Sorcery! #10 - The Crown of Kings

Valerian is outnumbered by his former companions

Campaign Diary

The Archmage dismounted from the dragon, wearing the Crown of Kings upon his head, and ascended his throne. Then he spoke to the assembled tribes, of his aim to bring them all under one banner, bringing peace between all of them, and of Kakhabad dealing with the other kingdoms as equals. Although the assembled tribes each had their own language, they all heard him in their native tongue.

Then one by one the leader of the tribes came before him and pledge their allegiance. Morgana used her sorcery to turn herself invisible, and approached the Archmage unseen, and tried to seize the crown off his head, planning to teleport away afterwards. But even as she grasped the crown, the Archmage raised his hand and seized her by her wrist. The Archmage uttered a spell, and Morgana turned visible again. For a moment there was confusion among the guards and the tribes. Morgana tried to teleport away, but she felt he spell countered by the Archmage's.

The suddenly she felt talons grabbing onto her shoulders, and yanking her off the ground - a birdman had seized her. She broke loose from the Archmage's grasp, and held the crown!

As the birdman flew higher, Goncol loosed an arrow at him, which sank into his side. Other birdmen flew towards the first birdmen, only to be tackled in the air by more birdmen. There was a hubbub as the tribes tried to figure out what was happening. The Mampang Guards rushed forward, and Goncol and Glowulf, separated by the mass of people, each quietly slipped away.

The injured birdman bore Morgana towards the Forest of Snatta, pursued by others. He was an ally, he told Morgana, a spy working for Analand. Wounded, the birdman could fly no more than several hundred yards before he had to set Morgana down, under the canopy of the forest, which was fortunate, for now the Archmage had mounted his dragon and taken off; unable to see Morgana, he landed once more, and commanded the tribes to hunt her down and retrieve the crown.

Under the forest canopy, the birdman revealed that he belonged to the tribe of Schinn, a tribe of birdmen whose ancestral place was the volcano crater where Mampang Fortress was built - centuries ago, his people weere driven away by the Archmage and the birdmen who had allied with him, and since then the Schinn had hidden themselves among the other tribes, but had never forgotten the injury. Not long after telling this story, the birdman expired.

Alone and with no bearing, Morgana ran in what she she thought was the southerly direction. Not long after she began to hear the sounds of pursuers behind her, which at least told her that she was heading in the right direction. Then, while hiding from a party of swamp goblins, she felt a hand on her shoulder - it was Glowulf, who had managed to find the body of the dead birdman and tracked her from there. Together, the two found their way to Fenestra's hut.

When she learned of what had transpired, Fenestra cast an enchantment, causing the trees around her hut to shift, creating a maze and preventing the pursuers from finding them. There, in the relative safety, Morgana and Glowulf rested.

Back at the shore of the lake, the Archmage summoned Valerian, and asked him where he thought Morgana would head.

'Khare,' Valerian replied.

The Archmage ordered his troops to search the land between the Forest of Snatta and Khare, set Valerian in command of a party of the guards, and returned to Mampang.

The next morning Fenestra handed Morgana and Glowulf a wooden ring, which she told them held the enchantment that caused the trees to form a maze around them, and bade her familiar, a firefox, to act as their guide to the edge of the forest. As the trio set off, the trees parted before them to reveal a confused Goncol, who had retraced his step to Fenestra's hut but was flummoxed when he could not find it, and had spent the night in the open. Together, the party decided to travel to the edge of the forest, and thence to Khare.

Along the way they were attacked by Klattamen, whose shaman overcame the enchantment of the ring, but the party managed to defeat them before they could send a message to the Archmage. But when they reached the edge of the forest, they found many birdmen circling the skies above, and dust clouds in the distance, indicating the many parties that are even now looking for them.

Glowulf prayed to Fulkra, god of travelers, and asked for the safest way to Analand. The way ahead, Fulkra replied, was fraught with danger, but he may seek the aid of helpers, friends, and family.

This, Glowulf thought, meant that instead of heading towards Khare, they should head east into the Vanti-Bak Wastes, where his tribe lived, and thence to the Earth End Coast, and from there find passage by sea to Analand.

When the sun had set, the party began its journey, under the cover of darkness. For a while they managed to evade the eyes of Mampang, but in the afternoon of the next day they spied a dust cloud to their rear, which got closer with each passing hour. Soon afterwards a single birdman began to circle them. The party waited, and the birdman landed. He declared himself to be Peewit Croo, one of the Schinn. The party had been spotted by birdmen, and a party of six horsemen had been sent after them, and would reach them in less than an hour.

Unable to outrun the horsemen in the open plains, the party decided to head towards a nearby hillock. The hillock turned out to be an abandoned mine or quarry, with shafts cut horizontally into its rock faces. The party plotted, and decided to lure the pursuers into the shafts by tracking footprints into one of them before backing out, then hiding on the reverse slope of the hillock. Once the pursuers have dismounted and entered the shaft, Morgana would call upon Throff, the goddess of earth, to shake the ground with an earthquake, and bury them inside.

And so they did, and hid behind the hillock with Peewit Croo. Here they heard the horsemen come to a halt, dismount, and enter the shaft. They crept forward again, and found that one of the horsemen had remained with the horses, holding their reins - it was Valerian!

Morgana called out to Throff even as Valerian called out to his companions. The ground shook, causing the horses to bolt off, and the shaft to collapse. When it was over, the party picked themselves up.

Morgana, Glowulf, and Goncol tried to make Valerian to switch his allegiance back to Analand once more, but the former Royal Guard would not be swayed. He charged his erstwhile companions and struck Morgana a grievous blow, but outnumbered, he was wrestled to the ground by Glowulf, Goncol, and Peewit Croo. Goncol forced a potion down Valerian's throat to make him comply, and while the potion was in effect the party tied him up, rounded by the horses, and continued their journey eastwards.

As the sun began to set, they spotted smoke from cooking fires ahead - they have found Glowulf's clan. Glowulf approached the caravan, and showed the pendant that was left with him when he was found by his foster father. By the pendant the Black Elves knew he was the child of one Gloranda, who bore him out of wedlock, and left the tribe one night, never to be seen again. They asked if Glowulf wanted to learn of his birth name, but Glowulf declined - his heart was with Analand, and he would return to his adopted family.

The Black Elf Tribe had ignored Mampang's summon, valuing their freedom, and after hearing the party's story, agreed to take them to the Earth End Coast in their caravan, hidden from Mampang's spies. And so they arrived at the coast, where they managed to hail a fishing boat from Analand.

The boat took them to Gummport, in Far Analand. There, they took the long journey to Arkleton, Analand's capital city, with Valerian in chains. Even as he was brought before the chancellor of the realm, the former Royal Guard would not renounce his allegiance to the Archmage. Pleading that his mind had been charmed by the Archmage, the party begged that his life be spared, and so it was that Valerian was imprisoned in the dungeon.

To reward the heroes there would be no great fanfare or feast, for even now the news of the loss of the crown had been kept secret, but each was asked what boon they requested from the king.

Morgana asked for land and a tower, wherein she could continue her study of sorcery.

Goncol asked for a grand manor, which he planned to continue his study of wizardry, with the aim of starting a school.

Glowulf asked for a modest reward, and returned to his adopted parents, and continued the life of a fisherman.

Thus ended the tale of the quest for the Crown of Kings, and peace was once more restored to Analand.

Epilogue

It was several years later when Goncol, now more learned in the craft of wizardry, asked for Valerian to be delivered to his manor, that he might use his knowledge to restore the warrior's mind. But by now Goncol had been tainted by the forbidden knowledge of the evil tome from which he learned the arcane arts, and his evil magic would soon warp Valerian's mind too.

Then one morning, Goncol awoke to find the guards he set to watch Valerian slain, and the fighter gone...

Prepping and Running the Game

I am both proud and ashamed to say that this final session of the campaign had been a hidden railroad.

Now when the previous session ended my players and I were not sure how the final session would play out. One brought along a boardgame for this session, and another prepared a one-shot game, in case the session ended in an early TPK.

On my part I procrastinated on prepping the session until the day of the game.

I had asked each player to tell me privately what their PC's plan was, and I knew Morgana was going to seize the crown with the use of magic. Now I could of course have the Archmage be so powerful that he could thwart Morgana, and have a TPK, but that would have been a bad way to end a campaign. The party, or at least the three 'loyal' PCs, must escape. I decided that the birdmen of Schinn, an important faction in the gamebook, would help them do this.

Once that was decided, then the question was: where would they escape to?

The obvious choice was Khare, but that would be obvious to Mampang too, so I decided that there had to be an alternative. Fortunately, in an earlier session, I randomly decided that Glowulf's clan lived in the east, near the coast. The coastal route seemed to be a reasonable option, and to nudge the party in that direction, I counted on Glowulf using his prayer to ask for the safest route to Analand, and slipped in a semi-cryptically worded message, which had the intended effect.

