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  • Apr 19, 2026

    Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 1, Scene 09

    [GM] Intro

    In our last scene of our Hell’s Rebels solo campaign, our heroes freed the Prisoners of Salt. Normally, this would be something they did after organizing the beginnings of the Silver Raven resistance, but since we mixed things up in this campaign the first public act of the Silver Ravens happens before there are any actual Silver Ravens!

    We’re going to actually get this rebellion up and running now, beginning with our PCs’ returning to their base and dealing with the Tengu Sisters, and them going to a higher level of abstraction as we begin dealing with our strategic layer.

    [GM] Mythic Bookkeeping

    There will be enough bookkeeping in this scene for me to worry about Mythic. Chaos factor stays at 5 because I say so. There are no alterations because I say so.

    We resolved Prisoners of Salt, and removed Kossrani & Friends from the board.

    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 (location)
    • The Livery Grimples
    • The Tengu Sisters
    • Nan Comerivos & Friends

    [GM] Preparation

    Before we start, here’s our quick-and-dirty rules conversion.

    Quick and Dirty Rebellion Rules Conversion

    I’m gonna skip the GURPS books on organizations for now, and base myself only on the Pathfinder rules. I’ll read those and make changes later.

    • Security, Loyalty, and Secrety all start at 10. For now let’s add the focsued and unfocused skill bonuses on p. 22 of the Player’s Guide to each skill. So the focused one starts at 12 and goes to 22, and the unfocused one starts at 10 and goes to 16. I might change this later on.

    • Check Difficulties: DC 10 checks translate into unmodified skill tests. Each +5 DC over 10 translates into a -2 penalty. So a DC 30 check, the hardest possible for end-game actions, would be at -8. Complementary bonuses are important, particularly to unfocused tests.

    • Level-up awards:
      • As usual, multiply all gp amounts by 5 for the amount in GURPS dollars.
      • XP awards gift a flat 15 character points.
      • Training awards let you put 4 character points towards any skill.
      • Each title grants one level of Reputation (all the time, everyone but Thrune supporters) valued at 3 points/level.
    • Officers:

      • Officers can use some of their skills as Complementary Skills for organization tests. If you have more than one of the listed skills you can test them all.

      • Multiple people can occupy the same post, but only one gets to roll their skills for a given action.

      • Demagogue:
        • May use complimentary skills on Loyalty checks.
        • Skills: Propaganda, Public Speaking, Leadership.
      • Partisan:
        • May use complimentary skills on Security checks.
        • Skills: Strategy, Leadership, Tactics.
      • Recruiter:
        • May use complimentary skills on checks for recruiting supporters.
        • Adds rebellion rank to the number of recruited supporters, and this stacks with multiple recruiters.
        • Skills: Public Speaking, Streetwise, Diplomacy.
      • Sentinel:
        • Occupying this post gives a +1 to the rebellion’s non-focused skills.
        • May use complimentary skills on any check used to resolve an Event.
        • Skills: any of the ones listed for the appropriate category.
      • Spymaster:
        • Spymaster: May use complimentary skills on Secrecy checks.
        • Skills: Intelligence Analysis, Streetwise, Administration.
      • Strategist:
        • Occupying this position grants a bonus action. May use its complimentary skills on the bonus action.
        • Skills: Strategy, Tactics, Administration.
      • Strategy Turn:
        • Each turn represents a week of game time. The phases are as described in the books.
      • Actions:
        • Actions are performed by teams. Each team can perform the actions in its description, using the appropriate Org Skill for it. Teams give a bonus to the Org Skill equal to their tier (this replaces the Team Manager mechanic).
        • Action List:
          • Recruit Supporters: Roll Loyalty. Success recruits 2d6 + Recruiter Bonuses supporters. Critical failure raises notoriety by 1d6.

    [PC] Building the Rebellion

    As a reminder, last scene’s raid means the rebellion will start with an extra 2 Notoriety. Quieting the lulzers and fascists all the way back at the Scene 01 riot also means they start with 6 supporters.

    Let’s just say they manage to recruit the sisters, since I want to know how that plays out. They’re a bonus Tier 1 team. We also get Rexus and Laria as allies.

    Officer job time!

    Rosalia will be our Demagogue, as that’s right in her wheelhouse. She has 2 unspent points, so let’s put 1 each towards Propaganda and Leadership to prepare her for the role.

    Let’s put Laria to work as our Partisan. Her Leadership-12 will have to do for now.

    Arthur unfortunately can’t do much in this layer of the game yet, but he can work as a Recruiter just fine as long as someone else also takes on this role. And that someone else will be Urist with his Public Speaking-13.

