Game Date: 8/31/21-9/2/21
Characters:
Crogar, human barbarian (350 points)
Gerrald Tarrant, human wizard (418 points)
Heyden, human knight (308 points)
Wyatt Sorrel, human swashbuckler (354 points)
Ulf Sigurdson, human cleric (362 points)
We picked up where we left off last time. Sakatha turned and bit Ulf - but Wyatt dove in between and saved him with a Sacrificial Dodge, taking a (very weak, 9-10 damage) bite on the torso.
Wyatt backed out a moment later, and re-sized his Universal Sword to a dagger to make it handier to dangle on his lanyard. Ulf, trapped against the throne, was bitten ineffectively by Sakatha. Crogar slashed him twice on the back for no effect. Gerry aimed an alchemists's fire but Crogar kept stepping in his line of throwing.
Wyatt tried spiking down alchemist's fire, which Crogar dodged and Sakatha stepped out of on his turn.
Wyatt then tried spiking holy water on Sakatha, and succeeded in hitting him and breaking it on his head. It annoyed him but nothing further.
Sakatha kept after Ulf, having determined he was the next weak link. Crogar followed. Wyatt spiked an alchemist's fire on Sakatha's back and broke it, igniting him in flames. Sakatha crisped a little but it didn't slow him down at all. Wyatt re-readied his sword and shifted it back.
Sakatha kept after Ulf, and eventually bit him on the neck, and then spun with him in his jaws. Wyatt tried to knock his crown off with the flat of his sword but found it was on too tight to get flicked off with a sword blow. So he and Crogar decided to just hack it apart. They did so as Sakatha kept biting down on Ulf's neck. The first bite did 9 cutting, but then the next three did 17 cutting each . . . 24 injury. The third such bite took Ulf to -5xHP.
Wyatt split the crown in the back and then Crogar in the front. The crown fell, and Sakatha growled in rage. But it didn't last - Wyatt stabbed him three times in the vitals, hitting twice. That did it for Sakatha, who fell and whisped away to dust within a second or so . . . before Wyatt could pose on the corpse.
Sakatha was defeated, but at great cost - Ulf and Bruce slain. They dragged Bruce out of the fires and dowsed the flames. The took some gold jewelry off of the lizardmen guards, an iron key, some orichalcum armor bits, a big girdle, and a key off of Sakatha, and Sakatha's crystal ball.
They spend a good 20 minutes or so healing people up. They bound up Heyden, healed him, and woke him up. Then Wyatt questioned him to see if he was still charmed. Every time he was even slightly satisfied that he wasn't, Gerry would point out that if he was charmed, he'd play it coy and wait for his moment. So they eventually released him but kept him unarmed from then on. I don't think they gave him his weapons back until much later. Also, they told him he'd helped kill Ulf and didn't tell him what actually happened until much later.
They searched the room and a nearby old lab, finding nothing of value. They eventually found a secret door off of the throne room, but couldn't find a way to pry or force it open. The figured it must open using the switch on the altar back in the entrance room (delver logic). So they sent Wayatt to throw the switches on that altar . . . which caused a poisoned dart to launch into his back. It penetrated his armor and scratched his arm, but thanks to Resist Poison he was fine. Eventually they decided to try some passphrases. They started with, "Hail Sakatha!" and variations. The one that worked, in the end, was "Open for Great Sakatha." (Logically, Sakatha would praise himself but not hail himself.) (Amusingly, they almost tried searching the entire ceiling for extended time to find a switch to release the secret door . . . and then would try the passphrases. Yeah, do the hard, slow thing first, then try the easy, fast thing.)
Past it was a short corridor. Naturally, before even looking, they cask Dark Vision on Wyatt, gathered up the fallen, armed and formed up - confident they wouldn't be back - and headed in. 10 yards later was a blank wall with a secret door. Past that was a 10' corridor with a demon visage on the far wall. Wyatt walked over, but then the floor opened up beneath him. He managed to get onto the slight ledge and not fall 30' onto spikes. They put Levitation on him. After trying touching it with a coin, which did nothing, they searched and found a keyhole and used a key they'd found on Sakatha.
