Real World Date: 4/26/2026
Game Date: 4/11/2026
Weather: Mild and sunny.
Characters
Chop, human cleric (367 points)
Duncan Tesadic, human wizard (355 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (360 points)
Persistance Montgomery, human knight (347 points)
Rogar Thane-Blood, human barbarian (259 points)
Thor Halfskepna, human knight (373 points)
Vladimir Luchnick, dwarf scout (333 points)
We picked up with Hannari, who tops the speed order, drawing a spellstone (it would turn out to be Blur 5) as golden swordsmen approached him slowly.
Some foe threw a smoke nageteppo to the front edge of the fight, right in front of the PCs, covering up the hallway between Rogar, Percy, the blinded Thor, and the wave of "Gith" and trorkers.
Percy kept smacking trorkers, but lacking Affect Spirits he wasn't managing much. Thor was blind and unable to find a foe, and wasn't willing to swing wildly to hope to hit one. Rogar was getting swamped in close combat by more trorkers but thanks to Enraged he wasn't backing off to make space. He tried to check one down with his shield but his foe rolled a 17 and fell - good enough.
Meanwhile Vlad spent a few arrows on the golden swordsmen, wounding one with a critical hit but otherwise watching them bat his arrows aside like swordsmen in a Zhang Yimou movie. Hannari was hit with a spell by the lead Gith. A second later, it was clear what it was - Levitation. The Gith moved the slightly-elevated (Walk on Air) Hannari three yards back, leaving only a hovering Vlad (Walk on Air) in the hallway. Five of the six golden swordsmen ran in and filled in the gaps between both sides of the fight - Thor, Percy, Rogar, Chop on one side, Vlad and Hannari on the other.
Hannari tried to move out of sight and into a good fighting spot, but the Gith spun him around and out of the way. The golden swordsmen rushed in, but the one right behind him took a shot at Vlad instead of Hannari's back (see below for a note on this.) Chop used Restore Sight on Thor, and Duncan cast Soul Rider on Chop so he could see without fixing his own vision.
Meanwhile Chop tried Command on the golden swordsmen but wasn't able to get it off the first time and failed to overcome resistance the second time. More foes piled in. Trokers went down under Thor's blade. Then gith moved in to back them. One golden swordsman hacked Rogar in the arm. Hannari took out a kama and did swing/impale to a golden swordsman, and used his grip on his all-metal meteoric iron kama to keep himself anchored to the ground to avoid the Levitation of the Gith. He inflicted 19 control points in the process with a hard hit - he's amped up on a strength potion as well as a dexterity potion, so he's ST 20+ and IIRC DX 26. The swordsman tried to pull himself off and managed to get a few CP off, but then tried to chop the kama to break it. It was parried (ugh, rules issue here). A few seconds later, after Hannari lopped off his left arm, a golden swordsman crippled Hannari's arm on a lucky critical hit. Naturally, a second later Chop healed him completely, but the weapon in that hand was released all the same.
As this happened, Vlad wounded one gith in the eye with an arrow, and Percey smashed one down with a skull-shattering hit.
Duncan started to rip off Great Haste spells, our newer version, on Thor and Hannari . . . and they began to roll.
We left it there.
Notes:
- I dislike how often my NPCs have issues from the VTT. DR 0 when they clearly have DR, especially common when I use the Mook Generator to create foes. Torso DR but nothing else when they're imported from GCS. Oh, and it ran like a slug today for a couple of hours - and basically made the first two runs through the turn order take 50 minutes or so each until I figured out the techical problem.* Aargh, VTTs.
- The GURPS module is doing a good job of adding in the effects of Status Effects. Yay, VTTs.
- Because someone asked, no, you don't get any kind of sense or cue to what effect a spell has on you when you fail to resist, if it has no otherwise visible effect. That's what Identify Spell is for.