    Jade will be our Sentinel. Just having her there gives us a bonus, and she has skills that are widely applicable to a variety of situations. We’ll spend 2 of her 3 banked points to get her Administration and round her out even more.

    Jania is our Spymaster, obviously. She has 5 unspent points so we’ll spend 4 of those to get her Intelligence Analysis, and 1 to get Leadership.

    Finally, Rexus will be our Strategist. Just having him there gives us an extra strategic action, and he can help with Administration. Jade can still use her Strategy here as the Sentinel.

    To top it off, Jania and Rosalia decide do dedicate the gold they’re carrying to the rebellion’s coffers, as they got it while tracking down Nan Comerivos in the first place. That’s 24 gold coins, or $9600, which should last them a while!

    Initial Rebellion Sheet

    • Rank: 1/5
    • Focus: Secrecy
    • Members: 10
    • Supporters: 6
    • Population: 11900
    • Treasury: $9650
    • Min. Treasury: $50
    • Notoriety: 2
    • Org Skills:
      • Loyalty: 10
      • Secrecy: 12
      • Security: 10
    • Actions: 1
    • Max Teams: 2+1
    • Danger Rating: 20
    • Active Events:
    • Teams:
      • Crow Sisters (bonus team)
        • Tier: 1
        • Members: 3
        • Actions: Earn Money, Gather Information
    • Allies:
      • Laria Longroad
        • +2 to Recruit Supporters as long as she’s a member.
        • Leadership-12, Streetwise-12
      • Rexus Victocora
        • -1 Notoriety per Upkeep phase as long as he’s a member.
        • Administration-12, Public Speaking-12
    • Officers:
      • Demagogue: Rosalia
        • May use complimentary skills on Loyalty checks.
        • Skills: Propaganda, Public Speaking, Leadership.
      • Partisan: Laria Longroad
        • May use complimentary skills on Security checks.
        • Skills: Strategy, Leadership, Tactics.
      • Recruiters: Urist; Arthur
        • May use complimentary skills on checks for recruiting supporters.
        • Adds rebellion rank to the number of recruited supporters, and this stacks with multiple recruiters.
        • Skills: Public Speaking, Streetwise, Savoir-Faire.
      • Sentinel: Jade
        • Occupying this post gives a +1 to the rebellion’s non-focused skills.
        • May use complimentary skills on any check used to resolve an Event.
        • Skills: any of the ones listed for the appropriate category.
      • Spymaster: Jania
        • Spymaster: May use complimentary skills on Secrecy checks.
        • Skills: Intelligence Analysis, Streetwise, Administration.
      • Strategist: Rexus
        • Occupying this position grants a bonus action. May use its complimentary skills on the bonus action.
        • Skills: Strategy, Tactics, Administration.

    [PC] Strategy Layer, Week 1

    As our PCs get settled on the Rat’s Nest and begin their operations as a formal rebel movement, we zoom out a bit to our strategy layer. Let’s run the first week to get a feel for the rules.

    Upkeep Phase

    The very first thing that happens is that we gain 1d6 supporters from our successful completion of Prisoners of Salt. The roll is 2, so we’re at 8 now. Not quite enough to level up. Dang it.

    [GM] I decide there's no need to roll for supporter attrition in our very
first strategic turn.

    Rexus reduces our Notoriety by 1, to 1. We can also say that initial deposit of $9600 to the org’s treasury happens here.

    Stat changes: +2 supporters, -1 Notoriety.

    Activity Phase

    We get 1 action from our rank, and 1 bonus action from having a Strategist.

    Our first action has to be Recruit Team, since we’re going to get an automatic success to recruit the people we rescued in Prisoners of Salt as a freedom fighter team:

    • Freedom Fighters
      • Tier: 1
      • Members: 6
      • Actions: Reduce Danger

    Our bonus action is going to be Recruit Supporters. This is a Loyalty Check. Laria gives +2 from her very presence. Urist, out chief recruiter, will use Public Speaking and Savoir-Faire to boost it, and Rexus will use Administration. With 2 successes and 1 failure, our final bonus is +3. Our roll is a success.

    This lets us recruit 2d6+2 supporters because Arcturus is also there. The roll comes up 6. We might be able to level up next week!

    Stat changes: +1 team, +6 members, +6 supporters.

    Event Phase

    Now we roll a percentage chance based on Kintargo’s current danger rating + our Notoriety: 21%. No event this week! However, the chance will double during the next week.

    Turn End!

