Paging All Humans

This blog is six months old (ish) and has no regular readers. Since adding Google analytics, it has demonstrated that the 200+ hits on the site a day, according to Blogger's less sophisticated tools, are probably bots or webcrawlers. So although very few people are or maybe will ever read this (comment once if you're not a bot?) I enjoy writing for its own sake. I'm also trying to use this blog to aid my own personal games, because it helps me accomplish two things I enjoy. So my articles on my own fantasy world and perhaps later my own sci-fi universes are for my players and myself. If you are a human then welcome. Please comment or share if you like what I write so we can have more awesome people engage with it. Otherwise, no worries—I’m going to keep on.

Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen - The Emperor of the Waves (Part I)

Table of Contents

Spoilers follow for the adventure...

The day following their return from the countryside, the adventurers visited Mr. Aubreck Drallion in his manor house in Kalaman. The house was behind a stone wall with iron gates that were opened by an officious goblin butler in a starched and pressed black evening jacket.

"Please, follow me. I presume you are those who Master Drallion sent for?"

Gringle swept into a bow, with a rakish grin. "Indeed! I am Gringle Gragle, Duke of Greenwood."

The butler did a doubletake, looking at the ragged goblin, then flaring his nostrils in an inaudible snort. "Indeed, well met sir."

While the grounds and house were maintained, it seemed as though there was something off. Flecks of rust and a squeak when the iron gate was opened, faded paint on the house and shutters, a few notable patches of brown on what must have once been a verdant lawn.

They were ushered into a sitting room and library with a middle aged man in fine clothes sitting on a faded sofa. They took seats at the butler's signal, greeting the man with a handclasp. The man had premature worry lines etched into his forehead and around his mouth, crows feet wrinkling around his eyes. Grey streaked his hair in far greater amounts that his years seems to justify. His clothes, though fine, seemed to be several years behind the current fashion.

This was Aubreck Drallion, and he proceeded to relate to them how he had invested in trade bound for a far-off land, converting much of his money and property into deeds and statements of credit, to be converted back once they arrived at that location. However the ship carrying this hoard in non-monetary form was separated from its escort and thought lost at sea. Drallion had heard reports though that the ship, the Emperor of the Waves, had been spotted barely a day's sail from Kalaman. He offered them ten percent of the value if they could recover the metal box containing his investment from the ship.

"You see the loss has quite ruined me," he said.

Drallion explained that he had contracted a ship called the Soul of Winter, procured equipment, and only needed their help to retrieve the box. 

The group agreed.

"We can leave immediately," said Asterius.

"The ship is prepared to get underway early tomorrow with the morning tide," said the merchant. "It has equipment that I have procured that may assist you as well."

They bid the merchant farewell then, and returned to their quarters in Castle Kalaman. The next morning they departed early upon the Soul of Winter, and came upon the derelict near the mouth of the bay after traveling most of the day. They all kept their stomachs, but Gringle particularly took to the rolling deck and the salt air. "Tis a perk of being a Duke," he remarked to his friends.

The abandoned ship appeared oddly calm, it's masts broken down to stumps, but the deck strangely clear of all debris. Their dwarven captain pointed out that the Emperor listed slightly to port, likely because her ballast had shifted.

Asterius armed himself with his equipment and a few vials of antitoxin from the supplies purchased by Drallion. The others left the new supplies, content with their own gear.

The crew rowed them over in the ship's boat, but refused to tarry close by the Emperor. "Signal to us when you come back atop deck!" The captain had said.

Once the adventurers were on deck, they surveyed the ship, but found nothing interesting topside. A rusted grate covered a hole into the hold, and doors led to cabins fore and aft. Opening the aft hatch, Asterius stepped into a dark room, veiled in spiderwebs and dust, with a dark, bloodied altar dominating it. A ring of skulls afixed to iron spikes in the wall hung above it.

