And so we come to the end. Did I know this would be the last session of the campaign? Hard to tell, but I posted about it going on hiatus shortly afterwards. This session ended up being a fitting conclusion for the campaign. Gus and Eric were both in attendance. We ended on real cliffhanger. The whole campaign had been building towards this moment: the party decided to attack the Jale Slaves based.
I had shared a dispatch from Space Alien Strike Force after the previous session, a couple weeks before we played, which might have nudged them towards this showdown.
The session ended with a giant mass battle, which I was once again unsure how to play out. I know I was tracking how many rounds it took to win the fight, and that would tie into casualties and other post-fight shenanigans. Maybe I have notes on G+ somewhere. Oh wait.
My map of the slaver’s base is incomplete, which is pretty funny since it was obvious early on that this was the one thread the party was most interested in pursuing. As it stands, my not finishing things worked out alright in this case.
Masters of Carcosa is the longest campaign I have run. 23 sessions, starting at the end of 2014, ending near the start of 2016. Sharing all these old play reports has been a lot of fun. I haven’t thought about this campaign in some time. Revisiting it now, all these years later, has me wanting to play Carcosa once again. It really is the fucking best.
All troop movement occurs via the large “front” door. The aliens suspect there must be at least one other exit, unless the slavers are idiots.
12 raptor riding guards always patrol the exterior of the slaver base. They think there are at least 18 raptors, based on how the guards rotate in and out of their shifts. They think they can get better intel with more time.
16 Jale Slavers took a group of 28 slaves North East. There are currently 13 slaves that remain chained outside.
There have spotted one person that they suspect might be the leader. Unlike the rest of the slavers he was shirtless and wearing a large lizard’s head as a helmet.
There has been too little troop movement for them to guess at troop size. They think there must be at least 60 slavers in the base, but likely more.
Recap:
The party mills around in Invak for an extra two weeks, prepping for a big battle, thinking hard about what to do next when it comes to the slavers.
Further news from the Space Alien Strike Force reveals that some slavers have returned with additional slaves (13 Red Men), 17 Jale Men look to have come to join as new recruits, and that’s about it.
The party decides, “Fuck it, let’s just kill those mofos.”
They ride out with an army of 120!
A make shift pontoon bridge is built to cross the river.
They leave part of their force behind, and approach with the most bad ass looking laser pistol wielding men and women.
They approach the slaver citadel, and begin making demands of the guards out front.
That doesn’t go well: laser fire is exchanged.
Normangina manages to blow a hole in one of their “arrow slits”, exposing part of the base further up the mountain.
They leave their demands staked to the ground and flee.
The party makes camp, and waits for a fight that doesn’t happen. The next day they advance with their whole army on the slavers base.
A slave is sent out from the base to parlay with the party. He informs them they must flee and never return. “the Overqueen of Small Petals” is an evil women, clearly one steeped in the ways of vile sorcery.
The party isn’t having none of that. They decide there isn’t much point waiting further, and launch their big attack.
One group of their number head up through the hole Normangina created earlier. The other bust through the front door after a bazooka is fired to make the entry easier.
The army of Invak and Jahar pour into the base.
The party come face to face with a group of 6 raptors and their riders.
A vicious fight where several of their hechmen die, and Normangina is knocked out cold. (Though not before hoping onto the back of a raptor and commanding it to bite someone!)
Dion’s character (name?) is almost killed, but the injury just makes him angrier. (Hulkamania Save vs. Death Rule!)
The party is victorious after 4 rounds of combat.
Orange Julia revives Normangina with a desert lotus potion.
What will happen to our fearless heroes?!
Comments:
Ramanan S (2016-04-26 04:29): I wanted to write it out before I forgot what happened. Gus you’ve used two bazooka blasts. Everyone else who still has weapons with explicit ammo counts remember to mark off how many shots you have left. We ended in media res. Gus you can attempt to quickly tame the raptors before you end up embroiled in another fight. It took you 4 rounds to end that fight. So that effects what your next encounter will be FYI.
Chris G (2016-04-26 04:54): +1 for Hulkamania!
Ramanan S (2016-04-26 04:55): First time that’s ever happened (natural 20 when making a save vs. death).
Logan McCormack (2016-04-26 06:06): I just love to read your game reports! :D
Gus L (2016-04-26 17:24): Oh yeah totally taming the raptors! We ride to victory! Also collecting a solid mob of extra combatants.
Post-Session Post:
The bodies of Jale Slavers lay motionless on the ground, their velociraptor mounts mill about confused. Fighting rages all about. The armies of Invak and Jahar have joined forces to fight the scourge of slavery once and for all. The fighting will be vicious. This day was coming: the Rainbow connection crosses the threshold of the Jale Slaver’s mountain citadel.
