PRYMPTOWN COURIER
Vol. 4, No. 4 (Sept. 2001)
EDITORIAL
This is the earliest in the morning I've ever worked on an
issue of the Courier. I've
had a horrible allergy attack in the last 24 hours, and little sleep in the
last 6. Working the late shift tonight
should be lots of fun...
At the least it's prompted me to make this month's editorial
topic -- time. There are several ways to
look at how time affects the campaign.
The most obvious way is to look at how long the campaign has been
running. I really wish I'd thought along
time ago to start dating my campaign notes
-- for a variety of uses, actually -- but because they
aren't dated it has become difficult to recall the date of our first playing
session. Thankfully, I remember having
to schedule it around GENCON, so I'm pretty sure it was in late August. The earliest date I've got in my notes is
from one of my own
posts to the Greytalk listserv, a campaign write-up from
March 31, 1999. My post said the
write-up was for January's session (ah, for the good ol' days when I was only
two sessions behind!), and that was for the 13th playing session. But backtracking 13 sessions reveals a
January 1998 starting date, which doesn't mesh at all with my
recollection. Did we really skip playing
four months of the first year of the campaign?
Perhaps one of my players will respond with additional
recollections. Regardless, we've been
playing for 45-48 months, or roughly four years.
It's hard to imagine the campaign has ran so long, but
another way we can look at time is in regards to frequency of play. This has already become an issue, since
months have gone by during all that time with no playing sessions. If I had instead ran a weekly campaign, with
no interruptions, our 37th playing session would have taken
place in 1998 instead of August 2001! As
an aside on level advancement, I don't *think* I would have caught so much flak for advancing PCs only three levels in
nine months instead of four years.
I've already mentioned problems with timekeeping, but
timekeeping within campaign time is a separate issue. Vlad's player has been working on a timeline
for the campaign that can hopefully appear either here or on the South Province
Website soon. We've encountered numerous
dating inconsistencies between his track and mine, yet I'm inclined to accept
his just because so much of my dating comes from hasty note-taking during or after
game play. If I could go back and start
over, I would start taping game sessions like I once tried to do, only this
time my emphasis would be on taking notes for myself during the session rather
than trying to preserve a record of out-of-character banter.
Just a few notes now about the rest of this issue before
moving on. The write-up for the 34th
session reveals a dearth of players, but the trend has reversed again since then and player attendance has been much higher for
the last three sessions. No need to fear
this campaign ending soon!
A slight change in write-up format is debuting here, as a
new method of note-taking I've tried during recent sessions has made time-keeping easier, but much harder to
pin events down to a specific day.
Also, despite its availability in the archives of three
listservs, I've collected and edited parts three through five of my GENCON 2001 Report and made them "part
two" for the Courier's edition. For
those who've already read it, bear with me for just one more issue, and
then the Report will be over and I'll be forced to come up with new material again...
SOUTH PROVINCE CAMPAIGN SESSIONS 34
Continuing Chapter 3:
SEPARATE JOURNEYS
PC Role Call (of those present):
Vladamir Kostitov, Lawful Good Oerdian male trickster 3rd
lvl illusionist).
Enlock Nightshade, Neutral Good Oerdian male prestidigitator
(1st lvl magic-user).
Planting 10-12, 581 CY.
Moonday-Waterday.
Enlock continued to meet with his grandfather who, magically
cursed with insanity, would constantly shift between warmly welcoming Enlock
and hotly telling him to leave.
When not at his grandfather's magical abode, he was
contacted by agents of one of the Eldritch Lords of Rel Deven and told to meet
with him. At his private suite, Enlock
was allowed to meet Asheron, one of the Eldritch Lords. Asheron explained that Enlock's grandfather
was also an Eldritch Lord, but in his madness, Nightshade was no longer able to
attend meetings of council. Asheron offered
an arrangement whereby Enlock would persuade his grandfather to support Asheron
on issues he could vote by proxy for, and in return Enlock would be given a new
spellbook to replace the one he had lost in the town of Benkend.
Enlock agreed to this, and became a frequent guest in
Asheron's salon. He became acquainted
with allies of Asheron, Alerax and Tantras.
He also became aware of one of his enemies. One night, Enlock was escorted into a nearby
tavern where he met Kogle. Kogle was
also an Eldritch Lord, and he had somehow learned of Enlock's and Asheron's
arrangement. Kogle told Enlock that he
would instead convince his grandfather to vote in his favor, while informing
him of any moves Asheron was making -- or else.
