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Part of the Bestiary for my solo Hell’s Rebels game.
Blosodriette first appeared during Adventure 01, Scene 05. Her stats also appear on that post, and they are reproduced here for ease of reference.
The Lore
Blosodriette’s background contains a bit of foreshadowing about the Soul Anchor beneath Kintargo. This is a static artifact that messes with the natural trajectory departed souls. Instead of going to Pharasma’s court to be judged, affected souls are sent directly to an afterlife plane suited to their disposition and turned into an inhabitant of that plane directly, instead of becoming a “generic” soul without memories.
This usually only happens with people who intentionally bind themselves to the Anchor, but sometimes the anchor will “snag” a soul within its area of effect. Such was the case with this imp, who used to be an enslaved halfling in life, and who became as cruel as her bosses. When she died, she became an imp, and spent some centuries in Hell doing imp things. Eventually she was summoned back to Kintargo during the Chelish Civil War.
When the Ravens killed her summoner and took the important documents he was carrying, they didn’t know her infernal contract was among them. As the contract was what actually kept her on the plane, she was forced to follow it, staying hidden with her invisibility and subtly sabotaging them. When the Ravens abandoned the Livery hideout, she stayed behind until the PCs found and slayed her.
In the original adventure, she was expected to stay hidden and follow the PCs to their own hideout when they inadvertently took her contract with them, where she would resume her sabotage, using invisibility and mind control magic to make their lives hellish until found and dealt with. I didn’t want to deal with that, so I kinda gave my PCs the tools to spot her from the start.
The Numbers
We start with the stats for a Hrogn from the Nordlond Bestiary, which is equivalent to the D&D imp. We then replace the claw attack with a Stinger (a piercing Striker). And we add some rogue stuff and items on top of that.
Blosodriette
ST 6; DX 12; IQ 12; HT 11;
Dodge 11; SM -3
DR 2;
HP 6; Will 12; Per 12; FP –;
Speed 8.00; Move 8 (Flight Move 5).
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Stinger (12): 1d-3 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes. Reach C.
- Stinger Backstab (12): 1d+2 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes. Reach C. Only on unaware targets who don’t get a defense roll.
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Tiny Blowpipe (12): Acc 1, Range 6. 1 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes.
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Lesser Wand of Explosive Fireball (12): Acc 1, Range 25/50, 1d burn ex.
Relevant Traits: Invisibility (selective), Injury Reduction 2 (non-magic damage), No Blood, No Neck, No Vitals, Backstabber 10.
Gear: Tiny blowpipe, 10 envenomed darts, Pipes of the Sewers, Lesser Wand of Explosive Fireball with 10 charges (worth $1600).
Blosodriette’s Loot
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The “Tiny Blowpipe” is like the blowpipe on Adventurers, but with a max range of ST instead of STx4. It’s worthless and not suitable for PC use.
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The Lesser Wand of Explosive Fireball replaces the Wand of Acid Arrow from the book. Per DF Magic Items 1, it’d be worth $9600 with the full 60 charges, so it’s only worth $1600 with 10. It’s a short baton. $1600, 0.25kg.
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Pipes of the Sewers: A set of pipes ($40, 0.5kg) enchanted with Beast Summoning (Rats) ($8000) and Rat Control ($4000). I’m using the price for Vermin Control here because it’s only a single animal type instead of the more general categories. Playing the pipes summons a rat swarm and casts Rat Control on it (two separate spellcasting rolls at power 15 each). It works once per day (+$680). This is a bardic item, and Bardic Talent applies to the rolls instead of Power Investiture (Druidic). It requires the appropriate Musical Instrument skill. The spells only last for as long as the song continues. $12720, 0.5kg.
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Gold-and-platinum signet ring worn as an armband ($1500), embroidered silk scarf worn as a wrap ($400).
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Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 1, Scene 06
[Author] Intro
Our last scene saw the PCs complete the Livery delve and make for the Long Roads Coffee House as previously arranged with Rexus. Now we’ll find out what happens there.
[GM] Mythic Bookkeeping
PCs were largely in control of the previous scene and dominated the fight against Blosodriette, so we can reduce the Chaos Factor back down to 5.
There were no changes to our lists of threads and characters. The Livery delve advanced The Path, but did not eliminate it. All new characters were monsters or foes, and were killed on the same scenes where they were introduced.