To be continued …
The game is on hiatus … for now! The Rainbow Connection fights the slavers for the last time. We will have to wait till next season to find out what happens.
This session was all about trying to make friends. The players had a zany scheme: dress up a slaver in the space alien amour they had stolen from a tomb in order to convince the space aliens it was in fact the slavers that were out there desecrating their holy sites.
They once again returned to the Space Alien outpost, no longer abandoned. They had returned to their experiments, making use of the deranged, spherical, hunter robot that stakes the wastes at night. The Carcosa book has this to say about the robot, which is what I used as the seed for my ideas for the this whole space and how all the parts fit together: “It will seek to abduct stragglers and take them to a small, hidden outpost to be shackled in close proximity to radioactive waste. Each hour spent thus requires a successful saving throw to avoid mutation.”
This is the session Asha Rey dies! I remember the session, but don’t recall if this was a surprise round followed by an instant kill due to the dice. Harsh if so. In my head this game was a real meat grinder, but there weren’t actually that many player deaths over the course of the campaign.
Wish I could remember the context for, “Chris P gets 15XP for just being an all around great guy.” He really was, though.
The party puts the space alien armour on one of the Jale Slaver bodies they killed and jam the body in a barrel with some salt and rocks to try and stop the body from decomposing too much.
They travel south towards the space alien outpost, no looking much less abandoned.
A group of space aliens—those the party “freed”—have gone to work repairing the outpost and continuing their experimentation.
The spherical hunter robot exists to bring specimens to the wastes: they will consider turning it off, but promised to stop sending it West towards Jahar and Invak.
The Aliens are far stranger than the ones you have met thus far. They seem cold and emotionless.
The party gives them the heads up that people on Carcosa are fucked up, and then head on their way after learning the space alien strike force headed south east (towards their leaders tomb)
As they get closer they see the same giant translucent T-Rex they saw last time they explored the tomb. It doesn’t see them and wanders South.
The space aliens are nowhere to be seen, but look to have headed south, so they head that was as well, taking care to avoid the dinosaur.
They come upon the poisonous swamps, which stretch out for miles. The aliens are long gone, so they decide to head back and wait for them to return to the tomb.
On the way back they spot 4 savage Mi-Go who dive out of the sky.
Asha Rey is killed instantly — RIP
The fight quickly turns, as the party manage to kill the Mi-Go one after another.
They camp near the alien tomb, waiting for the space aliens.
The aliens come upon them in the middle of the night.
They show the aliens the armour on the slavers body.
The space aliens are disgusted with what was done and will join their fight against the slavers.
Led inside to sleep, but party elects to sleep outside
No overnight drama, they awake safe and sound.
The Space Alien Strike Force head North, planning to scope out the slavers.
Treasure:
The good will of the Space Alien Strike Force
Chris P gets 15XP for just being an all around great guy.
Comments
Ramanan S (2016-03-16 04:09): Let me know if i’ve missed anything. I’ll make an event thread for the next session. We can do the stuff that happens between sessions there.
Dion Williams (2016-03-16 08:57): I was tempted to draw a picture of Asha-Ray exploding with the Mi-Go coming though “Chest Burster Xenomorph” style.
Ramanan S (2016-03-17 05:27): Dion Williams do it!
More slaver killing antics, as the party heads north to investigate rumours of slaver activity. The party had liberated the Orange Man citadel North of their home base of Invak many sessions ago, but hadn’t returned in some time. This was another fairly vanilla session, but was a good setup for the next one, as they had plans for the body of one of the dead slavers.
Though the party was still completely uninterested in exploring the Putrescent Pits of the Ameboid God, I wanted to make it clear that there was another faction exploring the space in their stead. A note they find amongst the dead indicates someone out there was in search of as many slaves as they could get a hold of to explore “the pits”.
My notes for the first floor of the dungeon describe two factions. Lawful Yellow Man cultists who are trying to prevent access to the pits, and Chaotic Purple Man cultists that worship the Ameboid God and want to venture down. There were two entrances down to a level I never bothered mapping (smart!), once guarded by the Lawful cultists, the other a secret entrance discovered by the Purple Men. These Purple Men cultists were operating in the wilderness, though North of the players, so they never really encountered them.
My notes of the dungeon from that time. Maybe I’ll revisit this one day:
There are two levels of caverns above the actual Putrescent Pits of the Amoeboid God. These natural caverns were built by the Snakemen thousands of years ago to cover the actual pit that leads to the Amoeboid God.
Who is here? Ameboid God Cultists. (Two factions: one inside the pit proper, the other trying to find their way down.) Mushroom Men. Space Aliens. Irrational Space Aliens. Primordial Ones. Shohgoths
The pit travels from level 3 all the was to the lowest levels of the dungeon, terminating at the giant Ameboid God. Several entrances to other levels via the pit.
