FIRST ADVENTURES IN DUNGEONEERING (by Gary Gygax, USA) - Peter's Comments

Here is an example of play from D&D I've never seen before.

Thanks to Zenopus Archives for linking to this earlier this week, and Allen "Grodog" Grohe for posting the transcript on another site

Reading it prompted a few comments of my own.

Here it is, assembled from Allan Grohe's two posts, so you don't have to hop around.

FIRST ADVENTURES IN DUNGEONEERING (by Gary Gygax, USA)

You have been thoroughly hooked on Dungeons & Dragon (D&D), and during the last few days every spare moment has been spent happily preparing several dungeon levels. Great care and thought have been employed to do things just so - and of course you have spent a bit of time laughing fiendishly at the thought of what the hapless dungeoneers will encounter in choice areas! Actually, you certainly don't want your players to get killed, for then they'd miss seeing just how cleverly you've set them up! They don't want to buy the farm either (unless the dice were unkind indeed). Think about that.

A good referee does not wish to deliberately set his players up for certain death in the game - although there are sometimes one or two players who... Anyway, by the same token you should not set out to aid them either. The whole purpose of the game is for the players THEMSELVES to face the challenge presented by the dungeonmaster's maze, to defeat it, or be defeated by it without help or hindrance. If they are clever they should survive and gain great rewards, and if they are stupid they should finish themselves off rapidly. This implies that you have located and numbered monsters carefully, so that the players can usually fight them on even terms, outwit them, or run like hell, i.e., one doesn't put invisible stalkers on the first level. If there are errors they will quickly be spotted on the first adventure, and they should be corrected before the next! In fact that is why I urge that a separate key listing monsters and treasure be kept for each level, rather than writing the information right on the map. With all this in mind, let's move on to the actual game.

Several players are gathered in some secluded place, and you have a good spot set up where they cannot see your dice rolls or map. It is a good plan to give them at least a half an hour to get everything together. Magic-Users will have to decide what spell they are going to take. Everyone will be selecting basic equipment, figuring costs and encumbrance. Although spell selection always takes a bit of time, we have pretty much settled upon the following as 'standard equipment':

dagger, 50' rope, 10' pole, 12 iron spike, small sack, leather back pack, water/win skin, lantern, 3 flasks oil, holy water/vial, quart wine, iron rations.

Your players can simply compute the price of what they set out as standard and save much time and effort. Additional items and encumbrances can then be noted aside as additions to the standard.

Your players will also have to appoint their leader and mapper. At this point everything is all ready for the first descent into the deepest dungeons! So let us move on to a typical account of a first trip, assuming that the players have moved outdoors to a ruined city which is reputed to have dungeons beneath it. The ‘dungeonmaster’ will be indicated as ‘D’, the party of the players as ‘P’.

D: “You have found the ruins of the deserted city of Detresed. You can see that there are streets going northeast, northwest, and north. Most of the ruins are nondescript, but due north you note that there are several larger structures, one or two of which are in less disrepair than the others.”

After going northwards a few hundred feet, and getting complete descriptions of the ruined edifices visible to them, the party selects a ruined structure which appears to have been a temple, and they enter cautiously. After thorough exploration they decide to ignore a set of steps they have located, for a vast stone idol hid a narrow shaft penetrating very deep beneath the temple. The latter would not normally have been located, but careful checking and perseverance found a secret door in the idol’s back. The party descends some 40’ into a large, circular arched chamber. It is 30’ in diameter and has eight doors.

P: “There is no sense debating, let’s take the door to the west, for it seemed that there were more ruins above in that direction than in any other direction. One member of the party will carefully try the door to see if it will open normally. All others will have their weapons drawn and ready in case there is someone or something behind it!”

D: “Door opens normally (without ANY sound, in fact), and beyond you see a 10’ wide corridor going north.”

P: “The door didn’t make ANY noise when we opened it?! Hmmmm. Examine the hinges.”

D: “They were oiled – greased lock.”

P: “Oh, oh! Watch out! These doors are USED. Helmets off, everyone. Listen at all of the other doors.”

After some time spent so listening, noise is detected behind the door to the east and that to the southeast. And meanwhile the dungeonmaster has checked, but the party is lucky and no wandering monster has happened along during the interim. The brave adventurers ready themselves, creep close to the eastern door, and ready an attack. Two of the six will watch the southeast, one will open the east door, and the three with bows will have their weapons ready as the door is flung wide.

P: “We are set. Open the door!”

D: “You see, ahh ((die roll)) 4 hobgoblins attending some sort of cleric. They are dressed in black and blood red garments. Now, did you surprise them? ((die roll of 3)) NO! Initiative check – you are at plus 1 because you prepared. ((The check shows that the party is able to attack before the cleric and his servitors will be able to react at all.)) The enemy is approximately 15’ away, by the by.”

P: “Loose arrows, drop bows, draw swords, and charge. If I can manage to cast a Sleep Spell during all this I’ll do so, but I will be careful not to cast it so as to include our men in its effect. The two watching the other door will maintain position.”

The dungeonmaster now checks to see which arrows score hits, whom the hits are scored upon, and how much damage is done. Simultaneously, he determines if the magic-user who opened the door will be able to get a spell prepared and cast – about equal odd for and against due to preparation and positioning. It is successful, and 4 of the hobgoblins fall to the floor snoring. The cleric was not named as a specific target, and as he is a 4th level (Evil Priest) the general area spell doesn’t affect him. He shouts loudly, points, and an attack is struck by a Light Wound Spell. Undaunted they press on, eager to close with the cleric and slay him. The next melee turn is spent by the party closing, with the cleric backing and raising his finger to deliver another Light Wound. Just as the party is about to hack and slew this evil opponent they hear shouts from the chamber without: “Beware! HOBGOBLINS! There are more who serve this priest…”

P: “Two of the fighters will finish the cleric off as quickly as possible. I will go to the door we just entered, with the other fighter, to help the rest of the party, but while he goes directly to aid them, I’ll stop and kill the sleeping hobgoblins here.”

A general melee now ensues in the chamber and in the room where the cleric fights on. Seeing that the party’s two fighters and cleric are seemingly holding their own against 6 hobgoblins, the magic-user creeps up behind the badly wounded Evil Priest and delivers the ‘Coup de grâce’. This frees them all for immediate attack upon the remaining hobgoblins. Good thing, too! One fighter and the cleric are down, and there are three hobgoblins attacking the remaining man. After a long round of attacks and counters the party finally wins, although only three remain alive – the magic-user leading it, an elven fighter, and a fighting man.

P: “Well, let’s quickly check the bodies and the rooms for any treasure. The priest’s quarters will be searched especially well by the elf.”

D: “You find some silver pieces in the pockets of the hobgoblins ((a dice roll determines how many for each)), and in the robes of the cleric you find a pouch with 100 gold pieces. Nothing else is found.”

P: “Let’s all go check out that room some more… I am not satisfied that we’ve located everything. But to be on the safe side, let’s spike the door shut good and tight, and the fighter will keep an eye on it also just in case.”

Several turns are spent in this manner, and finally a small trap door in the floor is discovered. It is lifted to reveal a hidden trove – an alabaster idol worth not less than 500 gold pieces. As the party is in bad shape, they elect to return immediately to the surface. Their comrades are buried, their own wound treated, and before passing on the idol to some merchant, they minutely examine it. It too reveals a small magical compartment, and after several days the magic-user manages to open it. Therein lies a map to a temple on the 4th level – a place veritably stuffed with treasure, but strongly guarded by many hobgoblins and powerful men and monsters. Better still, there are some very valuable gems hidden in the compartment too! When the survivors share the wealth and experience, they are all well-pleased and rewarded, all going up a level. Time now for them to seek some powerful allies and many men-at-arms for a special expedition to that temple…

The above may not be exactly typical, for many first adventures are spent trying to figure out where the party is, for mapping CAN be a difficult task until you get the hang of it. Also, many first-timers take on monsters too powerful for them, or don’t use ‘hit-and-run’ tactics as they should. Again, I have had first time parties who had adventures just about like the one above.

