Magic Item: Nena Bleeve's Journal

Nena Bleeve was the niece of Arvik Bleeve. Like her uncle she was interested in making items of magical value, but she had not reached his heights of creation (nor the depths of his madness). Nena had few friends, though occasionally played doubles Flaming Chess with aristocrats. Her distinguishing feature was the journal that many observed her writing in; compulsively some said. Writing walking down the street at times, writing while meeting people, making endless notes...

Described as bookish by everyone who met her, she was nevertheless a ruthless killer. People who survived her attacks spoke of incredible grace, speed of attack, and how sometimes she seemed able to shrug off what should have been horrific life-ending injuries. And after that she would write in her journal.

Nena died, surprised by an elven assailant who disintegrated her with a wand firing a rainbow bolt... Her journal was not recovered after the attack, and Wethamites who knew it for what it was have been unable to locate it. It is possible that it was destroyed in the attack, but who can say for sure?

Creature: TU-Rats

Two foot high ratlings, humanoid, dressed in simple leather and cloth garments and carrying needle knives (sometimes poisoned) and tiny bows and slings. They are primitive by some measures, but civilised, living (typically) in large nest communities. Teams of TU-Rats have been known to ride pack-horses and other large domesticated animals. Unlike other rats and ratlings they have long outgrown scavenging as a way of life.

Oh, and TU stands for Telepathically United.

The cranium of a TU-Rat is slightly larger than might be expected for a bipedal rat of their overall size. They create an open psychic field to other TU-Rats. They are individuals but share and coordinate via a groupthink as situations require. A TU-Rat is always aware of every other TU-Rat within 50 feet, and can transmit to TU-Rats much further away by a mental relay effect: messages are passed on but are not instantaneous.

TU-Rats trade with other intelligent races sometimes. They are not aggressive generally, but can be territorial. A TU-Rat by itself will not be a great challenge for a party of adventurers if they have to kill it. Problems occur when dealing with large groups of TU-Rats that attack en masse and which can overcome even the most hardy of warriors. The TU-Rat psychic field can have an effect on humans and other races.

Actual Play: Somewhere South

Last night Patrick and I were the only ones available for games night. After a quick discussion we decided to play something as a bit of a oneshot, and so I used Tales of the Scarecrow as a starting point for an evening's adventure...

Patrick quickly rolled up a party for himself; while he generated four sets of stats, I used Vornheim NPC tables to create some people to populate the world, and pulled some names out of the air ("Usher Beak, who is a herbalist, has asked you to take a chest to a friend of his in the nearby city of Wetham; you've been on the road a day..."). Patrick used Vornheim to name all of his characters - including pulling the detail that Vaskin, his fighter, was in fact two goblins standing on shoulders. Awesome.

PROBABLE SPOILERS FOR TALES OF THE SCARECROW BELOW!!!
But I'll try to keep as many details out as possible.

Somewhere North: The Vaeltaja

The Vaeltaja are nomads on the snowy plains. They wander on the snow and ice, and settle in their groups for the true winter. Where else is there to go? To the city of Zelman? Ha! They care not for the cities, nor for the towns. If pressed and in need they will go to a village or hamlet to trade, but even these are strange places for some of them.

They know where to fish, where to hunt, where to hide - and they know WHEN to do all of these things too. They travel in large groups, deer and ice ponies pulling great covered sleds - caravans of men, women and children - hunters and fishers, makers and leaders, warriors and mystics. Each large group is one great extended family. Groups meet and trade (resources, rumours) from time to time. Some of them are open to travellers stopping with them, especially if they would brave the snow in true winter.

Nomad Family

There are 10d20 people in a group. Each group will have a patriarch and matriarch and this "first family" has 2+d6 members.

For every 10 people rounded up, one will be a hunter (leather armour, dagger, sword, shield, bow) and will have some responsibility for finding meat. In two-thirds of Vaeltaja families they will have people adept at fishing, and the group will have made camp around a water source. In these cases there will be one fisherman for every 15 people in the family.

There are 2d4 spiritual/clerical people in a group. They will worship either the spirit of the open plain or a particular family spirit.

Many others in the family will be craftsmen, makers, food-gatherers, bards, ostlers and armourers. They share responsibility for the community and while they do have large extended families the "family" is more of a collective than one bonded truly by blood.

Everyone over the age of 4 will carry a weapon of some kind.

What determines the family's outlook? Roll a d12.