- Vlad wondered if these Gith/Masters/Bales/whatever have anything written, so he can learn more about them. You know, they never talk about themselves. They fight and fight and fight and he doesn't really know them. Heh. Anyway, I know all about them. How much is something the PCs can find out? Probably a fraction, but the secret to good characters is to understand things about them not everyone can see, in my experience. We'll see how much they learn.
- MVP was Duncan for his two Great Haste spells that are turning the fight.
- We had a rules disagreement about that turn-Hannari-with-Levitation move and what constitutes a back shot. More another day. But related rulings:
1) You can Wait and use your step to undo some of the movement of a Levitation spell. If you want to attack as part of that triggered Wait, you need to specify what you'll do ahead of time. If you want to use a ranged attack and you want to cover multiple possible targets, it's Opportunity Fire.
2) Immovable Stance doesn't affect Levitation. Immovable Stance just does what it says - and nothing additional. Keep this in mind when someone asks about using this to resist getting picked up after a grapple.
3) Levitation has ST 0 for purposes of moving through resistance. A handhold is sufficient to keep you from being moved around. A hand against a wall will keep someone from moving you up or down while you have contact with that wall; it wouldn't stop them moving you away from the wall. Giving it ST or making it a Quick Contest suddenly makes it a potent grappling spell. No thanks.
* I run in Chrome, which seems to handle Forge best. I eventually logged off, cleared my cache, turned off hardware acceleration, restarted, cleared my cache, turned hardware acceleration back on, and restarted Forge. That worked. No, I don't know why, but I do know I've had the occasional issue with hardware acceleration doing weird crap like this so I just suddenly realized I hadn't tried that. Thank goodness I did. I wish I'd remembered immediately and gotten a few more seconds of combat done.
Monday, April 27, 2026
Sunday, April 26, 2026
Felltower pre-summary
Not much to say on this one:
- we continued the fight
- the formation broke down
- the PCs got swamped by foes
- massively superior PCs are proving the edge in cutting down the swaths of the enemy - think Affect Spirits, Great Haste, max-roll DX potions, Blur 5, Shield 6, etc. - and healing is keeping up the people hit by crits.
Still a lot of fight to go, but the PCs are generally in a good spot.
- we continued the fight
- the formation broke down
- the PCs got swamped by foes
- massively superior PCs are proving the edge in cutting down the swaths of the enemy - think Affect Spirits, Great Haste, max-roll DX potions, Blur 5, Shield 6, etc. - and healing is keeping up the people hit by crits.
Still a lot of fight to go, but the PCs are generally in a good spot.
Saturday, April 25, 2026
Felltower tomorrow
We'll pick up in combat in Felltower tomorrow. Summary probably Monday, unless we end early enough tomorrow. We'll see. Even with a won fight I think we'll go another session after this one. With a slugfest . . . who knows how long it will take?
Sunday, April 19, 2026
Repetiton of the Boring Bits & Felltower
I repeat the same things over and over in Felltower.
"Okay, you head out of Stericksburg through the North Gate, across the dwarf-made Stone Bridge over the polluted Silver River, to Sterick's Landing. You pass the broken remains of a statue of a horse with Sterick on it, only his headless and armless torso remains. You pass through the slums on the north side of the river and up the winding track to the top of the mountain."
Every time.
Then it's picking an entrance, and making your way through the same tunnels, time after time after time.
You want to get to the "apartment level?" You have to walk there, and talk me through getting there. You have to tell me how you open doors, and who makes the roll and who is holding a crowbar or just shouldering it. You have to tell me who touches the doors with the six-fingered hand print to get by.
Every time.
You have to describe it all. No skipping ahead. If a passage is blocked and needs squeezing through, or a Will roll, or whatever, you have to make them.
Every time.
Why?
Players sit up and take notice when they change.
If I only ever mentioned the new things, and glossed over the repetition, they wouldn't have the same impact. You can argue this, but I used to do the "gloss over" thing. I pretty much told you what to pay attention to, because I only told you what was new and different.
But since they are always hearing the same things . . . and then hear different things, it piques their interest. It makes the dungeon feel more alive rather than just a series of connected encounters you can fast-forward to once you've dealt with what's beyond.