They opened it up and found a treasure room, with coins, jewelry, javelins, etc. all strewn around. It had the appearance of a neat room that had suffered one hell of a temper tantrum. Basically, they stood guard while Wyatt systematically went through the broken shelves and chests and splintered bits of javelins for individual coins. This took a lot of time (which they barely, barely, had enough of.) Eventually, they got it all and loaded it up, passing it back by having Gerry float Wyatt back and forth. But they managed to grab ~100 pounds of coins, 50-odd pieces of jewelry, a broken iron coffer full of gems (they took the whole thing), an iron lamp sealed with magical runes, a magic broadsword (Asher's old loaner from Vryce, it turned out), and 18 javelins (out of 36 originals).
As this went on, Heyden felt a little shudder. Like a tremor. They decided to get out as fast as possible.
So they grabbed their just-packed loot, carried the corpses, and headed out. More tremors came, each a little stronger than the one before. They were very careful to avoid the traps on the way out, as well. They managed to pass the river with levitation, avoided the undead bats that flew around crazily, avoided the trapped steps on the staircase, etc. They used some demon ichor to get past the secret doors and headed out.
They ran past the watery murder nymphs, who were wailing but not attacking or calling. They saw the water level was much higher than before. They ran as more tremors came. They made to the boats, dragged them free, and poled away as fast as possible - one boat with the living, the one with the dead towed behind. In jolts, a few feet at a time, each about twice as fast as the one before, the island itself sank down. They managed to pole free.
They headed home as fast as possible. The trip back was largely uneventful except for the usual bugs, snags, wasps, and so on. Also, bad weather slowed them down.
Two notable encounters - they heard what they decided was the giants investigating the tremors, and nearly back at Ulfhala they saw the dragon circling the island's location.
They hurried to Swampsedge and had their compatriots brought back from the dead.
Notes:
- The PCs finally defeated Sakatha. What did it? Hard to say exactly. They stopped attacking him for damage until after they doused him with holy water, then set him on fire with alchemist's fire, then he killed Ulf, then broke his crown. So what was it? One of those? All of those? None of those? It's not clear. If they ever had to fight him again, they'd have to decide which one to start with, or somehow make them all happen again.
- Can you Sacrificial Dodge for someone in close combat? Tough call. I ruled that since Sakatha was stepping into close combat to bite, Wyatt could jump in between and take the hit. He did . . . and Sakatha rolled terrible damage - like 9 or 10 on 3d+2. That was the next to last bad damage roll for him. After one more hit at 9, from then on he did 17 damage per bite to Ulf. It finally turned.
- I'm not a big fan of something my players do a lot - observe the effects of things on a 1-second scale. It was Wyatt this session, but it was, paraphrashing, "I have three attacks. I do X, is there any reaction? If so, then I'll do more of that." That's on one person's 1-second turn, and they want to basically take the shot and then observe the fall of the shot and assess the effects before the net shot comes out of the barrel. It's tied to something else people do - move and take free actions before deciding what their Manuever is. It's the old "I step here, I drop my weapon, fast-draw a grenade . . . that worked . . . and I'll All-Out Defend (+2 Dodge.)" Great, but that last bit is first. You can't see if the fast-draw works, and if it fails take a Ready. GURPS is already very generous with free actions, movement, decision speed, ability to assess the entire situation when making a move - you shouldn't also get to decide after you've seen how part of your move goes what the rest of the maneuver will be. The maneuver defines the rest, it doesn't follow from it. And neither does observing the results of your action.
- Sakatha was a load-bearing boss, but with a slow burn that sped up. Luckily for them, the very first tremor they felt impelled them to get the heck out as soon as possible.
- We had a bit of a debriefing with spoilers afterward. The place was collapsed and things destroyed permanently . . . so why not? I'll go into it myself later in the week or perhaps next Sunday.
- That iron lamp? Ulf is convinced it's a genie. No one else is sure, except for Wyatt, who is convinced that opening it is a risky thing that should be done with preperation and care. They're discussing selling it to Black Jans, as well, which has the advantage of not needing to set a price - Black Jans sets prices himself. There was suggestion of paying for sage research to find out what they can about it, but the iron lamp is fairly ordinary (if old) and the symbols on it are generic (but effective) magical symbols of sealing. It's remotely possible someone has a picture of that lamp in a book somewhere, but that won't necessary tell anything about who or what is in it. They'll have to sell it, or open it, next time. Adventure isn't done by email on downtime.