As for the route they would take, I guessed that the players would want to backtrack and seek the allies they have met along the way, and so I prepped what Fenestra, The Sham, and Shadrack would do to aid the PCs. As predicted, the PCs did seek Fenestra.

Now I knew Valerian's player was not going to abandon his allegiance to the Archmage, so I needed to prepare a temporary character or two for him to play. For this I took a 'monster' from the original gamebook, a firefox, and made him Fenestra's familiar. I gave the firefox the ability to do 1d6 points of fire damage by expending 1 of its Stamina, so as to give the player a combat option, and threw a combat their way.

The second temporary character was Peewit Croo, the birdman. Once more, I gave him the ability to grapple, and therefore lift a person off the ground, and perhaps drop him from a height. With his ability for flight, I had freedom to decide where and when to introduce him to the story.

To provide another encounter for the travel across the plains, I took inspiration from an episode of Manhunt, where the protagonist stole a horse from his pursuers who have dismounted to search for him in broken terrain. I decided that a quarry or mine would fit the terrain and also give another indication that there was once a civilisation in these lands, and then once more nudged Morgana's player to employ the trick of luring their pursuers into a shaft and then burying them with a divinely-inspired earthquake by asking who else had not used their godly favour this session.

This encounter was also a neat point to reintroduce Valerian into the story, so to avoid having him buried with the rest of the horsemen, I made him a horse-holder, which allowed the party to face him for a final confrontation.

In the end, we completed the session at the usual three-hour mark.

I do not know if my players knew that the whole session had been a bit of a set-up, but we enjoyed talking about what happened after the quest so much that we eventually decided (mostly via messaging over the phone afterwards) to play a spin-off of the campaign. Glowulf's player asked for a campaign where they could go all-out murder-hobo, so I decided this would be a good opportunity to run an evil-PCs campaign.

Goncol's player had asked for a building to be granted to him, and planned to start a wizardry school. He also wanted to use his magic to 'convert' Valerian back. I had originally ended the story with Valerian disappearing from the dungeon not long after the events of the game, but now we decided that Valerian was turned over to Goncol, but that the magic would in fact warp Valerian's mind. Valerian would escape, and form a band of evil henchmen, who will avenge him by killing the other three.

We will probably use 5E instead of AFF rules for this campaign, and I imagine it will be a short one, maybe one session for each if the former PCs. Our campaign calendar is pretty packed for the rest of the year though, so it will be a while before this happens, but I am quite excited about it.

Sorcery! #9 - The Kurultai

The party is waylaid by satyrs

Campaign Diary

With a heavy heart, the party continued up the foothills of the Xamen Mouintains, towards Mampang Fortress.

Near sunset they noticed an bird of prey circling above them - it was a Goldcrest Eagle from Analand. The eagle bore a message from the king, announcing his joy at the party's progress, as well as news that spies from Analand operated within Mampang - but the identity of these spies were not revealed for fear of the message falling into the wrong hands. The party wrote a quick reply, but soon after the eagle took to the air again it was attacked by two birdmen, who then quickly fled towards Mampang.

As the sun set the party found shelter in a cave by the well-used path to Mampang, where they observed a large party of soldiers carrying banners and supplies pass them, presumably to attend the meeting of the tribes.

The next day the party continued the climb, ever wary of winged spies from Mampang. Late in the afternoon they found they way blocked by a party of satyrs, who disarmed them and led them to their village. There, they met the head of the village Sh'houri who, learning that they were enemies of Mampang, offered to show them a secret trail to the fortress.

The satyrs claimed that the denizens of Mampang hunted them for sport, but the party noticed that they satyrs had many items among them that seemed beyond their skills to make, and came to the conclusion that the satyrs probably robbed the caravans that brought goods into Mampang. Learning that the next caravan was due the next afternoon, they concocted a scheme with Sh'houri: they would pretend to be merchants headed for Mampang who were attacked by the satyrs, and then join the caravan.

The plan worked, and the next afternoon our heroes entered the gates of Mampang Fortress disguised as merchants, carrying with them two sacks of medicinal tree roots supplied to them by the satyrs.

The caravan passed through a sturdy gatehouse into the first courtyard, around which the barracks of the Archmage's guards stood. Entering the fortress, our heroes were awed by the size and scale of the fortress, which more resembled a walled city than a fortress. A large caravanserai was directly to their right, and a small army of clerks and customs officer began to quickly look through and assess the goods brought in to the fortress, as well as levy a tax on them. Beside the caravanserai stood a large stone building, which the party learned was the Covered Market.To their right there were two large buildings with tall chimneys: one was the foundry, and the other the glassworks. Carts laden with ore and firewood were led to these buildings.

On either side of the second courtyard were buildings which held numerous stores and guild houses. Beyond these were the gated residential quarters of the inhabitants of Mampang.

Far from a garrison, Mampang looked more like a thriving town.

Facing the gate, behind another layer of walls, was Mampang Tower, a large building with a dome 150 feet across, built atop a rocky rise. Several smaller towers were built along the wall, and birdmen could be seen flying in and out of some of them.

Having paid their levy, the party found accommodation at the Mampang Inn, and decided to split up to investigate the town.

Glowulf tried to enter the residential area, but was told that it forbidden to outsiders. Here, he learned, the inhabitants of Mampang lived side by side, regardless of their race or origin.

Goncol investigated a walled part of the town known as 'the Dragon's Den', and learned that it indeed held a dragon tamed by the Archmage.

Morgana took herself near the second set of walls, and found it well-guarded by the black-clad soldiers of Mampang.

Valerian marched straight to the barracks, where he told the guards he wanted to join them. He was brought to the captain of the guards, a soldier formerly from Ruddlestone, who recognised his sword, and told him that his arrival had been expected.

As Glowulf, Goncol, and Morgana tried to make their way back to the inn, they were each confronted by guards, and brought before the second gate... where they now saw Valerian arriving from the barracks with a party of guards. They party was disarmed, brought through the second gate, and handed over to the Tower Guards. Then, they were led up the flight of stairs that ascended the rock that the tower was built upon, and into Mampang Tower. They passed through the cavernous halls of the lower levels, ascended yet more stairs, and were finally brought into a chamber in one of the smaller towers that rose like minarets from the main dome. Here, seated behind a large wooden table, was the Archmage.

The Archmage bade them to sit, and asked the purpose of their journey. The party accused the Archmage of stealing the Crown of Kings and planning to raise an army to conquer Analand.

The Archmage responded to their accusation calmly, admitting that he did steal the Crown, but only because the kings of the 'civilised kingdoms' had denied Mampang's admittance into the Femphrey Alliance. The lands of Kakhabad, the Archmage said, were once home to many non-human civilisations, until the devastating invasion by Analand centuries ago, which laid waste to the lands and reduced its peoples to disunited, warring tribes. Why, asked the Archmage, should the peoples of Kakhabad be denied the benefits of the Crown, when they have suffered so much from the kingdoms? Now, with the Crown in hands, he could finally unite the tribes, end the ceaseless warfare between them, and lead Kakhabad to a new age of peace and prosperity, where they could trade and deal with the other kingdoms as equals.

Valerian agreed with the Archmage, and pledged his service to Mampang. The others, still fearing that Archmage was intent on conquering their homelands, would not be dissuaded from their quest.

To convince them of his intentions, the Archmage asked the party to attend the Kurultai, the meeting of the all the tribes, with him, so they could see and hear for themselves. The party was then escorted back to the inn, and had their weapons returned to them.

The next morning a guard arrived at the party's room, bearing the uniform of a lieutenant of the guards for Valerian, and a message to meet at the gate. At the gate, the party joined a party of guards, made up of men, Black Elves, Svinns, ogres, and goblins, carrying banners and supplies. Over the next two days the party descended the Xamen Mountains, crossed the Visclami Swamps, where a wooden causeway had been laid, and arrived at the northern shore of Lake Iklalal on the evening of the second day. Here, the party rested and ate dinner, and as the full moon began to rise, they embarked dragon-prowed boats, and began to row for the south shore.

When they beached at the southern shore they could see thousands of people already gathered on the stretch of land between the lake and Snatta Forest: Black Elves, Swamp Goblins, Centaurs, and Klattamen. Tower Guards of Mampang ringed a small area of ground before them, upon which was placed large, flat stone, and upon that an elaborate throne.

Then as the moon reached the zenith of its path, a huge winged form could be seen approaching in the night sky: it was the Archmage, atop his dragon.

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was the first one where I (and the party) departed vastly from the books.

One of the questions I asked myself after reading the original gamebook was: if the Crown made its wearer wise and just, then why would letting the Archmage have it be such a bad thing for the rest of the world?