Threads
- The Path ***
- Find Shensen (Rosalia, Arcturus)
- Contacting Ms. Docur (Jania)
- Get Organized (Jade)
Characters
- The Dottari
- The Chelish Citizens Group
- The Red Jills
- The Asmodeans
- The Three-Legged Devil (location)
- The Livery Grimples
I roll a d10 here and get a 2. That’s an Interrupt Scene, which means something happens on the way to the coffee house. I have a pretty good idea of what it could be, but let’s consult the Meaning Table for Actions in Mythic v2 just to for kicks. Result: “Punish Freedom”. Yeah, there’s plenty of that going around these days.
My first instinct is to use the Unsanctioned Excruciation encounter, but we’re still on day one of the adventure here, so that might be too early. Let’s do something a bit different from another combat.
From the Livery site it’s a straight shot north to Bleakbridge, and once they cross that they can head West until they’re at the Coffee House. Let’s say there’s a dottari patrol, four of them, near the bridge crossing. They’re ostensibly looking for people who took part on the riot, but what they’re really looking for is excuses to harass passers-by. They don’t recognize our party from the riot, but since they’re carrying boxes and look a bit frazzled and dirty from all that delving, they will be stopped and briefly questioned. So this is a social encounter.
These guards are Intolerant and react at -3 to anyone who isn’t obviously a devil-worshipping fascist. It seems Kintargo doesn’t actually have a lot of laws preventing citizens from carrying weapons, but I’m still gonna rule the party is well-armed enough that these particular guards react at a further -2 to them. Gotta give our socialites a workout.
I’ll make a reaction roll for their initial impression upon seeing the PCs in the distance, and another one once interaction begins. Jade’s Impressive looks help offset the negative modifiers for the first roll, but no other modifier does as those require more interaction. The final result here is a 7, a Poor reaction.
[Player] Dottari Bullies
So there our heroes are, walking along the street and trying not to stand out. There are some other people about but not too many. Arcturus is carrying two boxes, Urist is carrying one. The guards have just finished harassing some other pedestrian for a bribe. They spot our heroes and decide to harass them next.
They’re very cocky, thiking that these strangers look like troublemakers and that they’re either going to be a nice bust or they’ll pay handsomely to go on their way. Y’know, “Look what we have here!” “Where do you think you’re going with that box?” and so on.
Before anyone else can mount a reaction, Rosalia walks up to them and begins talking. And talking. And talking. She doesn’t quite know where she’s going when she starts, but it turns into a complicated yarn about a delivery to a boss who will be very mad if they’re late because he wants to sell this stuff to an Asmodean big shot and you know how they get when they don’t get what they want and…
This is obviously Fast-Talk, and since it’s an Influence roll it will take the place of that second reaction roll I mentioned earlier. Combining Rosalia’s usual bonuses to the reaction penalty mentioned above, that means she rolls at -1. The dottari have a Will of 10, as per their stat block. She wins by 4, which means the slightly stunned guards motion then past. Rosalia keeps talking for a while until Jania tells her the guards can no longer hear them.
Though we technically ended a scene I don’t feel like doing any explicit bookkeeping for it. Nothing changed.
[Player] The Long Roads Coffee House
The rest of the walk goes without incident. They arrive at the coffee house to find Rexus talking to its proprietor, a plump halfling lady. When they notice the PCs have arrived, the halfing goes to greet them as old friends and invites everyone to her office in the back so they can “catch up on old times”. Most of the party understands immediately that this is an excuse to go somehwere private, and Arcturus goes along because he sees the lady prepping a huge tray of pastries to take with her.
Once in the office, Rexus introduces her as Laria Longroad, the owner of the coffee house and also one of the most well-connected Bellflower Network operatives in Kintargo. Laria and Urist alread knew each other and share a nod of recognition. Jade and Arcturus can see that the “plump cook” exterior hides the kind of muscle that only comes from a life of hard fighting. Jania can see this is a canny person with a lot of experience on the shady side of the street…
Laria is generally happy that the PCs came along and saved Rexus. Her past interactions with him and Urist predispose her to trusting the party, and every PCs sees a reason to befriend her now, so I imagine that part goes well. They discuss their reasons for wanting to restart the Silver Ravens, and Rosalia regales Laria with the dale of their daring delve under the Livery.
