Talakeal's Campaign Diary: Pirates of Foreth

[Talakeal]

Hello again!

Its time for another one of my campaign journals. We will again be using my Heart of Darkness system (play-test link in signature). The game is a gothic fantasy RPG with a setting somewhere between a Weird Western and Arthurian Romance, but its close enough to D&D that anyone familiar with that sort of game, or fantasy tropes in general, should have no problem following along.

This game is going to be seeing me as a PC for once, while my buddy Brian takes over GMing. The game is set on the high seas of his original campaign world of Foreth.

Also, the entries are going to be shorter, more bullet points than full prose stories.

This game has been in development for three years at this point, with one delay after the other. We had a rocky start, and then Covid hit, and now we are finally picking it up again. Where will it go? Who knows?

This time the crew is:

Sarah Blackwell, Female Human Ronin Samurai
Jane, Female Lampade* Necromancer
Fritz, Male Human Wizard
Tiana, Female Fairy Priest
Scraps, Male Ogre Pirate
Fervious, Male Human Blacksmith
Rain-Spirit, Female Acteon** Ranger
Myzquelitie, Jane’s cat familiar

Although Fritz leaves pretty quick and Rainspirit and Fervious won't be introduced for a while.

Spoiler: The Personal Log of Captain Sarah Blackwell the Tall

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June in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

Jane and I left Sodishu under false names aboard the Cemetery Rose.

Dropped off refugees within the nation of Landan and continued on for the Baronies of Oberwinder. Took on some passengers.

Attacked by pirates. I barricaded Jane in the captain’s quarters and none dared cross my blades, but the crew was murdered and the ship scuttled.

Surveying the damage, I saw the pirates left behind one of their own, an ogre who is gluttonous even by the standards of that monstrous race. Curiously, one of the fairy folk perches on his shoulder and advises him, and he claims it is his parrot.

Jane is able to raise some of the dead, both our crew and the pirates, as zombies and bids them to man the sinking ship. The ogre is given the wheel and instructed to make for the island of Conixo, the closest port.

I manually pump water from below decks and do what I can to repair the sump.

One of our passengers, a Landen named Fritz, is trained as a wizard, and is able to conjure up a favorable wind and hold the storm at bay until we make port.

The ogre is named Scraps, and I make him the boson and leave him in charge of repairs while the rest of us seek shelter from the rain at the local inn.

There is nothing to eat but watery soup made from last year’s root vegetables.

There is talk around town of a blight devouring their crops, and that Armond, the druid who normally tends to such things, has gone missing. He was last seen in a clearing two leagues from town.

The five of us set off to investigate. On the road we find an orcish slaver, heavily armed and overconfident. I kick embers from his campfire to blind him, then Scraps and I make short work of him. I tell his cargo, a family of halflings, that they are free, and offer them refuge on our ship, but they either don’t understand or don’t trust us, and we do not see them again.

We gut the orc and I cook his ribs. The ogre devours the rest. As we sit around the fire, Jane is shot by a sniper’s bullet. It isn’t a bad injury, and while Tia tends to her, I go to track down the assassin, but they were too far away and the trail is cold. Only a dionjen*** could have made that shot, and I suspect the orc had a partner.

Move through a glade of bleeding trees filled with swarms of toxic spiders. My companion’s fortitude leaves something to be desired.

In the clearing is a strange scarecrow made of human bones, guarded by a strange beast that is a composite of forest creatures; bear’s size, rabbit’s legs, deer’s antlers, wolf’s teeth, turtle’s shell.

It is tough and hops around a bit, but Fritz traps it under a magical dome of force and we bring it down. It fades away, likely a spirit of some sort.

In the druid’s hut, we find an almanac, last updated 90 days ago, predicting the storm, and speaks of the local spirits becoming disobedient.

We cut the scarecrow down and return it to town.

The dentist is able to identify the bones as belonging to Armond.

The harvest rapidly improves, although who can say if it is related to our actions. Either way, we are welcome in town.

I fill the bilge with scavenging crabs and dump the bodies down there; once they are clean bones Jane can go about re-animating our crew.

Fritz thanks us for the journey, but has pressing business elsewhere and departs on the next ship into port.

*: A breed of elves tained by death magic.
**: A half-deer. Similar to a Warcraft dryad or D&D Alseid.
***: A primitive hunter race known for their keen senses. Like a cross between a klingon and the Predator.

[Ameraaaaaa]

I wonder where they keep the vegetable roots.

Anyways a good ogre always is good to have if you need a strong fighter. Shame he's a cannibal.

[Talakeal]

I wonder where they keep the vegetable roots.

Anyways a good ogre always is good to have if you need a strong fighter. Shame he's a cannibal.

I doubt the DM thought about it, but I would assume they have cellars as the region was described as having a climate similar to Kansas.

Hey, we don't know if he eats other ogres! The correct term is man-eater!

Joking aside, I imagine the ogre would be less cannibalistic without the encouragement from the rest of the party. Bob wanted to play an evil character, and I decided to just lean into it rather than fight him (see my other post).

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: Session Two

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July in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

We hear tales of an abandoned church built over a bayou near town. It is supposedly haunted.

We send Tia in to investigate, giving her a bat’s skull to wear as a helmet and which Jane has enchanted to allow us to see through its eyes.

The parishioners are ghouls. The deacon is a merrow*, and he can see through Tia’s camouflage.

We assault the church before Tia can be cornered and captured or killed.

The ghouls go down easy enough, they try and devour the ogre but Jane is able to conjure walls of frost to channel them into a killing funnel.

When we approach the merrow, he defends himself with illusions and stinking clouds, and it escapes through the water ways.

We learn that the deacon’s name is Meleeku, and his god is Tsogathua.

There is a sea monster living below the church. Maybe a baby kraken? The bayou must connect to the sea somehow. Underground chasm?

Their treasure is something called the Riddle of Clockwork, a strange mechanical sphere none of us can puzzle out.

They keep a scrag prisoner, surgically crippled. He believes we are yet another of the Merrow’s illusions out to steal his secret, and he will not parlay. The decision is made to euthanize him, but we keep his head so that Jane might commune with him later.

Below the church, many of the ghouls are sick with ghastly fever and locked in cells. Jane binds them to her will.

The bell tower is full of crows.

*What you might call an illithid.

[Ameraaaaaa]

Spoiler: Session Two

Show

July in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

We hear tales of an abandoned church built over a bayou near town. It is supposedly haunted.

We send Tia in to investigate, giving her a bat’s skull to wear as a helmet and which Jane has enchanted to allow us to see through its eyes.

The parishioners are ghouls. The deacon is a merrow*, and he can see through Tia’s camouflage.

We assault the church before Tia can be cornered and captured or killed.

The ghouls go down easy enough, they try and devour the ogre but Jane is able to conjure walls of frost to channel them into a killing funnel.

When we approach the merrow, he defends himself with illusions and stinking clouds, and it escapes through the water ways.

We learn that the deacon’s name is Meleeku, and his god is Tsogathua.

There is a sea monster living below the church. Maybe a baby kraken? The bayou must connect to the sea somehow. Underground chasm?

Their treasure is something called the Riddle of Clockwork, a strange mechanical sphere none of us can puzzle out.

They keep a scrag prisoner, surgically crippled. He believes we are yet another of the Merrow’s illusions out to steal his secret, and he will not parlay. The decision is made to euthanize him, but we keep his head so that Jane might commune with him later.

Below the church, many of the ghouls are sick with ghastly fever and locked in cells. Jane binds them to her will.

The bell tower is full of crows.

*What you might call an illithid.

So the merrow seems like he is gonna be a reoccurring villain. That's nice. Classic evil cult storyline.

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: Session Three

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August in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

Strange dreams this night.

We are awakened by Tia, who says that she saw a falling star land nearby. I snapped at her.

Many townsfolk had the same dream that I did. They shouldn’t be copying me.

Followed the star, climbed down into caves on the Oceanside cliffs.

Inhabited by woses, chonchon, and cockatrice, all dead now.

Encountered a Dragas with two pet Mirri. He was seeking a necklace. I asked him if he could help us, he asked why we needed help, I told him I didn’t but was being generous. He refused, so I shot him in the back and kicked him in the head until dead. He is a wight now. The dogs ran off into the spirit world.

There is a tree guarding the main entrance, caked in salt and rooted in the surf. It is animate and guards the necklace the dragas was seeking. I like this tree. Jane froze it and we took the necklace.

Was the tree put here by Armond or his killer?

The fallen star is watched over by a copper golem. We liberated it, though the golem took some effort to put down, but the relentless undying dragonspawn kept its attention while we worked to find something that could put it down for good.

It is the size and shape of an ostrich egg. It is indestructible and radiates magic. It is covered with wards within wards.

The chonchon is a large vampire bat. It looks like a severed head, and people claim that they are the ghosts of beheaded criminals condemned to roam the earth. Its odd shape is likely natural selection taking advantage of those fears.
Woses are primitive humanoid vultures, sometimes called skeksis or hook horrors.
Cockatrice are half rooster-half snake chimera who have paralytic venom so potent some say it can turn you to stone.
Dragas are atavistic lizardpeople who have draconic features such as horns, wings, or fiery breath.
Mirri, sometimes called blink dogs, are strange hounds with large piercing eyes that have the ability to move in and out of the Dreamtime.

