra. Xaraya proved so soothing in her response that Tarnak looked at her with a look in his eyes that suggested he might no longer regard Jezra as the object of his affections. He said that Xaraya was his only hope now and he looked forward to her return.

In scouting out the headwaters, the party's scouts quickly found broo tracks leading to the cave from which the river flowed. The party discovered that the Vilinar had two sources, one warm and one cold, which caused steam to rise where they met, obscuring vision. They entered the caves stealthily to find two broos on guard, one of which proved to be somewhat of a handful, especially because he seemed able to reflect magic. Eventually, sheer numbers brought them down, and Xaraya gleefully pocketed the crystal the tough one carried.

The party did not feel like wading up either stream, so they found a tunnel leading off the entrance cave and followed that. A crude pit trap was avoided, and the party came to a bridge over the warm branchthat was covered in green slime. A broo stood atop the bridge, but fled as the party approached - the broos were now warned! The party took care to cross the bridge so that no-one slipped into the stream below and then inched forward carefully, anticipating ambush.

Our heroes soon came to a larger cavern, where the light of a fire flickered at one end, and which was filled with natural stone pillars of varying sizes. Leo and the Templars took one wall, inching round with spears and shields ready, while Grom with sword and board took another wall. Skye and Xaraya stood ready with their bows to lend support. Three broos sprang from behind a pillar to attack the Templars. As Grom tried to outflank them, he found himself in combat with a strange broo who moved extremely quickly and had a confusing appearance such that even weaponmaster Grom found it difficult to hit.

Trusting that Grom could handle himself, Skye and Xaraya aided the Templars. Homophilius and Cleombrotus suffered for lack of armor, but the broos were dealt with eventually. The fast broo disengaged and ran when its comrades fell. A search of the cavern found a long timber plank and a trapped chest. Skye disarmed the trap and the chest was found to contain some vials of an unidentified substance and a jeweled dagger. Leo advised his colleagues to stay behind to tend to their wounds, and the party inched down another tunnel, again expecting an ambush.

The party came to a high cliff over the cold branch of the Vilinar. There were three ropes hanging from the cave roof, one secured on the party's side, one secured on the other side and one being held by the strange broo, who was regarding them cautiously. It was flanked by two broos with bows. Skye and Xaraya raised their bows and began firing. The two missile users were easily dealt with, despite one being extremely strong and the other having one massive leg. Each of them went down with a leg wound, as it happened, before being finished off. The swift broo's confusing nature made it difficult for them to hit, but the two women were no slouches with their bows. The broo returned fire with magic, causing Leo to dissolve into a fit of sneezing. The others shrugged off further magical attack and the broo, now with a couple of arrows sticking out of its hide, took the fateful decision to swing back across, trusting to its chaotic abilities. Grom swung his shield at the beast as it sailed through the air and caused it to miss its footing. It slipped, but clung to the cliff such that it could have regained its footing, had not Grom managed an athletic move that knocked the broo down off its tenuous hold, and the fiercest adversary the party had yet faced fell into the stream below.

The party returned to the previous cavern and got hold of the timber plank, using that to cross the stream, rather than relying on the slippery ropes. The sandy tunnel widened into another larger cavern, which proved to be empty. The party inched further forward until they came to a chamber with a rock floor, rather than sand. It was occupied by a fearsome-looking broo clad in black plate armor, covered with chaos and death runes, bearing a massive sword that glowed with the Bladesharp enchantment and a black shield. The fight was a long one, with Grom at one point landing a mighty critical hit to the chest that would have killed any other opponent, but which the broo shrugged off as a minor wound. Skye and Leo contributed with their spears, and Xaraya managed a few good hits with her bow, but the broo started dealing mighty blows itself. Eventually, another blow inflicted a wound to the chest, and the broo was forced to try to use magic to heal itself. The party concentrated their attention to the chest and eventually brought the fearsome beast down.

The creature wore a valuable medallion studded with rubies around its neck and a key, and further investigation found more items of interest: the chest that matched the key, made of fine camphorwood, a set of phials that reeked of disease, presumably to be added to the river water, a set of manuscripts written in Auld Wyrmish, and a portentous letter. A chimney led out of the chamber upwards to the cliffs above, easily climbable to someone with some skill, it seemed.

Battered but triumphant, the party picked up their wounded and limped out of the caves. On the banks of the river as it left the cave, Xaraya found freshly-made broo tracks. Their fast foe had survived the fall, it seemed. They led to a cliff, which the broo had apparently climbed. Given its speed, the broo was presumably long gone by now.

The party staggered into Weis, where the wise woman informed them that Muriah was an unfortunate girl whose family, twenty years ago, was dying of disease and who had been denied aid by the villagers for fear that she too carried the plague. Her parents died, and Muriah had returned to the village to tell everyone that a day would come when all the doors of the village would be shut by Death, and then disappeared. Xaraya avoided Tarnak's attentions.

The letter read:

To Muriah the Blessed,

It appears you have a sister in Sun County. Someone else wronged as you were. I fear she may not be easy to approach, but I believe she will recognize a kindred spirit.

Despite your best efforts at Rabbit Hat, things have gone awry there. Pumpkinhead was slain and his altar purified. We believe his slaughterers also did away with Polybius, for we never heard the expected announcement from him, and work is progressing to rebuild the settlement. Nevertheless, GG’s plans continue unabated. The Waiting Mouth and the Changer dwell unnoticed yet.

Things progress well here, however. Our exploration of the caverns is proving most effective. We owe the discovery of your sister to the Talon’s kin.

Finally, the Great Vampire has made itself known to us, as GG said it would. It shall ensure we conquer the valley and befoul the River.

I look forward to your return. In your absence, I shall deal with Qad as you suggest.

Shallek-za-Kuza’an

2011-02-13T11:12:00.001-05:00

When the Outsiders came to Ehlaar, they brought with them seedlings of Kuza’an-ne-Qarzenn, the “tree-that-is-the-sinews-of-the-Infinite.” These seedlings grew into trees, heavily guarded in the courtyards that form the holy places of the church of the Infinite. From branches of the trees are carved the Shallek-za-Kuza’an, which the Natives style “wands.” Without a wand, a follower of the Infinite can use the Infinite’s power only in its raw form, as an immediate burst of power. In game terms, a sorcerer cannot use the Manipulation skill without a wand in his or her hand. This practically restricts the magician to the use of one-handed weapons if they wish to use magic in combat.

Wands range in size from the standard size of about a foot to great staffs wielded by the Zilaths and Pa-Zilaths of the cult/empire. The Qarmezinn-Pa-Zilath, the “Grand Theosophist” of the Outsider Empire, bore one carved from the wood of the Kuza’an-ne-Qarzenn itself. In game terms, larger wands give bonuses to the Manipulation skill.

A follower of the Infinite is traditionally given a wand at initiation. However, the number of wands is decreasing since the fall of the Outsider Empire. Sometimes a new initiate may be required to find a wand as a condition of initiation. The Queendom of Gla and various other jurisdictions despise Outsiders so much that they ritually burn wands when they find them. On the other hand, the Caravan Lords may have started stockpiling them, knowing that they can extract Outsider gold for them.

Pavis Campaign: Jezra's Rescue

2011-01-30T21:08:00.001-05:00

After the Heroquest to restore Darnbar Chaosknower to life, Marcilla the White Healer suggested to Xaraya, Grom and Skye that they come with her and Darnbar to Horn Gate to see if the Sisterhood could attempt to cure Darnbar of the Unlife Sickness. The Duke’s wife, Varna, was unwell, and Lady Jezra asked to accompany the group to see if she could purchase some herbs that she believed would cure her mother.

The journey to Horn Gate was interrupted by another encounter with the Morokanth, in this case Visishwaw Windclaw, a follower of Storm Bull and his gang. After an initial period of feeling each other out, Grom earned the Morokanth’s respect and Visishwaw offered Grom some Kvass, which Grom had to turn down owing to his geas. Visishwaw found it odd that a god would require a worshipper not to drink, and took this as a sign of Humakt’s weakness compared with the Bull. They spent the night camped on the plains, sharing the watch duties with the Morokanth.

The party found Horn Gate still controlled by the Sables. Xaraya bristled at this, but Marcilla asked her not to cause trouble. They delivered Darnbar to the Hospital and Jezra purchased her herbs. Not wishing to stay where the Sables ruled, the party set off back for Raus Fort via Weis Cut, aiming to overnight at Weis Village.

Arriving at Weis, they discovered the old Headman had died and been replaced by the arrogant young “Mayor,” Tarkan, who proceeded to attempt to flirt with Lady Jezra, ignoring the PCs. Jezra rebuffed him bluntly and demanded a hut to herself. Tarkan offered the hut of the old headman and set his “best men” to guard it.

The PCs were awakened by a might ruckus in the middle of the night. They heard Lady Jezra scream, but by the time they had gathered their weapons they found Jezra’s guards dead and the lady screaming for help from a distance on the back of a mighty riding beast of some sort, with others flanking her.

Xaraya loosed an arrow and hit one of the beasts in the leg. It slowed and the party was able to catch up. Its rider was an ugly sort, looking like a three way cross between a man, a troll and a pig. He put up a fight, but was slain by Xaraya’s arrow. The beast, a giant hog of some sort with enormous tusks, kept attempting to charge, but was brought down by Grom.

By this time, the rest of the beasts were out of sight and Xaraya lost the trail when they crossed the Weis river. The party knew they had no choice but to report the loss of his daughter to the Duke. Tarkan came with them. Daine informed the party that the beasts were Tuskers and their riders Aramites, or Tusk Riders, holed up in an ancient stone tower to the southwest, and they had already received a ransom note from them. The Duke was thunderous in his anger and ordered the players to kill these Tusk Riders who were defying his authority. Daine told the PCs after the Duke had left that they had better bring back Lady Jezra as well, although the Duke would not admit that this was more important to him. He suggested the party take Tarkan along, as his skills in hiding, sneaking and climbing would probably come in handy.

On the way to the tower, the party surprised a patrolling Tusk Rider and his beast. The rider was young and inexperienced and put up much less of a fight than his mount. The party made it to the tower without further incident, only to find it impregnable. An attempt at a frontal approach was answered by arrows fired from window slits. Tarkan suggested going round the back and climbing the tower, which proved to be much more weathered and craggy than it looked. It was very old indeed.

Tarkan and Xaraya made it to the top. While they were pulling up Skye and Grom, they discovered that what they thought were two statues were actually two gargoyles, one of which ripped off Tarkan’s right arm. A hard fight ensued, which the party won without further loss. Xaraya treated Tarkan’s wound so he would not die, but the man simply sat and cried, holding his severed arm. A quick search of the roof revealed a secret niche, where they found a valuable-looking necklace.

The party found the way down and made their way into the filthy tower. They quickly found, surprised and dealt with a pair of Tusk Riders who had fired arrows at them earlier, the searched what appeared to be the main floor of the tower, discovering a disgusting altar as well as the quarters for half a dozen riders. They could not find the remaining two riders, nor Lady Jezra.

The party decided to go down another floor. The worked out that the next floor was the ground floor and, judging by the smell and the noise, the stable. Attempting to proceed stealthily, Skye triggered a trap and fell about thirty feet, fully armored, into a deep pool of water. Heroically, Grom immediately jumped in to rescue the Vingan. It appeared he had forgotten two things – first that Skye, blessed by the nymph Kinope, was an excellent swimmer and second, that he was not and also more heavily armored than Skye! Skye ended up saving her would-be rescuer, dragging him eventually to the shore. Xaraya followed and was able to make it to the shore as well.

As the PCs stood there dripping in the wet and darkness, they heard some shuffling and creaking from around them. A skeleton lunged at them out of the darkness. Grom was delighted at a chance to destroy undead and drew his sword. The skeleton proved to be no match, going down at one blow from Grom’s sword. Grom followed the noise and dispatched six skeletons in all. Eventually the PCs found a source of light and to reveal a natural cavern surrounding the pool, with six graves from which the skeletons had emerged. A search uncovered some burial goods, including some silver and copper and an iron spear head.

It also transpired that there were steps leading up from the cavern. Despite his prowess against the skeletons, Grom was still suffering from nearly drowning, so Xaraya took point. The steps led to a sliding trap door, which Xaraya inched open. Peeking upwards, she found herself looking up at the legs of a Tusk Rider who appeared to be wearing only a bloody apron. He was taking something from a stone structure above the trapdoor. A few yards away, Xaraya could see Lady Jezra chained against the wall, her clothing in some disarray, but screaming blue murder at her captors, using words Xaraya had never heard before. An armored Tusk Rider stood grimacing at her.

Xaraya reached for her only stabbing weapon, an arrow, and jabbed it upwards between the legs of the Tusk Rider in the apron, dealing him a fearsome wound to the abdomen. He staggered backwards, allowing Xaraya to move the trap door further aside and climb out. The other Rider drew a wicked looking sword and cast a spell. Grom was able to make it out of the stairs before both riders attacked. Xaraya was able to take the torturer down with her battleaxe but Grom had a stiffer time with the Riders’ leader, who appeared magically protected. Eventually Skye was able to make it up the stairs too and joined the fight. With some appropriate use of magic and a few lucky blows, not to mention vocal encouragement from Lady Jezra, the Rider fell. The key to Jezra’s chains were quickly located and the Duke’s daughter released. After a few choice words about how long it had taken for the PCs to rescue her and a swift kick or two at her late tormenters, Lady Jezra demanded to be returned to Ronegarth NOW.

The party made their way up from the torture chamber to the stable, which was filled with four cantankerous Tuskers. The party decided simply to open the door and shoo the Tuskers out, there being no farmland for them to ruin in the vicinity. They then retrieved Tarkan from the roof, still sobbing, especially about what Jezra would think of him now. Jezra indeed looked disgusted at Tarkan’s new state, and remained aloof from everyone on the way back to Ronegarth.

History of Ehlaar

2011-01-24T22:14:00.001-05:00

Items in [Parentheses] are part of the Secret History – events that happened but are not general knowledge. Some are known only to a very few researchers, historians and priests. Highlight to read, unless you are possibly going to play in this world. (The observant may notice some elements taken from the excellent scenario Hammers of the God by James Raggi. Don't read the Secret History if you intend to play this. Here's the Grognardia review.)

Comments are welcome and may well be incorporated.

Cosmology

There are four worlds with four stars and four moons that revolve in complicated fashion around the Sun, or perhaps the Sun revolves around them (no-one is quite sure and astrologers and other wise men argue about this incessantly). In one world, Kanosza, gods ruled – the gods of the celestial bodies and the Afterworld. In another, Jaruusz, a seemingly omnipotent principle, The Infinite, governed the mundane world and the Ether. On Ghildra, spirits roamed the world and the Guinee, the spirit’s home. On Ehlaar, the goodess Ehla and her children were the creators, ruling both Ehlaar and the Dreaming, until her children rose up and imprisoned Ehla in the Dreaming, which became the Nightmare World. [The Afterworld, the Ether, the Guinee and the Nightmare World all share characteristics, and otherworldly beings can seemingly operate through all these planes, even if they do not interact with each other.]

Kanosza is a world of continents, Jaruusz a water world with a giant archipelago, Ehlaar is a Pangaea, with just one continent, while Ghildra is a desert world with no seas, few lakes and many oases.

On each world existed a major species of humans and another intelligent species: on Kanosza, dwarfs, on Jaruusz elves, on Ghildra dragonmen and on Ehlaar trolls.

Prehistory of Ehlaar (The Time of Doomtower)

After the Rebellion of the Children and the imprisonment of Ehla, the intelligent species of Ehlaar learned how to summon and negotiate with her grandchildren and, in some case, her children directly, for magical boons. Her grandchildren became known as Demons and her children as Demon Princes/Princesses.

One Prince, Lord Vazo, soon became pre-eminent. He left the Nightmare Realm and raised a mighty fortress called Doomtower.

At some point, the people of Kanosza discovered the secret of travelling between the worlds. Many arrived in Ehlaar and brought with them the worship of their gods. Dwarves also arrived with them, together with their earth god. The humans of Kanosza became known as Colonists as opposed to the Natives.

Kingdoms began to form, each with their own patron Demon Prince. Some colonists began their own kingdoms, although there were never enough to be a major force. The dwarves began to delve into the mountains.

Doomtower sent out armies to demand tribute from these kingdoms. All complied but the city of Zyman. Prince Azra, patron of the city, stood up to Lord Vazo and formed an alliance. Vazo reciprocated by gathering his subjects. Azra’s army laid siege to Doomtower, finally toppling it after a hundred years. Many legends are told of the siege of Doomtower but no-one now knows where it stood.

Time of the Ancients

Slowly at first, then quickly, the Kingdom of Zyman, began to absorb or conquer its neighbors. [The first emperor, Guto, had made a major deal with Prince Azra that involved massive sacrifice in return for great temporal power for Guto and his successors.] While Azra allowed pacts with his brothers and sister to continue (indeed, his favorite siblings were allowed to keep their kingdoms), he asked for the destruction of the theist cults that the Colonists had brought with them. The Colonist kingdoms were systematically exterminated and their temples thrown down. In the absence of organized religion, the Colonists were forced to resort to Blood Magic.

The Ancient Empire discovered the route to Ghildra, and brought back slaves – both human (who quickly became known as Brutes) and dragonmen. They brought their spirits with them, but the Demon Princes did not regard them as a threat and tolerated them.

The Dwarves shut themselves in their mines, content to wait for more tolerant times. [They also took the Trolls to their heart following widespread famine and empire attacks in troll lands, and shared their tunnels with them.]

After the defeat of the last independent kingdom, the Empire ruled unchallenged for a thousand years [which was the terms of the deal with Prince Azra.] Over the last few hundred years, however, central rule began to collapse [because Emperor Bebb, last of the descendents of Guto, died without issue.] Local Moguls became de facto rulers of local kingdoms and began to war with each other as Princes demanded more from their conjurers.

The end of the Empire and the coming of the Outsiders was presaged by a series of natural disasters – earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes and whirlwinds.

Time of the Outsiders

[A thousand years to the day after Guto’s deal with Azra,] the Outsiders came. From the world of Jaruusz, the Outsiders were on a holy mission to conquer worlds in the name of The Infinite. They had already conquered Kanosza and Ghildra (to the extent that the latter world was able to be ruled) and brought slave armies with them too. Their strange weapons and powerful sorcery swept the Ancient Empire aside. They destroyed many cities, and erected their Ziggurats in the center of others. Demon summoning was outlawed, and the Outsiders proved to have powerful magics to prevent summonings as well. The Natives were enslaved just as they had enslaved the Colonists. The new Colonists despised their Blood Magic-using predecessors, and were often appointed their masters, and cruel masters they proved to be.

Elves also arrived. They were ancient rivals of the Outsiders and had been running a guerilla war against them for centuries. [They joined with the dwarves, who aided them in their struggle.] Their greatest triumph was a Brute rebellion, where thousands of the primitives escaped into the Great Desert of Ehlaar, whence they organized many debilitating raids on the Outsider’s Holy Empire.

The Outsiders were ruled by The Great Theosophist from the Holy City of Infinity. He brought in many more Colonists and Outsiders, leading to a massive population in the Khultan river plain. Natives were the majority only on the fringes of the old Ancient Empire.

[The Dwarves began to be jealous of their allies and started to move against them. The priests of their old Earth God protested. The Dwarves made new gods to replace him and called the Old God a demon prince. They shaved off their beards and changed in appearance and nature.] Wars erupted between the Dwarves, Elves, Trolls and the hereto peaceful Giants.

[The Great Theosophist became intrigued by Demonology and began to dabble in it. Slowly knowledge of demon summoning spread among the Hierarchs. The Name of the Infinite suffered a secret schism.]

A Native conspiracy set about a plan to free the creator goddess Ehla. It succeeded, and a massive, continent-wide earthquake set off another series of natural disasters. Ehla took her place in the sky as a bright star, visible in daylight.

The Grand Theosophist died [slain by a Demon Prince]. With his death and the new presence of Ehla, the ability to travel between worlds disappeared and has never been rediscovered. Brutes and elves invaded the empire. Natives and Colonists alike rose up in rebellion. The Outsider Empire collapsed.

Time of Chaos

[War erupted between Ehla and the Demon Princes]. A further disaster afflicted Ehlaar – the Chaos Plague [unleashed by Ehla]. This killed most people and animals it infected. Most of those who survived became tainted by chaos. Farmers and their animals merged to form the hated Broos and other beastmen. A small number of survivors gained in health, intelligence and stature, gaining a golden hue. They are the Chosen. With the massive number of deaths, whole dioceses of the old Outsider Empire were laid waste. Successor Kingdoms rose in other areas, less affected by the plague, and fell just as quickly.

The Cult of Ehla spread quickly through the Natives, as did resurgent Demonism. The human races began to interbreed of necessity, and a final race, the Halfbreeds, was the result, and quickly became the majority.

A strong Kingdom arose centered on the port city of Endeavor. Dominated by the Colonist gods, a trinity of the War God, Healer Goddess and Fire God became important owing to their powers in fighting Chaos and the Plague. This became the Kingdom of Endeavor.

A horde of Brutes and Dragonmen riding dinosaurs swept in from the Wastes. Led by Ngezhor the Brutal, they established order of a sort, demanding tribute in return for protection from chaos. The Brutal Horde rules over a host of petty vassal kingdoms.

The Outsider province of Trasis had managed to retain its territorial integrity, but found itself at the mercy of dwarves who ruled mountain fastnesses in the Iceteeth range. Successful negotiation between the Lady of Trasis and the Dwarven Emperor led to the formation of the Empire of Dwarves and Trasians.

Along the Iron Coast and the banks of the great River Vaun, Native and Halfbreed cities formed a great trading league, which was able to hire mercenary forces that soon gelled into a mighty army. The Iron League and its prime city of Millanea became the richest lands of Ehlaar, owing much of their success to their patron Demon Princes.

The Cult of Ehla established a series of matriarchal Queendoms in the valleys of the Vaun headwaters and along its tributaries. The great Queendom of Gla remains the center of the cult.