The halfling tells them about the general state of the city’s resistance elements. Lord Mayor Jilia Bailinus is missing. Laria doesn’t believe she would flee the city as the Thrune rumor mill says, so she fears for Jilia’s safety. Every other resistance-oriented group in the city seems to have gone silent since the Night of Ashes, either lying low or destroyed.
Her own Bellflower Network decided to pull out of town for the time being, as the risk of their secret routes being discovered was considered too great. Laria chose to stay to keep an eye on things and to help them return in time.
She knows the Sacred Order of Archivists was destroyed, a fact of which Urist is only too aware. Of the other “illegal” religions in town, she guesses the cult of Sarenrae took a major blow when Shensen was disappeared and her house burned down (Rosalia makes a pained face at that). Of the cult of Milani, goddess of righteous rebellion, there is no sign. They operated under the name “Rose of Kintargo”, but have gone completely silent.
So yeah, things are pretty bad. It will be up to the Ravens to rally the survivors here, as any who are still intact are too afraid to take the initiative. Laria is more than willing to help them with that, and she’ll start by letting the PCs stay in the bunkroom on the second floor of the building, and allowing them to use the secret basement as a base. It was normally used for Bellflower ops as a temporary place to store refugees and “harmless contraband” before they were shipped out of town. There is just one issue she’d like the PCs to look into before they can use the place though… though it’s best if the current occupants explain it.
Laria takes the PCs downstairs after they’ve left their stuff in the bunkroom, and calls out to the current occupants she mentioned: a group of three tengu women, who come out warily. Jade steps forward to greet them.
[GM] Reaction roll time! 3d6+6 gives us a 14, which is Good.Jade is soon able to dispel their initial mistrust, and after brief introductions she knows the trio are sisters, traveling away from Riddleport for reasons that aren’t relevant right now. The eldest, who speaks for the group, is named Korva. They were being ferried by one Nan Comerivos, another Bellflower Network agent. He went out to find a buyer for the small shipment of Varisian cloth he was also smuggling, hoping to use the money to leave town with the sisters. This was a few days ago.
The sisters want to look for him, and so does Laria, as he’s a friend. However, the PCs are in a much better position to do it. They know the city a lot better than Korva, and they can move about without drawing suspicion a lot better than Laria. The sooner Comerivos is back and safe, the sooner they can stop sharing the space with the tengu refugees…
Before any more “practical” reasons can be stated for them to take this job, Arcturus effusively agrees. But of course we’ll look for your friend! It’s the heroic thing to do! The others either feel the same or agree those more practical reasons are worth it (Jania).
Before they can do anything about the underground, though, the party really feels they should go up to the bunkroom and finally distribute the loot! It’s getting dark, so the party decides begin their search in the morning when everyone involved is hopefully well-rested.
[Player] Loot Loot Loot
First off, we have the stuff that’s worth money. I kinda want to move along quicky so let’s say Rosalia and Jania can accurately evaluate its value over the time they spend sorting it.
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A platinum signet ring worth $2500, found a the livery’s ground level.
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A gold signet ring worth $1500, from Blosodriette.
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An embroidered silk scarf worth $400, also from the imp.
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A pouch with a dozen pearls worth $1000 each, from the boxes.
That’s a lot of money even taking into account the fact that this stuff needs to be sold for coin. They decide that Jania will try to sell the jewelry tomorrow, and Rosalia will try to sell the pearls.
Now we have the permanent items. Laria would have the skills necessary to evalue the weapons’ mundane properties, and Rexus can help with identifying the magic on them, if any. Full stats are in the previous file.
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A Balanced Silver Coated Dwarven Mace.
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A Balanced Pistol (from Pyramid #3/36).
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A Suit of Light Leather Armor enchanted with Fortity 1.
Rosalia gets the pistol, and makes a note to buy ammo as soon as possible. Urist gets the mace, which is better than the axe he’s currently using. Jade gets the armor, which I’m going to say is black with raven motifs. She’s our least-armored front-liner, so she needs it.
Finally, the fireball wand and scrolls. I guess they decide to leave those stashed at the bunkroom for now.
This ends our scene.
