Aborted Pimp-My-Stronghold entry converted to Blawg Post

[The following was found in a strange metal cylinder, washed up just off the coast outside Stavros, these writings/drawings are of an unknown age, although their relative robustness indicates a fairly recent origin]

Find herein a small account of the travels and travails of the Most Venerable Sage Ibn Tal Ibn-Salgrem of the House of the Most-Accumulated, as well as some scratchings that purport to be cartography by the same hand.

My abbreviated tale shall begin as our ship, the war-galley Three-Eyed Slattern of the City Infinite, turned east toward the ancient Western city of Larm. Our guide, onboarded at Crowkeep, was upset at the distance our ship kept from the shore, as he would prefer us to practically scrape our hull on any offshore rocks might exist than to be too far from the coast. The captain, although sympathetic to the fellow's nervous condition, opted to remain at a standard distance from the shore and it was because of this that the lookout was able to spot quite a sight, that of two ships bound together to our north, one a dark and suspicious ship that could only be pirates, the other being a tall merchant caravel of the Western Isles.

Upon sighting the ship being towed away, the captain gave the order to give chase, which alarmed our guide greatly, to the point where he had to be restrained and taken below decks, such was the intensity of his disapproval. His force of feeling was illuminated when a great lance of red light, traveling at a speed faster than any arrow, came from the northern horizon and with one blow split our craft from stem to stern. As though waiting for this very thing to occur, launches full of of pirates appeared on top of the wreckage and those of us who believed ourselves to be fortunate to have survived (oh how wrong we were) were scooped aboard. It was here that I began to realize the horrors that were to come, for these pirates were not men. Or at least they were no longer men, for each of them was horribly distended, each a flesh-made sin against the gods. Some had holes where flesh should be, some had too much of one thing, others, not enough. They gibbered and leered at us, such as they could, as they secured us with manacles and ropes and took us aboard their ship.

We sailed north, the disabled merchant ship still in tow, until we came to the northern sweep of the great bay. Once we were an hour out from the shore, a great tower dominated the skyline, skinny and dark and somehow ominous, it stood solitary and with a malicious air. It was with a growing sense of depression that I realized that this was our destination. As we drew closer, the style of the architecture, even from a great distance, indicated that this was a relic of times past, of the people of whom we know very little aside from their strange magics, those who we sages call Hyperboreans, amongst other names. Also, my initial assessment was incorrect, for there were a significant amount of other structures coming out of the sea around the tower, most of them being wrecked walls and spires, although there was a smaller, squatter tower that was still usable, for a launch set off from it and skillfully boarded the towed merchant-ship and began maneuvering it through the submerged ruins. We were taken from the main ship, which was anchored not far off from the smaller tower, and loaded aboard smaller ships, which carried us toward the main edifice...

Here I will cut short my tale, as my paper and ink is limited and I would write for eons on the first horrible hours in that tower. Instead I will endeavor to detail the overall situation in which I now find myself and hope to be extricated from, as well as such particulars of my daily existence that I find relevant.

The pre-eminent aspect of these ruins is the tower and the pre-eminent aspect of the tower is the "firelance" that sits at the top of it, for this is the device that destroyed our ship and allows these pirates to avoid the steel hand of justice and maintain their hideous hold on the surrounding environs. I have only seen it from a distance, its bulk however is great and I have seen various depictions of it in my time in the tower. These depictions indicate a device not unlike a spyglass, allowing the operator of the firelance to target any ship so long as it appears on this side of the horizon and given the height of the tower, that horizon is a great distance away. A single shot of this great ballista-like device is enough to shatter the largest ship completely.

However, the great power of the firelance comes with a secret -- it requires ammunition, and that ammunition is limited. The main driving force of the pirates, far moreso than their disrupting of shipping, is finding the "fire-tubes" that are used to power the firelance. The total number of remaining fire-tubes is a closely guarded secret; it must be small indeed for the nervousness and fear of the pirate leadership is palpable and is additionally easily inferred from the weight that they place on activities that center around gathering more of these tubes, the main number of which have been found in exploratory missions in the warren that lies beneath the tower.