Suddenly massive archnid forms looked in the darkness, and swarms of thousands of tiny spiders appeared from the rotting timbers under their feet. Finally, a humanoid figure with the face and mandibles of a spider bounded from the shadows to bite at them. Asterius and Darrett found themselves swarmed, covered in spiders and warding off bites from poison dripping mandibles. Gringle stepped back, firing arrows at the large creatures. The fight was going south, although Asterius fought valiantly, until Davgin arrived from examining a wooded detail fixture on the deck. He cast spells of frost and cold, blasting away the spiders. As the giant spiders and man spider attacked, poison dripped from their gnashing mandibles.

Soon however the tide turned. They killed the last of the spiders, before examining the dark altar. Amongst the wreckage they found a moldy and decaying book recording an attack on the ship by the captain. The account ended abruptly, presumably the author was killed in the final assault.

Next they tried the door into the forward cabin, finding giant spiders in the space and another spider man. A sea of tiny spiders boiled up from the decaying stairs leading down, rolling over them. Gringle's well placed arrows, Fallons rousing shouts and charms, Davgin's powerful spells, and Asterius' strength carried the day, and soon they stood in the now quiet room. 

Next they crept down the stairs, moving into a narrow corridor. They managed to spot a web blocking a doorway before blundering into it. Asterius took a swing with his axe, then a second, attempting to hack through the web. 

His cuts alerted yet more spiders to their presence, and soon they found themselves awash again in spiders. Davgin's castings of Frost Fingers proved crucial to turning the tide. After defeating these foes they advance cautiously into the ship, carefully opening doors, but only finding empty rooms. Until they came to the bow of the ship and opened a door into a dark room to find it shrouded in webs, and four bundles hanging from the ceiling. Upon closer examination each of the bundles of webs seemed to be vibrating slightly. 

Asterius swung his axe, attempting to cut one of them open. It burst open, and an unnatural creature that had stumpy legs and a mouth that seemed to cover half it's body slapped to the ground. The monster opened it's jaws, spewing forth a fountain of sickening acidic vomit at the heroes, and the other cocoons began to shake violently. At the same time they heard a loud "pop" and behind them appeared a massive spider as if from the air.

GM Reflections

This was a really fun, dungeon crawl session. The ship's map is a bit cramped, making it a bit difficult for players to maneuver. The crawl has definitely sapped many of the party's resources. The maw demons at the end were really fun to run. Their special abilities made them much more interesting than some of the others. The ettercaps (spider men) for instance are a bit underwhelming, as are the giant spiders.

Shadowdark Player Focused Prep

Planning to introduce a group to Shadowdark using the short adventure Tomb of the Serpent Kings. I also want to capitalize on us playing this game in person (this group normally plays online) and use paper character sheets and dice. So I plan to print a copy of the Shadowdark character sheet and then have them write their own versions on blank sheets.

As far as the process of character creation, I continue to try to find a step-by-step process, but can't in the book or quick start guide, so I'm going to make my own.

Step-by-step Making a Shadowdark Character

1. Roll 3d6 and add your results in order of attribute scores.
2. Pick ancestry.
3. Pick background.
4. Pick class, roll for hit point (+ CON mod), make one class talent roll, and determine spells or other choices associated with abilities.
5. Roll 2d6 x 5 to determine how many gold pieces you have to buy starting gear with. 
6. Purchase starting gear using starting gold.
7. Determine AC based on armor or 10 + DEX if not wearing armor.
8. Select alignment (lawful, chaotic, or neutral)
9. Determine Title
10. Give your character a name.
11. Determine the deity your character serves.

If you just want to hit a button and have a character, check out Shadowdarklings. If you use the tool, filter the character options down to only Dwarf, Elf, Goblin, Half-Orc, Halfling, Human for ancestries, and Fighter, Priest, Thief, and Wizard for classes. The GM will let you know if more options are allowed in a future game.

Delve Dungeon Concept Submission

Bob Worldbuilder solicited dungeon concepts as part of his Delve Kickstarter. Below is my initial idea:

The eldritch lair of an elder aboleth, warped by the nightmares of the alien being, on an island covered in the glowing fungi and rune etched ruins of an ancient advanced civilization in an underground sea.

After edits to ensure the text fit in the 200 character minimum:

The eldritch lair of an elder aboleth, warped by the nightmares of the alien being on an isle covered in glowing fungi and the rune etched ruins of an ancient advanced civilization on underground sea.