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Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 1, Scene 05
Intro
Our last scene was the first half of a small dungeon delve. The party arrived at the Fair Fortune Livery after some shopping, negotiated with the small grimple community living in its ruined basement, and learned of “foul demons” inhabiting a “cursed land” next door to them.
They accessed a section of old buried city streets, and fought two lemures and some giant rats who made their homes there. Then they resumed exploring the underground area in search of the Silver Raven hideout.
[GM] Mythic Bookkeeping
The fight was actually a bit more chaotic than I anticipated. The opposition was kinda weak but that last lemure took a lot of killing and managed to inflict some damage before it was taken down. Let’s increase the Chaos Factor to 6.
Let’s also add the Livery Grimples as “characters”. In the default campaign they were enemies to be exterminated, but here they’re peaceful and might come up again.
Threads
- The Path ***
- Find the Missing Elves (Arcturus)
- Find Shensen (Rosalia)
- Contacting Ms. Docur (Jania)
- Get Organized (Jade)
Characters
- The Dottari
- The Chelish Citizens Group
- The Red Jills
- The Asmodeans
- The Three-Legged Devil
- The Livery Grimples
Our PCs are progressing along The Path by continuing to delve the livery. This next scene is meant to cover the rest of the delve, ending when they leave the dungeon.
I roll a d10 and come up with a 7, which means there are no surprise alterations here.
[GM] Preparation Work
Time to plan what’s ahead. First of all: do I even want to include Blosodriette here?
She’s CR 4, and appears at a time when Pathfinder 1e PCs would be level 1. She has unreasonably high Stealth, at-will Invisibility, and her contract is disguised with an illusion spell the PCs can’t pierce at this level. She also has a wand of Acid Arrow with 9 charges, which could make short work of a level 1 party.
So clearly the book means for her to stay hidden, follow the PCs to their new hideout, and engage in sabotage during the back half of the adventure. The PCs are only meant to find her shortly before the end of the adventure, when their higher level and better gear makes fighting her a more reasonable proposition.
However, her sabotage is super annoying to deal with when playing solo. And our PCs are already powerful enough to take her on, and even to detect her presence right here. So I think I’ll let that happen, and run the fight here.
Blosodriette
We start with the stats for a Hrogn from the Nordlond Bestiary, which is equivalent to the D&D imp. We then replace the claw attack with a Stinger (a piercing Striker). And we add some rogue stuff and items on top of that.
[Author] I'm going to post a Bestiary entry for her too, as usual.ST 6; DX 12; IQ 12; HT 11;
Dodge 11; SM -3
DR 2;
HP 6; Will 12; Per 12; FP –;
Speed 8.00; Move 8 (Flight Move 5).
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Stinger (12): 1d-3 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes. Reach C.
- Stinger Backstab (12): 1d+2 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes. Reach C. Only on unaware targets who don’t get a defense roll.
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Tiny Blowpipe (12): Acc 1, Range 6. 1 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes.
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Lesser Wand of Explosive Fireball (12): Acc 1, Range 25/50, 1d burn ex.
Relevant Traits: Invisibility (selective), Injury Reduction 2 (non-magic damage), No Blood, No Neck, No Vitals, Backstabber 10.
Gear: Tiny blowpipe, 10 envenomed darts, Pipes of the Sewers, Lesser Wand of Explosive Fireball with 10 charges (worth $1600).
Blosodriette’s Loot
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The “Tiny Blowpipe” is like the blowpipe on Adventurers, but with a max range of ST instead of STx4. It’s worthless and not suitable for PC use.
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The Lesser Wand of Explosive Fireball replaces the Wand of Acid Arrow from the book. Per DF Magic Items 1, it’d be worth $9600 with the full 60 charges, so it’s only worth $1600 with 10. It’s a short baton. $1600, 0.25kg.
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Pipes of the Sewers: A set of pipes ($40, 0.5kg) enchanted with Beast Summoning (Rats) ($8000) and Rat Control ($4000). I’m using the price for Vermin Control here because it’s only a single animal type instead of the more general categories. Playing the pipes summons a rat swarm and casts Rat Control on it (two separate spellcasting rolls at power 15 each). It works once per day (+$680). This is a bardic item, and Bardic Talent applies to the rolls instead of Power Investiture (Druidic). It requires the appropriate Musical Instrument skill. The spells only last for as long as the song continues. $12720, 0.5kg.