    Well, that was quick. Here’s our new rebellion sheet:

    The Silver Ravens

    • Rank: 1/5
    • Focus: Secrecy
    • Members: 16
    • Supporters: 14
    • Population: 11900
    • Treasury: $9650
    • Min. Treasury: $50
    • Notoriety: 1
    • Org Skills:
      • Loyalty: 10
      • Secrecy: 12
      • Security: 10
    • Actions: 1
    • Max Teams: 2+1
    • Danger Rating: 20
    • Active Events:
    • Teams:
      • Crow Sisters (bonus team)
        • Tier: 1
        • Members: 3
        • Actions: Earn Money, Gather Information
      • Freedom Fighters
        • Tier: 1
        • Members: 6
        • Actions: Reduce Danger
    • Allies:
      • Laria Longroad
        • +2 to Recruit Supporters as long as she’s a member.
        • Leadership-12, Streetwise-12
      • Rexus Victocora
        • -1 Notoriety per Upkeep phase as long as he’s a member.
        • Administration-12, Public Speaking-12
    • Officers:
      • Demagogue: Rosalia
        • May use complimentary skills on Loyalty checks.
        • Skills: Propaganda, Public Speaking, Leadership.
      • Partisan: Laria Longroad
        • May use complimentary skills on Security checks.
        • Skills: Strategy, Leadership, Tactics.
      • Recruiters: Urist; Arthur
        • May use complimentary skills on checks for recruiting supporters.
        • Adds rebellion rank to the number of recruited supporters, and this stacks with multiple recruiters.
        • Skills: Public Speaking, Streetwise, Savoir-Faire.
      • Sentinel: Jade
        • Occupying this post gives a +1 to the rebellion’s non-focused skills.
        • May use complimentary skills on any check used to resolve an Event.
        • Skills: any of the ones listed for the appropriate category.
      • Spymaster: Jania
        • Spymaster: May use complimentary skills on Secrecy checks.
        • Skills: Intelligence Analysis, Streetwise, Administration.
      • Strategist: Rexus
        • Occupying this position grants a bonus action. May use its complimentary skills on the bonus action.
        • Skills: Strategy, Tactics, Administration.

    [GM] How did that feel?

    Good enough for now, I think. I might rethink these rules as the need arises. I initially wanted to play through more than one turn at a time, since this one took relatively little time to play through, but I think I’m going to do something different.

    We do one strategy turn, as above, and then one “tactical” mission, and that’s a week in game. “Tactical” here means it happens at a more granular level than the strategic stuff. It does not necessarily require a map.

    [Player] Mission Time!

    We currently have two missions before us, provided by the book. There’s decoding the documents retrieved from the Livery stash, and there’s investigating the fires from the so-called Night of Ashes.

    Rexus is working with the documents, and he will take seven weeks to decode them by himself. None of the PCs really have the skills necessary to help him out.

    He does however really want the PCs to investigate the fires from the Night of Ashes. As of the start of this turn it’s only been a little over a week since the fires, so there might still be clues in there somewhere… they should look into this earlier rather than later.

    We have three locations to check:

    • The Victocora estate, where Rexus’ family lived. As we already know they were members of the Sacred Order of Archivists.

    • A music store called The Silver Star, which was owned by the missing Shensen and hid a shrine to Sarenrae in its basement.

      (GM: Rosalia succeeded at her Current Affairs test here)

    • And a pub known as the Thrashing Badger. No idea why this one burned but there must have been something.

      (GM: And she failed this one.)

    The PCs spend a day quickly scouting each location. They’re all free of patrolling dottari, since those left after the first few days. The pub has burned down to its foundations, there’s nothing there. Rexus says he spent several nights searching the estate ruins, and an additional night spent by the PCs confirms there’s nothing of interest there.

    Which leaves us the music shop, which has turned into a huge rubble-filled sinkhole as the shop collapsed into the hidden basement shrine.

    [GM] There's a box of scrolls and potions here that can be found with a
successful Perception or Observation roll at -4. Each PC can make one
roll. This represents an hour of searching.

After one hour, a random PC triggers a shift in the rubble and must make a
Dodge roll or take 3d cr damage (wide area). There is also a 30% chance to
trigger an encounter from the book.

    I make our rolls, and both Rosalia and Urist get a success. They find the box!

    [GM] Let's roll 1d to see who needs to dodge ruble. It's Jania!

    Unfortunately, as Jania was searching her assigned area, the rubble around her shifts and falls on top of her! She fails to dodge, unfortunately, and so is hit for 13 crushing damage! This is Large Area Injury, which means she has an effective DR 0 against it. Ouch! Jania is now at -3 HP.