This should enable you to ready your dungeons. How about a questions and comments section from all of you next time? And I’ll try to answer in the next…

Now, my comments:

- "This implies that you have located and numbered monsters carefully, so that the players can usually fight them on even terms, outwit them, or run like hell," - sounds a lot like using GM judgment to set reasonably balanced encounters. But that's not really news to GMs - you're always putting up obstacles but rooting for the PCs to overcome them somehow. Still, sometimes it feels like people think encounters being set up so PCs can fight them on even terms was a new school, gamers-gone-soft invention.

- The magic-user is in charge. That happens very, very often in my experience.

- "Helmets off!" - Yes, you generally need to take off headgear to listen at doors in my games, too. Although, everyone? Geez, guys, have some care. Keep a couple people ready to fight and everyone else listen.

- Rolling for the number of hogoblins encountered at the time of the encounter? It's an interesting choice. It could be that he's just determining how many are there out of a larger, fixed pool, but nothing indicates it's not just determining how many exist only at the point of contact. Clearly, that's the case for the silver pieces later on.

- The +1 initiative for "preparation" is interesting, and not something I've ever seen elsewhere. It's potentially problematic in play, though, because people will want to know what counts as "preparation" and then do that 100% of the time. You'd also want to determine what monsters are "prepared" and thus negate it. A +1 on the roll wouldn't mesh well with AD&D segment-base initiative as I understand it to be played (or how I personally run it.)

- "“Loose arrows, drop bows, draw swords, and charge. If I can manage to cast a Sleep Spell during all this I’ll do so, but I will be careful not to cast it so as to include our men in its effect. The two watching the other door will maintain position.”"

So it's "If I can manage" - Would this count as conditional action, or as taking the chance the spell goes off or is "lost" because of interruption? It sounds like the former.

- The GM rolls for to hit and damage for missile fire and spell effects. Maybe melee as well . . . it's not stated either way.

- That magic-user gets a lot done - casts Sleep (careful to avoid including his friends, not an issue in all versions of the spell), killing the priest from behind, and slitting the throats of four hobgoblins. He cuts those throats faster than a proverbial Klingon.

- Combat is as lethal as always in example fights in early edition D&D books.

- "The priest’s quarters will be searched especially well by the elf." - I read that as "searched especially carefully and thoroughly" but it sounds like what one of my players love to say, "I (fill in the blank) with ease." "I slay it with ease." "I open it with ease." "I disarm it with ease." Etc.

- Who the heck is shouting "BEWARE!" in this example? Am I misreading something? It sounds like a third party - not the PCs, not the priest's buddies (why would they yell that?)

It's pretty interesting for all of that. I do really want to play some very old D&D at some point, not just AD&D. I may have to see if any of my players are like-minded and free at the same times I am to get a few games of something in.

Your First GURPS series

I want to recommend a series of posts by Warren "Mook" Wilson, author of How to Be A GURPS GM.

Warren has been doing a series of posts to introduce GURPS and walk through the mechanics of play.

The first post, Welcome to GURPS, has links to the rest of the series at the bottom.

It's an excellent walkthrough of the system and how it works and how it plays. Not only that, it's exactly the kind of stuff I think should be written but I never actually get the enthusiasm to sit down and write. I'm happy The Mook did this and I wanted to highlight it here - especially so I can point new players to it whenever I encounter them.

Free Stuff: Chris Gonnerman's RPG Primer

Chris "Basic Fantasy Role-Playing" Gonnerman has written an RPG Primer.

You can find it in print at Amazon, here:



Or download vers. 16 for free here:

Basic Fantasy Forums

I've gone with the free version, since I rarely need to refer back to print versions. But it might round a nice "boxed set" gift to someone just getting into (or interested in getting into) RPGs.

It's good advice in general and worth the time to read it.

And if you're interested, I reviewed the Basic Fantasy Role-Playing game here.

Playing GURPS Gladiators

One thing that happens when you write books and GM a lot face-to-face is you don't get to play your own creations much. I've never actually run my own ninja in DF. I've never gotten to fight against my own monsters. But I can now say I got to play as a gladiator from styles I helped put into 4th edition.

You see, Saturday nights Vlaclav Tofl runs a campaign set in GURPS Fantasy's Roma Arcana, with the PCs as gladiators in a ludus.

So here is an extremely long discussion of the game.

Abstract: I had a lot of fun, it was like Man-to-Man all over again, and it's interesting to see how other GMs roll and other players fight.

How was the game?

It was interesting. I got to play using a pick-up pregen called Marcus Claudius Crassus, a Roman soldier sentenced to the arena to die, assigned the role of Hoplomachus.

I joked that this was a terrible mistake - I've been a GM since I was 9. I'm an expert at running nameless guys meant to just fight and die. ;)

I'd picked another character but someone else who could actually play regularly (and not be a drop-in) wanted him, so Vlaclav asked me to hand him over. Done, I just wanted to fight stuff on a happenstance free Saturday night.

It was nice seeing the rules for overly-flashy strikes, crowd reaction, and Performance in fights in play (all from GURPS Martial Arts: Gladiators pg. 22 especially), GMed by someone else. I wrote that section of the book, and I wasn't sure how they'd play out in the hands of others. They played out well - as long as their is an incentive to take risks to do flashy stuff, it'll happen and it did.

Ironically my character didn't use them - he lacks Combat Art, he lacks Performance, and nothing in his personality suggests he's doing much other than trying to not die. So I played him that way - efficient victory was his aim, and the rare time I tried to be flashy it didn't help (Performance-6 is a hard roll under target on 3d6). He's expected to die for people's amusement but has the Proud perk, so goal one was "don't die" and goal two will be "kill well." At least as I ran them.

We did two rounds - a one-on-one fight with blunt weapons, and then two-on-two with real weapons. No armor in either case.

Round one was my guy vs. Adawolf, a big German. He was lucky it was blunts - I rolled a 3 on a vitals stab with my stick and rolled maximum damage. He's a big beefy dude and shrugged it off. Had it been real weapons he'd have been rolling to stay conscious and badly injured. His tactic was to Evaluate, then close and feint and dual-weapon attack. My tactic was to advance and Wait. This didn't work as well as I'd hoped because of two things - Vlaclav uses Per-based weapon skill for spotting Feints (my Per sucks). The other is that he uses a Contest of Skills mechanic to see who goes first in a Wait. You did this in 3e, and you do with Stop Hits in 4e (when you actually let the guy start to attack and then try to attack into it). But the base rule is just, Waiting guy goes first. So I was expecting to just nail him and I was thrown off when I had to see if I managed to do that - my tactics would have been very different had I known. I got lucky and Crassus got to attack first (and get his critical hit). Basically whenever he attacked, I Dodged. My Parry was good, but my Dodge (while unencumbered) was better, so I Dodged and Retreated.

Eventually I just moved around, Adawolf tried to hit and failed, I hit once again, and our owner got bored and yelled at all and made us stop. Fair enough.

Round two was Crassus and a big sword-armed gladiator against Adawolf and Parmenion, a thraex. Again, no armor but sharps this time. That proved pretty helpful to Crassus - unarmored foes vs. a spear? Heh. This fight was much messier. I'd decided that Wait wouldn't help me much so I didn't bother. I used my mobility to move up and then to the side of the fray. That was an error, because the two foes moved in on my teammate and got in a good hit. It suddenly looked like I'd stranded him. So I basically ran up and All-Out Defense (Increased Dodge)'d, getting between him and one opponent and getting in the face of the other. That kept me in the fray.

Basically I got lucky in that no one got more than one hit on me, and I was able to Dodge and Retreat against everything. I'm essentially a cautious fighter. I used a mix of stabs to the vitals, stabs to the torso, and Telegraphic Rapid Strikes to the torso when people were wide open. I know I got Adawolf at least once that way (vitals stab) and perforated Parminion the Thraex that way, too. Once Adawolf was bleeding badly, and Parminion was playing "roll Death checks until you fail!" the boss called a stop. Yeah, better to preserve your valuable fighters for a real show, not just a drop-in visitor who wanted to see some blood (the ostensible reason for our fray).


Generally, though, I felt totally comfortable fighting. I'd played so many hours of Man-to-Man, and then even more of map-based Advanced Combat/Tactical Combat in GURPS 1e-4e, that this was old hat. Skill 15 guy with low damage and shitty armor and moderate stats? Bring it! You're playing in my playground now buddy. It was "The rebels have to seize the armoury before the guards can blow the horn" all over again (old MTM reference.) Flat field, low-skill guys, and death spirals = how we spent our teen years when no one had cars ready for Car Wars.