This is the second major aspect of the tower, the constructions that lie beneath the water and indeed, I believe beneath the earth itself, the Hyperborean warrens of chambers and corridors, a small section of which have been mapped and made relatively safe by the pirates who mainly remain in the body of the tower itself, the rest a labyrinth of ooze, creatures that have grown from the ooze and assorted horrors...and treasures left behind by the Hyperboreans. For the pirates, the greatest of these treasures are the fire-tubes and parties of the brigands, who risk great harm and do not return more often than not, are sent into the dank tunnels to search out further stores of the things. I have only been there once myself and ventured a few rooms from the great stair that descends from the tower before thankfully returning.

As for the main body of the tower, it is full of chambers that have been converted into squalid living quarters for the debauched crimes against the gods that are the pirate band. The largest chamber contains a great tub of the ooze that is found in the rooms below. This ooze is used to "convert" prisoners who are found suitable for induction into the ranks of the pirates. Those that survive...change in both form and personality. The rest of us are kept according to our purposes, some of which are too horrible to speak. Luckily, the most erudite of the pirates recognized some of my tattoos and quickly surmised that I was not lacking in knowledge of the occult and as such, I have been pressed into service in trying to decipher various documents that have been found deep inside the roots of the tower. I do my best to subvert this activity; I confess that my squeamishness in terms of pain and desire for something other than fish entrails for food means that they do get some good work from me.

Aside from the main tower, there is the smaller tower that I mention during my initial tale and a similar squat structure that sits just ashore from the main ruins. These are the only other intact structures in these ruins and have a small number of pirates in each at any time. The structure on the shore is manned by the most junior pirates and is regarded as an undesirable assignment as its landlocked nature affords no protection from the monsters and savages that live in the coastal areas. However, the structure is valuable to the pirates as there is a door just beneath it, one that they have been unable to open thus far and does not appear to connect to any of the known complexes. I have been most intrigued about the stories regarding this door as it apparently asks riddles and evades common lines of questioning that have been used to open other portals. I recognize that I would represent too much of a threat at this point to work with it directly as the chance of escape would be too high were I to unlock its secrets (and thus the door itself); however, should their desperation for fire-tubes grow greater, it is quite possible that I will join those on the shore.

The smaller tower, further out to sea, is constantly surrounded by water, even at the lowest of tides. There is a single entrance door, inches above the high-tide mark (the door must be closed during certain synchronicities of the heavens) and the pirates keep a small group of launches tied to the tower at all times and a rope ladder to allow access to the door during low-tide. Nobody lives in the tower full-time, instead, groups of pirates are rotated over time, their duties in the small tower being ready to run out launches when the main ship returns and more prosaically, fishing, as this is still the staple food of most of who live in the tower. The tower does connect to the complexes below, with a single and circuitous route connecting it to the main tower, although this is rarely used for reasons of personal peril in doing so as well as the length of time involved in comparison to simply rowing a launch to the main tower's dry dock.

The tidal range in the ruins is great, exceeding slightly a 30' difference between high and low tides, such that at high tide the waters lap nearly to the edge of the shore building and at low tide expose all except the low side of the main tower. Exceptionally low tides reveal new sections of mud and ruins and the pirates have become more adventurous in terms of sending out prospecting teams to try and find new doors or access to the lower tunnels, with poor results thus far.

My resources are now starting to reach their limits -- I shall be brief, as much as I can! Because of the lance, any major water assault on the ruins would be madness. The lands on the shore are wild and rough enough that any large force would have a very hard time of it making it to the tower and then would have a hard time taking itself. I feel the best course of action, should whoever finds this feel inclined to rescue the prisoners of the tower or to try and claim it for themselves, would be to have a small group carried along the safety of the coast in a small boat and then attempt to infiltrate the tower, either through the smaller tower or if particularly brave and foolhardy, through the main tower itself.

May Abtu smile upon you if you do.

[Ed note: (cruddy) map to follow shortly, another post relating to these pirates]

The Heroes of Weaverham, Part the Whatever

The Heroes of Weaverham are now set up in the reasonably safe and cosmopolitan town of Dolmvay (a nice nod that I took piecemeal from the Labyrinth Lord rulebook), renting an outbuilding from a down-on-his-luck minor noble while trying out their new magical toy, a mirror that sends them to various odd places.

