A few fun bits from last session:
- I have the Brotherhood Complex fully mapped out in the VTT. So people can just click and drag themselves around willy-nilly. And they did. PCs got seperated, NPCs lagged here and there, and so on. It was fun.
Especially fun is that, just like Belmak Battlebeard in their last group to hit this area, Thor became Thor Doorsbane, and ran around opening every door he could. Even when other PCs weren't quite down with opening a door, too late, he was there and rolling Forced Entry. There is a lot more impulsive stuff going on when everyone can just move and do on their own.
- We have dragons at home. The players talked about going after a dragon last session, including the one they spotted at the lake in the Lost City of D'Abo. Chop shot that down, saying, basically, we have a dragon in Felltower, we don't have to go all the way to the Lost City to fight a dragon.
- In a less fun bit, flaming swords suck to GM. I have to and manually add 2 injury, burning, as a followup, to every foe hit. There must be a better way . . . and that +2 injury is nice but, geez, it's often on top of 30-40 injury and barely relevant.
Tuesday, September 17, 2024
Monday, September 16, 2024
GURPS DF Session 198, Brotherhood Complex 6 - Gnolls & Doors
Real Date: 9/15/2024
Game Date: 9/18/2024
Weather: Sunny, warm.
Characters Chop, human cleric (301 points)
Harold, human guard
Samual, human guard
Duncan Tesadic, human wizard (300 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (316 points)
Thor Halfskepna, human knight (306 points)
Vladimir Luchnick, dwarf martial artist (266 points)
The PCs gathered in Stericksburg, lacking, sadly, even concepts of a plan. After gathering rumors they decided their best bet was to take on the dragon near the beholder's lair in Felltower. That quickly became "let's send Invisible Flying Vlad down to steal a scoop of treasure and get out" and then back to "but fight the dragon." Thor pointed out that dragons fly, they don't have tactical combat flight, and then they'll all die fighting the dragon. So they decided to head to the Brotherhood Complex and raid it, sure they could at least score some loot from the guards.
There had been some recent discussion about going to the complex, and it was agreed that fighting intelligent, active foes in what would be an assault, not a normal dungeon crawl, would take some specialized gear (like Magebane grenades) and fighting support (as in, a large number of combat-capable hirelings.) All of that went out the window for an imediately delve.* Instead they just bought 10 days of rations and set out.
Around midday on day 3 they reached the valley where the cave to the Brotherhood Complex is. They watched it while chowing down on rations, saw nothing going on, and headed in. The cave concealed a long, meandering and narrow hall that eventually ended up in a large room with a pair of giant metal doors. They spoke the passphrase and went through. Relying on the notes of previous delvers, they avoided the obvious exit and found an illusionary wall with stairs beyond. They dumped all of their spare rations in a corner in the room and sent Vlad ahead, with Dark Vision and Invisibility. He headed down the stairs, quietly, and heard some suppressed breathing and a low rumbling growl. He moved around the corner and saw a half-dozen gnolls, with a mix of longbows and morningstars, all clearly waiting for action. A triger padded out of a crack in the wall and started howling. Vlad backed off and shot the triger, and whistled for help.
The PCs rushed down and formed a rough line. The triger had run off, but the gnolls advanced. Vlad kept shooting the gnolls, trying to wound as many as he could to limit their ability to run for help. The gnolls yelled and barked and the triger roared a triple-throated roar from the crack in the wall.
The PCs moved up and attacked. Chop used Command on one of the gnolls, Thor started cutting them up, and Vlad kept shooting them. The triger rushed out and clawed up Samual and hurt Harold before going down until a lot of sword swings, arrows, stabs, and axes from Hannari. Duncan hit the triger and one of the gnolls with Stone Missile, but otherwise it was mostly Thor and Vlad killing them with Hannari crippling a couple on top of that. In about 15 seconds or so of fighting, they'd managed to kill them all. This was before any could run for help, but the gnolls and triger had put up a loud racket before going down.
They made sure the gnolls were dead, healed up their hirelings, and started to search around. They wanted to move quickly. They did, going from door to door to door in the area east of the entrance stairs (which are in the NW.) Amongst the oddities they found was an acidic water pit. They stayed clear - good choice, as it burbled and bubbled and exploded like a geyser after a few minutes. They put Resist Fire for the heat and Resist Acid for the acid and sent Vlad in to investigate. He fished around in the acid a bit but there wasn't anything in it they could see. They took a path around it and went on, exploring further and opening more doors.