God is several (hundred?) feet below the lowest level
Rival cults distributed between levels 3,4,5
Shogoths on lower levels
Aliens on 5,6,7 fighting irrational aliens
Fungus Men distributed throughout?
Primordial ones 8, 9 battle shogotths
Yeah, that could have been a fun time too.
Players:
Eric Boyd: Orange Julia - Orange Women Fighter
Chris P.: Bone Crone - Bone Women Sorcerer
Dion: Asha-Rea, Ulfire Women Fighter
Recap:
The party leaves Invak and heads north to Investigate rumours about more slaver activity.
They are accompanied by 20 Bone Men from Invak, who will reinforce the citadel to the North.
At the ford where the party normally crosses the river they spot two fish like dinosaurs.
After some investigation it looks like they have just fed, and ignore the party
The citadel welcomes the party. They inform them of two settlements near by that are friendly to slavers: a citadel of Blue Men to the North, and a Village of Green Men to the North East (South of the Putrescent Pits of the Ameboid God)
The party decides to head to the Green Men village, along with two soldiers from the citadel.
Along the way they come upon 13 Bone Men, and 14 slaves manacled together.
The party skirts around and rolls down some rocks onto the slavers below, killing one person and somewhat blocking the path forward.
A big fight breaks out!
The Bone Crone is wounded, but manages to survive a blast from a laser gun.
The party manages to fall back and pick off the slavers in smaller groups, finally killing them all.
The party leads the captured slaves back to the citadel, where they sleep for the night.
They head to Invak in the morning.
They dig up the old space alien armour, which they plan to put on a dead slaver and present to the space aliens.
Treasure:
13 dead slavers can be claimed for the slaver bounty (1300 GP)
14 slaves freed (1400 GP)
2 Laser Rifles (“long” range, d10 ammo die, 2dCarcosa damage)
13 Obsidian Swords
13 Black / Brown “Leather” armour
14 manacles with chain and two sets of keys
200’ of strong rope
20 bone spikes
A letter requests “as many slaves as are currently available”. A price of 50GP per slave is mentioned, some sort of bulk rate. “Must be reasonably able bodied, as they are to be sent down to explore the [putrescent] pits [of the ameboid god].”
Comments:
Eric Boyd (2016-03-01 17:37): And two laser guns, d10 shot die, if I recall correctly.
Ramanan S (2016-03-01 17:38): Ah yes you are right!
Bryan Mullins (2016-03-01 19:44): Nice one you all!
Chris P. (2016-03-02 04:05): Gus L The tidbit about us finding a Jale slaver corpse and preparing to deliver it next session with the armor is probably relevant to you.
Chris P. (2016-03-02 04:09): Also of note, that letter requesting the slaves, and buying at bulk rate, some jerk is REALLY interested in exploring the pits of the amoeboid god. We should look into this. Whomever is getting the Costco discount from the Jale slavers is not somebody I think we want breathing.
Gus L (2016-03-02 06:46): Chris P. Indeed it is - with a day more notice I will certainly be there - I don’t mind giving up the armor for friendship and protection from the alien death squad.
Another session with no treasure, which was starting to become a point of tension with the players. In my mind Carcosa was really grim and grotty: rich PCs didn’t make sense to me. In hindsight, I think we could have made it all work. Dark Sun imagines the fighters raising armies and becoming warlords. This was a direction the PCs had started to think about. We could have leaned into that more. Live and learn.
The session was another zany one, with a Godzilla-esque monster destroying a town and escaping into the wilderness. Of course the monster Yog would end up on the wilderness encounter table.
Dion joined late, and caught the end of the mayhem.)
Recap:
The party heads west towards Torok, to investigate it’s relationship with the Slavers.
The trip West is uneventful.
They arrive in the evening, and decide The Bone Crone will play Queen Zelda, the Bone Men henchmen her guards, the rest of the party her slaves.
The towns people are willing to buy her story, and put up their illustrious host in what amounts to a fancy hovel.
The party visits a nearby bar and proceeds to buy boozes for the towns people.
They learn about the strange creature Yog that lives in the centre of town, that it is placated by a steady diet of slaves and the sweet singing of maidens of the village, and that the town buys slaves from the Jale Slavers.
That’s enough for the party to decide it’s time to burn this mother down!
They pay some patrons to get the word out to the militia there are free booze going around at the bar.
They investigate Yog and come up with a plan: they will torch the bar and hopefully a good chunk of the towns militia, kidnap the singing maiden, and book it.
This more or less works out: they are stopped by 6 towns people, but 2 of that group are convinced this whole Yog thing is really dumb, the remainder are vaporized, with one survivor running off into the night.
The party hops the wall and watches Yog destroy the town in the moonlight.