If the Archmage merely wanted to deny the civilised kingdoms of the benefit of the Crown, then he could have just destroyed or hidden it, instead of bringing it back to Mampang, which would have made the whole quest irrelevant.

As I thought about this while preparing for the campaign, I decided that the only reason why the Archmage wanted the Crown was to do good.

I then looked at the lands of Kakhabad and tried to construct a history. Why would the inhabitants of Kakhabad speak Common and use the same currency? Without a central authority, how would Khare have been built?

I decided that in the past Analand must have tried to subjugate Kakhabad, and indeed managed to extend its borders up to the Jabiji River, where they founded Khare, both as a city for trade, as well as to project their influence into the Baklands. I imagine the invasion broke the various non-human kingdoms of Baklands, but they were still able to repel the Analanders, who fell back beyond the Shamutanti Hills, and built a wall against these 'barbarians'.

Now the idea that the Archmage would want to the Crown to unite the tribes to just invade the southern kingdoms seemed a little silly to me, so I decided that like Genghis Khan, his aim was not to conquer the world, but to unite the tribes, establish peace, and trade with the civilised kingdoms, to the benefit of all. I then decided that as one of the steps in his plan, he would summon all the tribes to a greet meeting, a Kurultai, where he would wield the power of the Crown, and gain their allegiance. This added drama to the situation, and also gave the players a ticking clock to beat.

Throughout the previous sessions I gave clues that Kakhabad was home to several lost civilisations, and that the tribes were in constant warfare. Then I made Mampang itself an oasis of peace, trade, and civilisation.

The contrast was enough to sway Valerian's player to the Archmage's side and make him reveal himself to the guards.

This of course threw me off balance, as I had expected them to infiltrate or somehow gain entry into Mampang Tower, which would lead to a climatic confrontation with the Archmage, when I would present his side of the story. So I went along, presented the Acrhmage as a reasonable person, and moved the narrative along for the session, until we reached the next natural decision point.

After I ended the session, I asked the players to separately message me to let me know what their character would in our next and final session.

Morgana's player, with Morgana being the leader of the party, still felt bound by her obligation to complete the quest.

Glowulf's player found himself in a dilemma: on the one hand he wanted to fulfill his promise to the crown of Analand, yet at the same time he was drawn to Mampang's vision. In the end, he loyalty laid with his adopted country and parents, and he would probably side with Morgana.

Goncol's player was, ironically, the one who held out the most. Goncol, he reasoned, was used to being skeptical of people's intentions, and his natural instinct was to disbelieve the Archmage, and fall back to his previous assumptions.

During the whole session we only fought a single combat, and then only for two rounds as the captain of the guards tried to assess Valerian's skills. Most of the session was role-playing and exploration, with the players slowly learning the truth about Mampang and realising that the accounts they have been given were not always accurate.

The next session will be the finale, and with a party split in loyalty, I am not sure what will happen. Should be exciting, but I am prepared that it will be a short session...

Sorcery! #8 - The Boatman

The Water Serpent attacks!

Campaign Diary

The party continued their trek, and towards noon came upon a clearing. In the centre of the clearing was a solitary knoll. Walking around the knoll, the party found a door on its side. Morgana knocked on the door, and a voice from within the knoll bade the party to enter.

The party opened the door to find Black Elf seated at a table in the middle of the room. Before her on the table was a glowing orb. She introduced herself as Fenestra, and questioned the party and asked their purpose, and when she learned that they were enemies of the archmage and his Serpents, she cackled and offered to show them what was in the orb. Inside the glowing orb, the party now saw, was the form of a serpent made of flame.

That, Fenestra told them, was the Sun Serpent, who sought shelter at her hut during a storm, and was trapped by her magic. The Water Serpent, she explained, killed her father many years ago, and since then she had dedicated herself to the destruction of the creatures. She imparted to them the knowledge of the weakness of the Water Serpent – it cannot abide oil - and handed them two flasks of oil. The party asked Fenestra if she knew of the weakness of the Time Serpent, and she replied that she did not - although it was said that it could only be defeated by powerful sorcery.

Leaving Fenestra, the party continued on northwards along the forest track, until they came upon a wide path to the left. Examining the ground, the realised that remnants of flagstones once covered this path. They followed the path to large clearing, in the middle of which stood a large stepped stone pyramid. At the edges of the squares were fallen stone statues of goblinoid warriors, now covered by undergrowth. The party spotted a small green snake on the ground between them and the pyramid; the snake seemed to notice them also, and it began to slither towards the pyramid.

The party followed the snake as it climbed up the steps of the pyramid, and when all four of them were on the pyramid, a wall of flame rose up and surrounded the pyramid. At the same time, the snake burst into flames, and grew in size until it now towered over the party - it was the Fire Serpent! The heroes knew its weakness, but here on the stony steps of the pyramid there was no sand... except for a handful that Goncol had kept in his pouch! The thief cast the sand at the fiery form of the serpent... and missed. As Valerian and Glowulf battled the serpent, Morgana hurriedly gathered the scattered grains of the sand, and when she had done so, she cast the sand upon the serpent, and extinguished it.

The party continued on their way, and at sunset they came upon the shores of Lake Iklala. They made camp, hidden among the reeds by the shore, and when morning came they blew on a silver whistle that Fenestra had given them. The whistle gave no sound, but soon a figure emerged from the reeds nearby - it was the boatman Fenestra had told them plied the lake. The party paid the boatman his fee, and he dragged a long single-sailed reed boat out from among the reeds, and made the heroes sit astride it, and began to row the boat out into the lake.

When they had reached the middle of the lake, the boatman suddenly stopped rowing. Glowulf turned and saw his staring into the distance, and when he tapped the boatman, his form collapsed as though it was a rag doll, and out of the heap rose a sinuous whirlwind the form of a serpent - it was the Air Serpent. Balanced precariously on the reed boat, Glowulf and Goncol tried to fend of the serpent, while Morgana used a gale horn to summon up a wind to carry them to the far shore, and Valerian peddled as hard as he could. Using the serpent staff from the Sham, Glowulf managed to wound the serpent, which vanished back into the form of the boatman. As Glowulf rooted through the pile, a small snake emerged and slipped into the water. Glowulf leapt into the water after it, as did Goncol - unfortunately, the thief had forgotten that he did not know how to swim, and had to be rescued by Morgana. Meanwhile, Glowulf, raised as he were by a fisherman, quickly caught the snake, and snapped it into half.

The party returned to the boat, and Glowulf took the oars as steered it to the far shore once more. But just as they were nearing the shore, the water ahead of them began to churn. A form broke the surface, and a serpent, its form transparent as though it was made of water, emerged. But the party was prepared for it - they took out the flasks of oil that Fenestra had given them, and proceeded to splash the contents at the serpent. As the oil struck the form of the serpent, its body began to break up into globules, which for a while were suspended in the air... and then fell into the lake, and merged with the water.

Glowulf once more set the boat in its course, and it was sunset when they beached at the swampy northern shore of Lake Iklala. The party hid the boat, and entered the Vischlami Swamps. As they trekked north, the ground beneath them became drier, until at last they found a piece of higher ground where they could set up camp.

That night their rest was briefly disturbed by a party of Swamp Goblins which were heading for the lake - were they also heeding Mampang's call?

The next morning the party continued northwards, and by afternoon they could see the peaks of the Xamen mountains in the distance. Yet as they marched on, Valerian began to notice that the trees around them appeared to look... familiar. Suspecting that they may be walking in circles, the party left marks on the ground... but found themselves coming upon the same place, but without the marks!

The party also became aware that the sun appeared not to have moved in the sky - and just when they realised that they were caught in a time loop, the air before them began to shimmer as if it was heated, and then a large serpent, its body scintillating with the colours of the rainbow, materialised, and started to attack them. The party fought back, but each time their blow landed, they found themselves jerked back in time, and the wound of the serpent's body would close. But they fought on regardless, and soon even the Time Serpent's sorcery could not withstand them. The Time Serpent turned to flee, and when the heroes tried to pursue they found themselves slowed down, as the serpent flew north, towards Mampang.

When the serpent was out of sight they flow of time returned to normal, and our heroes found themselves at the edge of the swamp, at the foothills of the Xamen mountains. They have defeated five of the serpents, but failed to stop the Time Serpent. Soon, the Archmage will know of their quest.

Prepping and Running the Game

This was a combat-heavy session, as the party had to run the gauntlet of the serpents. The difficulty of each combat was dependent on whether the players knew each serpent's weakness, and whether they had the material needed to defeat it.

I tried to make each combat different by varying the environment. For the Fire Serpent, I lured the party onto stony ground where they could not easily get sand; this meant that if the first attack missed (which it did), it would take them several rounds to gather up the sand to make another attack.