In one, they saw a flickering light at the end of a hallway - from a crack in the floor. It was hot, too, so they all backed off and sent in Vlad with Resist Fire. As he headed down the hallway, the entire floor crumbled, revealing a bed of superheated coals. He fell, getting badly injured but not crippled. With help from Duncan - who also put Resist Fire on himself - he was brought out with Walk on Air. First, he spent some time searching the coals for loot before giving up. They headed out.
From there, they circled around and eventually found a hallway that led to a locked door. They tried to force it, but it was barred. Apportation couldn't shift the bar - it was locked down - and forcing the door failed. Hannari unlocked it, but that didn't help with the bar. So they decided to hack the door down, with Thor using Hannari's axe.
After bashing it a bit, Vlad - on lookout - saw a gnoll and shot it. He called to them.
The PCs stopped what they were doing and ran to Vlad. He saw more gnolls, and some humans in armor and a number of robe-wearing figures.
Vlad kept sending arrows down the hallway, wounding gnolls and trying - and missing - against the robed guys. Thor and Samuel and Harold rushed forward, and Hannari moved forward with him. Two of the robed guys throw spells - an Explosive Fireball and an Explosive Acid Ball, both 6d. They did a solid amount of damage - 24 for the fireball, 27 for the acid. In the narrow hallway there wasn't really anywhere to jump aside. Thor was fine, although his armor was corroded a bit on the back and he's got some burning gear. Samual is engulfed in flames, Harold burning and badly hurt. Hannari was hurt as well, and is also burned.
The PCs have the gnolls, robed cultists, and guards moving to engage them and also north . . . and are effectively between the PCs and the exit, now with two hirelings badly hurt and unable to outrun anyone (if they can stay up.)
And that's where we called it, for time.
* Because hiring NPCs means I need to generate them, make tokens for them, and put the in the VTT, which is time consuming . . . and that time would come out of our playing time.
Notes:
- I like having the whole map open so people can manually move around. Much easier on me.
- The plan was a hit-and-run raid - I think - but in the end a lot of time was spent clearing empty rooms and doubling over areas. They didn't map, because that would take far too long (and would have meant a response much earlier). But they also spent a good amount of time trying to hack down a door in a dead end. We'll see how it goes from here.
- So far, the loot is a triger pelt and some weapons from the gnolls they'll loot on the way out. Unless they can defeat the enemies they face now and hold the field, of course. The pelt is damaged - I'll roll to see how much, but since they took the Triger to -91 HP from 19, aka between -4x and -5xHP, it's going to be less valuable. Sorry . . . best way to get a triger pelt isn't to hack the triger to death.
MVP was Vlad for valuable and effective missile fire. My vote, which doesn't count, was for Hannari's player, who suggested a monster that I'll write up the next time I need a post with a silly monster.
Game Date: 9/18/2024
Weather: Sunny, warm.
Characters Chop, human cleric (301 points)
Harold, human guard
Samual, human guard
Duncan Tesadic, human wizard (300 points)
Hannari Ironhand, dwarf martial artist (316 points)
Thor Halfskepna, human knight (306 points)
Vladimir Luchnick, dwarf martial artist (266 points)
The PCs gathered in Stericksburg, lacking, sadly, even concepts of a plan. After gathering rumors they decided their best bet was to take on the dragon near the beholder's lair in Felltower. That quickly became "let's send Invisible Flying Vlad down to steal a scoop of treasure and get out" and then back to "but fight the dragon." Thor pointed out that dragons fly, they don't have tactical combat flight, and then they'll all die fighting the dragon. So they decided to head to the Brotherhood Complex and raid it, sure they could at least score some loot from the guards.
There had been some recent discussion about going to the complex, and it was agreed that fighting intelligent, active foes in what would be an assault, not a normal dungeon crawl, would take some specialized gear (like Magebane grenades) and fighting support (as in, a large number of combat-capable hirelings.) All of that went out the window for an imediately delve.* Instead they just bought 10 days of rations and set out.
Around midday on day 3 they reached the valley where the cave to the Brotherhood Complex is. They watched it while chowing down on rations, saw nothing going on, and headed in. The cave concealed a long, meandering and narrow hall that eventually ended up in a large room with a pair of giant metal doors. They spoke the passphrase and went through. Relying on the notes of previous delvers, they avoided the obvious exit and found an illusionary wall with stairs beyond. They dumped all of their spare rations in a corner in the room and sent Vlad ahead, with Dark Vision and Invisibility. He headed down the stairs, quietly, and heard some suppressed breathing and a low rumbling growl. He moved around the corner and saw a half-dozen gnolls, with a mix of longbows and morningstars, all clearly waiting for action. A triger padded out of a crack in the wall and started howling. Vlad backed off and shot the triger, and whistled for help.