This time the party decided to go through the mirror to the "seaside-smelling place", which turned out to be the island described here and here. Initially, they came through right as the sun was starting to go down. They used the 40 minutes of decent light that they had left to quickly scout out the town and then nipped back through the mirror as night was starting to fall. They decided to then go to sleep and wake up in the dead of night, which they calculated as being early morning through the mirror.

They did so and this time continued scouting out the town. They found the altar and figured out that they could open it; they decided not to in case there were catacombs below. After scouting the jungle and finding the detritus that surrounded the town, they got a little freaked and then decided to check out the beach, eventually hiking all the way around the island -- after a number of hours of hiking, they made it around to the fecund stream that ran out of the hideout described in the second post above. Going up the creek, they got to within a few hundred feet of the cave opening before losing their nerve and going back to the beach. It took about 10 minutes for them to figure out a way to get across the creek without actually touching the water and after getting back to the town, they decided to open the altar.

Upon finding the religious artifacts, they immediately jumped back through the mirror and set about having them appraised, including taking the kris blades to the local weaponsmith and paying him for his professional opinion. I was somewhat surprised by this, especially since they had cast Detect Magic and knew that all of these items were minorly magical; apparently the lure of gold (which will doubtless be spent carousing) is stronger than any potential utility that these items might serve.

It's definitely a trend now with this party, they seem uneasy about entering into dungeon-y type areas or taking on obvious threats while concentrating on grabbing whatever loot they can and then scarpering back to town to spend their ill-gotten gains on debauchery. Considering the mortality rate of their Labyrinth Lord characters compared to the campaigns run in other systems, this kind of reaction shouldn't be too surprising, I guess it's also accentuated by the fact that when they have ventured into dangerous situations, they've managed to avoid most of the richest rewards through bad luck and general trepidation, which would reinforce the desire to be risk-averse.

Like a Virgin (Apply Within)

The Kalapids live on the edge of the sub-fertile Salt Wastes that stretch seaward from the northern slopes of the Spine of the World. They gather what sustenance they can from the limited topsoil of the region and of course, the bounty of the sea. Their language is actually derived almost entirely from Dwarfish, a remnant of their days as a slave people, when they guarded the outposts outside the major Dwarven trade tunnels. The men still maintain impressive braided beards and stonework is very highly valued in Kalapid circles. Their culture maintains a militaristic and mercantile bent, with each Kalapid town being heavily fortified (especially around the entrances to the trade tunnels) as well as usually having a seawalled port (few Kalapids live far away from a major body of water).

The worship of the Dwarven gods continues amongst many of the Kalapids, especially the older generations; however, they've been largely replaced by many new deities, mostly local fertility and war gods. An interesting case is the major trading port of Tel Atwan, where an ancient red-stone temple has stood as long as anyone can remember. Inside there is a medium-sized hall as well as devotionals and housing for priests, all connecting in various ways to a complex labyrinth that seems to stretch far beyond the physical limitations of the temple. Only after many years of study are initiates allowed to venture into the deeper areas of the maze and when and if they return, they return changed, their tongues telling of the wisdom of Falfuhd, granter of great power and greater knowledge.

It is only then that they are allowed to command virgins.

You see, Falfuhd's greatest gifts are connected to innocence and harm done to the innocent. As interpreted by the male priests of Falfuhd, a certain percentage of Tel Atwan's young females are taken from their families and raised as handmaidens of Falfuhd. Carefully guarded away from the rest of the town to maintain their innocence, they are primarily used in the summoning of minor demons, as well as rituals to maintain the health and power of said demons. Mostly this involves being flayed with barbed whips and other kinds of bloodletting, up to and including sacrifices for the most major summonings, or for invocations involving direct communication with Falfuhd.

Falfuhd - Granter of Knowledge, Unveiler of Secrets, Defiler of Innocence

Falfuhd appears as a great dung beetle or as a wiry man dressed in a loincloth and headgear and carrying a serpentine staff (treat as viper in combat). In both of his forms he is a bilious yellow and excretes a bitter-smelling slime that is slightly acidic (1d6 damage/round unless cleaned off).