How is it being GMed in your own creations?

I generally follow a simple rule - the GM is right. If the rules say X and the GM says Y, the rule is Y.

This generally goes well, since it keeps play moving and doesn't make having the guy who helped write some of those rules a big hassle. Seriously, if I wrote Rule A and it says X, and the GM says no, in my game it's Y, then it's Y. I try to only pipe in with actual rules questions - "What's the modifier for Fit on Death checks?" or "How much does Retreat give me?" And I'm happy to explain how a rule is meant to work, if that's the question.

I did argue once, when the GM told me I couldn't move a certain way and I knew I could, but we sorted that out. It wasn't "I don't run it that way" it was "It costs X to do that" but how Roll20 shows movement made it look like I was doing something I wasn't. GURPS makes you face into a hex as you move in, using Move, but you can't simultaneously turn and move your piece, so it looked like I was either side-stepping or turning, then stepping, then turning. Just an interface oddness that lead to "you can't do that." He's right, I can't, but Roll20 wouldn't let me show what I was actually doing.

On the other hand, I did let something go by that the GM didn't intend to do. In 3e you rolled stunning and knockdown rolls separately. Now it's one roll - you get knocked down and stunned. I'd assumed it was a house rule (lots of people like the 3e version, including me), not a 3e-ism. A 3e-ism? When you remember a rule from 3e that isn't actually in 4e, like my players do with Wild Swing vs. Move-and-Attack or calling DB PD and using the wrong numbers for shields. Oh well, I'd have done even better if it was both, as I inflicted a stun on everyone I fought at least once.

Oh, and I did like that - like me! - he wants people to state their action before they execute (or roll) their actions. I know why people don't, but seriously, it makes it easier as the GM to track what should happen.

How about the rules?

Death spirals suck when it happens to you but not when you do it to someone else. Plus it's realistic, sadly - one good hit can put you into a position where all you can do is choose how you lose.

This was my first time using Evaluate. No one bothers in my games. I kind of see why - +1 isn't that helpful compared to "I'm hitting him." It's useful but I'm not convinced it's for me just yet.

I forgot to use Telegraphic Attack the first time I had someone All-Out Attack near me. I didn't forget again.

All-Out Attack is ridiculously dangerous one-on-one. It's almost silly one-on-many. I made two people who tried it near me pay for it. One had no choice (he was getting mauled, and his AOA let him deal some serious damage to my teammate before he went down) but it's really worth thinking "Can any of the other guys get to me this turn?" If the answer is yes, be wary. I deliberately moved in the 4-man brawl to ensure I could choose who to attack as often as I could do it. Keep your options open. Be aggressive but don't be aggressive until there is an opening. Forcing one gets you killed.

I feinted someone but he ran away. This was actually what I wanted to happen - I wanted him to move away so I couldn't get double-teamed and neither could my teammate. If he'd stayed I'd have taken advantage but I would have had a hard time if someone forced me to retreat in the meantime.

I liked the Per-based spotting of Feints. GURPS assumes that weapon skill stays on DX for Feints because you can react well to a feint even if you are out of position initially. Per-based feints also have the oddness that the less well you perceive things, the easier you are to trick out of position with a feint. So guys who see the best spot the feint, guys who see very poorly (or can barely see at all) fall for feints. I can already here the arguments at my table ("I look away and then look back, negating his feint!" "Guys, seriously . . . " "What, it makes sense!") Still, I like the idea that Per matters in combat, and it makes enough sense and adds enough fun to pass the "actual play" test.

It was fun actually using Extra Effort in Combat. I've offered that to my players more than once and no one has even bothered with saying no. They just don't care to use it. So I never get to actually play in fights that matter that use it. It's nice, and it was helpful, but it didn't change anything for me. It just let me get off a few extra stabs I might not have otherwise, most of which didn't tell anyway. Well, the last one did, but in a short fight with assured recovery after, it was kind of like free penalty reductions for not much change in the fight.

How is Roll20?

Every single time I use Roll20 in a Hangout I have problems. Last night I got booted, my PC locked up trying to get Firefox back up, I needed to reboot (maybe not need, but I did it), and then I needed to use Chrome. Then I couldn't get Roll20 to pop out into a separate window. Then I couldn't get it to stop displaying giant icons for everyone over the battlemap. I was on a 15.6" laptop with about 1" x 2" of vision of the actual play area. Annoying.


Overall I had fun, and while I doubt I can make it often I might try to drop in when I can, if only to watch and learn how other people fight. Vlaclav is a good ref and he's remarkably patient with crappy mics, misunderstood statements, and connection problems. Nevermind cautious "win ugly but win" gladiators run by GURPS writers.

DF Game, Session 9 - Mystery of the Minotaur

Sunday, March 25th, 2012

Characters: (approximate net point total)
Vryce, human knight (286 points)
Borriz, dwarf knight (280 points)
Nakar, human wizard (272 points)
Honus Honusson, human barbarian (280 points)
Fuma, human thief (250 points)

Inquisitor Marco's player couldn't make it. Fuma is a new player (but veteran gamer) trying out the game. He fit in really well, so here's hoping he liked it enough to keep playing.

The game opened with four of the "original" members of the group pouring over their map of the Caves of Chaos and discussing what to do. The plan roughly was, go find the Lord of the Maze (the minotaur) and deal with him once and for all (Honus) or just find his loot (Vryce, Nakar, Borriz). Fuma, who should have an accent over the u but I can't remember the html code for it, showed up and introduced himself. He'd arrived by caravan, and decided he'd take a shot at joining this (locally noteworthy) adventurers. Despite his obvious tattoo indicating he's been imprisoned, they welcome him to the group and include him in their plans.

They picked up some rumors - Kerrick the fur-trapper wasn't back from his trapping yet, which was unusual, and he's considering "missing." A farmer said the minotaur was a legend already when he got here years ago, and it was an immortal scourge by some god or by God to punish those who maltreated their livestock. Another trapper said the minotaur hadn't been spotted but he'd left tracks around.

Honus picked up some alchemist's fire (to potentially burn the LotM's corpse) and spoke briefly to Father Luke at the chapel. Father Luke advised him that if this minotaur is really immortal, most immortal beings have something that keeps them from their final rest on this world, and if can be removed, the immortality might go with it. Honus chunked 7 sp into the alms collection and slapped Father Luke on the shoulder in thanks.

The next day, after some stocking up, the group headed out. Thanks to Honus's inexplicably bad weather sense and shortcut attempt, they ended up getting rained on (despite Honus's predictions of "clear skies") without adequate preparations, which tired them out a bit.

The day after they made it to near the caves and camped out. On the second shift, as Borriz watched, three goblins and a hobgoblin moved up slowly on the camp. Borriz woke up (in order) Honus, Vryce, Fuma, and Nakar. All got up smoothly and got ready. Fuma slept with his crossbow loaded (bad for the bowstring, but better than getting surprised unarmed). As the goblinoids closed in, Honus got up and charged, screaming. Fuma aimed at the hobgoblin, Vryce shouted "Truce!" and Nakar made himself invisible. It messy, as always. One goblin panicked and shot an arrow at Honus missed, and Honus rapidly ran him down and then ran down another and bashed him to death with his morningstar, the Flail of the Gales. Borriz threw a hatchet a good 14 yards into a fleeing goblin and dropped him. Fuma decided, what the hell, and shot the hobgoblin (who was either waiting for Vryce to close, or just barking out orders of some kind) in the face. He rolled maximum damage (9 impale, 18 after multiplier because of the unarmored face) and the hobgoblin dropped.

The group took the one trampled goblin prisoner, bandaged up the two non-fatally wounded ones, and questioning began. The goblin broke quickly under a combination of Fuma's questions in broken Orcish (which the goblin also spoke in broken fashion) and Borriz's threats. They quickly found the goblins had a) wiped out the orcs, b) been looking for the party to "give money," and c) weren't trying to sneak up on them. Once Honus heard about the orcs, he called the goblin his buddy, shoved some food in his mouth and then dug out and gave him 20 sp. The poor confused goblin just shook and tried to answer questions as Honus fed him and Borriz kept telling him not to sneak up on them.

