Magic Items Are Gone for Good - Except for Arbiter

When a magic item is sold in Felltower, it's gone. Lost. Gone for good. It disappears from the game - you can't sell something now and get it back later. It's one of a few reasons you don't see Raggi anymore - he died in two delves, and the PCs sold his Weapon Bond-linked axe to pay for bringing him back. That was the final straw for his fun and value as a character, and he'd need a replacement he wasn't likely to ever encounter.

There is an exception - Arbiter.

Arbiter was given to the church, which paid out its full value - $60,000 - for its return.

But Arbiter is a potentially useful tool for the church in the hands of a Holy Warrior. It's a Fine, Meteoric Holy Sword. That's potentially +3 to hit, +4 damage in the hands of a Holy Warrior with Holiness 6. Few weapons like it exist - there are perhaps a handful of Holy Swords in the world, and likely this is one of only one or two that are meteoric.

Therefore, the church would be willing to put it back in the hands of a PC . . . for $60,000. Naturally, PCs are totally able to use clever explanations, carefully-worded speeches to the church, appeals for charity, good deeds, and reaction rolls to attempt to get it. That's fine. Any and all of those, plus $60,000, no less, will get them the sword. Heh. Just heading the usual "but we'd really benefit from it and the church would benefit from giving us $60K and then the sword just because" stuff I expect to come along.

So this rare weapon is still available, for now, at a high price. Is it worth the price? It will be when you're chopping at a lich unable to stop your sword with its Shield or Iron Arm and hitting for swing+5/cutting. I don't expect anyone to see it that way, not until $60K is something people have laying around.

DF Session 221, Brotherhood Complex 9 - Chop & Hannari's Excellent Adventure

Game Date: 6/29/25-7/7/25
Date: 6/29/25

Characters:
Chop, human cleric (362 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (360 points)
3 guards
2 laborers

Only Hannari and Chop were on hand, so they decided to make a go of a final exploration of the Brotherhood Complex. It was known to be deserted since their last raid trashed the place, but they were sure there was loot left.

Spoiler alert - there was.

I'll dispense with the usual narrative summary. Most of the session was just Chop and Hannari wandering around, forcing doors, occasionally blundering into evil runes, and exploring like crazy.

They:

- checked all of the guard and gnoll living areas and found nothing

- explored the torture chamber and found nothing

- found a weird purple stone behind a secret door - details below - in the area they'd caused to be covered with weird mold. They warded off the effects with Resist Cold but would later need Estoteric Medicine to clear their lungs out of the heat-sapping mold.

- cleared the junk room and sorted through the junk

- found some oversized ever-burning torches that couldn't be kept out, but light immediately underground and extinguish in the outside.

- found a weird room of billowing low sanctity smoke, and tried to explore it but gave up since they couldn't see anything and felt immense menace.

- found assorted weapons and left-behind gear

- scored some loot and a secret.

The huge oblong purple stone was a big find. Hannari came close to it and saw a vision of himself and Chop leaning over a chest. He motioned for help, and a figure came from behind and knifed the two of them in the neck . . . then nothing. Chop came close and a voice in his head told him to ask any question about the complex. He asked where the greatest treaure was. Contrary to popular belief, the greatest treasure wasn't the friends they made along the way. Instead, it was in the junk room. They went down and made a thorough search. In the false bottom of a big open crate they'd dismissed last time they looked was a broadsword - it turned out to be Arbiter, a fine meteoric holy sword (see DFRPG Magic Items.)

They also found the quarters of the two leader-types they'd killed in the past, and in a locked, trapped chest with 8 large rubies in it. And they found the lair of the wizards, who left loot behind when the last of them fled.

They also found a way out, that had been coveed with magically-created stone last time. They eventually decided to leave that way. It was worked stone, and many miles long. It took 3 nights of camping underground to follow it the whole length . . . right into the gate level of Felltower near the Brotherhood area. They found their way out, figured out how to get back out the seemingly one-way passage (Hannari guessed right on how), and then headed to Stericksburg.

They paid off their henchman and brought Arbiter to the church. The church wanted it back very badly, and offered its full value for its return . . . . 60,000. Chop doesn't use blades and Hannari uses money, so they said yes. $30K each.

Notes:

- Someone is going to insist they said they searched that crate. They did not. Too bad, because there was a Holy Warrior in the party then.

- MVP was Hannari for doing all of the exploring in the VTT. Chop's player claims to have no sense of direction.