For the combats on the lake, I had the PCs sitting astride a reed boat, which meant that they could not easily switch positions, and I could pick which character I wished to attack.

The Time Serpent was a powerful adversary. I ruled that once a turn it could force a reroll of a combat round, and that this power could only be negated by the ZED spell, a spell which costs 7 stamina points. Unfortunately for the players, Morgana's player did not realise this despite my hint; but fortunately for them, they rolled so well that despite the rerolls, the Time Serpent was taking a beating. I decided then to make it flee, and gave it the power to slow time down; once more the party failed to use the ZED spell, and I allowed it to escape and bring the news of their arrival to the Archmage.

During the session I continued to drop hints that the whole of Baklands was once home to great civilisations that had since fallen, and I continued to show them that the tribes were gathering, to give them a sense of the gravity of the situation, as well as the urgency. This seemed to have worked, as would become clear in the following session (which we played yesterday, and which I shall report on soon).

Sorcery! #7 - The Sham

Campaign Diary

The party tried to parley with the Moon Serpent, but it was in no mood to talk. The Moon Serpent attacked with ferocity, and neither weapons nor Morgana’s spell seemed to wound it. Then Goncol, frustrated by the ineffectiveness of his daggers, cast a cantrip to conjure a flame in his hand, and struck the serpent with it – instantly there was a flare as the fire burned the skin of the serpent. The Moon Serpent turned its wrath on Goncol, but another attack with the fire saw it go up in bright flames that temporarily blinded the party. When their sight returned, they saw that all that remained of the Moon Serpent was a crystal orb on the ground where it had stood.

Morgana picked up the orb, and cast a spell of premonition. In her trace she saw herself walking through a forest. As she walked, she became aware that she was being stalked by an invisible foe. She tried to walk faster, but felt herself unable to move her limbs. As she began to panic, she was shaken back to her senses by the others.

Finding shelter among outcrops of rocks, the party rested for the night.

The next morning the party decided to head northeast, hoping to find the Sham, a sorceress mentioned in the scroll Glowulf had purchased from the Black Elves. However, dark clouds approaching from their east forced them to seek shelter. The party found a large ruined building standing amidst the remains of a village. Reading the inscriptions on the temple, they learned that it was a temple to Throff, the Earth Goddess. The roof of the building had long collapsed, so the party descended the flight of stairs in the main hall and entered the hypogeum, where the worship of Throff took place.

The stairs ended in a large hall, decorated by painted flagstones that are now broken by weathering. Outside, the sound of rain and wind indicated that the storm has arrived. Exploring deeper into the hypogeum, the party came upon a smaller hall. Before they could investigate the hall further, bronze doors came down over the archway they had just entered through and the archway opposite it. At the same time, the four stone pillars in the room began to twist and bend until they each attained a roughly humanoid form, and then moved to attack the party. The party’s steel weapons could do little against the rocky forms of the creatures. Realising that these creatures were probably guardians of the inner temple put here to keep non-worshippers out, Morgana immediately declared her allegiance to Throff, and the creatures stopped attacking her. Rushing to the far door, she bade it to open in Throff’s name and it did as she commanded, and the party fled through it.

The door led into a passage that ended in a small round room, at the centre of which was a small pool. Morgana approached the pool and saw that its surface was covered in scum. When she reached into the pool, the ghostly form of a skeletal figure rose up, and again the party found themselves under attack. Once more their spells and steel had little effect on the incorporeal form, and once more Goncol thought to try a different means: he poured the holy water he had bought from the Black Elves into the pool; instantly the scum receded from where the water touched, and the ghostly form faded. Soon the pool was filled with clear water. Morgana drank from the pool, and felt the blessings of Throff.

The party took a short nap, and when they awoke the storm had passed. They continued their journey towards the northeast. Late in the afternoon they came upon a solitary gnome, traveling in the opposite direction from them. The gnome demanded to know if they were friends or foes, and when they replied that they were friends, the gnome demanded a gift as a token of their friendship.
They obliged. The gnome accepted their gift, and transformed into a beautiful woman – she was the sorceress called the Sham. The Sham in turned gifted them with a vial of gas that would put to sleep the Sleepless Ram, a formidable guardian of the archmage in Mampang, a staff that would weaken the Seven Serpents, and knowledge of the weakness of the Fire Serpent. She then reverted to the form of the gnome again, and continued her way.

Near sunset the party spied a Klatta village. Curiously, only women, children, and the elderly were visible – there were no men in sight. The party made a wide berth of the village, and settled down to another night in the open.

The next day passed without event as the party continued to trek to the north. Now and then they saw the dust clouds stirred up by large bodies of men – the tribes are on the move. In the afternoon they came across old bones from hundreds of skeletons, littered across the ground. The bones were of men, elves, and centaurs, and the damage to the bones and the presence of flint arrowheads embedded in some of them told Valerian that they were crossing an ancient battlefield.

At sunset they arrived at the escarpment at the edge of the Klatta-badu Plains. Here they could see the Forest of Snatta below, and beyond that, the dark line and snowy tops of the Zanzunu Peaks. Wary of spending the night in the forest, the party settled down for the night. When the sun has set, they saw clusters of campfires to their east and their west. In eleven nights the tribes will gather at the shores of Lake Ilklala.

The next morning the party started to descend the scree to reach the forest. As they struggled to keep their balance, the ground suddenly opened up under Glowulf and Valerian, and they fell into a large pit some ten feet deep. Before they could climb out of the pit, the ground began to rumble again, and rocks leapt from the ground and struck them. They scrambled to reach the edge of the pit, but once more the ground heaved, and a giant serpent with scales that looked like rocks emerged – it was the Earth Serpent.

Morgana and Goncol jumped into the pit, and together the four heroes battled the serpent. Remembering Shadrack’s advice, Glowulf and Valerian grappled the powerful form of the serpent, and with great effort hoisted it off the earth. The serpent began to shrink to the size of a small snake, slipping out of their grasp; but before it could touch the earth again, Goncol reached out and seized it. He then thrusted the writhing snake into a glass vial, where it struggled weakly, before turning into stone.

The party hurried down the slope and entered the forest, hoping that their battle had not drawn unwanted attention.

It was a different world under the thick canopy of the forest: the air was cool and moist, and there were sounds of birds and unseen forest creatures. The party followed animal trails, heading towards the north. Soon, the party became aware that they were, true to Morgana’s vision, being followed by creatures they could not see. When he heard a rustling sound coming from his left, he lunged towards the sound, striking blindly with his sword… and felt something constrict around his sword arm – a plant had come alive, and had wrapped its vine around his arm.

Glowulf grabbed the hewing axe he had bought from the Black Elves, and with a swift stroke cut through the vine, but more vines began to wrap themselves around Valerian’s feet. At the same time, Goncol felt the claws on an invisible beast strike him across his back. Morgana panicked and ran down another trail, but was attacked by one of the another invisible beasts. For a while confusion reigned, until Goncol landed a blow against his invisible opponent and it showed its form: it was a Snattacat, a tiger-like creature that could turn invisible at will. Glowulf managed to free Valerian, and together the party soon slew one of the Snattacats, and the other one retreated.

Prepping and Running the Game

Most of the encounters in this session came from the original gamebook/module, but the Temple of Throff mini-dungeon was re-designed to make it more interesting.

This was an action-packed session in terms of combat, but I also did two things that were important to the whole story: I gave the players the sense that the tribes were on the move, and that something momentous was about to happen, and I also tried to impress upon them that the Baklands was a region that saw warfare between the various races and tribes that dwelt there - this last part would have bearing later in the story.

While the session was light-hearted as usual and saw the usual jokes and banter, the gravity of their quest had become more apparent to the players. For a while they discussed whether they should try to rouse the tribes against the archmage, or to ambush the archmage as he came to Lake Ilklala, but they eventually decided to continue traveling to Mampang as originally planned. This was a bit of a disappointment to me, as I was fully prepared to let them take control of the direction of the quest, and I was also hoping to not have to prep the whole fortress, which would take quite a lot of effort on my part.

Sorcery! #6 - The Caravan

Meeting the not-so-friendly locals...

Campaign Diary

The party continued their march northwards, and soon the walls of Khare had disappeared behind them. Ahead lay the vast expanse of the Baddu-Bak plains.

As the waning moon began to rise in the east, Glowulf noticed a few birds circling above the party. Suspecting something unnatural, the party prepared themselves for an attack. Sure enough, one by one the birds began to dive at them - Nighthawks! The party quickly took down three of the raptors; when the remaining two turned to flee, another raptor, this time an eagle, dived out of nowhere and attacked them, killing them before they could get too far.

The eagle then landed before the party. It was a goldencrest eagle, a bird used as messengers by the royal court of Analand. Around its neck was tied a metal tube, which contained a rolled up parchment.