They sat him down by the campfire and then promptly went back to sleep except for the person on watch. They didn't bother to disarm the goblin, or even keep away him from the pile of weapons they looted from his friends.

Next morning, they dragged the shaking goblin up and checked on the wounded - the hobgoblin had died overnight, and the axe-wounded goblin was in bad shape. Borriz smashed the axe-wounded goblin's head in. The goblin asked if they wanted the food, they said no, but let him eviscerate his freshly dead buddy and grab a few choice organs to bring home. Waste not, want not. He didn't seem bothered at all by their ruthlessness, just scared of them.

They marched him back to the caves and noticed a few new things - hobgoblin sentries in the former orc and gnoll caves to the east, and fresh orc skulls lining the hobgoblin cave. Oh, and daytime patrols. The hobgoblins had clearly taken over and learned something. They put the goblin to work and sent him to fetch the chief. He banged on the hobgoblin door, they looked out, and grabbed him by the neck and dragged him in. About 10 minutes later they looked out again at the party, and then ducked back in. Another 10 minutes later, a big party of them, followed by the hobgoblin chief, marched out.

The parties quickly began negotiations. The hobgoblins offered a chest of coins - a big pile of copper ($0.10 coins), some silver ($1 coins), two gold ($100 coins), and a couple potions. In return, they wanted either the Gnoll Chief up on the highest level killed, or the Lord of the Maze killed - either one and they'd pay up. The party also asked about the six-fingered man they'd seen etched on the wall and the oddly-shaped metal torch. The chief denied knowing anything about it but was clearly shaken and lying through his teeth.

More threats and offers and whatnot, and they hammered out a deal - two potions now, then they kill the LotM, then they get the money and the chief tells them about these six-fingered guys. Deal! The took (and tested) the potions - both minor healing.

The asked for a guide, and got their friend the goblin. Borriz got his name and it was unpronounceable but shortened it down to "Brak." Fuma said, can I call him Nancy? So everyone called him Nancy. He lead them to the cave the LotM comes out of when he raids. It was the cave with a few scattered copper coins, a broken speartip, and (this was new) a dented-beyond-salvage gnoll helmet. They entered.

The group spent what turned out to be the better part of an hour winding around caves. Using his brandy-new shield-mounted lectern, Nakar tried mapping*. Soon his map wound in on itself and they decided they weren't doing so well with the map. They bypassed some sluggish giant glowing beetles that didn't seem aggressive.

As they turned one corner to a tight, tight bend, the Lord of the Maze trotted out and attacked. Borriz was facing him, and turned and All-Out Defended.
Vryce shouldered his way up, and Waited. The mino moved up and Vryce stabbed at him. Not yet berserk, he was able to parry one stab and dodge the other. The LotM then speared and gored Borriz - who prompted critically failed his parry and hit himself in the leg, nearly crippling it, and was severely speared by the minotaur. He fended off the gore attempt. He barely held on to consciousness.
The fight was short from there - Vryce mildy injured him with a stab, Borriz brained the LotM and mildly injured him on on his first strike and deal out maximum damage on the other. The mino's skull caved in and it left one eye cocked oddly and his brain exposed. He roared with rage and attacked! Luckily they fended off his strikes, and then Vryce stabbed him in both eyes, blinding him and finishing him. He dropped dead at their feet.

The group set up around Borriz and the mino, and tended to Borriz's wounds (he ended up needing both minor healing potions and then some) while keeping watch. Fuma searched the minotaur, including a body cavity search, but didn't find anythign interesting. Honus took his mail shirt and spear, again. Then Honus began to cut up the minotaur with the solid silver dagger they'd looted from some wights last time out. He kept up the minosection until he'd totally sliced everything up. Head off, neck open, chest open, organs open, stomachs (he has three) open and a bezoar removed and handed over to Nakar. Nakar checked out the bezoar and found it was wet and soggy, but consisted of rotted grasses, very old stone and bone bits, and assorted bits of grue - and wasn't magical.

The group spent a lot of time dissecting, discussing, and deciding. Then they decided against burning the corpse, but took his head (Honus would hold it instead of a weapon), his hooves, and his hands, and keep them visible at all times.

They began to track the minotaur, depending on Brak/Nancy's (soon determined to be useless) nose and Honus's tracking. They soon lost any trace of him on the dry stone, but kept searching. Nakar kept mapping (although we switched players - now Borriz's player and Fuma's player kept tandem maps)** but the maze still seemed too complex. Multiple times they used markings, numbered markings, arrows, etc. but kept coming back to places they'd been when their map indicated they'd turned down "new" directions. They ended up outside at one point and just camped for lunch before heading back in.

Finally, they used Seek Earth to locate the nearest source of gold (except what they carried). It wasn't far - 50 yards or so. But they couldn't seem to get nearer . . . and then Honus felt dizzy for a second and saw the group decide to go left . . . and turn right. He stopped them and explained. They tried again, and a few more realized what had happened.

They also took a look at their trophies - the mino head had dried out, the hands shriveled a bit, the hooves hollowed. Uh-oh.

Long story short, they began to check every turn and see if they could resist whatever supernatural power was turning them away from the gold. They slowly but surely made their way to a new area - a big cave full of meticulously arranged stacks of skulls, piles of bones, collections of phalanges, etc. and a sleeping mat of leaves and old furs. They searched carefully and found a big rock was being used as a "door" to wall off a small section of cave. Vryce got a double handhold and Borriz and Honus wedged in their crowbars and pried it open partway.

Inside was a smallish nook with a staff***, a wooden coffer, a small iron chest, and an ironbound chest. Some careful trap detection and examination and lockpicking by Fuma took care of a (decoy) lock designed to blast a jet of alchemist's fire into a would-be lockpicker, a poisoned needle, and the locks. They scored a few pieces of gold jewelry, a fine quality suit of elven mail (roughly Fuma's size, too, coincidently), three potions (major healing, universal antidote, and gaseous form/body of air), 51 gp, 930 sp, and the staff turned out to be magical. They spent an hour searching (and trashing the neat bone piles) while Nakar used Analyze Magic on the staff. It's a Staff of Healing, which lets a cleric heal people of minor injuries once a day per patient at no cost.

They looked again at the trophies - the skull was a bare skull now, and was gently flaking away. The body - they tried to find it with Seeker but the spell failed. The hands were bones. Double uh-oh.

After this, the group tried to find its way out, but even that took a lot of work before they managed to find the exit and walk out into daylight. They showed the skull, etc. to the hobgoblin chief, and Nancy/Brak confirmed their tale. They were given the gold and the chief told them what he knew about the six-fingered people.

They are the masters, who rule underground. They came from the big mountain (yes, the megadungeon), they rule everything underground, and they are clearly treated as feared gods by the goblinoids (at least when they're around). No, they didn't know anything about some metal torch, and they seemed alarmed the PCs meant that either they worked for the six-fingered blood drinkers or that they were nearby. In the end the PCs confirmed as much as they could through the chief's broken common. Seems like the hobgoblins serve the six-fingers when they are compelled to, fear them, and don't know much about them beyond that.

The group realized the minotaur was coming back again, and he'd want his mail and spear. So, evil bastards that they apparently are, they gifted them to the hobgoblin chief and told him to keep them safe deep within their lair. They figure the LotM will return and bust his way into the hobgoblin lair and kill them in bunches to get his stuff back. As I said, bastards. The chief seemed pleased with this well-made spear, but clearly has no idea what that'll mean for his tribe.

After that, the group returned to the Keep to rest up, pack up, and then head to Stericksburg.

Notes:

* I don't allow the players to map unless a character is mapping.

** It doesn't matter to me which player draws it (Player A's character is mapping, and Player B draws it = fine with me), but someone needs to be doing it. No character mapping, no map. One guy mapping, yeah, everyone can join in if they want, I'm fine with that.