They head back to Invak with two wandering monster encounters worth of complications!
Comments:
Chris P. (2016-01-27 02:57): No XP, right? (Since we didn’t actually get any gold)
Ramanan S (2016-01-27 03:19): Yeah … I need to see what people do for alternate / additional means of gaining XP. I feel like treasure hunting hasn’t really been a focus of the game for a while. Though the initial slaver animosity may have been due to the bounty on their heads.
Gus L (2016-01-27 03:45): I would say Ramanan S that while treasure might not be the game’s focus neither is leveling. The rules are clear, the only thing I’d say is that when we finally sack these town we should get gp value for supplies and useful properties seized.
Chris G (2016-01-27 05:26): How about giving an XP award for discovering a new settlement? Your game has a fair amount of exploring/getting lost.
Chris P. (2016-01-27 20:03): Gus L If the reward for the game has reflected something that is no longer the focus of the game, then the reward should either be removed or changed. If the intent is to stay first level/low power forever, then we should remove all pretense otherwise and eliminate the XP mechanic entirely.
The players decide to head East, further into the territory friendly with the Jale Slavers. The town the players learn about, Joi, may have been lifted straight from an episode of Masters of the Universe. As sessions go this was pretty straight forward. Lots of chatter in town, and then an encounter in the wilderness. It feels weirdly short reading the re-cap below.
At this point I was so far behind on writing my Carcosa recaps that I stopped! I should try and do it retroactively from my notes now.
In town the Bone Crone examines the dead Bone Men bodies, brought back from the snake men ruins.
The party debates for some time on what their next course of action should be, before deciding to leave the snake me ruins alone to explore the slaver friendly towns to the East.
The journey is uneventful: the party makes it to Joi unmolested
They decide to set up a fake camp to lure people out of the town, who they hope to capture.
Sure enough, a group of 10 Orange Men and Women make their way towards the campsite.
The party wait for them to get close, than attack.
Their apparent leader is knocked out in the course of battle, their second in command vaporized. Both leaders are women.
The remaining men are captured, and marched back to Invak.
Notes:
The captured orange men reveal the following: in Joi men are forced to work as slaves in underground mines while the women live in luxury in the beautiful city above.
Comments
Ramanan S (2015-12-29 03:04): Let me know if I am missing stuff please: I waited too long to write this up.
Eric Boyd (2015-12-29 03:16): What did the Bone Crone determine again?
Ramanan S (2015-12-29 03:20): Ah yes, the dead bodies have decomposed to a point beyond what one would expect. They look and smell like they have been dead for weeks, despite being newly dead when they were brought to town. (When you guys were fighting them they appeared some what gaunt, but otherwise seemingly normal looking.)
Chris P. (2015-12-29 03:22): You forgot me. I sad now.
Ramanan S (2015-12-29 03:23): Ah yes: you beat me to my own game.
Chris P. (2015-12-29 03:23): Also, Ramanan S they had the sensation of some kind of bad magic (or the equivalent of some other unknown force) that I had no familiarity with at all.
Ramanan S (2015-12-29 03:24): Yes that’s right: the Bone Crone feels the mark of sorcery over all of this, but is aware of no such ritual.
Chris P. (2015-12-29 03:36): We also found no biological markers inside of the bones or anything, at least not that we could identify. If there was any sort of wound reflecting what turned them into the monsters, it was lost among the many wounds we inflicted upon killing them.
Chris P. (2015-12-29 03:37): Also no more radioactive than anything else.
Eric Boyd (2015-12-29 03:40): Earworms or similar parasites would be really obvious with Bone Men, one presumes.
Chris P. (2015-12-29 03:45): Hmmm, BY JOVE, Eric Boyd you may have it! MUSIC! Ramanan S were they ever humming or moving unusually, like they were rocking back and forth or something?
Beloch Shrike (2015-12-29 03:53): There was a session tonight? I never got an invite.
Ramanan S (2015-12-29 03:53): No this was from last week. I just never wrote up the recap. I’m in holiday mode.
Eric Boyd (2015-12-29 03:56): Chris P. I was thinking literally, not metaphorically: http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Ceti_eel But you might have something there…
Chris P. (2015-12-29 04:29): Eric Boyd yup, I knew, I just will use any excuse I can get for a pun. (Bonus points if it produces a good lead.)
Ramanan S (2015-12-29 06:47): Music would be cute, but no they were basically totally stationary when encountered.
The previous session the players rolled a 1 on the Hazard Die when travelling back to town. We didn’t want to play out the encounter at midnight, so I told them it’s how the session would start. I had an idea in my head: the blue men the players had saved were actually bandits! The session opened with a fight through the town.
