ToEE 4E Session 6 - The Walking Dead

As we pick up the action our heroes discover a bundle in one corner of the dead ogre's room begins to move. After a cautious investigation they discover it's an elf - an adventuring elf named Draco who was captured by the ogre the day before and fortunately not eaten yet. He begins looking for his gear as the party unlocks a door in the south wall and discovers more prisoners - a couple of humans and a gnome. The two humans are merchants from Hillsfar and promise to send a reward if they are freed. The gnome is a bit more mysterious about his background but mentions that he too was captured by the ogre a few days ago and gives Horus a pin, telling him that it will mark him as a friend to other members of his brotherhood.

After leading the freed prisoners up to the surface, the wizard offers to escort them back to Hommlet. Draco, however, wants to stay and explore the ruin with his rescuers as he is a ranger and wants to make sure the danger is ended.

Moving back to the under-moathouse the party heads for the southern end of a long hall they did not explore previously, discovering a row of doors in one wall. Opening one, it appears to be a cell, and it contains two zombies who shuffle forward, moaning, as soon as the door is opened! This appears to be a signal as the other 4 doors are shoved open and more zombies emerge. From the darkness behind the party more shuffling sounds are heard as even more zombies stagger forth! It's not looking good and the party undergoes a serious morale check around the table at this point.

Swarmed! (Yes there are some PC mini's in there somewhere)

Draco, somewhat farther back than the rest of the group unleashes death in the form of twin arrows to the face of the nearest zombie as Horus and Po cut down another! Encouraged by the double kill, and realizing that they might be able to fight their way through this, the party now makes a stand, slashing and smashing their way into the horde. Torinn finds himself cut off from his companions and unloads his acid breath and his burning spray spell all at once, sending blazing, smoldering zombies staggering back. The bladesinger, druid, and swordmage (and Po) form a line, supported at range by a quick-firing ranger and link back up with the sorcerer, finishing off the shambling horrors soon enough.

A brief rest is called after the fight and then of course the searching begins. Checking the area, the cells, and the remains they find a few trinkets but nothing major. The room adjoining the hall is a torture chamber, one used more recently than it should have been for an old abandoned ruin. They also find a secret door in one of the columns in the area - the column turned out to be hollow and had runs set in the interior wall, leading downward into darkness. After a brief debate the heroes climb down, one by one, into a dank, earthen tunnel, complete with bad smell.

Moving single-file down the tunnel they soon come to a larger, open area and at the far end they see a group of humanoid creatures clustered around something on the ground - the ranger thinks it's a body, and the bladesinger agrees. They decide to be the attackers this time and charge forward, gaining the advantage of surprise. Concentrating on the nearest thing, which they identify as a ghoul as soon as it turns toward them, they score hits from blasts and blades but these ghouls are made of tougher stuff than the zombies and it does not fall. In fact, one of them leaps at Po and slays the spirit-bear in a rending slash of claws and teeth! Enraged, Horace lays about with cudgel and spell, as do the others, and soon the remaining ghouls are slain, the last falling to a flourish from the swordmage, showing off again but in an effective way. The heroes pause to rest and to resummon their spirit companion before exploring these catacombs.

DM Notes: Our new player from last session couldn't make it but Apprentice Who decided to make his first foray into 4th edition and made up (with some assistance) a bow ranger which turned out to be a very effective choice, especially for a new player. With a melee defender, melee striker, melee (somewhat) controller, an a melee animal companion blocking for him he was pretty safe, and he was still able to contribute a lot to the group. He was very happy with his choice. Starting off with the ogre's prisoners made this swapping in and out of characters quite easy to do within the adventure.


Both combats lasted 5 rounds, not too bad for 4E, and did not drag out ridiculously in real time either. Undead are actually fun again in 4E as you don't have the massive swing factor of 3E where either the cleric  blows them away with a Turn Undead or he fails/sucks/is dead and the no-crit/no sneak-attack rule means that the fight goes on longer than most - 4E doesn't see a ton of turning and doesn't do the no-crit thing.


The prisoner rewards give me openings to complicate their lives down the road. Some are immediate - I'm sure some of you recognize the pin - and some are longer term, like the grateful merchants who might have a job or a request in the future - more fun for me.


Anyway, next time: more fun in the catacombs. 

Motivational Monday

New Marvel RPG - First Look

Short Take: It's very different.