Our Time

Lord Providence rules the Kingdom of Endeavor and directs operations against chaos from his stronghold, Castle Might. The lords of Endeavor worry about the waste of military spending and dream of rivaling the Iron League for trading riches.

The Brutal Horde has settled down somewhat. While still possessing a formidable force, the descendents of Ngezhor have settled in the City of the Gilded Hides on the edge of the Wastes, and some other forms of worship than totem spirits have begun to spread, much to the disgust of the Shamans of the Horde. The Qaghan Zayakhagu has reached out to the Dwarves and Trasians but has received little response.

Parsyatis is the Great Queen of the Dwarves and Trasians. Her father, Meti, reversed the dominance of the Dwarves to become Great King, leaving the title of Emperor to the Dwarf Gad-Kazun. Parsyatis is building a great new capital at Metiapur. She looks to the Iron League to the north with dreams of absorbing its cities.

The Iron League and its demon patrons continue their intrigue with one another, secure behind their mercenary legions. Ukhaantu the Brute commands the armies, but many believe he has gone soft.

The Queendom of Gla and its associated lands conduct an ongoing magical war and an on-again off-again physical war with the Iron League. The Queen offers citizenship to all Chosen [and is secretly breeding a new super-race, with the aim of exterminating all non-native races and returning Ehlaar to its original state].

Questworld 2.0

2011-01-24T19:48:00.004-05:00

If I'd written this post a few days ago, it would have been very different. Like James from Grognardia, I'm fascinated by the road not taken for Runequest, to wit, the project called Questworld. This project aimed to provide an alternate world for Runequest adventures other than Glorantha, where everything had to go through Greg Stafford's approval process. Developers were free, however, to use Gloranthan gods. In a particularly interesting idea, the Chaosium took one continent to develop (Kanos, pictured) but allocated others to the big players in the Runequest industry at the time like Judges Guild. Another was to go to Britain's own Games Workshop, several years before that group became obsessed with Warhammer.

At the time - the early 1980s - GW's White Dwarf was going through a golden age, with multiple useful articles and scenarios in every issue. In WD #38, the magazine's Runequest luminaries explained their plans for the continent, Theelar, and these guys knew what they were doing. I was entranced. I wanted to learn more about this project and be first in line to snag a copy when it came out. For the next dozen or so issues, fascinating tidbits of the world came out. A truly magnificent set of rules for demon summoning, complete with stats for demons and the demon lords, was the highlight, followed by our first glimpse of the geography and culture of Theelar. The scenario Lone and Level Sands was one of the best ever published for Runequest, and it set out a conflict between a decadent and corrupt Ancient Empire and the Invader Race from Glorantha. Rudimentary character generations rules for Ancients were included. It all looked like exactly the world I was waiting for.

Then it all stopped. References to the forthcoming Questworld set became few and far between and eventually ceased, with no explanation given. Whether the licensing deal got caught up in the disastrous transfer of Runequest to Avalon Hill or whether there were creative differences with Greg Stafford who was antipathetic to Glorantha having links to other worlds, I just don't know.

Nevertheless, for thirty years the possibilities of Theelar have intrigued me. Until a few days ago I had a plan in mind. I was going to catalog every reference to Theelar I could find to provide a skeleton of the GW Questworld project and then reconstruct a campaign setting from that. I had spent months extrapolating from what I already knew, and had many seeds ready to plant.

Then this weeked, in researching the work of Dave Morris, one of the authors of the project, I discovered that the GW Questworld files still exist and may even be collated and published for his Dragon Warriors game:

The premise in brief: pilgrims from the known lands of Legend sail west seeking an earthly paradise as the millennium approaches. They arrive at another continent, which many are convinced is their reward from God. Some centuries later, few still believe that in their hearts, though it is still the official teaching of the Church and the capital city is called Deliverance. Inland, a decadent civilization known to the Coradians as Ancients, shored up by a slave army of creatures called habdigars, continues to oppose the newcomers' expansion along the great river Ophis. Think Legend meets Aguirre with a dash of Showboat World and you're not far off.

If you're a DW fan, don't expect this stuff to be rolling out overnight. It was originally written for Questworld, so much of it uses Runequest rules. Typewritten pages are not so convenient for re-editing as Word documents. Some of it is too close to other ideas we've used since. Role-playing has moved on (well, changed anyway) in the intervening years, so it would need updating. And editing material Oliver and I wrote over two decades ago has to take a back seat to projects like the Fabled Lands e-gamebooks. But in spare moments we'll tinker with it, and eventually, you never know...

Dave has included some mouth-watering tidbits, including a description of the city of Deliverance (perhaps originally Port Diaphos?) in his blog, which you can find by searching for Ophis, which I think was originally the Issaries River. There's one splendid scenario outline in there already.

While delighted to hear this, this obviously squashes my beloved project, which I was just gearing up to after twenty-five years of thinking about it. Yet the prospect of finally seeing this wealth of imagination, even in a non-Runequest form, makes my mouth water.

So back to the drawing board for my project. I imagine that the basic geography of Theelar, if not the name or the specific geography of Tamary and the Wastes of Gizen, is still part of the Questworld project, so I can at least use that as the basis of my non-Gloranthan world. And the idea of invader races whets my appetite. So I have come up with a new name, cosmology and history for my Questworld idea. I'll develop that here on my blog, as I use it to hone my thinking on Runequest mechanics as well. Watch this space for the history of Ehlaar, coming very soon!

Cult Ideas

2011-01-19T22:27:00.001-05:00

The Mongoose Runequest II rules are great at the three traditional forms of magic - divine, spirit and sorcery - but I wonder if there is room to adapt the system for certain historic forms of worship that don't really fit into the organized hierarchies envisaged. Here are some basic ideas that I'll try to expand on later.

Mystery Cults

The Eleusinian Mysteries, the cult of Cybele, the Great Mother, Isis - all were extremely popular cults that outsiders (and therefore us) had no real idea of what they did at worship ceremonies. This is pretty easy to mirror in MRQII terms - you take a Compulsion not to reveal the Mystery to the profane. Yet this doesn't really get the point. What is the Mystery and what makes it special?

Here are some suggestions on how to run a mystery cult. The cult has several mysteries. The first mystery is handed down on initiation (pious membership), with further mysteries revealed on becoming a fervent member and a high lord/priest (probably different for each one). The most sacred mysteries, known by the high lords, are actually the point of the cult, and it is the high lord/priest's most sacred duty to find someone worthy of passing the secret on to so that the cult continues. This should lead to good role-playing opportunities. In a rune-based world, the mysteries could be tied to a rune, and if you play the runetouched rules, then you become runetouched when you learn the mystery.

Lesser mysteries often involve the viewing of sacred objects, which may themselves imbue the initiate with a one-use power on exposure to them at the worship ceremony. Moreover, the objects are in some way the channel whereby the initiates get their magic. Thus, if the objects are stolen (heh heh) or destroyed, the initiates lose their magic - no divine spells, all spirits leave or a sorcerer forgets the grimoire (mysterious sorcery cults will probably have the grimoire as their object).

Greater mysteries, those known by fervent and high members (gosh, I wish I hadn't written that), are actually heroquests, involving a trip to the otherworld or afterlife. They are dangerous and unpredictable, but should end in the revelation of whatever eternal bliss (or damnation) is the ultimate reward of the initiate. Perhaps High Lords/Priests take Fervent Members along with them for part of a MysteryQuest, but progress to the end alone. In all probability a new high type (much better) will receive a new sacred object, or reimbue an old one, to start their own branch of the cult. In some cases, however, there will only be one cult object or site and only one high type.

In all cases revealing the mystery to an outsider is cause for the loss of all magic, visit by spirits/agents of reprisal (if you use those) and outlaw status (kill on sight) in the eyes of all other initiates.

Sacrifices

Many ancient religions held that blessings were only received after an appropriate sacrifice. MRQ II has in some ways abstracted that into a sacrifice (or rather dedication) of POW to a deity. However, what if the deity actually does require an appropriate sacrifice before any blessing - acquiring magic, calling for a miracle, or even using magic? Pete Nash has some basic rules for sacrifices in his excellent Rome supplement for BRP, whereby a player makes a sacrifice and a Theology roll and if successful, gets the blessing requested. For MRQ II I think we need something more. In Necromantic Arts there is a Sorcery Spell of Sacrifice for human sacrifices whereby if the sorcerer makes a successful cast and the victim fails a resilience roll, the Sorcerer gains the MPs of the victim. This is more like it. I would suggest a skill - Lore (Sacrifice) probably works - where, with a successful skill test the caster gains as many MPs as the SIZ of the sacrificial animal (or POW+SIZ if human, perhaps, or POW+CHA for certain cults...) divided by 5. So a chicken gets you one MP and a horse gets you 5. These MPs could replace Dedicated POW for divine magicians, but are not reusable - once you use the magic, you have to sacrifice again to get the magic back. For spirit magicians, perhaps spirits require a sacrifice that would gain MPs equal to their intensity before they will respond to a spirit magician's request one time. So shamans would spend a lot of downtime biting the heads of chickens and so on, which seems appropriate. Sacrifice doesn't seem appropriate for sorcery except for evil sorcery, where the Necromantic Arts spell seems good (and allows for mass sacrifice with Target and Range manipulation). I should add here that obviously these suggestions are inappropriate for Glorantha.

Orgiastic Cults

Let's face it, Bacchanals were very popular... I would suggest that cults that require orgiastic rites as part of their worship require their participants to fail a Resilience or Persistence roll (depending on whether wine or some mental stimulant brings on the orgiastic state). Only after successful completion of a rite would the character gain or regain magic - spirit, divine spell or knowledge of the grimoire (which I suggest be revealed knowledge rather than a physical book in such cases). This would give an unusual incentive to keep resilience and/or persistence low. The role-playing opportunities involved with waking up the next morning, imbued with magic but unsure of what happened last night, are also tremendous. And just imagine an orgiastic heroquest... I might have to develop an orgiastic cult now! According to the published HeroQuest RPG rules, there are plenty of orgiastic cults in Glorantha.

Your Own Personal God

The greatest heroes of the Iliad literally had gods following them around on the battlefield. To emulate this, one way might be to have High Lords who have dedicated all their POW to their god actually have the GM run the god as a shadow NPC for them after a successful Pact roll when the PC calls on them. This NPC has no stats, unlimited MPs and access to all spells which they will cast at GM's discretion. They will also automatically grant one miracle if called on, but will then leave. If they encounter another "personal god" they will cancel each other out and both disappear. Another way to do it just to use the Ancestor Spirit rules, just spiced up a bit (say +1d6 to all characteristics and +10 to POW, with other extra abilities as in the rules), whenever the PC makes a critical Lore (Theology) roll. They will then be imbued with the godhead for an appropriate amount of time, and will have full control of their actions except when the GM decides otherwise (perhaps use Mythic Resonance rolls with a difficult or hard penalty). This is more like Gloranthan "Heroforming" really but may be a better approach.

Comments welcome!

Exodus of Rome Journal

2011-01-19T20:43:00.001-05:00

(Written by the GM, Jujitsudave, and as posted on the MRQ Forum)

The First Journal entry of Publius Equitatus Aquilla (formerly known as Athdain of the Pictii) this day November 18, Anno Urbis Conditae 1160.
As transcribed by Flavius Ventario of Alexandria.

I now dictate this journal to my new travelling companion who has urged me to begin making a journal as a kind of record of my travels. I myself do not write this because I have no knowledge of my letters since the people of my childhood take no stock in writing and because Flavius is an educated man far better at this than I.

Today has been a monumentous one. I am recently of 20 years and have been full grown for quite some time, but it is now within me that I must go and fulfill my goals as my skills are keen enough to this purpose.

When I was a boy, my father, Ardinius (formerly Ardain) had chosen to meet with the Romans to sue for peace in exchange for trade of our tin for their cattle. Such would have been a good trade, but the Roman officer that had made it had more interest in warfare. My treacherous uncle Prydain had bargained with him and my family was exiled for conspiracy with our enemies and it is since then we reside in the Roman city of Eburacum. We have both been working as Venatores for a ludus as he and now I are seasoned trackers and can make a living at this, but today I have left the employ of Valentius, my Patron.

My goal now is to seek this Roman and execute him before returning to my tribe and claiming my rightful place as the cheiftan as my father before me. Surprisingly, Valentius was not at all displeased with me once he learned of my plans to kill this Roman but in fact wished to assist me with provisions.It would seem that this same man had once wronged Valentius but how I don't know. He also sent 2 gladiator bodyguards, Gromius and Cassius. The former is a large warrior who enjoys gambling and hence is why he is a gladiator for his debt and Cassius Ursus who that very day slew a bear in single combat (although I suspect he may have had some help...). Finally there is Valentius' representative Flavius who writes this now.

This evening I must get rest. We start early and I hope the gladiators will be ready, for it would seem this evening they are in the throes of debauched celebration of their victories.

+++

Aquilla's second entry, November 19, Anno Urbis Conditae 1160.
It is testament to Valentius' gladiators that they should be able to travel with throbbing heads and bowels turned to mush!

We walked along the via Hadrianum north and although the day is damp they are not bitterly cold. Flavius has insisted we stay at a taburnae rather than a cauponae so we are not robbed and our ox is not stolen in the night. The place we are in now is in Cataractorum, a sprawling little town that even has a theater and is a place for well to do Romans. We went to the taburnae there and Gromius set to betting at once. We joined an old tin merchant and in walked some patrician that thought himself better than everyone else there. He sat to begin betting and when he began to lose, became infuriated, grabbing the merchant and threatening to kill him right there. Gromius stepped in and I thought that that point there would be bloodshed, but the patricians legs had become lost to his control! I know not what happened, but it shut him up and when he regained control of his faculties, he had stormed away.

I fear we have not seen the last of him.

(I hope Dave will be posting more recaps. If not, I'll probably start doing them myself).

Review - Life and Death (d101 Games)

2011-01-19T00:30:00.001-05:00

RPGs aren't a matter of life and death, to paraphrase Bill Shankly, they're more important than that. And anyone who spends large amounts of time designing RPG campaigns will appreciate Life and Death (L&D) by Newt Newport. Written for Newt's Openquest system, a slimmed-down version of Mongoose Runequest 1 designed under the Open Game License, L&D is an extremely imaginative campaign setting and adventures that resonates well with the distinctly non-medieval tradition of Runequest adventures. I heartily recommend it.

L&D is set in the Shattered Lands, a setting of 5 city states that all fell under a magical curse 500 years ago and endured centuries of complete isolation. During that time, their gods disappeared and magical has become extremely limited in its scope. Some "replacement" cults have now arisen and the objects of devotion are attempting to achieve godhood. This makes for a fun setting, especially as undeath is pretty common around the Lands.

Newt says in his introduction that the two adventures for the setting aim to embody several themes that he has found running through "d100" adventures through the years. Those are:

Monsters are characters too
Treasure is often culturally significant
Cultural detail is important
Magic is an integral part of the world
Interaction with the world is not just based around combat

I have to say that this is a great list, and will use it as a checklist for my own future scenarios. It's also safe to say that Newt has succeeded in his aims.

Of the two adventures I marginally prefer the first, Dead Pot Country, which takes the characters into a desert area populated by peasants and bandits, a whole bunch of walking dead and a lost civilization ripe for exploration. Tomb robbers looking for loads of loot are going to be extremely disappointed (and that's probably why most adventurers will be lured to the area), but those looking for the unexpected will be delighted, assuming they survive.

The adventures are written in a particular style that makes them ideal for "sandbox" style gaming. There is no railroad here. The setting, characters (including "monsters") and certain encounters are described individually, for the DM to use as he/she feels fit. This makes them adaptable to almost any DM-ing style. The storyteller can write the story beforehand from the ingredients provided while the old school referee can let the players explore and drop in the encounters when it seems right.

The second adventure, the eponymous Life and Death, has more of a plot, but it is one that can unfold in a variety of ways. It takes the characters through from being newcomers to a city, through involvement in political factions to a mythic encounter in the deserted realm of the gods. All good Runequest-style stuff.

The downfall, however, of area-based settings like this is that they can often be difficult to insert into an ongoing campaign. L&D, by contrast, could fit quite well into Glorantha almost as written. The isolation of the Shattered Lands fits well into Gloranthan myth, with the Closing and the Syndics' Ban. The removal of the gods also has all the hallmarks of a God Learner experiment. I'm therefore tempted to insert the Shattered Lands into an area of Third Age Pamaltela without many changes. It could even fit into the Second Age, perhaps as an early God Learner experiment (with some appropriate contraction of time) or even, with some tweaks, as a relic of Nysalor's Bright Empire, shattered at the end of the First Age. If I ever get my Questworld project off the ground (more of that later), I'll drop it in as written.

All in all, an excellent pack, well worth the $12 for the PDF at DriveThruRPG. If you're in the UK, you can pick it up at Newt's store here.

Back Again...

2011-01-18T22:03:00.000-05:00

Boy, I really dropped the ball there, didn't I?

Anyway, I intend to get back to regular posting (we've heard that before, says the DM's Screen) with updates on the Pavis campaign, some reviews of old school and Runequest/Openquest products, and perhaps a running recap of Exodus of Rome, a new Runequest campaign I'm playing in via Skype, which is shaping up very nicely. I'm writing another book as we speak, so this writing will be a natural complement to the rest of the day...

MythConceptions (hang on, that's been done, hasn't it...?)

2010-08-01T23:34:00.000-04:00

The new issue of Rule One Magazine (an online Glorantha zine) is out and has a few nice articles. In particular, there's this article about the use of Gloranthan myths in games. I've had mixed success in getting my players to adopt Gloranthan attitudes, and the major obstacle has been a lack of knowledge of the various mythologies. The Mongoose I Cults of Glorantha volumes aren't detailed enough and the Heroquest stuff is just overwhelming in its detail, so what we really need is a Cults of Prax equivalent for the new systems (Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes does manage this for the Orlanthi gods, but I need something more Praxian). Hopefully Loz's Cults of Glorantha remix will suffice when it comes out.

So Gregory Molle's approach strikes me as a great way to introduce myths into the game. It also would probably mesh well with Loz's Mythic Resonance rules, which I haven't used so far. My players' characters currently worship Humakt and Vinga, with another slowly learning about sorcery by researching a fragment of the Book of Arkat, given to her by, if I remember right, Kyger Litor during a Heroquest. So these are the myths I'll give them (comments welcome):

HUMAKT

Humakt the Champion (Resonance 80%): Behaviors – act honorably, fight tirelessly, stand your ground, appreciate the power of death. Insights (skills involved in the challenge) – influence (leadership), resilience, combat style (sword.)

I’ll tell you how… Humakt became the First Weaponthane. When Humakt wore the sword called Death, Orlanth wanted it. First Orlanth tried to treat Humakt like a thrall, but Humakt told him he would never be lord over Death, fought him for sixteen days and nights and slew many of his thanes. Then Orlanth tried to treat him as a cottar, but Humakt told him safety and shelter were small things compared to Death. He fought Orlanth for four days and nights and slew many carls. Then Orlanth treated Humakt like a carl, but our god told him that a thing, once killed, could never be the same, fought him for a day and a night and slew many cottars and thralls. Enemies came then, and Orlanth was too tired to fight them. Humakt slew them all. Orlanth said to him, “You shall have a place at my side, not as my brother, but as my champion. Your weaponthanes shall answer only to you.”

How Humakt commanded his warriors (Resonance 50%): Behaviors – think quickly, exhibit bravery. Insights – influence (leadership), lore (tactics). Myth as per card.

VINGA

How Vinga Joined the Thunder Brothers (Resonance 75%): Behaviors – stand up for yourself, do not settle for second-best, it is best to have the last word in a contest, trust in your own abilities. Insights – resilience, any skill used in a contest, combat style (javelin).

I’ll tell you how…Vinga joined the Thunder Brothers. After coming second in a series of contests, Vinga proposed her own challenge. “Let each of you take up a javelin,” she said, “and we will see who is the better man.” She let her brothers throw first. When they had all finished, Vinga turned three circles and let her javelin fly with a piercing shriek. All her brothers watched in admiration as it flew a full mile and shattered the marking stone at the border of the next field. The Thunder Brothers carried her on their shields to toast their newest member with Minlister’s best brew.

How Vinga Gained New Powers (Resonance 40%): Behaviors – it is best to show mercy, vary your combat styles. Insights – combat styles (any), insight. Myth as per card.

ARKAT

How Arkat Stole the Power of Sorcery (Resonance 45%): Behaviors – deception is often better than combat, do not trust Western sorcerers, keep your promises. Insights – sleight, stealth.

I’ll tell you how…Arkat stole the power of sorcery. To defeat D’Wargon, Arket vowed to bring the power of sorcery to the Uz. He journeyed to the Dread Isle of Zzabur, the Brother of the Devil. He invited himself to his Castle, and stayed with him. He got him drunk on troll drinks, and hid Zabur’s Blue Book in his jerkin. That night he slipped away, using the good dark to hide him.

How Arkat Defeated Gbaji (Resonance 90%): Behaviors – always fight against chaos, do not give up, trust your companions, wounds are not serious, destroy your enemies utterly. Insights – virtually anything.

I’ll tell you how…Arkat defeated Gbaji. Arkat was called Kingtroll because he was acknowledges the supreme fighting leader of all living trolls. In this capacity, he sent out the Ebon Net of All Hooks to muster Uz in his struggle against D’Wargon. Arkat led the boldest and bravest in the final fight inside the Spiral Heart of Silence where he thre down D’Wargon and then confronted Gbaji, the deceiver. In a hand-to-hand struggle in which all his old wounds reopened, Arkat saw within Gbaji and dealt him the dislocating blow which severed him from chaos. Gbaji’s parts were separated in the Manner of Arkstintoris, and the parts taken and hidden in the spirit worlds by Arkat’s surviving henchmen.

Secrets of Pavis Campaign: A Heroquest

2010-07-31T15:33:00.000-04:00

It's been a while since I updated the campaign log and even longer since some of the sessions, so memories are hazy and almost certainly inaccurate, but for the record, here we go.