A circle of Bone Men stand watch around ancient Snake Men ruins. They exist in a state of undeath, and will not attack the party, but simply scream when they spot someone.
The Bone Men the players encounter were a magical trap guarding the now reoccupied Snake Men ruins. They surround the ruins and warn the Snake Men when people approach. The Bone Men were those taken from the Castle of Decline. If the campaign ran longer I think the players would have done more with this thread, but as it stands these ruins would remain unexplored.
The lack of treasure in most of this game was a running joke the entire time we played. I wouldn’t change a thing.
The 3 injured Blue Men from last session were in fact bandits!
Their leader Aboye killed the person who runs the towns infirmary, and ran off into the town to try and flee with some supplies and a new weapon.
The party aides in the capture of the bandits, killing the leader.
The town guards execute the other two bandits
You fear the incident may play into the towns already existing rampant xenophobia.
The next day the party decides to head to Invak, but travelling towards the Snake Men ruins first, to investigate the strange bone man sightings.
On the way there, they bump into the Space Alien Strike Force, which has been laying low recently.
It turns out they had been exploring to the East, in the towns the party rarely frequents.
Many towns to the East are friendly with the slavers—someone has to be buying the slaves, after all
They think the party are foolish to be heading towards the Snake Men ruins—they seem to be superstitious when it comes to the Snake Men
The party continues on, coming upon a solitary bone man standing alone.
As they try and move past him they see that there are other such bone men in the distance.
Chongo decides to investigate what’s up with these Bone Men by cutting the first one they saw down.
As he charges the man spins his head around and starts screaming—perhaps they have some sort of supernatural alertness
Chongo kills the bone man, no problem, though even in death the creature seems ‘off’
The party hide to see if anyone comes to investigate the murder, and sure enough a group of bone men sprint out to the scene, and then proceed to sprint off in search of the perpetrators.
The party attack!
In the melee Chongo is killed, but his death is avenged by Normagina!
The Bone men are all butchered in the end, their bodies piled on pack lizards as the party races off to Invak to investigate who or what they may be!
Treasure:
None! Classic Masters of Carcosa.
Monsters Killed:
6 (Mysterious) Bone Men
1 Blue Man Bandit
Post Session Notes:
Some of the Bone Men in Invak, originally from The Castle of Decline, recognize the bodies as their former friends and allies!
The two towns the Space Aliens mention to you in their travels to the East are Joi (an Orange Men village) and Torok (a Bone Men village)
Comments:
Eric Boyd (2015-12-16 01:49): Seems to me it would be easy to bait those Bone Men into a tripwire/pit trap/etc.
Chris P. (2015-12-16 02:57): So how come all of you haven’t all been strung up for murder yet?
Ramanan S (2015-12-16 03:46): They have done enough good stuff for the town people believe their story. (And it would match what the merchants shared the previous previous week.)
I forgot the man himself Daniel Dean also made an appearance during this campaign. This might have been the only session he managed to play, but the nice thing about G+ was people would sometimes drop into games if they happened to be free on a particular night.
Eric and Gus had it in their minds to start building a keep, recruiting an army, and just moving on to a sort of domain type of play as they plan to go to war with the Jale Slavers. They had discovered their hide out in an earlier session. I hadn’t really thought through what that would look like. I made notes to myself to re-read the last OD&D book the Underworld & Wilderness Adventures to see what it had to say on the topic. Not bloody much, but it does tell you how much gold it takes to build a keep.
This session the party returns to the hidden citadel they had spent a few sessions trying and failing to enter, constantly battling Mi-Go in the process. Here they finally came face to face with another faction I had active in the region: the Protector of Truths and his war with the Mi-Go on the other side of Carcosa. This is discussed in my Carcosa-style recap of the session. I hadn’t fleshed out much about what this Mi-Go war was even about, which was good because the players didn’t want to figure it out either.
We ended the session with a roll of 1 on the settlement hazard die. Next session the players would learn what transpired!
The party starts work on a small keep in Invak, recruiting some labourers to gather and repurpose materials.
The speak with the Speaker of all Graces, who agrees to let them recruit in town to form a militia. He fears an assault on slavers is too risky, but will give the idea more thought.
Nick’s Blue Man henchmen (name?) & Mr. Whyte recruiting and training a militia in town.
Hearing rumours about Mi-Go bothering the merchants the party head South to Jahar.
Encounter 3 injured Blue Men in the wilderness.
They heal them and bring them back to Jahar, who are really not too happy to be hosting random Blue Men within their walls.
They return to the citadel, and climb through a large pane window to enter the Castle.
They enter a large dorm style room, which they start to search when 6 Yellow Men walk in.
Another Yellow Man, who appears to be a commander of some sort, and a Mi-Go join the fray.
There is some talking, and then much fighting.
The Mi-Go is killed. The leader flees down some stairs!