They don't always notice. There were signs, for example, that some people took residence in the dungeon for a while. The players didn't really pay too close attention to the differences in descriptions of noises and sights in the upper levels of the dungeon. A few months on, the NPCs finished what they wanted to finish, and left. The PCs did eventually find their camping grounds, but never when they were there or what they did. I said a few things, no one thought they were important ("Stay on target!"), and they missed something. But equally, they've noticed very small differences in the dungeon and made real progress out of them.
Your choices matter.
Did you smash up the portcullis near the main entrance to block some monsters from using it? Now you can't use it, either. You killed off some monsters to get rid of a problem that slowed you down? You get the benefit of having smoothed out your travel path.
This has forced the players to spend time re-opening entrances. It gets people checking little mysterious oddities every time, hoping they'll provide a distraction, a reward, or a shortcut. It gets people trying to solve problems that annoy them on the regular. Yeah, the orcs were a problem for a long time. The PCs smashed them repeatedly. Why? Because they annoyed the shit out of the players every session they had to pay a toll, or deal with orc patrols, or blockede. If getting deeper in the dungeon was just a quick, "We pay our toll and now we're on level five!" or whatever, they wouldn't have done it. They cleared the well to make their path deeper easier. They make lots of decisions based on the repetitions.
I know for a fact this has cost me players. Not everyone has stuck my game out because of this. But it's okay. I like the two benefits I get. And if it costs me some players, it's okay. My style of game isn't for everyone. I don't try to make it so. I think it's how megadungeons function well. And it's how Felltower has evolved to be, and I like it.
"Okay, you head out of Stericksburg through the North Gate, across the dwarf-made Stone Bridge over the polluted Silver River, to Sterick's Landing. You pass the broken remains of a statue of a horse with Sterick on it, only his headless and armless torso remains. You pass through the slums on the north side of the river and up the winding track to the top of the mountain."
Every time.
Then it's picking an entrance, and making your way through the same tunnels, time after time after time.
You want to get to the "apartment level?" You have to walk there, and talk me through getting there. You have to tell me how you open doors, and who makes the roll and who is holding a crowbar or just shouldering it. You have to tell me who touches the doors with the six-fingered hand print to get by.
Every time.
You have to describe it all. No skipping ahead. If a passage is blocked and needs squeezing through, or a Will roll, or whatever, you have to make them.
Every time.
Why?
Players sit up and take notice when they change.
If I only ever mentioned the new things, and glossed over the repetition, they wouldn't have the same impact. You can argue this, but I used to do the "gloss over" thing. I pretty much told you what to pay attention to, because I only told you what was new and different.
But since they are always hearing the same things . . . and then hear different things, it piques their interest. It makes the dungeon feel more alive rather than just a series of connected encounters you can fast-forward to once you've dealt with what's beyond.
They don't always notice. There were signs, for example, that some people took residence in the dungeon for a while. The players didn't really pay too close attention to the differences in descriptions of noises and sights in the upper levels of the dungeon. A few months on, the NPCs finished what they wanted to finish, and left. The PCs did eventually find their camping grounds, but never when they were there or what they did. I said a few things, no one thought they were important ("Stay on target!"), and they missed something. But equally, they've noticed very small differences in the dungeon and made real progress out of them.
Your choices matter.
Did you smash up the portcullis near the main entrance to block some monsters from using it? Now you can't use it, either. You killed off some monsters to get rid of a problem that slowed you down? You get the benefit of having smoothed out your travel path.
This has forced the players to spend time re-opening entrances. It gets people checking little mysterious oddities every time, hoping they'll provide a distraction, a reward, or a shortcut. It gets people trying to solve problems that annoy them on the regular. Yeah, the orcs were a problem for a long time. The PCs smashed them repeatedly. Why? Because they annoyed the shit out of the players every session they had to pay a toll, or deal with orc patrols, or blockede. If getting deeper in the dungeon was just a quick, "We pay our toll and now we're on level five!" or whatever, they wouldn't have done it. They cleared the well to make their path deeper easier. They make lots of decisions based on the repetitions.