When last seen, Xaraya, Grom and Skye had agreed to aid Marcilla, High Healer of the White Sisterhood, in a Heroquest to bring Darnbar Chaosknower back to life. The PCs escorted Marcilla to Horn Gate, stopping off at Ronegarth, where they picked up Lady Jezra, who was intent on visiting the White Sisters to get some herbs to help treat her mother, who had fallen quite ill.

They reached Horn Gate without incident, and Xaraya was able to restrain herself from confronting the Sables. At the hospital, Marcilla gathered her sisters and explained the legend to her helpers. During the Gods War, Lhankor Mhy went missing. Chalanna Arroy was worried at this, and asked Humakt, Issaries and Vinga to help find the Knowing God. Each was unwilling, but the Goddess persuaded them. They overcame obstacles on the way to the land of the dead, where they found Tien about to decapitate Lhankor Mhy. Humakt defeated him and drove him off. Chalanna Arroy healed Lhankor Mhy, Issaries told him where he was, Vinga gave him a pair of walking boots and Humakt gave him a sword to defend himself. In return, the Knowing God gave each of them a reward. Then the gods returned to their homes.

Xaraya agreed to play the role of Issaries, while Skye and Humakt of course agreed to play the roles of their patrons. Marcilla explained HeroQuesting for the PCs’ benefit, and emphasized that if the PCs veered too far from the ritual, very bad things could happen and if they did so on purpose then they would commit the sin of God Learning. She stressed that if they failed at their tasks, they would likely fall out of the God Plane, with possibly bad results. If they died on the God Plane, however, they would almost certainly be lost there forever. In the earlier parts of the legend, when they are being recruited, they would have to play the parts of disinterest well. If they simply agreed to go along, they would have failed and would fade as the legend goes on. If they played their part too well, however, they would not accompany CA on her quest and would fall out of the HQ. The PCs gulped and agreed to these conditions.

The sisterhood began their prayers and the questers found themselves on the God Plane, each heroforming into the gods they represented. First Marcilla approached Xaraya, who as Issaries was engaged in a market. Xaraya successfully resisted Marcilla's first two attempts to persuade her/him to come with her, when Marcilla argued that she/he must help her friend, and that without knowledge the market goods would be worthless, but agreed to come when Marcilla said that Issaries' customers were falling in numbers, for they did not realize they needed his goods.

Next, the gods approached Vinga, who was playing with Yinkin. CA failed to get Vinga's attention until she sent Yinkin away, but was glad to see Vinga did not follow. Then CA explained she needed someone who could climb far over hill and dale to find Lhankor Mhy, and the goddess agreed to go with them.

Then the gods approached Humakt, who was locked in combat with a Zombie god. Grom defeated the Zombie easily and realized his sword was now enchanted against zombies. Marcilla asked him to come with her, but he said he had other zombies to dispatch. So Marcilla showed him affection, and Grom was eager to help her, realizing his emotions for the beautiful healer.

The gods then came to a great scarp, which the legend said Vinga climbed and then pulled up her friends, with some undefined help from the other gods. Skye climbed the cliff with difficulty, but then was at a loss as to how to pull her friends up as she failed in exerting herself. Xaraya/Issaries shot an arrow up attached to a rope, and with the two ropes the questers were able to continue.

The legend then said that Issaries guided the gods across the River Styx towards Havan Gor, judge of the dead. Xaraya did not know the secrets of Issaries' travel in the underworld, and so was left to her own devices. She managed to bring the gods to the dark river, where again she shot an arrow tied to a rope, which enabled them to cross over.

At last the gods found Lhankor Mhy, unconscious and with a garrote around his throat, put there by the headhunting Chaos god Tien. The god was a headless monster, and Grom/Humakt challenged him. Grom won swiftly, setting the monster to flight.

The questers could now see that Lhankhor Mhy was Darnbar, suffering from a grievous head wound. Marcilla healed him and he opened his eyes. He asked where he was, and Xaraya told him. In return, the god gave her a magical map that could tell her where she was at any time, if she could read it.

Next, the god said he needed boots to make his way back to the God Plane. At this point Skye realized she had forgotten to bring a pair that would fit him. She faded out of the Heroquest.

Finally, Lhankor Mhy asked for a sword. Grom realized that he, like Skye, had forgotten to bring the item, but he had the sword at his side. Reluctantly, he turned over his newly-enchanted sword. In return, the god told him the secret of Defending Knowledge.

The gods started back to their homes, although Lhankor Mhy did so with difficulty because he had no boots and Vinga the pathfinder was not there. The questers woke up back at the hospital. Darnbar was breathing and would live, but Marcilla said that because the myth was not wholly successful, he had not found his way back easy. Ever after, she lamented, Darnbar would be subject to the Relife Sickness, and would be a shadow of his former self.

Nevertheless, the quest had succeeded in its main objective, and the party celebrated with the sisterhood that night. Grom found himself unable to take his eyes off Marcilla all evening.

Gringle's Pawnshop

2010-07-27T22:20:00.000-04:00

Thanks to James at Grognardia for linking to Gringle's Pawnshop, a discussion board for old-school Runequest fans. When I get my act together I'll be posting there as Lucky Eddi.

Summons of the Wyter

2010-07-24T13:00:00.002-04:00

The first adventure in the Mongoose Second Age "Living Glorantha" campaign is out. Summons of the Wyter, although suffering from the sadly usual proofreading issues (they even misspell Wyter in the title, for Orlanth's sake!), is actually a very nice episode. In particular, it introduces the mythical nature of Gloranthan gaming very well right up front. In fact, I think that if Avalon Hill Runequest had developed along these lines rather than the chaos-and-caves of the Runequest Renaissance (which are excellent adventures in their own right, I should stress) then we might never have had the Hero Wars schism.

It's also nice to see some MRQ2 NPCs statted up. The NPCs of Blood of Orlanth, for instance, during the MRQ1 era were very magic-lite and so, while the setting and plot were recognizably Gloranthan, the NPCs didn't seem right. These guys are much more evocative of the magic-rich Second Age, as is the dilemma the PCs are presented with. A very nice beginning - even if you're not going to port your characters around between Living Glorantha GMs, it looks like this campaign will be well worth playing.

Image taken from Questlines.

Second Age Adventure Setting: Pythos University

2010-07-22T20:22:00.000-04:00

I've become more and more interested in running adventures set in the Second Age, and have been toying with a few different settings. Here are my first few notes on Pythos University, a God Learner academy located in Slontos. I'd love to know what you think.

Doomed to a hideous parody of existence after the fall of Slontos, Pythos University is currently a center of experimental Heroquesting, pushing the boundaries of myth to come up with new theories about the way the hero plane works. The University is made up of several Collegia (vulgarly, colleges), associations of scholars centered around differing theories or avenues of inquiry. The leaders of these colleges – variously called Masters, Principals, Wardens and Deans – are often in quiet, and sometimes noisy, competition.

The University is famous for having developed artificial Heroquest Gates, allowing researchers access to the Hero Plane directly from the colleges. Because of the experimental nature of the magic involved, the University is a dangerous place, and at least one college bears the marks of backlash damage. Crippled students are common, and, although the College of St Xemela looks after them, many have severed ties with their colleges and settled in the town, which recognizes the wealth the colleges bring, but worries about the horrors the experiments can unleash on the town.

Attempting to keep order in this town is Inspector Fanto, a former student of great intelligence who found himself stripped of magical ability during one experiment. There is a high level of mortality in the town, and it is the Inspector’s job to sort the accidental from the deliberate. The Inspector is highly respected by the University’s leaders, but often finds that researchers dismiss him for his lack of magic. Townspeople often do not trust him because of his status as a former student. Nevertheless, the Inspector and his staff are often all that stands between the University and oblivion.

The Colleges

Collegium of the Fifth Action (Action College): Action College is headed by Master Hedin tel Frolos, leader of the Hedinist or Hypotheticalist School. Hedinists are interested in what happens when central characters or events are altered or prevented in Heroquests. Hypotheticalism is extremely dangerous, because often the myth falls apart or “snaps back” with massive backlash. Hedin’s leading researcher is Doctor Hawk, who has been crippled so badly that he is confined to a magical flying chair and can only speak through mental link with his Venator servant. Doctor Hawk is zeroing in on a grand unification theory of Heroquesting, something that will underpin the artificial Monomyth that is central to God Learner theory. Other personalities at the College include…

Collegium of Hwarosian Mystery (Old College): Old College was the first college established at the University. It is headed by Warden Moser de Suler, one of the oldest and wisest researchers at the University. Old College is a mainstream God Learner research establishment and does not push the envelope particularly, which is why the other colleges were established. Warden Moser is concerned at just how far his colleagues are going, and often employs agents to spy on their activities.

Zistorite Research Institute (Machine College): Machine College is a combined effort of the Cogs of Zistor and the Order of Otherworld Exploration. Led by Clarxo the Wheel, the College devotes itself to applied mechamagics, and the Advanced Mechamagic Building has produced some very important advances over the years. However, there have not been many breakthroughs in recent years, and Clarxo is becoming impatient.

Collegium of St Volanc (St Volanc’s College): St Volanc’s ceased to be a college devoted to the war order some time ago and is now the home of the Conditionalist School of Enginistos Got, a former Hedinist who took his research one step further. Conditionalism seeks to promote other participant(s) in a myth to replace the protagonist(s). The central concept of Conditionalism is The Could-Have-Been King, whose power the Conditionalists are attempting to harness, along with an army of Meanwhiles and Never-Weres. Needless to say, this is even more dangerous than Hypotheticalism. The college’s East wall has been blown down and several dozen students killed in the past couple of years.

More to come if people are interested.

Whirrr...click...reboot

2010-07-22T20:17:00.000-04:00

Time and tide wait for no man, and neither do blogs. Sorry I haven't posted in so long, but I do have lots of content ready to see the light of day.

In the meantime, here's an interview with one of my gaming heroes, the great Paul Jaquays, co-author of Griffin Mountain and the splendid Hellpits of Nightfang.

Addendum: Second Age Refuge?

2010-04-16T23:21:00.000-04:00

Could Sanctuary work in the Second Age of Glorantha? As it is located very near Zistorwal, the Clanking City, it would make a nice base for PCs involved there. Ilsigi could again be Heortlings, with the EWF taking the place of the Rankans and the God Learners/Zistorites the Nisibisi. The Waertagi have been swept from the seas by the God Learners, so they fit as the Beysibs again. The EWF have savage leaders like Varankol the Mangler and in fact, you could just make Vashanka a member of the Eternal Dragon Ring who is defeated in battle, with Tempus as his closest associate. Savankala could be the Golden Dragon Sun. In fact, it probably all works better like that, with added dragons! What's not to like?

Sanctuary Much

2010-04-16T23:14:00.000-04:00

One of the things I retrieved from the UK recently was my Chaosium edition of Thieves' World. As classic games go, this is really up there with the best of them. The only thing missing was the original Personalities of Sanctuary book, which I had discarded at some point because I had the RQIII stats in the Thieves' World Companion. Darn it! As it happens, I discovered the recent Green Ronin game based on Sanctuary was available direct from them for a fraction of the price asked at my FLGS, so I ordered that for comparison. So far it feels like a useful addition to my Thieves' World games collection.

But what has this got to do with Runequest, I hear you ask. Well, not only was the Chaosium set put together by Greg Stafford himself, complete with RQII and then RQIII stats, but Sanctuary itself was transplanted to Glorantha. As "Refuge," the city was perched at the tip of the Eastern peninsula of the Holy Country. Beyond that, however, I know nothing, but as I intend to make that area an attractive adventuring element in my sandbox I have decided that Refuge will indeed be Sanctuary transplanted.
However, this will take more than a little work given the complications of "modern" treatment of the Holy Country, where things have gotten a bit complicated. The basic idea of Sanctuary in the era I'd like to run it is of an old culture (Ilsigi) recently conquered by a strong empire (Ranke) that has weakened severely owing to a war with a magically powerful neighbor to the North (Nis). In addition, a rich and powerful seafaring matriarchy (the Beysibs) have recently moved in and essentially taken over.

This actually fits quite neatly until you get mythologies involved. The Ilsigi can be the Heortlings. The Rankans can be the Holy Country 'federation' imposed by Belintar the God-King (I still prefer Pharoah, which I never interpreted as meaning he was Egyptian, which apparently a lot of people did). Nis is plainly the Lunar Empire, complete with women with powerful magic. The Beysibs can even be returning Waertagi.

The complicating factors are the Esvulari - the monotheist Orlanthi that reside in the lowlands of Heortland - and the Knights of Malkonwal, followers of Sir Richard the Tigerhearted, possibly the worst name in the history of Gloranth (he has since been retconned to Rikard the Tiger, but I'm calling him Rijkaard). I'm going to deal with this by declaring that the Esvulari never made inroads in Refuge and that Prince Kadakithis is actually the younger brother of Rijkaard, but was appointed regent by Belintar. The disappearance of Belintar and the reign of Rijkaard can mirror the chaos in Ranke caused by the accession of Theron.

Where things get difficult is the religions of Sanctuary. The Ilsigi religion has a trickster god as chief, with an Earth mother type, a trade god, a love goddess, a healing goddess and a thief god prominent. The Rankan cosmology has a Sun god, a Star goddess and a really violent Storm/War god. The Ilsig pantheon translates quite well to traditional Heortling gods: Orlanth Adventurous, Asrelia/Ernalda, Issaries, Chalanna Arroy and Lanbril are reasonable analogs. Eurmal can have a prominent role too to get the trickster element in. But the Rankan gods just don't seem to fit and this is important because the nature of their gods is reflected in the personalities of some important characters that I want to see in Refuge.

Here's my solution: Vashanka, the mad war/storm god, becomes Belintar the God-King himself. Tempus, the great hero, is one of the Masters of Luck and Death, destined to be a vessel of Belintar, but that plan is blown apart when the Pharoah disappears. This makes his hatred of the Nis/Lunars more obvious. Cime, his sister, can have a similar background. Savankala, the Sun God, can be the Invisible God of Malkonwal. And I'm going to write Sabellia out of the equation, as she doesn't have that important a role. Ayzuna can be a damaged spirit cruelly abused by the Pharoah in his ascension.

As for the "outsider" gods, Dyareela is obviously Krarsht, Heqt can be Frog Woman, the Praxian spirit cult, Weda Krishtawn can be Magasta the sea god and the Order of the Blue Star is going to be a sorcerous order associated with the House of Black Arkat.

So, bearing this in mind, here are the dispositions, as it were, of the most prominent characters of Refuge, in the order presented in the Thieves World Companion:

Prince and Officials

Aye-Golphan, Captain of the Palace Guard, Rokari mercenary
Critias, Stepson, initiate of the God-King (and Humakt?)
Danlis, lady-in-waiting, Rokari
Prince Kadakithis, Prince-Governor, Rokari
Molin Torchholder, Bishop of the Invisible God, Rokari
Niko, Stepson, Rokari or Esvulari
Tempus Thales, Hell Hound, Master of Luck and Death
Walegrin, Rokari mercenary, knows secret of iron
Zalbar, Hell Hound captain, initiate of the God-King (Esvulari?)

Residents

Alten Stulwig, alchemist
Amoli, owner of Lily Garden
Dubro, Blacksmith
Enas Yorl, cursed Brithini sorcerer from God Forgot
Gilla, wife of Lalo
Hakiem, half-Fonritian storyteller, adviser to the Beysibs
Hanse Shadowspawn, servant of Orlanth Adventurous and Lanbril
Haught, apprentice sorcerer
Hort, storyteller and ex-fisherman
Illyra, half-Praxian seer
Ischade, cursed sorceress and enemy of Roxane (Carmanian?)
Jarveena, waif and survivor from Lunar conquest of Sartar
Jubal, Argimori ex-gladiator and crime lord
Kemren the Purple Mage, sorcerer and apostate priest of Magasta
Kurd, God Forgot vivisectionist
Lalo, portrait artist, blessed of Orlanth
Masha, human midwife
Melilot, scribe
Mizraith, Brithini sorcerer
Mor-am & Moria, former Hawkmasks
Mradhon Vis, mercenary from Tarsh (Exile)
Myrtis, owner of Aphrodisia House (and sister of Lythande)
Lastel, slumming Esvulari noble
Zip, thief and revolutionary

Transients

Cappen Varra, minstrel from Ralios
Chenaya, Holy Country noble, Master of Luck and Death
Cime, immortal harlot, former Master of Luck and Death, now sorcerer-killer
Cythen, Heortling mercenary
Jamie the Red, Sartarite barbarian noble
Kama, soldier and bard, initiate of the God King
Lord Kurrekai, Waertagi nobleman
Lythande, Adept of the Blue Star
Monkel Setmur, Waertagi sea captain and elder
Randal, Stepson, Hrestoli mage
Roxane, Lunar agent and sorceress
Samlor hil Samt, Pavic merchant, priest of Issaries
Smhee, Black Fang assassin a long way from home
Shupansea, "Beysa" and empress of the Waertagi
Sync, Captain of the 3rd Commando, Rokari mercenary

It'll probably be a while before my players get to Refuge, but I'm going to enjoy it when they do.

Stalethia the Moondancer

2010-04-11T20:31:00.000-04:00

Inspired by this thread on the Mongoose forum, I decided to try to create a Lunar magician. As it happens, I needed to design one for my campaign, so if you are a player, read no further, there be spoilers ahead! I think these rules for Lunar Magic work quite well and are based on the original rules in Gods of Glorantha adapted to be more compatible with new, improved Sorcery. As you might guess, some of the inspiration for the character comes from Ni Chang, the white-haired witch in The Forbidden Kingdom (a very Gloranthan movie).

Stalethia the Moondancer, Agent (Rune Priestess) of HonEel the Dancer

Stalethia is a direct descendent of HonEel herself, although via a cadet branch, and therefore a distant cousin of JarEel the Razoress. She therefore considers herself akin to a demigoddess, although few others do. She has therefore trained herself to the utmost to perform missions on behalf of the Emperor in the hope that Takenegi might notice her and raise her to her appropriate position of honor. She is willing to do anything in the service of the Empire and to honor her ancestor. Fortune has brought her to Prax, where she is working with Imperial intelligence to subvert local authority and bring it under the control of the Count of Prax, her cousin SorEel the Short. Stalethia’s preferred modus operandi is seduction (either sex, she doesn’t care), although if she has to engage in combat she is no slouch, and her Lunar Magic and heroic abilities can make her extremely deadly.

In appearance, she resembles mostly a high-class Lunar courtesan. She generally wears just a loose-fitting silken garment of red and silver silk that gives the promise of revealing more than it conceals. She goes barefoot and wears many silver anklets, bangles, nose-rings and other items of jewelry. She is heavily tattooed, with representations of HonEel’s life and rune tattoos extending even to her face. Her hair is silver, and is usually worn up, piled elaborately on top of her head, held in place by four ruby pins, which double as darts. When she lets her hair down, it initially appears to be waist-length, but can grow magically when she uses her Silver Hair Dance legendary ability. She moves with the grace of a cat, and even when walking appears to be dancing.

She will often use her Lunar Magic to combine her “social” spells and increase their duration, before an evening’s mission. When necessary, she will enhance with Aphrodisiac. If forced into combat, she will use Disarm first, use Lunar Magic to combine combat spells, throw up Absorption either duel an individual using her heroic abilities to the utmost or cast out multiple Disruptions using her Lunar Magic if possible. She tends to avoid getting into potential combat situations on Dark or Dying Moon days.

Characteristics STR 9 CON 15 DEX 20 SIZ 8 INT 18 POW (7) 15 CHA 17

CA 4 DM -1d2 MP 7 SR 19

Skills Athletics 29% Brawn 17% Culture (Lunar) 66% Dance* 102% Drive 35% Evade 80% Evaluate 33% First Aid 38% Influence* 64% Insight 33% Lore (Lunar) 66% Lore (Lunar Theology)* 86% Perception 63% Persistence 75% Resilience 30% Ride 35% Sing 82% Sleight 37% Stealth 88% Swim 17% Unarmed 29%

Courtesy 45% Language (New Pelorian) 85% Art (Music) 32% Seduction* 98% Play Finger Cymbals 47% Language (Sartarite/Pavic) 50% Language (Tradetalk) 35%

Base skills: Close Combat 29% Ranged Combat 40% Common Magic 62%

Lunar Magic 33%

Common Magic 62%; Entertainer’s Smile 4, Glamour 3, Goldentongue 4, Heal 3, Understanding 4, Disruption 6, Protection 4, Coordination 3, Bladesharp 2

Pact (HonEel)* 55%; Absorption, Aphrodisiac, Bless Crops, Blessing, Disarm, Heal Body, Madness, Mind Blast

Scimitar* 109% Dart 75% (both with Blade Venom)

* Cult Skill

HP 5/5/(1)6/(1)7/4/4/5 Armor: Loose silk dress

Heroic Abilities: Arrow Cutting, Deflecting Parry
Special Heroic Abilities: Dance of Slaying, Silver Hair Dance

Lunar Magic: Allows sorcerous-style Manipulations of Common Magic, depending on the phase of the Red Moon. Dark/Dying: No Manipulations. Crescent Moon: One Manipulation. Half Moon: Manipulations as if Lunar Magic skill is Manipulation skill. Full Moon: Manipulations as if Lore (Lunar Theology) skill is Manipulation skill. Thus, Lunar Magician may increase range, duration and targets of spells and combine spells. It has no effect on Magnitude.

Dance of Slaying: By spending an MP, the Hero may use her Dance skill in place of her Evade skill. In opposed contests, the other party must also use their Dance skill, often making even the most skilled combatant appear clumsy.

Silver Hair Dance: The hero can spend an MP to release her impossibly long silver hair and use her Dance skill to use it as either a Net or a Whip. The hair is immune to Disarm Opponent, for obvious reasons, and has 2 AP and 6 HP for the purposes of cutting free via Damage Weapon

Possessions: Magical silver scimitar, magical hairpins/darts, bound Lune, MP storing crystals (to be detailed once Arms & Equipment arrives!)

