My 4th Campaign on Roll20

 

So as of last night my new 5th ed. campaign, The Lost and The Lurking (yep, title totally stolen from a Silver John novel). Well, actually, the first session zero was a couple weeks ago, but out of the four in that (long time player Terry could not make it) only two remain, the eager and adorable noob couple in their 20's who I, as I often do with couples, refer to as "The Twins." One guy seemed promising, but he wanted both a more dark ages setting, and he wanted orcs to be like Warcraft orcs. Well, my setting has progressed (after over 100 years of character continuity) to being sort of post Italian Rennaissance-like, and pre-industrial Britain-like. Strike one. And Strike two was my orcs are nasty, stinky, rape your wife and eat your guts Tolkien orcs. Warcraft? As if. Those are just big humans with tusks. Fucking boring. The worst thing to ever happen to orcs.  So he was out. The other was a girl who seemed great, I hit it off with right away, and immediately thought of her as player numero uno. The others were mostly new to the game, so it's always helpful to have a seasoned vet. Especially since I haven't exactly memorized the PHB. 

But then after the session zero, she started being problematic. She was running an Eloquence Bard. I didn't study up on it at first, because she was talking up how she was sort of an acrobat high wire performer. That sounded cool, but I should have seen a red flag when she kept asking about running some sessions featuring her circus family as the NPC's. Hm. That was usually a mistake in the past. OK. Maybe. But then another new guy told me "hey, do you know what you are in for with that class?" 

So I looked it up and was like "wow." This bard by third level will pretty much be successful with every persuasion roll. Its called "Silvertongue" or some such. Plus the character will get the ability to reduce the saving throws of foes, a lot, and will also be able to give almost endless bardic inspirations. So I was a little concerned. I told her so, and though I won't nerf it, we need to be on the same page on how some of this stuff would work. I was being nice about it, but she seemed offended. Accused me of calling her a power gamer (which she was being...she was also asking to start with a powerful 4th level feat). It was getting negative, so I bailed on her. I felt bad about it. Almost sad. I went from being excited she would be involved to in a week not wanting to deal with her. So out out out. 

More humorously, another girl, an 18-year-old, contacted off the forum practically begging to be in the game. I much prefer folk 25 and older, but she said she did art and likes to make images throughout a session. That was enticing. But when I let her into the Discord to talk more, she started demanding written up setting information. Well, I have an "info dump" setting channel for random thoughts on my setting I post, but she was all like "no, if people are going to play in your world you need organized and detailed info on politics, important families, etc etc." Sorry kid, I don't keep piles of notebooks anymore. I've had this setting since I was a kid. It mostly lives in my head. And that she should maybe be more concerned about what happens in the course of the campaign than detailed background durp. Then she started demanding to know what the "story" will be and was name dropping Critical Role. Ah, that makes sense now. I told her that CR is actors pretending to play D&D as a performance and there are plenty of groups doing that out there. So lotsa luck.

Ah well. I promised myself I would heavily vet the group, so that was what I was doing. But with a couple more dudes on board, and Terry doing her dwarf from the previous campaign, we were up and running. I used Marge, the major caravan master from the last campaign, as a sort of patron for this one. This would not be a caravan campaign. The NPC is simply taking a couple seasons off to invest in some expeditions. I'm using LOFP's Death Frost Doom as sort of an inspiration. I personally find that adventure to be sort of Unrunnable as is, but there are gems in there, including the Lichway rip-off ending. I love Lichway. 

From DFD I'm mainly using the mountain, town below, graveyard, and cabin. I would be using my own, decently smaller, dungeon map for the temple (I will show in a later post). The temple in this case will be a temple of Orcus. Here's is the information Marge will show the party next session (this session was mostly dealing with some town thugs and a kobold cave).

This cult arrived at the pass some 100 years ago (year 1 of the New Age), when there was still a well-trod overland trade route between the West and The Acherian Empire to the northeast. 

At that time in the area it had a force of several Orcus  (a foul devil lord who has nothing to do with orcs) clerics, a few dedicated and well-trained guards, and always a dozen or so slaves, and with the fierce power of the cult protector and anti-paladin Atrigan the Deathdealer, they carved a hidden complex on the top of The "Broken Spine," a local mountain with a high peak and a rambling trail that lead up to it. It was what the religion of Orcus called "a material plane undeath garrison", a place where worldly worshippers of the Demon God tortured living humans to drive them chaotic mad, and then murdered them to temporarily lay them to rest, seizing their souls so they could be unleashed to help create an undead army at such time as when Orcus decided he wished to conquer the living world with a great force. The bodies of most of the priests, after they passed away for whatever reason, would also share this fate. Even his worshippers will serve Orcus in death.