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: Chapter Four

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September in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

A bird with a reverberating voice comes to our window in the night. It speaks.

Heeding its advice, we purchase an offering of jet and travel for several days to a cave with an entrance like dragon’s teeth.

Stupid people didn’t listen to me and don’t have any light source, so we waste almost a fortnight making this trip twice.

Found an old shrine with holy water.

Within the cave two giant skeletons stand guarding a silver crown on a rotten throne. Their bones are coated in iron.

A gigantic scarab attacks us in the dark. She is immortal and invulnerable. She brings down the columns in her pursuit of us and is buried in the collapse. We steal her eyes.

Are we in the labyrinth? It is sized for the ogres of old.

We kill a Grendel, takes its thin inky hide. I am sick from its poison.*

We cross a chasm on a bridge of magical frost conjured by Jane. Bat swarms fly up and attack us in a frenzy; this would have been almost certain death if we had attempted crossing the chasm normally.

Come to a shattered dais, 30 paces across and one pace high.

Wraiths attack us. They were previous explorers. I shove holy water up their arses, it takes all I have.

We speak with Suing Zhi Chu, a fallen angel of death and a smith.

He makes a grimoire from our offerings. He is sponsoring Jane, but has no master. They have a long talk about things that are mostly beyond my ken.

The Lich of Iron Sent for us. This lich has no equal. It dwells in the East, but not in Ku.

Spoiler: The Raven's Rhyme

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“Jane, no mother’s daughter, attend and give me heed.
Know though that they actions have rippled across the ether.
You stand summoned. Rise to meet your destiny.
To make thyself ready for thy initiation, an offering must be made.
Plight thy troth to the setting sun, and make the journey of two score and ten leagues.
Power awaits within the jaws of the dragon.
The embrace of the tomb will guide thy step.
Four stones of the humble helper’s eyes.
A handful of the night’s tears made imperishable crystal.
The unblemished hide of the hunger in the darkness.
The heart’s cage of the fallen and misbegotten.
To the heart of the cleft bring these gifts and this vessel’s dust,
Lest blood and breath be paid in their stead.
Siung Zhi Chu waits, a force to be bargained or beaten;
In the eyeless depths, a tool be forged.”

This clears out my backlog; updates going forward will be ~every two weeks but a little more in depth as the memories will be fresher.

*: A grendel is a subterranean predator; simultaneously like a worm, an octopus, and a preying mantis. It is dark and almost too horrible to describe.

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: Chapter Five

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October, in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

Repairs on the ship have stalled out, the villagers have no logs big enough to make a new mast, and the wood-cutters guild (half a dozen local lumber jacks) are afraid to make the trip to the forest.

They also have stories of a massive monster in the forest, and promise us a rich reward if we drive it off.

Scraps has heard tale of a water-horse nearby and wants to eat it.

My calligraphy is interrupted by strange voices on deck. I find that the ogre has found a friend, dark-skinned and bearded, with heavy armor and a strange poll-axe.

He insists that he is a human rather than an ogre, but when I tell him that humans don’t grow that tall, he admits that his bloodline is impure.

He tells us that he is searching for supplies stolen by one of the houses of Landon, men who wear white and green livery and are hiding in the forest. He proposes we journey together.

I ask him what his weapon is, and he tells me it is a ham axe. I tell him that we are likely to be doing a lot more than slaughtering pigs on this mission, but if he wants to serve as a human shield he is welcome to tag along.

We decline to hire a guide, instead following the old wagon ruts across the fields. The nearest forest is almost a week away. I hope we brought enough food, I am afraid the ogre will eat all of his and then take ours, leaving nothing for the way back.

We encounter a pair of poachers named Jonah and Jesse.

He has a mouth but no brain, she has a brain but no desire to speak.

I greet whem with my traditional “namaste” and Jonah has no idea what I am saying. Jesse tells him it means “my soul recognizes yours,” or some such nonsense, and I have to correct her and tell her that it simply means hello.

They are suspicious of us, but claim they do not have a bounty on their heads, and I can’t imagine what law they are afraid of all the way out here. They have a pair of tusked gorillas with them who stand in a daze. They claim that they are dangerous beasts held calm by a tonic from the Black Forest Company alchemists, stolen from their nest while their mother, a beast eight times their size, was out foraging, and they are bound for the arenas of Ku.

I ask them if they would be willing to help us track down our quarry, and they decline, saying they have a boat to catch in Stone Harbor. Jane and I quietly discuss whether they might be more useful dead, but decide not to risk the confrontation.

Our fairy, however, secretly casts a spell which will free the beasts from their chemically induced stupor some time in the night.

We move on. The next day, we find an abandoned wagon no doubt left by the wood-cutters guild. A forest child is eagerly digging through the rusted tools. She is younger than Jane, an albino with the legs of a fawn and the antlers of a stag. I greet her and ask what she is doing, and she says she is playing with the “tinker’s toys”. As we go to leave, she bounces along after us.
Her name is Helathyra Rain Spirit. We call her “Hey-Hey” for short. She does not know of Armond.

Scraps is uncertain, but I say that she can guide us, and worst case scenario he can eat her. He smiles.

As we approach the forest, we are ambushed by a pack of deformed creatures whose flesh is stained with many bright and unnatural colors. They are hard to describe, or even imagine, and I believe they were some sort of gremlin. One of them shouts “Fire-Cow” and a burst of flame forces us to scatter. They charge.

Most surround the deer-girl, and Scraps, incensed that something else is going after “his meat” rushes to her rescue. I walk forward slowly, twirling my swords and whistling a battle-hymn in a challenging display.

One of the creatures casts some sort of spell and sticks its hand through pig-boy’s breastplate, sending him crashing to the ground and writhing in pain. I cut them into pieces, supported by Jane’s cantrips, but the pieces reform into smaller gremlins.

Eventually they burn themselves out with their own magic, leaving us to bind our wounds. The only serious injury I suffered was a deep cut on my left thigh, but I decline to let Tia treat it.
We enter the woods, and follow Rain Spirit’s guidance. She isn’t from the forest, but has lived her for a while.

Five men come walking down a slope toward us. They are wielding pavises and crossbows, and wearing green and white livery. I attempt to parley with them, but they tell us to turn around if we value our lives. A challenge I cannot let go unanswered.

They form ranks, and I fire a warning shot from my revolver.

They pepper the butcher’s shield with quarrels as I draw close.

One of their number is an assassin, and he has slipped away in the confusion and moves to garrote Jane. I rush to her side, and when he realizes he cannot match blades with me, he throws stinging powder in my face and runs.

The forest child uses fairy-fire to reveal his shape and then tags him with an arrow in the chest.

As scraps tears down two of the crossbowmen, the others run. I tell them to come back, for we still need to learn the value of our lives. One of them shouts that it wasn’t him who said that, and the ogre gives chase.

The assassin lies dying, and Tia casts a spell to prolong his life, though she does not heal his wounds. He is either unwilling or unable to answer our questions, but has a map which shows five locations that pig-boy is pleased to have. He indicates that something killed seven of his men.

Scraps returns, chewing on a leg. I ask him if he would prefer his meat raw or cooked, and he tells me nobody has ever offered to cook his food before. As I start the fire, I ask the would-be assassin if he is contemplating the choices that led him to this point, but he goes into shock rather than answer me.

After the ogre’s grisly feast, we move deeper into the woods. In a low lying bog, half a dozen hulking figures composed of mud and algae rise up. We move to attack them, and Jane casts a spell of reaving cold on us, making it deadly for anyone to draw too close, but unfortunately these mud-men are only interested in devouring Jane and her cat and walk past us, ignoring our blades, anchors,
antlers, and “ham axes”.

In the end we defeat them without incident, but we have to get so close that our own shrouds do more damage than the muck-monsters, and even Jane is chilled by the cold.

Rain Spirit says that the ley-lines have become kinked here, and she casts a spell to untangle them, but she says that the ultimate source of corruption remains.

Soon we hear crashing in the underbrush, and decide to follow it. What we find is a massive creature built from living logs in the rough shape of a truly enormous bear. Numerous bees have made hives in its wooden hide.

It is powerful, and those who approach are stung by swarms of insects that burrow beneath their armor, making it impossible to focus on a proper defense against their master.

I can endure the venom, but not the creature’s kicks; I roll back and draw my revolver.

I empty the cylinder, going little damage, and the acteon exhausts her quiver, doing less.

Scraps goes down, and the monster shoves his heavily armored friend down into the mud.

As it approaches us, I reload, and Jane casts a spell which causes a frost to settle upon the forest floor. With no suitable corpses to animate, she is relying heavily on her cold magic this expedition.

We all slip and slide, but the monster most of all, buying us time to put some distance between us. Hey-hey casts an incantation that summons a wall of thorns.

Things are looking bad, and Tia gets the beast’s attention, provoking it into chasing her through the magical brambles. She is small enough to fly through them unharmed, but it is not, and it is well and torn up before it can finally swat her away like a bug.