6 more Yellow Men join the fight.
More murder, but then a call to stop fighting.
The party meets the Protector of Truths, the person in charge of this Castle.
They are fighting a war against the Mi-Go on the other side of Carcosa.
They travel to the castle via a strange crystal device.
They have been lobotomizing the Mi-Go and setting them free inside a cavern that connects to this castle, because of their leaders beliefs about killing.
They are working with a handful of Mi-Go that are also fighting against this particular group of Mi-Go, for reasons unknown.
He gives the party 1000GP gem as a ‘sorry for all the Mi-Go’ gift.
Treasure:
1 Black Gem (1000GP)
Monsters Killed:
5 Yellow Men
1 Migo
Note:
Wandering monster check at the end of the session means future drama for the party! (I know what it’ll be.)
Some important discoveries this session. The Rainbow Connection finally discover the lair of the Jale Slavers. They had first learned of it after rescuing some slaves in the wilderness. They would begin to plot its downfall starting now.
They meet my Carcosa take on Trap-Jaw. I had written up a Carcosa style He-Man encounters, though I didn’t end up using too many in my game: 16 Encounters on Carcosa & [16 More Encounters on Carcosa][h2]. Master’s of the Universe was meant to be core to the whole game, and I tried to inject littles bits and pieces of that world when I could. I wrote these encounters after reading Richard’s [How Brightly Coloured Should Carcosa Be][color]. This post about Carcosa and Masters of the Universe was one of the biggest inspirations for my game. It’s what got me thinking about Carcosa in a completely different way.
They also discovered that the Castle of Decline was empty. The Bone Men from that town had said they would join them in Invak many sessions ago, but never made it. The party would learn what happened to them for a few more sessions. (Half travelled south to Snake-Men ruins, others were captured by Slavers on route to Invak.)
Finally the players find the Orange Citadel’s former “God”, the Frog Spawn Llothali. They killed the creature so hard I would end up having lots of discussions with them about whether the laser guns in the game were too over powered. Probably, but we never ended up changing any of the rules.
Quiet in Invak, the party head south towards Jahar to inquire about raptor trainers and their staff.
On the way they encounter 11 Blue Men, one shouting about wanting their metal.
They chase them off once they produce their armaments.
In Jahar they learn their staff has the power to summon the evil old one Molkrom: the sage doesn’t know how exactly, but thinks vile sorcerers may.
Merchants are readying themselves for a trip South to Cron.
Head back to Invak to go after some slavers!
No one will join them! Or will they?
The Lawgiver of Winds joins the party after a rousing speech about slavery.
Encounter a group of 12 slavers on the road while looking for the Slaver encampment!
A battle breaks out, of course. The Slavers are aware of the Rainbow Connection and aren’t fans.
Midway through the fight an old crone shows up, ready for battle! It’s Chris P.
This battle is bloodier than most: almost no misses till the every end!
A jerk ass slaver wounds Renoir, and makes his escape with 3 of his friends.
Capture 7 slaver heads and the vaporized remains of another
They find the slaver encampment. As they were told, it is a base built into a hillside. Slaves are chained up outside, and raptor mounted guards are outside.
The party decides now isn’t the time to attack.
They make their way over to the castle of decline, stopping along the way at the former Orange Men citadel.
Continuing to the Castle of Decline, they come to learn it has been abandoned. They aren’t sure where the Bone Men may have went, as Invak seems like the obvious choice.
Meet 4 Red Men on the road back to the Former Orange Men citadel, who they escort with them.
Head back to Invak without incident
Oh, the party also killed the Llothali without breaking a sweat. What?
The players had their home base in Invak, and had a strong relationship with the merchant town to the south, Jahar. At this point in the campaign they wanted to try and unify the region around the common aim of dealing with the slavers. There was a lot of travel between the two towns session, as they tried to negotiate an agreement. This was the session the Space Alien Strike Force finally made an appearance. They had been hinted at over the previous session, and were an entry on my random encounter table for some time. They were looking for whomever desecrated their tomb and stole the armour of their hero. Bad luck for the players: Gus’s character was wondering around in that armour. Had been since they found it. Hilarity ensues.
The players also reconnected with the women who escorted them to Invak at the start of the campaign, Queen of Autumn. Another random encounter roll? I don’t remember anymore.
The party heads South from Invak towards Jahar to learn more about the Staff of Avion and try and set up an alliance.
The Speaker of all Graces seems disinterested in this idea, but doesn’t say no outright.
Along the way they stumble upon the the Space Alien Strike Force: they are caught in a moment of rest.
Gus hides behind a rock because he is wearing the amour they are looking for.
The aliens have him sighted, so he ends up using his Solid Snake skills to sneak away. Meanwhile the rest of his team are friendly, and show the aliens they don’t have the armour. (And in fact saved their friends.)