1. Family are wary of outsiders.	7. Family speak a bizarre language.
2. Family worship an ancient spirit.	8. Family are well-armed and warriors.
3. Family possess a Dwarven treasure.	9. Family are wealthy.
4. Family rob travellers.	10. Family are keeping a monster.
5. Family have a rivalry with another group.	11. Family are poor scavengers.
6. Family recently suffered an attack on them.	12. Family are at war with a band of pugs.

How is the favourite son of the family known? Roll a d20.

1. Great Axe	6. Pathfinder	11. Firstborn	16. Knifeman
2. Singer	7. Mead-drinker	12. The Runt	17. Spirit-friend
3. Pug-slayer	8. Bastard sword	13. Mutant	18. Monster-slayer
4. One-arm	9. Farseer	14. Wolf-slayer	19. The Fast
5. Fisherman	10. Future-sight	15. Goatherd	20. The Mute

Example:
There are 111 people in the Hentunen family, a group known for being well-skilled as warriors. Arto and Liisi are the head people in the group, and they have two young daughters. An organised band of twelve hunters keeps the family in wild deer and shaggy pig flesh, and a small but skilled group of fishermen bore holes in the ice over lakes to find prized fish. Half a dozen clerics worship Kalevi, the protector of travellers. Kimi the Mead-drinker is the favourite son of the clan, known for his exploits in drinking contests.

Hate Bear

The Hate Bear is a monstrous white bear that grows to three metres in length. It is the only known species of bear-mutant to not have a typical head. The Hate Bear's fur thins out near the top of the chest, revealing a great muscular maw, surrounded by spiky tentacles that seek to grasp, ensnare and then swallow prey.

The tentacles of the Hate Bear move and seem to track prey without any visible eyes. They respond to sound and can elongate to the length of the Hate Bear. A deep bass growl echoes up from the pit of the stomach. Encountering humans and other sentient species, the Hate Bear tends to only attack if surprised, otherwise it will snarl, growl and posture to intimidate. If weakness is shown too quickly, the Hate Bear will attack. If a bear is encountered with a cub it will fight to the death to protect the little one.

The fur of Hate Bears is extremely flammable; the shoulder blade and chest bones of bears are quite valuable, as they can be fashioned (by a skilled armourer) into a flexible armour that is as tough as chainmail but as light as leather armour.

Hate Bear (originally designed for play in LotFP)

Found "Somewhere North"; icy, snowy conditions. Lives in caves.

AC16 (equivalent to chainmail)

5HD

Can swipe big paws twice (2 attacks) for d8 damage each but at -2 to hit. After a successful swipe and if close can try to grapple with tentacles at +2 to hit. No damage, but restrains successfully trapped prey; will not attack but will attempt to swallow on next turn. Very difficult to escape. Swallowed victims will take d4 crushing damage and d2 acid damage (damages armour first).

A Hate Bear cub has AC12 (no armour), 2HD and only one swiping attack that does d4 damage. It's too small to grasp and swallow, but has tentacles. All Hate Bears have 2d4 spiky tentacles.

TL;DR - a huge polar bear with the pre-Special-Edition-Sarlacc's maw instead of a head! 

Actual Play: Somewhere North (session 3)

Yesterday I met up with noisms and Patrick to continue their adventures Somewhere North... Actual play report, and then some notes/thoughts at the end.

Previously (at the end of session 2, which I forgot to mention last time), Kolk the Artifex (Patrick) and Esa-Pekka (noisms) had really ticked off a greedy toll-levying village by cursing the village and surrounding area to silence. Forever. Hastening to the town of Rovaniemi, they set about installing themselves in some digs (above that wonderful drinking establishment The Knife & Cousin - thanks Vornheim!) and going for a lookaround. Esa-Pekka took a seemingly blank book to the grotesque and diseased Ungrall the Unctuous (a bookseller), who made a big noise about wanting to keep it. The contents could be revealed and read only under the light of a full moon. Ungrall sent his hulking servant Jonas after Esa-Pekka, but despite accusing him in public of being a thief, Esa-Pekka was shrewd enough to worm his way out of it. Meanwhile Kolk had acquired the services of Helvi Ritva, a cleric (NPC) of the spirit Ritva; the PCs planned to take her with them when they went to explore the tomb of the long-dead Dwarven King Oddli. Oddli's burial place is rumoured to be filled with treasure and undead monsters. The PCs know that some reindeer thieves are camped out there as well.

So, session 3!

Actual Play: LotFP, Somewhere North

December has gone by in a flash, and I've not written on here at all! I disagree with noisms describing me as having an irregular blog - I just haven't written in the last month. I was pretty regular before then. But no matter. I'm writing here and now.