Slightly longer take: The terminology is a little confusing on my first read-through but I'm getting it. It's not a dead-simple mechanical design like Icons but it's not as complex as M&M or Champions.

Personal scale of Supers games from least to most complex:

Icons -> Marvel Super Heroes -> V&V -> Silver Age Sentinels -> M&M -> Champions

The character sheet looks about as complicated as any traditional Supers game but what's there is not the same as other games.  I would describe most other super RPG's as driven by plot then settled by mechanics. This game is almost plot as mechanics. There's a lot of player control mechanics and giving and taking of dice based on weaknesses or complications or seeking an advantage or just rolling a "1" sometimes.

There are no standard attributes like Strength Dex or Con - only the stuff that is unusual is rated. That's taking a little time for me to get used to, but I think I can live with it. It is absolutely not a Simulationist game, in gamer techie terms. It is very much a storytellers game. You're not likely to see CharOp boards springing up around this game. Things are rated by die type, kind of like Savage Worlds, and you then assemble these different capabilities into a dice pool that you use to resolve your action. I've never played another game using these mechanics so it's a pretty big shift for me. I usually associate dice pools with fairly simple game mechanics like d6 Star Wars and Shadowrun but these are a level more complicated than that and at the moment less intuitive.

Final Oddity for now: There really aren't detailed rules for character creation. That's a little weird since character options are usually the heart of a Supers system. There's a short section that walks you through the structure of a character and basically says "decide what each of these things should be" but if you're looking for a long list of powers and point costs or random charts you're not going to find them here. They do give you 20+ Marvel heroes (which can be mined for power ideas) and a starting "Event" which is this game's name for a campaign, and I think it works, but I need to read through some of it again and try running it.

Easy Star Wars Names

Running Dawn of Defiance has been fun but some of the names in the thing are just not right. Star Wars names have a certain quality to them and I don't think it's that hard to come up with them but you do have to think about it a little bit.

Example: One of the early allies for the players is named "Sirona Okeefe". I don't mind Sirona really, but Okeefe? Is she Irish? Easily recognized ethnic names are kind of out if you're trying stick to that long time ago & far away thing. Part of it is how the name sounds, and part of it is how it looks on the page. For example, I would change this one to "Okifi" just to mix it up. The sound is mostly a change on the emphasis, but it looks different enough that most people aren't going to think about shamrocks and such when they hear it.

Another one is a stranded hiding-out leftover mercenary named Vazus "Mandrake" - seriously? Does he wear a top hat? Does he do magic tricks? I tried to emphasize the Vazus part and vowed to do a serious cleanup on these ridiculous names.

Now for Sirona I modified it and for Mandrake (grind) I tried to ignore the bad half. Besides these options you can use other words that just sound like they belong in Star Wars:

• Jedi Knight Jeet Kun Do is a formidible fighter even without his lightsaber. More fun here.

• Gran trader Gnip Gnop is a wealthy merchant who could be a patron or an enemy

• Chewchilla the wookie berserker, is called a monster by some.

• Trunkk Ajarr, Trandoshan Bodyguard (that's A-jar, emphasis on the "A")

There was an old (and bad) Avalon Hill game called "Freedom in the Galaxy" that was based on Star Wars and had some good names including a lizard man named Ly Mantok, a galactic knight named Vans Ka-Tie-A, and others:

A lot of those are pretty useful although Adam Starlight is clearly a DC Heroes name, not a Star Wars name. Boccanegra was a space pirate and I thought that sounded very much like a pirate name. I think it's Italian for Blackbeard or something anyway, so it fits.

 These are the bad guys and while not quite as colorful I think Thysa Kimbo (wink wink) is a darn fine name and I'd use that picture too. Smuggler, Emperor's Hand, whatever - I can find a place for her in the game. Here's her writeup in the game:

Illegitimate daughter of Coreguya, the princess has spent most of her adult life waiting for Coreguya to die so that she may ascend to the throne, oblivious to the fact that Redjac may have other plans for the throne that do not involve succession. She grew up pampered in the Imperial court, and became the bitter enemy of Zina Adora when she learned that Rayner Derban was more attracted to Zina than to herself.

For a complete rundown of names and a brief snippet and some pics go here and scroll down to "Player Aids". The characters are in the "Rebel cards" and "Imperial cards" files.