I draw my swords and realize this may well be my last stand. The dryad, out of arrows and of magic, resorts to chucking rocks.

I focus my will on parrying, and guide the creature over Scraps’ downed bulk, and with the last of his energy, the ogre buries his anchor in the monster’s belly and pulls, and then I guide it over the ice, where it begins to slip. In attempting to get at me, it pulls itself apart, and a large mossy green stone, what Rain Spirit calls the heart of the forest, falls out.

The druid does her best to wake Tia, and then the fairy uses her magic to heal Scrap’s wounds. Jane, meanwhile, performs a grand ritual to replace the primal energy that animated the hulk with profane. The insects die and the heart turns black, but in the end she is able to knit the carved wood back together and bind the monster to her will.

We find the old lumber camp, where a towering woman made of wood holds court. We attempt to parley, but she is incensed by our desecration and orders her minions to kill us. A quartet of spriggans, small plant people, spring to attack us, but our necromantic goliath takes their charge.

I move to challenge the wooden queen, and though she is slow, her flesh is tough as an old oak, and my swords do little damage.

Vines come to life around the grove in an attempt to ensnare my comrades. Jane casts a massive spell that withers all of the plants in an expanding wave. The vines drop dead, as do many of the trees. This frees them, but several branches crash down on the group. Jane is unharmed, but her spell-book is trapped under the deadfall, and she is so concerned that she forgets about the battle going on around her.

The forest queen orders some of the still living trees to strike at me, and one branch catches me square in the chest, and I feel something burst inside of me. I can tell that this is a fatal blow, but I focus my will and ensure that my opponent falls before I sink to my knees.

I debate the issue for long moments before swallowing my pride and allowing Tia to use the last of her mana to cast a healing incantation upon me.

We return to town, the acteon accompanying us like a lost puppy.

We do not find any sign of Jonas and Jessie save for a battered and bloodstained rifle.

As predicted, Scraps has eaten all the food. We take a detour to check out his “water horse” and find a herd of hippopotami. I am somewhat relived, I was expecting an actual hippocampus, but either way nobody wants to risk provoking a stampede when we are all injured, tired, and out of magic, and so we tighten our belts and press on despite the ogre’s protests.

We hide the oaken behemoth in the caves. Jane is convinced the townsfolk will turn on her for it, likely the result of a bad experience in her childhood.

In town, the wood-cutter’s guild pays our reward, and tells us we can keep the heart of the forest. I tell them that it was never theirs to bargain with.

I decide to make a backup copy of Jane’s spell book, although it takes a couple of tries to get it right.

I also feel it is time to better become acquainted with the people of this village, and allow them to lose their money to me at the poker table.

Our new recruit says that he is a blacksmith by trade, and offers to repair our gear while we plan our next expedition.

Hopefully there will be more wood coming in soon and repairs to the ship can continue, although I regret having no new additions to our crew this month.

[Ameraaaaaa]

Spoiler: Chapter Five

Show

October, in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

Repairs on the ship have stalled out, the villagers have no logs big enough to make a new mast, and the wood-cutters guild (half a dozen local lumber jacks) are afraid to make the trip to the forest.

They also have stories of a massive monster in the forest, and promise us a rich reward if we drive it off.

Scraps has heard tale of a water-horse nearby and wants to eat it.

My calligraphy is interrupted by strange voices on deck. I find that the ogre has found a friend, dark-skinned and bearded, with heavy armor and a strange poll-axe.

He insists that he is a human rather than an ogre, but when I tell him that humans don’t grow that tall, he admits that his bloodline is impure.

He tells us that he is searching for supplies stolen by one of the houses of Landon, men who wear white and green livery and are hiding in the forest. He proposes we journey together.

I ask him what his weapon is, and he tells me it is a ham axe. I tell him that we are likely to be doing a lot more than slaughtering pigs on this mission, but if he wants to serve as a human shield he is welcome to tag along.

We decline to hire a guide, instead following the old wagon ruts across the fields. The nearest forest is almost a week away. I hope we brought enough food, I am afraid the ogre will eat all of his and then take ours, leaving nothing for the way back.

We encounter a pair of poachers named Jonah and Jesse.

He has a mouth but no brain, she has a brain but no desire to speak.

I greet whem with my traditional “namaste” and Jonah has no idea what I am saying. Jesse tells him it means “my soul recognizes yours,” or some such nonsense, and I have to correct her and tell her that it simply means hello.

They are suspicious of us, but claim they do not have a bounty on their heads, and I can’t imagine what law they are afraid of all the way out here. They have a pair of tusked gorillas with them who stand in a daze. They claim that they are dangerous beasts held calm by a tonic from the Black Forest Company alchemists, stolen from their nest while their mother, a beast eight times their size, was out foraging, and they are bound for the arenas of Ku.

I ask them if they would be willing to help us track down our quarry, and they decline, saying they have a boat to catch in Stone Harbor. Jane and I quietly discuss whether they might be more useful dead, but decide not to risk the confrontation.

Our fairy, however, secretly casts a spell which will free the beasts from their chemically induced stupor some time in the night.

We move on. The next day, we find an abandoned wagon no doubt left by the wood-cutters guild. A forest child is eagerly digging through the rusted tools. She is younger than Jane, an albino with the legs of a fawn and the antlers of a stag. I greet her and ask what she is doing, and she says she is playing with the “tinker’s toys”. As we go to leave, she bounces along after us.
Her name is Helathyra Rain Spirit. We call her “Hey-Hey” for short. She does not know of Armond.

Scraps is uncertain, but I say that she can guide us, and worst case scenario he can eat her. He smiles.

As we approach the forest, we are ambushed by a pack of deformed creatures whose flesh is stained with many bright and unnatural colors. They are hard to describe, or even imagine, and I believe they were some sort of gremlin. One of them shouts “Fire-Cow” and a burst of flame forces us to scatter. They charge.

Most surround the deer-girl, and Scraps, incensed that something else is going after “his meat” rushes to her rescue. I walk forward slowly, twirling my swords and whistling a battle-hymn in a challenging display.

One of the creatures casts some sort of spell and sticks its hand through pig-boy’s breastplate, sending him crashing to the ground and writhing in pain. I cut them into pieces, supported by Jane’s cantrips, but the pieces reform into smaller gremlins.

Eventually they burn themselves out with their own magic, leaving us to bind our wounds. The only serious injury I suffered was a deep cut on my left thigh, but I decline to let Tia treat it.
We enter the woods, and follow Rain Spirit’s guidance. She isn’t from the forest, but has lived her for a while.

Five men come walking down a slope toward us. They are wielding pavises and crossbows, and wearing green and white livery. I attempt to parley with them, but they tell us to turn around if we value our lives. A challenge I cannot let go unanswered.

They form ranks, and I fire a warning shot from my revolver.

They pepper the butcher’s shield with quarrels as I draw close.

One of their number is an assassin, and he has slipped away in the confusion and moves to garrote Jane. I rush to her side, and when he realizes he cannot match blades with me, he throws stinging powder in my face and runs.

The forest child uses fairy-fire to reveal his shape and then tags him with an arrow in the chest.

As scraps tears down two of the crossbowmen, the others run. I tell them to come back, for we still need to learn the value of our lives. One of them shouts that it wasn’t him who said that, and the ogre gives chase.

The assassin lies dying, and Tia casts a spell to prolong his life, though she does not heal his wounds. He is either unwilling or unable to answer our questions, but has a map which shows five locations that pig-boy is pleased to have. He indicates that something killed seven of his men.

Scraps returns, chewing on a leg. I ask him if he would prefer his meat raw or cooked, and he tells me nobody has ever offered to cook his food before. As I start the fire, I ask the would-be assassin if he is contemplating the choices that led him to this point, but he goes into shock rather than answer me.

After the ogre’s grisly feast, we move deeper into the woods. In a low lying bog, half a dozen hulking figures composed of mud and algae rise up. We move to attack them, and Jane casts a spell of reaving cold on us, making it deadly for anyone to draw too close, but unfortunately these mud-men are only interested in devouring Jane and her cat and walk past us, ignoring our blades, anchors,
antlers, and “ham axes”.

In the end we defeat them without incident, but we have to get so close that our own shrouds do more damage than the muck-monsters, and even Jane is chilled by the cold.

Rain Spirit says that the ley-lines have become kinked here, and she casts a spell to untangle them, but she says that the ultimate source of corruption remains.

Soon we hear crashing in the underbrush, and decide to follow it. What we find is a massive creature built from living logs in the rough shape of a truly enormous bear. Numerous bees have made hives in its wooden hide.

It is powerful, and those who approach are stung by swarms of insects that burrow beneath their armor, making it impossible to focus on a proper defense against their master.

I can endure the venom, but not the creature’s kicks; I roll back and draw my revolver.

I empty the cylinder, going little damage, and the acteon exhausts her quiver, doing less.

Scraps goes down, and the monster shoves his heavily armored friend down into the mud.

As it approaches us, I reload, and Jane casts a spell which causes a frost to settle upon the forest floor. With no suitable corpses to animate, she is relying heavily on her cold magic this expedition.

We all slip and slide, but the monster most of all, buying us time to put some distance between us. Hey-hey casts an incantation that summons a wall of thorns.

