Somebody translated/adapted my rules for Tales of Mordhearse into French. Like a RaLaLy long time ago and I'm just now showing creds because I am a forgetful jerk. elf games.
This is a write up of my last few games, more to jog my own memory that for anyone else. If you like long-winded play reports read onnnnnn....
Started up a new campaign on Tuesdays with two players from my last campaign (my girlfriend 'Monday' and my sister 'Anne'), both are very familiar with my games, and two new people (girlfriend's teenage brother 'Jordan' and buddy from work's husband 'Charlie').
Charlie has played only 5e and left his last game because A. they were dicks and 2. only wanted to play super-power shoot-em-up style dungeons. He was stoked when I told him Level 1 characters in my games usually die in one hit.
Jordan has played a few solo one-shots with me. Dyson's Goblin Gully and a bit of Tomb of the Serpent King. If you only have an hour to teach someone how to play Get Killed games go with Goblin Gully.
On the first game they all met up at a bar to RP being new-hire sellswords at a goldrush town yaddayadda. They got drunk, scoped the sick statue of Tyr riding a wolf in the chapel, goofed around, then witnessed a dude come back alone from the dungeon carrying a magic sceptre. Adventurers surged out of the bars and crowded around the guy cos almost everybody that's gone down the local dungeon has died. Town guards hauled him off to the Lady in Charge. PCs nearly get into a fight with town guard trying to get more info about the guy.
Jordan: I tell him "oh yeah? What's he gonna do?"
Monday: Dude.
Anne: Don't!
Me: He steps to your face and brandishes his mace. His plate armor glistens. "Get out of here. Now"
Monday: This guy is gonna kill you.
Me: She's right. You're gonna fucking die if you fight this guy.
Jordan: I say "C'mon man, do it. Hit me"
Charlie: I grab him by the arm and drag him away.
Monday: I grab his legs.
Then they decided to leave down and go to the dungeon. It's Caverns of Thracia. They find mutilated corpses hanging from trees by ropes made from vines on the way there. They don't take this as an omen.
They split up to investigate the ruins and get ambushed by Tribals. Tribals use every tactical advantage against the PCs and get them totally cornered. PCs manage to survive long enough to kill one of the Tribals, who then fail their Morale check and run away. Players admit they thought they were fucked and descend.
None of the PCs matter because they all got killed by the ambush in Room 20. Jordan lights a flask of oil and Charlie gives a brimstone sermon on top of a pile of skulls while everybody get cut to ribbons.
All except Anne's character who sprints out of the flames and makes it to the surface.
Session ends with everyone laughing and rolling up new character for next time. Phew.
Next game I decide to restart the game world and change the tone. I didn't like the cartoonish adventure-time style world I had built the first time around, and wanted something darker and more based in reality. This time I give them the low-down: The town is an outpost on the edge of a jungle, the Caverns are there, you're hired by an ex-adventurer to map it and bring back treasures. GO!
The dungeon is a half-day away. The PCs leave late and end up camping out. They choose a watch order. I roll checks every two hours at night. They get 2, 1, 1, 4 so we end up roll-playing a ton of encounters, including city guards and friendly gnolls. The last one is with some bandits who pretend to be adventurers wanting to take the PCs to a 'secret entrance', which is total bullshit but the PCs buy it.
The secret entrance is an ambush. Jordan, once again, steps up to the bandits, who have the team completely surrounded.
Jordan: I get in his face 'C'mon dude!'
Anne: Don't!
Monday: You're gonna get us killed.
Me: The archers point their bows at you.
Jordan: I grab him by the throat.
Charlie: I lean in to the nearest bandit and say "I don't know this guy. Can I just give you my money and leave?"
A melee ensues. Jordan dies. Charlie dumps all his stuff out on the ground, buying Anne and Monday time to run away. The survivors slink back to town defeated. Session ends.
Jordan: Man, we still haven't seen a single piece of treasure!
Me: You have to survive long enough to find it! What part of 'you have 4 HP' do you not understand? Don't pick fights you don't need to!
To add insult to injury I'm charging the PCs 5 silver per night at the inn and each game happens a week apart, so 35 silver per session. Monday decides to have her character stay at the homeless camp.
Monday asks if she can port in her character from our last campaign which used Knave, since they did lots of trans-dimensional travel it's theoretically possible her character would end up in this world. Seeing that the players obviously need some kind of boost I allow it.
This character is Garnet the Pirate (Level 2). She picks Thief for her class, since its the closest thing to her character vision. Garnet is kitted out with an emerald snake skin cloak, a smear of Skeleton Jelly on her tunic protecting her heart, a Scroll of Minor Transformation and potions of Treasure Sight and Ghost Clone (converted spells), a single drop of poison to kill 50 men, and a quad-barreled wheellock pistol.