Morgana unrolled the parchment and read it aloud. It was a missive from the king, acknowledging that the party was not the first that the court had sent on this mission - several other parties had been sent, but none had returned. The king also bade them to be wary of the Seven Serpents, servants of the archmage, and to seek out Shadrack the Hermit, who might be able to aid them on their quest. Morgana wrote a message to the king on the back of the parchment, asking him to send the eagle at more frequent intervals, and placed the message back into the metal tube. The eagle took to the air, and flew south.

Scanning the horizon, the party found a solitary dead tree, which they decided to spend the night under. They had barely settled down under the tree's bough when they heard a rustling sound coming from it. They turned and saw that a face had appeared on the gnarled bark of the tree trunk. The face spoke, bidding them to travel eastwards to the fishtail rock, where they would find Shadrack. Despite the lateness, the party decided to break camp and head east.

The moon was high in the sky when they saw a huge rock rising from the flat plain, with its top shaped such that it looked like a fish had been buried headfirst into the ground. The opening to a cave could be seen at the base of the rock, and standing outside it was a man whose face resembled that which appeared on the tree - it was Shadrack the Hermit.

Shadrack welcomed the party into the cave, where he offered them food and asked them of news from Khare, which Goncol happily supplied. The party asked him about the Seven Serpents, and he related how it was told that the archmage had slain a huge hydra many years ago, and raised its seven heads as seven serpents to serve him. In the recent months the Serpents had be about Baklands, rousing the nomadic tribes of the plains.

Each was gifted the power of one of the primal gods which the archmage worshiped: the Moon, the Sun, Fire, Water, Earth, Air, and Time. Though powerful, each serpent also had a weakness - the Air Serpent, Shadrack told the party, could leave its solid body and become intangible, but if its body was destroyed while it was in this state, the serpent would perish.

With their stomachs filled, the party spent the night by the fire in fishtail rock, and when they awoke in the morning Shadrack was nowhere to be found.

The party resumed their course northwards. Once they spied a dust cloud in the distance, as if a large body of horsemen was riding past. Another time they came upon an ancient, now dry riverbed, scoured with many large pits, and heard the sound of a flute coming from one of them. Both times they made a detour to avoid giving themselves away.

At around noon they were attacked by a giant frilled lizard which ambushed them, and Valerian suffered a grievous on his sword arm from the acid which the lizard spat.

In the afternoon the party came upon a caravan in the distance: a Black Elf encampment! Glowulf bade the rest of the party to make a detour around the camp, while he approached it alone. When Glowulf was within bow range a couple of arrows clattered around his feet. Several Black Elf archers challenged him in Elvish, but Glowulf could only reply in Common. Glowulf asked for permission for the party to be admitted to the camp. One of the elves left, and after a while returned to tell him that permission had been granted by Cesstar, the leader of the tribe.

When the party had entered the ring formed by the Black Elves' wagons, they began to question Glowulf, and the party soon learned that Glowulf was not in fact a native of the Baklands which he claimed to be, but was in fact raised by a fisherman in Analand after he was found floating in a basket near the mouth of the Jabaji River! Glowulf had joined the party on it quest as he wanted to return to the Baklands and find his tribe. He showed a pendant which his foster father had found on him, and was told that it bore the symbol of a tribe that dwelt in the Vanti-Bak Wastes to the south.

The Black Elves then questioned the rest of the party on their reason for venturing into the Baklands. Morgana revealed that they had come on a mission against the archmage. Instantly the mood in the camp change - hands gripped sword hilts and arrows were nocked to bowstrings. The Serpents, agents of the archmage, had demanded that all the tribes report any strangers to them, and for all the tribes to gather by the shores of Lake Ilklala on the night of the next full moon to pledge allegiance to the archmage; Cesstar now blamed the party for bringing the archmage's attention to Baklands.

Morgana used all her wits to persuade Cesstar to keep their presence hidden, saying that the tribes would retain their independence if the party succeeded in their quest. Cesstar conferred with her advisors, and loudly proclaimed in Elvish that these "traders" would be allowed to trade at their camp. An elf named Elecar was assigned to be their chaperon, and they were led to the trader's wagon, where Morgana was horrified to find a copy of the spellbook from Analand on sale. She purchased the book, and found that it belonged to a classmate, who no doubt had been sent on the same quest before her, and had perhaps met her end. Walking to the bonfire at the middle of the camp ground, she threw the book into the fire, that its secrets would not be known to the forces of evil.

As the party prepared to leave the Black Elf encampment, Cesstar took Glowulf aside, and asked him to abandon the party's futile quest and join his tribe, but Glowulf replied that he had made a promise to get the party across the Baklands, and he intended to keep that promise; when the quest is over, he would return to the Baklands and find his tribe.

With night approaching, the party headed towards a field of boulders to the north, where they made camp. But their rest was disturbed by a few Klattamen, wild men of the plains. Quickly defeating their attackers, the party decided to move their camp before more attackers arrived.

As they trekked through the night, Glowulf raised his eyes up to the moon to take a bearing, and was puzzled when he saw that the moon was full, when it was waning the night before. Slowly, before their eyes, the moon began to become smaller and smaller... and then it suddenly turned into two moons - the party found themselves staring into the eyes of a large, jet black snake, whose eyes seemed like the surface of the moon: it was the Moon Serpent...

Prepping and Running the Game

This session followed the book rather closely. I once more looked at all the encounters listed in the modules, and picked out the once which I thought was interesting.

One of the changes I introduced into the story here was that the archmage was trying to unite all the tribes of the Baklands, and that the Seven Serpents were his messengers. This gave them a reason to be in the Baklands, which the party must cross and also gave them two options: to try to sneak past all of them and reach Mampang unannounced, or to kill every single one they come across, so no word of their mission reach Mampang.

Unfortunately for me, the players took their mission rather seriously, and set about trying to avoid ALL the potential encounters I placed before them. Now in the original gamebook, and of course in a more traditional fantasy RPG, players would *want* to check out all the encounters to find information and loot and gain experience points; but I failed to realise that when the aim of the mission was to avoid detection, players will of course do the most logical thing and avoid everything!

To prevent the session from ending too early, I had to reveal to the party that the caravan they encountered was a Black Elf encampment, and persuade Glowulf's player to investigate it instead of avoiding it.

I had left clues alluding this the fact that the party was not the first one sent on this quest, and now I made it clear in the message from the king. I was hoping that this would invoke some emotional response from the players, but I was disappointed.

Likewise I was hoping that the other players (or at least their PCs) would have a reaction when they found out that Glowulf was in fact a fake "barbarian", but again I was disappointed.

Glowulf's player did RP the encounter with the Black Elves very well though,  and I think if we ever return to this campaign again Glowulf's quest to find his own people would be a good hook.

The party nearly came to a bad end when Morgana revealed their quest though. It was rather unwise for the player to risk disclosing the information to strangers, and I used the advice from Matt Colville to prevent it from ending in disaster, by slowing time down, giving them ample indication of the change in the Black Elves' attitude, and giving them a chance to talk their way out of it.

From this point on I see that the players have two options: to carry on their covert mission to Mampang to recover the Crown of Kings, or to try to create an alliance of the tribes of the steppes against the archmage. The second one seems unlikely to succeed, but if they do want to try that it is something I think is worth exploring and derailing the campaign for.

Roman-Persian War Campaign - Game 1

We decided to play a short campaign using the set of campaign rules by Dan Mersey from Issue 2 of Battlegames magazine, this time with our Late Imperial Roman army invading Sassanid Persia.

The battle report is over at wahj's blog:

The rules are a mash-up of Dan Mersey's Dux Bellorum and Impetus, which we have cobbled together and refined over the years.

I've got some more West Wind figures in the mail, so hopefully in the next game you will see some new units.

Sorcery! #5 - The Beggar

Campaign Diary

The party set about planning the heist. Goncol called on his old contacts, and learned that the key to the vault at Vlada's Gambling Hall was kept by Horace, the pit boss, who usually kept an eye on the whole joint from the upper floors of the gambling hall. They discussed several options, but finally decided that they would ambush Horace on his way home and seize the key off his person.

With still several hours till the closing of the gambling hall, Morgana proposed the party returned to the Temple of Slangg, where she revealed the party's plans to the priest. The priest, bemused by his latest convert, decided to aid her, and provided them with information of where Horace lived. The party decided to steal into Horace's room at the inn where he kept a permanent room, hoping to find something which would give them some leverage over the man. However, they found little information there - Horace apparently kept all his business at the office; they nevertheless decided to steal the coins and a set of nice clothes they found there.

Returning to the gambling hall, the party staked out the place: two of them watched the front door, while the other two watched the back door.

After midnight the gamblers began to leave, and an hour later the back door opened, and the party saw a humanoid creature with no arms came out of the kitchen, holding several bags with the tentacles which emerged from its misshapened head. It threw the bags into a heap against the wall of the building, and returned into the kitchen.