I know for a fact this has cost me players. Not everyone has stuck my game out because of this. But it's okay. I like the two benefits I get. And if it costs me some players, it's okay. My style of game isn't for everyone. I don't try to make it so. I think it's how megadungeons function well. And it's how Felltower has evolved to be, and I like it.
Monday, April 13, 2026
GURPS DF Session 221, Felltower 140 - Second GFS Assault, Part I
Date: 4/11/2026
Weather: Mild and sunny.
Characters
Chop, human cleric (367 points)
Duncan Tesadic, human wizard (355 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (360 points)
Persistance Montgomery, human knight (347 points)
Rogar Thane-Blood, human barbarian (259 points)
Thor Halfskepna, human knight (373 points)
Vladimir Luchnick, dwarf scout (333 points)
The PCs gathered in town, swapped rumors, and commiserated over Thor's new shield being delivered tomorrow. They suggested wait a day or two before going into the dungeon, but decided not to [when the GM said, "Okay, see you guys on Tuesday, then!"].
The group used the well entrance, and made their way down to the "gate level." They noted the air was fresh, not the stale air they're used to.
A few rooms later, they opened up a door to a chamber with a black hemisphere on the ceiling. Inside the room, guarding a nest, where a pair of horse-sized eight-legged lizards, with bright blue hides tinged with white. Shock slorn! The slorn hissed, the PCs attacked, and a short fight erupted. Rogar and Thor rushed in, along with Percy, and Vlad and Hannari contributed ranged attacks. Chop and Duncan whipped Resist Lightning spells on themselves and likely targets. The slorn didn't last that long. A zap of lightning apiece and they got shredded. Percy and Rogar bashed one's skull apart, and Thor stabbed the other to ensure it was dead. A quick (and cheap) pair of Prepare Game spells left them a pile of hides, bones, and meat. They took the hides and a pair of eggs they found in the nest. The room was especially breezy, and the air felt light and fresh, if a bit ionized.
They noted the black hemisphere didn't shoot them, so they left it alone and headed to the "Will Wall" - an illusiary that required a Will roll to pass through. After a few tries and some Strenthen Will spells, they all made it through. There they deposited the shock slorn hides and eggs.
Next they headed down the second GFS, and into the door beyond the first landing. They were hit with two spaced out Dispel Magic spells which wiped out a lot of ligthstones, but they managed to get off their Walk on Air spellstones and moved into the rooms. The exits were blocked with a gossamer, smoke-colored but opaque material hanging directly from the walls and ceiling. Thor cut the first and second down with his sword as they moved to their left, a faint and low chime going off the whole time.
It was here they first encountered the enemy. From behind, four norker brutes charged up, yelling loudly. Vlad wounded one and the others continued on, as the party revered to face them. As they did, trorkers backed (way back) with a few "Gith" moved up to join them, coming from the corridor opposite the stairs. Then a half-dozen golden swordsmen appeared from the direction the party had headed originally.
They melee'd a few norkers and trokers down, right after Hannari put down five of them with a sleep grenade. Duncun put up a wall of earth, 1' thick, to cut the "rear" area down to a single hex width. Hannari rushed into the gap. But then a Gith tossed a blinding dust grenade and blinded Thor and Duncan, each for 1d minutes - Percy made his HT roll by enough to resist it.
Blinded Duncan turned his wall to stone, Vlad shot a golden swordsman only to have it parry his arrow with ease (the other missed with a 17, a rare normal failure.) Hannari deployed a flash nageteppo but it didn't bother the golden swordsman. The whole fight had gone earily quiet except for the sounds of metal hitting flesh or shields, as the norkers quieted down.
We ended there as it was 6 pm, our preferred cutoff time.
Notes:
- We knew this would be a multi-session delve. The new rules for multi-session delves, with a +1 XP per session after the first, has really taken the sting out of longer fights.
