You are standing in a field...

Otherness: Session 12 was held this last Sunday at the Fantasy Flight Games Event Center, which is a really great place to game. The staff was friendly and accommodating, and someone actually took a picture of Will's whitebox and LBBs, along with my copies of Greyhawk and Gods, Demigods, & Heroes---they claimed their friends wouldn't believe that someone was still playing with these rules. :) Carl was, unfortunately, working there, but he was at least able to catch some of what was going on.

So, I had a last minute inspiration and started the group out "standing in a field, west of a white house." Those of you as old as me may well remember those opening lines to Zork, the venerable text adventure game from Infocom. I think Will was the only one who picked up on it right away, but it was worth it. I didn't stick slavishly to all the details, but the main stuff was in there (D&Dized, of course) as noted on the map above. Once they opened the trap door in the living room, it led, not into the Great Underground Empire, but instead the somewhat less-whimsical Long Tombs.

I created the map for the Long Tombs using this random dungeon generator. AFAIC, it's the best out there. And, we decided to give up on mapping, so I just plunked it down on the table, showed them where they were, and they chose where they wanted to go. I noticed no angst.

As for characters, Will played Aldmore, 3rd lvl MU; Susan played Sydney, 1st lvl Fighting Girl (or Battle Maiden, as we started referring to her); Jesse, returning to game with us again after an absence, played Treehorn the 1st lvl MU; Trevor played his 2nd lvl MU Narpet, as well as running Ashley's cast-off FG (whose name is currently escaping me), and Max played a 2nd lvl three-headed dog named, of course, Rex.

Some Highlights

• The mailbox contained a mummified hand holding a piece of parchment that read, "Go not into the Long Tombs."
• The characters found a brass lanthorn that, once polished, produced a warm, golden light that seemed to be the only thing that dispelled the oppressive darkness in the attic---all other light sources guttered out as the steps were mounted.
• Trevor's FG was attacked by something in the darkness of the attic. A Grue? 
• Sydney claimed a sword from the living room display case with old Elvish writing on the blade stating, Strike Once Slay Thrice.
• In the Long Tombs, they ran into a hideous, giant, scarlet amoeba with three glaring eyes and a fanged sphinctermouth. This was rolled up using Geoffrey McKinney's excellent supplement Carcosa. I've been itching to use the random Spawn of Shub-Niggurath generator for some time now... Even at 7 HD, they managed to kill it AND take its eyeballs...
• At the very end of our adventuring time, they ran into four dwarves, possibly another party of adventurers. Jesse decided to roll the Black Die of Fate (otherwise known as as 30-sided die given to me on my last birthday.) All were informed that a roll of one would be horrendous, and a roll of 30 would be wondrous. He rolled a 9, and another dwarf came around the corner, carrying a crossbow. He panicked at the sight of Rex, and fired. The bolt missed Rex; however, Treehorn was standing right behind him, and was hit for maximum damage (right between the eyes!), killing him instantly. Fate is indeed a fickle mistress...
• Jesse has introduced four characters to Otherness in two sessions, and three of them have died. That's oldskool, baby!

A hat trick? Is that right?

This post is more than a month overdue at this point, but I'm a-tryin' to catch up. I may well forget some details, but, you know, nothing important. I hope.

Above is a map of GRISTLEHELM so far. Actually, I'm cheating a bit because I forgot to take a picture for this particular session. So, this map is actually from Session 9, which we played just this last Sunday. Confused yet? Ah, just look at the map---it's a thing of beauty. T.J. even colored in the spaces...

This was a crazy session from the get-go: my brother and sister-in-law were going to be in town for a concert on Sunday (the day we played), which I knew, but they decided to come the night before (they live in Omaha) and surprise me by showing up to play! Which I was! Too cool.