A little while later, the front door opened, and two men exited and proceeded to lock it. Soon afterwards, the back door opened once more, and Horace, accompanied by two other men, exited, locked the door, and together the three made their way towards the inn.

The party trailed Horace and his men, and became aware that they were taking a circuitous route to the inn, perhaps just to avoid any ambush. Using his knowledge of the city, Goncol led the party to a narrow alley, where they managed to surround Horace and his companions.

The party, now masked to hide their identities, managed to quickly overcome Horace's men, but before they could get their hands on Horace, he smashed the windows of a nearby building and entered it. The party followed him into the building, and after a short scuffle managed to knock him out. The party searched and found a bunch of iron keys, which they took off of Horace. Then, carrying Horace's limp form between them, they returned to the gambling hall.

Using Horace's key to unlock the back door, the party entered the kitchen. There they found a staircase leading to the upper floor, a door to the main hall, and a door to the side. Entering the side door, they found themselves in a storeroom, and saw the humanoid creature they saw earlier on a pallet on the floor. The creature screamed, and Valerian struck it with a makeshift sap, hoping to knock it out, but the creature screamed even louder. Valerian struck it again, and then again, and the creature fell silent. Valerian had killed it. Immediately Valerian felt the blessings of his patron god Usrel, the goddess of Peace, depart him.

Another staircase led from the storeroom to the basement below. The party entered the basement to find two guards, alerted by the creature's screams, waiting for them. The party quickly subdued the guards, this time without killing them. Opening a door behind the guards with another key from Horace's bunch, they found themselves in a vault with many locked niches in the walls. Using his magical sense, Glowulf detected the faint glow of magic behind the door of one of the niches. To their horror though, they realised that none of the keys in the bunch fit any of the locks!

Morgana tried using sorcery to unlock the niches but failed. Goncol then tried his lock picks... and succeeded. He opened the niche, and found the book that he had stolen not so long ago.

The party took their loot back to the Temple of Slangg, where they rested for the rest of the night. Goncol studied the pages of the book, and memorised as much of it as he could. The next day they returned to Lortag's house, where they exchanged their loot for the third spell line. Lortag informed them that their heiest had become the hottest news in Khare, and he bade them to leave as soon as they could before Vlada and Darius' men found them.

The party still lacked one spell line, though. Desperate, they decided to find Theetah, the seventh noble of Khare, who was rumoured to have been blinded by the Red Eyes. At first they searched among the beggars near the South Gate, where the few beggars who claimed to be Theetah were quickly revealed to be impostors. Morgana then had the idea to search Theetah's old residence for clues. Goncol led the party to the abandoned mansion, but a search of the interior revealed no clue to the nobleman's whereabouts.

Returning outside, the party saw a blind beggar approaching them. When asked, the old man claimed to be Theetah. The party offered to help Theetah get his vengeance against the Red Eyes in exchange for his spell line, but Theetah, suspicious of their intent demanded that they revealed their purpose for opening the North Gate. Wary of leaking their mission to spies of the archmage, the party refused to do so - they were at an impasse.

Then suddenly, three winged forms appeared behind Theetah - harpies! As their cries pierced the air, Theetah begged the party to protect him against the harpies, whom he told them were sent by the Red Eyes to torment him. The party set themselves between Theetah and the harpies, and after a hard fight brought all three of the creatures down. The grateful Theetah reluctantly gave them the spell line.

With the sun setting, the party hurried to the North Gate. As they approached the isolated north wall, the few guards on the walls paid them little heed. Our party stood before the north gate, and one by one they each recited one line of the spell. When the final word of the spell was spoken, a rumbling sound issued from the gate. Belatedly, the guards realised something was wrong. They called out to the party. Three loud clanks were heard, as the bolts holding the gates disengaged themselves, and the doors to the gate began to open.

The party ran towards the gate, while the guards stared in confusion. They were through the gate before the first of the guards had descended the walls.

Prepping and Running the Game

I had planned to base the session on the module "Sea's 7", a heist module by Evan Perlman. The module had an interesting story, a cast of NPCs which would have provided role-playing opportunities, and some description of the layout of the gambling hall/casino. I imagined the PCs would interact with the NPCs and either try to con or blackmail their way to the vault, or else use subterfuge to lift the key from Horace. As it turned out they chose the murder-hobo approach. Well, at least they didn't just charge into the gambling hall, weapons flashing...

I did not plan on them visiting Horace's home, and had to make up where he lived on the fly. I decided that Vlada employed only people with no family, to ensure that they were less likely to be compromised, and that Horace was careful to leave all work-related materials at the gambling hall.

The ambush against Horace would have been an easy encounter for the party, so I decided that Horace would naturally guess that any attacker would have been after the keys to the vault, and so made his priority keeping the keys away from the attacker. I had Horace hide the vault keys inside the building he broke into - the irons keys the party found on him were keys to the other doors in the hall. Had the players asked to search the building for other keys, I would have let them find the hidden keys.

The flayer, the tentacled creature whom Valerian killed, was originally a cook found in another encounter in the original book. I decided to put him in the kitchen of the gambling hall as the party had not had a chance to meet it earlier. The creature was harmless, and probably the only innocent being in the whole city, and it was a shame that it died despite their intention to avoid killing it. In the original book, killing the creature would have resulted in the failure of the whole mission, I believe.

The encounter with Theetah was pretty much as in the original book. I decided to place him near his old residence when Morgana's player suggested the party search it.

Over all I found the session rather bland. Part of it I attribute to the low crunch of the combat system. In future sessions I will try to let the NPCs utilise more of the combat options, which will hopefully inspire the players to try them too.

Sorcery! #4 - The Scholar

Campaign Diary

Acting as casual as they could, our heroes managed to walk past the two dock guards without arousing suspicion, but as soon as they returned to the gate to find it unlocked, they immediately gave chase.

Goncol and Glowulf scaled up the wall of a nearby building and spotted the three masked men making their getaway on the roof tops - they gave chase, while Morgana and Valerian shadowed them from the streets, ready to cut the men off.

Just when our heroes finally caught up with the masked men, the dock guards also arrived. The masked men tried to leap across a wide street from rooftop to rooftop, but stumbled and fell to the ground along with the chest. As Morgana and Valerian tried to hold the guards off, Goncol and Glowulf managed to recover the chest, leaving the masked men and the bewildered guards at the scene.

Returning to the necropolis, they found Darius and his men waiting for them. The party handed the chest over, received one of the spell lines in return, and - too tired to travel to an inn - spent the rest of the night in one of the crypts.

It was mid-morning when the heroes woke up. Having freshened themselves at one of the public fountains, they took stock of the situation.

They had one of the four spell lines needed to open the North Gate, and they had but some 36 hours to leave the city. Acting on Flanker's tip, they decided to visit Lortag the Scholar at the Artist's District.

Lortag, as it turned out, did know one of the spell lines. In exchange for the spell line, he tasked the party with stealing the very same book which Goncol had stolen from Darius! He bade the heroes to meet him for dinner later that day, while he tried to learn where Darius was keeping the book.

With several hours before dinner time, the party wandered the streets, hoping to learn where else they could find a Noble of Khare. Passing through the Temple District, they were drawn to the sermon at the chapel of Slangg, the God of Malice. At the end of the sermon, the priest made a call for a champion to represent the chapel in a contest of wits and sorcery, in return for any favour the champion asked for. The heroes asked if the priest knew one of the spell lines, and when he replied in the positive, Morgana took up the challenge. The terms of the challenge, however, required her to convert to the worship of Slangg if she did not win the contest.

Morgana entered the contest, but was defeated. She duly converted to the worship of Slangg, and the party gained their second spell line. They were halfway there.

Then Glowulf had the idea that perhaps a noble could be found at the gambling hall. Hoping to gain entrance to the upper levels at Vlada's Gambling Hall, where the rich gambled, the party first tried to have some suitable clothes tailored, but finding it beyond their means, they decided instead to lure a rich gambler outside the gambling hall to a back alley, where they proceeded to rob him of the clothes off his back, before tying him up.

Goncol dressed in the rich man's clothes, and with the others acting as his bodyguard, tried to gain admission to the upper levels. However, the ante at the tables there were too high for their coin pouches, and our heroes retreated to the ground floor, where the common folks played. Goncol played a game of swindlestones with a gambler, and during the banter learned that the seventh Noble of Khare went missing several years ago, and it was rumoured that he was blinded by the Red Eyes, a mysterious race that lived in their own enclave in Khare, after he tried to enforce the city laws on them. The party thanked the gambler, and left to meet Lortag for their appointment.