    [GM] Let's just say she's unconscious from this, which is reasonable.

    The party spends a few minutes digging the unconscious wizard out of the rubble. Jade administers 3 minor healing potions to her - one from Jania’s own pouch, one from hers, and one from Art’s. This gets her back to top form.

    [GM] Do we get an encounter? 63, nope.

    Deciding they had enough and there is nothing more to be found here, the group departs back to base.

    [GM] Treasure Time!

    According to the original adventure we have the following scrolls:

    • Cure Moderate Wounds
    • Daylight
    • Remove Blindness/Deafness
    • Remove Disease

    And the following potions:

    • 3 x Lesser Restoration
    • 4 x Cure Light Wounds

    As of this writing it’s getting a bit late, so I’ll convert these next time.

    …

    It’s next time. Onbly one day has passed, which is kind of a record for me. I figure it’s better to a bit of this every day than to spend months idle.

    The potions of Cure Light Wounds are easy: Minor Healing potions.

    In Pathfinder, the Lesser Restoration spell cures effects that reduce ability scores, partially heals temporary ability damage, and either removes the fatigued condition or improves exhausted to fatigued.

    Since most of that stuff at low levels will come from poisons, I think we can replace this with 2 Universal Antidote potions and 2 vials of Paut.

    Just the scrolls left!

    Daylight is easy. It’s a Sunlight spell with a 3-meter radius. Divine charged scroll.

    Remove Blindness/Deafness becomes Restoration, which does the same thing.

    Remove Disease = Cure Disease.

    The Scroll of CMW becomes a healing stone.

    Additionally, the group gains 1 Character Point for surviving this challenge.

    Final Treasure Pile

    I already transferred this to the PCs file.

    • 4 x Healing Potion, Minor: Heals 1d HP. $120, 0.25kg
    • 2 x Universal Antidote: Instantly cures all poisons. $750, 0.25kg
    • 2 x Paut: Restores 4 FP lost to magic. $135, 0.25kg
    • 1 x Scroll of Sunlight: Divine, charged, 3m radius. $300, 0kg
    • 1 x Scroll of Restoration: Universal, Charged. $1500, 0kg
    • 1 x Scroll of Cure Disease: Universal, Charged. $400, 0kg
    • 1 x Healing Gem: heals 8 HP when crushed. $400, 0kg
  • Apr 13, 2026

    Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 1, Scene 08

    [Author] Intro

    Our last scene in our Hell’s Rebels solo campaign was an investigation where the party managed to track down the whereabouts of Nan Comerivos, the half-elf smuggler they need to rescue. They found out he’s being held prisoner at the Salix Salt Works, which was taken over by mercenaries in service of Thrune and is being used to hold “low-threat” prisoners.

    This scene will then be about planning and executing the rescue mission.

    It has been some months since I last played, and a lot of that was due to Foundry being cantakerous last time. I was trying to find some ready made maps for Hell’s Rebels, because I didn’t want to keep redrawing them in Dungeondraft. I found a whole module with lots of bells and whistles covering all of Adventure 01, but it had been done for a much older version of Foundry. I remember spending like half a day trying to get the two to play together, but in the end I gave up in frustration.

    And now I sat town in front of it again, updated to the latest stable version, and just imported the manually extracted map image from the old module into the one I’m using to play. Total time to do the thing I had been dreading for months: 5 minutes.

    [GM] Mythic Bookkeeping

    While some unpredicted things happened last scene, the PCs also managed to shorcut a long investigation, so I’m going to keep the chaos factor the same: 5.

    We add “Prisoners of Salt” to our threads, as we should have done already last scene. We advanced this thread then, and we expect to complete it in this file. Let’s add Nan Comerivos & Friends to the list of characters, as well as Kossrani & Friends. These are the prisoners and their guards, respectively.

    I roll a 2 on the d10. This would normally signal an Interrupt Scene that was completely different from our expectations, but let’s be real here, I don’t wanna. After all that time being anxious about preparation, I want to do the thing I prepared for.

    Let’s try to divine what an altered scene would look like here, however. If it’s something cool I’ll add it in.

    • 1d10: 6 => Add an Object

    • 2x1d100 on the Descriptions table: 83 & 54 = Positively Less

    • 1d100 on the Object Elements table: Protection

    Let’s add a small magic item with protective qualities to the loot available. It’s probably being worn by Kossrani, and it’s not armor. Let’s make it a Moly Amulet from DF Magic Items p. 9. +5 Magic Resistance when worn, $23.600, 0.12kg.