Enlock agreed to this ultimatum, but the next day he
informed Asheron of Kogle's plot. Enlock
agreed to be a triple-agent, spying on Kogle while pretending to be spying on
Asheron. Asheron promised him more
spells in his spellbook. He also was
able to tell Enlock more about what had happened to his grandfather. Some time ago, the elder Nightshade had
entered a magical duel with a wizard named Xaene. Xaene hailed from Rauxes, was said to serve
the Overking personally, and was clearly the victor in the duel.
On the 12th, Enlock returned to see his grandfather. He was escorted through the magical doorway
at the back of the alley by his grandfather's servant -- the black-robed,
hooded figure. Again, Nightshade was
convivial at first, but during the visit grandfather's disposition took a
violent turn. He accused Enlock of being
a spy, and told him that he must leave at once.
Enlock ignored his father's advice and tried to talk him down. This failed, and Nightshade sicked his
servant on his grandson. The figure lept
at Enlock, raked him with clawed hands, and Enlock collapsed like a blob of
jelly. Then the creature picked Enlock
up, and threw him out into the alley to die.
Planting 14-18, 581 CY.
Freeday-Godsday.
Vladamir, Perpegilliam, and Godrum had left Hexpools, and were
soon ferried across the Greyflood River into the Sud Graufult. They came soon after to the large village of
Sulzdorf. Near the center of the village
were two inns across the street from each other -- The Sword and Fist and the
Defenders of the Faith. The former
sounded more appealing to them, and Vlad and Peri looked into booking Peri into
some fights that Vlad could beat on.
Unfortunately, The Sword & Fist Inn had no resident fighters at
present, and the locals were settling for cock fights.
Vlad went to the keep at the east end of the village and
learned it belonged to Lansgraf Tilman de Bourne. The Lansgraf agreed to see Vlad that
day. Vlad told him what he knew of the
unknown threat to the Sud Graufult he had come to thwart, and also offered to
sell his services to the Lansgraf while in the area. Vlad had the spell Invisibility in his
spellbook since his training, and wanted to know how much that spell would be
worth to him.
Leaving de Bourne to contemplate the matter, Vlad discovered
a traveling troupe of performers putting on a show on the north side of the
keep. Vlad learned as he blended into
the audience that the troupe had been crossing the Sud Graufult and was bound
for Hexpools. The first act Vlad caught
was a psychic named Madame Yamilah.
After several moderately impressive acts of divination, she singled out
Vlad from the crowd, and announced to all that she foresaw deadly sickness and
terrible death in his near future. Vlad
confronted her behind the stage, but Yamilah had only a vague premonition to
describe.
Just then, Vlad heard Peri on the stage threatening the next
performer. What Vlad saw next was Peri
with his hands around the throat of a Hobniz knife thrower named Alcar. Vlad encouraged him to take it elsewhere, and
they fled back to the inns, dragging Alcar with them. Once there, Peri revealed that Alcar had been
his own father's second-in-command back when Peri's father ran Prymp's thieves'
guild. Alcar admitted this was true, and
told Peri what he knew of the fate of Peri's father. The elder Brown had been assigned by the
mysterious Flying Turtle Guild to go to Hexpools and perform a secret mission
for the city's laird. It was common
knowledge that the laird of Hexpools was obsessed with finding a mythical
Fountain of Healing, and Brown was to help find it in exchange for some aid
from Hexpools. Brown had taken Alcar
with him to Hexpools, but Brown then stopped keeping in touch with him once
they were there. Presumedly, Brown had
long since found an adventuring company and left to find the Fountain.
Peri was mad about being kept in the dark so long about his
father's whereabouts, but more confused as to where to go next. He had no desire to hunt down a magical
fountain if no one knew where it was, yet he did want to see his father
again. And on the other hand, there was
Vlad's mission in the Sud Graufult, and Vlad was promising that this Agent of
Acererak would have enormous treasure.
The next day, Vlad went to talk to de Bourne, and found the
lansgraf had decided he would very much like to have an invisible spy on his
payroll. He offered 50 gold Ivids for
the casting of the spell, which Vlad agreed to.
This new enterprise looked profitable, as Vlad anticipated meeting more
customers in the region.
Leaving Sulzdorf that same day, the band of three headed
east, following a road that followed the south bank of the Hexpools. It was a lesser road, only 20 feet wide, and
then only paved on the 10 feet to the right that was raised slightly above the
dirt path. This road led to the town of
Olvenstaadt-am-Graufult -- an unwalled community of over 2,000 people,
overlooked by a castle atop a high, steep hill.
