Quail Valley Session 6 (SW)

When we last left our party, they had spent a couple of more days exploring the tunnels and caverns below the Lonesome Drake (and Presov), encountering more giant and normal sized cockroaches and a massive nest with the queen. A door bearing the mark of the Birds of Prey had also been found. After various futile attempts to open it, they determined that both it and rings being worn by Wink and Raspin were all magical. Both Wink and Raspin pushed on the door with their “ring hand” together and it swung open. That is where we pick up below the break.

It has been over two months since we last played this campaign. Various scheduling conflicts (and an approaching hurricane) kept us from having a quorum of players for a considerable time. I think this is about the longest gap in playing where I tried to continue on with a campaign rather than just starting a new one. It is very hard for me to keep interest in a campaign if we aren’t playing on a regular basis, but we’re going to give it a go tonight with a much delayed sixth session.

There have also been a few changes. You may have also noticed that the title doesn’t have BFRPG in parentheses; it has SW. That’s because we’ve switched over to Savage Worlds. During our long hiatus from the campaign, we played a little Savage Worlds at RJ’s request. It is a game system that we’ve played quite a bit, one that I enjoy quite a bit, and one that I find very easy to run. Hannah and Teresa are also no longer playing so Thorn and Siobhan have left the party. I’m giving everyone a couple of weeks to get adjusted to the new system and to tweak their characters. Once they are final, I’ll post them.

This recap is from Rachel and we had all four regular players in attendance plus Claudia who quickly adjusted to the fact that RJ has turned Raspin into something of an alcoholic. As usual, my GM comments are in [brackets and italics]. There are potential spoilers for The Vault of Larin Karr below the break.

After Raspin and Wink held the two rings up against the stone door with the Birds of Prey symbol on it, the door opened to a room. We went in and saw that this looked like a way station of sorts for the adventuring group—there were a couple bunks, a desk and chair (the desk held a torn blank piece of paper—it fit the map and note on torn paper that we found in the scroll tube [in the initial cockroach nest that Raspin dug through]), 2 open casks with arrows and torches, a capped barrel of stale but still drinkable water, hooks with lengths of silk rope, a crate full of flasks of lamp oil, and some hard tack and cheese that were past their prime. It looked like this room had not been visited for years.

After stocking up on some of the supplies we headed out through the door on the far side of the room from where we entered. The door opened to a room with a spiral staircase going up. There was an empty room at the top with a short hallway to the right leading to a door that was barred on our side. We were a bit cautious about unbarring it so Wink magically created a small opening so we could see through the door—we heard dripping water and saw a short hall opening up to a larger room.

[Elemental manipulation to a stone door equals instant peephole. We are using a no power point option for this campaign.]

We unbarred and went through the door and short hallway. There was a large round room with stone steps around the outside going up to the left of us and down to the right of us. There was water about 30 feet down from where we entered and we heard and saw vigorous thrashing down there. Pseudopods started climbing up the walls toward us but we were able to stay out of their reach as we headed up the stairs. We had tied ourselves together in case someone lost their footing before heading up the stairs. About 90 feet above the door we came in was an alcove with a door with the Birds of Prey symbol.

[The steps were small platforms of stone that jutted out from the walls of the chamber with nothing connecting one step to the other. Imagine a fire escape with just the steps and that’s essentially what the party was climbing up.]

Cailana tried to open the door quietly but it scraped a little and she heard a voice say something she couldn’t understand. Luckily Raspin heard it as well and understood the goblin for “oh sh!t!” Raspin called out (in goblin as well) to the goblin(s) not to attack us and that we are powerful sorcerers. We heard about six sets of small feet run off as we started moving into the room. The room had a lot of goblin debris where we entered with a ledge about 10 feet up across the room. Upon climbing up on the ledge we found goblin bedrolls, a fire pit and some dolls.

[Raspin had passed the magic ring that he wore to Cailana and then the door opened. The players suspected that it was this ring that opened the prior door as it had been found with the map and note from the Birds of Prey in one of the cockroach nests. This pretty much confirmed it for them.

I had Muse make a stealth check to see if the door made sound as it opened. The failure meant that a few bones had been scattered about on the other side of the door and this is what caused the scraping sound.]

There was a hole in the ceiling about fifteen feet up, and then a tunnel went another thirty feet up from the hole. Raspin called up a threat and the goblins moved a board over the opening at the end of the tunnel. With Utazas’ assistance, Serena boosted Cailana’s athleticism and Raspin lifted Cailana closer up to the hole. Cailana was able to climb up and push the board off the hole then lower a rope down so the rest of us could climb up and join her.

We were in another room with a hole in the ceiling. At the far end was a carved devil-like head in the wall, with a big mouth as a doorway through which light was visible. Several goblins dropped down [a rope in the shaft leading up] and we took care of them pretty quickly. One goblin surrendered and Raspin was able to get some information from him. The goblin said the boss and about six other goblins are upstairs. The boss has a treasure room that he will not let anyone else enter and the goblin said he was a jackass several times. The goblin told us that going through the mouth doorway leads to a bridge crossing a gully and comes out in some woods.

[Raspin is the only party member who speaks goblin.

The bridge leads to some other chambers which exit through a tree into the woods…just to be exact. 😉]

At Raspin’s direction, the goblin called to the boss to throw down the rope but the boss said no. When we threatened to come up, a board and tree stump were moved to cover the hole. Faelan turned himself into a small lizard and climbed up to the board and stump, peeking through a hole. He saw the boss and about six other goblins around the hole. After he reported back, Cailana climbed up and stuck some oil-soaked cloths up into the board, then came back down and shot flaming arrows at them so they would set the board on fire. It worked and the board and stump fell to the floor in the room where we were.

Raspin called up in goblin that if they throw the boss down we will let the others live. After a quick scuffle above, a loud buzzing noise started above and five goblins jumped through the hole, dying as they hit the floor after the forty-five foot drop.

[There were some goblin screams as well that coincided with the start of the loud buzzing noise.]

Faelan climbed up as a small lizard again to peek through the now open hole. A goblin spotted him right away [acing that notice check] and tried to eat him as they both fell down the hole. Faelan quickly changed back to his regular form and lucky for him, broke his fall on the goblin, who died on impact. Faelan sustained a little damage but Serena was able to heal him quickly.

[This was a nice example of the Savage Worlds Soak mechanic in action. The damage from the fall was pretty significant, a total of four wounds so it would result in incapacitation. RJ elected to soak and took it from four wounds to a single wound. Although Faelan fell in a manner such that it looked like had broken his back, the goblin was beneath him and Faelan had only cracked some ribs instead. A relatively minor wound that Serena magically healed.]

Cailana climbed up the hole with assistance from Serena, Raspin, and Wink, who created a hook for her to loop a rope on at the top of the hole [more elemental manipulation]. The goblin boss sent swarms of hornets at her but fortunately she was not hurt by the first swarms. As Cailana climbed up into the room, the boss sent more swarms of hornets at her.

[One thing got left out here. As Cailana was climbing up the shaft, a goblin peered over the edge and spotted her…she was carrying a torch with her which did make it pretty easy for the goblins to know someone was coming. As it stared at her, the goblin was shoved into the shaft…presumably by the goblin boss above. The falling goblin narrowly missed Cailana sparing her from a fall.