Best Description of Third Age Glorantha, Ever!

2010-04-09T13:09:00.000-04:00

It comes from Deleriad in this thread at RPG.net:

My personal view of Third Age Glorantha is that it's somewhat like, what if the Romans had discovered nuclear bombs while the Greeks had dabbled in Lovecraftian science. The two empires had then both imploded and taken large chunks of the landscape with them and only the fundamentalists who had refused to have anything to do with either, had survived into a "new dark age." Only now, some more fools with more brain than sense had managed to hurl a portion of the planet into space in order to make a moon. To me, that's the backdrop.

That's about the size of it...

Inspiration from the Doctor

2010-04-08T23:56:00.000-04:00

With the new Doctor Who almost here in the States and already there over in the UK, it occurred to me I wanted to mention how the last episode of the last season contained some rather nice inspiration for a Gloranthan theme. The corrupt Time Lords had engineered the return of Gallifrey and the Doctor berated them:

"You weren't there in the final days of the War. You never saw what was born. But if the time lock's broken, then everything is leaking through. Not just the Daleks but the Skaro Degradations, the Horde of Travesties, the Nightmare Child, The Could-Have-Been King and his army of Meanwhiles and Never Weres. The War turned into Hell and that's what you opened, right above the Earth. Hell is descending!"

That sounds like God Learner territory to me. Under attack by all the forces of myth in Glorantha, what could the God Learners have created to defend them? Their magical imagination would have been stretched to the limits. What if the last desperate act of the God Learners in Jrustela was to lock part of their existence away, including the war against them, waiting for a chance to return? Preventing their return could be a major act in the Hero Wars. Perhaps the Nightmare Child and the Could-Have-Been Kin will make an appearance in my campaign in years to come...

Character Bank

2010-04-08T23:42:00.001-04:00

Goodness. Is it that long since I last posted? In any event, inspired by a post on the Mongoose Runequest II Forum, I thought I'd post some generic NPCs along the lines of the useful generic NPCs in the old Gamesmaster's Handbook. They're based on an 80pt characteristic build, with 200 free skill points, so as not to overshadow PCs. They try to follow the characteristic spread of the NPCs in the Handbook, some of which were rather odd (generic herder with a CHA of 17?). They're made for Glorantha, hence the Common Magic skills. We start with 4 barbarians...

Barbarian Crafter

Characteristics: STR 14 CON 10 DEX 12 SIZ 14 INT 12 POW 8 CHA 10
CA: 2 DM: +1D2 SR: 12 MP: 8 Move: 8m

Skills: Athletics 36%, Brawn 33%, Culture 54%, Dance 22%, Drive 20%, Evade 24%, Evaluate 72%, First Aid 24%, Influence 55%, Insight 20%, Lore 54%, Perception 25%, Persistence 21%, Resilience 30%, Ride 25%, Sing 18%, Sleight 42%, Stealth 29%, Swim 24%, Unarmed 26%, Language 72%, Survival 18%, Craft (Specialty) 84%, Engineering 24%, Mechanisms 44%

Combat Styles: Great Hammer 36%, 1d10+3+1d2, AP 4/10, Hammer and Shield 66%, 1d6+1+1d2, AP 6/12, Spear and Shield 36%, 1d8+1+1d2, AP 6/12

HP: 5/5/6/(2)7/4/4/(2)5, Likely Armor: Linen Shirt, Hard Leather Helm (-1 SR)

Common Magic 48%: Co-ordination 2, Detect (Craft Object) 1, Extinguish 2, Ignite 1

Barbarian Redsmith*

Characteristics: STR 16 CON 10 DEX 12 SIZ 15 INT 9 POW 8 CHA 10
CA: 2 DM: +1d4 SR: 11 MP:8 Move: 8m

Skills: Athletics 38%, Brawn 81%, Culture 48%, Dance 22%, Drive 20%, Evade 24%, Evaluate 54%, First Aid 21%, Influence 20%, Insight 17%, Lore 48%, Perception 22%, Persistence 16%, Resilience 70%, Ride 25%, Sing 18%, Sleight 22%, Stealth 21%, Swim 26%, Unarmed 28%, Language 69%, Survival 18%, Craft (Redsmith) 74%

Combat Styles: Great Hammer 78%, 1d10+3+1d4, AP 4/10, Hammer and Shield 78%, 1d6+1+1d4, AP 6/12, Spear and Shield 38%, 1d8+1+1d4, AP 6/12

HP: 5/5/(3)6/(3)7/4/4/(2)5, Likely Armor: Ringmail Hauberk, Hard Leather Helm (-2 SR)

Common Magic 48%: Armorsmith’s Boon 2, Endurance 1, Bladesharp 1, Bludgeon 2

*A version of bronze is the standard metal of Glorantha, hence "redsmith" rather than "blacksmith"

Barbarian Herder

Characteristics: STR 8 CON 12 DEX 13 SIZ 10 INT 10 POW 13 CHA 14
CA: 3 DM: -1d2 SR: 12 MP: 13 Move: 8m

Skills: Athletics 31%, Brawn 23%, Culture 50%, Dance 27%, Drive 56%, Evade 26%, Evaluate 24%, First Aid 48%, Influence 28%, Insight 23%, Lore 60%, Perception 58%, Resistance 26%, Resilience 49%, Ride 61%, Sing 47%, Sleight 27%, Stealth 58%, Swim 20%, Unarmed 21%, Language 74%, Survival 65%, Track 52%

Combat Styles: Spear 31%, 1d8+1-1d2, AP 4/5, Short Bow 36%, 1d6-1d2, Sling 76%, 1d8-1d2

HP: 5/5/(1)6/(1)7/4/ 4/(1)5 Likely Armor: Soft Leather (-1 SR)

Common Magic 57%: Endurance 1, Heal 1, Lucky 1, Mobility 1, Speedart 1, Spirit Bane 1

Barbarian Hunter

Characteristics: STR 10 CON 9 DEX 14 SIZ 15 INT 14 POW 11 CHA 7
CA: 3 DM: 0 SR: 14 MP: 11 Move: 8m

Skills: Athletics 54%, Brawn 30%, Culture 58%, Dance 21%, Drive 25%, Evade 48%, Evaluate 21%, First Aid 28%, Influence 14%, Insight 25%, Lore 88%, Perception 70%, Resistance 22%, Resilience 38%, Ride 30%, Sing 18%, Sleight 21%, Stealth 73%, Swim 19%, Unarmed 26%, Language 71%, Survival 50%, Track 83%

Combat Styles: Sling 38%, 1d8, Spear 34%, 1d8+1, AP 4/5, Short Bow 68%, 1d6

HP: 6/6/(1)7/(1)8/5/5/(1)6 Likely Armor: Soft Leather (-1 SR)

Common Magic 48%: Bandit’s Cloak 1, Clear Path, Mindspeech 1, Speedart 2, Warmth 1

Creature Feature

2010-03-14T11:57:00.000-04:00

One of my very few complaints about Mongoose RuneQuest II was the paucity of monsters in the core rulebook. Now, this is going to be rendered moot very soon with the release of the Monster Coliseum book, and we have the MRQI Monsters and Monsters II books that don't need much conversion. However, for the most part the monsters we have are tried and true and it is hard to see where new monsters are going to come from. Well, until now. Check out RPG Creatures. This guy not only describes his monsters and provides generic stats, but he posts quite beautiful pictures of them as well (see example to the right).

That'd be pretty good on its own, but reading through the generic stats it becomes clear that conversion to MRQII stat blocks is going to be a piece of cake. Not only that, but most of the descriptions feel right, with a bit of tweaking, not just for RQ, but for Glorantha. A lot of these are going to show up in My Glorantha, somewhere.

Thank you, Nicholas Cloister, thank you.

In Memoriam: Gygax on Taxes

2010-03-04T20:05:00.000-05:00

In memory of E. Gary Gygax, who died two years ago today, here are some of his thoughts on taxes, from the first edition of the Dungeon Master's Guide:

DUTIES, EXCISES, FEES, TARIFFS, TAXES, TITHES, AND TOLLS

What society can exist without revenues? What better means of assuring revenues than taxation, and all of the names used in the title of this section are synonymous with taxes - but if it is called something different perhaps the populace won't take too much umbrage at having to pay and pay and pay...

If the Gentle Reader thinks that the taxation he or she currently undergoes is a trifle strenuous for his or her income, pity the typical European populace of the Middle Ages. They paid all of the above, tolls being very frequent, with those trying to escape them by use of a byway being subject to confiscation of all goods with a fine and imprisonment possible also. Every petty noble made an extraction, municipalities taxed, and the sovereign was the worst of all. (Eventually merchants banded together to form associations to protect themselves from such robbery, but peasants and other commoners could only revolt and dream of better times.)

Plus ca change...

This is SARTAR!

2010-03-03T22:15:00.000-05:00

The old Runequest 2 (not the new one I review below), had what can fairly be described as a legendary section that previewed "sources to be published," most of which have either never seen print or have only done so in vastly changed form. One of them was:

THE SARTAR CAMPAIGN: Maps, personalities, histories, local cults, and other material about the storm Kingdom of Sartar. Includes tribal specifics, extensive Road Encounters section, and a full explanation of the Orlanth cult. Based on the campaign led by Greg Stafford.

Almost thirty years later, that sourcebook is finally here. And perhaps it's the Gloranthan fanboy in me speaking, but it's been worth the wait.

For many years virtually all I knew about Sartar came from playing the game Dragon Pass, in which it was clearly the plucky little underdog with a barbaric (in the classical sense) culture taking on the hyper-civilized Lunar Empire. With Lunars often having Roman names, I could not help but think of Sartar as Gaul or Britain. In fact I often thought of developing a small village holding out aganst the Lunar invaders, aided by the unique magic of their priest. The chief, Tonobri, would be carried everywhere on a shield, but the village's main assets would be two warriors, Steri and Obel... Perhaps I shall put that clan together some day - the new book makes that easy and interesting, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
During the days of RQIII, it seemed that the best source for Sartar, barring the sections in the Genertela supplement, was actually Greg Stafford's own Vikings pack set in the Alternate Earth experiment Avalon Hill foisted on Runequest. (I should note here that I never owned any of the Wyrms Footnotes issues that probably would have answered a lot of my questions about the setting). When I had Sartarite settlements to detail, I based them and their social arrangements on the materials in that set. Being a proud descendant of both Vikings and Saxons, I added in a few Anglo-Saxon elements but, let's face it, there wasn't that much difference between the cultures.

So when I stopped playing RPGs after my move to the States, that was where my concept of Sartar was left. I never played King of Dragon Pass, nor did I have to deal with the Hero Wars Sartar books, which seem to me, reviewing them later (thanks, Better World Books!), to have sucked a lot of fun out of the setting and made it a realm of sheep, erm, rearers with a bizarre religion of subcults. I have to say that if I'd come back to Glorantha five or six years ago, I might have given it up forever.

Luckily, I didn't. Instead, my first new Gloranthan product, from the Third Age at least, was this hefty tome. When it arrived I opened it with a great deal of trepidation. How could it match up to thirty years, give or take a ten year hiatus, of my thoughts about the setting. The answer is that it does so surprisingly well. Here's my review.

PRODUCTION VALUES. Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes (SKOH from now on) is a substantial tome, 378 pages long. It is softbound, and the cover is already starting to fray. The cover art I have mixed feelings about. It's evocative, but I don't think it's the artist Simon Bray's best work. The interior art is mostly good, but a lot of it has been seen elsewhere; the maps are uniformally excellent, both the color maps and the black and white sketches. The layout is crisp and clean and sidebars and text boxes all seem to serve a useful purpose. The overall feel is utilitarian to good.

CONTENT: GAME SYSTEM. SKOH isn't just a sourcebook. It also applies the Heroquest 2 rules to Glorantha. I could never get the hang of the first edition of Heroquest, which seemed very complicated for a supposedly rules-lite system, but HQ2 seems much more elegant. Unlike HQ1, however, HQ2 is not dedicated to Glorantha, and has just one appendix about magic in the Lozenge. So SKOH is really the book to tell us how the system works. It seems to work well. Character design is quick and simple, with the main element being the choice of runes. Various social roles are given as guidelines and the character's role in his or her community is very important. So much so that Clan Generation is as important as Character Generation. This is done by means of a questionnaire, with the players' answers determining important aspects of the clan background, which will in turn have effects on the characters themselves. Both character and clan have well-designed record sheets, which are also downloadable from Glorantha.com. Religion is central to Sartarite life and I am very glad to say that the Sartarite religion has returned to something recognizable to old Runequest fans, with the countless subcults of Storm Tribe being, if not outright retconned out of existence, swept under the carpet. Each of the major cults is well described, with very good ideas for how the religion works in game terms. The section on Heroquesting (the in-game feat, not the game system) is excellent and finally answers a bunch of questions I've had on the phenomenon. The bottom line is that I think I now know how to run a Gloranthan game using HQ2. I probably still prefer RQII, but the fact is that the new version of RQ is so compatible with the concepts outlined in SKOH that it is actually just as valuable for RQ as for HQ. That's a big plus in my view, and a heck of an achievement considering the state of both systems just a few years ago.

CONTENT: BACKGROUND. As you'd expect from a 378 page book, there is a vast amount of background material here. From the average Sartarite's clothing and homestead layout to the kingdom's legal system to the geography and climate of the region, virtually any question you'd have about Sartar is answered somewhere in the text. Maps, personalities, histories, cults, tribal specifics and the full explanation of the Orlanth cult - all promised back in 1979 - are delivered. The only thing missing is the extensive Road Encounters section, which the authors say was cut at the last minute... Truly, there's a huge amount of very rich background, and yet the book does not feel detailed for detail's sake. You have everything you need to know here with very little you don't need to know. Nor is there much that would constrain an imaginative GM, which I felt was the case with the previous Hero Wars/HQ1 incarnation.

CONTENT: THE COLYMAR CAMPAIGN. About 70 pages are given over to a fully-described campaign, which will take the PCs from a riotous party to the gates of hell (yes, we've all been there). I don't want to give away spoilers, but this is a very well described plot, with plenty of room for role-playing and genuine player choice (seriously complicating the plot, for instance) that really plays to the strengths of the setting. It is easily adaptable to RQII and even a Second Age GM should get plenty of ideas from it. By the end of it, the PCs will be well-placed for a prominent role in the liberation of Sartar, something that seemed forced in the previous Sartar Rising campaign (which I still think has a lot of good things going for it, so I hope it will be revised for future release*). I'd gladly pay $20 for a campaign book of this length and quality on its own and hope there are many more to come.

A QUICK WORD ON CUSTOMER SUPPORT. I ordered my copy at Christmas, but it had not arrived by the third week of January. I contacted Moon Design and they told me that it had been posted in the first week of January, but as it had not arrived they sent me a new copy. It arrived within the week. I was very impressed with this and want to record my thanks to them publicly. I presume I have a bemused neighbor who received the first package in error, because it never arrived here!

OVERALL. This is the book I was waiting thirty years for. It's an inspiring volume for an old Glorantha hand and I suspect for a newcomer as well. There's a lot of old stuff therein, but presented in a new way, and there's more than enough new stuff to make it satisfying. At $60, the price is steep and probably off-putting, but I found it more than worth it. Now if only they'd included the Road Encounters section...

*Talking of which, I wonder if the promised Pavis book will revamp the Cradle adventure, probably the best scenario in the history of RPGs.

Old School: Midkemian Splendor

2010-03-02T23:44:00.000-05:00

Back before he became a best-selling author, Raymond E. Feist published some pretty good old school town/city supplements based in what was to become the famous world of Midkemia. Of these, I still have the workable city of Carse, which actually found its way to Glorantha as the city of Karse in the Holy Country. However, my first Midkemian purchase was Tulan of the Isles, which I thought was a splendidly developed town built on several islands in a river. It even had its own dungeon, The Black Tower, which was available as a separate product. Yet my local game store never had it in and I'd given up paying shipping by that stage. Exploring around the old school blogosphere, what do I find tonight but Midkemia Press's residual website, which includes a free download of The Black Tower. Now if only I could find Tulan of the Isles...

Runequest Campaign: Rabbit Hat Farm II

2010-03-02T23:06:00.000-05:00

Duke Raus took the news of possible chaotic activity, more than just broos, in his lands at Rabbit Hat with little humor. He instructed the PCs to clean out the place, and to aid them sent with them Dranbar Chaosknower, a Lhankor Mhyte expert in chaos lore, Gorkin Rockbone, a Flintnail rock dwarf whose experiences as a pestle (don't ask) had scarred him for life, and the beautiful Marcilla, a High Healer of the White Lady. The party set off for Rabbit Hat with some trepidation and wondering whether Subodai's chaos-killing skills might have protected him. On the way, Grom noted that Marcilla would occasionally speak to a butterfly that flitted around her, and the dwarf would occasionally talk about not letting his secret out.

Marcilla quickly confirmed that the farmstead had suffered the depredations of worshipers of Malia, the mistress of disease. She cleansed the well and the headman's house, which Darnbar noted had also been converted into a shrine to Primal Chaos itself. The party then prepared itself to examine the tunnel they had found earlier.

Gorkin muttered and fussed his way to arranging a pulley system to allow for a safe descent down the tunnel (including a tea break during which he muttered away while eating a can of unappetizing Dwarf Food (TM)). As the party descended, Dranbar examined the tunnel walls, declaring them to have been chewed out of the rock by a Krarshtkid, an awful beast sacred to the Devouring Mother, Krarsht.

The party proceeded with caution down the tunnel, finally coming to a wider cave dominated by a wide, murky pool. On the lip of this pool, Xaraya was distressed to find the headless body of Subodai. Marcilla declared that his head had been bitten clean off. As the party carefully explored the cave, Gorkin slipped and fell in the pool, from which he had to be rescued. At this stage, the first mutterings of "damn, dirty dwarf" was heard among the party. Skye too slipped in to the pool.

The pool turned into a stream, which the party discovered had been dammed and diverted down another Krarshtkid-built tunnel. The party noticed a pile of tarnished silver coins, which they decided not to touch at this stage [GM note - and forgot to come back to], as they proceeded down the new tunnel.

It turned out that the stream entered a hole in the center of a spherical cave, from which several other tunnel radiated out. The party explored one of them, at the end of which was a dead end and two bodies, locked together in their death struggle: a Sun County patrol commander and a chaos-spawned Krarshtkid. Dranbar explained that the gooey strands holding them together were Pratzim, a glue-like webbing extruded by the monsters.

Returning to the spherical chamber, the party heard an ominous sound, as if of something huge slithering towards them from the pool cavern. At the same time, a Krarshtkid emerged from one of the other tunnels, its six limbs propelling it up the tunnel at a frightening rate. It spat Pratzim, covering Gorkin and Skye in the gooey mess. Shortly afterwards, a nightmare loomed into view as a gigantic shelled squid-monster appeared from the tunnel to the pool, its eyes frantic and its maw screaming as if for blood. Grom engaged the Krarshtkid while Xaraya leveled her bow at the beast, Marcilla attempted to free their trapped comrades and Darnbar watched the other tunnel in case of another nasty surprise.

The fight was hard. Xaraya used her skill to shoot the beast repeatedly in the head, while Grom and the others fared less well. The Krarshtkid's tongue, they discovered, bore acid that dissolved their weapons and armor and there seemed to be no end of Pratzim. Eventually, just as it looked like Gorkin, Skye and Grom were all doomed to suffocate in the goop, Marcilla called on the power of her goddess and the Pratzim dissolved to water. Grom and his fellows wasted no time in carving up the Krarshtkid before turning to the squid-beast, which had inflicted severe damage on Xaraya even while taking arrows, multimissiles and speedarts to the head. The beast fell, and the party pulled it to the hole and dropped it down, giving them once again a way back. Marcilla worked her magic on the wounded and the party pulled itself together again.

Moving down the remaining tunnel, the party noticed a hole in the roof. The party once again resolved to explore that later and continued on, keeping a wary eye to their rear. The tunnel ended in a much larger chamber, expanding well beyond the limits of their magical light. The chamber appeared to be a large cube, about 20 meters on each side. In the center of the room was a weird structure; a circular pit surrounded a raised altar of some sort, which appeared to depict a waiting maw. Covering the pit, however, was what appeared to be a net made of human hair. As the party examined this monstrosity, they were surprised again. Simultaneously, a thrown web of Pratzim engulfed Skye and a Krarshtkid descended from the darkness to attack Grom.

Again, the fight was difficult. Grom and Xaraya made short work of the Krarshtkid, although receiving injuries that Marcilla was quick to tend to, but even Gorkin's Earthsense was unable to locate who had flung the Pratzim. A crossbow bolt then came out of the darkness, skewering Dranbar in the head, killing him stone dead. The healer wailed, for she had lost access to her immediate resurrection ability when she had called on her goddess earlier. Gorkin worked out that their undetectable assailant was located on a ledge 10 meters up the west wall of the cube. The attacker then flung out a net over Skye, and began to drag her towards the ledge. At Xaraya's urging, Gorkin pulled out his secret weapons, a Pistole and what he called a grenade. Meanwhile, the Krarshtkid had been healed magically and attacked Grom and Xaraya again. Despairing, Marcilla once again rescued the party by dismissing the magical protections of the enemy. A hideous, cowled individual with a crossbow was revealed. Gorkin tossed his grenade and, following the explosion, the stunned enemy tried over the edge of the ledge and fell to his death. The Krarshtkid followed its master into oblivion soon after. Skye was freed from the net and the Pratzim with some difficulty.

The body was confirmed to be human, if mutilated, with an amulet bearing the chaos rune round his neck, along with a sharp tin razor. The party decided to set fire to the net, in case the pit contained another Krarshtkid. In one corner of the chamber, the party found a series of empty crates, stenciled with a Moon Rune and the legend, "Office of the Commissary of Despatch, Furthest (Duty Paid in Full)."