Vlad found a chapel dedicated to Pholtus, and spoke to a
priest named Simis there. Then he
approached the castle to speak to its ruler, but he was only given an
appointment for the next day to speak to Waldgraf Taras Cranden-Guarhoth. When Vlad went back down into the town, he
found his two companions were already at one of the two inns in this town --
the Comeback Inn.
There was a small crowd of people around the entrance to the
inn who parted when Vlad approached to enter.
Inside there were women dancing, men drinking, and Peri and Godrum
enjoying the good life. Vlad asked
around to find who owned this establishment, and was led to a man named
Oldos. But upon questioning, Vlad
learned that Oldos was just a manager hired by the inn's owners, who had not
been seen since the inn mysteriously appeared in town just a few months
ago. Since its arrival, the inn had
rapidly become thee hotspot of Olvenstaadt.
Vlad went to leave, but found upon stepping out the door
that he was in fact walking back in.
While recovering from this suprise turn of events, Vlad noticed the men
outside snickering, and they revealed the inn's secret -- that no one can leave
without being helped out by someone outside.
Vlad haggled with the men for the price of a helping hand, and was then
pulled back outside. None of the three
wound up spending the whole night there, and they instead reconvened at the
Foot of the Cliff Inn beneath the castle.
GENCON REPORT 2001:
PART TWO
Before leaving for the night, Ronny and I walked back to the
Arena so we could check the advancement in the D&D Open. My team had advanced and his hadn't. That meant that I had to make room in my
schedule for the semi-final round Saturday at noon. I had a ticket for that time slot to play one
of the demos of a new Sherlock Holmes game.
Luckily, I had seven hours of sleep time to think it over.
Friday, August 3rd.
My roomies again dropped me off at the convention center,
and for my open 8 am slot I decided to play the Sherlock
Holmes game, so I wouldn't feel bad about missing it the
next day. It was an
interesting game, but hard to get into
when you're psyched up for traditional role-playing. In
this game, you don't tell the DM what you want to do -- you
tell the DM what you did AND its result, and then a die roll
determines if you had in fact done that.
The scenario was the "Case of the Missing Bride," but beyond
the
introduction, the players were free to make up the rest of
the story themselves, based on the interests of their
characters. I played
Sherlock Holmes, but it was an
energetic Asian gamer playing a lawyer who stole the
show. We were part of a coalition of
half the players, creating evidence to pin the murder on an NPC, and
corroborating each other's evidence.
Then, inspired by the TV show Law & Order, you have to sit through a
short court case once you've made your arrests and assembled your
evidence. I bungled my prosecution,
since I couldn't remember half the characters by name, but some other players
salvaged my presentation. The game was a
lot of work, but it was fun. The
designer was selling copies for $13, but that seemed pretty steep to me for a
pamphlet with some introductions in it and a summary of the scant rules.
Friday, Aug. 3rd. Noon
I thought it was time that I finally checked out the exhibit
hall. I started on the left end and
worked my way across the aisles. I
stopped by Ninth Level Games' booth to look at Kobolds Ate My Baby. I had wanted to playtest that at previous
cons and never got around to it. That,
and their new game, Ninja Burger, looked hilarious. At Steve Jackson Games, I was impressed to
see that they had secured the rights to Tom Wham's Awful Green Things From
Outer Space. I was sorely tempted to
pick up a copy of that. And even though
I don't ever play Ars Magica, I like what Atlas Games has done with it and was
tempted to pick up some issues of the Ars Magica fanzine at their booth.
The biggest treat of the con was when I went in search of
the Kenzer & Co. booth.
It turns out, everyone there
recognized me by face, and when I talked to David Burke, I
found out why.
Several years ago, I had won "best Bob" in a Knights of the
Dinner Table live reading, and my performance made it onto a videotape of clips
from various readings that had been circulated throughout the company! I got to meet several people from the company
I had corresponded with through e-mail, and then they recognized my name. Best of all, when I asked about my
submission, I was told that Brian Jelke loved it! So, everyone can look for "The Invasion
of Arun'Kid" for the Kingdoms of Kalamar campaign setting in 2002!
I had planned on also showing Kenzer some of my artwork, but
someone else with a portfolio was getting lots of one-on-one time, and it was
almost 2:00 pm. I had wanted to try Ninth Level Games' Beer Engine game
mechanics, so I dashed downstairs to try Ninja Burger.