    Kinda expensive compared to what Pathfinder 1 characters should be getting at this point, but I don’t care.

    Threads

    • The Path **
    • Find Shensen (Rosalia, Arcturus)
    • Contacting Ms. Docur (Jania)
    • Get Organized (Jade) *
    • Prisoners of Salt*

    Characters

    • The Dottari
    • The Chelish Citizens Group
    • The Red Jills
    • The Asmodeans
    • The Three-Legged Devil (location)
    • The Livery Grimples
    • The Tengu Sisters
    • Nan Comerivos & Friends
    • Kossrani & Friends

    [GM] Preparation

    A map of the Salix Salt Works, with labeled rooms
    Here's our arena for tonight.

    I extracted this map from the original book, it should give us an idea of how things are arranted. I had a screenshot that included the tokens but I lost it somewhere within the folds of my computer.

    The front entrance is the big gate on the “map north” edge of the courtyard at D6. The small outbuilding at D7 is a dormitory for the night shift guards.

    The rooms in the main building are, from top to bottom: Front office (D3), break room (D5), supply closet (D4), and a big loading dock/work area (D1) that opens into the circular oven (D2). Wet salt is brought in and dry salt is shipped out from the big double gate on the southern wall of area D1.

    All external gates and all external doors on the western building are locked, but the locks are Basic (+5 to Lockpicking) because this is a commercial building and the mercs were too lazy to change the locks. The front office has been cleared out to act as a prisoner dormitory (they sleep on rags spread over the floor).

    The CCG Thugs present here are not minions, but they still use their standard stats. Kossrani is based on the Brute template and is fairly well-equipped.

    Early in the morning, the salt works gets a big delivery of wet salt on a cart. Early in the evening, another cart comes to pick up the dried salt. Late at night, a smaller cart comes in to pick up the salt Kossrani is skimming off the top to sell on the black market. All of this happens on the southern loading gate.

    There are also no kitchens or anything in the place, so they take meal deliveries in a few hours after the early morning salt delivery and a couple of hours before the evening pickup. These are delivered by a dottari patrol, and consist of decent food for the guards and crappy rations for the prisoners.

    The prisoners work with the salt during the day and sleep in the front office at night. There’s always at least one guard keeping an eye on them. Kossrani and four thugs keep watch by day while three thugs sleep. Those three keep watch at night while the others sleep. Kossrani wakes up at night to deliver his clandestine salt, then goes back to sleep.

    [Player] Planning

    I think it’s fair to assume that the PCs would have a planning meeting in the Wasp Nest now that they know where Comerivos is.

    My impulse as the player who has read the adventure is to have them watch the place for a day to see who comes and goes, which would let them figure out the salt delivery schedule, and use a delivery to storm the place. But I don’t want to go straight that way, as in a more “traditional” game the players wouldn’t know all this beforehand. Plus the PC’s personalities might incline them towards alternate approaches. How about we try to simulate these discussions using Mythic and GURPS?

    First, let’s look at our PCs, and what their personalities and traits suggest they’d prefer.

    • Arcturus is Impulsive, so obviously he wants to charge in right now, beat everyone up, and heroically rescue the prisoners!

    • Jade is concerned with doing this without risking harm to the prisoners, and a Tactics roll tells her it’s best to watch the place for a while to spot openings in their security, and then exploit those to charge in and rescue the prisoners.

    • Jania is lazy and overconfident, so she’s in favor of doing what has worked for her in the past: sneak in at night, pick the locks, and spring the prisoners quietly.

    • Rosalia is also Impulsive, and is with Arcturus all the way.

    • Urist is with Jade, as he’s concerned about potential harm to the prisoners.

    I roll Diplomacy for Jade with some aid from Urist’s Public Speaking, but I fail! Let’s say they arrive at a compromise here. They’ll forgo lengthy scouting but they’ll do a night-time raid because that’s when the guards are likely to be less alert.

    They’ll get in through the side gate and then the small side door towards the back of the building, letting Jania open both and staying quiet for as long as possible. Once inside, Arcturus and Jade will focus on fighting and distracting the guards while the rest of them get the prisoners out.

    That’s it for the plan. No time for anything more elaborate, no time for shopping expeditions. They move tonight.

    [GM] Reacting to the Plan

    If the party is going to break in at night, I need to change the position of the enemies on the map. Kossrani will be in the sleeping quarters, and a mook guard will take his place.

    Sleeping defenders don’t have their armor on, but can fetch their weapons with a single Ready maneuver after getting out of bed.