Apparently, there are many such temples and "garrisons" across the lands. And perhaps waiting undead armies of a variety of Lords of Hell. The thought is chilling. Perhaps many of the hostile undead encounters in the dark corners of the earth are souls who have awakened early to inhabit their devil-cursed material forms. 

In the 100 years since the creation of the temple at the top of the "The Broken Spine" the dead where never called upon. But over the years the progeny of Atrigan and the other priests continued to slowly accumulate victims from the trade pass and remote villages, and eventually bury their bodies in the dirt consecrated for Orcus. 

Captive non-humans, elves and dwarves, were unwanted as soldiers of the future undead army of Orcus (for Orcus was a devil brought about by human sin), so after proper torture, degradation, and murder, the bodies of any non-humans were burned in a kiln that the Orcus priests trapped a fire elemental within.  

In the year 40 of the new age, 60 years ago, the cult got greedy and instead of the usual furtive and secret capture of a select few unwary folk from year to year, attacked a well-guarded Acherian noble caravan going through the pass, as they had a surplus of living slaves to force into battle. A dozen captives were taken. Among them was Grunhix Maxima, the young niece of the then Acherian Emperor Decemberious Maximus The Third. Grunhix was on a sightseeing tour of the trade roads to the west.

The Emperor back in Acheria met with his royal Oracles,and was told of the cult and what they did with captives. The forces he sent to destroy the cult on the top of the mountain found the trail up The Spine to be treacherous, as both guards, slaves, and landslides were sent down to rain devastation upon them. The troops camped at the bottom of the mountain, and the emperor sent them three high priests of the Acherian Empires cruelest and most powerful gods of the time. A priest of Borias, God of the North Wind and Winter, a priest of Jubilex, lord of slime and corrosion, and the priest of Flambix, Goddess of flames and wartime destruction. The powerful Flambix priest personally killed the Orcus priests and their mad slave defenders, the priest of Jubilex cursed the underground temple with acidic green slime to keep the complex uninhabitable, and the priest of Borias covered the mountain top and its graves of woe with eternal winter. 

Ironically, it was a few handful of years before the Kingdom of Tanmoor ousted Acherian forces from the western kingdom and gained independence, and the great East/West pass became far less travelled. 

Apparently, there is a village at the base of The Broken Spine Peaks that was founded by the last freed slave of the Cult. 

But the temple of Orcus at the top of the spine still sits, quiet and undisturbed.  Only fear, and the constant chill of never-ending winter on the mountaintop, keeps the greedy away from any possible wealth there.

So a nice sense of grittiness there. This will be the first several games. I purposefully have no plans yet for the rest of the campaign. I wanted it to be open depending on the characters and hooks they get and so forth. So the characters are:

Female dwarf fighter

Female gnome wizard

half elf ranger (grasslands)

human fighter (cavalier)

Half elf warlock

(Pic unavailable)

I think it's an interesting and diverse group. More to come

Cheers

Favorite board game obsessions of recent years part 4 - Dead of Winter

OK, though Talisman will probably remain a forever fave of me and my fellow board warriors in my group, DoW has become a close second. 

My local besties B & L sold their house and hit the road in a huge pick up and a luxury mobile trailer to see the country. Until we discovered Talisman had a digital online version, our gaming pretty much halted. But last summer, when they were managing a nice RV park near Salt Lake City, I made the 6 hour drive to spend a few nights in one of the parks hotel rooms, and besides hiking in the local national park (and spending a bit of time in the RV parks rustic pub) we spent most of our time  playing the shit out of the board games I have mentioned previously, but especially our newest jam Dead of Winter. 

Here is Board Game Geeks description:

 "Crossroads" is a game series from Plaid Hat Games that tests a group of survivors' ability to work together and stay alive while facing crises and challenges from both outside and inside. Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game, the first title in this series, puts 2-5 players in a small, weakened colony of survivors in a world in which most of humanity is either dead or diseased, flesh-craving monsters. Each player leads a faction of survivors, with dozens of different characters in the game.

Dead of Winter is a meta-cooperative psychological survival game. This means players are working together toward one common victory condition, but for each individual player to achieve victory, they must also complete their personal secret objective, which could relate to a psychological tick that's fairly harmless to most others in the colony, a dangerous obsession that could put the main objective at risk, a desire for sabotage of the main mission, or (worst of all) vengeance against the colony! Games could end with all players winning, some winning and some losing, or all players losing. Work toward the group's goal, but don't get walked all over by a loudmouth who's looking out only for their own interests!

Dead of Winter is an experience that can be accomplished only through the medium of tabletop games, a story-centric game about surviving through a harsh winter in an apocalyptic world. The survivors are all dealing with their own psychological imperatives, but must still find a way to work together to fight off outside threats, resolve crises, find food and supplies, and keep the colony's morale up.