After a final editing pass:

The eldritch lair of an elder aboleth, warped by the alien's eternity of nightmares, on an isle covered by fungi and the rune etched ruins of an ancient advanced civilization on an underground sea.

After a final, final pass, this was submitted:

The eldritch lair of an elder aboleth, warped by the alien's eternal nightmares, on an isle covered by fungi and the rune etched ruins of an ancient advanced civilization on an underground sea.

The winner of the contest will have their dungeon concept turned into one included in the final book. First it has to be reviewed by the campaign creators, who will choose their favorite proposals and put them to a vote by backers.

If they don't take it, I will probably still make this dungeon...and perhaps post it here or as a product. We'll see...

The Journey to RPGs

Reflecting today, it struck me how my journey into the TTRPG hobby is similar yet different from the evolution of the hobby. Most people now have played plenty of videogame RPGs or games that have RPG elements or influence. But unlike many of my friends, I didn't play games like Skyrim or others. I never played, but had a friend who played RuneScape while we were kids and I remember spending a fair amount of time watching over his shoulder. 

Really, I enjoyed building and playing with Legos, probably predisposing me to a fascination with miniatures (although I don't collect miniature largely due to the cost and space to store them). So one day as a kid I stumbled upon the rules and their earlier variations of Brik Wars.

BrikWars cover art by Mike Rayhawk

While I never played, mostly because I could never find anyone interested in learning the rules and taking the time to do so, I remained fascinated by wargaming. Throw in my abiding interested in military history, and it's no surprise that I really was more interested in tactical RTS games, like Age of Empires in its many flavors. I spent many happy hours with Age of Mythology and played the Lord of the Rings RTS game at a friend's house that you can now no long find anywhere due to the expired licensing. 

Eventually I discovered the Total War games, which still strike me as perhaps the best blend possible of a strategic and persistent overworld in which year construction and empire-building matter, combined with a more realistic tactical game than the scrums of declining hit points in most RTS games. Total War units feel like they are full of men, each fighting and dying one by one, while remaining part of an organized mass. Maintaining organization and correct maneuver, alongside using the battlefield terrain and the right equiped units is key to victory, just like in the real world. The original Total War: Rome and Medieval 2: Total War remain perhaps my favorite games of all time, despite the later advancements to the series. I also spent literally hundreds of hours conquering Europe and the New World as Britain, Prussia, and Spain in Empire: Total War. 

The closest game to an RPG I played during this period were Zelda: Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword on the Wii. These were fun, but I found the puzzles and linear dungeon progressions tedious at times. I wanted to punch through much of the time and get to the storytelling, exploration, and combat portions. I loved my time in those worlds though.

I tried Sid Meier's Civilization V, but never really got into it. Later however, I discovered Paradox's excellent games like Stellaris. I never played Europa Universalis, instead spending most of my time in the sci-fi galaxy of Stellaris. The latter focuses mostly on exploration, then research and technological development on a civilizational scale, in an ever advancing arms race towards eventually conflict with neighbors. Fleets and power levels matter more than individual ships and tactics in that grand strategy of space opera. But I often thought about how interesting it would be to be able to zoom in on a character in a battle while still conducting the grand strategy level. 

COVID lockdown proved to be a good time to try out other games with greater RPG-like elements. I played my way through the entire Assassin's Creed series available at that time. Ezio remains a favorite character from the genre along with the landscapes of Florence, Rome, and Constantinople—I would still love to see the Hagia Sophia, having gotten to climb the minarets virtually in the game. I think the closest to true RPGs of that series are Origins and Odyssey though. I would love to try Valhalla at some point.

From there, I tried out Dragon Age: Inquisition, which is very much an RPG. I don’t feel like I ever fully grasped the game, and I’d like to go back and finish the story at some point. Then I also tried out The Witch 3: Wildhunt, which I think remains a masterpiece of a game. 