The PCs rushed down and formed a rough line. The triger had run off, but the gnolls advanced. Vlad kept shooting the gnolls, trying to wound as many as he could to limit their ability to run for help. The gnolls yelled and barked and the triger roared a triple-throated roar from the crack in the wall.
The PCs moved up and attacked. Chop used Command on one of the gnolls, Thor started cutting them up, and Vlad kept shooting them. The triger rushed out and clawed up Samual and hurt Harold before going down until a lot of sword swings, arrows, stabs, and axes from Hannari. Duncan hit the triger and one of the gnolls with Stone Missile, but otherwise it was mostly Thor and Vlad killing them with Hannari crippling a couple on top of that. In about 15 seconds or so of fighting, they'd managed to kill them all. This was before any could run for help, but the gnolls and triger had put up a loud racket before going down.
They made sure the gnolls were dead, healed up their hirelings, and started to search around. They wanted to move quickly. They did, going from door to door to door in the area east of the entrance stairs (which are in the NW.) Amongst the oddities they found was an acidic water pit. They stayed clear - good choice, as it burbled and bubbled and exploded like a geyser after a few minutes. They put Resist Fire for the heat and Resist Acid for the acid and sent Vlad in to investigate. He fished around in the acid a bit but there wasn't anything in it they could see. They took a path around it and went on, exploring further and opening more doors.
In one, they saw a flickering light at the end of a hallway - from a crack in the floor. It was hot, too, so they all backed off and sent in Vlad with Resist Fire. As he headed down the hallway, the entire floor crumbled, revealing a bed of superheated coals. He fell, getting badly injured but not crippled. With help from Duncan - who also put Resist Fire on himself - he was brought out with Walk on Air. First, he spent some time searching the coals for loot before giving up. They headed out.
From there, they circled around and eventually found a hallway that led to a locked door. They tried to force it, but it was barred. Apportation couldn't shift the bar - it was locked down - and forcing the door failed. Hannari unlocked it, but that didn't help with the bar. So they decided to hack the door down, with Thor using Hannari's axe.
After bashing it a bit, Vlad - on lookout - saw a gnoll and shot it. He called to them.
The PCs stopped what they were doing and ran to Vlad. He saw more gnolls, and some humans in armor and a number of robe-wearing figures.
Vlad kept sending arrows down the hallway, wounding gnolls and trying - and missing - against the robed guys. Thor and Samuel and Harold rushed forward, and Hannari moved forward with him. Two of the robed guys throw spells - an Explosive Fireball and an Explosive Acid Ball, both 6d. They did a solid amount of damage - 24 for the fireball, 27 for the acid. In the narrow hallway there wasn't really anywhere to jump aside. Thor was fine, although his armor was corroded a bit on the back and he's got some burning gear. Samual is engulfed in flames, Harold burning and badly hurt. Hannari was hurt as well, and is also burned.
The PCs have the gnolls, robed cultists, and guards moving to engage them and also north . . . and are effectively between the PCs and the exit, now with two hirelings badly hurt and unable to outrun anyone (if they can stay up.)
And that's where we called it, for time.
* Because hiring NPCs means I need to generate them, make tokens for them, and put the in the VTT, which is time consuming . . . and that time would come out of our playing time.
Notes:
- I like having the whole map open so people can manually move around. Much easier on me.
- The plan was a hit-and-run raid - I think - but in the end a lot of time was spent clearing empty rooms and doubling over areas. They didn't map, because that would take far too long (and would have meant a response much earlier). But they also spent a good amount of time trying to hack down a door in a dead end. We'll see how it goes from here.
- So far, the loot is a triger pelt and some weapons from the gnolls they'll loot on the way out. Unless they can defeat the enemies they face now and hold the field, of course. The pelt is damaged - I'll roll to see how much, but since they took the Triger to -91 HP from 19, aka between -4x and -5xHP, it's going to be less valuable. Sorry . . . best way to get a triger pelt isn't to hack the triger to death.
MVP was Vlad for valuable and effective missile fire. My vote, which doesn't count, was for Hannari's player, who suggested a monster that I'll write up the next time I need a post with a silly monster.
Sunday, September 15, 2024
Felltower pre-summary
We played Felltowe today.
The PCs . . .
- set out to slay one of the dragons of Felltower!
- immediately changed their mind when someone pointed out this was hard
- headed to the Brotherhood Complex
- successfully alarmed the occupants and killed some gnolls
- opened many doors
- and got caught against a locked door by approaching gnolls, cultist guards, and cultists wizards
- and fun ensued.
Details tomorrow!
The PCs . . .
- set out to slay one of the dragons of Felltower!