So we ended up with a huge party: nine players---the largest since our very first session. Will played the ever-present Melvin; my son Max made a new goblin character named Spike-of-the-Death, who fought with two daggers; my sister-in-law played a hobbit Thief named Catgut Dogskin; my brother reprised his role as Loric the elf, acting as a Fighting Man; Larry played Nimfitz the elf, acting as a Magic User; Carl played Mondlach the Magic User; T.J. started out playing Punka (are you guessing where my title comes from yet?) the Fighting Man; Steve played Mardias the Fighting Man; and Jesse (aka giantbat, our newest player!) played Saas the Cleric. Whew. I played the DM.

Some Highlights

• In one of the first rooms entered, both Punka and Saas were killed in a savage melee with hobgoblins (what is it with hobgoblins?!) I'm pretty sure Jesse in second place for quickness of new character death (right behind my friend Bill, who's character died in the first moments of the first room entered in our very first session...) This was sad, but Jesse...simply flipped to the next page of his notebook. He had come prepared with three characters! Pure old school, ladies and gentlemen. His next character was another Cleric named Marjoram, and T.J. rolled up a thief which, when he carried over his experience from Punka, turned out to be 3rd level (Punka had been 2nd level.) Death sometimes has its benefits...
• In another previously explored room, an old wine cellar, some of them thought a bit of a drink might be good. Marjoram, devotee of some jolly Finnish deity, broke off a bottleneck, took a swig (DM rolls a d6), failed a save vs. poison, swelled up, choked, and died. "She's dead?", someone asked. "Yup." Other characters quietly put the bottles back or stuck them in backpacks to use on gullible monsters...
• Jesse's third (and final) character, Pelf the Thief (you know, T.J.'s new Thief, Guppy, caught up with the party at some point, too, I just don't remember when...) found the rest of the party just after they had opened a tightly stuck door. Once dislodged, it expelled strange fumes; most of them failed a save vs. poison, which allowed me to roll many more d6s: Mardias and Melvin both suddenly not only believed that they were the last Lord Gristlehelm, but found they had perfect knowledge of the entire dungeon. Both immediately took off for parts unknown. Catgut and Nimfitz's hireling Veri both believed they were dead, and so collapsed to the floor. Nimfitz believed that he was a boa constrictor, and so began trying to constrict the "dead" Veri. Spike-of-the-Death believed he was a tree frog, and began making hopping leaps at the wall, trying to stick to it. Alan, Melvin's hireling, believed he was a gorilla, and so thumped his chest and tried to groom Catgut. Loric, Mondlach, Guppy and, soon, Pelf, looked on bemusedly. I'm pretty sure they stopped Nimfitz when he tried to swallow Veri... The room itself was bubbled, burned, charred, and empty.
• Melvin and Mardias came back to their senses in complete darkness. Luckily, Melvin's magic sword glows, and so they saw they were standing in what looked like a corridor with two dead-ends. Melvin concentrated on Alan, I believe, and proved without a doubt, as the sword pulled him forward, that part of its magic was locating objects... they did eventually find the secret door and the rest of the party.
• In a niche in an otherwise unassuming corridor, they found a gigantic golden head, a bust of the evilly leering last Lord Gristlehelm. About six feet high and four feet in diameter, T.J. calculated via iphone that it probably weighed in the neighborhood of 45 tons. Catgut climbed up on top of it, but couldn't find anything useful. Much discussion ensued about what the hell to DO with the thing. Finally, Melvin decided to chop off the nose with his magic sword. This worked, but his failed save vs. spells resulted in his face drawing up into a mirror-image of Gristlehelm's awful leer. Net result? His already low charisma was halved (down to three, I believe...) At some point here they were attacked by an ogre and a wolf, but took them down, with a sleep spell and some arrows. Man, adventurers are savage...
• They discovered what must have been a wizard's workroom, which ended up having a strangely thin wall on one side. Pelf broke through into a corridor where the mournful ghosts of dwarves stopped their work and pointed to a finely made dwarven hand axe, embedded in the wall. Pelf picked it up, and the ghosts faded away...
• Two doors in the room had complicated glyphs carved on them. Both were locked. When Guppy tried to pick one, it blasted flames at him, which he mostly avoided...

At this point, with our Real World time running out, they decided to leave and return to die another day...