*** Which I described as looking like Moses' staff in The Ten Commandments.

See Secrets - We had some (inevitable) discussions about See Secrets, which Nakar keeps up and active at all times that he's awake. Like most spells, it's both absolute and powerful but also vague. My ruling has been that it'll reveal anything deliberately hidden automatically . . . if you can see the hiding spot directly. A secret door? Easily spotted. A normal door or secret door behind a curtain? Can't see it, even if the curtain was deliberately placed there to conceal it. The idea is to make you open chests to see the false bottom, use Night Vision to spot the stuff in the dark, flake off paint to see the hidden thing undernearth. Otherwise, I feel the spell is too broadly powerful, and becomes a potential abusive way to circumvent investigation and actual searching.

So for example, See Secrets didn't detect that the (fake) padlock was a trap, because it wasn't hidden. It didn't notice the stone door, because it wasn't a secret door but rather a stone slab door that just wasn't recognized initially as a door.

I figure that's a ruling I can live with, and so far so good, although the limitations bug my players a little bit.

Mazes: This is why I don't use mazes. This one was supernatural, but it also sucks to deal with. One player mentioned Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord and it's turnaround/teleport maze. That's not what I want to emulate, just because the fun-to-frustration ratio is a bit too low for regular use. They'll turn up, but not that often.


(Originally mis-titled this "Session 8" but it is in fact session 9)

DF Game - Rumors

Here are the news and rumors my players have just picked up in my DF on the Borderlands game. I won't vouch for the accuracy of this stuff, it's just what the PCs heard.

Big news - a merchant and his guards got massacred just west of the Keep! They were bringing a load of assorted goods from the keep to Arras. The merchant, Jovan, and his son Tada and two mercenary guards were found torn to shreds, with some of their organs taken from their corpses, and their pack mule was missing. Their money, the goods the mule was carrying, and a few weapons were missing. As a result the Castellan is offering an unspecified "generous reward" to those who can bring in the still-living transgressors (or their heads, if necessary) and sufficient proof of their involvement. What that proof is, is unspecified.

You hear a bit about the swamp to the south. It's call the Cold Mire, because a) it gets cold up here [and the snow is starting soon - pretty much as soon as we get it in the real world, you'll get it in game] and b) it's a mire. It's considered a very, very bad place. It is known to have sharp-toothed flesh-eating frogs, big crocs, giant frogs, eight-legged lizards, and lizard men viciously hostile to men. From high points on the road travelers have spotted some kind of flying tentacled monstrosity hovering over the mire. But local legend also claims that there is a frog-like "swamp oracle" who can accurately any one question you have, once in your life, in return for a certain weight of gold . . . or some of your blood. And further legends say that the lizard men in the swamp have a long-standing feud with the elves of the southlands, who drove them out of the warmth into the cold, cold north.

Finally, Honus asked about furs - there are a few exotic creatures in the wilderness. These include the ravenous owlbear, for one, and the farrier at the Keep has a buyer who'd love to get his hands on an owlbear fur-and-feather cape . . .

DF Game, Session 4, part 2 - Caves of Chaos

Saturday, November 26th, 2011

Characters: (approximate net point total)
Vryce, human knight (265 points)
     Koric, human guardsman (NPC hireling) (62 points)
     Orrie, human guardsman (NPC hireling) (62 points)
Inquisitor Marco, human cleric (255 points)
Borriz, dwarf knight (260 points)
Nakar, human wizard (250 points)
Red Raggi, berserker barbarian (NPC co-adventurer) (unknown points)

After a week off to recharge and refresh, the group decided to head back to the caves. They still wanted to raid the orcs before taking a shot at the shrine. They rounded up Red Raggi (who was in jail, and the guards said they'd waive bail and charges if they'd take him to the caves). They also met Nakar, who was looking to raid the caves. So they headed up to the right-most cave, climbed up and headed in. They had all the stealth of a pack of stampeding elephants running over a brass band. Deliberately, really - they didn't care if they had surprise or not.

They entered the cave and found themselves facing a wall of skulls and decomposing heads. They gave them little more than a glance and then turned left and marched ahead, keeping an eye behind. They found a big room with a soft glow of a charcoal fire - and charged in. As they did, a wave of orcs charged back from the other side! The fight was on in a huge banquet hall full of tables and chairs.

At the same time, orcs they'd bypassed charged in from behind. Something like 12 orcs from the front, 8 from behind. Red Raggi and Vryce were in the lead, and Borriz turned and ran back to the rear guard, Korric and Orrie, who Vryce ordered to stand and All-Out Defend. Nakar started casting Great Haste and Inquisitor Marco lit up his mace with Flaming Weapon.

The fight turned messy but never went badly, really. Korric and Orrie tried to defend but they just don't have the defenses to stand against massed orcs, and got stabbed repeatedly. Red Raggi charged into the fray with his axe, and started hewing down orcs even as they stabbed and chopped him badly. Vryce maneuvered carefully and killed orcs in singles and pairs. Borriz, forgetting he had his stubby throwing hatchet instead of his mace, ran right into melee and attacked the orcs in the rear. More orcs came in - the chief and his two mates, one of whom was a fire shaman and started tossing fireballs. Borriz got Great Hasted and used his doubled turns to just tear orcs apart. He does a mere 2d+5 cut with that hatchet but a few skull shots helped, as did lots of very high damage rolls (like 10-12 on 2d repeatedly). In one especially brutal second he took his pair of turns and cut down 5 orcs, dropping 4 for the count and leaving one badly injured, stunned, and prone. Next turn he chopped that guy down, spun 180, and threw his hatchet back into the fight he'd left behind and hit a fleeing orc in the back, killing him. THAT is Dungeon Fantasy, right there.

Red Raggi, meanwhile, cut down like 4 orcs and then the chieftan ran up and smacked him one. Raggi made his death check and unconsciousness checks, and then critically hit the chief for a lot of damage and dropped him. Red Raggi now can claim the final blow on the Lord of the Maze and an orc chief. After he fell, along with 6 or 7 other orcs in that same turn, the remainder broke and ran. They didn't make it, although the shaman escaped. One orc female took a sunbolt in the back and caught on fire. She fled off and the PCs didn't find her again. Red Raggi finally fell after this, having taken like 50-60 damage.

Fun fight - a big knock-down brawl with all the orc minis I had (with appropriate WYSIWYG equipment). The second it ended, Nakar got off a Seeker spell on the shaman, found her despite a boatload of penalties (-8 or -9, I think) and then Traced her. They could find her relative location with ease, now. They set to looting, barricading the room, and looting. Oh, and killed orcs. Vryce refused to cut throats and decapitate them - these aren't animals. He stabbed them instead. Borriz did some throat cutting.

After an hour (!) in the room, the PCs headed out. They felt pretty safe resting, what with 20+ dead orcs in the room including the chief, and a trace telling them the shaman had fled somewhere and stayed there. They were right - they'd killed all but her out of the tribe's adult combatants. After looting they headed on and found the chief's room. They searched it, found his treasure niche, and pried out a boulder they thought concealed the shaman's escape nook. Nope. Just some treasure. They kept looking and eventually found a secret door. They figured out the tricky catch and in they went to a dank secret room. The shaman was waiting and tossed a fireball at Vryce, hitting him squarely and setting his clothing on fire. He ignored that and charged and chopped him, dropping her. He saw a bucket of dank liquid, and splashed a little on himself as he burned - water. He splashed more and put the flames out. Nice caution - yeah, it could have been lamp oil or something and he'd need a new PC not some extra healing magic.

They searched this room too, and found another secret door. And pressed on, hoping for more money. They went down a long corridor with a door on the right side. Borriz opened that with his hatchet in hand and met the oncoming axe of a lurking orc guard. The guard got initiative and got in 2-3 good swings before Borriz could respond and cut him down. Vryce advanced down the hallway and Borriz went for his crowbar to wedge the door shut. But too slow! Arrows came out the darkness and one hit Inq. Marco and injured him. A female orc, as big as a male and wearing mail, pushed the door open and swung her axe. It didn't help - Borriz brained her with his crowbar and broke her skull into pieces (Weapon Master - All one-handed axe/mace weapons - does include crowbars). Vryce ran past the door and told Borriz to hold it. The chief came behind her and attacked, throwing a hatchet into Vryce's back and injuring him. Vryce ignored it and stood his ground, waiting for the orcs. They came and died. Chop, chop, chop. One also took an arrow in the back from a miss-aimed friendly attack, and fell to his hands and knees. Vryce ignored him. Inq. Marco and Nakar teamed up with a sunbolt and a stone missile and burned and crushed another orc. Borriz turned on the chief, drew his mace, and killed him, breaking his skull through a pot helm and mail coif. The remaining orcs fled, and a few dropped weapons as they did. The chief, his mate, his guard, and four of their best warriors died horribly in seconds. A bad morale check and gone, run away!