Poking around on the internet it appears that someone is using Freedom in the Galaxr to run a Star Wars campaign - now that's an interesting approach. Having a big board to jump around on could be a lot of fun.

Anyway there are some of my easy ways to fix or find names for Star Wars. Even looking outside of Wookieepedia, there are plenty of good candidates out there.

An Urgent Announcement to the Populace!

The ongoing campaign against the invader Hannibal has suffered a terrible setback!

Despite winning the first 3 battles of the war - Akragas, Crimissos River, and Bagradas, Roman leadership faltered at the Ticinus River*, recovered at Trebbia**, then suffered another defeat at Lake Trasimenus!

Fear not though, citizens! Another battle is set to take place at Cannae and Lord Blaster is confident that he will prevail over Lord Blacksteel, despite these recent thrashings.***

This news provided by the Capitoline Brotherhood of Millers. The Brotherhood uses only the finest flour: True Roman bread for true Romans!



*suffering a total shut-out

** thanks to an ambush that never occurred - Hey! Hannibal's brother! Off with your head!

***Perhaps too confident, based on this weekend's results.

Motivational Monday

Savage Tides of Kalamar - Session 13 - "Who's going to clean up this mess?"

Biirthday and Valentine's Day and Kid Stuff have cut into my time recently so here's another blast from the past...

October 25, 2008

Players:

Dorian Windseeker, High Elf Ranger/Rogue

Katan, Half-Hobgoblin Paladin

Arianne, Grey Elf Cleric of The Lantern

Quillathe, Grey Elf Paladin of The Lantern (deceased) Liamae, Human Sorceress

Tylock, Human Fighter

Michella, Human Wizard

Solveliss, High Elf Sorcerer

(Party levelled up, most are 4th now)

Our Heroes begin in the basement of the Vanderboren mansion, catching their breath after a hard fight. Searching the area they discover that Liamae, the prisoner, had not managed to kill herself but was instead attempting to fake her own death and had succeeded a little too well, putting herlself into unconsciousness. The party revivied her, Tylock, and Arianne with some spells and healing potions, but nothing could be done for Quillathe. After a few moments of silence, they headed upstairs, leaving the body of their companion behind.

Moving quickly, the warriors moved up to he ground floor, then up additional flights of stairs. Encountering no one, they continued a rapid search of the house.

On the 3rd floor, the group discovered what appeared to be Lavinia’s room, where a fight had taken place, as indicated by the dead bullyug still in the room. Next door they discovered an undisturbed room they suspected might belong to Vanthus. Finally, investigating the last room, they heard noises inside. Readying weapons, Dorian kicked in the door.

Inside was a disturbing scene – Lavinia, the housekeeper halfling, and 2 more members of the “A-team” were tied to chairs in the middle of the room. All of them appeared unconscious and at least one them was injured. A large, heavily muscled and tatooed half-orc was rolling off the large bed in one corner, scimitar at the ready. A huge, bloated frog-man was seated in a chair opposite the door and was already casting a spell of some kind.

Dorian moved to free the hostages, Katan charged the frog-man while the wizards began shooting at the same target. Katan was briefly double-teamed by the half-orc and the frog priest, while a Fiendish Wolverine materialized among the group at the entrance and scattered the magic-users.

Dorian discovered that the housekeeper was dead, throat cut. he moved to free Lavinia who appeared to be awake but pulled back when he realized her chair was trapped. The Half-Orc pulled out of the fight with Katan and ordered the group to hold as he held his blade to Lavinia’s throat.

Aggressive negotiations ensued when the party tried to convince Drevoraz that His captain, Harliss Javell, had sent the party to stop him. Eventually he was convinced and made a deal with the party – let him leave unharmed and the group could do what they wanted. The Bullywug shaman in the room lost it at this point and began attacking the party. Drevoraz held out of this fight while the band quickly dispatched the crazed frog-man. After this, the half orc left to find his captain and the party began freeing hostages.

Lavinia was alive and mostly unhurt, though she was now clearly done with her brother, Vanthus. She thanked the party for rescuing her, put them on a bigger retainer, then asked for some time to consider her options as she was planning to have them hunt down her brother for justice and not a little revenge.

During this aftermath, the group took the opportunity to recover and refit. Wounds were healed, diseases were cured, salvaged equipment was sold and new equipment was purchased. Some special items were even comissioned.

