Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Gehenna Expedition

Having fought the vampire titan Avalos Gemini into an interplanar retreat, Revan Ward of Khadghar and Inquisitor Joseph Prax began planning a pursuit and an attack. Research revealed the villian to have some kind of connection to the Purple Order, perhaps. Also, his location was roughly determined: a pocket plane of Gehenna.

Upon purchasing a scroll allowing a large Gate spell to be cast, Fergus flew the party, along with a small army into the unknown aboard the modified drow spelljammer Impervious through the mystical veil. Included among this army were Geena, Lola Elizabeth Swan, Revan, Joseph, Mick the Gangly, Black-Eyed Bill, a team of dwarven seige engineers, and a great variety of experts, clerics, mages, and fighters. Among these fighters was Phil's bugbear named Dante, or snotface or something (I can't remember and I don't have my notes).

Through eerie blue-green light that seemed to come from every direction, they flew for days, searching the strange landscape of floating blue rock hills. No living thing could be seen. Swampy cloudlike floating lakes pierced the endless sky. At last, the titan's citadel came into view, gothic architecture stretching in every direction. It's great doors measured over 100' tall, and each cathedral window glowed bright red. The Impervious could not get close enough, so everyone climbed onto the nearest asteroid-like blue rock/mountain.

Three titans emerged from the crenalated towers of the citadel with fluttering black capes and glowing hate-red eyes. A great wyrm came into view also, green and more enormous than any dragon the party had yet seen. The ensuing battle saw many strange and horrible scenes: loyal followers trying to swim across the floating lake to attack the citadel, some of them treading water, others drowning slowly in the low gravity. Grizlok the dragon, focusing on one opponent at a time to rend limb from limb: Gemberlion the gnome, a snot-faced bugbear, a mighty cleric... Titans focusing their "hate rays" of red and burning the stalwart attackers from within. Titans swinging huge greatclubs, smashing their foes. The enormous doors themselves speaking horrible things and biting any who approach too near. Dwarven seige engineers falling up into the sky, knocked off their perch by colossal arrows...

Revan charging his pegasus completely through the dragon, coming out the other side covered in its blood and bile as Grizlock turned his dying face to discover who had bested him.

The citadel, floating with mysteries still waiting within.

XP: 4,000. GP: none yet (in fact, a lot was spent prior to the adventure)
Next session: Sunday, January 7, noon.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Vs. The Vampire Titan

With the aid of magic and information provided by the kobold accountant Brom Sprickle, Revan, Taito, Joseph, Black-Eyed Bill, Geena, Fergus and Nightsong Sharpfang tracked down the drow army who had stolen the Vampire Titan Avolos Gemini's treasure. After a long journey involving jumping over rifts, climbing subterranian cliff faces, and magically crossing underground rivers, the party prepared for the coming battle through prayer, magic and planning. Several silenced arrows, lance charges, flying drunken master kidney punches, brimstone, rock-turning-to-mud-and-back rounds later, the 50 drow were defeated, with the last of the priestesses "WITCHES!" burning; the treasure lay in the rock under the tunnel path.
Then, the Vampire Titan and his four invisible henchmen came for their treasure. This battle was difficult, but with the party still "buffed" from the previous fight, it ended with the defeat of the four henchmen and the retreat of Avolos Gemini, the Vampire Titan.
We didn't play Star Wars.
Experience: 6,000. Treasure: 6,000 GP; 12 Gems (total value: 12,400 GP); Ring of Wizardry III; Ring of Freedom of Movement; Amulet of Health +6 ; and an old apothecary business book
Next session: Sunday, December 16, Noon.

Saturday, November 25, 2006

Magic "B.Y.O.B." (Bring Your Own Boosters) Draft

Today John E., Ian E., Jon G. and I enjoyed being the FINAL FOUR (out of 4) in a makeshift Magic: The Gathering CCG draft. We decided ahead of time that any 15 card, non-Unglued boosters would work fine, and brought 4 each (3 to use, 1 for the prize pot). John and Ian brought a lot of the new Time Spiral, which is a great set that features a lot of re-released cards and game mechanics. I brought 2 each of Champions and Saviors of Kamigawa and Jon brought some Guildpact and Kamigawa, and I think I even saw some Coldsnap so it was all relatively recent stuff. To me, to be honest, it would not have mattered much what cards were in the packs because playing Magic is just a lot of fun. Plus, it had been a long time since most of us had played.

Final ranking was 1. me (6-1), 2. John (5-3), 3. Ian (2-4), 4. Jon (1-6). I ran heavy white, with medium blue and a splash of black and artifacts. John included green/red, Ian used black/red and Jon ran white/green/blue. Read on if you're interested in more details.