- immediately changed their mind when someone pointed out this was hard
- headed to the Brotherhood Complex
- successfully alarmed the occupants and killed some gnolls
- opened many doors
- and got caught against a locked door by approaching gnolls, cultist guards, and cultists wizards
- and fun ensued.
Details tomorrow!
Friday, September 13, 2024
Random Bits for 9/13/2024
Not much of a week for gaming - lot of non-gaming things to do.
- This is pretty funny - Conan vs. Barbarianism.
- 2000 posts is a lot of posts. Omedetou, Monsters & Manuals.
- Felltower is Sunday. The fabled Tavern Level probably has this. I doubt the PCs will find the Tavern Level, though. But as Principal Skinner says, "Prove me wrong, kids!"
- I think I might play this, next: Victory in Europe: The Collapse of Nazi Germany 1944-1945. I think the other games I got from Omega Games, War to the Death and Napoleon's Leipzig Campaign, might be a bit too much. We'll see. I'm reading the rules now before I decide. I bought these games so long ago my address on the package is from the house I grew up in. And one of them I'll probably never play.
- This is pretty funny - Conan vs. Barbarianism.
- 2000 posts is a lot of posts. Omedetou, Monsters & Manuals.
- Felltower is Sunday. The fabled Tavern Level probably has this. I doubt the PCs will find the Tavern Level, though. But as Principal Skinner says, "Prove me wrong, kids!"
- I think I might play this, next: Victory in Europe: The Collapse of Nazi Germany 1944-1945. I think the other games I got from Omega Games, War to the Death and Napoleon's Leipzig Campaign, might be a bit too much. We'll see. I'm reading the rules now before I decide. I bought these games so long ago my address on the package is from the house I grew up in. And one of them I'll probably never play.
Sunday, September 8, 2024
TWW: Persian Gulf - Finished
I finished out my standard-length (8 war turns) game of Persian Gulf tonight.
In the end, it was a NATO Substantial Victory. That seems odd, give that, at the end of the game:
- the Turks had been crushed almost entirely
- Iraq was half overrun and over 50% of its military forces were destroyed
- the Jordanian forces had been totally destroyed
- All of central Iran was controlled by the Soviets (albeit narrowly)
What bailed out NATO was aggressive counterattacking and the limited time that the Soviets had thanks to very late mobilization of the Southern Military Districts. That and the fact that only oil fields and forcing surrenders really helps, and the Soviets couldn't force anyone to surrender. They couldn't get to the gulf, either, thanks to the USMC seizing all of the ports. In the end, the Soviets were in a solid position but ran out of time.
I'll post pictures tomorrow if I can, edited back into this post. I have a lot of cleanup to do, since I don't want to just pour everything back into the box. Overall, it was a very satisfying game. If I play another in the series, it'll likely be Southern Front (which might be my favorite) or Artic Front (which is my least favorite, so I think I need to give it another chance.) More likely, I'll work up a game of Fire in the Lake, instead, or dust off Victory in Europe and finally give that a go. But that's for another time.
In the end, it was a NATO Substantial Victory. That seems odd, give that, at the end of the game:
- the Turks had been crushed almost entirely
- Iraq was half overrun and over 50% of its military forces were destroyed
- the Jordanian forces had been totally destroyed
- All of central Iran was controlled by the Soviets (albeit narrowly)
What bailed out NATO was aggressive counterattacking and the limited time that the Soviets had thanks to very late mobilization of the Southern Military Districts. That and the fact that only oil fields and forcing surrenders really helps, and the Soviets couldn't force anyone to surrender. They couldn't get to the gulf, either, thanks to the USMC seizing all of the ports. In the end, the Soviets were in a solid position but ran out of time.
I'll post pictures tomorrow if I can, edited back into this post. I have a lot of cleanup to do, since I don't want to just pour everything back into the box. Overall, it was a very satisfying game. If I play another in the series, it'll likely be Southern Front (which might be my favorite) or Artic Front (which is my least favorite, so I think I need to give it another chance.) More likely, I'll work up a game of Fire in the Lake, instead, or dust off Victory in Europe and finally give that a go. But that's for another time.
Friday, September 6, 2024
Random Thoughts & Links for 9/6/2024
- Next Felltower is the Sunday after this coming Sunday.
- CRPG Addict finally got to Betrayal At Krondor, which I really enjoyed.
- Wealth in GURPS, in a long and detailed look, and a specific campaign's set of rules.
- B/X Procedural Flowcharts. Neat!
- Getting rid of Weapon Master? I won't for Felltower, but I'd run a game without it.