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Gold-and-platinum signet ring worn as an armband ($1500), embroidered silk scarf worn as a wrap ($400).
Additional Loot In The Room
First Crate:
- A pouch with a dozen pearls worth $1000 each. (total $12000)
- A Balanced Pistol, from Pyramid #3/36: Acc 2, Range 75/450, Weight 1.5/0.005, RoF 1, Shots 1(20), damage 2d-1 pi+. $1000, 1.5kg.
- A Balanced Silver-Coated Dwarven Mace: +1 to skill, sw+3 cr, reach 1, Parry 0. $550, 2.5kg.
- A suit of Light Leather armor with a Fortify +1 enchantment. $1150, 9kg.
The second crate has a locked iron box. DR 6, HP 18, unmodified Lockpicking test to open. Inside is:
- Charged Universal Scroll of Hide Emotions (1 hour duration): $200, neg.
- Charged Universal Scroll of Hide Thoughts (30 mins duration): $500, neg.
- Charged Universal Scroll of Scryguard (10 hour duration): $300, neg.
- Charged Universal Scroll of Light Thread (10 minute duration): $200, neg.
- The documents which are the goal of this whole delve.
The third crate has six Silver Raven Figurines of Wondrous Power. These can turn to life-sized mechanical ravens on command. The user can then use it like a D&D Animal Messenger. This means they can mentally imprint a location on the raven and have it carry a letter there, waiting for a specified amount of time and allowing the letter to be removed during that wait. Then it returns, possibly bearing a response.
[Player] The Old Hideout
Mechanically, we’re going with this procedure for the exploration, and I think it’s fair to say this includes Urist’s Detect Evil rolls. Me-The-Player would definitely argue for that with Me-The-GM.
The party arrives at the old hideout on their second exploration turn, take in the ruined ambience, and decide to spend another exploration turn searching the place. This is a no-brainer, really. So we get to make some Perception rolls for them.
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Jania spots the nest in the corner, and notes it seems to have been recently used by a tiny humanoid creature.
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Rosalia notices the three boxes of Stuff.
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Urist’s Detect Evil power finds that there’s a demon in the area, but none of the others can find anything with their mundane senses.
Blosodriette is invisible and trying to be silent. I’m giving her Stealth 15, and no one could beat that with their Hearing rolls. However I do think the clues the party did find would make Jania cast See Invisible, and I want to say that’d let them spot her because she’d be relying on her invisibility to stay hidden.
[GM] Call it a +10 modifier to Jania's Perception because the imp is now in plain sight for her. With the bonus, Jania succeeds by 14 while B only succeeds by 7.Jania spots the imp and calls it out. Blosodriette freaks out, startled and angry at life, and begins to fight. Let’s say she recognizes Jade, since she was definitely around when the Ravens were active!
No surprise, but only Jania can see the imp currently. The creature opens by launching a fireball from her wand at the party, but she misses, causing the projectile to hit a nearby wall and explode. Everyone is startled but no one is hurt.
Jania casts another See Invisible spell on Urist, which leaves her low on fatigue. The priest begins charging a Sunbolt spell.
Rosalia, meanwhile, figures that even though she can’t see Blosodriette the imp should be able to hear her just fine, so she begins her own string of insults as a Song of Humiliation, and manages to stun her target!
[GM] There is a penalty for not being able to see the target, but Rosalia won the Quick Contest anyway.The party’s melee fighters have a rough idea of where Blosodriette is and begin closing in on her position while she struggles and fails to recover from her mental stun. Urist lets his Sunbolt fly and slightly singes the imp, and then Arcturus ends the fight by grabbing at the flapping and cursing sounds and getting a good hold on the creature.
Blosodriette cannot possibly escape Arthur’s grasp, so this is when I go out of combat time. Frustrated, the imp just shouts for them to kill her already so she can go back home after a century trapped in this cesspit. Before anyone can reason whether this is really a good idea or not, Arthur wrings her like a wet rag and that’s that. She disappears in a puff of sulfur, leaving her gear behind.
The imp will pop up back in Hell, and though she’s in for a bad time down there for her “failure” she will still inform some higher-powered fiends about how the Sixth Raven is back, thus giving us a reason for more exciting Monsters of the Day.