- Even with 100 lbs of gold and silver coins, several magic items, 150-odd gems and pieces of jewelry . . . they carried Sakatha's broken oversized medium shield and trident home to potentially repair and sell. There is Greed and then there are players carrying home broken scrap to potentially get magically fixed up for sale. Yeah, I dunno. This is why I kind of miss AD&D and its stupidly heavy treasure. One barbarian can carry home an entire dragon's hoard, so why not also carry home this rusty old axe you found and try to get it cleaned up to sell for $16? After all, you can afford the weight! It just feels a lot less fantastic when this happens. Fantasy pulp heroes recover and dispose of fortunes and DF PCs sell scrap because waste not, want not.
- Lots of loot today. Sadly, the PCs destroyed a fair bit of treasure in the process of gaining it - wrecking a magical trident, wrecking a crown (which they sold for gold weight, not as jewelry) . . . even so, they took home ~18K each. More than enough for Bruce and Ulf to get resurrected. Which yes, I allow even when you're decapitated, just not when you're at -10xHP. And I require a roll . . . hence the race to get home. Two rolls at a 13 . . and made.
- XP was 5 each. 4 for loot, 1 for exploration. MVP for this session was Ulf for the idea of breaking the crown.
Ulf is now tied with Varmus! Time to update graveyard! With Ulf still alive he has a shot at setting the all time record
ReplyDeleteHe's the clear favorite. Varmus is too focused on getting bisected by giants - Ulf dies all sorts of ways.
DeleteI bet Sakatha succumbed to food poisoning. To test this theory, next time they have a hard foe Ulf needs to jump into it's mouth and get bitten to death again...
ReplyDelete"I'm not a big fan of something my players do a lot - observe the effects of things on a 1-second scale."
There's a 30 point advantage to be allowed to do that. Tell Wyatt to pony up for the rest of Enhanced Time Sense, then he can make Per checks after every sword stroke.
"Fantasy pulp heroes recover and dispose of fortunes and DF PCs sell scrap because waste not, want not."
To be fair, that does feel very Black Company too me, grubbing every last grot out of every piece of scrounge.
"MVP for this session was Ulf for the idea of breaking the crown."
In my headcanon it's for Ulf sacrificing himself to give Sakatha a fatal bout of indigestion.
I don't really equate The Black Company with "gritty maximizing of economic value even in the face of portable, actual loot." Given that looting things rarely happens in those books, and actual looting tends to destroy far more value than it realizes, the "get every last coin of value" is more video game than anything else. In Skyrim, say, you can sell every single weapon you find for cash, and loot holds value, but in reality much value bleeds away. I don't want to cheap out the players on loot value, but every $40 axe sold for $16 when the PCs have taken home $15-16K in cask takes away a piece of my soul and damages my belief in the game world.
DeleteFWIW, one strong suggestion is that if they have to fight Sakatha again the first move is to let him kill Ulf, because to Wyatt that's clearly what did it.
"I don't really equate The Black Company with "gritty maximizing of economic value even in the face of portable, actual loot.""
DeleteIt's more the BC scrounge after every possible //advantage//. In your game that very often equates to money.
Your crew is very into... what I call "scrounge fantasy" (if I'm having to name a genre). They grasp for every possible monetary increase, no matter how slight.
For me, it depends on the character I'm playing, but this "hunt for every last lootable" seems to be a very strong running theme with every Player in your game (or at least the ones who don't care aren't recorded as arguing against it). This isn't a bad thing per se, but...
You set up the very premise of your game to be "scrounge after every last piece of loot"* not "Bigger Then Life heroes who defeat Bigger Then Life foes, and then do it again because they just blew their spoils on Bigger Than Life parties".
,* Granted, I'm not sure if it's exactly what you were aiming for, even I spotted that tendency when I finally got around to reading DF 2, the whole concept of dragging out scrap was right there encoded in the rules. I'm just mildly surprised your lads aren't piling up wheelbarrows next to the entrance of the megadungeon...
I mean, in the DF games I'm in, we even sometimes leave "bug out bags" of loot stashed behind us as we go forward to keep our weight down, we take the most valuable on us, and leave bundles of 'negative value' loot to be grabbed on the way home. Or ignored if we don't have capacity for it. One group even has a wagon.
I have to remember to paint it red, it's an ox cart that's drug around by the SM+2 Ogre Barbarian after all, a mix of "her little red wagon" and to go with her most common threat of putting everyone on it so they 'can get to the fun stuff faster' - maybe she should scrawl "Go Fasta" on it as well. Definitely needs to paint her big iron wedge yellow (it's a crude, SM+2 axe/mace).