When they investigate where Gus was, they see no one was there.
The party continues South, while Normangina takes a wide route to avoid the Aliens.
Along the way she stumbles upon a dead body off in the distance, which she decides to avoid as well.
Travelling further still she see a large Insectoid Spawn.
She manages to distract it with her smell squid, and sprints further away.
Finally she makes it back to the party.
They travel back to the dead body, to see if it has any loot.
They quickly learn there are several dead bodies, arranged in a circle head to toe with their arms reaching out to the centre. (So it looks like a spoke of a wheel.)
They take one of the bodies, a Red Man.
Evan’s character is loitering near by, he joins the group—strange. No one mentions it.
In Jahar the party run errands.
They convince the guard guild to recharge their weapons.
Gus’ Bazooka and Evan’s teleportation Ray are fully charged.
Drink with guards ends with crazy mayhem. The guards are even more friendly with the party now.
Chris P’ character steals small change from all the revellers, earning 60 GP
The next day the guards get the party an audience with their leader.
“The One” gives the players a letter saying he will support a military alliance with Invak
the party travels North, actively searching for trouble, but end up finding the Blue Menhirs
They arrive in Invak and give the Speaker of All Graces the letter of support.
Travel East looking for Slavers.
Find Queen of Autumn and the group that had went searching for her led by The Illustrious Prince of the Bone
They had actually just rescued her from a Spawn, which they fled.
The party is looking for trouble, however, so they head back in search of the Spawn they were fighting
Kill that thing so hard. I need laser proof spawn.
Other notes:
Gus puts out a bounty for raptors! And Eric will match that! And a hiring bounty as well!
Eric looking for binoculars, Geiger counter, which will be set aside in Jahar if the merchants find one.
Staff of Avion is left with the Sage. Owed 200GP if he learns anything about it.
Treasure:
1000 GP in Spawn Bounty (200 GP for them, 800 GP split between the party) so that’s 133 XP each
Comments:
Ramanan S (2015-10-13 04:49): The Queen of Autumn tells viewers to admit their mistakes rather than lying to cover them up.
Wait, you guys didn’t learn that lesson.
Gus L (2015-10-13 04:51): Maybe - more lies and a few dead bodies will bury a mistake pretty deep?
As you’ll see in the comments, I had been reading Blood Meridian, and the book and its mood started seeping into the game. I wrote about this a few years ago: A Carcosan Western. The game was meant to be light-hearted Masters of the Universe themed game, and while there was a fair bit of that, the game was probably more cowboys than He-Man. (That said, the Staff of Avion the players find this session is from Masters of the Universe.) The players were wandering the wastelands, having shootouts with bandits.
The dead man they find on the road was meant to be a clue something was amiss at the castle, but maybe not enough of a clue. The Snake Men ruins were another important site in the game the players would ignore. Kheret ils Nu’s Reliquary, which I wrote for the Trophy Gold megadungeon, borrows ideas from this campaign and these ruins my players never explored. The Snake Men would end up freed by the Dominant Reflection. They would restart their war with the Old Ones, so nominally aligned with the players, except to the Snake Men the players were just reagents for spells.
My rules for getting lost seemed to only come up when the party would leave their home base. They were constantly getting lost right next to their home. A little silly, but I kept with it because I thought it was funny.
[You can contrast the recap that follows with my Carcosa-style hex descriptions.][s14]
Trade has resumed between Jahar and Invak. The merchants are happy to hear you dealt with the cultists.
The Illustrious Prince of the Bone, former head of the Bone Man village in the outpost, has not been heard from since heading South in search of The Queen of Autumn.
Traders speak of wild aggressive Migo wandering in packs to the South, harassing their caravans.
The Black Man rescued from the Cultists is planning on leaving for the Castle he is from to the West. (And wouldn’t mind company for the trip.)
No word from the Citadel of Decline to the West in weeks.
Aggressive group of Space Aliens continue to stop and search travellers to the South.
Plus all the open threads from the open thread thread.
Recap:
The party rests in Invak, having emptied out the (no longer abandoned) space alien outpost.
Black Man “the Speaker of Benedictions” needs help getting home.
Was hunting when captured by slavers.
The party agrees to take him back to his home, being promised a modest reward for their efforts (and good karma, of course)
On the way West they get a little bit lost—par for the course when leaving Invak, apparently.
They wait till the evening to re-orient themselves using the stars.
While searching for a place to camp, they find some ruins of the ancient Snake-Men. The place fills them with foreboding. The leave it alone.
In the morning they head Northward. On the way they encounter a long line of Giant ants heading South West.
They leave the ants alone and continue North.