- This kind of thing reminds me of Felltower - more than once my players have realized that, well, maybe they're the bad guys. But like these players, they got over it when they found loot and rationalizations for murder.
"Losses: moral/ethical high ground?" - I love it.
Sometimes I get a little nostalgic for the days when I ran a game and no one killed anyone - deliberately, not just because they didn't find someone to kill.
- My TWW: Persian Gulf game has taken an interesting turn. Nuclear escalation allowed the US to leverage its superior airpower to smash several key Soviet divisions with nuclear weapons, but the Soviet's 3rd wave reservists have flooded the map. A US counterattack has started to push into central Iran, but a massive wave of Soviet divisions - like 15-16 of them - is pushing back the last of the Turks and is moving on Iraq. It should be a tough two turns to finish the game out - the Soviets have to hold on to central Iran or lose a lot of VPs, but they can make up for the loss by crushing Iraq. But is there time? We'll see.
- CRPG Addict finally got to Betrayal At Krondor, which I really enjoyed.
- Wealth in GURPS, in a long and detailed look, and a specific campaign's set of rules.
- B/X Procedural Flowcharts. Neat!
- Getting rid of Weapon Master? I won't for Felltower, but I'd run a game without it.
- This kind of thing reminds me of Felltower - more than once my players have realized that, well, maybe they're the bad guys. But like these players, they got over it when they found loot and rationalizations for murder.
"Losses: moral/ethical high ground?" - I love it.
Sometimes I get a little nostalgic for the days when I ran a game and no one killed anyone - deliberately, not just because they didn't find someone to kill.
- My TWW: Persian Gulf game has taken an interesting turn. Nuclear escalation allowed the US to leverage its superior airpower to smash several key Soviet divisions with nuclear weapons, but the Soviet's 3rd wave reservists have flooded the map. A US counterattack has started to push into central Iran, but a massive wave of Soviet divisions - like 15-16 of them - is pushing back the last of the Turks and is moving on Iraq. It should be a tough two turns to finish the game out - the Soviets have to hold on to central Iran or lose a lot of VPs, but they can make up for the loss by crushing Iraq. But is there time? We'll see.
Sunday, September 1, 2024
Felltower Monsters Bits Law
I blame martinl for this, which just goes to show how I roll my campaign.
Whereas, the dungeons of Felltower and their environs are full of dangerous monsters and fell beasts of untrustwothy and evil origin;
and whereas, the dumping of the corpses of such monsters in Stericksburg's public facilities are potentially dangerous to the morals, bodies, and souls of the inhabitants of the city aforementioned;
and whereas, the discouragement of bringing said fell creatures into the safe environs of the town is to be encouraged and the encouragement of bring them henceforce and into the environs is to be discouraged;
it is hereby decreed that it shall be illegal, against the law, and against the moral standing of the city, county, and kingdom of New Kingdom to bring such fell beings or their remains into town for the venal profit of profiteers. Any and all monters, human-like or human-unlike, shall be prohibited from sales within the confines of town, as shall be their possession. Various and sundry special exemptions are made for those parts previously allowed to be sold under the Wizard's Exemption* unless the sale of such should cause especially problems for the officials especially charged with the discharge of the taxing and allowance of said special parts.
In other words, sale of anything not listed in the Notes sections of monsters is banned in New Kingdom, aka the Kingdom the Game is Set In. In other words, if a skill roll or prior knowledge doesn't say it's valuable, don't take your chances, there will be legal issues. Leave the monsters, take the coinage.
Whereas, the dungeons of Felltower and their environs are full of dangerous monsters and fell beasts of untrustwothy and evil origin;
and whereas, the dumping of the corpses of such monsters in Stericksburg's public facilities are potentially dangerous to the morals, bodies, and souls of the inhabitants of the city aforementioned;
and whereas, the discouragement of bringing said fell creatures into the safe environs of the town is to be encouraged and the encouragement of bring them henceforce and into the environs is to be discouraged;
it is hereby decreed that it shall be illegal, against the law, and against the moral standing of the city, county, and kingdom of New Kingdom to bring such fell beings or their remains into town for the venal profit of profiteers. Any and all monters, human-like or human-unlike, shall be prohibited from sales within the confines of town, as shall be their possession. Various and sundry special exemptions are made for those parts previously allowed to be sold under the Wizard's Exemption* unless the sale of such should cause especially problems for the officials especially charged with the discharge of the taxing and allowance of said special parts.
In other words, sale of anything not listed in the Notes sections of monsters is banned in New Kingdom, aka the Kingdom the Game is Set In. In other words, if a skill roll or prior knowledge doesn't say it's valuable, don't take your chances, there will be legal issues. Leave the monsters, take the coinage.
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