And it seems appropriate to write about the campaign that I seem to be running for Dave and Patrick. It started in the week before Christmas, when I offered to run a festive weird horror setting for them; I had just recently received LotFP (taking advantage of the 50% print discount), and created "the Lodge of Zinternik" - an evil red-dressed toymaker, who delighted in putting life of all kinds into things. The local villagers had heard that he had recently died, so his house on the mountain, and more importantly the conternts, were ripe for the taking...

Patrick rolled up a Specialist (or as he prefers, Artifex), a young adventurer named Kolk, and Dave created a Magic-User, the older gentlemen-rogue Esa-Pekka. Both had to be careful, as they had low STR, and Esa-Pekka also suffers from having a Charisma of 3. But they have their wits and creativity to keep them going.

Zinternik's Lodge was a mix of monsters and traps, and NPC "baddies", some of whom the players turned really quickly. They convinced a pair of halflings hired by "Zinter" to labour in his workshop, and turned some elves against each other; they avoided Dolf, the animated evil stag with a blazing red ruby for a nose and and tractamorphic tentacle antlers, firing at him from the roof of the lodge. And finally they left the Lodge with some mysterious (probably magical) items, and with a promise to Mumble and Crumble (the halflings) that they would help them return to their home in the far frozen north.

And that was that... Or so I thought...

When we mentioned playing again in the setting I updated the map, a few more villages (generated with help from noisms' own random village generator) and a handful of details about the nearest large town. I googled One Page Dungeons and had a quick look for something that could be modded easily. I statted up a few more creatures and things. And I thought about what had happened before, and noted a few interesting things that could be good. And that was it.

In the second session the players decided that their characters needed answers, and set off for a nearby village where someone was said to be very wise, perhaps someone who could tell them what they had found at Zinternik's Lodge. The old man, Hannes, gave them some ideas of the artefacts that they had found, and they set off across country for Rovaniemi, the nearest large town. They were looking for provisions and gear to head on the long road north, back to the home of the halflings.

After a run in with a banshee wolf, and a night of talking with some nomadic reindeer herders, they found the road and kept on for the town. However a small village stood in the way; the village was built in a narrow pass between rocky cliff faces. To go around might take a day or more. To go through they would have to pay a steep toll. This did not sit well with the PCs.

In Zinternik's Lodge they had found a magical scroll of incredible power. A one use Scroll of Indefinite Silence. If the nine syllables on it are read aloud then a permanent silence would fall in a sphere with a mile radius. Everlasting silence. As far as they know this can never be removed.

So, what do you do when some toll-charging villagers have hacked you off? You curse their village to silence. Forever. And off you ride to the town you're headed for...

In town they set about trying to recruit retainers for an expedition to a Dwarven King's Tomb, filled with the undead, Kolk sleeps with a young woman (noisms asks "Does she become pregnant?" The DM rolls and makes a note...) and Esa-Pekka of the Low Charisma ticks off a shady bookshop owner, calling the attention of the town guards. As they make their way back to the tavern they are staying at, one of the halflings runs up and says "I was down by the gate, and a posse of a dozen men from that village have just rode up shouting and asking if anyone had seen you!"

Oh dear...

Tomorrow I'll collect some thoughts about what I'm using and how I'm doing this, and what the setting is like. Anyone interested in seeing stats and descriptions of weird creatures that lurk the frozen north?

Dogs and Dice and Decisions

It's Games Night! And tonight I start GMing a game of Dogs In The Vineyard, something which I'm really excited about. It's the first time I've played DitV and also the first time (assuming all goes well) that I'll be GMing something which isn't a oneshot. And we have at least one new player joining our merry band.

I think I have my head wrapped around the dice mechanics and the general principles of "Say yes or roll dice" and "Escalate, escalate, escalate!" Other than that, I'm just interested in playing something a bit different. DitV feels like a breath of fresh air. I thought that setting prep would be difficult, but so far it has been really straightforward. Why? Because they focus on people, what they need, what they want and how far they might go if others (or demons!) push them. And it is so much easier to focus on those fundamentals, the inclinations and breaking points. I have a little map (which I have to redraw to get rid of my notes) and I have notes of circumstances for a few towns and their inhabitants, as well as a paragraph each for those I've not fleshed out yet - I want to see what direction my players take things...

I'll be writing a lot about this over the next few weeks. If I ever finish writing about other dice mechanics I've been interested by I might even get around to thinking about the simple but complex dice of DitV. I can't wait to see it in play.