Things are looking bad, and Tia gets the beast’s attention, provoking it into chasing her through the magical brambles. She is small enough to fly through them unharmed, but it is not, and it is well and torn up before it can finally swat her away like a bug.

I draw my swords and realize this may well be my last stand. The dryad, out of arrows and of magic, resorts to chucking rocks.

I focus my will on parrying, and guide the creature over Scraps’ downed bulk, and with the last of his energy, the ogre buries his anchor in the monster’s belly and pulls, and then I guide it over the ice, where it begins to slip. In attempting to get at me, it pulls itself apart, and a large mossy green stone, what Rain Spirit calls the heart of the forest, falls out.

The druid does her best to wake Tia, and then the fairy uses her magic to heal Scrap’s wounds. Jane, meanwhile, performs a grand ritual to replace the primal energy that animated the hulk with profane. The insects die and the heart turns black, but in the end she is able to knit the carved wood back together and bind the monster to her will.

We find the old lumber camp, where a towering woman made of wood holds court. We attempt to parley, but she is incensed by our desecration and orders her minions to kill us. A quartet of spriggans, small plant people, spring to attack us, but our necromantic goliath takes their charge.

I move to challenge the wooden queen, and though she is slow, her flesh is tough as an old oak, and my swords do little damage.

Vines come to life around the grove in an attempt to ensnare my comrades. Jane casts a massive spell that withers all of the plants in an expanding wave. The vines drop dead, as do many of the trees. This frees them, but several branches crash down on the group. Jane is unharmed, but her spell-book is trapped under the deadfall, and she is so concerned that she forgets about the battle going on around her.

The forest queen orders some of the still living trees to strike at me, and one branch catches me square in the chest, and I feel something burst inside of me. I can tell that this is a fatal blow, but I focus my will and ensure that my opponent falls before I sink to my knees.

I debate the issue for long moments before swallowing my pride and allowing Tia to use the last of her mana to cast a healing incantation upon me.

We return to town, the acteon accompanying us like a lost puppy.

We do not find any sign of Jonas and Jessie save for a battered and bloodstained rifle.

As predicted, Scraps has eaten all the food. We take a detour to check out his “water horse” and find a herd of hippopotami. I am somewhat relived, I was expecting an actual hippocampus, but either way nobody wants to risk provoking a stampede when we are all injured, tired, and out of magic, and so we tighten our belts and press on despite the ogre’s protests.

We hide the oaken behemoth in the caves. Jane is convinced the townsfolk will turn on her for it, likely the result of a bad experience in her childhood.

In town, the wood-cutter’s guild pays our reward, and tells us we can keep the heart of the forest. I tell them that it was never theirs to bargain with.

I decide to make a backup copy of Jane’s spell book, although it takes a couple of tries to get it right.

I also feel it is time to better become acquainted with the people of this village, and allow them to lose their money to me at the poker table.

Our new recruit says that he is a blacksmith by trade, and offers to repair our gear while we plan our next expedition.

Hopefully there will be more wood coming in soon and repairs to the ship can continue, although I regret having no new additions to our crew this month.

Well seems like the heart of the forest was a tough encounter. I was nearly expecting a tpk. Clever thinking.

[Talakeal]

Well seems like the heart of the forest was a tough encounter. I was nearly expecting a tpk. Clever thinking.

Oh it was certainly close; I was also expecting one. Definitely the toughest fight yet.

This big problem was that we hadn't had an opportunity to animate any corpses before the fight, and our party is kind of built around having undead minions to serve as meat shields.

[Ameraaaaaa]

Oh it was certainly close; I was also expecting one. Definitely the toughest fight yet.

This big problem was that we hadn't had an opportunity to animate any corpses before the fight, and our party is kind of built around having undead minions to serve as meat shields.

I see. Interesting.

Hey question about this heart of darkness system. How well do you think it handles solos and 1 on 1s. Just asking out of curiosity. And also because i think being able to handle 1 on 1s are important to less games. imo the rise of solo players is Interesting and also their's a lot of 1 on 1 or 1 on 2 groups in recent years. I remember seeing lot's of threads of 1 on 1 groups in the rpg sub reddit which leads me to think it is a growing phenomenon.

So basically since your the designer i just wanted to ask how your game can handle 1 on 1s and solos. How would combat look in a 1 player game. Anoth important question is how do they deal with the unusual campaigns that 1 player games are free to do like a game focused on trade as a merchant for example.

[Talakeal]

I see. Interesting.

Hey question about this heart of darkness system. How well do you think it handles solos and 1 on 1s. Just asking out of curiosity. And also because i think being able to handle 1 on 1s are important to less games. imo the rise of solo players is Interesting and also their's a lot of 1 on 1 or 1 on 2 groups in recent years. I remember seeing lot's of threads of 1 on 1 groups in the rpg sub reddit which leads me to think it is a growing phenomenon.

So basically since your the designer i just wanted to ask how your game can handle 1 on 1s and solos. How would combat look in a 1 player game. Anoth important question is how do they deal with the unusual campaigns that 1 player games are free to do like a game focused on trade as a merchant for example.

I have played several solo campaigns; they work fine, I wouldn't say Heart of Darkness is particularly better or worse than any other system, although it probably handles it better than something like Dungeons and Dragons where most of the character abilities are centered around fighting as there tends to be a lot more RP and exploration than action scenes in a solo game.

Combat can be a bit basic as you don't have as much synergy and positioning; its a lot more trading attacks until one side goes down. Its also dangerous, combat in Heart of Darkness can be a bit swingy and if you don't have someone to pull you out or bind your wounds if you go down that can get nasty.

I would say the game actually works best with a tighter focus for a single player. By default the game rewards a diverse group with a broad set of skills, but that is obviously not going to happen in a solo game, so you can instead focus on the sort of things your character would be doing and let the rest fall by the wayside.

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: Chapter Six

Show

November, in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

Hey-hey takes some coaxing to go into town and get on the boat; she doesn’t know what it is, and I have to explain the entire concept of boats and why people cut down trees to make them, but she doesn’t follow.

Once onboard she totters about on her hooves, unable to find purchase on the swaying deck.

I brush the leaves from her tangled hair and fur and ask what happened to her people. She doesn’t know, she merely went to look at the “tinker-toys” and then was alone.

I tell her I have something for her, and I retrieve the strange mechanical orb we took from the Merrow church, what they called the “Riddle of Clockwork”. She is entranced.

A few evenings later, my calligraphy is interrupted by a knock on the door. It is Pig Boy. He tells me his name is Feurvious, and I tell him that isn’t going to work for me.

After some urging, he tells me that he was looking over the map he was sent to retrieve and one of the locals was able to identify some of the landmarks. He tells me he suspects it leads to a series of entrances into the Labyrinth which are unknown the lords of the Grey City.

Apparently, the Grey City is the capital of this island, and is located some three weeks' journey away. They post guards around the entrances to the labyrinths, presumably to detour monsters coming out and rampaging the countryside as well as exerting heavy taxes on treasure hunters seeking their fortunes within.

He wants our crew to accompany him on an expedition into these sites, and quickly before he must return the map.

I gesture toward my desk and tell him I could copy the map, and he declines, saying he won’t even let me know where the original map is stashed. Probably not a bad move on his part given our track record.

I tell him that this is a bad move on his part. When he asks why, I say that I have a lot of dead friends.

Still, he won’t be deterred.

I agree, on the condition that we don’t have a repeat of the same fiasco last time we ventured into the labyrinth; he needs to arrange for a light source.

I wonder if the tooth-like cavern we used is marked on his map?

The next three days are idiocy. None of our companions want to carry a lantern; Jane doesn’t want to be a target and can see in the dark anyway, Tia is too small to carry a lantern and they don’t want to pay extra for one large enough for Scraps. Feurvious can’t carry one along with his shield, and they don’t even ask me to part with one of my swords. It is all I can do to stop them from tearing the lamps from the ship’s hull.

In the end, they decide to pay a local eleven-year-old girl to carry a torch for them. She comes to introduce herself to me, and I refuse to let her tell me her name, for she will not survive this expedition. Instead, I will call her the Little Match Girl.

On the trek through the hills, I whistle a funeral dirge for those of us who will not be making the trip back. By the time we get there, everyone else’s spirits are as low as my own.

When we arrive in the low hills that are marked on the map, we find a cold campsite, likely once having belonged to those whom we took the map from in the first place. Nearby, we find a dark hole leading down into the rocky soil. It smells foul, and I hope that we won’t suffocate or cause an explosion.

From within, we can hear the sound of children calling for help over and over again.

Our naïve benefactor wants to rush to the rescue, but I explain to him that those aren’t children down there, and whatever it is, the only help it is going to need is to be saved from us.

We move down the tunnel slowly, until it widens out into a room of hewn stone supported by great cyclopean columns. Out of the darkness, still imitating the voices of human children, come a pack of woses. The little match girl shrieks and falls back, plunging us into the gloomy half-light.

The woses are much larger than we are, save of course for Scraps, and this proves their undoing, for we are able to maneuver through the columns and surround them. Two are killed quickly, and the remaining two flee. Hey-Hey brings one down with an arrow to the back, and goes to pursue the other but I hold her back, it is best not to venture into the darkness alone.