I understand your point re: The Black Company, but I don't think it's worth applying that as a descriptor for all forms of maximization. Fighting to win and taking every advantage to do so isn't quite the same as a clearly video-game based desire to carry out every ounce of salable material and get every coin for it you can. I think one is about doing everything to ensure victory, and the other is about a compulsive need to maximize value.
DeleteI may be a good deal to blame for this. But then so is a system centered around taking home loot and buying better equipment in town (again, video games). And the GM also gets the game the players want to play. At least some of my players want to always maximize their loot down to the coin. They want to know how much X weighs and what you can get for Y, they don't want to just sell a Giant Foozle's Magic Spleen for $600 but also sell its horns, eyes, schnozzle, hide, etc. and will argue strenuously that they should have real value. They'll find old coins and try to get more than face value from collectors. They'll repair broken stuff and sell it. Anyone coin left behind is seen as a form of defeat in some fashion. I've played with groups that just wanted the luxuries and the wine and the gold . . . and with groups that would unhinge the doors and sell the doors and hinges back in town and argue with the merchant over the price given for them.
I'm not blameless by any means but I'm not the only reason this happens.
I had the thought to touch on the same two topics as evileeyore but I don't play GURPS DF so my comments likely aren't as valuable to you. I do see the exact same thing in every game system, but some systems make it easier on the GM to deal with than others. I suspect GURPS has recommendations and guidelines if not rules for all this stuff and it is not you creating your own problems.
ReplyDelete"I'm not a big fan of something my players do a lot - observe the effects of things on a 1-second scale."
On a 1-second scale very little should be permitted to be conditional. I've played a lot in the middle realm where game systems have 6-10 second granularity and the GMs are always so very stingy about what can be accomplished. It rubs me the wrong way so I sometimes retreat to OD&D, which like AD&D has a 1 minute round. When players ask me "can I..." the answer is always "yes". It makes it very easy on me. You want to fire, observe if you hurt or killed the enemy and then chose whether to hit him with the next shot or hit his ally if you killed him or run away because he was unharmed by normal missiles? Sure! You want to run over to X, hand them Y, draw a hand axe, turn and throw? No problem. I have trouble contemplating a 1 second granularity because players are always so indecisive and at that scale any indecision at all should cost you your turn.
"Fantasy pulp heroes recover and dispose of fortunes and DF PCs sell scrap because waste not, want not."
This may again be a GURPS or DF thing. In other systems that don't dictate things like repair and resale prices, I just don't allow it. You don't get much for a beaten up old item. It costs nearly as much to repair an item as to replace it. Put those together and if you were to repair and then sell and item you would be taking a loss. It sure is in the real world, even when you avoid the absurd economics that make it cheaper to replace than to repair. I figure the only way it would be possible is if the PC did the repairs personally, which would require relevant skills and equipment and workspace. The repairer is basically trading in his time in exchange for the repair not being costly. Once you pay a professional to repair something broken (not just heavily damaged) you're looking at 75% of the cost of the item and you could resell it for 25%, just throwing out numbers from how I typically run things.
I don't have anything to add here, but I did like reading this comment.
Delete"You don't get much for a beaten up old item. It costs nearly as much to repair an item as to replace it. Put those together and if you were to repair and then sell and item you would be taking a loss."
DeleteThat actually, basically, is how it works in DF, at least how Peter's Felltower DF seems to run, and it's how I tend to run DF as well. There really isn't "repair" costs, Peter is winging that from other non-DF/RPG GURPS sources, but as it's all GURPS at the core it's pretty easy to wing if you know where to look.
I suspect some of it is pure Player 'cussedness', "We killed Sakatha, look here is his Spear and Shield, now pay us extraordinary sums for the legendary, non-magical, Spear and Shield of Sakatha, truly unique collectors items, for a limited time we'll throw in the collector's bag and teak display, call now".
There is a spell, though, which has a weight-based cost, plus cost of missing materials. It's not cheap but it's cheaper than the sale value of a sufficiently well-made item. I need to allow the Repair spell to be cast by NPCs in town for a fee because it is the only way to repair certain items, but it also allows for people to go pay for a repair and then sell something.
DeleteWe've had PCs with Repair, as well, which is an even bigger problem. I've had to be very harsh with "missing materials" requirements and with rulings about how repairing a burned book or scroll doesn't repair the writing, too.