During the draft, I saw some okay white and blue flying creatures and cards early, and they seemed to keep coming, so I stuck with those colors mostly. I only drafted a couple of red and green cards, but there were a few black cards I thought I just might use, because blue/white is weak on creature removal/control. In draft, artifacts are almost always useable, and I got three or four useable ones. I know I let a lot of good cards go and could have made some better choices for my deck but on the whole I was happy with the cards I chose as they came around.

The most memorable play of the game for me came late in game one of my first match, when John tapped 8 mana to play a red dragon, some kind of Hellkite (Shivan or Balduvian, I think) that's a 5/5 flyer and does 5 damage split any way among creatures or players when it comes into play. I countered it for 4uu with Draining Whelk (Flash (You may play this spell any time you could play an instant.) Flying. When Draining Whelk comes into play, counter target spell. Put X +1/+1 counters on Draining Whelk, where X is that spell's converted mana cost. 1/1 rare from Time Spiral. All of a sudden, with a card I had not planned on including in my deck at all because of its high casting cost, I had a 9/9 flyer! Incidently, that card has excellent artwork. I went on to go 2-1, winning the first and third games of the first match, but each game was long and close. John is an excellent player both in deckbuilding and game play, and a great guy too. He was topdecking well with an artifact, and made good use of massive red removal. His deck also produced excellent mana and some big green creatures that were difficult to deal with, and everything seemed to work together. Most of my creatures had a toughness of 3 or less, and kept all getting killed off at once. For me, Fortify (a white common instant from Time Spiral that gives all my creatures either +2/+0 or +0/+2) helped me a lot. I had two, and each time I used the card, I used for power, not toughness. So did Clockwork Hydra, an uncommon artifact creature that automatically "Tim's" for 1 whenever it attacks or blocks. My white and blue weenies and relatively low-casting cost fliers were the workhorses of my deck, but I think it was the surprise factor of instants like Fortify that won games. One of my favorite aspects of Magic is finding really useful commons.

The second match I played Ian, who had just beaten Jon 2-0 very quickly. His deck was a very fast and focused black/red Sligh style deck, well-tuned for draft. His deck had cool graveyard effects too. A guy this good, this young has real potential. I was a bit concerned that my life total might dip into the danger zone because so many of my cards (especially the fliers) cost 4 mana or more. But it seemed like every draw I got just what I needed. Thunder Totem (U, TS Artifact 3 tap: add w to your mana pool. 1ww: Thunder Totem becomes a 2/2 white Spirit artifact creature with flying and first strike until end of turn) helped speed my mana curve, as did my 1-cost (Drifter il-Dal, Children of Korlis) 2-cost (Silent-Chant Zubera, Fathom Seer) and 3-cost (Descendant of Kiyomaro, 2x Icatian Crier) creatures. It was interesting that Ian and I each had a creature with shadow in play in game 2. One of his favorite creatures was a black 3/1 with flanking for a casting cost of 2b, that is a common (I forgot it's name). What really saved me against stuff like that was first strike. Creatures like Shinen of Stars' Light (2w Creature-Spirit First strike Channel 1w, discard Shinen of Stars' Light: Target creature gains first strike until end of turn.) and especially artifacts like the Thunder Totem and also No-Dachi (2 Artifact--Equipment. Equipped creature gets +2/+0 and has first strike. Equip 3.) really did help. So did that splash of black, especially for Ostiary Thrull (3b, Creature--Thrull. W, tap: tap target creature 2/2). In the later part of the games, blue enforcers like Viscerid Deepwalker (4u Creature -- Homarid Warrior u: Viscerid Deepwalker gets +1/+0 until end of turn. Suspend 4 -- u) really came in handy too. The effect that caught my attention in the second match was the combo of Promise of Bunrei (2w Enchantment, whenever a creature you control is put into a graveyard from play, sacrifice Promise of Bunrei. If you do, put four 1/1 colorless Spirit creature tokens into play), Icatian Crier (2w, Creature--Human Spellshaper 1w, tap, Discard a card: Put two 1/1/ white Citizen creature tokens into play. 1/1) and Fortify. It's not hard to make white goblin-like hoards and pump them up quickly. I had two Criers and two Fortifies in my deck, and didn't pick up on the combo until we were actually playing. Promise of Bunrei is one rare that would be scary in a constructed enchantress-type deck, especially something with recursion...