Just at this moment Inq. Marco (run for the moment by Nakar's player, because the real player has a long trip home) decided to heal himself. That's heavily penalized in GURPS, and he rolled a 17 - critical failure. BAM. My (brutal) house rule is you take 2x the damage you tried to heal as damage. This dropped him negative and he had to make a death check. 12 or less . . . clatter, clatter . . . 11. He lived.

But now with everyone damaged and a late hour, they decided to hightail it out of there. They grabbed a few things off the chief and his mate, took his gem-pommeled broadsword, and quickly looted the orcs. Borriz killed the crawler and finished the dead off. They grabbed some stuff, headed back, looted the orc chief's room (which they may have done first), and then headed back to civilization.

I was nice because of the late hour and didn't ding them with wandering monsters. They got back to the keep and that's where we ended.

Notes

Some notes.

Borriz got the +1 bonus XP for this session, as voted by the players, because of his awesomeness. Voting for himself helped tip the balance though.

- I'm using the Partial Surprise rules/Initiative rules, which I hadn't before. I like the effect but I doubt my players like occasionally going after slower critters that jump them. Oh well.

- Genre rule: fodder fail all HT rolls automatically. Who isn't fodder and gets to make them normally is my decision. Editing later: I mean "fail all HT rolls for consciousness and death checks automatically." They still get HT rolls against poison, disease, spells, etc. I just don't care what happens to them after their HP go to 0 or lower.

- 62 point guys with halberds shouldn't All-Out Defend. And they can't stand up to multiple attacks from multiple orcs. It's not that they suck, it's that 4-1 odds isn't something they can handle against equally powerful foes.

I need tighter game notes, and spreadsheeted NPCs not a document of stats. That's fine for writing them up but too annoying in play. My "how to manage a fast game with lots of enemies in multiple fights" skills are improving. My old game was "slower game with one single big-ass incredibly nasty fight per session or three" which didn't require so much page flipping. That said Foxit Reader + all of my DF and GURPS PDFs open at once + word docs of the adventure = very easy to run game and look stuff up for rulings fast.

Here is my setup for game.

Red Raggi has SM+1 and 19 HP. This means spells are 2x cost on him. At 20 HP, healing spell effects are doubled. So he's just shy of the sweet spot and he's freaking hard to heal. Bad design on my part, he needs to get one more HP with his XP!

Worth noting that Vryce is SM+0 and 20 HP, Honus is SM+1 and 22 HP, and Borriz is SM+0 (dwarves are short but broad, and SM isn't just height) with (now) 18 HP, closing in on 20 HP. That doubled effect is very useful.

Borriz's player remarked that the fact that the group is totally profit-motivated makes it fun. They always push too far trying to get a little more treasure, and risk too much trying to get extra loot home to sell. The only answer to any question is, "Will it get us more loot? Then yes."

The group is really afraid of the wights they heard about, and want to find magical weaponry before they go for them. Magical weapons are pretty high-value treasure, though, so they aren't exactly common.

I need more orc minis, just because I have too many with swords and not enough with spears. And wide-stance minis with widely-held weapons are freaking annoying on the battlemap.

Part 1 is Here

DF Game, Session 4, part 1 - Caves of Chaos

Saturday November 26th, 4th DF session.

Split session. We had to finish up from last time, where the PCs were lost in windy tunnels and had just finished a fight with the rampaging minotaur known as the Lord of the Maze.

Characters: (approximate net point total)
Vryce, human knight (260 points)
     Koric, human guardsman (NPC hireling) (62 points)
     Orrie, human guardsman (NPC hireling) (62 points)
Volos, human wizard (260 points)
Honus Honusson, human barbarian (260 points) (run temporarily by Volos's player since Honus's player had work)
Inquisitor Marco, human cleric (255 points)
Borriz, dwarf knight (255 points)

     plus Mikal (Status Unknown) and Aelfred, rescued drovers
     Red Raggi, rescued berserker barbarian (unknown points)

We last left with Red Raggi standing screaming on top of the fallen Lord of the Maze. The party commenced dealing with the aftermath - Inq. Marco started in on first aid and healing after check Mikal and Volos (dead and dead). Borriz kept watch after retrieving his hatchet, while Vryce did the same but also called out repeatedly for Aelfred (there was some confusion about who died). They also took a trophy - Red Raggi hacked off a bit of horn and the group claimed the LotM's spear - which turned out to be fine (+1 damage) and balanced (+1 skill).

The group decided that although they wanted to keep tracking the gnoll chief, they were really hurt. They also wanted to find the minotaur's treasure (they are certain he must have some) but again, too hurt. Vryce announced no one would be left behind, although they didn't mention Mikal's corpse on their "to take" list . . .

In any case they dumped the random weapons and junk they'd accumulated on the litter and used that for Volos's corpse instead. Honus and others smashed the minotaur's skull into little pieces.

The group re-traced its steps back to the secret door into the gnoll cave thanks to markings and drippings from dead glow beetles. However the secret door back was closed. It was easy enough to find, but there was no latch or trigger to release it. Borriz tried to pry it open with his crowbar and failed, and critically failed (18!) on his second try. Crank. He bent the crowbar and it sunk in to the stone deep enough to wedge the door shut. Oops. Back the other way!

They trudged back into the caves, keeping left. They heard a lot more of the hooting and flapping noises they heard last time, and as they came into a larger chamber, a swarm of stirges attacked them. Borriz nailed one with his thrown hatchet and then he and Raggi got swarmed. Borriz ended up with three on his face, sucking blood, and Raggi with four on his body. Borriz had to carefully smash them off his face with his mace, pulling his damage from 2d+8 to something a little more likely to drop an 18# bird-thing but not potentially break his own face. Raggi tore them up with his hands. Vryce killed a couple, Inq. Marco scorched one to death with a sunbolt, and Honus helped Raggi and Borriz with theirs. He'd grab a strix, yank it out (ouch!) and then smash it. It worked and in the end, they finished them off. They lost a lot of HP, though. Stirges are f-ing nasty in GURPS, and they can hit the eyes in a pinch so even a greathelm isn't certain safety against them.

The group decided to rest, but realized that a) there was big thunderstorm coming (thanks to Honus's nose and Weather Sense skill, he knew what that rumbling was, even distorted by the tunnels) and b) they were close to the exist. They debated resting in the caves until Borriz said, "Seriously, we're more afraid of rain than of monsters?"

They looked at each other and left the cave. The moved to the gnoll cave and set up shop there, eating rations and then adding some ale and wine from the gnoll's stores. Vryce kept checking on the storm, and once when he did he came around a corner and smack into two hunting gnolls! They attacked at once, which was a split second too late - Vryce killed both of them with a Rapid Strike. He looted them, and found they'd been carrying a trussed-up-for-cooking human hunter's corpse. He looted him, too, after determining they didn't know the guy.

Long story short after this - storm cleared up, the PCs headed home, and successfully avoided any wandering encounters (they've been extremely lucky on the rolls, and Honus's good Survival rolls have helped there too).

They went back to the keep, Vryce warned the guards that Raggi is trouble, and they sold their loot. The farrier said he's in the market for any furs and exotic monster furs, which got Honus interested.

They also found a plot of land outside and designated it as a cemetary. They dug a nice grave for Volos, and put him there sans equipment. Each in turn said something about Volos, giving him a brief eulogy. Vryce just shook his head, but the others all had a colorful bit to say about him - his magically created food, his Dehydrate spells, and so on. Even Raggi said a few words - "He died in battle." It was nice, actually. They also cast Final Rest on him to keep him from coming back to haunt them (literally)

Honus headed for the hills, and the group took a week off to recover from injury and so on. Raggi headed to the bars and said he'd come with them again if they wanted.

Part 2 will come a little later - same session but some different PCs.

