To any and all interested,
I'm running a BW event entitled "The Provincial Life" at NC Gameday on Saturday 9/25 in Raleigh (a NCSU student center to be semi-precise). As of now, it's schedule to run from 3pm to 7pm.
It's an original adventure stressing role-play, investigation, and intrigue punctuated with the potential for one or more intense BW combats depending on the path PC's take. Here's the intro from the website:
"The best day of Aeric's life was when he graduated from the Imperial Academy of Sorcery and was commissioned as an Imperial Mage. It was also one of his worst days when he then found out his first posting would be to the backwater province of Graymoor assisting Preceptor Aulderfast, a sorceror with a reputation for eccentricity and secrecy... hardly the fast track to success.
A year later, Aeric finds himself terminally bored, stuck in a province where nothing happens. But then a mysterious letter arrives from Aulderfast, who is away to the east with Baron Graymoor. The letter speaks of failing wards and possible trouble at Aulderfast's secret laboratory and commands Aeric to gather a company of adventurers and investigate. Adventure at last! "
Pre-gen characters will be provided. I'm thinking about posting them on this thread as I create them. Would love the feedback.
http://ncgameday.dhorizon.org/
Sounds pretty cool, Ubby. I'd love to see what you've got!
ok Ub,
what's the goal of this scenario? What are some possible outcomes?
What characters are participating and how are they involved?
-L
As much as I'd love to, I know 2 of the registered players read these forums, so I don't want to post any spoilers. I will say that there is an initial incident at a mage's secret lab that the PC's will investigate, analyze clues, and react to. After that I've tried to design the scenario to be matrix based and provide 2 or 3 leads at each scene. Its a lot of extra work, much of which will never see the light of day in the game, but I think the best scenarios are non-linear ones with actual PC choice. Also, the modular nature allows me to adjust depending on whether the scenario is running too fast or too slow. Anyway, each scene will add to the picture and ultimately lead to a climatic scene. As its a one-shot, it'll have a decisive feel.
The Pre-gens will have a wide array of skills and I'm tuning the scenes accordingly. I'm also tuning the BITs.
I've burned 2 of the pre-gens, and I'm going to try to write a brief background on each at lunch. I'll post them when they're done.
I have posted 5 pre-gens over in the Wheel of Life section. I plan on posting 2 more, a hedge-knight eager to find employment and glory, and a dwarven tinkerer who is fascinated by magic.
I plan on having only 5 players at the event, but I wanted to offer a variety of characters, and show off the strengths of BW character creation. I may use one other pre-gen as a "GM's Voice" NPC depending on characters selected.
I have tried to set the foundations of a "party" with some similar beliefs and common contacts. I plan on bringing them together with some more common threads in the adventure introduction.
I have to say that burning these characters was the most intensive and rewarding part of creating this adventure. While the adventure itself is generic enough to be run with most any system, BW really makes the characters come to life... in fact I've tweaked the adventure based on elements of the characters that came out in the burning process.
In case you haven't noticed, I'm really thrilled with BW.
The game was a blast. While I had only 3 players (it was a small local con), it was definitely a case of quality versus quantity. The players were great roleplayers and had a great chemistry with each other. TGryph and Andy from the forums played along with a gentlemen named Travis whom I hope will be appearing on the forums, as he said he had a great time as well.
TGryph played Aeric the Sorcerer, Andy played Savain the former noble turned Grasshopper, and Travis played Jak Tarn, the young, naieve, and lucky local boy done good. Due to the party size and plot elements I played Arcenzo Kell, young courtier and close friend to Aeric, as an NPC. This worked out well as TGryph and I are friends in real life, and we were able to capture the characters' friendship. Again, all of these characters' backstories and character info are in the Wheel of Life forum.
The adventure is set in a backwater province of a Britain-esque fantasy empire, where Aeric is an Imperial Mage subordinate to another Imperial Mage named Preceptor Aulderfast. The province is on the brink of war with a neighboring rival which draws the Baron and his advisor, Aulderfast, off to the east, leaving Aeric to sort of mind the shop back at Moorwind Keep, the provincial seat. The players randomly picked some pre-written rumor cards I had written, to give each one of them some local knowledge they could later add via roleplaying. I also provided maps of the province and town of Graymoor.