When I played Jon in the third match, I could see early on what he was going for with the cards he had chosen for his deck. Although his deck shared colors with mine, he had more creature enchantments, while I had more creatures. One of my bigger fliers, Castle Raptors (4w, Creature--Bird Soldier Flying As long as Castle Raptors is untapped, it gets +0/+2 3/3) came in helpful, as did No-Dachi. I finally got to use Kaho, Minamo Historian (2uu Legendary Creature--Human Wizard, When Kaho, Minamo Historian comes into play, search your library for up to three instant cards and remove them from the game. Then shuffle your library. X, tap: You may play a card with converted mana cost X removed from the game with Kaho without paying its mana cost. 2/2), one of the reasons I drafted blue in the first place. What a great card. Unfortunately, in the game situation where he came up in game two I had to insult Kaho's ability by pumping him up with No-Dachi and just attacking with him, instead of using his ability.

Next D&D Game should be Sun, Dec. 3rd at noon

Next Magic: TBA.

Sunday, November 19, 2006

Slugs and Stormtroopers

In D&D today, the Joseph figured out that the party had just been to Olympus. The portal vanished and after exporing the cave further, Geena and Fergus discovered a narrow fissure in the wall, which the party followed for four periods of waking and sleeping ("days" are meaningless underground). The fissure opened into a huge chasm, and once the party climbed to the top of the ledge, observation and scrying unveiled more titan city ruins a quarter mile across, with bits of buildings on both sides, including a crypt, with pieces of titan bones sticking out of each cliff face. The party climbed (and/or fell) down to a ledge below, where they fought three giant acid-spitting slugs, each 5' in diameter, with slippery yet sticky thick hides. After what proved a difficult encounter, the group continued downward and discovered the ruins of a titan bank. "Oh great, more huge coins?" said Taito. No, it had been emptied a few days previously by the drow, according to the well-dressed kobold accountant who was the sole inhabitant of the empty vault. "I'm supposed to tell the owner of the vault it was the lizard men who took it. The drow tried to get me to implicate my own kind, to say it was kobolds, until I threatened to kill myself if they made me. That magic eye is watching. The vampire titan is going to be very upset when he comes back here for his money."
XP 2000 GP 0

Star Wars was pretty fun today, with the Akbar's Trap bunch up to their usual craziness. Crashing landspeeders until quickfoam spilled onto the duracrete. Disarming killing and misleading the endless supply of stormtroopers. Stealing plans for the Empire's newest underwater "maximum supression" war machines. Stuff like that.
XP 2000 Party credits 30,000

Remember, this coming Saturday (the 25th) we're playing Magic, so bring 4 boosters (or 60 random non-land cards).
Next D&D/Star Wars session should be December 3.

Sunday, November 05, 2006

Underdark Olympics?

Aaron J., Phil, Rod, Rob, Carson, Jon, Aaron E. all made it to today's D&D session. Welcome Aaron J. We were going to play upstairs but space looked a bit tight in the kitchen and the basement wasn't quite too cold this afternoon. We played D&D the whole session.

Picking up where we left off last time, within one of the clay pots in the ruins of the titan city market were found the recent remains of a halfling. Curious, High Inquisitor Joseph Prax did a raise dead on the body. As it turned out, Day-O, the halfling rogue, had been smashed by a titan's gargantuan warhammer about a week previously. The little halfling had been attempting to loot the market ruins on a solo expedition, and had the misfortune of getting caught in the act. Having explored the area a bit, the halfling discovered an area of loose gravel in the floor. After investigation, stonecunning, and excavation involving Geena and Gemberlion, a circular hole was revealed. A while later, the party had 150' of rope leading straight down into the unknown. Gemberlion was digging further when the bottom fell out from beneath him and he was falling into such a large underground chamber it seemed he was outside. Luckily, he was able to save himself from a crushing death by using his flying bicycle, which he had been using to cart debris to the surface of the hole.

Before long, the party had decended to the floor of the great chamber. There, a 35' tall carved arc of stone stood, with 10 symbols and glyphs in an old dialect of the giant tongue. As the party investigated the "henge," they found it to be much more greatly detailed than the crude structures of stone they had seen on the surface. They also noticed a path made of large stones, which formed a perfect circle. In the distance a gigantic tent and several flaming braziers could be seen. Soon, footsteps thundered. Day-O recognized the toga-clad titan who had crushed him the previous week. Already atop the stone arc, the rogue pushed buttons at random. Warm air rushed into the area. Suddenly, beyond the portal beckoned a bright cloudy mystery. All of the party but Noctorium went through, and the titan followed. Noctorium stood vigil; you never know when you might need a wizard friend on the other side of something like this, especially if you want to make sure you get back...