Our heroes get to loot B’s gear and the three boxes described above now. Jania has no problem opening the locked box. She identifies that the stylish suit of leather armor inside one of the boxes is magical, and while she can’t feel any magic from the silvered mace next to it she figures there must be something special about it. And the pearls, oh the pearls. Jania and Rosalia get little gold pieces in their eyes as they realize how much these must be worth.
The silver raven figurines also ping as magical, and bear further analysis. There’s some magic mixed in with the big pile of documents too, but they’re not gonna sift through that right now. After Urist confirms none of this stuff is evil, they decide to carry everything out in its boxes and distribute later. B’s gear goes into the iron box for later sorting as well.
Victory Celebration
When the party emerges from the old hideout, they’re hailed as heroes by the grimples. A few of them bring out tiny improvised musical instruments for a celebration, which fascinates Rosalia enough that the decides to gift them the tiny pipes. They do get a bit scared when that summons a swarm of mundane rats who start dancing to the tune, but in the end the grimples are even more grateful for the party’s generosity.
Their leader pledges to help the party in the future, should they need it, and explains how to leave a letter at a place on the surface where they will check for it.
With that done, they set out on the long walk to the Long Roads Coffee House. It takes about 90 minutes.
[GM] Rewards
The party gets a total of 3 character points:
- 1 for fully clearing the Livery.
- 1 total for the battles inside.
- 1 for retrieving a “quest item” (the documents).
For treasure, they get the $2500 platinum ring found in scene 4, and everything listed in this post except for the Pipes of the Sewers. Rosalia gave that away to the grimples. Yes, it’s really expensive, I know.
We’ll distribute the treasure in the next scene, after the party arrives at the Long Roads Coffee House.
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Hell's Rebels Bestiary: Lemure
Part of the Bestiary for my solo Hell’s Rebels game.
Lemures first appear in the big fight during Adventure 01, Scene 04.
The Lore
Sometimes also known as “orts”, these things look like vaguely humanoid clumps of fetid slime. They’re the demonic equivalent of zombies, about as smart and even filthier. Lemures are used as cheap labor by stronger demons, which they are compelled to obey. Lacking orders, they tend to mill around aimlessly and attack any living creatures they can sense, fighting to the death.
The Numbers
ST 13; DX 12; IQ 8; HT 12;
Dodge 9; Parry 10 (Unarmed)
DR 3 (13 vs. Fire); Control Resistance 1
Speed 6.00; Move 5;
- Slimy Claw Or Bite (15): 1d+1 cutting; Reach C.
- Slimy Grab (14): 1d+1 control; Reach C.
Class: Demon.
Relevant Traits: Foulness (GURPS DF Monsters 5, p. 14); No Brain; No Vitals; Doesn’t Sleep; Doesn’t Eat or Drink; Immunity to Metabolic Hazards; Automaton.
Notes and Impressions
Lemures fulfill the exact same monster niche as zombies but they’re a bit tougher and are demons instead of undead, so they’re vulnerable to a slightly different set of abilities. Other than that, there’s not much to see here.
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Let's Play Hell's Rebels!: Adventure 1, Scene 04
Another scene in my solo Hell’s Rebels campaign.
[GM] Intro
In our last scene, our heroes officially decided to reform the Silver Ravens, and decided their first mission is to check out the abandoned Raven hideout under the Fair Fortune Livery. In this scene, we’ll see how that goes.
No interrupt checks today, because I don’t wanna.
This scene will cover the first half of the Livery delve.
[GM] Mythic Bookkeeping
The Chaos Factor for the last scene was 5, and I want to keep it at 5 even though the last scene was peaceful.
Let’s add the Three-Legged Devil tavern as a “character”. I don’t think it ever comes up again in the default campaign, but it might here! If it comes up on a roll, it could either about the location itself or about the people associated with it.
We can also close the “Reunite!” thread, as that happened last scene.
So here are our lists.
Chaos Factor: 5
Threads
- The Path **
- Find Shensen (Rosalia, Arcturus)
- Contacting Ms. Docur (Jania)
- Get Organized (Jade)
Characters
- The Dottari
- The Chelish Citizens Group
- The Red Jills
- The Asmodeans
- The Three-Legged Devil
Delving the Livery counts as following The Path.
[Player] Shopping!