Powers

- Any damage done to an innocent in his presence heals Falfuhd to a equal degree
- Any time a Lawful cleric has their blood spilled, Falfuhd heals 1d8 damage. If a Lawful cleric dies, he is brought back to full health, including bringing him back to life if he "died" in the last 4 turns.
- Farfuhd can curse one word per round by saying it in a mocking voice. Any creature saying that word or writing it takes d8 points of damage until demon is destroyed. (Demon is immune.)
- Maze spell (as AD&D) 2/day. A creature may elect to spend extra time in the maze (maximum time for his/her intelligence level + 1 round) and, if so, and if s/he either succeeds in an intelligence check at -10 or goes to the right place in a maze the DM has prepared in advance for this purpose, may find the demon's soul, in the form of a bizarre relic or talisman and, once s/he returns to the material plane, may use it to bind the demon to his/her will.

(Major cap-tip and Apologies to/for Zak S. and his marvelous Demonic Attribute Table.)

Heroes of Weaverham: An Update

A quickly-summarized update on how the campaign is going:

After traveling to Larm, the party discovered that the idol that they were searching lay in an abandoned fort two day's journey into the swamp. When they reached the fort, they discovered the remnants of another party -- since the party reacts to new encounters with a single strategy of unfettered violence, the situation deteriorated into the two mages from each party standing in a field full of slept adventurers. The wizards came to an agreement, woke everybody up and then planned their excursion into the fort, which was full of endlessly-regenerating undead. The other party's mage was here to research this phenomenon and his guess was that the idol had something to do with it. The combined parties managed to avoid both the major dangers and riches of the fort and ran out with the idol, with a handshake agreement on letting the other mage study the idol once it had been returned to its resting place.

Said resting place turned out to be in another part of the swamp known locally as the Poison Lands, where even the water and earth would be deadly if consumed. Heading back to Larm first, there was an interesting interlude where the thief was kidnapped by the local noble, Lady Orchid, who had it in for the party. A partially-botched rescue attempt ensued and the party got away with only the loss of a few retainers and the health of the thief's urethra. (Hint: if a torturer is asking you to guess where he's going to put a red-hot needle, saying "up your dick" is only going to give him ideas.)

Once the group was back in the bog, they were of course double-crossed by the other mage, who used his sleep spell to KO all of the party except for the elf and the thief. With the elf near death, he agreed to let the other wizard take the idol and he ran off into the bog, pursued by the thief and the now-awake cleric. He then decided to use Sleep again in order to make good his escape. He had multiple casts of it because I've adopted the DCC spell system for use with Labyrinth Lord. He then rolled a one and fell into a coma. The party thoughtfully cut his throat before he drowned.

Replacing the idol was actually quite easily done, once the part figured out how to traverse the sunken temple that they were headed to -- again, there were dangers and riches galore; the players felt that get in/get out was the wisest course of action. Heading back to Larm, they decided to take out Lady Orchid once and for all, leading to an incredibly bloody home invasion adventure which concluded with the party deciding that the Lady must have escaped through the magical mirror that they found in her bedroom and headed off to try and figure out just exactly how it worked...