- Good rolling on a DX potion and high stats has put Hannari at DX 26. Yeah. Ironically, Chop was maneuvering so Hannari could fight Trokers - with Affect Spirits on one of his weapons - and Persistance could fight the golden swordsmen - with their swords, weak defensively against his flail, which currently lacks Affect Spirits. Oh well. His his DX will certainly help.
- Prepare Game is ridiculously fast and cheap, especially for a spell which completely eliminates the utility of a bunch of skills. Typical.
- MVP was Hannari for suggesting they stash the shock slorn hides and eggs "beyond the Will Wall" to ensure nothing bothered them that couldn't pass that. Good thinking, honestly. It could have been Duncan's player, for suggesting that "Sword of Slorn" is a great band name. I suggested that "Beyond the Will Wall" - their second album - was clearly SoS's best work, if a real departure from the standard death metal of their first album and a more lyrical, psychadelic rock opera approach. And yes, someone AI'ed up a logo for them and we all kind of want t-shirts for them. "Name three songs!" should be a fun exercise for that shirt.
Weather: Mild and sunny.
Characters
Chop, human cleric (367 points)
Duncan Tesadic, human wizard (355 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (360 points)
Persistance Montgomery, human knight (347 points)
Rogar Thane-Blood, human barbarian (259 points)
Thor Halfskepna, human knight (373 points)
Vladimir Luchnick, dwarf scout (333 points)
The PCs gathered in town, swapped rumors, and commiserated over Thor's new shield being delivered tomorrow. They suggested wait a day or two before going into the dungeon, but decided not to [when the GM said, "Okay, see you guys on Tuesday, then!"].
The group used the well entrance, and made their way down to the "gate level." They noted the air was fresh, not the stale air they're used to.
A few rooms later, they opened up a door to a chamber with a black hemisphere on the ceiling. Inside the room, guarding a nest, where a pair of horse-sized eight-legged lizards, with bright blue hides tinged with white. Shock slorn! The slorn hissed, the PCs attacked, and a short fight erupted. Rogar and Thor rushed in, along with Percy, and Vlad and Hannari contributed ranged attacks. Chop and Duncan whipped Resist Lightning spells on themselves and likely targets. The slorn didn't last that long. A zap of lightning apiece and they got shredded. Percy and Rogar bashed one's skull apart, and Thor stabbed the other to ensure it was dead. A quick (and cheap) pair of Prepare Game spells left them a pile of hides, bones, and meat. They took the hides and a pair of eggs they found in the nest. The room was especially breezy, and the air felt light and fresh, if a bit ionized.
They noted the black hemisphere didn't shoot them, so they left it alone and headed to the "Will Wall" - an illusiary that required a Will roll to pass through. After a few tries and some Strenthen Will spells, they all made it through. There they deposited the shock slorn hides and eggs.
Next they headed down the second GFS, and into the door beyond the first landing. They were hit with two spaced out Dispel Magic spells which wiped out a lot of ligthstones, but they managed to get off their Walk on Air spellstones and moved into the rooms. The exits were blocked with a gossamer, smoke-colored but opaque material hanging directly from the walls and ceiling. Thor cut the first and second down with his sword as they moved to their left, a faint and low chime going off the whole time.
It was here they first encountered the enemy. From behind, four norker brutes charged up, yelling loudly. Vlad wounded one and the others continued on, as the party revered to face them. As they did, trorkers backed (way back) with a few "Gith" moved up to join them, coming from the corridor opposite the stairs. Then a half-dozen golden swordsmen appeared from the direction the party had headed originally.
They melee'd a few norkers and trokers down, right after Hannari put down five of them with a sleep grenade. Duncun put up a wall of earth, 1' thick, to cut the "rear" area down to a single hex width. Hannari rushed into the gap. But then a Gith tossed a blinding dust grenade and blinded Thor and Duncan, each for 1d minutes - Percy made his HT roll by enough to resist it.