The livery is clear across town, so our heroes agree to stop on the way to do some shopping. I’m not going to roleplay the shopkeeper here. Let’s keep it abstract. They agree to use the money they just got from Rexus to buy extra gear for the Livery expedition. That’s $750 in coins (1 gold, 17 silver, 10 copper), plus a ring worth $750.
First of all, Jania will try to sell the ring. Like everyone else in the party she’s of Average wealth, so she can sell it for 40% of its value. Haggling is a Quick Contest of her Merchant vs. 15, which ends up a tie! This means the price doesn’t change, and the ring is sold for $300. That leaves the party with a $1050 budget.
- 3 glow vials: $90, neg. Carried by Arthur, Rosalia, and Jade.
- Hand mirror: $15, 0.5kg. Carried by Jania.
- 2 doses of visibility dust: $100 total, 0.5kg. each. Carried by Rosalia and Arthur.
- 5 minor healing potions, 1 for each $600 total, 0.25kg each.
- 1 paut, for Urist. $135, 0.25kg
They agree to split the remaining $110 equally, getting $22 each (1 silver, 2 coppers). Jade also gets the blessed papers.
[GM] I'm not gonna make the shopping into a separate Mythic scene. The following scene will be different from what's in the book, and I think we can count that as an "altered" scene even though I planned the differences myself.[Player] The Fair Fortune Livery
It’s mid-afternoon when the party arrives at the Fair Fortune livery. Jade remembers the original Ravens talking about how it used to be a slaughterhouse, but was rebuilt under new direction. She remembers thinking that was nice, but the place is abandoned and in disrepair now. They never brought her to this particular hideout. It was fairly minor and probably not kid-friendly.
The livery is now a ruined stable, precariously leaning to the right. Its frontal double doors are ajar despite being chained, and there’s a significant gap that could allow the PCs to squeeze through. That’s exactly what they do, for as soon as they get close to the building they hear the sounds of fighting!
[GM] I determine that squeezing past the front doors requires an unmodified DX roll, and all of the party succeeds.Inside, the group finds a small pack of dogs viciously attacking a band of small creatures that look like upright possums. The “possums” wear clothing stitched from rags and carry small and crude weapons, putting up a spirited but ultimately doomed defense.
The party advances to help! As soon as the dogs see a bunch of people larger than they are approaching, they run away, passing through smaller gaps in the walls.
The possums look warily at the newcomers, not yet knowing what to make of them. Jade can see the fight was hard on them, as two lie dead on the ground, and the remaining three are quite tense. She sheathes her sword and raises her hand, proclaiming they come in peace. The rest of the group follows her lead on this.
[GM] Reaction roll time! I want the grimples to be peaceful, but let's make things a bit more random. Let's say the possums react at -2 due to their stress. That's barely an obstacle to Jade, who still has a net +7 reaction bonus. The grimples' leader does consider himself a knight of sorts. The result is 15, a Good reaction.The … possum-people?… seem reasonably convinced that the party means no harm. The one who seems to be their leader steps forward, sheating his makeshift sword. He introduces himself as King Godric, leader of a small community of grimples who has recently arrived at this “land” to try and make a home here. He speaks as though the crumbling livery is a bounteous kingdom, causing Rosalia to remark that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Godric enthusiastically agrees with this and says he’s glad to meet a kindred spirit.
Godric apologizes for being so bold, but he would like to know if the group is interested in helping his people one more time. The dogs were not the only threat they had been facing. There is a region of his underground kingdom from which only a single explorer has managed to return, half-dead and half-mad, describing terrible demons of enormous size! Ever since then, mobs of terrible monsters have emerged to raid his capital, and he fears they might not last much longer. The dogs were yet another disaster heaped on top of his unlucky people.
The group has a little private discussion. It seems that this “underground kingdom” might be the old hideout, and they would have to deal with whatever is down there regardless. So, Jade thinks, they might as well agree to help.
Jade returns to “negotiations”, and mentions they came here looking for ancient documents. The grimples never found anything like that in the part of the “kingdom” they inhabit, but Godric hastily adds that the group is free to keep any treasure they find from the “cursed lands”, should they agree to help. Not seeing a reason to refuse, they agree.