    It’s a bright starry night, so our Darkness modifier is -6 outside. There are some lanterns inside the perimeter and buildings that provide torch-equivalent illumination (zero penalty out to 3m, -3 out to 6m). We can assume the building has small windows for lighting and ventilation, so at night the penalty for unlit interiors is also a -6.

    [Player] The Raid

    The party travels to the salt works, and approaches the side gate near the outbuilding. Jania conjures a Light and gets to work opening the lock. It readily clicks open after a few seconds. Pleasantly surprised with how easy this has been so far, the group sneaks across the courtyard, where she opens the other door just as easily.

    [GM] Success on the spell, which costs her 1 Fatigue.

For both doors, Open Locks gives her +4, this being a basic lock gives
another +5, and she decides to rush a bit and get it done in half the time
for -5. Our effective skill is still 20! We succeed at both tries.

Stealth is a group check, made with the highest skill (Jania's at 15) at a
-1 penalty for each PC who doesn't have that skill (Urist). She succeeds,
and the guards don't because there are several walls between them
and the the PCs.

    Opening the second door reveals a large but messy room where seven disheveled people sleep on raggedy blankets. Rosalia and jade move forward to quietly wake them up, figuring they have the best chance of doing so quietly. This is exactly what happens, as they wake up each prisoner with soft words and and are readily believed when they say they’re here for a rescue. One of them even asks Jade if she’s an angel, which embarrasses her because she’s not sure herself!

    [GM] Mythic, are these exhausted, stressed-out and malnourished
prisoners going to make loud noises when suddenly woken up on the middle of
the night (Likely)? Answer: No.

Okay, so they're going to be able to see and react to our PCs before they
make a noise. Let's say 4 of them see Rosalia, and 3 see Jade. They all
react pretty well, as expected, with the lowest roll being a 15.

    While the party was able to pretty much ghost into the building, they can hear the sounds of people playing cards just beyond a corridor, and the prisoners are unlikely to be able to sneak as well as they are, in their state. Jade decides to take the rearguard here, and fight any guards that come in from the south. Urist will stay just outside the door, while the rest attempt to sneak out with the prisoners.

    [GM] That's another group test, but a much harder one. Let's consider Nan
Comerivos has Stealth, since he's a smuggler, but none of the other
prisoners do. So Jania's Stealth-15 has a -6 penalty here, and the guards
have no penalty to their Hearing rolls.

This is a tie! However, ties go to the "defender", which here means the
guards.

    Despite Jania’s attempts to get this lot out safely, their shuffling attracts the attention of one of the CCG thugs in the front room, which decides the prisoners are being too noisy and goes over to rough them up a bit…

    The PCs hear him coming, and decide to hurry up, abandoning stealth and following their original plan. Jade and Art stay behind to tie up the guards while the rest of the group books it.

    [GM] It's a fight! Let's say the PCs and prisoners get to make one move action
before we enter combat order. Prisoners move with the PC side.

    Round 1:

    The rescuer team and the prisoners begin running out of the building, intending to go back through the courtyard and out the already open side gate. The guards in the front room begin running towards the source of the noise, while the ones in the dormitory (including Kossrani) begin waking up.

    Round 2:

    More running, as the sleepyheads begin getting up from their beds and the other guards keep running to reach the back room. The prisoners and their escort are halfway to crossing the courtyard. Jade and Art begin backing out of the room, since it’s very dark now.

    Round 3:

    The sleepyheads gather their weapons, but have no time to put on any armor. The prisoners are almost out of the courtyard. Rosalia, Jania, and Urist decide to lag behind a bit because they heard the shouts from inside the dormitory. Jade and Art hang by the exit door.

    Round 4:

    Kossrani finally begins moving, and opens the dormitory door to find a bunch of people running away throught the courtyard! Urist closes in to engage the new threat, as another CCG thug emerges from the dormitory to approach him.

    Most prisoners are out of the gate, but still on the map. The CCG thugs from the building are almost closing in on the courtyard door.

    Round 5

    Our first attacks in this combat!

    Urist blocks a club swing from one of the thugs and retorts with his mace, knocking the enemy down and stunning him. Kossrani steps over the fallen guard and engages both Urist and Rosalia in melee. Jania casts a Grease spell under him, and while the dwarf manages to retain his footing he’s now standing on difficult terrain. Rosalia attacks Kossrani with both her words and her blade, but he resists both.

    Meanwhile, Arthur runs and tackles another thug, while Jade stands ready to stab the first fool who enters her reach.