Further along they find a dead body, a Black Man whose head has been blown clear off (from laser a gun), gear scattered everywhere.
They continue to approach the castle.
The “the Speaker of Benedictions” goes ahead to get the gates opened.
He is promptly shot at by two men on the parapets of the Castle.
Attempts at parlay are for naught, so the Bazooka comes out.
The doors to the castle are blown open.
4 riders on velociraptors ride out, two armed with pistols, two with clubs.
Are long fight breaks out, but eventually the party succeed in driving away the remaining Purple Men who had taken over the castle. (6 flee into the wilderness)
The party capture two of the raptors during the fight and by searching the wilderness for one that ran away.
The party create a pyre and burn the dead Black Men that litter the castle.
They, along with the “the Speaker of Benedictions”, take all the valuables and head back to Invak.
Treasure:
8 Laser Pistols (but “the Speaker of Benedictions” claims two as side arms)
9000 GP = 2250 GP each (since “the Speaker of Benedictions” claims a share of the gold)
“Staff of Avion”
Two raptors (4HD, AC 12, MV 160’), Feathered Orange hide. Immune to poison.
Comments:
Ramanan S (2015-09-15 04:31): Feel like I remember more when I force myself to write them down right away. I should sleep for real now, though.
Chris G (2015-09-15 05:33): Dang! I would have shat a brick when dudes on velociraptors came out of the gate.
Dion Williams (2015-09-15 07:30): Sounds like a great session. Wish I could be making these.
Ramanan S (2015-09-15 12:24): Me too. One day Dion!
Ramanan S (2015-09-15 13:33): This session feels heavily informed by my reading cowboy books right now. (Though now when I look back at all the seasons they start to feel like Westerns.) You guys have good success killing over confident cultists and bandits.
Chris G (2015-09-18 05:25): I remember you mentioning Blood Meridian. What other cowboy books are you reading? I’m on a major Western kick right now.
Ramanan S (2015-09-18 11:22): Chris Geisel I said books I really meant that one, which should count for several. Hah.
Chris G (2015-09-18 23:26): lol, too true. I got excited for a cowboy book recommendation.
Ramanan S (2015-09-19 12:25): Gus can recommend several! There were some Elroy books he had mentioned a little while ago I have been meaning to check out. If you haven’t seen Unforgiven you should go do that now, though. There is a Japanese remake with Ken Wanatabe which is also cool.
Gus L (2015-09-19 16:26): Chris Geisel The cowboy books I’d recommend are actually very limited:
Pete Dexter’s “Deadwood” (1986) is just a great book. It’s the inspiration for the series of the same name, but very different.
Cormac McCarthy “Blood Meridian” is amazing - is it a Western? Mostly. In form certainly, but it’s very surreal at times, and very strange.
As to Elroy, that’s more historically researched hard-boiled pulp detective stuff. The darkest there is. Very good - especially the LA ones about greed corruption and lurid crime. Elmore Leonard wrote a mess of Westerns and I know I’ve read a couple, but they’re pretty standard fare, well written and amusing though in his jaunty style.
Ramanan S (2015-09-19 17:08): I’d actually say Blood Meridan is a post-apocalypse novel. I’m sure someone has written an essay about that.
Chris G (2015-09-20 03:03): Gus L I’ve read Blood Meridian. I’ll check out Deadwood, thanks. There’s a collection of Elroy’s Western stories at a local book store here, do you think it’s worth checking out.
Gus L (2015-09-20 03:17): Chris Geisel I haven’t read a lot of his Westerns, I like the guy’s writing and he’s pretty much at the core of that genre.
Ramanan S (2015-10-07 12:32): I think i’m going to start using my alternate time line re-stocking tables as a way to do rumours going forward. Sort of like meta-rumours, I guess.
Eric Boyd (2015-10-12 03:25): Gus L Beloch Shrike How are we splitting up the haul, here? Two people get velociraptors and a low-charge pistol each, someone else gets the Staff of Avion and four laser pistols? Orange Julia would prefer a dinosaur if we go with that split.
Gus L (2015-10-12 16:00): Well I figure dinos would be based on the mechanics. Normigina has Animal Handling 3 - what’s needed to ride the raptor?
Ramanan S (2015-10-12 19:39): The raptors you have are domesticated enough you can hop on them and ride around. None of you would likely have practice riding them around for a fight, though. Maybe Normangina would be a bit better here? So you would need to practice that. They will likely run away if left unattended. They need to eat 3x the rations you guys do, but will happily eat the lizard meat available in Invak. Gus can try and train them to get used to your troupe so they know to stick around. Or to try and fight on command. Etc. Would probably take more time than a week?
Ramanan S (2015-10-12 19:41): The Staff of Avion is 6’ long and inscribed with runes, clearly of snake men origin to any sorcerers in the group.