Dead of Winter has players making frequent, difficult, heavily-thematic, wildly-varying decisions that often have them deciding between what's best for the colony and what's best for themselves. The rulebook also includes a fully co-operative variant in which all players work toward the group objective with no personal goals.

That all sounds cool, and in reality its all true. There is a certain amount of complexity (nothing like some of the more popular Lovecraft games) but its fairly easy to pick up if you are focused at least for the first hour of the game. Most of its mechanics are intuitive. 

So you are living in a walled off community. You each start with two characters, with stats related to fighting, leadership ability, and scavenging. For instance the soldier has a high charisma and fighting ability, while the schoolteacher has improved scavenging in the school location. There are not hit points per se, but exposure to the elements and the zombie hoards outside can inflict wounds, and a zombie bite might outright kill you, and endanger others (if you get bit near others then you have to roll exposure for them - basically the dead character is now a zombie attacking them. A lot of elements in this game you have to make assumptions like that because, thankfully, the creators didn't want to waste to much of your time on fiddly details). 

The colony has its problems from turn to turn. When you use resources the trash piles up, affecting morale. You also need a certain amount of food to keep every body happy (besides characters there are a few nameless non coms you have to take care of). You are constantly trying to maintain a balance to keep morale from going down.

Besides taking out trash and such, the characters can go outside on their turn (rolling for exposure to the weather and zombie bites each time) and do some scavenging for food, weapons, medicine, and tools. Locations include the school, police station, grocery, and library. Just like the colony gates these areas can become overrun with zombies, so killing them now and again is a good tactic to keep things from going out of control. If a place gets overrun then characters start dying. 

When starting a new game you pull a card for the entire games tone and goal (keeping people fed, worrying about the trash, finding a certain amount of medicine, etc). Each turn you pull a card for that turns immediate goal (just lesser versions of the main game goal) and each turn another player will pull a crossroads card for you before your turn. That card has certain events that happen to a character on their turn, and often depends on certain things like if a particular character is in play or an action the character might take. Crossroads might also include an immediate event that almost always includes a choice to be made. Maybe you encounter a bus load of kids and have to decide if you can take them in and feed them, or if you abandon them (often all players vote on the outcome). Morale is often involved here. 

Then there is the goal of each player. At the start of a game each players secretly pulls a card for that. It might include things like end the game with a certain amount of guns, or to have a certain amount of characters under your control. Mixed in with these random motivations and requirements is a traitor card. There is a good chance a player will pull one, and buddy, these can be a pain. It usually requires that the game ends with zero morale on the board and you needing to fulfill certain requirements similar to the turn by turn cards. These are often seemingly impossible feats to accomplish. You need to work at fulfilling your requirements and lowering the colony morale without tipping off the others that you are a traitor. The players can vote to kick somebody out, and that just makes it all harder. Though being a bad guy in plain site can be fun. A nothing to lose scenario. I had a habit of pulling the traitor card in more than half the games we played, and had concluded that they were impossible. But in one of our last sessions I actually pulled a win out of my ass in the final turn. I needed morale to go zero, and I needed to have more characters in hand than anybody else. It wasn't going to happen, but suddenly the stars were right. Morale was low. I realized only one player had more characters than me.  I managed to get a crossroads card that gave me two more characters, evening me up with another player. I still had a move left so I had my karate guy move to a location with somebodies janitor character and kill him in a fight. That allowed me to have the most characters and brought morale to zero to end the game. It was an exciting win in a game that most of the time everybody loses, and it took the other players by complete surprise. So if you are the traitor it can pay to wait things out and hope the stars are right for a win in the final turns. 

There seems to be endless variation because not only are there a lot of characters to choose from, there are tons of all the cards. The crossroads deck is huge. So no games should ever play the same twice. 

I love a lot of the characters, but one of the funniest is the mall Santa. An old drunk who still wears his suit, the colony actually gets a boost in morale if he dies. 

Like Epic Spell Wars and King of Tokyo, this happens to be another game I encountered on Will Wheaton's Tabletop show (I actually saw it in a store originally but watching the episode cinched me buying it). I find it one of the most entertaining episodes and it features the late Grant Imahara and Ashely Johnson of Critical Role and The Last of Us fame. Its especially fun because you don't find out who the traitor is till the end of the episode, and its a great twist. 

There are other editions of the game I have yet to sample, but that in itself might be a good reason to go to a convention for the board game room. 

Its another long form game, usually taking 3 hours for three players. On game days we liked to play a game of this, and if we had another hour or so do a few shots of our shorter games. I love this game and King of Tokyo and Spell Wars, so days I got to play all of them were a great day for me. 

Oh, also, I love the art by Fernanda Suarez. There are certainly some beautiful looking people in the apocalypse.