Friday, Aug. 3rd. 2
pm.
Ninja Burger is apparently based on an online comic strip I
haven't got around to checking out yet. Juvenile (in any sense of the word)
ninjas work for Ninja Burger, and samarais work for a rival fast food chain.
Ninjas must deliver orders in 30 minutes or less, or commit hari-kari. They
also cannot be seen by their customers, or they will have to cut off some of
their fingers to atone for their dishonor. There are a whole bunch of ways to
wind up cutting off your fingers in this game, including saying out loud what
any of your ninja's stats are.
An older guy walked us through character creation before a
12-year old kid took over DMing us. We had to sneak into a
factory to deliver orders. My ninja, Akira, snuck through
the ventilation system, dropped down into a room full of
cubicles by my costumer, disguised myself as one of her
co-workers, and then dropped the food off for her. Meanwhile, the other ninjas were getting
shot by security
guards, killed by samarai, and what-not. The guy who showed
us how to make characters was playing, but he rolled snake eyes on a random
chart and couldn't speak for the rest of the game without having to cut off a
finger. I made him cut off the last of his fingers explaining some rules to me,
at which point he had to roll on a random horrible death table.
Meteors struck the vent shaft his ninja was in, simultaneously wiping out my ninja
and his customer.
Several other customers were killed, and the remaining
ninjas dropped their orders on their corpses. I was, of
course, the only one to deliver to a live customer. I was
also suitably impressed by the game, which would clearly be
a lot of fun if your ninja wasn't killed immediately after
winning the game.
Friday, Aug. 3rd. 4
pm.
I went downstairs again to meet up with the two Ron's for
supper. However, Ronny and I were by different, but similarly named booths, and
thus missed each other. I
did get to run into Noel Graham and Denis Tetreault again,
on their way to the Manual of the Planes seminar. It was
tempting to join them, but it was even more tempting to eat
supper. Before I
left, I ran into Tom Harrison for the second time that con. He had just played the Castle Falkenstein
event and raved about how good it was.
In truth, I had forgotten all about it, and was somewhat disappointed,
even though I had enjoyed Ninja Burger.
Friday, Aug. 3rd. 5
pm.
After supper, I had a ticket to play a second Lejendary
Adventures tournament. I sat down for “Calvacade,” and as
the minutes ticked by, it became clear that the DM and I
were the only people who were showing up for it. The DM was
disappointed and ready to cancel the game, but I pressed him to run it for me
solo. He balked, saying it would be way too hard for me, but I pressed again
for a solo game and won. This time I played an “ecclesiastic,” or cleric --
giving me the chance to experiment with LA’s magic system. A bit later, a second player did join the
game. The scenario started off easy enough, with my player soothing strained
relations between a human thorp and a kobold tribe (kobolds being more like
elves in LA). Then we did lots and lots...and lots of tracking. Encountered
some just plain weird things which kinda, sorta explained the problems between
the humans and kobolds, and that was it. In the whole “impossible to run solo”
adventure I wasn’t even seriously injured once. I did find out that ecclesiastics
have much better offensive spells than clerics used to have, but still won’t be
switching to LA anytime soon. But then, I also have yet to game with a DM for
LA who was good...
Friday, Aug. 3rd. 9
pm.
Afterwards, it was time to set up for night two of The
Village of Hommlet. I had the group of four return with
undiminished enthusiasm, plus a fifth player joined in a
little later, and introduced the pre-generated paladin into
the group. I had enough time before play to draw out some
rough maps of two encounters the PCs were likely to hit, and
sure enough I needed the giant rat room map almost right away. The ranger took
point, waded in, and waded out with giant rats swarming over him. The PCs
behind him immediately began attacking the ones on the ranger's back, Three
Stooges-style. Needless to say, the PCs won, but it was a long, spell-less
combat. Afterwards, they went down to the lower level, and green slime dropped
on the paladin. He and the ranger worked
to scrape it off, and then they withdrew up the stairs while the paladin burnt
it away. They managed to find the
concealed doors leading to the supply rooms. The broke all the arrows they
didn't take, got excited about the keg of brandy, and the halfling thief tried
on a black cloak with a flaming eye emblem on for size. They ultimately decided
to leave the cloaks alone,
and went back to exploring. They encountered, and defeated
the ogre. They freed its prisoners, and got the iron ring from the gnome. The
prisoners told them of a secret door in the rear of the ogre's lair, but after
everyone in the party failed their secret door checks, they agreed in
frustration that the prisoners must have been wrong! Zert and Spugnoir (the
NPCs) were sent to escort the prisoners back to the village, and then the party
went to explore the last hallway on the lower level. Zombies in groups of two
spilled out of cell doors off to the right hand side of the hallway every time
the PCs advanced ten feet. The first time, the PCs turned them, but after that
they decided just to fight the rest. It was time-consuming, in fact taking up
the rest of the night's session! Plus many PCs were injured. One of the PC
clerics nearly got his eyes gouged out, but not before making the zombie's head
spin backwards. The dwarven fighter was twice picked up and strangled, and the
halfling thief found that groin shots are even effective against the dead.