Gorkin arranged a series of pitons to allow the party to climb up to the ledge. There they discovered a small, portable shrine in the shape of the mouth of Krarsht, made of porcelain. In its central orifice sat a severed human appendage, barely recognizable. Following the ledge around, the party came to other side of the hole they had noticed earlier, with a rope ladder ready to be dropped down it. Further on, they found the tunnel blocked by a large oaken door, thankfully unlocked. Inside was their enemy's quarters. Ransacking it, they found a crate of weevil-infested hardtack biscuits, a crate of the hazia drug, assorted nails, and a complete 12 volume set of the books of Elephantis, a famous work of Pelorian pornography.

Having found nothing more of interest, the party gathered up Dranbar's body and made their way warily back to the surface, Gorkin carefully noting spots where the caves could be collapsed. As they made their way back to Ronegarth, a weeping Marcilla asked the party if they would aid her on a Heroquest to restore Darnbar's soul. The battered party agreed without question.

Old School: Mining White Dwarf 3

2010-02-17T22:46:00.000-05:00

The cover to White Dwarf issue 3 is one I particularly like, because the adventurous couple, who have obviously bit off more than they can chew, aren't wearing any armor. I like this because our first level characters never really wore any either, except for the odd fighter who claimed he was of knightly stock and had inherited some chainmail. The reason for this was simple - you go into dungeons to liberate large amounts of cash and the more you are weighed down by armor, the less you can be weighed down by treasure. In the first few levels of the dungeon, those amounts of cash are likely to be copper or silver rather than gold, so you really need the carrying capacity. At least, that's how we reasoned it. As a result, the lives of our PCs tended to be nasty, brutish and short (a bit like the players, really - we were 12-13 year old boys...)

Turning to the contents, the first article is extremely interesting and I suggest still useful. It suggests a non-geomorphic approach to solo dungeon mapping which requires considerable investment in time to set up but once you've built your library of 200' by 200' dungeon elements, you can use it to create a massive variety of dungeon layouts. I did this one summer vacation and it worked extremely well. Worth looking at.

Next up is part 3 of Competitive D&D, which describes some interesting puzzle-type rooms that would still make nice entries in a tournament dungeon but which don't really work in a setting that requires any sort of suspension of disbelief (one of the rooms references Judy Garland). There's a couple of nice ideas but generally this is of limited use. Straight after that is the news section that announces the imminent release of Traveller and Chivalry & Sorcery. The second generation of RPGs was about to arrive!

Part 3 of the Monstermark System follows, which reveals that, under the system, a lone 8th level fighter would need to slay 125 Shambling Mounds to advance to 9th level, with each of them on average handing out 385 hits in damage. Yikes! As explained below, the Monstermark system is basically useless today but the glimpses of Don Turnbull's dungeon design philosophy are nice to see. It would be wonderful if Don's son did indeed find his Greenlands Dungeon and published it. It might be the closest to a full original megadungeon we get.

Up next are Don's reviews of the first slug of Judges Guild materials to hit the UK, including such classics as the Ready Reference Sheets, the Judge's Shield, Tegel Manor and, of course, the City State of the Invincible Overlord. My, I wanted the City State and woke up every day anticipating the first post waiting for it to arrive (GBP 6.50 - 13 weeks pocket money!). Also reviewed are three boardgames, illustrating the paucity of RPG products available at the time.

Yet another long essay by Lew Pulsipher on D&D Philosophy is next. To give you a taste of the level of discourse, there's this:

What method should the referee adopt to regulate the interchange between himself and the players? There are several decisions to make:
1) Shall the players roll their own attack and saving throw dice?
2) Shall each person be permitted to decide what his characters do?
3) Shall the players be permitted extended time to think about what they intend to do?
4) Shall the referee permit players to change their minds about what they intend to do (before they are told results, of course) ?
My answer to all these is yes.

No spit, sherlock. It's intriguing, however, to realize that some DMs at the time might not have allowed these. Ye gods. On the other hand, there are these trenchant comments on the alignment system and the creeping addition of good/evil to the law/chaos scale:

Four-way alignment, allowing such combinations as Lawful/Evil and ChaoticIGood, requires a complete
restructuring of the game. Even if this were practical, the effect of the four-way is to reduce alignment differentiation to nil. Only Law/Good and Chaos/Evil are automatically hostile, as most referees interpret it, and few players choose either of these pairs. Virtually anyone can be in any party, and all act about the same regardless of alignment. If automatic hostilities resulted whenever Law met Chaos or Good met Evil,
regardless of the other member of the pair (four mutually hostile alignments), this would be greater differentiation and no doubt quite interesting. But I know of no one who runs it this way.

You know, I think I agree with him. I like the Law/Chaos duality, as mentioned several times below, and consider that all the extra alignments added was a plethora of gods that ruined the cleric class. But that's just me.

The article on painting minis (or figures, as I always called them), Colouring Conan's Thews, is interesting in that it reveals the lengths people had to go to in the days when you could get all sorts of paints for Napoleonic uniforms but little of use for medieval-style figures (besides the odd "ancient" color).

The Treasure Chest feature has another incomprehensible entry in the Loremaster of Avalon series, but also some nice refinements for the Assassin class (including the ability at second level to slit throats on a first hit on a roll of 19 or 20 - suddenly people wanted to play assassins!) and two trick rooms. One of them, the Room of Cloning, was a big hit in my first playable dungeon:

Any Neutral who steps inside this room will be split into two characters - one Lawful and one Chaotic. They will immediately start fighting to the death by whatever means at hand. The survivor will go up one level and the dead character will vanish. The player has no control over the fight. Other members of the party may help, but once inside the room the Lawful characters will have a tendency to fight the Chaotic character and vice versa (assuming you allow both types to go down together).

I vividly remember the first time I ran this. The way it was set up was the clones descended into a pit in a room by an underground river. The two started laying about each other, but being first level, kept missing. I allowed the player to roll both characters' dice, as we didn't know which one he'd be playing. The assembled party started chanting, "Good guy MISSES, bad guy MISSES, good guy MISSES, bad guy MISSES..." and so on, until the "bad guy" hit and killed the "good guy" in one go. He looked up at his former allies and strode off into the river, which he was able to wade up until he found a boat at a dock elsewhere in the level and rowed off in it, never to be seen again. The lack of boat came back to bit the party on the backside...

Finally, the letters page includes my first encounter with Paul Jacquays, the genius behind Griffin Mountain and the Caverns of Thracia. Incidentally, he has put some of his treasures up for auction on Ebay.

Our mysterious benefactor has archived a PDF of this issue here.

Runequest Campaign: Rabbit Hat Farm I

2010-02-17T21:12:00.000-05:00

As part of the deal that took them from Pavis to Ronegarth, Duke Raus gave the PCs a land grant. Rabbit Hat was the name of the walled settlement and farmlands that made up the grant, and the PCs expressed an interest in visiting their lands. Daine, however, had some news for them.

Far from being a fully working holding, Rabbit Hat was currently, Daine presumed, unpopulated. The settlement had been attacked out of nowhere by Bison Riders from the Wastes. The few survivors fled to Sun County on hearing that broos had been seen in the area after the nomads had departed. As a result, the settlement was presumed ruined. Daine added that the Duke's title to Rabbit Hat was also a matter of legal dispute with the Count of Sun County, although the case had lain on Sor-Eel's desk in Pavis for years and was unlikely to be decided soon. Because of the likely presence of unquiet spirits, the shaman Stars-Not-Night was prevailed upon to accompany the party, as was a Storm Bull follower, Subodai the Uncouth, in case the broos were still around. Finally, a young Orlanthi mercenary, Oderic, also accompanied the group.

Having set out early in the morning, it took the party much of the day to make it to the outskirts of Rabbit Hat, on the east side of the Zola Fel, near the wastes, just south of Sun County. Their initial scan of the area suggested no inhabitants, but they decided to be careful, approaching southwest from the Beastfold, examining the sheep carcasses and making note of those that appeared to have suffered the ravages of brookind. They came to the settlement's wall and followed it round to the gate. They entered the village and quickly scouted it, making note of the ruined adobe buildings, the cut down palm trees and the well almost surely defiled by broos. They secured the watchtower and assessed the scene. Nothing living could be detected. All that remained were corpses, a totem of some description to the southeast and a broken-down scarecrow in the rotting fields with their clogged irrigation ditches.

Two buildings remained intact. The first, the granaries, appeared inviolate, so the party was glad to have found a potential source of food should they need it. The second was marked on their map as the headman's house and the party approached it warily, cautious of broos or worse. The main room was indeed full of offal and dung, tell-tale signs of broo activity. Corpses, evidently of militiamen, had been stuffed unceremoniously into the fireplace, with spears, helms and shields strewn around the place. Subodai detected chaos from an otherwise unremarkable stone in the corner of the room and from the next room.

As the party approached the other room of the house, they noticed the rotting bodies of two adults and a child. Entering the room prepared for a broo ambush, Grom found himself attacked by an angry spirit. He retreated from the assault and Oderic and Skye also found themselves victims of spirit attacks. The ghosts appeared to be those of the bodies in the other room - a mature adult male, an older, overweight man and a young girl. The party retreated further into the settlement's main yard to enable themselves best to react to this unexpected attack. Grom soon found himself possessed and attacking Oderic, who himself was then possessed. Xaraya was able to cast a spirit screen spell and Stars-Not-Night handily defeated the third spirit while Skye and Subodai attempted to fight off their possessed friends. Skye remembered that Zorak Zoran himself had given her a use of the Free Ghost spell, so she was able to cast that on Grom, to the relief of the young girl's spirit. Stars-Not-Night's fetch then defeated the spirit possessing Oderic, freeing him. The party breathed a sigh of relief and regrouped. Searching the house again, the party somewhat luckily found a bag of hidden treasure, including an impressively jeweled golden circlet, wrapped in a skin that Subodai said was chaotic, and a ledger written in Firespeech. The party cremated the bodies of the victims of the broos and made a note to bring a priest to cleanse the house and well. By this time, some in the party were coughing or otherwise feeling slightly feverish.

The party then decided to explore the fields to the southeast and as they surveyed the area by the wall, they discovered a deep, tunnel-like hole that Subodai said stank of chaos. Presuming this to be the broo lair, Subodai was all for heading down the hole now, but he could also sense chaos to the east and south. Checking to the east, the party found, near the scarecrow, a bison carcass with a millstone around its neck that had been carved with the message "Pray Malia or Blood Die Small Cut." Grom and Subodai felt even more unwell.

At this point, Subodai froze in place. The party could do nothing to move him. Skye followed soon after. The party began to look around for what could be causing this. Stars-Not-Night seized up. The remaining party members realized that the scarecrow had moved from the position they had last noticed it at, although it was still and seemingly harmless right now. Xaraya and Oderic leveled their bows at it and Grom moved over to hack it to bits. He took a mighty swing at it and landed a blow strong enough to cripple any human or broo disguised as a scarecrow, but all that happened was the scarecrow leaned to the side a little. He then felt a claw rip at him, although the scarecrow had not moved. Xaraya let loose an arrow that flew through the scarecrow's arm, then froze. Grom aimed a blow at the scarecrow's legs and toppled it, then froze too, just as another invisible claw ripped him. Oderic started retreating, aiming arrows as he went at the scarecrow's head. Eventually, one of them shattered the pumpkin head of the scarecrow and all the other party members unfroze. Oderic realized that the scarecrow, which had looked as it had just toppled over, was in fact in a crawling position, looking at him. [GM note - TPK only just averted!]

The unnerved, unsettled party decided to take their leave of Rabbit Hat now and seek help for their wounds and their increasingly obvious maladies. Subodai refused to go and headed down the hole to kill chaos. The others decided to head to the Sun County village of Wyoth nearby. By this time it was night, and the party found Wyoth's gate closed. Grom called for the nightwatchman, who asked what they wanted. Grom explained that they had come from Rabbit Hat, which they had found ravaged by broos and infested with disease. The nightwatchman called the headman, who told them in no uncertain terms to stay away from his village!

By this time it was pitch black and the party debated what to do. Skye and Xaraya suggested that they should try to make their way back downriver to Ronegarth now. Xaraya even discovered the appropriate trees to make a raft, but then realized no-one had the skills to pilot it. Skye, the impetuous Vingan, refused to give in, and set off on the raft while the others made camp for the night.

Skye soon found herself in trouble. Her raft ran aground on a swampy island, and she heard the sound of a Giant Toad. Before she could see it and arm herself, its tongue hit her on the head and knocked her out...

Xaraya, Grom, Stars-Not-Night and Oderic struggled back to Ronegarth the next day and were dismayed not to find Skye there already. Luckily, the beautiful High Healer Marcilla was there. She fussed over Grom, clasping him to her astounding bosom and curing him of the Creeping Chills and the Bleeding Disease in the process.

Meanwhile, Skye woke up in a damp stone cell. After a while, a newtling guard and an old newtling shaman entered. The shaman spoke: "You in Five Eyes. I Croaker, shaman. My Traskar find you, bring you here. Where you from, you have ransom?" Skye explained that she was an associate of Duke Raus of Rone, who would pay her ransom but would exact vengeance should anything happen to her. Croaker laughed and said he would send to Ronegarth, and release her back there on payment of the ransom.

Back in Ronegarth, the Duke expressed concern about the presence of chaos in Rabbit Hat, saying that the scarecrow was certainly a Jack O'Bear, and the tunnel entrance suggested something worse beneath the ground. As Subodai had not returned, the Duke said that he would send to Pavis for a sage knowledgeable in the lore of chaos and a dwarf who could help them in the tunnels. About this time, the ransom demand from Five Eyes arrived, which the Duke agreed to pay against his debt to the PCs. Grom and Xaraya decided to go to Pavis while waiting for their friend to be freed. While there, they arranged for the forging of armaments for the people of Weis, which would be delivered in a couple of months. As they made their way back with a Lhankor Mhy sage and a muttering Flintnail dwarf, Skye was being rafted back to Ronegarth. Soon the party would be on its way back to Rabbit Hat...

Review: Runequest II Core Rulebook (Mongoose)

2010-02-10T20:33:00.003-05:00

First, apologies for the lack of updates. I've been afflicted with various health problems (I have something wrong with each of my heart, lungs and digestive system. Yay!) and haven't really felt like writing outside work. However, the release of Mongoose's latest version of my favorite role-playing game is worth getting back in the saddle for. Simply put, this is the best role-playing game ruleset I have ever seen. Lawrence "Loz" Whitaker and Pete Nash have done an astounding job in fixing the problems with the system - many of them going back to the classic Runequest 2 (don't get me started on the numbering issues) of 1979. They have both simplified and enhanced the rules while remaining true to the central principles of RQ and, indeed, Glorantha. So let's take a look at the major features of the book.

Production Values. First of all, this book looks impressive. It is leather-bound with gold lettering (runing?) although the rune is not the Magic rune as depicted above, but the Luck rune (looks like Pi). The typesetting is clear without the annoying borders Mongoose often uses. Pull quotes are useful and tables make sense. There are a few typos and mistakes but an errata sheet is due soon. The artwork is serviceable to good with only a few gratuitous scantily-clad women (not that there's anything wrong with that). This is the sort of book you wouldn't mind leaving out in plain view, which sadly isn't often the case with RPG books.

Character Creation. The process is simple and straightforward, with a welcome return to "raw" 3d6 rolls rather than the power-gaming options of 4d6-drop-the-lowest and so on. This means that characters will be more average on, err, average and rather more thought will need to be put into exploiting a character's strengths and minimizing his/her weaknesses. The previous experience system is simple to use and an intriguing addition is the introduction of community in the shape of family, contacts, rivals and allies, echoing a major theme in the development of Glorantha.

Skills and System. One of the problems with the Chaosium/Avalon Hill editions of RQ was a plethora of skills, leading to characters who could spot an ant from miles away being unable to find a slightly hidden keyhole right in front of them. Mongoose's first edition (MRQI) rationalized the number of skills and this edition refines them further. A few anomalies in the system have been removed and things generally tidied up. Fumbles should now be rarer (1 in 50 chance rather than 1 in 20), which my players will be grateful for. Improving skills is slightly easier, and there is a bonus for high Charisma which makes that characteristic much more valuable than simple vanity (the explanation essentially translates to the golf pro paying more attention to helping the sexy girl with her swing). Improving characteristics, on the other hand, is going to take much longer, and so the race to high Power that characterized (sorry) much of earlier RQ play is going to have to be rethought. Disease and poison are handled much better than in MRQI and should become an important part of play again (yes, even the Greg-hated Blade Venom). Encumbrance and Fatigue are handled elegantly and playably, and there's even an abstract fatigue system for those who find the basic system too much bookkeeping. All in all the system seems very simple, elegant and playable.

Armor and Combat. One of the big problems with MRQI was the skill penalty for wearing armor which in some cases meant that in a fight between two evenly matched opponents, the one wearing armor was far less likely to win. That has been fixed in what looks like a playable fashion, with the penalty being to timing in combat. Armor types are also more diverse, with a real ancient world/ dark ages feel to them. As for combat, in previous editions fights have been alternately deadly or long, neither of which is particularly attractive to players. Some very simple tweaks have seemingly made combat much quicker but also more likely to end in surrender or unconsciousness (leading to some interesting role playing situations, I imagine). The system introduces Combat Maneuvers that can be used when someone gets a decisive advantage in a fight (one for a success versus a failure, two for a critical versus a failure or a success versus a fumble and three for a critical versus a fumble). There are also penalties for using the same maneuvers too often. Size and reach of weapons has become important and the number of combat actions each character has in a round cut down. Finally, combat styles (such as Sword and Shield) have replaced individual weapon skills, making advancement quicker. As one of the authors explains in an article in Signs and Portents, these styles could be much broader:

Games Masters who wish to de-emphasise combat so that their players spend more Improvement Rolls on non-combat skills, can bundle together a range of weapon forms under a single Combat Style. To be a proficient warrior throughout history required learning a large number of diverse weapons. So allowing a Combat Style to cover all of a profession’s expected weapon forms saves a lot of skill points! A Janissary character for example could be granted the Janissary Combat Style, covering the use of musket, bow, axe, sabre and shield.

Examples for other settings could be:
Ubiquitous City Militia – Halberd, Club, Dirk, Crossbow
Rightness Army Hoplite – Two-Handed Spear, One-handed Spear, Hoplite Shield, Short Sword
Pictland Savage – Bow, Buckler, Handaxe, Club
Mouser’s Sailor thieves – Sling, Sword, Dagger, Thrown Dagger
Sengoku Period Samurai – Yumi (bow), Yari (spear), Katana, Naginata, Musket
Granbretanian Beast Mask warrior – Flamelance, Sword, Shield

This makes a lot of sense to me and I've already designed a bunch of such packages. All in all, the changes, while radical, are very much in keeping with the traditional RQ system and should make it much more fun.

Magic. In the 1979 RQ2, there was a simple and workable two-tier magic system. There was Battle Magic, which everyone possessed to some degree, and the more powerful Rune Magic, obtained from the Gods in return for the sacrifice of Power. There were also Shamans who could control and bind spirits. In RQ3, Battle Magic was renamed Spirit Magic and associated primarily with Shamans, Rune Magic became Divine Magic but little else changed and a third magic system, Sorcery, was introduced which was complicated to learn but flexible and potentially extremely powerful (there was an, in my opinion, over-complicated Gloranthan justification for this based around the idea of there being different supernatural planes associated with each system). In MRQI, Spirit Magic was renamed Rune Magic and was learned and cast via the possession of physical magic runes, with different skills for different runes. Shamanism became confused, Divine Magic required the sequestration, as it were, of magical ability to power it, making it just not worthwhile in most cases, and Sorcery was stripped of many of its advantages while remaining complicated and a challenge to learn to its full extent. The result of all these changes was that magic had, well, lost its magic. Thankfully, the same philosophy that fixed the combat system has fixed the magic system(s) too. Rune Magic is now Common Magic, with one skill used for all spells, and the silly physical runes have gone (although the commendable idea of 'rune integration' remains, appropriately in a game where a character's relationship with runes is central to his/her worldview). Divine Magic has a new system involving a Pact with a deity, making it more powerful depending on how devoted you are to your deity. Sorcery has been simplified, with far fewer skills required, and buffed up (although the extremely long duration spells of RQ3 are still gone, and I think I'd like to see them back); there are even effective offensive sorcery spells, which there just weren't in MRQI. Finally, Spirit Magic has been reinvented, with this animist form of magic being all about locating, capturing and commanding spirits. It seems like an exciting and, again, playable form of magic that should add new dimensions to games. Finally, the importance of myth to animist, sorcerous and divine cults has been reinforced, with understanding and emulation of myth central to advancement, and the resonance of myths having its own, potentially inconvenient, effects on the player characters. RQ magic is back, in a big way.

Monsters etc. This is perhaps the weakest part of the book. Only 18 "monsters" are described (21 if you count elementals separately), and such basics as Vampires, Baboons and Minotaurs are not present. I understand that Monster Coliseum is the first planned supplement, but those without access to the MRQI monster books will find this depressingly thin fare.

The book rounds off with a helpful section on gamesmastering RQ, stressing themes like community and (of course) the HeroQuest. There are also some splendidly old-school random encounter tables.

So, looking back at my post about the good and bad of MRQI you can see they've kept and built on the good, and fixed the bad. This is probably the best version of RQ ever and one that emphasizes playability while retaining the thematic elements that make RQ so distinctive. I just wish that its commercial use was not restricted to Second Age Glorantha as I'd love to see Dorastor and Balazar, never mind Prax and Dragon Pass, brought to life with this system.

Bottom line: Best RPG core rules I've ever seen. More monsters needed, though.

Coming soon: reviews of Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes, James Raggi's old school adventures and the magnificent old school dungeon Stonehell.

Old School: Mining White Dwarf 2

2009-11-28T10:01:00.000-05:00

Things are starting to get moving! Still not lots, but definitely a few items of interest to an old school fan in this issue.