On the other side of the portal there was daylight. As their eyes adjusted, the group saw a tremendous stone sports arena, where "Olympic" events were being held, with "entries across time and space." Here, the titan who had seemingly followed them ignored the party completely and simply went about his business. In the place and time where the party arrived, the 10 events were: Javelin throw, 1-mile footrace, Greek-style wrestling, triple-jump, rowing, archery, water polo, maze race, diving, and two equestrian events: dresage and obstacle race. Delegations present included Goblonia (goblins), Kingdom of Orcus (ogres & orcs), Draconia (lizardmen), Titania (titans, the hosts; many magically reduced in size for fairness), Liliput (halflings), Garumoso (trolls), Fiveleaf (elves), Dargnagor (dwarves), Diamos (drow), Nilofanti-Nova (gnomes), and others (mostly unaffiliated and mongrelmen). Most of the judges were titans, however representatives of each of the races were included on the judges panel (Joseph, for example, represented the humans, who were otherwise represented only by the human members of the party).

Most of the rest of the game session consisted of the various competitions. I will relate here what I can remember to the best of my ability, with apologies for anything I'm mistaken about (but let me know and I'll edit this later): 1. In the Javelin Throw, the ogres and trolls dominated, but I think one of the party members got the bronze, either Revan or Taito. There was talk about "the incident," of a few years previously, when the goblin delegation went into the supply shed and began throwing javelins into the stands, killing a young titan girl when she was struck in the throat; security has since been increased. 2. The One Mile Footrace was held "indoors, out of the heat and wind," back through the portal the party had used earlier. Day-O managed to sabotage the track by raising one of the stones in the one-mile path, without getting caught. The titan, running his race at 6' instead of 25' for fairness, tripped on the stone and Taito ended up winning the gold. 3. Greek-Style Wrestling was also won by Taito, but the competition was pretty good. 4. The Triple-Jump was interesting, but I didn't write down who won. I think Revan got a medal. 5. Rowing was dominated by Black-Eyed Bill, Fergus and Taito, all of whom have spent many an hour wielding an oar at sea, arr! Medals for events with each type of boat, with one to six men or women were awarded. Even the gnomes managed a bronze, though they had to remove the footgears and propeller from their craft first to qualify. The Diamos Drow were caught by event judge Joseph Prax trying to use hawk on a rope to go faster, though they were losing anyway. Joseph's proposal to burn the drow as punishment was considered and dismissed, as was the idea of branding them. Incidently, each event is surrounded by an anti-magic shell for its duration, largely due to previous drow attempts at cheating. 6. Archery was won by Geena, a first ever for a female and a first ever for a dwarf. Elves took the silver, I think, and Revan or maybe Balthizor took the bronze. 7. Water Polo was ferocious, with the "Human/unaffiliated" team consisting of Black Eyed Bill, Revan, Fergus, Taito (I think) and a walruslike mongrelman goally. After beating the lizardmen favorites of Draconia, the team were defeated by the Garumoso Scrags (trolls), who had a lot of penalties but could not be stopped. The silver was the first medal ever for humans in this event. 8. The Maze Race, for which the minotaur team were barred after 500 consecutive golds, was in turn designed and administrated by the minotaur delegation, who focused entirely on it. Two identical mazes, one contestant at a time. Some come out alive, and some don't. Others have gone crazy or exited the maze with dehydration and starvation symptoms. Nobody from the party won, though Day-O was able to complete the maze in 28 rounds. (five consecutive DC 32 search checks are required for success). 9. Diving: Day-O got the bronze by virtue of a great tumble check. 10. Equestrian: Dresage and Obstacle Course events were both won by Revan, though the elves had a good showing also.

After each Olympic events, the flag of the delegations of each medal winner were hoisted in turn, while the song of each played. Nightsong Sharpfang (the former Daybill) performed this service for the party members, as heraldry and music are her stock in trade. Taito drunkenly sung his Monster Island anthem from his pedastal whenever he won a medal.

Experience: 2,000 xp. Treasure: Bragging rights. Next session: should be two Sundays from today at noon.

Sunday, October 22, 2006

Dungeon Crawl & Star Wars Deal

The dungeon crawl continued today. Encounters included drow and trolls, including Louis of Trolltown, the only non-evil troll in the group who speaks common (he was last seen by a few of the characters about 5 years ago, in game time). The ruins, once a city of titans destroyed by an earthquake or some cataclysm, spike downward and blend into a lot of natural caverns. Today the party explored the remains of a coloseum/auditorium and a market, featuring coins one foot wide. At the market, some pretty big gargoyles were encountered. 4,000 xp, adventure to be continued.