At dinner, Lortag revealed that his informers had learned the location of the book. After his own vault was broken into by a thief (actually Goncol) a few months ago, Darius decided to rebuild it. When he recovered the book from the crypt, Darius called in a favour from Vlada, and kept the book at the gambling hall's vault! The party would have to break into the vault, and steal the book again. Well, at least they knew the layout of the gambling hall by now...

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was a rather open one - I left the players the choice of where in the city to go to try to find the spell lines based on what they learned from the last game. They chose to visit Lortag, which I expected, and I in fact planned for the quest he would give them to be the game for the session after.

The encounter at the chapel of Slangg was taken from the original book - after I chose to let the PCs each worship a god, I thought it would be nice to reference it by having conversion a possibility.

The actual contest was based on a logic puzzle, which I saw here:

The players chose a sub-optimal strategy, and lost.

The visit to the tailor was unexpected, as was the idea that the gambling hall would be a good place to look for a noble. The players had the impression that *all* nobles in Khare knew one spell line - I should have made it clearer that only the major ones did. Nevertheless, it was fun watching them lure the poor minor noble to a back alley and mug him.

The next session will see them plan and pull off the heist, after which they will have about 24 more hours to find the remaining one spell line.

Sorcery! #3 - The Necropolis

Khare - the Cityport of Traps

Campaign Diary

As the party stepped through the gates of Khare, they came upon a market fair in the square just beyond. Their senses were overloaded by the sights, sounds, and smells of the city: stall owners hawking their wares, minstrels and town criers trying to grab the attention of passers-by, a myriad of colourful clothes and spices on sale, and the mixed odour of animal dung, roasted meats, and too many people in the same space.

Forgetting their mission for a while, the party spent some time wandering the fairgrounds, eating skunkbear meat on skewers, trying their luck at "Honest Hanna's Cabinet of Fortune", and Valerian took part in the fighting ring and (with the help of some magic from Morgana) won against the reigning champion, which gave the party some more gold to spend.

Having had their fill of food and fighting, our heroes turned their thoughts once more to their quest. To pass through the North Gate, Goncol told them, they needed to know the four spell lines that would unlock it. The only person who knew all four lines of the spell was Sansas, the First Noble of Khare, while the remaining Nobles, the identity of which were secret, each knew one of the spell lines. Goncol now revealed that he did not in fact know the spell lines as he claimed, but he knew that a book containing the spell lines was hidden in a crypt in the city's necropolis, which he proposed they go to.

Traveling north to the bridge across the Jabaji river, they took a brief halt at the Wayfarer's Rest, a large inn and tavern by the docks area, where they met Flanker. From Flanker the party learned that Lortag the Scholar was possibly a Noble, and that they might seek his help if they wished to learn more about the spells.

It was near sunset when they came to the gates of the necropolis. The party waited for the few people around the grounds to depart, and then Goncol guide them to a mausoleum. Pushing open the stone door of the mausoleum, they descended a flight of stairs to a large crypt underground. Goncol approached once of the sarcophagi in the centre of the crypt, and pushed open its lid. After a few moments of searching, he realised that what he sought was not within the sarcophagus. Confused, he nevertheless asked the others to search in the other sarcophagi and niches within the crypt. While they were busy searching, the door to the crypt sudden closed with a loud noise. Their candles and lanterns went out, and a rattling sound was heard as some of the bones within the wall niches knitted themselves into skeletons, which then came to life and started to attack them.

After a short, sharp fight, the party destroyed the undead, but Valerian and Glowulf were wounded. Goncol finally conceded that the book he came to find was no longer there, and the party headed out of the crypt... to find a dozen armed men waiting for them outside.

A pale, cloaked figure stood at the centre of the line of men; in one hand he held a book with a midnight blue cover - the book that our heroes had come for. The man revealed himself to be Darius, the Third Noble of Khare, and expressed his surprise that the party had survived the "reception party" he had prepared for them in the crypt. Goncol, he declared, had stolen the book from him several weeks prior, and had hidden it in the crypt before he skipped town; his men had trailed Goncol to the crypt and recovered the book, and Darius had laid a trap for the thief for when he returned to collect his loot.

Outnumbered, surrounded, and already wounded from their earlier fight, it was clear our heroes could not fight their way out. Goncol started hurling insults at Darius, hoping to distract him. Valerian and Morgana denied being Goncol's accomplices, and stated that they only wished to exit the North Gate.

Hearing this, Darius made the party an offer: he would let them have one of the spell lines, if they would "recover" a box from a warehouse in the docks for him before daybreak; in addition, they would have to leave the city within two days, or his men would kill them on sight. With no other choice, our heroes accepted the offer, and made their way to the docks.

Arriving at the warehouse late at night, our heroes spent the next two hours observing the guards' routine. When two of the guards had left to procure a midnight snack for the others, Goncol picked the lock to the gate, and broke into the warehouse with Morgana while Valerian and Glowulf kept a watch outside.

Inside the warehouse, Goncol and Morgana was surprised to find that two masked figures had entered the warehouse by removing the tiles on the roof and climbing down a rope. One of the figures took a small box from an opened crate, and together the two men climbed up the rope before Goncol and Morgana could stop them. Outside, Valerian heard a sound on the roof of the warehouse that told him something had gone wrong. Goncol and Morgana rushed out of the gate and informed Valerian and Glowulf what had happened, and together the party started to run out of the warehouse compound, hoping to catch the two masked men before they could get too far... and ran right into the two guards who had returned from their break...

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was based of course on Book 2 of the Sorcery! series, or rather the Myriador and Arion Games conversion of the book. Unlike Book 1, this part of the adventure had more branches, which meant that the party would bypass some of the encounters; yet at the same time, they needed to collect all four lines of the spell, which made things difficult for me as the GM.

My solution to this was to make a list of all the encounters in the modules which I found interesting, and then placed them in parts of the city which I thought they fit. I then let them know what the various districts of the city were and what they could expect to find there, and left it to them to decide where they would like to visit. These were the "flavour" encounters, which would allow the PCs roleplaying opportunities, as well as a chance to make some money and to buy or gain equipment and spell components.

For the spell lines, I decided to let them to associated with mini-quests. To avoid having the campaign grinding to a halt due to a single failure, I decided that there will be more than four Nobles who know the spell lines, which will allow them more than one chance to obtain each of the spell lines.

This session also dealt with Goncol's backstory, and introduced the campaign's theme of deception. Unfortunately for me, my players have a rather light-hearted approach to the game, and did not react as strongly to Goncol's betrayal as I had hoped for; fortunately for me though, this will not be the first deception they will encounter...

Mad Robot Minaitures Sci-fi Cavalry

I finished painting this 5-Horse squad which I bought from Mad Robot Miniatures over the weekend. They round up my WW1 themed sci-fi force, which I will be using to playtest a set of rules by a well-known author that will probably be published in the future.

The great thing about this squad is that Mad Robot Miniatures allows you to customise the figures, so you get to choose from dozens of heads and torsos, and also three variants for the horses' heads.

I painted these in the same scheme as the rest of the force, and also decided to apply the decals which I got from Dom's Decals to the helmets. The resolution on these are really fine, as you can see from the photo below.

I also applied the decals to the rest of the force: the larger ones on the shoulder pads of the infantrymen, and the smaller ones on the weapon crews' helmets.

With the cavalry unit done, I now consider this force complete. Question now is what to do with the 40 Bauhaus infantry figures I still have lying around...

Sorcery! #2 - The Manticora

Fighting the manticore in its lair

Campaign Diary

Our heroes were able to quickly defeat the owlbear that had attacked them, but the rigours of combat and the need to move camp afterwards meant they all got precious little sleep that night.

The next morning Glowulf called upon Fulkra, the god of travelers, to show him the safest path to their destination - for most of the morning they traveled without any trouble.

A little before noon they came upon a hut by the side of the road. Exploring it, they found a woman in a large cage inside it. They quickly learned that she had been locked inside by the elvins, and pleaded for our heroes to free her. Neither spell nor strength could unlock the cage, however, until Morgana remembered the key they had stolen from the elvin's hut the day before; the key fit the lock on the cage, and the grateful woman gifted them with several magical items before she stomped off to repay the elvins a favour.

Continuing the path they had chosen for the day, they arrived at the village of Dhumpus, where they managed to earn enough gold to afford rooms at the inn by digging cesspits. They visited the store at the village, and Valerian noticed that one of the swords on sale was an Analander royal guard sword... how did the owner come by it?

On the third morning of their journey they wasted much time doubling back on their track after discovering that the path would take them to a village stricken by a plague. It was nearly sunset when they came to the village of Birritanti. Once more they found work washing towels, for which they were granted a visit to the crystal waterfalls.

The next morning our heroes continued they journey towards Khare. Just before noon, Goncol noticed that someone had set an ambush in the path before them. They party attacked the ambushers before they were ready. As Goncol demanded to know why their ambushers were attacking them, a familiar voice called out in reply: it turned out the attackers were apprentice-assassins being coached by Flanker, whom Goncol knew from Khare. Flanker apologised for the attack, offered some gold to our heroes as compensation, and admonished his apprentices for their sloppiness.