First up is the second part of Fred Hemmings' Competitive D&D essay. In this he describes an excellent set-up for an old school competitive dungeon. The PCs (pre-rolled characters, two per player) are all members of the same family, brought together for the reading of the will of a deceased patriarch, an adventurer of renown. Each gets two basic magic treasures but are told that the real inheritance is hidden in a dungeon. Nothing wrong with that! Interestingly, the players were (it seems) given a list of tasks that would gain them points in the competition, but this was done in the form of cryptic clues. Thus, visiting Mars (and living!) would gain them a measly 5 points. This refers to standing on a painting of Mars in a room the floor of which was decorated with a depiction of the solar system. The list of objectives is itself very evocative of old school tomfoolery.

Next up is a taste of things to come - a one page review of Asgard miniatures. One of them, the Old Wizard, who looks more like an orthodox priest, still makes regular appearances in my campaigns as a Grey Sage. To think he cost but 12p (around 20c) in 1977! I'm also reminded of Asgard's giant dwarves, which were seemingly 3" shorter than humans on average...

Lengthy Lew Puslipher review of The Green Planet series or games (sigh), so let's move on, past the almost useless description of the famous Midgard play-by mail campaign, pausing only to observe Pulsipher's review of first edition Tunnels & Trolls, which he decries as silly (and therefore possibly appealing to the British!), and part 2 of the Monstermark system, until we get to Treasure Chest. Now this is something.

There's a new magic item, the Needle of Incalculable Power, which essentially does whatever its user thinks it might do, but at a high cost - 5 prime requisite characteristic points, for a month. Heavy, but lovable. There's the Scientist character class, which contains some good jokes, but is notable mainly for being the creation of SF writer/reviewer Dave Langford. Then comes the meat - five excellent new monsters, the Spinescale, the Dune Stalker, the Ning, the Giant Caterpillar and the Blood Hawk, all of which saw some use in my dungeons. I love this, for instance, in the description of the least interesting monster, the Giant Caterpillar:

They are often hunted as their skins are highly sought-after, especially by Hill People, for manufacture of ceremonial dancing costumes. Prices of up to 200GPs per skin are often paid.

Then we finish off with part 2 of the ridicualously complicated "what's wrong with D&D and what I'm doing about it," notable only for "grudge points," seemingly an early version of Hero Points.

Someone has archived White Dwarf 2 as a PDF here.

The World's First One-Page Dungeon?

2009-11-27T20:34:00.000-05:00

I love the one-page dungeon concept. Some of the entries in this year's competition were nothing less than inspired, and a few of them show up, suitably converted, in my Gloranthan sandbox, although none of them have yet been discovered, sadly. Even the new megadungeon Stonehell was developed using them (note to self: buy Stonehell in book form!).

It was only after the contest, however, that I realized I'd seen it before, after a fashion. Back when you used to send off a few pennies to Games Workshop for their latest price list or a sample copy of Owl & Weasel, you used also to get a two-page flyer that briefly described the new wonder that was Dungeons & Dragons, taken from the venerable Games & Puzzles magazine. This flyer also contained a one-page dungeon, the Dungeon of the Ground Goblins, a remarkably simple yet evocative first dungeon level. Elements of its architecture showed up in my own dungeons for years afterwards.

The page is probably unreadable in the jpeg on this post, so here it is in legible form for download.

Old School: Mining White Dwarf I

2009-11-27T20:19:00.000-05:00

Those who only know White Dwarf magazine as a glorified miniatures catalog may be surprised to know that for its first 100 issues (or so) it was probably the best general RPG magazine anywhere, ever. It never failed to be filled with useful, well-written material about virtually every popular (and quite a few unpopular) RPGs during the late 70s and early 80s. The first issue I ever saw was Issue 4, but I didn't get round to buying the postal order I needed for a sample copy until Issue 6. This was lucky, as if my parents had seen the cover to Issue 5 my fledgling hobby would probably have been strangled in the, err, nest. In any event, I soon got all the back issues and subscribed.

Given that WD's glory years were the glory years of old school roleplaying, I thought it might be interesting to go through the early magazines' contents and see what there is useful to highlight and/or resurrect for the old school movement. And there'll be Runequest material in here too!

Starting at the beginning, with WD1, what do we find? Interestingly, the very first article is not about D&D, but Metamorphosis Alpha, TSR's "lost spaceship gone to hell" precursor to Gamma World. I actually used the deck plan as a dungeon level once, and I wouldn't be surprised if others had as well. Next up is the Monstermark System. This was the brainchild of the late Don Turnbull, who was in many ways Britain's version of Gary Gygax. His Greenlands Dungeon was as legendary in the UK as Greyhawk or Blackmoor and, I believe, was equally never properly published, although bits appeared in WDs over the years. If I recall correctly, Don was a postal diplomacy guru who was an early adopter of D&D and went on to run the creative but ill-fated TSR UK. The Monstermark System was Don's dual answer to two commonly-perceived problems with AD&D monsters - experience points for killing them and their placement on monster tables. Don developed an extremely complicated algorithm for working out how deadly a monster was and where it should really appear on the tables. I was really impressed and used the system until AD&D came out, but looking at it now it represents far too much work. Much better to accept the idiosyncrasies of the original game design.

Moving on, we come to the first in a series of articles by Fred Hemmings about Competitive D&D. I used this when I was running D&D demo sessions at my school's Open Days, but it doesn't really have much applicability for general megadungeoning. One idea I did like and used repeatedly in pick-up sessions was "the magic knapsack," described as:

These wonderous items, both useful and standardized without being overpowerful, contain one of each item appearing on the D&D equipment list although their weight is negligible . However, once an item has been taken out it can never be put back nor can any new item be put into one.

A nice idea for a self-contained adventure.

Following some basic puzzle ideas, which are basically a diversion for the reader rather than something easily translatable to a campaign, is one of Lew Pulsipher's seemingly never-ending supply of essays on gaming philosophy. I didn't find much useful here when I was 12, never mind today. Then there's an article on the excellent "nuclear wargame," The Warlord, which Games Workshop later reissued as Apocalypse, and which became a staple of light-night college gaming sessions for me (I remember one game where the reconstruction rule was dropped as wimpy, and where the two surviving players created a "wall of glass" between them - all this when the threat of nuclear war seemed very real indeed!)

Finally, in Treasure Chest, WD's regular collection of submitted AD&D tidbits from readers, comes a useful idea. From Steven Littlechild, presumably not the later Electricity Regulator, comes the Helm of Vision. Here's the description:

This helm, which can be worn by fighters or clerics, resembles an ordinary fighter's helm. However, it is gold plated, which alone gives it a value of 750 GPs and in combat it has an additional protection bonus of 10%. The two eye slits are fitted with clear, diamond-like gems and have the following properties :
(i) They act independantly [sic] as Gems of Seeing .
(ii) They act together as double range Gems of Seeing.
(iii) They give an infravision ability, range 60 feet .
(iv) In direct sunlight they have the following additional properties :
(a) Monsters of 4th level or below are confused as per a Confusion spell
(b) All monsters combat at -15%
(c) Morale has a penalty of -10%
(v) If removed from the helm they become merely low value gems worth 10GPs each .

(vi) They have the following effects, depending on the alignment of the wearer:
(a) Lawful - The wearer sees with 'time sight' . That is, the wearer sees any polymorphed,
invisible etc. man/monster in its true shape and will not be aware of the polymorphed shape.
The wearer sees all illusions as illusions.
The wearer sees through a disguise 90% of the time.
(b) Neutral- The wearer sees illusions as illusions 50% of the time.

The wearer sees through a disguise 50% of the time .

The wearer will see an evil intention towards him 'written all over the face' of the potential evil doer .
(c) Chaos- The wearer sees illusions as realities .
The wearer will never see through a disguise .
The wearer will see a non-human monster 50% of the time as follows :
(i) A weaker monster will appear to be stronger than himself.
(ii) A stronger monster will appear to be weaker .

I like this. The different alignment effects scream old-school, and actually suggest all sorts of reasons why it should be found in a dungeon - the chaotic wearer who tangled with an ogre believing it to be a goblin and so on. As for the question I asked myself - if the gems can't be removed, why the distinction between acting independantly [sic] and together? - the answer is surely to do with one-eyed fighters. In any event, this would be a nice item to find in a megadungeon.

Then there's a series of ridiculously complicated suggestions for "improving" D&D's mechanics, the infamous Pervert character class (don't ask) and a nice set of rules for scaling poison effects to character level, based on (we have come full circle) Metamorphosis Alpha.

Hmm. Not as much good there as I remember. But this was issue 1.

A PDF of issue 1 can be downloaded here.

Glorantha Background: The Ibex People

2009-11-18T21:19:00.001-05:00

Note: I needed a "dead" people for a character background, preferably one that had the Lunars to blame for its extinction. I thought to myself: who lives in the Eiritha Hills of Prax? Not finding an answer immediately available in my Gloranthan sources, here was the result.

The Ibex People are named for the beasts they ride, giant Ibexes, or mountain goats. Because of the nature of the beasts, the Ibex people range around hills or mountains far more than other beast nomads. The Giant Ibexes are not quite as big as a Sable or High Llama but are formidable mounts, given their massive horns. It is common, as with other nomads, for particularly impressive horns to be preserved as helmet ornaments or used as the basis for magical enchantments.

The Ibex People are (or were) divided into two clans: the Great Ibex and the Lesser Ibex. The Great Ibex live in the Great Wastes, primarily around the Tunneled Hills and Plateau of Statues, although occasionally they range as far as the Iron Forts. Because of the nature of their range, the males of the Ibex People venerate Storm Bull especially. The Lesser Ibex inhabited the Eiritha Hills, and the Ginmuz Mountains especially. It is not clear from the myths whether the Lesser Ibex were an offshoot of the Great Ibex or vice versa. Each chieftain possesses a “Godhorn” that summons the Founder, who is reticent on the issue (it rarely comes up in conversation).

Ibex People tend to be shorter than other nomads, partly because of their slightly smaller mounts, and so roll for SIZ on 2d6+4, but make up for this in other ways, for they are hardy and have +1 CON. They are also natural climbers, for there are times they need to leave even their nimble mounts behind, and so have a beginning climb skill of 50 (and in detailed experience tables, gain an extra x1 each year to the skill). They are also used to looking from heights and gain +10 to Scan when looking from a hill, tower or other elevated site (which makes them sought-after guards). Farsee is taught by all Ibex cult magicians and shamans and most Ibex people know the spell. Ibex People are paler than most nomads, probably because they live in higher, cooler elevations, and are normally brown or dark auburn haired. Like other nomads, they often braid their hair. Again, because of the cooler nature of their range, they dress more fully than other nomads, in soft leather tunics and high boots, although they keep their legs bare for best control of their beasts in precarious situations.

Ibex People are generally monogamous, although most males have slave concubines as well. There is less division of labor on gender lines than usual in a Praxian society, with women fighting, herding and hunting just as often as men. Slavery tends to be restricted to “useful” occupations as slaves have a tendency to fall down cliffs and break their necks. A typical Ibex camp will be set up in the foothills of a higher range, with herders venturing up and down mountains every day. The average size of a camp is quite small, but several camps can exist within easy ride of each other, allowing for significant social interaction between camps and strong clan links. Attacking or otherwise offending a camp usually results in the swift construction of a warband and retaliation. Ibex People are notoriously quick to anger, which, combined with a high percentage of Storm Bulls, leads to a reputation for touchiness. If bested, Ibex People always know they can quickly retreat up hills and mountainsides, so tend to stick close to them, and if followed can normally turn the tables. Favored weapons are composite bows (made from the strong horns of their beasts) and short spears, deployed overhand, for mounted or foot fighting. The Ibexes themselves possess a formidable butt attack.

The Lesser Ibexes were recently (1616) destroyed at the culmination of a long feud with the High Moon Sable People. The origins of the feud go back generations, long before the Lunars came to Prax, and the Lesser Ibexes normally had the better of their conflicts. But Targitad Redlance, Khan of the High Moon Sables, was clever enough to lure the entire Lesser Ibex clan down below the Ginmuz foothills by making them think his tribe was heavily outnumbered. On the banks of the Bitter Stream, however, it became clear that there was Lunar trickery involved, with Illusion Magic and other Sorcery deployed to great effect. The Lunar Magic blew away the Ibex magic, and the entire tribe was surrounded and massacred, with the High Khan Yesugai Greathorn falling and his treasures taken by Targitad. The noncombatants who had come to watch the fight were unable to reach the foothills quickly enough to get away, and those who were not killed resisting capture were mostly taken as slaves. There are rumors that Khan Yesugai’s daughter escaped, but these have not been confirmed.

It is not known what the reaction of the Great Ibex people has been to the destruction of their cousins. There are doubtless many Lesser Ibex Storm Bulls currently living within the Great Ibex people, practicing their chaos-fighting skills against the denizens of the Tunneled Hills. The involvement of chaos-loving Lunars will probably draw their ire at some point, if a leader can draw them together.

A Tip of the Hat to Popehat

2009-11-17T21:09:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Patrick and the guys at Popehat for recommending my new venture! As for Traveller, yes, I'm sure there'll be the odd reference here and there.

Runequest Campaign: The Borderlands

2009-11-17T21:05:00.000-05:00

When we left our heroes, they were arranging for an auction of the priceless Bonesung Armor they had retrieved from the Big Rubble. Let's just say the auction didn't go as planned. Rather than selling it to a friendly cult, the players found themselves caught in a bidding war between Sor-Eel the Short, Count of Prax, Lunar Governor of New Pavis, and Duke Raus of Rone, Lunar Governor of the god-forsaken Grantlands in the Zola Fel valley to the south of Pavis. Eventually, Duke Raus won out and the PCs found themselves the target of Sor-Eel's redirected anger. The PCs were also somewhat miffed to discover that Duke Raus' winning bid was guaranteed but not yet actually manifest in cash. The Issaries priesthood said they would hold on to the armor pending delivery of the cash. Also part of the deal was a grant of land, the settlement known as Rabbit Hat.

The Governor's mood was not improved when a Moon Boat hove in to view on the horizon soon afterwards. Rumors spread throughout the city that Sor-Eel had been replaced as Governor and the boat contained his replacement. That night, the PCs dined at Gimpy's, where Krogar introduced them to Griselda and Wolfhead, and after a few tense moments between Xaraya and Griselda, the latter pronounced the party as worthy. As the PCs left the tavern, however, they were set upon by three savage Sable Rider nomads, seemingly directed by a fourth, unseen assailant. Unarmored, the party took some severe wounds while dispatching their attackers, and they stumbled back in to Gimpy's for healing. Krogar and his friends provided it, while Wolfhead went out to examine the bodies. They discovered notes implicating Lunar intelligence and GimGim the Grim.

Krogar suggested that our heroes should get out of the city for a while. The Chalanna Arroy priestess they had rescued from the trolls needed to be taken to her sisters in the hospital at Horn Gate to recover from her ordeal, and had been offered a place on Duke Raus' barge the next day as he was traveling down to his new fortress, Raus Fort, or Ronegarth as he called it. Krogar's messengers swiftly secured passage for the PCs on the barge as Charvina's companions and as the new holders of the Rabbit Hat grant.

The next day, the PCs met up with Charvina at the Chalanna Arroy temple and accompanied her to Duke Raus' townhome, where the Duke, his family and retainers joined them. Before going down to the river, however, they went to see the Moon Boat dock on the Pavis temple. Sor-Eel was also there, looking distinctly unamused. The Moon Boat discharged its passengers: an imposing general of some sort, a beautiful though mature noblewoman, a bald-headed sage, a fierce, tattooed criminal of some sort and a demure girl clad in the raiment of the Northern nomads. The Governor looked at once relieved and yet upset, while GimGim the Grim, who had been shadowing Sor-Eel, disappeared as soon as he saw the newcomers. The noblewoman smiled at Duke Raus, who responded with an extremely deep bow.

On the trip downriver in the Duke's barge, the PCs became familiar with the Duke's right-hand man, Daine, a former Scimitar of the Lunar war-god Yanafal Tarnils. He impressed the PCs with his honesty and common sense, and especially with the no-nonsense way he dealt with the attempts by Sun County officials to extract some form of tax for using the river. Grom was intrigued by the Duke's attractive daughter, Jezra, but also nonplussed at her rudeness to him. All down the river, the PCs also noticed newtlings staring at the barge with what seemed more than basic curiosity.

Ronegarth itself proved less than advertised. A stone tower, a wooden palisade and a bunch of tents did not a capital make, the PCs thought. They were happy to stay there that night, however, before setting out across the plains the next day. Daine accompanied them, saying he had to purchase some more slaves for construction work. Xaraya and Grom both expressed disquiet at this, but Daine did not understand their objections.

An uneventful trip across the chaparral followed the next day, and the party arrived at Horn Gate without incident. Daine explained that this was an unusual oasis. The downtrodden folk of the oasis, blond and blue-eyed as they were, poor souls, grew dates and other desert fruit for their sustenance but were always subject to whichever nomad tribe had moved in to exploit them. At the moment, this was the hated, pro-Lunar Sable people, much to Xaraya's disgust. There were two things that made the oasis unusual, however. First, there were ruins from the First Age here. At one point, Waha! himself had erected giant horns that surrounded a gate to subterranean ruins. Those horns had long-gone, but the gate to the underworld was still there, guarded by a cult of Amazon warriors, the Daughters of Azundati, who protected the gate but not the people. They also guarded a white-stone hospital, a temple to Chalanna Arroy, occupied by priestesses who could not stomach the Lunar occupation of Pavis.

The PCs delivered their charge to the White Sisters. They were delighted to see Charvina, whom they had thought dead. The PCs met Matron Mother Arquanel, an impossibly aged crone, only four feet tall, who nevertheless had Heroquested many times and her two other High Healers, Sister Aelbertha, plump and jolly, and Sister Marcilla, raven-haired and the most beautiful woman anyone in the party had ever seen. The Sisterhood put on a feast to celebrate their sister's return, and during the feast the seemingly senile Arquanel reached moments of lucidity where she pledged her aid to the PCs should they seek to fulfill their destiny and overthrow the Lunars.

The next day, while Daine stayed to purchase some slaves from the Sables, the PCs set out to explore some more of the land. In the plains, they met their first Morokanth, the slaver Kareel Keenclaw, with his train of herd men (unintelligent humans), and slave trollkin and baboons. The PCs were appalled by the idea of herd men, which Kareel referred to as his cattle. The PCs scraped together all the monies they had and bought not just the slaves, but also the herd. Kareel kept a couple to eat and headed off towards Horn Gate to purchase some more slaves with his new riches.

The PCs did not find it easy to keep their new coffle under control, but they found a couple of trollkin they could rely on, given a promise of freedom. With their aid, they moved the gang towards the defile known as Weis Cut. In the caves at the head of the cut, they encountered the Men-And-A-Half, the Agimori, and their leader Chaku Ironspear. Chaku was amazed but impressed at the PCs rescuing the Herd Men, and explained that some of his people had been enslaved by the Morokanth and turned into animals. After long discussion over kvass and roasted meats, Chaku agreed to have his shamans awaken the Herd Men to intelligence in return for favors to be bestowed later and for influence with Duke Raus.

The next day, the PCs and their trollkin and baboons entered the squalid hamlet of Weis, a people even more downtrodden than the oasis folk, and their cocky Mayor, Tarnak, who expressed interest that Lady Jezra had returned to Ronegarth. A few hours later, they reached Fort Raus, where they freed the trollkin, who agreed to work hard for their benefactors and help build the settlement at night, allowing for 24-hour long construction. They then freed the baboons, who scattered in every direction.

After another night's sleep, the PCs decided to head out to Rabbit Hat to review their new property. Daine, however, said he had to brief them first...

The Barrow: A Runequest Cameo

2009-11-16T20:14:00.000-05:00

Note: I ran this encounter under RQIII rules. Obviously the changes to spirit combat under MRQ rules will make it a little different, but it should still work.

While walking through farmland, the players are approached by a young girl, around 11 years old. She is looking for a Humakti warrior. Sample dialog, “Sir, are you a Humakti warrior? We need one. There is an Undead menace causing my family woe. An evil ghost is haunting my grandfather’s barrow. My father says if a Humakti warrior defeats the ghost, it will leave us.”

As the girl leads them towards the barrow she will explain that her grandfather was a Sword of Humakt and that her grandmother was very beautiful. However, an evil companion of her grandfather’s desired her. Spurned, he left the cult and joined the cult of Zorak Zoran, the troll god of hate and war. He killed the grandfather and accidentally killed the grandmother while beserk. After their burial he killed himself outside the barrow, but his hate kept his ghost in the area. He continues to haunt the area, and has been getting worse and worse, now making the fields barren and drying up the cows’ milk.

Outside the barrow is a skeleton holding a large mace and dressed in scraps of black leather armor. Inscribed on the skull are the runes of disorder, darkness and death. Beside the corpse is another heavy mace. As the players approach the skeleton the ghost will form, resembling a warrior in black, holding a maul, his face morphing between human, trollish and skeleton.

At the same time, however, the girl will scream and faint. From her will coalesce another spirit, a woman in flowing robes whose appearance will morph between beauty, ugliness and decay.

The male ghost will attack to possess a Humakti. The female ghost will attack to possess a woman, choosing the one with the highest APP.

Male ghost: INT 15 POW 9, MPs 9, Move 9, Spells: Bludgeon 4 45%, Demoralize 45%, Fanaticism 45%, Create Skeleton (one-use)

(Note: the reason this ghost is so weak is that it has already prepared the skeleton – its own – that it will raise as a last resort to help fulfill its plan. If it does not look like it will be able to possess the Humakti, it will attempt to kill him and hope to try again with another victim)

Female ghost: INT 13, POW 17, MPs 14*, Move 14, Spells: Shimmer 2 85%, Strength 2 85%, Repair 85%

* Three points expended in possessing the local girl.