    The guards from inside the main building are almost at the courtyard door now, but they’ll be late: all but two of the prisoners have already escaped.

    Round 6

    Arthur uses his leverage to strike the enemy he’s grappling, and Jania approaches to help by hitting the thug with her cane. Another guard manages to run out of the main building, right into Jade’s waiting blade. He’s dead.

    Another guard tries to charge her but she slashes at his legs and knocks him down. More exit the main building into the courtyard, to engage the impenetrable “wall of sword” that is Jade.

    Meanwhile, Urist keeps Kossrani occupied while Rosalia steps to his flank and stabs him. The remaining prisoners escape, and now it’s just the party against the guards.

    Round 7

    Arcturus dispatches the thug that was stunned back in round 5 with a suplex just as he manages to recover, and Jade kills two more guards with her blade. The last surviving guard moves to flank her. Kossrani continues to fight vigorously against Urist and Rosalia.

    Jania begins casting an Ice Dagger spell, and a critical success lets her charge a bigger missile at no cost to herself.

    Round 8

    The flanking thug tries to attack Jade and gets cut for his trouble, while Kossrani continues to stand his ground against Urist, Rosalia, and Arcturus, who manages to grab his weapon but cannot further increase his leverage yet.

    Round 9

    The three PCs engaging Kossrani finally manage to distract him enough for Urist and Jania to get good hits in, defeating him. This effectively ends our fight.

    Post-Combat

    With Kossrani down, the remaining guards immediately turn tail and run back inside the building, intent on running away. Jade lets them, as she recognizes they are defeated and sees no honor or utility in chasing them.

    The prisoners have all escaped, and now it’s time for the group to escape with them… after a quick spot of looting where they take Kossrani’s amulet. Everyone meets up soon after, as the prisoners didn’t have enough energy to run very far. Together the group re-enters the walls and finds a spot to rest away from patrols, and then they all make their way back to the Long Roads Coffee House without further incident.

    [GM] Consequences

    As stated in the book, each attempted raid on the salt works increases notoriety by 1d4. This one increased it by 2. There will be no others, at least for now, the place was emptied out.

    We haven’t started dealing with rebellion rules yet, due to the different order in which we’re running these scenes, but we will do so on the next chapter.

  • Apr 8, 2026

    Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 1, Scene 07

    [Author] Intro

    Our last scene in our Hell’s Rebels solo campaign saw the PCs go to the Long Roads Coffee House, meet up with Laria, and officially start their effort to rebuild the Silver Ravens. They met up with the tengu family currently occupying the place’s secret basement and agreed to help look for the missing Bellflower agent that would take them out of town.

    In this scene, they’ll do exactly that. The intention is that this will be a sort of investigation montage that will end when they find the guy.

    [GM] Mythic Bookkeeping

    The last scene was pretty chill, but it did mostly consist of the PCs being exposited to, so let’s keep the Chaos Factor at 5.

    The Tengu Sisters are our new entry on the Characters list. We progressed along The Path and Get Organized, but there have been no changes to the list.

    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
    • The Tengu Sisters

    I roll an 8 on the d10 here, so we have no surprises and the scene will indeed be an investigation montage.

    [GM] Prepping the Scene

    Dungeon Fantasy doesn’t really have rules for extended investigative scenes, as all your generic delver wants is to find vague rumors about their next dungeon. So let’s borrow some from GURPS Action and/or Monster Hunters instead.

    Our “final answer” is this: Nan Comerivos was captured by dottari and imprisoned in the Salix Salt Works.

    The PCs start out knowing the following, from conversations held in the previous scenes, and rumors heard all the way at the beginning.

    • Comerivos brought in a shipment of Varisian cloth along with the tengus.

    • He took a sample and left to try and find a buyer, so he could use the money to leave the city with said tengus.

    • He disappeared.

    • Political prisoners deemed to be “low profile” or “low threat” are being taken to the Salix Salt Works to perform forced labor, rather than being locked up in Kintargo Keep. This is a rumor from scene 1. It’s not relevant yet but the PCs will remember it when the right time comes.

    If we follow the rules, I think it would take a Current Affairs roll to deduce Nan’s current location, at an initial penalty of -6. A success right away would mean a Holmes-like deductive leap, perhaps based on information the PC happened to overhear… but Rosalia doesn’t trust her chances with a base skill level of 14, so let’s investigate until we reduce that penalty.

    [Player] Finding the Guy

    Jania suggests they follow in Nan’s footsteps in the most literal way, by grabbing another bolt of cloth herself and trying to find a buyer for the shipment. In the process, they will keep an ear out for rumors about the situation of Kintargo’s black market and about what might have happened to Nan specifically.