20 Questions Tiiiiiiiiime

1. Ability scores generation method? - 3D6 in order. If you get the required stats, you can then be a demihuman. If you don't, you're a human and you can move the stats around as much as you want.
2. How are death and dying handled? - If you hit 0 hitpoints, you die. I have been thinking about introducing a rule where you get an additional Save vs. Death to see if you go into a coma or something like that.
3. What about raising the dead? - Extremely high level clerics may do this for a truly outrageous amount of money or if the party agrees to do something very dangerous for the church. You'd have to find access to one of these clerics though.
4. How are replacement PCs handled? - Either one of the retainers is promoted or you roll up a first level character. There's almost always somebody hanging around that's worth being "promoted" though.
5. Initiative: individual, group, or something else? - Group. Somehow it adds an extra bit of flair to combat because when I ask the party to roll, everybody rushes to be the one to roll it or briefly argues about who has had the best luck at it recently.
6. Are there critical hits and fumbles? How do they work? - Roll a 20, it's a critical hit. Either the damage gets multiplied or something extremely advantageous happens (generally if somebody rolls low on their damage, rather than multiplying it, they'll disarm/temporarily blind/hamstring the opponent). Rolling a 1 is a critical miss and generally leads to people dropping their swords, breaking their arrow strings, etc.
7. Do I get any benefits for wearing a helmet? - Everybody wearing armor is assumed to have a helmet of some kind.
8. Can I hurt my friends if I fire into melee or do something similarly silly? - Oh my yes. If you roll a 4 or below, you get to roll another attack against your fellow party member.
9. Will we need to run from some encounters, or will we be able to kill everything? - It is generally advised that the party have a Plan A, Plan B and probably a Plan C for every encounter. Discretion is the better part of valor. So yeah, you're gonna have to run a bunch.
10. Level-draining monsters: yes or no? - I'd like to say yes; I typically will go to some lengths to avoid stocking them, so in practice, no.
11. Are there going to be cases where a failed save results in PC death? - Yes. Hasn't happened yet, although there's been one close call with a poison needle.
12. How strictly are encumbrance & resources tracked? - Resources are tracked fairly rigorously, encumbrance hardly at all. I've basically said "don't do anything outrageous or I'll get really picky about it" and that seems to have done the job in terms of everybody keeping things reasonable. There's a fair amount of hiring of retainers and they've bought donkeys and carts as well without needing to do a full accounting of everything in everybody's pack, which is good.
13. What's required when my PC gains a level? Training? Do I get new spells automatically? Can it happen in the middle of an adventure, or do I have to wait for down time? - It has to happen between sessions. There's no training involved. Clerics automatically gain spells going up levels, mages don't.
14. What do I get experience for? - Surviving/doing well with encounters, 1:1 for money and non-magical items looted. Oh, and we use Jeff's Carousing System.
15. How are traps located? Description, dice rolling, or some combination? - If the player says they search an area, there's a description. If they don't, there's dice rolling.
16. Are retainers encouraged and how does morale work? - Retainers are very much encouraged, although they do tend to lose morale when openly referred to as "meatshields". Morale is I roll 2D6 and make stuff up based on my reading of the situation when I feel it's appropriate.
17. How do I identify magic items? - Detect magic is a good starting point, allowing you to "read auras". More specific information requires more intense study/use of special rituals.
18. Can I buy magic items? Oh, come on: how about just potions? - No and mostly no. You can buy stuff like "love potions" and other alchemical nightmares with the caveat that they tend to be made by people who sample their own wares on a regular basis.
19. Can I create magic items? - In theory. We'll find out when we get there. I'll know when that is.
20. What about splitting the party? - It's your funeral. It does mean that I get to physically separate the players by making them go into different rooms and then run between them as they try and figure out what's going on. This can be really fun.

The Falling Dominoes of World Design

One of the major features in Weaverham is the road West. The discovery of the route west through the mountains was one of the defining features of the town. When I came up with this distinctive feature, there wasn't really anything on the other end of that route, it just existed as a point of interest. Now, the players haven't questioned this; however, it's not something that could stand for long. So the Walled City of Mirandir came into being as something Worth Going To, in this case, a strange city with a lot of wealth and access to exotic stuff, justifying the existence of trade caravans.

Then, there was another issue. Considering that there was a medium-sized city on a major river flowing west just a few days march south of Weaverham, why was that route through the mountains so important, especially considering that it was only open during the non-winter months? Why wouldn't merchants just jump in their boats, sail down the river, then cut north back up the coast to Mirandir?

The answer clearly was that there was something bad in the way, something terrifying enough that only the extremely foolhardy would risk sailing that route. Now, that something could be on the coast itself because the current state of sailing in the Weaverham campaign is such that few people have the technology or the cojones to sail out of sight of land.

Originally, the answer was: pirates. An established camp of them preying on water traffic -- everybody likes a pirate city and that would certainly "work" within the established world. That doesn't really have the "oomph" to it that I'd like, especially if we were talking about something that had been around for generations.