- XP was 4 for loot, 1 for exploration.

- Yes, the complex was a side area. But it's been there and waiting and coming up in rumors since the earlest days of Felltower. Why? Because they're connected.

Next game . . . not sure. I'm off on a big trip soon, so maybe August?

Friday Roundup 6/27/2025

- I have a good run going in Battle Brothers. My first run, I didn't understand how to build good brothers, so I'm kind of stuck. My second only lasted a few days before it was clear I was in a living hell - few fights I could handle, almost no recruits I could afford, and lots and lots of undead and wolves and other nasties in the area. The third playthrough, I'm around day 55 or so with the Headhunters, and they're kicking ass. I literally smashed an undead camp for a mission, took an additional mission to smash more, and then wiped out a bandit camp on the way home just because they were on the way.

Three things* turned it for me:

1) Having a better idea how to recruit and build brothers

2) Ruthless use of fishing nets and daggers early to get better armor (and I scored a pike in week 1, which was massive)

3) A policy of having as many fights as I could, much like D'Artagnan was counciled to by his pop.

Because of this, I had better armor than before, better brothers, and guys with as many fights as they have days in the company. Fun stuff.

- I didn't have much time to do game prep, because I wasted what I had on Battle Brothers. Next game is Sunday.

- Concussion sucks enough that everyone fixes it. It's broken.

* Besides surprise, fear, and an almost fanatical devotion to the pope. Ah, I'll start again.

Week Ending Post 6/20/2025

I do these weekly, but last week I was checking out an advanced class at a BJJ school with my training partner who wants to start at that school. Excuses, excuses.

- It's interesting watching the Ardun Vul campaign go through many of the iterations of XP and loot tresholds that I did.

New Loot XP thresholds for DFRPG Arden Vul

"What's the intent of this rule? The "gamist" intent is that we're simulating the way the amount of XP needed to go up a level increased at higher levels in D&D. Because there are no levels in GURPS, we can't have increasing costs to go up a level, so instead we make it harder to earn each XP as PCs get more powerful. The "motivational" intent is to give PCs a reason to keep looking for bigger and better treasures even if they have enough money to buy whatever they can find for sale in the Gosterwick area. "Now that the castle is paid off, I'm thinking of going part-time" is totally reasonable, but probably not something Conan would say."

Yeah, that's why I wrote the tables in my game and in DF21 the way I did.

- A nice look at MERP, Rolemaster, and its retro-clone knockoff.

Reflections on Middle-earth Roleplaying, Rolemaster, Against the Darkmaster, and Art

- Next game is a few weeks away!

Felltower - Fun only happens when you take risks - where to risk next?

Our next game is tentatively 6/29 - two weeks from today.

Where will the PCs go next?

Where will they take risks to have fun?

Air Gate

The players said something about this being a "sky vikings" world. They feel like there is more to raid and more to do, although it will take a bit of exploration as they can't assure themselves of any castles except the seemingly fixed "fairy tale castle" aka "meeting hall" they found.

There are potentially nasty air encounters here, too - rocs, dragons (they've seen two singular appearances, and once long ago multiple together), magic-using giants, and assorted related creatures. But also potentially great wealth.

Do they leap on back here while they're good and ready to raid, and hopefully catch another giant or other loot-laden foe in a position where they can defeat them? Do they bet that the locals aren't organized enough to get ready to deal with them, or their defeated foe unlikely to enlist aid? Or do they let it lie fallow for a bit, and come back when folks aren't as on guard as they might be after a sudden and effective raid?

Second GFS

A potentially dangerous area, with organized foes and traps. But it certainly must have loot - the old PCs lost a lot to the "Gith" who inhabit the area.

It's been left alone for a while - it's not clear if that helps (less suspicious foes) or hurts (well-reinforced and fully healed and rady foes.)

Brotherhood Complex

The PCs smashed this place, but there was some talk about going through it thoroughly to find anything left behind - or catch anyone who returned.

Others places?

I'm not sure what else the players have in mind. The beholder? The dragon? They've rejected those over and over and over again - not content to fight the dragon while it's awake, and worried by the beholder if they attack it asleep. The teleport trap? The dragon below the flooded prison? It's not clear.

Lots of options - none are free of risks, but the risks are all full of potential fun.

Air Gate game notes

Some reveals and notes.

I said I'd reveal this after - Cumulon's castle layout and traps are from Dungeon Magazine #9, The Plight of Cirria. It was written by Grant and David Boucher, who wrote a few very influential dungeons in the early days of Dungeon magazine.