Again, a good time had been had by all!
Saturday, Aug. 4th.
Some time in the morning.
We all knew the amount of sleep we were getting just wasn't
cutting it. There was no way we could get up
and get to the con again by 8 am, so I agreed to abandon a
half-time slot, and we arranged a wake-up call that would
get us to the con at 10 am.
Saturday, Aug. 4th.
10:45 am.
The wake-up call came 45 minutes late.
I was royally ticked that we were now not getting there
until noon, but my roomies wanted a nice leisurely breakfast
together. My roomies now included two more players from my campaign who had
arrived the previous day. We had an okay
meal at Country Kitchen, and much time ticked by, and then we had to wait for
the guys who wanted to stand in line at the ATM machine rather than get in the
car and drive me to the con! Ron, my
driver, didn't appreciate the minute-by-minute countdown until noon I was
doing, failing to appreciate the heightened sense of drama it lent to the
occasion.
I absolutely positively had wanted to get there by noon,
because I had decided to go ahead and play in the semi-final
round of the D&D Open.
Saturday, Aug. 4th. A
couple of minutes after noon.
When I arrived, my party excused the alternate they'd picked
up in my absence and welcomed me into their midst as if they hadn't just been
looking to replace me. We were assigned a table and waited for our new DM. Our DM showed up wearing a Bullwinkle hat
with antlers. Despite our initial
reservations about our DM, "Ratty" proved to be more than up to the
task, and this section of the adventure turned out to be much better than the
first. True, the threat of an evil
turnip god was no less laughable. I
really had an opportunity to shine as a leader, however, because my fellow
players were obviously tired already and were missing obvious clues as to how
we were supposed to get from encounter to encounter. I had to pound on the table a few times and
shout, but after we kidnapped the ensorcelled baron and learned we had to go
back into the castle and get his librarian, I got them to Dimension Door us
into the library instead of fighting our way back in again and wasting
time. It was then my correct assumption
that we had to go to the turnip grove that kept them from wandering idly around
the castle for the rest of the time slot.
My co-players acquitted themselves much better later when they defeated
a purple worm that would have done me in if not for teamwork, and they managed
to outwit the dragon we encountered. Here, I had been wrong. I thought the dragon was delaying us from our
goal of finding the high priest, but in fact the dragon was guarding our way to
the high priest. We completed the round fairly confident that we might advance
again.
Saturday, Aug. 4th. 4
pm.
After Friday's fiasco of meeting for supper, we hadn't even
made plans to do so this day. I bought a hot dog from one
of the outdoor vendors. Bless them, for underselling the
caterers in the convention halls.
Saturday, Aug. 4th. 5
pm.
I now had a ticket to play an Ironclaw adventure. I had
seen this game the previous year at the con, and I thought a
fantasy setting with no humans but only anthropomorphic
animals looked intriguing. Such intrigue, however, would
turn out to be lost on our DM, for whom "naked
rabbits" was the height of hilarity. He and several other players also
took the time to admire a miniature of a female fox that had
an ample bust. The game took place over in the nearby
Hilton, in a room that was so crowded with tables that one
could not be heard at our table without shouting. The game
mechanics themselves were not even to my liking. Combat
rounds are divided into three sub-rounds, where fast actions
go in the first sub-round, medium actions go in the second
sub-round, and slow actions go in the third sub-round. So
each round of combat takes three times as long. We spent
two hours fighting three bandits, two of which weren't even
armed! I felt I was
lucky that I had already informed the
DM I would be leaving at 8 pm to go to the Knights of the
Dinner Table Live Reading.
While in that room at the Hilton, however, I ran into the
same group of players who had played Village of Hommlet with
me two nights in a row. They were playing an
oriental-themed game that one of them had created, and
expressed that they would be showing up that night. My
roommate and chauffeur, Ron, was in there as well getting to
play Champions! Ah, how I envied him...
END
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