The tunnels leaving the room appear to be natural caverns, or perhaps the original chamber has collapsed and been dug out.

As we move single file down the rocky passage, we are suddenly ambushed from above. Great blobs of slime drop down on us, some sort of strange ooze monsters. I try and fight them off, but they don’t cut, and instead crawl up my blades and over my skin, burning my flesh. I want to call out to Jane, tell her now is the time for her chilling shroud, but I dare not open my mouth. Soon I am being smothered, and trying to accept the fact that this is a foe I cannot defeat with swordsmanship, but before I black out Scraps grabs my coat and pulls me free, and we run further down.

My wounds aren’t especially deep, but they are exceedingly painful, and for the past two weeks my skin has been red and periodically scabbing over.

We come to a large chamber, and within we encounter a group of rotting creatures that may once have been men, surrounded by mangy, agitated hounds with bulging eyes. The creatures are gnawing on corpses, some of which are fresher and bear the green and white livery of House Celwyn; it was likely their camp we saw above.

These ghouls are pitiful creatures. Their own flesh is sloughing off before our eyes, at which point they devour it. They expect combat and move to strike, but when we hail them, it is all they can do to restrain their hounds.

We introduce ourselves as the entourage of Jane, acolyte to the iron lich.

They say they are servants of Goremaw out seeking food for their master.

When they see Scraps, they ask if he also bears the mark of the Devourer, which is apparently the ogre devil.

Beyond them is a huge stone door, some twenty feet tall. On it is a mandala symbol, that turns when I touch it.

My companions ask me to open the door in that manner, and I wave my hands sarcastically while making wooshing sounds.

I notice one of the older corpses has the same symbol on its tunic. I search the body for a key, but only find a few trinkets which I might be able to sell back in town.

Scraps tries to force the door open, it's no use, and then I have to explain that maybe he should try and pick the lock. He pulls out his tools, and eventually gets it open. I can’t believe I have to explain his own trade to him. The ghouls disappear beyond.

There are several branching paths. We eventually come to one inhabited by a pair of large crystalline insects that I believe are called lithovores. There is a large well in the center of the chamber, and they react with hostility.

In the scuffle, pig boy is knocked down the well. There is a loud clang a few seconds later, we don’t know if he survived.

I manage to corner one of the creatures, and after a long fight I eventually put it down; I don’t think I would have been able to injure it at all if Jane’s cantrips hadn’t been guiding my blades, their stony hides are not exactly easy to cut. Speaking of which, I need to replace my swords, the blades have worn out quite a bit since leaving Sodishu.

Scraps manages to pin the creature’s mate on his anchor and then lifts it into the air and tosses its carcass down the well.

We tie off a rope and climb down the well one by one. It is about ten paces down, maybe a little less. We find Feurvrious lying at the bottom, beaten but alive. He seemed to take more damage from the beast falling on him than from the initial fall.

A grander hallway lies beyond. A trio of morlocks, shaggy subterranean abhumans, stand guard, riding atop a trio of giant cave geckos. They are belligerent and full of themselves, telling us that these halls are the property of the “under king”. We ask to speak to him, and we are told that should we surrender we may be granted an audience after seventeen years of slavery. We ask if they are willing to cut a deal, and one bellows back “No!” so I pull out my revolver and shoot him.

The other two move to attack. Helathyra manages to hold the know riderless gecko at bay.

My companions charge one of the underground knights while I engage the other. He is a sloppy combatant, and at one point falls from the saddle. I move to finish him off, but as I do so I take my eyes off his mount, and it surprises me by lashing out when I draw close and crushing my right elbow in its jaws, breaking all three bones and nearly severing the arm in two places. It is almost certainly the most severe wound I have ever suffered in all my years of battle, and to think it came not from an enemy’s blade but by a dumb beast acting out of fright.

I muster my will, drive the lizard against the wall, and drive my left sword through the soft skin under its jaw and into its brain, and then I black out.

When I come to, Tia is binding my arm in a sling. She tried to heal me with her magic, but I reflexively resisted her spells while unconscious.

I am not going to be much good for fighting, so I sheathe my blades and draw my pistol; not that I can shoot straight left-handed.

Helathyra has managed to time one of the geckos, and asks if I want to ride it. I agree, but only because it gives me the position to put a bullet in its brain stem.

Jane raises the three geckos, and their riders, as zombies.

We come across a strange nest. When we approach, long slender cave drakes move to defend it, and they and our zombie escorts mostly destroy one another. We recover a large egg from the next, and Scraps wants to eat it, but our druidess convinces him to wait by saying that it will be a much larger feast once it has grown up.

We find another well. This one is much deeper and darker, a torch dropped in goes out before hitting the bottom, and even Jane’s death sight cannot tell what lies below.

The worked sections appear to end at a massive door.

A squadron of a dozen skeletal soldiers is attempting to force it open. Behind them is a swarm of buzzing insects.

My companions are afraid to fight them in as sorry a shape as we are in, but I assure them that Jane will have no problem with this.

She casts an incantation that disrupts the magic holding the skeletons together, and then Scraps bulrushes into the group, knocking them to the ground with his great ogreish bulk.

The swarm of insects descends upon the Little Match Girl, and proceeds to skeletonize her with almost preternatural speed. I am so shocked that she didn’t make it.

The creatures are massive golden scarab beetles, each longer than my head, with a death’s head pattern on their shells. They move to swarm onto Jane, but do not bite, rather they follow her about and crawl over her like pets. I have heard legends of necromancers breeding insects to do their bidding, these are likely descendants of the same.

We open the door, and find the ghouls from earlier holed up within.

They apparently were chased in here by the skeletons. They found no food, only worthless gold, but are willing the share the latter with us in appreciation for their rescue.

Beyond these doors is an even large door with a more ornate mandala upon it. The ghouls tell us that it can only be opened on the full moon. I have a bad suspicion about what our next adventure is going to be.

I suggest that Jane animate the Little Match Girl as a ghost, so that she might light our way evermore, and thus we never have to repeat the stupidity of fighting over who carries the lantern when we go underground.

We did not fully explore the caves, but we found an alternate route back to the surface that avoided having to climb the rope back up the well or another ambush by slime creatures.

As I write this, I am debating swallowing my pride and asking Jane to brew me a healing tonic. It is hard to focus on calligraphy with the pain of the chemical burns, and my right hand is all but useless. I can tough it out, but I am not sure if it is worth the lost time and income, or the risk of it healing wrong.

I was so looking forward to bringing a handmade deck of illustrated playing cards to the next poker game.

This was probably the worst session for me.

I was feeling kind of sick going into it, and my mood did not get better.

The party spent almost THREE HOURS of real time debating over who was to carry the lantern or how to split the cost of paying for an NPC torch-bearer, and by the time it was over, any enthusiasm I had for the game was gone.


Then we had the situation with the gecko. The GM made a weird call. The Morclock fumbled his ride test and was knocked prone, but then when I went to capitalize that and continue to attack him, the GM ruled that moving into a new position gave the gecko an attack of opportunity on me (but I didn't get one on the morlock when he left my reach in the first place for some reason) and then the gecko rolled a gigantic crit and all but one shot me. I didn't have the energy to argue the call, but I was pretty much checked out after that.

[Ameraaaaaa]

Spoiler: Chapter Six

Show

November, in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

Hey-hey takes some coaxing to go into town and get on the boat; she doesn’t know what it is, and I have to explain the entire concept of boats and why people cut down trees to make them, but she doesn’t follow.

Once onboard she totters about on her hooves, unable to find purchase on the swaying deck.

I brush the leaves from her tangled hair and fur and ask what happened to her people. She doesn’t know, she merely went to look at the “tinker-toys” and then was alone.

I tell her I have something for her, and I retrieve the strange mechanical orb we took from the Merrow church, what they called the “Riddle of Clockwork”. She is entranced.

A few evenings later, my calligraphy is interrupted by a knock on the door. It is Pig Boy. He tells me his name is Feurvious, and I tell him that isn’t going to work for me.

After some urging, he tells me that he was looking over the map he was sent to retrieve and one of the locals was able to identify some of the landmarks. He tells me he suspects it leads to a series of entrances into the Labyrinth which are unknown the lords of the Grey City.

Apparently, the Grey City is the capital of this island, and is located some three weeks' journey away. They post guards around the entrances to the labyrinths, presumably to detour monsters coming out and rampaging the countryside as well as exerting heavy taxes on treasure hunters seeking their fortunes within.

He wants our crew to accompany him on an expedition into these sites, and quickly before he must return the map.

I gesture toward my desk and tell him I could copy the map, and he declines, saying he won’t even let me know where the original map is stashed. Probably not a bad move on his part given our track record.

I tell him that this is a bad move on his part. When he asks why, I say that I have a lot of dead friends.

Still, he won’t be deterred.

I agree, on the condition that we don’t have a repeat of the same fiasco last time we ventured into the labyrinth; he needs to arrange for a light source.

I wonder if the tooth-like cavern we used is marked on his map?