I repeat my amusement that the PCs weren't willing to adventure here until they could satisfy all three of the following conditions:

- everyone has personal flight ability not tied to a single caster

- their single caster has the ability to put Walk on Air on everyone, maintained for free, for self-controlled air movement

- their caster has the ability to put Flight on every PC for better combat flight speed

- and optionally, people have spellstones with emergency flight-based magic to save themselves if the first three fail.

I know, I know - I get it. No one wants to be screwed because one fails. They're still highly concerned with No Mana Zones that will potentially cause havoc with all of the above. They'd want Holy versions of all of those if at all possible, if any existed (they don't, and won't.) So for all the hand wringing about selling that carpet of flying that was found early in the game, it wouldn't have ever been seen as enough.

The SAS motto? "Who Dares, Wins." It doesn't apply here at all. This is why I don't expect, say, going through the fire gate until everyone can put level 3 Resist Fire on everyone, all the time, with backups, or expect people to go through the water entrance to Felltower without several forms of water breathing. It's a cautious group.


The Air Gate is likely a repeat-delve location, although the PCs can't always expect to find a place to stand and fight in a hallway. We'll see if they remain excited when they have to deal with flying enemies in flight. But it's a potentially lucrative exploration area - just no more safe than any other lucrative exploration area.

GURPS DF Session 210, Felltower 135 - Exploring the Air Gate, Part III

Date: 6/8/2025
In Game Date: 5/4/2025
Weather: Wet, warm.

Characters
Chop, human cleric (362 points)
Duncan Tesadic, human wizard (346 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (360 points)
Persistance Montgomery, human knight (322 points)
Thor Halfskepna, human knight (358 points)
Vladimir Luchnick, dwarf scout (318 points)

We picked up where we left off - the PCs had a knocked-out storm giant and a lot of wounds to heal.

I started the time going and they got to work. Vlad carefully searched the giant and found an alchemical amulet - a human-sized one - on a small chain attached to proper chain around the giant's neck. He took it. Chop healed and healed and healed, Hannari policed up the area and weapons, Thor took the giant's club out of easy reach, and Percy stood around guard. He also vetoed Chop's suggestion that they just kill the giant.

There was a plan to use Create Earth to make dirt manacles (seriously), then make them stone manacles, then make them metal. They forgot this until, oh, 15+ minutes in when the giant was waking up.

The giant mumbled something as he woke and sat up, and Chop put Gift of Tongues on Duncan.

Duncan chose the unusual tactic of being honest with the giant - they won, they'd win again if he tried anything, and they were willing to let him bargain for his life. The giant seemed amused by getting beaten by "children" and allowed that he'd never met such strong little ones. Amongst other things, they learned:

- the giant's name is Cumulon er-Statos (symbol of er-Stratos - two bird heads facing away from one another)

- the fairy tale castle is a neutral ground meeting area

- the giant was here for business, which isn't their damn business, thank you

- the amulet he had conveys some kind of authority or office

- the giants rule the skies, and raid and extract treasure, loot, and the amusement of battles from the little people below

The giant offered them all his available cash in return for his life, and a magic hatchet taken from some really little person in return for his amulet. He didn't want to deal with the hassle and effort it would take to regain the lost rank - or maybe it was lost prestige - from losing it.

The PCs agreed. The giant kept his end - he limped inside, wounded, came out much less wounded but with a bit more treasure than he'd said he had. It turned out to be 27,000 sp, 575 gp, and 45 gems with an average value of 100 sp each. The hatchet turned out to be a fine quality climber's hatchet with Puissance 3 on it.

All that settled, they left. The giant took to his roc to watch them go, and observed them rest at the gate for 15 minutes before going through with Walk on Air.

The PCs headed home once they made it into Felltower.

Notes:

Excellent, very short session - 2 hours?

MVP was Duncan for very effective negotiation. He managed to avoid the usual self-justification of adventuers - you know, "technically, we were defending ourselves from attack by these evildoers whose home we invaded looking for heads and plunder and they owe us everything they own." He bargained from strength but with consistent and reasonable expectations. The giant seemed amused at getting beaten up and then having to ransom himself. Naturally, he took the word of a "fellow master of the supernatural arts" and was impressed that Duncan's minions so handily trashed his summoned servitors.

Total look was ~8k each. MVP was Duncan for negotation.