In all this time, I’d never tried D&D. I remember reading about it briefly during the 4e era, but didn’t feel particularly interested at the time. After COVID I began looking at Warhammer 40k, watching videos of miniature painting. But I also noticed some of the channels I followed painting D&D miniatures. I’d noticed the Lost Mine of Phandelver starter set at my local Target before, but I began really looking at it, and one day bought it. This was rapidly followed up with a Player’s Handbook, and the other core books. The rest is history. And hopefully much more fun times with friends and family.

Usharia

Spoilers for potential players. GMs only...

Usharia is meant to be an off map location to house the adventuring party's patron. But what happens if the characters want to go back there?

First, Usharia is meant to be very distant from the adventure region to give players some autonomy from their patrons, and to limit the availability of many items and magic. They have to go into the dungeon to find their own. So the journey will be long and difficult to return. 

But I don't think you really need a whole city or town for Usharia. If I were to do so I'd suggest dropping in Dulwich from Shadowed Keep on the Borderlands, swapping the NPCs at the cathedral for those detailed below and changing any other relevant details. Otherwise you really just need the cathedral and some NPCs.

Cartography by Dyson Logos

The map above is available at the link and released under a commercial attribution license by Dyson Logos. I think it's perfect for the Cathedral of St. Tevra at Usharia.

Cathedral of St. Tevra

St. Tevra

The legend of St. Tevra is depicted through the statuary and painted panels around the walls in the main nave and sanctuary of the cathedral. Born a poor child in Uqance, St. Tevra is said to have been cast a blessed coin by St. Tedmund as he rode through the city on his departure to slay the green worm Goavraynth. She almost spent the coin on a bit of bread and a warm drink, but instead her feet led her to a wheelwright's shop where she was apprenticed. Many years later she embarked on adventures, the details of which are lost to time, until she was knighted and made a Holy Lancer of the Order of the Nine. 

Archbishop Garvey

Archbishop Garvey is an elderly priest who has risen through the Church hierarchy due to his efforts in the ministry. Previously the leader of the Church of Our Lady St. Adevalia in the small town of Barrowmark, and the head of the Monastic Order of St. Orpheus of the Iron Spike, he was promoted and assigned to St. Tevra's just a few years ago. While he maintains great loyalty to the teachings of St. Tevra, he has added statues of St. Adevalia and St. Orpheus on the left and right alcoves before the inner sanctum to the north of the main nave of the cathedral.

Preferring to be called Father Garvey in less formal instances, the priest is a devout believer in the Nine, the Heavenly Choirs, and the Saints. He is uneasy with having an Archdeacon work alongside him, as the previous deacons he worked with in Barrowmark and at the monastery largerly treated their positions as a ceremonial title alongside their affairs as minor nobles. Having an Archdeacon take such an active role managing the political affairs of the Church bothers him, although he guards these thoughts well. 

Father Garvey largely leaves the ceremonies and worship conducted in St. Tevra's to the younger priests and acolytes, reasoning that they need to learn the skills to lead the Church one day. He spends much of his time in his office off the main nave, or wandering the gardens in quiet contemplation and secret yearning for a return to his simpler life as a lesser priest or contemplating the mysteries alongside the monks of St. Orpheus.

Archdeacon Tamari Philona

The Archdeacon takes her office very seriously, having come up under the tutelage of senior deacons in the Church diplomatic corps. She has reached the pinnacle of her career. While she is extremely devoted to the Church as an organization, she is less versed in the theology and finds ceremonies with hymns, prayers, and incense a bore (but she attends nevertheless to keep up the image of the Church). Archdeacon Philona finds Father Garvey to be quaint and naive in his faith, and doubts that he is capable of doing what she knows from experience is necessary to protect the Church. Philona maintains connections to less reputable people and organizations by necessity, so that should the Church need an action taken to protect it that wouldn't fall into it's definitions of morality, it can be done for the greater good.

Old School Examples of Play

I stumbled across a great YouTube channel that I want to highlight. Mythic Mountains RPG does some great videos of old school, open table games. The GM does some amazing work with visuals and interactive elements on VTT because they play online, which just goes to show you you can have old school fun with innovative tools. Definitely recommend checking out their channel for some great video of Classic Traveller, Shadowdark, Swords & Wizardry, and more. I'll be taking my own notes!