The next three days are idiocy. None of our companions want to carry a lantern; Jane doesn’t want to be a target and can see in the dark anyway, Tia is too small to carry a lantern and they don’t want to pay extra for one large enough for Scraps. Feurvious can’t carry one along with his shield, and they don’t even ask me to part with one of my swords. It is all I can do to stop them from tearing the lamps from the ship’s hull.

In the end, they decide to pay a local eleven-year-old girl to carry a torch for them. She comes to introduce herself to me, and I refuse to let her tell me her name, for she will not survive this expedition. Instead, I will call her the Little Match Girl.

On the trek through the hills, I whistle a funeral dirge for those of us who will not be making the trip back. By the time we get there, everyone else’s spirits are as low as my own.

When we arrive in the low hills that are marked on the map, we find a cold campsite, likely once having belonged to those whom we took the map from in the first place. Nearby, we find a dark hole leading down into the rocky soil. It smells foul, and I hope that we won’t suffocate or cause an explosion.

From within, we can hear the sound of children calling for help over and over again.

Our naïve benefactor wants to rush to the rescue, but I explain to him that those aren’t children down there, and whatever it is, the only help it is going to need is to be saved from us.

We move down the tunnel slowly, until it widens out into a room of hewn stone supported by great cyclopean columns. Out of the darkness, still imitating the voices of human children, come a pack of woses. The little match girl shrieks and falls back, plunging us into the gloomy half-light.

The woses are much larger than we are, save of course for Scraps, and this proves their undoing, for we are able to maneuver through the columns and surround them. Two are killed quickly, and the remaining two flee. Hey-Hey brings one down with an arrow to the back, and goes to pursue the other but I hold her back, it is best not to venture into the darkness alone.

The tunnels leaving the room appear to be natural caverns, or perhaps the original chamber has collapsed and been dug out.

As we move single file down the rocky passage, we are suddenly ambushed from above. Great blobs of slime drop down on us, some sort of strange ooze monsters. I try and fight them off, but they don’t cut, and instead crawl up my blades and over my skin, burning my flesh. I want to call out to Jane, tell her now is the time for her chilling shroud, but I dare not open my mouth. Soon I am being smothered, and trying to accept the fact that this is a foe I cannot defeat with swordsmanship, but before I black out Scraps grabs my coat and pulls me free, and we run further down.

My wounds aren’t especially deep, but they are exceedingly painful, and for the past two weeks my skin has been red and periodically scabbing over.

We come to a large chamber, and within we encounter a group of rotting creatures that may once have been men, surrounded by mangy, agitated hounds with bulging eyes. The creatures are gnawing on corpses, some of which are fresher and bear the green and white livery of House Celwyn; it was likely their camp we saw above.

These ghouls are pitiful creatures. Their own flesh is sloughing off before our eyes, at which point they devour it. They expect combat and move to strike, but when we hail them, it is all they can do to restrain their hounds.

We introduce ourselves as the entourage of Jane, acolyte to the iron lich.

They say they are servants of Goremaw out seeking food for their master.

When they see Scraps, they ask if he also bears the mark of the Devourer, which is apparently the ogre devil.

Beyond them is a huge stone door, some twenty feet tall. On it is a mandala symbol, that turns when I touch it.

My companions ask me to open the door in that manner, and I wave my hands sarcastically while making wooshing sounds.

I notice one of the older corpses has the same symbol on its tunic. I search the body for a key, but only find a few trinkets which I might be able to sell back in town.

Scraps tries to force the door open, it's no use, and then I have to explain that maybe he should try and pick the lock. He pulls out his tools, and eventually gets it open. I can’t believe I have to explain his own trade to him. The ghouls disappear beyond.

There are several branching paths. We eventually come to one inhabited by a pair of large crystalline insects that I believe are called lithovores. There is a large well in the center of the chamber, and they react with hostility.

In the scuffle, pig boy is knocked down the well. There is a loud clang a few seconds later, we don’t know if he survived.

I manage to corner one of the creatures, and after a long fight I eventually put it down; I don’t think I would have been able to injure it at all if Jane’s cantrips hadn’t been guiding my blades, their stony hides are not exactly easy to cut. Speaking of which, I need to replace my swords, the blades have worn out quite a bit since leaving Sodishu.

Scraps manages to pin the creature’s mate on his anchor and then lifts it into the air and tosses its carcass down the well.

We tie off a rope and climb down the well one by one. It is about ten paces down, maybe a little less. We find Feurvrious lying at the bottom, beaten but alive. He seemed to take more damage from the beast falling on him than from the initial fall.

A grander hallway lies beyond. A trio of morlocks, shaggy subterranean abhumans, stand guard, riding atop a trio of giant cave geckos. They are belligerent and full of themselves, telling us that these halls are the property of the “under king”. We ask to speak to him, and we are told that should we surrender we may be granted an audience after seventeen years of slavery. We ask if they are willing to cut a deal, and one bellows back “No!” so I pull out my revolver and shoot him.

The other two move to attack. Helathyra manages to hold the know riderless gecko at bay.

My companions charge one of the underground knights while I engage the other. He is a sloppy combatant, and at one point falls from the saddle. I move to finish him off, but as I do so I take my eyes off his mount, and it surprises me by lashing out when I draw close and crushing my right elbow in its jaws, breaking all three bones and nearly severing the arm in two places. It is almost certainly the most severe wound I have ever suffered in all my years of battle, and to think it came not from an enemy’s blade but by a dumb beast acting out of fright.

I muster my will, drive the lizard against the wall, and drive my left sword through the soft skin under its jaw and into its brain, and then I black out.

When I come to, Tia is binding my arm in a sling. She tried to heal me with her magic, but I reflexively resisted her spells while unconscious.

I am not going to be much good for fighting, so I sheathe my blades and draw my pistol; not that I can shoot straight left-handed.

Helathyra has managed to time one of the geckos, and asks if I want to ride it. I agree, but only because it gives me the position to put a bullet in its brain stem.

Jane raises the three geckos, and their riders, as zombies.

We come across a strange nest. When we approach, long slender cave drakes move to defend it, and they and our zombie escorts mostly destroy one another. We recover a large egg from the next, and Scraps wants to eat it, but our druidess convinces him to wait by saying that it will be a much larger feast once it has grown up.

We find another well. This one is much deeper and darker, a torch dropped in goes out before hitting the bottom, and even Jane’s death sight cannot tell what lies below.

The worked sections appear to end at a massive door.

A squadron of a dozen skeletal soldiers is attempting to force it open. Behind them is a swarm of buzzing insects.

My companions are afraid to fight them in as sorry a shape as we are in, but I assure them that Jane will have no problem with this.

She casts an incantation that disrupts the magic holding the skeletons together, and then Scraps bulrushes into the group, knocking them to the ground with his great ogreish bulk.

The swarm of insects descends upon the Little Match Girl, and proceeds to skeletonize her with almost preternatural speed. I am so shocked that she didn’t make it.

The creatures are massive golden scarab beetles, each longer than my head, with a death’s head pattern on their shells. They move to swarm onto Jane, but do not bite, rather they follow her about and crawl over her like pets. I have heard legends of necromancers breeding insects to do their bidding, these are likely descendants of the same.

We open the door, and find the ghouls from earlier holed up within.

They apparently were chased in here by the skeletons. They found no food, only worthless gold, but are willing the share the latter with us in appreciation for their rescue.

Beyond these doors is an even large door with a more ornate mandala upon it. The ghouls tell us that it can only be opened on the full moon. I have a bad suspicion about what our next adventure is going to be.

I suggest that Jane animate the Little Match Girl as a ghost, so that she might light our way evermore, and thus we never have to repeat the stupidity of fighting over who carries the lantern when we go underground.

We did not fully explore the caves, but we found an alternate route back to the surface that avoided having to climb the rope back up the well or another ambush by slime creatures.

As I write this, I am debating swallowing my pride and asking Jane to brew me a healing tonic. It is hard to focus on calligraphy with the pain of the chemical burns, and my right hand is all but useless. I can tough it out, but I am not sure if it is worth the lost time and income, or the risk of it healing wrong.

I was so looking forward to bringing a handmade deck of illustrated playing cards to the next poker game.

This was probably the worst session for me.

I was feeling kind of sick going into it, and my mood did not get better.

The party spent almost THREE HOURS of real time debating over who was to carry the lantern or how to split the cost of paying for an NPC torch-bearer, and by the time it was over, any enthusiasm I had for the game was gone.


Then we had the situation with the gecko. The GM made a weird call. The Morclock fumbled his ride test and was knocked prone, but then when I went to capitalize that and continue to attack him, the GM ruled that moving into a new position gave the gecko an attack of opportunity on me (but I didn't get one on the morlock when he left my reach in the first place for some reason) and then the gecko rolled a gigantic crit and all but one shot me. I didn't have the energy to argue the call, but I was pretty much checked out after that.

Honestly with a group like that I'd rather play online or solo or not at all. All 3 are better options at this point.

[Talakeal]

Honestly with a group like that I'd rather play online or solo or not at all. All 3 are better options at this point.

I have been told that a lot :)

Honestly, in this case I was as much the problem as anyone else, I wasn't really feeling it and wasn't helping anyone along.


Anyway... after only two sessions it looks like this game is on hiatus again. Hopefully a short one this time.