The adventure begins when Aeric receives a letter from Aulderfast delivered by an exhausted messenger. The letter instructs Aeric to investigate Aulderfast's secret laboratory in a forest 10 miles to the north east. Aulderfast senses that his wards have been triggered and that something is amiss. Aulderfast demands that discretion be of the upmost importance. Aulderfast also warns Aeric that it might be dangerous so he should seek out a discreet escort. Aeric recruits his friend Arcenzo, and the femme fatal Savain. Arcenzo agrees because of his friendship and the chance for adventure, Savain agrees in exchange for Aeric's assistance in tracking down a murderous sorcerer from her past. They also recruit Jak Tarn since Jak knows the province as well as anybody, and he is eager to help. Travis said it best when he said that he pictured Jak as combination of Legolas and Eek the Cat. This whole scene was role-played amazingly well and set the tone for the rest of the session.
The party arrives and investigates the lab, which has been ransacked. The party also discovers that the lab's vault has been broken into. Inside the vault they find the smeared remnants of a Prison Circle... but no occupant. This prompts Aeric to read a second letter from Aulderfast, whose instruction was to only read it in the event the vault was disturbed. The party learns that 10 years ago Aulderfast, the Baron, the local priest Dyar Naesean, and the local crazy hermit Gaius, a practitioner of the Old Ways (a Summoner), fought and imprisoned a demon summoned by a cult of Darkness Worshippers called the Hel Shezhar by binding him with a Talisman. While the hermit wanted to dismiss the demon back to the Abyss, Aulderfast and the priest convinced the Baron to let them keep the demon (now in the form of a simple older man) imprisoned to study him. The party finds evidence that the Hel Shezar is responsible for rescuing the demon from the lab, and that the Hel Shezar may be related to a merchant party sitting at the carvan grounds in Graymoor, waiting for the brewing war in the east to lift.
Aulderfast tells them that while the demon is free from the lab, the only way to remove the talisman, thereby restoring the demon to power, is by a dark ritual which can only be done at midnight of a full moon... 4 days hence. The party can now either stop the ritual and/or destroy the demon by stabbing him with an enchanted dagger (found in the lab) with a hollow pommel that can inject poison on a successful stab. Aulderfast leaves the party with a list of 3 ingredients necessary to create a poison that can destroy the demon.
The party elected to go the route of gathering the ingredients. First they go to a nearby convent of a healing faith to obtain a rare herb that only they grow. They discover that the convent was attacked by 2 large cloaked figures the night the laboratory was ransacked, and that a "pure" acolyte was abducted. The party rightly guesses their problems are related and bargains for a sprig of the herb in return for seeking out and rescuing the abducted girl. On the way back to Graymoor, the party encounters the local Warden, nemesis to the local characters, who tries to learn what they are up to. Remembering they need to act discreetly (because of the consequences to the Baron, priest, and of course Aulderfast if it became known that they conspired to keep a demon for the sake of study) they manage to not give away anything.
Back in Graymoor, the party splits up. Savain acquires the second ingredient, charcoal from a forge used to create weapons. She does so from the local smith. Aeric searches the arcane laboratory in Moorwind for the last ingredient, quicksilver. He is unsuccessful. During his search, he crosses path with Chancellor Blye, Aulderfast's chief political rival (the Warden is the Chancellor's lackey). Very cool role play where Blye also presses him for what they're up to, but doesn't succeed. Aeric then goes to the local apothecary in search of quicksilver. The apothecary has none, but by pressing him he learns that the local crazy hermit Gaius is known to possess unusual ingredients for his heretical ways. Jak investigates the caravan grounds and discovers two wagons bearing the same trademark as a button found in the laboratory. Several gruff guards chase him off.
Next the party sought out the hermit Gaius to seek out the quicksilver they needed. They found him atop Dead Witch Hill in the ruin of a standing stone circle where the pagans of the Old Ways practiced their rituals. Dead Witch Hill is of course haunted, and the party had to deal with disturbing noises, shadows, and movement out of the corner of their eye. It was a great ambience scene, and the players peformed Steel checks on their own without prompting, which was very cool. Aeric cast The Sense and was immediately barraged with a flashback scene to several hundred years ago when Imperial knights and soldiers took the hill and slaughtered the pagans. Of course their spirits remained...