Notes

Some things that got my players wondering:

Who the hell built all these secret doors? The caves are riddled with them. I guess Gary built them. But is there an in-game reason besides the wahoo effect of rolling to detect secret doors?

If there are only a few dozen orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, etc. in each cave, where is this big army of goblinoids they heard about? My answer was simple - I never told them they heard about an army. Huh, I guess that's how rumors get started.

Other stuff:

Funerals are fun. Seriously, having everyone say a few words about the departed is amusing, especially when the departed's player is sitting there listening to the eulogy.

Everyone thinks litters are made of "stuff lying around" and stuff on them weighs nothing. Er, no, limestone caves don't have "stuff" lying around to make a litter out of. Stuff on it is full weight, but GURPS says it's half-weight on smooth surfaces for determining what you can pull around.

Better character sheets - I need to bash around the Phoenix GCA sheets a bit so they have less of the info no one actually looks at and more of the stuff we end up needing ("How much do I weigh with all my stuff, now that I'm unconscious?")


Part 2 is here

DF Game, Session 3 - Caves of Chaos vs. 250 pointers

Warning: this summary got wordy but I'm keeping it. It has Keep on the Borderlands spoilers.

Sunday November 6th, 3rd DF session.

Characters: (approximate net point total)
Vryce, human knight (260 points)
     Koric, human guardsman (NPC hireling) (62 points)
     Orrie, human guardsman (NPC hireling) (62 points)
Volos, human wizard (260 points)
Honus Honusson, human barbarian (260 points)
Inquisitor Marco, human cleric (255 points)
Borriz, dwarf knight (255 points)

We left off last time at Falcon's Keep (aka The Keep on the Borderlands), as detailed here.

The group finished spending their cash, learning a few new things (in other words, spending XP), and then officially taking on the two hirelings, Koric and Orrie. Vryce is their official employer, so they have one boss to ultimately obey if they get conflicting orders. The group debated hitting the evil shrine, but they decided they didn't have the weaponry to take on the wights Goldleaf had mentioned in session 1 and decided to raid orcs instead.

The group headed out to the Caves, taking two days instead of the usual one and a half, allowing them to camp nearby and listen to the night traffic unseen (thanks to Honus's wilderness skills), and to cast a few extra daylight-brightness Continual Light spells. The next day near dawn they headed to the hobgoblin cave they'd raided last time.

The knocked on the door - the idea was to ask them some questions and possibly recruit them to help raid the orcs. No answer, and no sounds within, either. So they climbed up the hills and worked their way around. Near one cave that the hobgoblins said was part of the shrine they found 13 strangely bloated and warped trees, with half-dead leaves. Honus popped an arrow into one and it passed almost all the way through with a rotten "thunk." They also smelled rotten meat near the cave mouth but they didn't approach too closely. They avoided that one and continued on, passing yet another cave, which the hobs had also said was a shrine entrance.

This next cave had some scattered copper coins in it and a burned out torch on the floor, and was a bit damp smelling, and had hooting, flapping, and cheeping noises emanating from it. They avoided it as well. They found a third cave, previously not spotted due to trees. It had a few wooden signs up in various languages including Common, saying that goblinoids were welcome and there was food and rest within. They entered and in short order they found a trio of gnolls toasting meat over a fire. In even shorter order they trashed the gnolls and left them dead on the floor, killing one a split second before he could hit a warning gong. The fight featured some impressive (max or near max damage) hits by Inquisitor Marco using his Flaming Weapon-imbued mace and a slam by Honus. They looted the bodies and checked the room. Some of the meat turned out to be human flesh, and the rest turned out to be roast rat. Honus ate some of the rat-onna-stick and the group continued on.

They quickly found the chief's room, pried the door open with a crowbar, and rushed in. The chief and his mate fought back bravely, and a gnoll shaman Winged Knife'd Honus in the face with a large knife, but it didn't help much. Honus shrugged off the blade shot and he and Vryce pounded the chief and his mate down, Volos used magic to disrupt the chief's defenses (Tanglefoot and Mental Stun, I think), while Inquisitor Marco and Borriz and then Honus moved in the shaman and finished him. Honus naturally body checked the shaman down to get that rolling, and Inquisitor Marco hit him a few times with his flaming mace. Once they were down Honus throat-slit the shaman and Vryce stabbed the chief's mate a few times, but everyone overlooked doing a coup-de-grace on the chief . . .

They then looted the room, finding a key and some piddling change and jewelry. Not much else, even after they tore down all the tapestries, flipped the tables and chairs, and pounded a few walls with a morningstar. Inquisitor Marco prayed and cast See Secrets, his newest prayer. Sadly he critically failed (he rushed the words and messed them up a bit) and apparently greatly annoyed the Good God. Far from seeing hidden things his vision went cross-eyed and will remain that way for a while (-5 Per and -2 to combat skills for 1d days - he rolled a 2).

They then found the nearby storage room for the gnolls, and swiped a big jug of alchemist's fire (flaming oil, the self-igniting kind) and some leather hides. They put the jug in a sack, padded it with cloth from the chief's room, and gave it to Koric (I think). They then went back to exploring. They found a set of stairs down and headed that way, and a hail of arrows and spears met them. One arrow critically hit Borriz and knocked him down despite minimal damage, and that left Honus and Vryce to charge . . . into 15 gnolls. They immediately went to work. The spellcasters chucked Sunbolts and Mental Stun spells into the fray, Borriz got back up and moved in, and the Koric and Orrie guarded the rear. The gnolls fought hard, but eventually they all got put down. Borriz brained a few, Vryce stabbed and chopped more, and Honus beat a few down with broken legs and ribs. They got a few glaive stabs in return, though, and Honus needed healing to keep him ready for front-rank combat.

The group slit throats, looted corpses, and found a couple of keys. They explored a bit more and found a room with 10 goblins, orcs, and hobgoblins roped to the walls, and another with three humans. They left the goblinoids after discovering none spoke Common, and freed the humans. The humans were Mikal and Aelfred, drovers for the merchant they'd rescued weeks ago, and Red Raggi, a barbarian raider who'd raided those self-same merchants just prior to them getting hit by hobgoblins. They had no love lost between them. Raggi was not impressed - he was proud to call himself a raider and a tribal renegade. The group debated not freeing Red Raggi but they were all on one chain . . . so they let them all go and armed Raggi with a couple axes (well, he armed himself off the dead gnolls) and the drovers grabbed spears but quickly found the PCs wanted them to pack-mule some weapons on a stretcher. The PCs also found some bloody footprints about this point, where three young gnolls had come and checked on the dead females and then fled. They followed the footprints to a door. They had Raggi chop it down, and then he rushed in.

By the time they got in the room, he'd pounced on the three young gnolls inside, screaming a warcry. Inquisitor Marco pointed out they were kids so Raggi finished the wounded one he was standing on with a blow to the head. The others were already slain. This got the group muttering. Heh. They looted the room (again, not much, although Honus found some ale to drink).

They decided the gnolls had to have more treasure, so they rested briefly and then headed back to the chief's room. He was missing! No bloody footprints, either. So they blocked and locked themselves in the room, cast See Secrets, and spotted a secret door. They quickly opened it and found a piece of tapestry the chief had used to sop up his falling blood and avoid leaving a trail. They followed on, found another secret door, and decided the wights must be nearby. The sequence of events was eerily like Goldleaf's story! So they left the NPCs behind in the room, blockading the door with the table and chairs from the chief's room.

They advanced into the caves and got rushed by a trio of yard-long giant glow beetles (basically AD&D fire beetles, GURPSified and modified). Borriz killed one with a thrown hatchet, Volos missed one (thanks to their tricksy Dodging) with an Ice Sphere, and Vryce killed one with his sword, slicing it in half. Someone - maybe Honus - accounted for the last one. Honus also carved out a glow-gland, and found they could be handled like heatless lights or pierced and drained of their glowing juice.

They advanced along, and followed their usual "keep left" approach. They entered living caves, limestone coated, dripping, stalactites and stalagmites, etc. - the usual stuff. Volos kept an eye on the ceiling. Piercer paranoia, perhaps? But nothing bothered them from above. They heard more hooting, more flapping, more skee skee noises, but didn't see anyway. They decided to turn back, but despite their careful "left only" strategy they managed to get turned around a end up in places they didn't recognize. Lucky for them they stumbled into daylight - the way out!