Blinded Duncan turned his wall to stone, Vlad shot a golden swordsman only to have it parry his arrow with ease (the other missed with a 17, a rare normal failure.) Hannari deployed a flash nageteppo but it didn't bother the golden swordsman. The whole fight had gone earily quiet except for the sounds of metal hitting flesh or shields, as the norkers quieted down.
We ended there as it was 6 pm, our preferred cutoff time.
Notes:
- We knew this would be a multi-session delve. The new rules for multi-session delves, with a +1 XP per session after the first, has really taken the sting out of longer fights.
- Good rolling on a DX potion and high stats has put Hannari at DX 26. Yeah. Ironically, Chop was maneuvering so Hannari could fight Trokers - with Affect Spirits on one of his weapons - and Persistance could fight the golden swordsmen - with their swords, weak defensively against his flail, which currently lacks Affect Spirits. Oh well. His his DX will certainly help.
- Prepare Game is ridiculously fast and cheap, especially for a spell which completely eliminates the utility of a bunch of skills. Typical.
- MVP was Hannari for suggesting they stash the shock slorn hides and eggs "beyond the Will Wall" to ensure nothing bothered them that couldn't pass that. Good thinking, honestly. It could have been Duncan's player, for suggesting that "Sword of Slorn" is a great band name. I suggested that "Beyond the Will Wall" - their second album - was clearly SoS's best work, if a real departure from the standard death metal of their first album and a more lyrical, psychadelic rock opera approach. And yes, someone AI'ed up a logo for them and we all kind of want t-shirts for them. "Name three songs!" should be a fun exercise for that shirt.
Sunday, April 12, 2026
Felltower pre-summary
Full summary tomorrow, but:
- a crew of seven PCs entered Felltower
- they killed a pair of Shock Slorn and found some slorn eggs
- they made it through the "Will Wall" and down the second GFS
- they got into a brawl with norkers, trokers aka thorkers, Gith, and Golden Swordsmen.
It's going to be a long fight, so we ended it on time and we'll spend the next session(s?) resolving it.
- a crew of seven PCs entered Felltower
- they killed a pair of Shock Slorn and found some slorn eggs
- they made it through the "Will Wall" and down the second GFS
- they got into a brawl with norkers, trokers aka thorkers, Gith, and Golden Swordsmen.
It's going to be a long fight, so we ended it on time and we'll spend the next session(s?) resolving it.
Monday, March 2, 2026
What color is paut? Sigh.
I think when you've played with a group long enough, and they've asked every question imaginable, they imagine up new ones to torment you.
Actual question from game on Sunday:
What color is paut?
My answer? I don't know. And I don't want to rule on it because, somehow, this will come back to haunt me. It'll be a specific color and then people will ask if it's paut because of the color, is this paut colored, if it's paut colored is it magical, can I get poison that is paut colored, can I get food coloring for my paut so it's a different color . . . aargh.
Look, it's probably blue because of Diablo. But honestly, I don't care. It won't matter. If people really need to know the color - in this case, so they can tell the casters what color the paut is in their bag in case they're unconcious and the casters need to sort the paut from the other potions - they can just tie ribbons of a specific color on the bottles or label the freaking bottles PAUT in large, friendly letters.
But geez, what color is paut.
Oh brother.
Actual question from game on Sunday:
What color is paut?
My answer? I don't know. And I don't want to rule on it because, somehow, this will come back to haunt me. It'll be a specific color and then people will ask if it's paut because of the color, is this paut colored, if it's paut colored is it magical, can I get poison that is paut colored, can I get food coloring for my paut so it's a different color . . . aargh.
Look, it's probably blue because of Diablo. But honestly, I don't care. It won't matter. If people really need to know the color - in this case, so they can tell the casters what color the paut is in their bag in case they're unconcious and the casters need to sort the paut from the other potions - they can just tie ribbons of a specific color on the bottles or label the freaking bottles PAUT in large, friendly letters.
But geez, what color is paut.
Oh brother.
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