The mythical Last Campaign took place in and around the Tombs of the Serpent King. Monday is pretty attached to this guy and really doesn't wanna let her die.
At this point I can't tell if my players are idiots or I'm doing
something wrong, so I take to the OSR Discord to ask for advice. They say losing characters every single game is abnormal. I get the
suggestion to send the PCs with an "Obby the Rat" type character who
knows the tricks of trade, grease, caltrops, 10 foot pole, the works. Give the PCs an idea of what a successful adventurer looks like.
So I do exactly that. Next game the team meets up with Monday at the bum camp and "Obi the Rat" appears, a tiny fox-faced human accoutered with vials of acid, sais, grappling hooks, and pouches all over. PCs immediately take to calling him "Obi the Rat Kenobi". He's got a job he needs extra muscle for: Some goblins ambushed adventurers returning to town with a cartful of treasure, slaughtered them, and took their swag back to their nest. Let's go smack up goblins and get treasure! The PCs jump at the chance for actual treasure although they aren't sure if they can't trust Obi after the bandit thing. I make a mental note to roleplay my liars more blatantly.
Pulling double-duty as a pseudo-PC I quickly realize my players problem: they don't plan ahead. We hash out a plan to assault the cave. Obi's initial plan was a terrible one--start a fire and snipe all the goblins that run out--the players veto it because they don't know how many goblins are in there. They elect to peek inside and find themselves on a ledge (near the entrance of one of my favorite Dyson maps). Down in the den the goblins are distracted being goblins (but wearing kingly jinglies like mink hats and bejeweled finery).
They sneak past into the first hallway just inside and find a wardrobe tipped on its side against the wall and a mat of rotting furs carpeting the floor. Obi stops and wonders aloud if this is a trap. Charlie's Kraig the Elf Mage makes a Search (2) and discovers a 10 foot pit trap with spikes and a decayed goblin corpse hiding under the mangy carpet. This takes 10 minutes so I also make an Encounter check (2-spoor): They hear some goblins coming down the hallway ahead of them, bickering over who's hat is bigger.
Thinking quickly Kraig and Jordan's JoeyJoe the Dwarf Thief climb inside the wardrobe, Rowan isn't here because Anne couldn't make it. Monday doesn't like the look of Garnet's Merge With Shadows roll, so she climbs under the furs and hangs from the ledge of the pit. I have Obi Merge With Shadows.
The goblins both stop, one on each side of the pit, to investigate because they notice the trap's been messed with. Jordan rolls out and shoves his goblin into the pit, Obi knifes his in the back. Garnet lets herself drop down to harvest the bits of finery off the goobs. I roll a Surprise check for the goblins in the den behind them to see if they notice the noise (they fail).
The team moves forward to scope out the next room. This area is far enough away from the entrance that it's too dark to see (AKA I suddenly remember I need to account for lighting). JoeyJoe and Kraig who have Darkvision narrate what they see to the humans.
Inside is an oxcart of treasure and a pompous goblin king on a pile of skulls wearing a turban the size of his whole body being fanned with palm fronds, in addition to two goblin guards and some various servant running about. Garnet has experience with goblins before (the booger goblins from TotSK) and tells the team of the time she was goblin king. Sez goblins are stupid and easy to trick. JoeyJoe decides he wants to cover himself with a cloak and march out pretending to be a goblin from another tribe bringing offerings to the goblin king. This is supposed to distract the goblin king long enough for the rest of the party to loot shit from the ox cart.
Obi points out that he has a Scroll of Web to use in case things go badly.
The goblin king doesn't buy the ol' blanket-over-the-head-pretending-to-be-a-goblin trick at all and has his guards grab the intruder. A test of wits and wills happens between the goblin king and the captured JoeyJoe in which the goblin king decides JoeyJoe must prove his loyalty by drinking from a cauldron of goblin transformation. JoeyJoe hesistates. Garnet, thinking quickly, uses her scroll of Minor Transformation to turn herself into a huge goblin pope replete with huge hat and crosier.
In due time a melee breaks out and Obi uses his scroll of Web, which turns out to be a scroll of incinerate-everything-in-the-fucking-room.
The team skedaddles out the door and is met in the hall by the goblins from the den area. They shudder in fear at the sight of the goblin pope giving the team a moment to form battle ranks. They launch missiles on the approaching goblins, dropping several, then clash into melee, where they cut a swath with a bunch of lucky rolls.
The team gets out safe and sells their junk, bumping them 1/3rd the way to level 2. Obi takes his cut and vanishes. They make note to return and finish clearing out the goblin nest later.
So the Team (now) is:
(Anne) Rowan the Elf Thief -- Level 1
(Monday) Garnet the Human Thief -- Level 2
(Jordan) JoeyJoe the Dwarf Thief -- Level 1
(Charlie) Kraig the Elf Mage -- Level 1
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