Driving themselves to the top they encountered Gaius, who harangued them for Aulderfast's mistake of not dispelling the demon in the first place. He indeed have quicksilver, but the party would have to convince him to give it to them. I really really wished I had the Duel of Wits rules for this scene, but instead I went the way of "answer me these riddles 3". I gave the party 3 riddles. Very cool moment when each player actually answered one of the riddles successfully. Having obtained the quicksilver they hurried back to Graymoor to make the tincture necessary to destroy the demon.
In the interests of the adventure, I let Aeric test his Enchantment skill to create the tincture. He burned a lot of Artha but he got it done over the course of one full night (hooray for open ended dice). The next day, the day of the full moon, Aeric rested while the others went back to the Hel Shezar caravan to ascertain where the Ritual would take place. I had created a full encounter for it, but the session time was starting to run short, so they were able to discover the location through stealth. They learned that the ritual was to take place in an altar recently uncovered in a mine some 20 miles distant. (The cavern discovery, which took place several months prior, was one of the rumors the players had at the beginning of the game. They suspected it was there, but there were enough red herrings planted that they couldn't be sure.)
By using a contact (the Keep's stablemaster), the party is able to obtain horses (gotta love those contacts). They press on hard for the mine. Of course they come across the Warden once again, who had been investigating the robbery and violent murder of the gem merchant of Basserton, the village that supports the mining community. The party learns that 2 larged cloaked figures brazenly broke into his house, took a very large gem and killed him. The party deduces that the gem is necessary for the Dark Ritual. In an unexpected moment, Savain reveals all that is going on and tries to enlist the Warden's help. Her gamble doesn't pay off, and the Warden, a coward, flies back to Graymoor and to the Chancellor.
The party enters the mine as the hour of the Ritual draws closer. They discover a map that indicates where the new cavern is. They steathily entered deeper into the cavern where they encounter a T-intersection. To the left they hear sobbing and guess that it's the abducted acolyte, and to the right they see light and hear words. The party chooses to go right.
They sneak up on a make shift altar and lab. They discover the demon, still in the body of an old man wearing the talisman, and a sorcerer who is the object of Savain's revenge. The party discusses their plan, when all hell breaks loose. The "2 large figures" prominent in the story, are actually orcs, and were in the left hand tunnel when the players chose right. They were sneaking up from behind, when one of them kicked a stone and made some noise (0 successes). In a flash Jak was drawing his bow (he had an arrow nocked), Savain was sprinting toward the demon with the prepared dagger in hand, and Aeric was casting a spell at the orcs. Basically here's what happened: Aeric cast a Shards spell at the orcs, mega-boosting it with all his remaining artha (including 1 Deeds point to double the dice... I was liberal with the starting Artha so they could see as much of the system as possible). He managed enough successes to knock them out. Jak Tarn let loose his arrow and managed to hit the dark sorcerer for a Superb wound to the head, instantly killing him (I guess he really did have the Lucky trait), and Savain, burning all of her artha, managed to sprint and lunge for the demon, wounding him (reduced stats for being "imprisoned") and successfully delivering the tincture. The demon swelled and exploded (ala Blade, unintentional but there it was) issuing a B5 wound to Savain in the process, but more importantly starting a cave-in.
The party fled out of the cavern, but not before Jak, in the moment of the night IMO, both rescued the priestess AND played his Instinct (When meeting new people, politely introduce myself) with the memorable line, "Hi, I'm Jak Tarn, I'm here to rescue you." The day had been won.
By then the session time was running out, and we were all pretty much spent from being jazzed by that ending. It was a great time and we all had a blast. Everybody really loved the system.
I just wished it was the beginning of a campaign, because the cat's out of the bag, and there is the reckoning between the Chancellor, Aulderfast, and the PC's to be had...
TGryph
09-29-2004, 10:25 PM
I have to echo my boy Ubby's sentiments..an excellant time was had by all, due in no small part to his story and GM skillls. It was great to get out, meet new players, and do some more "burnin'" :)
Thanks again Ubby for a great scenario and a big howdy and thanks to Andy K and Travis.
Hope to see you all soon!
TGryph
(aka Aeric the Apprentice Sorceror / Arrogant SOB)
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