Add in another bit of world background, the Hyperborean ruins scattered around, roughly equivalent to those left behind by the Afternoon Cultures in M. John Harrison's Viriconium series. In this case then, there is a port/castle complex on the north lip of the river entrance, mostly destroyed; however, some towers and halls still remain and in them dwell a clan of mutated pirates, warped by their surroundings and granted power due to their possession of what they refer to as a "firelance", a cannon mounted in one of the towers and capable of splitting ships in half from miles away.

Results:

- Since few, if any, ships dare to sail past their hideout, the pirates make their bones by raiding Mirandir and the shipping going into the river mouth (the south part of the river delta being outside of the range of the firelance). They strike quickly and then retreat.

- The mutating effects of the ruins have the effect, aside from making the pirates gruesome in appearance, of rendering the inhabitants sterile. The pirates then rely on increasing their numbers through abductions, either through their shipping raids or attacks on nearby settlements. For obvious reasons, children are preferred targets, although young males work well too.

- It's probable that the pirates have some way of dredging stuff off the ocean floor. Maybe some kind of Hyperborean submersible. Maybe some of the mutants have gills. Maybe they have a deal with some undersea dwellers who give them a cut of the detritus that showers onto them from above. Lots of possibilities.

The Heroes of Weaverham, cont.

Our Heroes continued north from the bandit encounter and the next day found a large gathering of nobles and men-at-arms camped around a small tower-and-bailey castle. The servants collecting water and washing clothing in the nearby stream were happy to inform the party that the group, about a hundred strong, were holding a tournament to decide who was worthy to lead the small army into battle against the brigands of the woods, who apparently had a large hideout and numbered twice as many as the men in this camp. The party decided to continue north to Stavros with their caravan.

After successfully seeing the caravan to the Trade Syndicate warehouse, the party took a few days to procure goods and then leave Nyxa, the girl who was ravished by the goat-beast, with the priestesses of  the local church of Tittivila. It was decided that the group would head back to Weaverham with the goal of getting the fourth stone skull that they knew to be in the possession of the sheriff and then see what happened when all the skulls were placed on the pedestals in the goblin caves west of town. The journey south involved repeated encounters with a group of savage men living in the woods who made hit-and-run attacks over multiple days. One of the wizard's hirelings was killed and a near-TPK loomed at one point; however, clever use of a light spell and the net they'd carried out of the goblin cave turned the tide enough for the party to escape mainly unscathed.

Reaching Weaverham safely, a successful Charm Person from Brains resulted in the sheriff happily handing over the skull and when placed upon the pedastal, the group found a secret entrance into a long-forgotten Duvan'ku hideout. Brief exploration led to a few traps being successfully triggered from distance by the thief and while the party avoided touching the various unsettling objects within, they did find a secret door in the chapel that revealed a relative mother lode of treasure in the form of tithed silver coins. Deciding to get out while the getting was good, the party returned to Weaverham and promptly caroused with their newfound wealth. Only one major mishap occurred (Olin got a pretty cool looking tattoo) as Forest Woodtwig was compelled to go on a quest by his gods, Dogar and Kazon.

(A reminder: Forest Woodtwig is an Elf that was raised by Orcs who told him they were Elves and then taught him a falsified version of Elvish culture as a joke. Part of this apparently was teaching him to worship nonexistent terrible gods. We decided that what he thinks are Dogar and Kazon is actually Tsathogga.)

The quest in question is to go down to the swamps south of Larm (itself 3 days south of Weaverham), recover a frog idol and return it to its proper place. The journey south involved a couple of encounters with hostile orcs in which one of Brains' followers died again, now making him 4/4 for deaths of hired infantrymen. He's already paying double rates for hirelings in Weaverham and he's likely to get outright refusals soon.

Arriving in Larm, the party again hit the local merchants and searched around for a good base of operations. Carousing again (our sessions wind up being pretty short and there was plenty of discussion before decamping for Larm) led to Forest insulting Lady Orchid, one of the town's nobles and a mysterious figure from the exotic West. While Forest went into hiding, the remaining party members took part in the local Rat Festival, in which armed men compete to see how many swamp rats they can kill. The party wound up being 2 rats short of the eventual winners, which they accepted as a decent result considering their lack of knowledge of the surrounding terrain. As the last session ended, the rest of the party was preparing to meet Forest at the Gallow Middens outside of town before setting out in search of the frog idol.