In the middle of these operations, a message arrived from Brother Egil in Freeport. He requested the party’s aid in solving another problem, as it appeared the evil they encountered previously had returned and was plaging his temple and the city once again. Our heroes finished outfitting and hopped aboard a ship to Freeport on Pelsday, the 2nd of Sowing, Year of the King 1044, almost a month after thay had left that city. Trading stories with the crew along the way, they were unaware of the danger they were about to face…

Dawn of Defiance - Session 2

In a small retcon it was determined that Jed Striker and Ril Stendar had taken off earlier to scout out the storage bay where Maya's package was located. This was because one of my players was out and another one changed characters. Emerging from the shadows at the back of the cargo bay was one Dith, trandoshan soldier, who had been asking Switch about job opportunities when the party entered.

Noticing the stranger and with Switch vouching for him (though he didn't know the lizard at all) the party decided that some extra muscle couldn't hurt and invied him along. About this time the distinctive sound of gamorrean guards being gunned down blasted through the bay and a posse of low-life thugs walked in. Behind the thugs was one Ganga Lor.

A rival "crime lord" to Switch, he had picked this particular time for a showdown with the crimedroid and it took only a few words for the blaster bolts to start flying and for the less-armored and less brave to start diving for cover.

The trandoshan and the Jedi of course pull melee weapons and wade into the fight while the rest of the team provides supporting fire from behind crates and cargo pallets. Dusan's saber works the expected magic and cutting foes down to size while Dith's vibroaxe ups the game to an "R" rating as he performs even more violent size alterations without the neatness of instant cauterization. While this carnage is going on Talor gets a chance to use a grenade on one cluster of goons and discovers they too are quite effective and probably rated R as well.

In short order the fight is over. Most of the party is fine except for Ardana who sports a nasty blaster burn and might possible have passed out during the fight when it happend. On the bright side, everyone knows how force points work now.

Switch thanks the group, rewards them with credits and some additional information, and curses his own clearly-bought-off guards. Emboldened by their success the heroes head out to secure Maya's cargo from Blue Deck.

There's a nice combination of recon, tactical thinking, and roleplaying at this point as you might expect.  Knowledge, persuasion, stealth, gather info, and the twi'lek's non-force based mind control powers ...

It would probably work on me too

...are focused on the main corridor outside the docking bay, one snivelling weasel of an informant, and a small group of docking bay cargo handlers, chased out of the bay by a squad of stormtroopers. Among the information, rumors, and comm numbers collected is the location of a small side entrance to the bay used by the regular workers.

All goes well at first as the group pokes around, carefully noting the location of the stormtroopers and sneaking in behind various pieces of cover near the door. Then someone blows a stealth check - badly - and the fight is on.

The Jedi cuts down one trooper then leaps over to the glorified hover-forklift being used to pull the cargo pod out of a rack and slices the trooper driving it in half. The imperial officer in charge tries to form some kind of organized response but he is gunned down as soon as he shows his face to the waiting Talor. Ardana takes another nasty shot and the trandoshian vibro-axes another hapless stormtrooper before the fight is over.

Inspecting the package it is revealed to be a human frozen in carbonite ... hum, who would have seen that coming. Thinking swiftly the team locks out the doors at the computer console and frantically radios Maya with an update. She tells them to wait and the heroes are greeted with the sight of a Baudo-class star yacht sliding into the bay. The ramp drops and a human woman shouts "let's get that on board and get out of here" so they do and then they do. It's Sirona Okeefee, captain of the Banshee,  and she and her pilot droid Crash are the ride today, departing for Alderaan RIGHT NOW! They jump to light speed and ... end scene.

Landing uneventfully on Alderaan they unload their cargo and then end up meeting with Senator Bail Organa who thanks them, asks them for a favor, and gives them some money and a vaguely-defined expense account. Freely spending the Senator's credits, the team prepares for a simple extraction from an imperial prison facility - next stop Felucia!

DM Notes: this was a good session with some player and character shuffling, both wrapping up part 1 of the adventure and setting the stage for part 2 and the rest of the campaign. Combat is fairly deadly to low level - low Dex - low Con - low Reflex & hit point characters. Fortunately they do get 5 force points each. 


Also: Half of the names in this adventure are fine, but the other half are terrible, just terrible, not Star-Warsian at all. So I'm going to have fun with them. More on that later.  

Motivational Monday

Man, that does not look good ...