In the meantime, I will be starting my new mega-dungeon, so look for a report on that next week!

[Talakeal]

So, this game is on hiatus for a couple of months. Hopefully it will resume shortly.

In the meantime, please check out my other game:


Gateway to the Dreamscapes: A megadungeon

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: Chapter Seven

Show

December, in the 78th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

We have recovered from our wounds, although it took longer than we expected and we again missed the window for the opening of the last door at the time of the full moon.

I finished painting my new deck of cards. I am teaching Jane to play the game, although at this point she does little more than look pretty and distract the other players.

The boat is nearly repaired, and the local wood workers are doing the fine detail work too small for Scrap’s ogreish hands. They have put us up in the local inn, and have been warned to stay out of the hold or else.

While I am out one morning looking for a blade smith, one of the ghouls from the underground comes in search of Scraps, telling the ogre that the ghoul’s master Gore Maw wishes to speak with him, and cannot enter town directly for it would cause a panic.

We talk it over, and agree to meet with them, traveling across the moors and into the highlands. As dusk falls, we come to his master, a great stone that has been bitten by some ancient goliath into the shape of a throne.

As I approach, I see that it is not the stone itself that is their master, but the being seated atop it, a massive robed ogre, twisted and corrupted by some dark curse.

I bow before the bakemono, and introduce myself. It is clear he underestimates me and looks past me, so I introduce Scraps.

The ogre hisses in disappointment, turns to the ghoul, and says “You told me that he was one of the chosen!” before twisting the pitiful creature’s head off and eating it like an overripe apple.

Gore Maw then tries to induct Scraps into his cult, telling him of the great devourer who will eat the stars, and about how his chosen can take all the food they wish and finally sate their hunger by embracing the corruption of their people.

Scraps seems unsure, and I tell him to go for it.

He steps forward, and the great Gore Maw stands and removes his robe, revealing a hideous second mouth in his stomach, like the Yomi of legend.

This second mouth, which seems to be the creature’s true voice, chants an incantation, and he pulls out a great scythe and slits open Scrap’s belly. He then touches a finger to the pirate’s forehead and imbued him with dark energy that is so painful that he forgets all about the gaping wound in his abdomen.

Scraps shadow twists into a monstrous form, and begins to whisper blasphemies into his ear.

Gore Maw then invites him to join in on the celebratory feast which lies before them, turning a hungry eye towards our crew. Not unexpected.

I draw my blades in a reverse grip, step up to the throne, and whistle a challenge.

He is surprisingly fast, able to land a blow on me, and my own blades do little to pierce his blubbery hide.

Tiana blesses the ground beneath Scrap’s feet, allowing him to think clearly without alien interference.

Gore Maw steps forward, batting me aside, and then swats the fairy, sending her spiraling and bleeding.

Ghouls close in around us. Hey-Hey panics and casts a mass entanglement spell, causing the yellowed grass to rise up and restrain everyone on the field, friend and foe alike.

The ogres both manage to tear free with little trouble. Gore Maw stares at Scraps expectantly, and then the pirate shouts “I need my crew!” and stabs the Yomi with his anchor.

The few ghouls who manage to free themselves from the grass move to surround us. Jane conjures a wall of ice around herself, and then a shield of reaving cold around me, keeping the ghouls at bay.

Helathyra fends them off with her spear, giving the butcher-boy a chance to pull himself free, but in the end, both are surrounded and overwhelmed.

Jane withers the roots of the plants that hold me in place, and I move around killing the ghouls who are still entangled; clean kills upon helpless foes.

Gore Maw is soundly beating Scraps, and he cares not about trampling his own minions to do it. When they get too close to me, my frost shield burns them both.

Gore Maw howls and asks how Scraps can show loyalty to friends who care so little about his well-being. Scraps responds by pointing out his hypocrisy in crushing his own servants, to which the Yomi responds that obescience only goes one way.

I wish that one of us had thought to bring along the undead beast that we created in the forest, and how wondrous it would look cresting the next hill, but no such luck.

Instead, Jane animates the dead ghouls as zombies, they aren’t much, but they will buy us some time, and they mob their former master.

In the end, the zombies and the ogre both fall, and I realize I am alone on the field of battle, save for Jane who is enshrouded in ice.

Jane tells me that the ogre’s shadow eats her curses, and she instead uses a cantrip to guide my blade.

Gore Maw lunges with his scythe, his reach too great for my shroud of cold to harm him, and I decide that I need to get closer; I will only get one shot at this.

Pouring my soul into my blade, I leap forward in a reckless attack, and cleave the giant’s head down the middle.

Unfortunately, his head was more or less decorative, and it takes several minutes for him to bleed out from the wound. As he does so, I lead him on a merry chase, and he literally tears his own body to pieces and devours the flesh to sustain himself, and in the end, all that is left is a great round belly rolling along and gobbling down everything in its path.

When he is finally still, his shadow leaves him.

The remaining ghouls pledge themselves to Scraps, but I do not accept their surrender.

I put them down, and consider doing the same to our ogre, but something stays my hand.

Feurvious and Scraps are down, but not out. Helathyra and Tiana are dying, and the young druidess conjures up magical cocoons, protecting and nourishing them as they sleep the night away.

In the morning they burst free, much improved, and the fairy uses the remainder of her mana to heal our wounds.

Scraps laments that the ghouls would have made good slaves, and I say they make better snacks. He nods, and digs in.

Scrapag is no more, he lost his name in the bargain.

The ogre tells Tianna to call him Morfran, which means “Sea Crow” in the tongue of his people. From now on, he is the big crow, and she is the little crow.

We return to town, and I throw what is left of the ghouls in the bilge for the crabs and the scarabs.

Our ogre spends long hours in the night conversing with his shadow. He is turning into something else, and I do not doubt that in time the wound in his belly would become a second maw, even hungrier than the first.

I tell Jane that she might want to listen in, and she doesn’t know why, for the shadow’s magic is of the void, not of death, and she can’t imagine it has any bearing on her art.

I tell her she never knows, and it’s best to keep these open, and I flick the points of her ears. She glares at me, and it is adorable.

I approach the local blacksmith Harlan one morning when his daughter Annette keeps him out of his cups, and instruct him on replacing my blades, which have become dull and cracked after killing so many men and beasts, some of them wearing armor.

It pains me to watch him desecrate the beautiful Sodishun steel with his inferior Western techniques.

He also melts down Scrap’s anchor and creates a pair of vicious punch daggers for him.

Pig-boy also replaces his ham axe with a somewhat more battle-worthy poleaxe, I do not know where he got it.

Helathyra has begun to unlock the Riddle of Clockwork, and uses its lessons to attach strange wires to her bow in an effort to improve her shot.

A short session, but a tense one!

Most of the day was spent discussing the game's future. Bob's schedule and mine are in almost direct conflict now, Sarah is still busy with kids, Johnny is sick more often than not, and we may need to relocate. Going forward we are probably going to do 1 or 2 more sessions of this game, and then switch over to my mega-dungeon B game full time until November.

[Ameraaaaaa]

I always loved the "ogres are always hungry" interpretation. Gives them more character then just being big dumb brutes.

Is it weird that pig boy is my favourite. I just find the concept of his character funny.

[Talakeal]

I always loved the "ogres are always hungry" interpretation. Gives them more character then just being big dumb brutes.

Is it weird that pig boy is my favourite. I just find the concept of his character funny.

Well now I feel bad; the journal is in character and my character doesn’t like him and goes out of her way to make him sound dumb.

[Ameraaaaaa]

Well now I feel bad; the journal is in character and my character doesn’t like him and goes out of her way to make him sound dumb.

But he's trying. And that's all that matters.

[Talakeal]

Spoiler: A Musing

Show

They say that the great ruins below the world were built by ogre paragons. In my land, they tell legends of magical ogres called Oni, I wonder if they are the same thing?

There are also tales of demonic ogres called Yomi.

If that is what Gore Maw was, as I suspect, I wonder if he has somehow found a way to embrace the degeneracy of the ogre race rather than fighting it, becoming a dark mirror of the ancient ogre paragons.

It is a shame we killed him before seeing if he could awaken the ogre in Fervious.

Spoiler: Chapter Eight

Show

January, in the 79th year of Yairmen the Seventh’s Reign

A new year, and the boat is almost finished.

The local carpenters put us up in the Green Toad Inn while they finish the detail work on the interior.

The ogre is staying in the stables. I wonder if they are going to clear out the livestock or risk them being eaten.

Joyce, the innkeeper’s daughter, asks why she hasn’t seen us before and why we spend so much time on the Cemetary Rose. I tell her the food is much better, and she asks if I am talking about the boat or the inn, and I tell her that is a riddle only she can solve.

Morfran, Scraps who was, is playing with the magic stone we took from Gore Maw. He carries it with him, and occasionally it pulls in a direction.

One of the sailors says it looks like a giant compass needle.

We affix it on a rod, and it points north when Morfran expects it to.

I explain that it is likely a magic compass and will point toward whatever he thinks about.

Morfran leaves, following the rod.

I gamble into the evening, and am on a terrific winning streak, so much so that I barely notice the rapid drop in temperature or the rising humidity.