Godric produces a key and goes to unlock the gate to the old killing floor, saying the entrance to his territory is through a trapdoor beyond. While he does this, Jania spots something shiny near the ceiling and proceeds to levitate towards it. It’s a signet ring hanging from a nail! She doesn’t recognize the heraldry on it, but it’s made of platinum and worth a pretty penny.
[GM] $2500, to be exact. Jania succeeded at the Perception roll to spot the ring and the Merchant -4 roll to assess its value. She's also down 1 FP from the levitation spell.[Player] Down Below
Guided by the grimples, the party makes their way to the basement of the ruin, through a trapdoor on what used to be a workroom. They descend to a former equipment storage agrea, which is now a moldy, rusty, stinky mess. Godric and his fellow grimples appear to not notice the smell, though the party certainly does.
It’s here that the PCs activate their light vials. Jade, Rosalia, and Arcturus tie one each to their wrists using the string that comes with the vials, holding them aloft like torches.
From the storage cubicle they cross a doorway to a larger hall that seems to have been used to butcher recently slain animals. It’s a small village, with many tiny tents pitched over the sawdust floor. There are about twenty grimples in here all told, though Godric’s party seem to be the only combatants. The smell is not much better.
To the east there’s a large, rusty grate, with a hallway visible beyond it’s. Godric describes that as the “threshold” to the “cursed land”. Before he lets the party through, the village has a short impromptu ceremony to pay homage to the brave heroes who have agreed to help them. “Though they are of the tallfolk, their hearts are as honorable as any grimple’s!”
After that, he opens the gate using the same key as before, and the delve is on.
[GM] So far we've neatly skipped a lot of the filler fights, but now we got to the main event of this delve.[Player] Polluted Cistern
Beyond the gate, there is a set of stairs leading down. The environment here looks much more like a street than a basement. Rosalia remembers that some decades ago the city’s “street level” was raised to help control flooding, and the old streets became a mix of sewers and other underground tunnels.
The party finishes going down the stairs and opens a pair of double doors to find a huge pool of stinky brown sludge. The few patches of wall and ceiling near it that still retain their plaster are covered in evil-looking writing, and the two demons splashing around near the margin only make it all look more sinister. They don’t look the talkative type - as soon as they spot the PC’s lights, they turn and growl, looking like very angry human-sized balls of excrement.
GM: It's two lemures. We also have three rats waiting in the wings for an extra surprise. These would have been a separate, previous fight in the original adventure. I'm throwing them in here, to bring the fight's challenge closer to the PC's power level. Anyway, this is where we enter combat mode.The party steps forward to the edge of the pool to wait for the lemures to close in, and they spot the rats nearby right away. The animals are used to being ignored by the lemures and they’re eager to bite into some fresh meat, so they charge in and try to bite the heroes, to little effect.
The battle takes 5 rounds total. In the first two, Jade shows how useful her sword skills are by slaying one of the lemures and two of the rats, and one of those with a parry instead of an attack. The rules for parrying unarmed attack with weapons can be nasty. Urist kills a rat too. The rest of the party manages to stay mostly untouched, save for a small rat bite on Rosalia, but they have trouble bypassing enemy defenses. That’s some rotten luck on the part of Arcturus, as he should definitely have the skills to do that.
For the last three rounds we only have a single lemure left, but the fight becomes a slog as the entire party proceeds to roll badly. Urist suffers a critical failure that unreadies his weapon. Rosalia suffers one that sends her saber flying off. And to cap it off the lemure manages to grab Jania and grievously injure her with a bite before Arctururs can finally dispatch it.
Witht he fight ended, Jania is both in pain from the demons’ claw wounds and faintly horrified that the thing got its stink all over her. Urist can at least solve the first problem with a Major Healing spell, but the second will have to wait until they’re done with this place.
The cleric also identifies the evil runes scribbled on the walls as a failed attempt to open a portal to Hell. They might have worked briefly in the past, which is how these two lemures got here, but they’ve been inert and useless for a long time now.
The party resumes exploration of the underground street, finding that it leads north. They move that way.
[GM] Session Notes
Even though we’re not through the dungeon yet, I’m going to introduce a scene break here, because I’m going to need some significant GM work for the next bit.
I actually took a three-month break between round 4 and 5. I stopped because I was out of time, but between other distractions and a slighty feeling of annoyance at my PCs’ performance it took me that long to return to it.
In Scene 05, we should finish this delve.
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