Skeleton: STR 9, SIZ 12, DEX 9, Mov 3, Heavy Mace 55%/55% 1D10 AP 10

Tactics: The male will attack to possess a Humakti then, once possessed, he will cast Demoralize on the most powerful-looking remaining fighter. Next, he will drop the Humakti’s sword and move to pick up a mace from the corpse, then fight. If he cannot possess or is losing, he will raise the skeleton. The female will attack to possess the best-looking female, then cast Shimmer on herself, Strength on her lover if he has possessed someone, or on herself if the body she occupies feels like a fighter. She will save at least one repair for the skeleton. The ghosts will flee if they are losing, but will try to kill the bodies they are occupying first.

What has actually occurred was that the “grandmother” and the Zorak Zoran cultist were actually adulterers. The “grandfather” discovered this and slew his faithless wife, but was then slain by the Zorak Zorani, who promptly called for DI to preserve his lover as a ghost. After the burial, the Zorak Zorani killed himself, having taken steps to preserve himself as a host too. The doomed lovers have since been looking for a Humakti and attractive woman to possess so that they can live again, taking pleasure in their victory over Death. The female possesses local girls for the purposes of luring likely subjects here.

Inside the barrow are the remains of previous victims – when the bodies become unattractive, old or weak (or start to fight back), the lovers bring them here and commit suicide. The remains contain a gold ring (225L), a jeweled armband (450L) for SIZ 13-15, a Heater-style shield bearing the Death Rune that has received and Armoring Enchantment to raise its APs to 21, with the condition that it can only be wielded by a Humakt initiate (or higher), and a fragmentary Grimoire that teaches Intensity 40%, Treat Wounds 20% and Palsy 15%. Finally, a ring on the finger of the “grandmother” herself holds a an Intellect Spirit binding enchantment. The body of the Humakti warrior wears Iron chainmail and bears an Iron sword, but no self-respecting Humakti would desecrate this grave.

Destroying the skulls of the Zorak Zorani and the “grandmother” after reducing their MPs to 0 will banish the ghosts to the Hell they deserve.

OD&D Sandbox: The Valley of Castles

2009-11-15T20:57:00.001-05:00

On a recent trip back to the UK, I retrieved certain cherished artifacts from my parents' house. The first edition Empire of the Petal Throne, the first edition Call of Cthulhu, the Chaosium Thieves World boxed set and, most impressive of all, the white box D&D little brown books, together with supplements 1-3 (I never bothered with Gods, Demigods & Heroes, for reasons that will be explained).

Now this got me to thinking. Why not design an OD&D sandbox based around the most important points of the white box rules, with a twist or two? So here goes.

First, I want humanity to be under pressure. This isn't an Arthurian world with other races and monsters hiding in the margins. Instead, it is a world where humanity is almost extinct, with monsters and other races wanting to finish them off. This is the backstory:

Once upon a time, mankind ruled the world. While other races were limited, mankind alone could reach dizzy heights of martial prowess and magical power. Moreover, mankind alone was granted divine favor. Man's fortresses and cities dotted the land. Graceful wizard's towers reached to the sky. Cathedrals, crypts and catacombs signified the favor of the divine Creator.

However, man's pride proved his downfall. Led by ancient dragons, the monsters attacked. Orcs, ogres, goblins, gnolls, hobgoblins and kobolds poured out of the caves and caverns where they had been preparing. This had happened before, but this time the dragons had an ally. Evil High Priests, servants of the Destroyer, enemy of the Creator, cursed their own race. From this day on, virtually all children born to human women were not humans, but hobbits. These weak creatures could not stand against the evil hordes, and human settlements slowly but surely fell to the opposing races. Dwarves and elves filled the gap in some places, but for the most part, the ancient towns, towers and sacred places were occupied by the rivals of man. Those humans who survive in what is now called Wilderness have become bandits, brigands or beserkers.

Save for one land, the Valley of Castles. In this place, man's divine favor still held true and women still bore human children. This valley contains three cities, one for each alignment, and each one dominated by a different class.

At the head of the valley, beneath a cliff-face and a towering waterfall, stands Dunnkkarganstad, the City of Chaos. Dominated by the most powerful wizards in the world, Dunnkkarganstad knows no law. There is no constabulary, no courts. Power projects from the towers of the wizards, and what order there is exists simply to keep people from bothering the wizards. Thus, around the base of the Tower of Aedward the Earth-Mover exists a fortress where his guards live, an inn where his guests can stay (and others so long as they don't bother him), a shop where his agents sells things he no longer needs and other small vestiges of civilization. Beyond these pockets, the city is a hell-hole, with people occupying what ruins they can or eking a living in slums. The cliff-face that looms above the city is dominated by a long, twisting staircase carved into the side of the cliff. The Long Stairs lead not just to the plateau above the city, but to dungeons carved into the cliff by successive powerful wizards to host their experiments and provide bolt-holes for when their towers were not strong enough. Some wizards still live in these dungeons, while others have been taken over by the creatures once imprisoned there or by other denizens. The Dungeons of Dunnkkargan, as they are known, are therefore fabled repositories of lost knowledge and great treasure.

The waterfall mentioned above falls into a lake from which flows the River Voana, whose waters are clear and drinkable despite the filth poured into it by the residents of Dunnkkarganstad. The valley around it is lush and green, with forests inhabited by friendly elves and villages of hobbit refugees. Then comes the great city of Turesme, centered on a tight bend in the river that forms an incised meander, with an easily defensible peninsula. On this spit of land is the Cathedral and Castle of Turesme, the seat of power of the Prince-Patriarch, who rules the Church of the Creator. This is a city of Law, ruled by the clergy. There is a law for virtually every form of behavior known to man and visitors must be careful to acquaint themselves with the law or they will find themselves in court for looking the wrong way on a one-way street (literally - on Brown Cow Street, which leads up to the Cathedral, all pedestrians must face the Cathedral at all times; those riding animals may face away as it is difficult to get animals to obey this particular law). Turesme is a bright, shining city, kept that way by force of law. Many goods are illegal and its economy is fragile, to say the least.

The river flows on until it reaches the sea at the port of Leutheria, a stunning natural harbor made stronger by fortified piers. Leutheria is a Neutral city, dominated by the Guild of Fighting Men, who hire out their services but also guarantee that the one law of the city - the rule of contract - is respected. All social interactions are contractual in some way in Leutheria, which leads to a thriving economy and a serious disrespect of cheats (they are driven out of the city to Durrkkarganstad or to throw themselves on the mercy of the Turesmic priesthood). The port maintains trading relations with dwarven, elfin and hobbit settlements that hold out against the Wilderness and its nominal leader, the Harbormaster, employs the Guild to man a significant navy that fights pirates and sea monsters alike.

The valley is called the Valley of Castles because it is a frontier. To north and south the forces of the Wilderness encroach on a regular basis. When fighting men, clerics and magic users reach enough power, they generally attempt to push back the wilderness a bit by building a castle of some sort on the frontier. Sometimes these castles thrive and become the centerpiece of a new settlement, but sometimes they fail and are ruined or, worse, become occupied by monsters. Only through the bravery of such adventurers can humanity hope to survive.

You'll note that the Valley has a simple, dualist religion. I've always thought D&D lost something when the idea of religion being pantheon-based got foisted on the game with Gods, Demigods & Heroes (even if that supplement seemed to provide just bigger, badder monsters to fight). That's not to say there aren't demons that Evil High Priests can worship or perhaps even summon, but to me it makes more sense of the cleric class if it is focused on one benign deity.

Anyway, there we are. This is a world in which people have a reason to go adventuring and fight monsters, a choice of three alignments and three classes, a choice of other races (including hobbit "should any player wish to be one") and the general hostility of everything else in the world. There's an initial megadungeon and any number of ruined castles providing small dungeons for one-off adventures. Now if only I had the Outdoor Survival map...

Mongoose Runequest: The Good and the Bad

2009-11-15T17:43:00.000-05:00

So we've now been playing Mongoose Runequest (MRQ) for about 6 months. I have to say I'm generally happy with the system, with a few provisos as outlined below. Here's my brief analysis of the best and the worst points of the rules:

The Good

I like the abolition of distinction between parrying and attack. It always seemed odd to me that you could reach high levels in one and not in the other. Not using a weapon to parry should be more of a function of the unsuitability of the weapon (weakness or vis-a-vis a shield, for example) than lack of skill, or so it seems to me. It does make for faster advancement, but I can live with that.
The combat actions/ strike rank system seems to work well. It's important to have a degree of randomness in deciding combat order for variety, but the quicker characters do still tend to act before the slower characters.
We haven't used it much but the fatigue system is much better than any other version I've seen
In general the rationalization of the skills system works very well, although the brute force vs general athletics distinction is confusing.
I like rune integration. Seems very Gloranthan, even if Runecasting, holding physical runes etc doesn't.

The Bad

The lack of a general Hit Points system has led to some ludicrous combat situations akin to the Black Knight from Monty Python & the Holy Grail. I think I'll restore a general HP total of CON + SIZ for PCs and important NPCs. The alternative combat rules from Signs & Portents #54 have certainly helped with ~~arrow fodder~~ less important NPCs.
Magic appears to have been nerfed. A character with high Persistence can normally shrug off even major spells from powerful opponents, and less powerful magicians often don't even cast the spell successfully in the first place. And vice versa, so my PCs don't use target-affecting magic very often, while when considering what tactics to use for their opponents I generally only use such spells near the beginning of a combat. Now in my Glorantha, most combats are supposed to have magic crackling all over the place (something HeroQuest reflects quite well) rather than fizzling or bouncing routinely. This needs to be sorted out.
Various systems that worked very well with the Resistance Table (most notably spirit combat, poison and disease) don't work nearly as well with the replacement rules. I think I'm going to bring back the Resistance Table for spirit combat. Not sure about the others.

As we work out the House Rules, we'll post them here. Of course, with MRQII coming, it may all be moot.

Gloranthan Legend: The Bull Hunt of Murharzarm

2009-11-15T01:14:00.003-05:00

This is a strange, almost universal legend, which appears in myths throughout Western and Central Genertela. The generally-agreed details are this: an enemy or rival of the Emperor god (most often Murharzarm) let loose a great bull upon the world. The bull was a chthonic beast, equal in power to gods. It ravaged the lands, slaying many mortals, and in most versions was responsible for the creation of the Elder Wilds. The Emperor sent out a call for aid, which was answered by gods, demigods and heroes, who set out to hunt the bull, across the entire world. Most legends cover only the trials of the particular focus of the legend, with some interaction with friends and rivals. In all cases, the particular god or hero has to fall out of the hunt, as a result of injury, trickery or distraction. Often, the interactions of the protagonists contradict each other (eg in the legend of Orlanth’s participation, he was tricked by his brother Ragnaglar, whereas the legends of Yelmalio and High King Elf both put the reason for Orlanth’s withdrawal down to those figures). All the legends agree that a victor caught the bull and brought it back to the Emperor, who skinned it and took the hide as a trophy, but no legend actually says who the victor was.

Because of the various conflicts, some scholars have theorized that the Bull-Hunt is the result of God Learner myth-conflation. The myth is almost always set in the pre-Gods War Godtime, but Waha has a myth as well, as do some First Age heroes. Some theorists even suggest that the mystery of the victor indicates the God Learners erased a god from myth, although this is regarded as unlikely by most. A less extreme theory suggests that the God Learners changed the myth of the victor into a failure, leaving a “blank god” as the victor, presumably to “map” a figure of their own into the myth. Most scholars suggest instead that the legend has simply been lost, but could be discovered by a determined HeroQuest.

Because most of the legends involve failure in some way, this myth is rarely HeroQuested.

Runequest Campaign: The Trouble With Trolls Part II

2009-11-14T11:36:00.001-05:00

At the Kyger Litor stronghold, the night was disturbed by a massive wagon guarded by Rubble Trackers. The dwarves unloaded crates and barrels. Gragkizzie, leader of the dwarves, said that they were secret weapons and had Garrath employ an Oath spell to ensure the PCs would not reveal any of these secrets to outsiders. The dwarves were going to use these weapons on the trolls: a Disorder Keg, a Wonderbuss and two Pistoles. The PCs expressed some skepticism to their value.

The next morning the PCs, their Dwarf allies, Leotychidas, Stars Like Night, Njall and two of his followers gathered at the “back door” of the temple where the Dwarf assault had stalled previously. The dwarves threw down rocks and made noises to alert the trolls to their presence, hopefully gathering the trolls to a close defensive formation. Gragkizzie then lit what she called “fuse” to the Disorder Keg, a barrel the size of an average human, and rolled it down the stairs. Witha cry of “Fire in the trolls!” the assault party took cover. An explosion ripped back up the stairs and Gragkizzie and her followers Runi and Harc grabbed their secret weapons and charged down the stairs.

The sight that greeted the party was of a troll mob in disarray. Several trollkin were dead or severely wounded, with dark trolls also clearly wounded. A pair of Great Trolls and the Death Lord Magrak, however, appeared to have escaped serious injury. Gragkizzie leveled her Wonderbuss at a dark troll… and saw it blow up in her hands. Runi and Harc missed with their pistoles. Thinking, never send a dwarf to do a man’s work, the PCs and their allies charged in.

At this point Magrak yelled out, “Enloslikk! Cowards! Satakkash varkur uz! Fight like a troll! Satakkar garno! Single combat! Zu satakk mar! Your best man! Satakkar garno! Single combat!” Njall stepped forward, but Grom indicated that he had a Humakti geas never to turn down a challenge to single combat, and moved to face the Death Lord, whose favored weapon was a vicious looking Ball and Chain. As he passed by, Xaraya surreptitiously cast Protection I on Grom. This proved crucial.

Grom cast Bladesharp III, giving Magrak a chance to hit, and he landed a blow on the head which would have wounded Grom were it not for the Protection spell. Magrak parried Grom’s next blow, and then cast a Beserk spell, filling him with the fury of his dark god. There followed a mighty duel, where three times Grom came close to receiving grievous wounds that would have left him in serious trouble, but Xaraya’s Protection spell saved him. In return, Grom concentrated on Magrak’s abdomen, and eventually felled him. But Magrak’s beserk fury kept him going, and even after Grom had reduced much of his anatomy to a bloody pulp, he still frothed with bloodlust. When Grom succeeded in completely incapacitating the Death Lord, a Great Troll threw a slingshot at him, and battle was joined between the party and the treacherous trolls.

A long and hard battle saw the party completely victorious, but not without serious wounds to Xaraya and Njall. The party needed to use most of its healing magic to patch itself up, and found itself severely drained of magic points.

Consulting with Garrath’s party via mindlink, they discovered that the battle in the main temple had bogged down to an exchange of missile fire and magic, with the temple’s undead guardians proving difficult to cut through. Garrath confirmed that Keratagg Gan was not there, and that the PCs’ party should seek to find him, for if he fell then their troll allies might be able to persuade the temple to surrender.

Searching the troll barracks, the PCs found numerous treasures. They also found that Magrak was a surprisingly literate Death Lord and was studying 4 books he had rescued from the Rubble, including a Life of Pavis and a volume entitled “Secrets of the Garden.” Moving forward cautiously, the PCs found what was probably Magrak’s office, including a large map of the Rubble annotated in Darktongue, which seemed to detail a 300 year-long campaign against Chaos, but with surprisingly few recent notations. By this time, they had been joined by Dharrgag, the Karrg’s Son, who allowed Grom to take the map temporarily, but warned that it was Clan property.

In the next room, a disused cellar, the dwarves quickly located a secret door which opened on to stairs leading down. As they were heading down, cautiously, in battle formation, a small trollkin appeared to emerge from the stone, incongruously dressed in a red pallium. She gestured to the PCs to follow her. Looking around, the PCs realized everyone else in the party had frozen in place. The trollkin opened her robe to form what could only be called a portal, which the PCs stepped through.

They found themselves in a rough-hewn tunnel, in which they could see without any discernable sources of light. Following the trollkin, they soon found themselves approaching a small cave, in which a female troll was the only occupant, weighed down with many chains. She asked the PCs, “Do you know who I am?” and eventually Xaraya twigged she was the Queen of the Gunddahaak Clan. The successful answer seemed to dissolve some of the heaviest chains, but she remained firmly shackled to the ground. She revealed that she had not been captured by a rival clan, as everyone supposed, but imprisoned by Keratagg Gan. She asked the PCs to take word of her imprisonment to her mother, Kyger Litor, which the PCs agreed to do. To serve as a token of good faith, the Queen, Gretaslagg, asked Grom to take a tooth from her mouth. Grom was brave enough to do so, and wrenched the tusk from her maw.

The trollkin appeared again, and led the PCs on. This time they came to a huge cave, filled with firespouts and dark pools. In the center of the cave, working dark magics, was a terrifying creature, half troll woman and half spider. Behind her was a massive reptilian snout, the size of a palace. Skye recognized the troll creature as Cragspider the Fire Witch, and the snout obviously belonged to her ally, the Black Dragon.

Cragspider turned her attention to the PCs, and asked if they wished to be tested by Fire or Mind. Xaraya answered first, choosing Mind. She soon found her mind invaded by a powerful magic presence, clawing at her thoughts and memories. The assault caused he magical pain, but she was able to gather herself and expel the presence from her mind. Skye too chose the test of Mind, and was able to resist Cragspider’s mental claws quickly. Grom also chose the test of Mind, but when Cragspider saw the tusk he bore, she relented. The troll hero addressed the party, saying “You represent an aggrieved party. The crime is terrible. You must plead for your Queen before her mother. She will tell you what to do. Be ware, however, for she is likely to ask much of you. If you wish, you may leave this place now.” The party kept faith with their quest, and moved on.

Heading onwards, the trollkin guided the PCs into a cave where it somehow magically morphed into a gigantic, six-breasted female troll, suckling a variety of dark/mistress/great troll children that she somehow cradled in her giant arms. The PCs realized they were in the presence of the goddess Kyger Litor. A huge troll – Karrg – stood guard before her. Pools of water surrounded the PCs.

Grom managed to attract the goddess’ attention, and on seeing the tusk, she told the PCs that her daughter had been dishonored by Keratagg Gan, but that he was a servant of Zorak Zoran, who was not hers to command. She had Cragspider test the PCs because she would need emissaries of exceptional bravery and willpower to go deep into Hell and tell Zorak Zoran that his servant has forsaken him. They have passed that test, but she had further questions to ask of each PC.

To Grom, she said, “You are the servant of Humakt, and there is mutual hatred between him and Zorak Zoran. You are aware that many trolls in Sartar worship Humakt. Will you honor the Queen of Gunddahaak by bringing the word of Humakt to the tribe when you become an Acolyte of the god? The cult of Zorak Zoran will take time to rebuild and the tribe will need warriors.” Grom agreed, and the goddess asked him to drink from a pool. On quaffing the water, Grom realized he had integrated the Darkness Rune and gained the ability to speak Darktongue fluently.

To Xaraya, she said “Little one, you have lost your faith. Why is it so?” They discussed the reasons for Xaraya forsaking her original faith and her desire to learn powerful magics that could help destroy the Lunars. Kyger Litor asked Xaraya to drink from another pool and when she had finished she found that she had a tattered, ancient, fragment of a book in her hands, written in Darktongue, which she could now read. It was part of the Book of Arkat. The goddess told her to “seek the Kingtroll.”

To Skye, she said, “Sweet daughter of Pavis, you have walked in darkness before now. You follow a foreign goddess. Tell me, do you love Vinga or Pavis more?” Skye thought deeply and said that she preferred the Loyal Daughter more. The goddess nodded and asked Skye to promise to visit her son, Pikat Yaraboom, then reached out a claw and drew a Man Rune on her forehead.

Kyger Litor then told the PCs that they would be venturing deep into Hell and offered the help of her son Karrg, who seemed unhappy at the suggestion. Accompanied by the Demigod and the trollkin, they moved on.

The path led down, and the darkness became tangible and the heat greater. On the way, Skye attempted to engage Karrg in conversation. The demigod looked at her as if she was something he had found on the underside of his boot, turned and left them.

The trollkin led them down a side tunnel, and they came before an immensely obese troll matron, whom they realized was Xiola Umbar. She thanked Xaraya for returning her holy object and reached out to bless her. Xaraya realized she was now under Xiola Umbar’s protection and had also been blessed with fecundity.

Pressing on, the trollkin led the PCs down a series of increasingly dark and menacing tunnels. Things also got hotter. Fireholes could be seen. Noises began, which eventually Grom realized were screams. The screams, moans and other expressions of pain got louder and louder. Finally, the PCs entered a cave dominated by a huge troll-shape made of darkness and fire. This was Zorak Zoran, god of hate and vengeance, fear and violence. Shades danced around him, as did salamanders.

The god noticed the PCs and a wave of fear swept out from him. Skye and Xaraya stood their ground, but Grom was overcome by fear, dropped his possessions, turned and ran. Zorak Zoran then grabbed Xaraya and would have eaten her had he not realized she was under his sister’s protection. The god then asked Xaraya, “What do you hate?” She answered that she hated the Lunars, and the wave of hate that emanated from the god indicated he agreed. Xaraya understood he hated the Red Moon for violating the rule of darkness at night that Zorak Zoran had fought for during the Great Compromise.

With an air of extreme menace, the god asked them what they had come for. Together, Xaraya and Skye explained Keratagg Gan’s betrayal and its consequences. The god cursed the name of his priest in extreme terms and called up a spirit of hate and rage, the fabled Hell Roar. He tempered his hate towards the women, and they realized this was his form of blessing. Xaraya gained knowledge of the Firearrow spell, whilst Skye realized Zorak Zoran had granted her a use of the Command Ghost spell. The god commanded them to go, so they picked up Grom’s possessions, and a strange ivory object that resembled a massive snake fang, found Grom cowering in a side tunnel, and followed the trollkin away. After a short distance, enough for Grom to recover, the trollkin opened her cloak to form a portal, through which the PCs left. They found themselves back on the staircase, and as the trollkin disappeared, time started again.