Shortly after sunset, the ogre literally bursts through the wall of the inn. Panting and blubbering, he tells us his tale.

He wanted more hippo meat, and the compass led him to a young calf that was separated from its mother.

He tried to eat it, but found that it provided no sustenance, and he instead stuffed it into the second mouth that was forming in his belly. It provided no relief from the hunger, indeed it may have made it worse, but it made him like the hunger. He went about trying to stuff himself with dirt and rocks and grass, but when he looks up; he saw a strange watery sky, and a great serpent swimming down from the heavens, wreathed in sheet lightning.

Morfran goes on to recount how his old bosun would tell stories about the forgotten god of the deeps, and the hell it would bring to those who dwelt on land, and realized that the hippo calf must have been sacred, and he is being punished, and the great sea serpent chased him all the way here.

I open the window, and see a wondrous sight.

The stars and moon and even the clouds are gone, but above us are the ocean deeps, the shadows of whales swimming slowly through the sky. I can feel the icy water all around me, but I can move freely and my hair and clothes remain dry. I can breathe, but my body tells me I am drowning. I can barely suppress my instincts with all of my monastic training, I don’t know how the others can stand it at all.

Large carnivorous eels slither just above the street, drawing towards us like wolves. I shout at Joyce to start boiling the soy sauce, and she happily retreats to the warmth of the kitchen.

Jane remains in the inn, and I move to get a better vantage point from above. Fervious and Morfran go out to hold off the eels. We send Helathyra to retrieve the undead which we have hiding in the cave near town, we are likely going to need them.

Fish pour down the stairs.

From the balcony, I can see more eels on the street below, and the great sea serpent that is still pursuing Morfran.

A school of barracudas somehow floats onto the terrace with me, and I realize I can’t kill them all with my blade. Thinking quickly, I pull out my pistol, glad that it will fire in this unearthly weather, and get the attention of the great serpent. Sure enough, once it draws close, the smaller fish are stunned or killed by the electricity rolling off its scales. I command my muscles to obey me and leap from the balcony, using my momentum to slice one of the giant eels in half, before flopping onto the dirt street, a bit like a fish myself.

Fervious and Morfran manage to kill the rest of the eels, and the great serpent loses interest and floats away. Tia patches their wounds.

We go back into the inn for Jane, and hear a loud crash and scream from the kitchen. We go to investigate, but Myzquellitie literally bites Jane in the leg, so insistent is she that we be on our way, so we leave the innkeeper and his daughter to their no doubt horrible fate.

Most of the townsfolk are bundled up in their homes. Smart.

Two tall, gangly figures walk down the street towards us. Their 10’ frames, bluish skin, and domed heads mark them as scrags. I ask if they are looking for their friend, as I desperately try and recall the name of the scrag whose head we removed in the dungeons under the church.

They snarl at me with tooth-filled maws, their eyes glowing red, and Jane tells me not to bother, they are already dead.

She is able to ensorcell one of the wights and bind it to her will. The other goes for Morfran, and nearly rips his heart out through his chest when something in the ogre awakens, and the wound in his gut grows teeth. It bites off the undead scrag’s hand, and soon the ogre pirate has cut the monster to pieces and is devouring it, but it is still twitching and fighting in his stomach and the sensation makes him feel ill.

Meanwhile, Pig-boy and I are beset by a swarm of crabs.

A few moments later, we find the general store being ransacked by a school of tritons, fish-headed hengeyokai. We send Fervious up the back stairs to check on the owner and his family in their apartment above the shop, while the undead scrag stands outside of the front door.

I smash in a window and open fire with my revolver upon the animal folk inside. They are confused, some rush me single file, and others run out the front door; the first to do so has his head bitten clean off by the scrag. Jane guides my blade with her cantrips, and I cut them down one at a time as they try and fight back, while those who flee are devoured by the scrag and the ogre in the street.

Upstairs, Fervious finds the storekeeper’s family murdered in their beds. He chases away a few of the raiders and their leader, an enormous mermaid, swims away into the sky.

We help ourselves to the money box. It isn’t much.

Jane animates the two largest tritons who still have their heads as her undead protectors.

A great crystalline monolith rises ten or twenty paces above the town square. It is no doubt the source of this aquatic anomaly. Sea creatures swarm about it, and they attack us relentlessly when we draw close.

Meleeku, the merrow who served as deacon for the church in the swamp before we evicted him, lies frozen in the center. He looks dead, but Jane can see his life force ebbing out of him, being used to power this profane ritual that has collocated the small coastal town with some unholy land at the bottom of a distant sea.

The fighting is fierce. We are beset by eels, sharks, and worse.

We are all wounded, and then the great serpent returns. It moves through the center of town like a storm, its electric aura striking down everyone in its path before grounding on the spire.

My companions, already injured, are struck senseless, and I tell Jane to run for the ship.

I get the leviathan’s attention with my revolver, and it chases me. I am too swift for it, but I don’t have enough bullets on me to kill something this large. Fortunately, its will breaks after the fourth shot, and it disappears into the night.

Tia gets our companions on their feet. Neither their blows nor her holy water can make a dent in the obelisk.

We meet up with our undead retainers at the docks, and find our ship in the grasp of a kraken.

I don’t know if it is the same one from under the bayou, I presume it is, but it seems much larger now, though still not fully grown if the legends are to be believed.

I still don’t know if it is what the congregation worshipped under the name Tsogatha or if that name belongs to some greater horror.

Thus began the second battle for the Cemetery Rose.

Our companions were already on death’s door, they didn’t last long. Tia got it the worst, crushed near to a pulp, I still don’t know if she will pull through.

The great forest guardian climbs onto the prow of our boat and tears the tentacles away; it manages to free us, though it is pulled apart in the process.

The undead warriors, both old and new, are felled one by one, though they do sever a few tentacles in the process.

Jane conjures a shield of chilling air around me, as well as a cage of ice to protect herself.

The front of the cage is smashed, and I shield Jane with my body, and I tell her that I don’t have much left in me. I protect her as she makes her way below deck.

Three tentacles remain, and I let them corner me, feigning defeat. Then, as they draw close, I use the very last of my strength to lunge forward, severing the three of them with one broad stroke and burning the stumps with reaving cold.

The kraken withdraws.

Jane calls forth the skeletons of our crew from the hold and we depart.

I tell Jane that we are back where we started. A boat, an ocean, and the two of us. We can wash our hands and start over.

Jane does not consider my proposal long, and with a combination of my rudimentary doctoring and her alchemy, we save the lives of Morfran, Helathyra, and Fervious, and do what we can for Tia.

We have a magic compass and we have our allies, but none of our undead warriors survive.

Fortunately, we have enough left to crew the ship, and when we discovered the bodies of the wood carvers among the kraken’s victims, Jane forbid them from letting death stand in the way of finishing their task. Their bodies and their tools will be a great help maintaining the boat in the future.

We can track down the pirates whom we owe a debt of vengeance, but might not be able to defeat them in our current state.

The decision is made to make our way to Stone Harbor, where we can set out and hit up the other three treasure sites on Pig-boy’s map.

It will be harder to build up our forces there, we are going to have a harder time disguising the undead, and they might have witch-hunters there, or even spies from the Imperium of Light. Still, it will be nice to in a real city again, with a real library, a real tailor, and real food.

Overall, this session was a meat grinder, but a really fun one. The idea of bringing the ocean floor to town is creepy and Lovecraftian, but also some wonderful variation on the norm.

After the session I had to listen to Bob bitching for an hour about how it was too over tuned and that all of Jane's undead were wiped out. This is normal for him, but its nice that I am not the only DM he does it to.

My only complaint was that the GM ruled that because the sea monsters were swimming they ignored all terrain and vertical movement, which made the battle a lot blander than it would have been if scenary was more in play.

Hela and Tia's players were gone for the session, so their characters were kind of on auto-pilot.

We chose not to protect the town, but to keep the party together. We are not in great shape, as now we have no built up forces or even a home base. But atleast our ship is seaworthy again!

Bob seems weird about how he plays a necromancer. He doesn't bother animating weaker creatures or healing more powerful ones.

There was lots of bitching about exactly how powerful the Icescape spell is. Bob thinks it can create a full enclosed dome that is fully transparent and allows oxygen in and out, but completely blocks all attacks except for poison gas. I don't think that's quite right, but its up to Brian to make the call. There was a big fight when Johnny tried to tell them his opinion on the matter, and I really need to have a talk with the group about dog-piling people.

Speaking of talking, we still have really bad communication. Much like the row last time about whether or not Sarah was "down", we had something similar where I said Tia was completely tapped out of both spells and HP. Brian then proceeded to attack her (he usually ignores downed PCs) and scored a critical hit that killed her outright, and then claimed that I have never said anything about her being injured. Neither of us likes the idea of killing a PC while her player was absent, so Tia's fate is currently in limbo.

I was a bit salty (pun intended) about the magic compass. Brian told me I couldn't have one when the game started, but then he gives one to us as our first (and so far only) magic item. Odd. I can speculate as to his motives, but that is all.


There was talk about putting this game on hiatus until next year when attendance can be better, but at this point I am having fun and really want to see where it goes next!