Thursday Tales

Following on from last week I thought it might be interesting to take something from the Zero Point oracle that our group put together for a far future sci-fi setting (which sits within our Microscope-generated "To The Stars" universe), and see what falls out of the elements selected. This is just my interpretation - the story set-up that I see. If you see something else, then tell me in the comments!
The Oracle says...
Jack of Hearts: Monks plot revenge on those they envy.
Eight of Hearts: There are ghosts in space who worship Satan.
Five of Diamonds: After civilisation collapses, an AI takes the form of an ancestor spirit to relate to the survivors.
Seven of Diamonds: A grief-stricken soul dreams of a new life as a ship's captain.

A Village

(back from work trips and holiday! Normal rate of posting should resume in the next week)

Bexam is a small village on a major trade route to the west of civilisation. A wide stream trickles past not ten feet from the stone walls around it, and the road runs through the middle, with unguarded gates to the north-east and south-west. Many of the town's 80-or-so inhabitants are expert hunters. The forest nearby, Xam, is overflowing with small animals, which a good portion of the village's families are expert at hunting and skinning.

Bexam is a strange place, so small, and yet rich in so many ways: Argun, the village's headman oversees a prosperous little domain, the furs keep a good standard of living - although one that is earned through hard work. Bexam is also home to a master baker (Crumb) who, as well as selling to the village's inhabitants, is sought after by many larger towns nearby. He refuses to move though, and spends most nights baking and in conversation with hallucinations of his dead wife.

Aric and Cira are twin brothers, now estranged, who serve opposing minor deities in shrines within the village's borders. They each try to sway the villagers to their respective godlings, with little success. Most villagers instead seek advice from Dorse, a hermit who lives alone and sees visions of the town's ancestors.

Dorse and Crumb are both dependent on "Bexam Blue", an addictive moss that grows in secluded parts of the forest. Bexam Blue is a strange organism: it keeps the person who consumes it in excellent health, and has remarkable restorative properties for people suffering from all kinds of diseases and afflictions. A side-effect is that regular users, like the hermit and the baker of Bexam, see (true) visions of the dead at night. If consumed regularly (at least once a day) for five days, someone will have to fight to remain unaddicted to it.

A few villagers secretly harvest the moss and sell it to traders and magicians. Argun disagrees with this, but turns a blind eye so that the village continues to be prosperous.

(rolled from noisms' Random Village Generator)

New Worlds, New Ideas

Yesterday afternoon I sat down with Patrick and noisms to start world-building and character generation for a game of Diaspora that we will be playing over the coming months. noisms is going to be DMing, and he has the Diaspora pdf so lead us through the generation part. It took us about three hours to get up to the point of having characters, and it was a really interesting process. noisms has already posted about it over on Monsters and Manuals, and one thing that I'm 100% totally behind is his assertions about creativity through constraints. Creativity is not straight-jacketed by constraints, it thrives in them, in the sense that being completely open to all possibilities leaves us swamped and unable to see the wood for the trees.

...I was describing one of the worlds, in one of the systems we were creating, as being a water world, populated by Melnibonean-esque decadent epicureans. One of the players cut in, "Do they live on the surface in big floating cities, or under the water, or what?" And I was forced to think, "Well, where do they live?" And in answering the question more detail was added to the setting: creation by question in action.

There is a lot of power in this, and it applies not just during shared setting-creation type games like Diaspora: it applies in any kind of game...

It's something that I see a lot through work as well: you ask a totally open question and people look really stumped, and inevitably give vague and general answers. Follow up with more focused questions and they say a lot more; having to think about things which are deep beneath the surface can be really valuable. In games - especially story games (I think) and with world-building it can go a long way.

I'll write tomorrow about the character that I ultimately generated (and the process, which has given me a lot to think about), but I'll finish by saying a few words about some of the cluster of systems that were generated. First, I really thought that the random generation (using a Fudge dice system) was great; it's amazing how generating three numbers (relating to Technology, Environment and Resources in a system) can then go such a long way to detailing what the system is like.

Second, I liked how the layering on of details really started the ball rolling - and like lots of creative endeavours, started connections forming. Humans look for patterns. We have no choice, we try to make sense of the world. For example, one of my systems, Feynman, has neighbours which have either better technology or nicer worlds, so as I start to think about the political and social structure there it makes sense to think that they would be jealous of their neighbours. My other system, Temperance, has extremely high tech but environments that are slightly hazardous - which lead me to think that the citizens might be dispersed in artificial habitats throughout the system, rather than mostly residing on a particular world.

Now we have to make the time to meet up and play!