In the afternoon they came upon another solitary hut by the side of the road. An old woman, introducing hereself as Mama Clay, invited them inside for tea. She laid five cups of tea on the dining table, and as she turned to refill the teapot, Goncol, suspicious of her intentions,switched his cup with hers. As the other heroes drank their tea, they all felt refreshed, but Goncol found his limbs losing all strength, and he fell to the ground, paralysed. Mama Clay chided Goncol for doubting her hospitality, and demanded magical items from the heroes before she would give them the antidote. The party grudgingly gave up two bottles of potion, and left hastily once Goncol was able to walk.

As the sunset our heroes arrived at Torrepani, the final village before the gates of Khare. Here they found the inhabitants in a state of despair, for a man-eating monster - a manticora! - had taking up dwelling in the hills outside the village, making all commerce impossible. The winged creature would swoop down from the sky without warning, and when it faced stiffer resistance than it had expected, it would simply fly away. Our heroes offered to rid the village of the monster, and was given food and lodging for the night.

The next day our heroes put in action the plan they had come up with the night before: Goncol and Glowulf set several traps in the canopy of the forest near the edge of the village, and they started roasting a goat in the nearby clearing, hoping to draw the manticore. Sure enough the smell of the roasted mutton attracted the attention of the manticore. Our heroes retreated into the forest, hoping to drawing the monster in after them. When it became clear that the manticore was a faster and tougher opponent than they had expected, Morgana cast a spell on Valerian, causing him to double in size - but when Valerian swung his sword at the manticore, he found his sword arm caught in one of the snares they had set! Alarmed, the manticore turned and fled to the open ground, where it took flight.

The party chased after the monster, and Morgana called to Pangara, the god of winds, to send a gust upon the it, causing it to tumble out of the air. Now on the ground, the manticore continue to flee on its feet, towards its lair in the hills. The party could not keep pace with the beast, but Glowulf was able to track it to its cave, where after a fierce fight, they were able to slay the beast. Valerian took the head of the beast as proof, and Goncol harvested the venom sac from its tail. Searching the cave, Morgana found a broken staff similar to the one she held - a Analander Sorcerers College staff, and the tattered remains of a sorcerer's robes.

Our heroes returned to the village and were welcomed as heroes. A feast was held in their honour. Tomorrow they would enter Khare, but for now, they would eat and rest.

Prepping and Running the Game

This session was also runned pretty much out of the book, but I did use it to do some foreshadowing, and lay the seeds for future encounters.

The party got a sense that perhaps they are not the first team sent out of Analand for this mission. This will become clearer as they progress.

To add another element of the original gamebook to the campaign, I made each of the players choose a god for their character, and allowed each character to utilise the priestly power associated with that god once per session. I am glad that two of the players have called upon their gods for favours - the more attached they are to their gods, the more fun it will be for me when their PCs are forced to convert!

The next stage of the campaign will see them in Khare. I plan to run this part of the campaign in a more free-form manner; Goncol is a native of Khare, so I plan to let his player know about the various locations in the city, and let him tell the other PCs where they could go to find what they need to find. This will make things less predictable for me as a GM, but I imagine it will be fun for the players, and especially for Goncol's player.

Sorcery #1 - The Elvins

Campaign Diary

It was a cool spring morning when our heroes passed through the Cantopani Gate and entered into the Shamutanti Hills. Following the dirt road to the northeast, they arrived at the village of Cantopani at noon. They were met by the village headman, who offered them some advice for their journey beyond the village, but he was rebuffed. Entering the trader's hut, Morgana spent much of her gold purchasing a bamboo pipe (useful as a spell component) and a glittering jewel set on a necklace. Finding little else of interest in the village, they soon departed.

Beyond the village the dirt road split into two. On the fork to the left, leading down into a valley, Glowulf noticed several figures made from sticks hanging from the branches - it was a way to ward off evil spirits. Ignoring the warning, our heroes continued down that path. A few hours later, they arrived at a clearing with three thatched huts; a fire burned in a pit at the open area in the centre of the clearing.

Our heroes went about exploring the seemingly deserted village, managed to get themselves cursed by a dark spirit found inside a chest in one of the huts, fought and killed two guard dogs inside another, and finally were put into a magical slumber by the music inside the third. When they awoke they found themselves prisoners of elvins, a magical, elf-like race. They were admonished for their intrusion, and were thrown outside the village, with some of their provisions taken.

With the sun setting, our heroes hurried on to try to find a place to spend the night, and arrived at the village of Kristatanti just before sunset. Having spent most of their gold on purchases in Cantopani, they found themselves with insufficient funds for a room at the inn, and decided to sleep in the open just outside the village.

They settled upon a spot beside a stream, and while the others started a fire, Glowulf started fishing, and managed to catch enough fish for two. After dinner, the heroes set a watch, and with Morgana taking the first watch, the others went to sleep.

In the middle of her watch, Morgana heard a rustling coming from the brush near the camp. She quickly roused the others; the party barely had enough time to grab their gear before a large form burst out of the bush with an unearthly shriek - they were being attacked by an owlbear...

Prepping and Running the Game

For this session I stuck pretty close to the script of the module, since at this point it was reasonable that things were relatively linear.

Truth be told I was rather disappointed by how the players played their characters in this session. Three of the four players are from the Terrinoth campaign, and played experienced characters who behave accordingly; put in the roles of new characters, however, they regressed to the typical murder-hobo type, insulting NPCs and breaking and entering as though they were in a video game RPG. To be fair this type of behaviour is par for course for gamebooks, but hopefully after their encounter with the elvins they will be more circumspect.

The owlbear is of course not "native" to the Sorcery! setting, but fg had recently painted the model, and I thought it was as good a stand-in for a skunkbear as any other monster we had.

The best bit of meta-roleplaying in this session was actually when Glowulf's player announced that he would try to catch some fish for dinner. While seemingly innocuous, this actually foreshadows and event that will occur much later on in the campaign.

It was a short session, as we spent the first hour creating characters. During the next session I hope to complete the remainder of the first part of the trilogy.

Sorcery! #0 - A New Campaign

Introduction

This week, we started a new campaign based on the old classic, Steve Jackson's Sorcery! gamebooks from the 80s, using Arion Games' Advanced Fighting Fantasy rules.

I have wanted to run this campaign for many years, and at one point was waiting for the now defunct Myriador to release the fourth and final module in their conversion of the campaign, but sadly that never happened. I got the Arion Games version of the campaign, which is a faithful reproduction of the plot of the original campaign, which means it had a rail-roady ending which I did not like. I let the whole project stew at the back of my mind for many years, until I decided to set aside a few months this year to finally make it happen.

I wanted to keep the basic plot of the campaign, but not necessarily all the details. This means that the party will be tasked to recover the Crown of Kings, will have to journey through the Shamutanti Hills, enter Khare, find the spells that will let them open the gate to the Baklands, race/defeat seven serpents as they cross the Baklands, then finally enter Mampang Fortress and defeat the Archmage. As long as I kept to this basic structure, I reckoned I could just find suitable modules and slot them into the appropriate places in the campaign.

I also wanted to add something to the campaign... a theme, which I think I have settled on, but which I will not reveal for now.

The Party

As befits the title, I wanted to have a sorcerer in the party. A lot of the fun in the original game was the spells with their funny names and the odd spell components which were required before the spells could be cast, which you found along the way, so I decided to use the AFF rules, which retained the original spells.

At the same time, I did not want a whole party of sorcerers. I decided that one other PC would be a fighter, an escort for the sorcerer. Once these two roles were taken, I asked the other two players what they wanted to play. One wanted to play an elven barbarian, and the other a rouge. Together, we worked out a reason for these characters to be included in the party.

So I present... the party!

Morgana Lefay, Sorceress

Trained in the Royal Academy of Sorcerers, Morgana was chosen to undertake the quest to recover the Crown of Kings and prevent a war that will destroy Analand and the other nations of the Femphrey Alliance.

Valerian the Victorius, Warrior

A sergeant in the Royal Guard, Valerian was hand-picked to accompany Morgana in the perilous quest.

Goncol, Rogue

A native of Khare, the cityport of traps, Goncol was recruited for his knowledge of the city and the spells which will allow the party to open the North Gate.

Glowulf Armstrong-Blackarm, Black Elf Barbarian

A black elf raised by barbarians of the Baklands, Glowulf was employed to guide the party through the wilderness beyond Khare and to their destination.


So there we have it: four characters, each with their reason to be in the party. Over the next few months I will post the adventures of our heroes as they travel towards their encounter with destiny. I hope you will join us on this journey.