Coming to the bottom of the stairs, tunnels led south and north. Skye attempted to scout southwards, but tripped and fell. A large Great Troll charged towards her, but missile fire, Grom and Leotychidas felled the troll. On its body they found a large lead key. Progressing further, the party found a prison. In it, they found a cowardly Lunar agent called Erastes Fulmen, whom the party decided to leave locked up until they had dealt with Keratagg Gan, four elves and a sickly dryad, with whom Leotychidas could haltingly communicate, and a naked Chalanna Arroy priestess, Charvaina, who had been reduced to skin and bones. All wore slave collars, which the party broke. Grom clad Charvaina in his cloak, and the priestess used what she could of her skills to tend to the dryad. They found a couple of bows to arm the healthier of the elves.

Turning north, the party advanced in battle formation and came across a room that could only be described as a chapel. Its floor, walls and vaulted ceiling were decorated with scenes of soaring spires and swooping dragons. The floor was made of a mosaic that depicted a ring of twelve dragons, each holding another’s tail in its mouth. Human faces were associated with each dragon, and Skye recognized Obduran the Flyer, Lorenkarten the Mile and Isgangdrang the Storm, members of the Eternal Dragon Ring of the EWF.

More importantly, however, was a trollish mob, with about twenty dark trolls, four dark trolls and Keratagg Gan all in battle formation. Most had cast fireblade. Two large shades were advancing towards the party, while the black smoke spirit with hammers for hands hovered above them. Keratagg Gan laughed.

At this point, the party saw the darkness and smoke leach from the shades and spirit, while the fire from the fireblades was also drawn towards a mass in the centre of the vaulted ceiling. The shades and spirit ceased to be and the fire left the weapons completely as the mass formed into the creature the PCs recognized as Hell Roar. Speaking in Darktongue, Hell Roar yelled, “Traitor! Faithless! Weakling! You have forsaken your calling! You toy with chaos and replace hate with greed! You shall come to hell not as a servant, but as a slave!” It picked up Keratagg Gan and literally ripped his soul from his body. As the corpse fell to the ground, Dharrgag the Karrg’s Son called out to the trolls to lay down their arms or be cursed by Zorak Zoran. All spells the enemy trolls had cast fizzled and, overcome by fear, they all complied.

While the others were ensuring the trolls were firm in their intent to surrender, the dwarves checked the room and found a secret door. Behind, they found Keratagg Gan’s real office. It contained a variety of documents in Darktongue that indicated that Gan’s plan to take over the clan, then the entirety of the Stronglands, has been underway for a while. There were indications that Gan had been dealing with a mysterious adviser, known only by the codename of Runeface. At this point, the PCs noticed the red-robed trollkin, who indicated a section of the office wall before disappearing. Searching they found a secret door. Behind it they discovered Queen Gretaslagg, heavily chained and wearing a slave collar. On being freed, she swore undying gratitude to the PCs and demanded the heads of Keratagg Gan and Magrak (which were later delivered). Xaraya contacted Garrath and relayed the events to him. Dharrgag went to convey the truth to the remaining defiant forces in the temple.

Exploring further, the PCs found Gan’s bedchamber, which also contained various items of very expensive human female clothing, leading Xaraya to speculate that Runeface might be a human woman with odd tastes. Beyond, they found Keratagg Gan’s hoard of treasure, which contained a small fortune in coin and various magical items, including an iron Humakti helmet that Grom was very keen to lay claim to.

The Queen invited the assault parties, even the dwarves and elves, to a celebration that she presided over with the heads of Keratagg Gan and Magrak adorning her throne. In the riotous celebration, Xaraya was challenged to drink an entire cup of Powzie! Amazingly, she survived all ten sips, with progressive loss of faculties. By the end, she was dancing on the tables without any idea what she was doing, and would have succumbed to Garrath’s amorous advances had not Skye seen in her a sister in trouble and blocked Sharpsword’s intentions.

The next day, nursing hangovers, the assault party returned to the Flintnail Temple. Gragkizzie agreed to use the Flintnail tunnels to move most of the PC’s share of the loot into New Pavis, where it could be picked up without attracting the Lunars’ attention. However, there remained the question of what to do with Erastes Fulmen, whose story could not seem to stay straight. The PCs agreed to take him in via the People’s Gate themselves.

Fulmen was clearly known to the gate guards, who seemed to snigger at the PCs for being associated with him. The last story they had got from Erastes was that he was working for Jotaran Longsword, Constable of Pavis, and the PCs decided to accompany him to Jotaran’s office to check out this story. On the way, however, they encountered a Lunar patrol that took charge of Erastes. The PCs followed the patrol and were surprised to see it take him to the Silk and Plume instead of any of the administrative buildings.

After picking up their loot from the Flintnail temple and a quick trip to the Knowledge Temple, where at last they could afford identification services, Grom decided that they should finally arrange the auction of the Bonesung Armor…

Runequest Campaign: The Trouble with Trolls Part I

2009-11-14T11:35:00.001-05:00

The combined force attacking the Temple of Zorak Zoran had been joined by two others, ‘Bob’, a sneak thief born and bred in Pavis, hired as a scout, and Embla, an enormously tall (6’11”) and glamorous merchant woman, hired to use her detection magic to find the gems the temples had had stolen from them.

With Garrath Sharpsword’s force occupied by about 10 Great Trolls in the main entryway and the Flintnail Rubble Tracker dwarf force having run into heavy opposition coming down the back door, it was up to Xaraya’s force to press on into the temple alone. The shaman Stars Like Night went discorporate, while Bob advanced stealthily down the hall, taking advantage of his Dark Sight ability. About 50m down, Bob was lucky to notice two holes, one of either side of the hall. Theorizing these might be spy holes, Bob jabbed his dagger through one of the holes with great force. It just happened (01 on the roll) that a troll was just “looking” through the hole at that point and the dagger went through the hole and the gap in his helmet into his ear and brain, killing him instantly. Bob hurried back up the passage as trolls broke through the wall on either side, rounded a corner and concealed himself against the wall.

Xaraya heard the commotion and ordered the force to prepare missile weapons. As the trolls rounded the corner they stepped into a hail of fire, which took several of them down at once. Bob used surprise to come from behind and stab a one troll in the head, taking him down too. The trolls did not have a chance to stop their charge and switch weapons before they were all down, dead or dying. This was despite Embla snagging her staff sling on the tunnel wall and having to pick up her fallen weapon.

The force advanced cautiously to the watch posts, to discover two small tunnels running parallel to the main one (which was easily big enough to let Great Trolls walk down). Learning that Garrath had dealt with the Great Trolls but was going to the aid of the dwarves, Xaraya’s force conferred on strategy. Stars Like Night had returned to tell them that a large force of trolls was gathered in a chamber at the end of the tunnel to meet them, while another force was fortifying the temple chamber itself, beyond. Xaraya decided to scout out one side tunnel with a torch, while Bob advanced down the other with his dark sight.

Xaraya’s torch attracted troll attention. A trollkin and dark troll came up the tunnel. At this point, Xaraya decided to try diplomacy and announced in halting Darktongue that they were supporters of the true Queen. Despite some language difficulties, it seemed that the trolls were sympathetic, for they did not attack, but disappeared back into the darkness.

Meanwhile, Bob had discovered that the force in the main chamber was about 13 strong – a Death Lord, two Great Trolls, 4 Dark Trolls and half a dozen trollkin, gathered in two lines of battle (trollkin in front). Embla was deputed to sneak down the second tunnel and use her confusion magic if necessary, while Grom led half the force forward to try diplomacy again.

This time it was the party that was met by a hail of missiles, which for the most part bounced off their armor. Embla immediately Confused a Great Troll, much to the distress of the Death Lord, who fired off a Fear spell at Leotychidas, whose shield still burned with his Lantern spell. In a great loss for the party, the Fearshock stopped Leo’s heart, and only timely first aid from Skye saved him. But this meant that their only immediate light source was out, with his shield providing untargeted light. The party’s missile users fired back, and Njall the Wind Lord loosed a Lightning spell. Once again they had great success, and the Death Lord was hit by the full force of the lightning. Grom and others started forward, but were saved by Solibar noticing a pit they would have fallen into if they’d continued. The party’s missile force continued to have great success and Njall’s second and last Lightning spell crisped the Death Lord such that half the remaining trolls that could stand broke and ran. Bob’s attempt to launch and impromptu fire bomb failed, and as he moved in to finish off the second Great Troll, he slipped and was knocked out by a blow to the head by the troll’s massive maul. Grom jumped over the pit and saved him by finishing off the troll.

By this point, Garrath had revealed that he and the dwarves were withdrawing back to the Strongpoint. Although Xaraya’s force had probably succeeded better than had been hoped (taking out over 20 trolls and trollkin, including a Death Lord) for just two severe injuries, the loss of their hands-free light source suggested that discretion should be the better part of valor, and they gathered up Leo and Bob to take them back to the Strongpoint.

Exiting the temple via the sewers, the force was met by a Kyger Litor trollkin who told them to come to the Kyger Litor stronghold, where Garrath revealed he had lost 4 men and the Dwarves 6. They would be reinforced by Dharrgagg, a Karrg’s Son and some of his bravest fighters. A war council sent out Stars Like Night and some trollish spirits, which concluded that there were three areas the trolls were guarding: their barracks by the “back door,” the Temple itself and a mysterious area deeper in the temple that seemed to be guarded by spirits only. Embla was able to use her skills to draw what sounded like a remarkably accurate map of the temple, and the War Council decided on a two-pronged attack this time. Xaraya’s friends, the dwarves and some trolls would lead the attack on the back door, while Garrath would lead the attack on the temple, where the fighting was likely to be heaviest.

RuneQuest Campaign: The Road to Pavis

2009-11-14T11:32:00.002-05:00

When we left our party, they were on a trek to find the Ficus Aureus, or Money Tree, tied to Bullford’s Esrola shrine. Accompanied by Griswald and Salvidienus Cansor, a Lhankhor Mhy sage, they overcame many obstacles to find the tree, although Griswald was carried off by a gigantic bird of prey just before they found the tree. On the way they found a terracotta jar they later learned was sacred to Xiola Umbar.

On the way back to Bullford, the PCs were forced by a storm to seek shelter in a hut which appeared to have been occupied by a Lunar scholar of some sort. In the hut, they found a sleeping baby covered by a thin layer of dust. The baby was impervious to harm and would not wake up. Simple tests by Cansor suggested it was extremely magically powerful. That night, the hut was attacked by trollkin, although their Dark Troll mother intervened when it became apparent the PCs were not Lunars, but not before Grom had sliced off a couple of arms. The PCs then witnessed an epic fight between heroes on a distant hill. A Lunar magician wielding two scimitars defeated a Mistress Race troll, then sat down to play his Aulos.

The PCs earned the friendship of the troll mother, who sheltered them before setting them on the right path to Bullford. On the way down from the hills, the PCs encountered a ghost-ridden barrow, haunted by two lost souls of faithless lovers.

After arriving at Bullford, the players received their reward and were delighted to find Griswald alive, having been rescued by the intervention of Orlanth.

After a few day’s rest, the players were introduced by Henere to Jaldon the Black, a non-Praxian hero from Prax, who asked them to convey messages to two people in Pavis: Krogar Wolfhelm and Suneye.

En route to Pavis by water, the PCs came across a fight between newtlings and gorp. Intervening, they turned the battle in the newtlings’ favor and Skye found herself blessed with a Water rune by Kinope, daughter of the river.

Encountering Pavis, the PCs encountered Rudent Pheric, a Lunar bureaucrat who took an instant dislike to Grom, and Karntayar, a Lunar decurion follower of Yanafal Tarnils who challenged Grom to a Humakti duel. Grom pulled out the win, and asked only that Karntayar pay for an evening’s entertainment. The PCs delivered Salvidienus to the Knowledge Temple, where he alerted the Sages to the baby. The Sages proceeded to devote large resources to understanding it.

After Grom discovered a great deal about the Lunar politics in the city from Karntayar in a night at Geo’s, the PCs sought out Krogar at Gimpy’s (and were able to lose some followers thanks to Skye’s knowledge of the city). The next day happened to be Humakt’s Holy Day, so Grom Ashburn attended at worship ceremony where he found himself especially blessed. He now has a Death Rune emblazoned over his left eye.

Krogar revealed that Jaldon’s message meant that the Lunar magician they had run across was Vindrman sol Veir, a great hero of the empire. This was unspeakably bad news.

The PCs needed money to identify some items they had acquired, and Krogar offered a deal. They could run a quick ransom mission into the Troll Stronglands and ransom a figure of prophecy, Brennason, from the Gunddahaak Clan, who had captured him. The players set off, accompanied by a pair of dwarven Rubble Trackers, Solibar the Huge, a Humakti mercenary, and Galen Pechoi, a Vingan archer and old friend of Skye’s. On the way in, they encountered another bureaucrat, Aldent Pheric.

The PC’s troubles with Lunar bureaucracy continued as a mounted Lunar patrol, led by Garimond the Apostate, attempted to shake them down. The party stood their ground and incited Garimond to violence. Grom sliced off another arm and Garimond escaped certain death only by divine intervention. The PCs then discovered the Central Bridge occupied by a gang of broos, led by what seemed like twins. The PCs prevailed after a tough contest that drained their magic (and Grom sliced off some more arms) and saw Grom and a dwarf infected with disease. The PCs encamped for the night to restore their power.

After an uneventful night, the PCs proceeded to the territory of the Gunddahaaks. Blowing a horn in a fountain square as instructed, they were confronted not by the clan Queen, but by a Zorak Zoran Death Lord, Karatagg Gan. He surmised that Brennason was more valuable than the PCs were offering, and surrounded the party. When they set up to resist, he unleashed two huge Shades on them, fearshocking them into submission.

Xaraya and Grom woke up stripped in cages in the dark. They soon discovered that in other cages were Solibar, the object of their quest, Enostar “Bad Dream” Brennason, a shaman called Stars Like Night, and an uptight Yelmalion called Leotychidas. Soon, a priestess of Xiola Umbar came to them and expressed gratitude that they had brought the terracotta jar. She released them and helped them regain their property, but not their money. She advised them of a way out through the sewers connected to the cellar they were imprisoned in. She informed them the trolls had eaten the dwarves and sent Skye and Galen back to demand more ransom, on the grounds that their red hair made them protected by Pikat Yaraboom.

Trying to find a way out, the party discovered another cellar containing chests of trade goods, which they were able to ransack despite the attention of the Great Troll guard.

Turning back to a barricade they believed the priestess had told them to go past, the party encountered a hole in the wall surrounded by vines, identified as Darkvines by Stars Like Night. Pushing through, the PCs realized the vines were carnivorous but flammable. They devised a way to set fire to the vines and burned them out. They discovered in the husk of the central mass a dead elf, who possessed several runes. Unfortunately, they also had to deal with a gigantic chaos root that had broken through the roof of the cellar.

Exploring further, they discovered a tomb of an ancient figure, clutching a scroll. A flood-damaged room contained fragments of a library, with a few volumes salvageable. After trying to work out how to open a mysterious door, Enostar suggested putting the runes they had discovered together to create an EWF rune. This opened the door. Behind, they found two majestic, ancient robes, and a suit of armor made of dragonbone.

Finding a way out of the cellars, the PCs discovered Garrath Sharpsword, Skye and Galen leading a rescue party. Garrath laid out Enostar with one punch.

Returning to New Pavis, the PCs discovered that the armor was Bonesung Armor from the EWF and the tomb belonged to Harukesh the Scaled, a Wyrm’s Fang Exultant. After receiving a bid from the Knowledge Temple, Xaraya arranged for the scrolls and robes to be sold to the Temple of Pavis, making the friendship of Fleeter Nemm.

The PCs attended a council of war arranged by Garrath Sharpsword and various groups. Sneaking into the Rubble so as not to attract Lunar attention, the groups formed a 30-strong party aimed at punishing Keratagg Gan for a variety of outrages.

Having made contact with dissident forces within the clan, the party split into three for a three-pronged assault on the temple, which began with Stars Like Night defeating a guardian spirit.

Is This Thing Still On?

2009-11-14T11:28:00.002-05:00

Completely forgot about this blog, but a few things have happened since I last updated it. First, the campaign has gone on and reached a convenient pause, so I'll update what happened. Secondly, I've invested quite a bit in Mongoose Runequest so will be reviewing those products. Finally, I've had an idea for an old school D&D sandbox that I'd like to outline here. Hopefully I'll remember to update this time.

RuneQuest Adventure Log II

2009-02-22T00:31:00.003-05:00

Another player joined, so we now have three: Grom the Humakti, Xaraya Greatbow (and is that surname accurate) and now the beautiful redhead Skye. On we go...

SESSION 2

There remained one more contest – the Chest-Pounding. This contest was for men only, so the women jeered from the sidelines (Xaraya: “You call that a chest?”), among them a young Vingan warrior from Pavis, Skye. Grom, as champion of the wrestling contest, felt he had to enter and handily defeated Gradulus the Lunar Apostate, but drew his old enemy Kwik-Kik in the next round. Kwik-Kik used his martial arts to avenge his broken leg and defeated Grom. Eventually “Big Daddy” Fathacnut defeated Taizon the Agimori in the final, and was awarded a magnificent Chainmail Hauberk, which he gifted to his son Rathacnut.

That night, Xaraya and Grom found themselves at Griswald’s table once more, and they were once again joined by Salvidienus. This time, the Vingan contigent joined them, including Britgar Spearhaft, Ethburga (a large woman who drank like a fish), Alyrra Ingilli and Enfrewa Hendriki, a sacred Red Woman of the cult: beautiful, sensible, charming and utterly unattainable. They teased the sage, with games like Britgar sitting on his lap and caressing his beard, before Ethburga took over. The sage made his excuses and left.

Griswald then approach Grom and Xaraya, saying he had a task he had agreed to do for his old friend, the Constable of Bullford, and wondered if they would join him. Xaraya asked what the task entailed, and he said it was a task to harvest the fruit of a Money Tree. Ordinarily, the people of Bullford would send a large party of men to do this, but because it was the beginning of Sea Season, they needed all their men to plant their crops. Xaraya found the idea of a Money Tree preposterous, but agreed to listen to Griswald’s friend’s offer.

Godday

The wedding came and went, with many cattle slaughtered and much BEER consumed. Amazingly, no-one tried to disrupt the wedding or kidnap the bride and Caerthan and his wife rode off for their yurt. After the wedding, Griswald introduced the players to Henere Hamilcar, Constable of Bullford, who explained about the Fiscus, or Money Tree, how such a thing existed and how sacred the task was. Griswald explained how, twenty years ago, he had been part of the group that went to harvest the tree, and so knew the way. This would be his last adventure before settling down to raise young warriors. Grom and Xaraya agreed, as did Skye, who had been recommended by Enfrewa. Salvidienus was also coming along, to value the haul. Henere said that the Wise Woman of Bullford, chief priestess of Esra in Bullford, would teach each volunteer a point of Spirit Magic. They would set out the next morning.

Sea Season, Disorder Week

Freezeday

An uneventful trek into increasingly wild lands saw no events of note. At night, Skye was keeping watch when she heard something large coming through the undergrowth towards the campsite. She woke the Sage and told him it was his watch! He, however, also heard the creature and woke Griswald, who said it was just a bear and they could frighten it off. They did so, and resumed their night’s sleep with their food sources unsnaffled.

Waterday
As they were making their way along the banks of the Zola Fel, the party found its way blocked by a small, disheveled figure, the duck bandit Yozarian. Several of the party noted the bandit appeared to be backed up by armed crossbowmen to his rear. He demanded 10L each, then, as the party sized up their options, increased the demand to 12L each. Xaraya informed him that his men were being targeted by their own allies, at which point Yozarian told her he knew she was lying. Grom was certain they were about to come under attack, but Xaraya realized the duck’s back-up was actually a series of dummies, one with a pumpkin for a head. Yozarian, figuring the game was up, dropped his crossbow and jumped into a pool, where he swam quickly to the bottom. Skye divested her armor and jumped in with a shortsword to follow him, but was unable to get deep enough before her breath ran out, although she noticed that the duck appeared to be using a couple of barrels tied down as air pockets. Grom looked around for a large boulder and, along with Xaraya, was able to roll it, with difficulty, towards the pond. The boulder attack drove Yozarian to the surface, where he offered ransom. Xaraya, however, told him merely to make himself scarce and find something else to do for a living. He left with a quack and waddle and a quack and, after an arrow for Xaraya hit a tree near him, a flurry of eiderdown. Griswald raised an eyebrow and smiled.

That night, Griswald was keeping watch when he heard three large creatures heading towards the camp through the bush. He swiftly woke the others and they formed a defensive circle. Three large rock lizards burst out of the treeline and started towards the party. Skye and Salvidienus both hit one lizard with disrupt spells, before Xaraya’s bow struck true and severely injured the lizard Grom and his cat were closing on. Meanwhile, Griswald hurled a spear and impaled. Grom’s cat clawed its lizard before Xaraya felled the beats with another good shot. The other beasts had closed, so Skye drew her sword as Salvidienus hit with another Disrupt. Xaraya meanwhile adjusted her position and let off another shot, which again bit deep. Griswald landed a heavy blow on his lizard which Grom charged back to engage it. Skye finished her lizard off. The group converged on the remaining lizard, which Grom took down with a heavy blow to the head.

Clayday

The trail led through increasingly thick forest and the party found its way blocked by a large, orb-shaped web, above which dangled a deer trapped in a cocoon of silk. Xaraya tried to find a way around, but Grom noticed the forest was covered in thick gobbets of web. Griswald said that the way lay beyond the web, so took out his knife to begin to cut through the web. Salvidienus joined him, as did Xaraya with her axe. Their hacking brought down the denizen of the web, a Giant Spider, which rappelled down a strand and attacked Griswald, but missed. He hefted his spear and shield while Skye and Salvidienus fired off Disruption spells. Grom, Xaraya and the cat hacked away at the monster, all connecting. The spider bit Xaraya’s shield twice before its wounds and rapidly dwindling number of legs forced it to retreat back up its strand. Skye missed with a shot from her self bow before Xaraya, dropping her shield and axe connected with a shot from her bow. Grom kicked the beast in the head and noticed its poison sacs, which Xaraya was able to cut out cleanly.

Next up, the players have to get to the top of the mountain, and get the leaves of The Money Tree.