They went out, circled around, and back to where they left the NPCs. They knocked on the door and Koric let them in, saying they'd closed the secret door and barricaded it because something - a big man ("Not no gnoll!") tried to get in, and it wasn't any of the group. So they slammed the secret door shut and blocked it. The PCs cheerfully opened it back up and went in, this time with the NPCs. Left in a clear and obvious trail down the passage were five silver pieces. Bait? A breadcrumb trail? Vryce announced that of course they were going to follow it. My gamers can be careful sometimes but they aren't going to shy from obvious encounters, plus it's in character for Vryce.

They went back to the scene of the beetle fight and found some drops of glow beetle glow-sack slime left like a trail. They followed it, again winding around the caves. But now they here a lowing, groaning noise. Like a moose, or a bull. "OR A MINOTAUR!" as Borriz put it. "What kind of cow lurks in caves?"

As they passed one opening, out of the darkness lunged a mail-wearing minotaur with a spear. The party wasn't surprised but their PCs near the back got caught. Aelfred the drover got gored and Koric took a spear in the side, and dropped from the wounds inflicted. He also dropped the flask of self-igniting oil! Vryce's player dropped a d6 - on a 1-3, it would burst and ignite. On a 4-6, it would land gently enough thanks to their best-effort packing job. Clatter, clatter - a 4. Safe, from fire anyway. Since they had 10 flasks worth of alchemist's fire in that jug, this would have been really bad.

The group reacted. Red Raggi turned and charged back. Borriz aimed his hatchet into the melee. Vryce turned and put two hard chops into the minotaur's left leg, opening it up and spraying blood but not crippling it. Inquisitor Marco put Might on Vryce to boost his strength. And Volos did something, but now I can't remember what.

Then Volos got gored with the Lord of the Maze's horns and by his spear. He tried to block the horns and Fumble the spear. Both failed, and he was run through the stomach by the spear and gored through both of his pectorals by the mighty horns; he failed his HT roll from the massive damage and died.*

The group really opened up on the Lord of the Maze. It wasn't defending itself, so they hit the minotaur at will. Vryce sliced its leg twice more, shattering its thighbone for sure but he didn't fall. Borriz put his throwing hatchet into its skull and did enough damage to knock a piece off and expose some brain and carry a bit away, but it didn't seem to bother it much. And Orrie chopped the minotaur in the neck with his shortened halberd (thanks to Telegraphic Attack, which I added to the GURPS canon years back, heh), slicing through some mail. Red Raggi ran up and two-handed it in the chest with the captured gnoll axe. And still it came on, trying to gore and spear Vryce but failing. Vryce hit it again, this time in the body for tremendous damage. And then Red Raggi whacked it and dropped it to the ground.

Silence reigned for a second or two.

Then Red Raggi screamed his victory cry and thudded his axe into the mail-clad minotaur at his feet.

Amusingly, Vryce's last pair of blows had put the critter to 1 HP above automatic death (-5xHP), and then Raggi hit it and finished it.

We left the game there, right after the minotaur fell. It was late, late, late for us workers and family folks - I had to be awake for work in less than 7 hours and others had to pick up kids, get home to their kids, etc. So we literally dropped it there and decided to pick it up next time.

* For non-GURPS players, this is something I consider a feature of the game. All combat is dangerous, regardless of who or what is involved.

Some of out of game notes:

- the players have been told repeatedly the game setting was "lethal" and that PCs could and probably would die. Also, that more powerful critters than they'd encountered so far were around. They took this seriously and played with care and brutal ruthlessness in combat. Even so, they found one of those more powerful critters in unfavorable circumstances, and lost a PC despite their best efforts. But they didn't panic or get demoralized. They pretty much shrugged off the losses and then beat the Lord of the Maze down.

- My usual rule for DF is that we end a session when people have to leave, but you also have to get yourselves out of the dungeon and back to safety. So we tend to make decisions based on "I have to leave in 45 minutes, so you had better start looking for a way out."
This allows for rotating in and out of players and PCs, and lets me pass time between sessions using the actual calender. But even though we had an obvious stop point, we didn't stop . . . because the players wanted to go on a bit more, and I really liked to see people follow the temptation to do just . . . one . . . more . . . room and then find out it was a room too far. That's fun and worth the headache of not stopping 30 minutes or so before.

- I gave Volos a really gory ending to make his death fun, but it didn't help anyone's enjoyment at the table that I can tell. Oh well. What I might do is allow some kind of dying action, or dying speech, or other bit of fun for the player of the now-dead PC. My only concern is dying actions that undo the death of the PC ("I'm dead, eh? My dying action is to use this Ring of Great Wish . . . ") or make killing a PC instantly fatal ("I failed my HT roll. Crud. Okay, for my dying action, I smash my necklace of fireballs into the jug of alchemist's fire I'm carrying . . . ") But we'll see.

Volos's player is a bit disappointed he died, but he's already got ideas for his next wizard and we'll see what he ends up with. This is good because a trip to the nearby city and funds to donate to the church to get Volos Resurrected would almost certainly bankrupt them. And it'll cost them more than just cash, because I want to make Resurrection a big, big deal.

- I guess that session a while back where Inquisitor Marco's player showed up with a six-pack and it was all we had in the way of snacks and drinks for 4 people hit home. We had more snacks and beer than we needed, which is how it should be.

- My rule is, the music is on, what you say is in character. A few painful slips out of character might come back to haunt them - they openly discussed turning Red Raggi into the authorities when they returned to civilization. In front of Red Raggi, and in front of NPCs who strongly dislike Red Raggi. That might not bite them on the ass but it could.

"It's okay, Gary sent us."

Way back in my early years of D&D, I started with the red box Basic Set.

Page B28 had an Example of Combat. Here's a small excerpt of the party encountering some hobgoblins. The party consists of four 1st and 2nd level characters . . . their fifth member having died in another example further on.

Silverleaf steps forward with both hands empty in a token of friendship, and says "Greetings, noble dwellers of deep caverns; can we help you?". Just in case, Silverleaf is thinking of the words he must chant to cast his spell [Sleep]

[snip some stuff about reaction rolls]

The largest of the hobgoblins shouts, in his language, "Go away! You're not allowed in this room!"

"It's okay, Gary sent us," Silverleaf answers.

"Huh?" the hobgoblin wittily responds.

The DM rolls a new reaction roll with no adjustments. The roll is a 3; the hobgoblins charge.

Picture me reading this as a nine year old. The editor of the book is a guy named Tom Moldvay, and even his name isn't on the cover. Who wrote this I wouldn't even have known.

So who the hell Gary was, I didn't know.

This only became funny years later when I connected the "Gary sent us" to Gary Gygax. By then I was playing AD&D and hobgoblins were Lawful Evil and no Good or Neutral player would never have negotiated with them.

A few things strike me about this example, years later. Things I'd like to see emulated in my Dungeon Fantasy play:

People negotiate with intelligent creatures. Not just bribes tossed to hungry monsters or a sword dropped to discourage a rust monster from eating your armor. They talk to monsters to try to avoid combat.

There isn't a big emphasis on slaying things for experience points. By the time I got to playing in a big way, and understood things like how to gain levels (we had a few guys at first level until it seemed like second level seemed appropriate) . . . we knew that you killed every freaking monsters you ran into and looted it. A properly "done" dungeon was empty of anything alive that was worth XP. The idea of exploring further and conserving resources by trying to deal with intelligent creatures who obviously won't be wealthy never even came up. The fact that this encounter netted the PCs nothing much beyond some information and a dead PC shows what could happen in combat.

Prisoners are taken and spared. I'm trying to remember last time that happened and it wasn't a group of lawful mercs that the PCs didn't want to kill to avoid pissing off other mercs. Everyone else got Black Company'd and had to dig their own graves. Heck, the example says outright that the Sister Rebecca "tells Morgan [Ironwolf] that a Lawful person keeps her word" - to evil humanoids!

So yeah, Gary sent us. He sure did, but as a kid I missed the joke and as an older GM we got away from "get some treasure out of this hole!" and moved to "kill everything we can to gain levels." Shame, that.