    [GM] Of course the "player" would send me right back to look up rules
with the very first thing he says.

    Jania and Rosalia make a series of discreet inquiries about where to sell this shipment of very high quality cloth that hasn’t exactly gone through customs. They learn that the best place to find a buyer would be Redroof Market, since that’s where all the cloth merchants and tailors are.

    [GM] That's a Streetwise roll. Jania leads the effort with her skill level
of 14, and Rosalia makes complementary rolls to help with her 13.

Rosalia succeeds at her roll, giving Jania a +1 to hers.

    However, the same shady stranger at a bar that tells them this information also cautions that the dottari have been cracking down on contraband at that particular market. No, they can’t really track the provenance of every scrap of cloth that changes hands there, but these are Thrune’s goons. All they need to do is declare someone looks suspicious and take them away. Happened to this kinda nondescript half-elf dude just the other day. He was carrying around a bolt of cloth very similar to that one you have on you.

    [GM] It takes another Streewwise roll to discover information about their
actual goal. Rosalia once again succeeds in her complimentary roll and Jania
rolls a critical success thanks to her help!

This gives us a total of +3 towards our final deduction roll.

    So Nan was caught by the dottari, huh? Now is the time for our heroes to remember that session 1 rumor: low-profile and low-threat prisoners are being taken to the Salix Salt Works to perform hard labor. Nan seems like it would fit the profile, but is he really there?

    Well, turns out verifying this hypothesis is quite easy. Jania knows the Seeker spell, she knows Nan’s name, and many of his personal effects are still back at the coffee house’s basement. She sends a Silver Raven Figurine message to Laria asking for one of his spare hats and setting up a meeting at Redroof Market.

    They receive the message and Jade decides she will go. While she’s making the trip, which should take about 20 minutes, the pair decides to try to sell that looted jewelry here at the market.

    [GM] Rosalia takes the lead, with Jania helping, both using their
Merchant-13. Jania succeeds, and Rosalia wins with her effective skill of 14
against the "generic 15" described in the rules.

This means they'll get 60% of the goods' real value, which they already
know. That means the two signet rings and the embroidered scarf will be sold
for $2640. 6 golds, 12 silvers.

I decide to add a little more color here.

    They end up selling the two signet rings and an embroidered scarf to a tiefling tailor named Hetamon Haace, who has a big shop in the area and shows an interest in the scarf.

    Rosalia: “We’ve fallen on hard times, don’t you know, and so we need to sell some of Grandma’s jewels to make ends meet. A very tragic story.”

    Haace: “These two signet rings have different seals. Are you sure they belong to your grandma?”

    Jania: “Well, they belong to somebody’s grandma.”

    Haace buys the stuff even though he obviously knows it’s not 100% on the up and up. Jania and Rosalia split the money amongst themselves for added security. Rosalia then goes around the market selling the bag of pearls piecemeal to various merchants.

    [GM] We use the same rolls here, so $7200 for the lot. 18 gold for
simplicity, again split between the two.

    Once Jade meets them, they set off to an area just outside the Salt Gate. It’s close enough to the Salt Works that it’s unlikely to fail if Nan is there, and will be fairly unambiguous. Sure enough, the spell points Jania towards the Salt Works, and not to the Holding House or to Kintargo Castle, the other two primary holding areas of the city. Case solved!

    [GM] Way to shortcut the investigation process! Then again, that's exactly
why I made sure Jania had Seeker.

    Now that they know where their target is, it’s time to plan a raid. That ends our scene.

  • Apr 2, 2026

    Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 1, Scene 06

    [Author] Intro

    Our last scene in this Hell’s Rebels solo campaign 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.

    • A platinum signet ring worth $2500, found a the livery’s ground level.

    • A gold signet ring worth $1500, from Blosodriette.

    • An embroidered silk scarf worth $400, also from the imp.

    • 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.

    • A Balanced Silver Coated Dwarven Mace.

    • A Balanced Pistol (from Pyramid #3/36).

    • 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.

  • Mar 31, 2026

    Hell's Rebels Bestiary: Blosodriette

    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).

    • 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.

    • Tiny Blowpipe (12): Acc 1, Range 6. 1 pi + 1d toxic follow-up. Roll HT-2 or become nauseated for 1d minutes.

    • 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

    • 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.

    • 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.

    • 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.

    • Gold-and-platinum signet ring worn as an armband ($1500), embroidered silk scarf worn as a wrap ($400).

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