Star Wars was a short but fairly successful session for the party. An arms deal netted the party some profit and will ultimately help the Rebellion a bit, though the scenery was a bit cold and stinky, with a methane atmosphere. There was a bit of roleplaying and we ran out of time before any battles or encounters took place, but that's fine. I awarded 1,500 xp anyway.

Monday, October 09, 2006

Magic, Star Wars & D&D Sun 10/8/06

Magic
Aaron E. came up a day early for Sunday's game, and he picked up some D&D & Star Wars miniatures and some Magic cards at Old Town Hobby (in Shelton, WA). We played a two-person booster draft using Champions of Kamagawa (they were on sale). He played blue-black-green; I played red-white-blue, and I won mainly just by keeping a bigger creature count on the table. It was a lot of fun. From what I've seen of the new Coldsnap and Time Spiral sets, Magic is due for a BIG comeback soon.
THERE WILL BE A "B.Y.O.B." (BRING YOUR OWN BOOSTERS) M:TG DRAFT GAME AT MY PLACE ON THE SATURDAY AFTER THANKSGIVING (NOVEMBER 25, 2006). BRING ANY 4 UNOPENED 15-CARD BOOSTERS OF YOUR CHOICE (EXCEPT UNGLUED/UNHINGED) 3 ARE FOR THE GAME, 1 FOR PRIZES.

Star Wars
Coreward, on the desert world of Imquew, Yarvil the Hutt joined forces with the Empire to profit from the antigrav systems production there. Imperial Commander Dork Gumball, on Yarvil's payroll (administrated locally by the Twi'lek Lyv) ran a massive grav-parts assembly plant using thousands of local and imported human slaves for cheap, disposable labor due to the radiation and toxins required for the work. Imperial stormtroopers oversaw the operation, aided by private contractors. Dabbo the Hutt hired the party to try to disrupt the operation, which he once controlled in a more hospitable manner. Using Imperial and private contractor forged identities (acquired with some outside help), the party was able to execute a frontal infiltration, falling directly under Gumball's command and/or Lyv's payroll. Among the party members were Jaina Briel, Mandalorian fringer/soldier 3/3 (Rob); cap'n Garik Gracus, human noble 1/scoundrel 5(Carson); Alpha Vega, Khommite soldier(Phil); Archu King, codri-ji Soldier 7(Bella); Drael Gracks, Trandoshan Jedi guardian/Jedi weapon master(Jon); Destro S'Xavio... cold-blooded assassin (Rod); Velkin, human force adept 6/scoundrel 2(Aaron); and Pieda Bowman II, Jedi Counseller 5/Soldier 1/Noble 1 (Dave's main NPC). Other NPC's featured were Jarn Thro (+22 computer use about 3 levels ago...) and Mike Skaruyabutavich (+19 repair a few levels ago...), and Ulrich (Dabbo's agent in the Livisko region of Imquew).
The party were successful, largely through deviousness, the use of poison, sneakiness, demolitions and overall foul play. But the end result was beautiful: Yarvil the Hutt himself was persuaded to travel to Imquew to oversee the operation after Liv died mysteriously from poisoned cake and the civilian workers went on strike in the absence of his over-controlled payroll. Though Yarvil had many of the workers executed for their insolence, he himself was slain (as was the reptilian Captain Jensen, according to Imperial records) in a mysterious explosion (one of many, written off by the Imperial PR office as an industrial mishap). When the party left, the entire operation was beyond the control of anyone and in utter chaos; slaves were able to escape as the civilian contractors, Hutt mercenaries and Imperial stormtroopers blamed and killed each other. Meanwhile, the party escaped with relative ease, finally being chased by TIE intercepters who arrived too late to capture or destroy the rogue Imperial agents aboard the medium freighter Akbar's Trap.
Vastly pleased with the end result, Dabbo invested 2,000,000 credits into the ship fund for the team to arrange construction of a new base and hangar and to establish new identities for themselves and their vessel. Of this, Cap'n Garik allocated 20,000 credits to each member of the team for personal equipment, training and supplies. I awarded 2,500 experience points for the adventure.

D&D
The party, ever in search of better and older magic items, flew over the top of a 1-mile diameter "Stonehenge" site of standing stones on the Isle of Ancients, visible as such only from far above, from the clouds. The best available guess is that this could be the actual long-sought site of the original city of Rotalia, said to have been founded by Titans millenia ago, and to have been a hub of interdimensional commerce. With the help of magic and mostly due to the sheer luck of spotting it from above, a cave entrance was found to enter the buried ruins. Almost immediately after penetrating the darkness of the cave, the party were set upon by a mixed unit of the Violet Vultures; lycanthropic mouse-people transmuted and bred for strength and spell ability long ago by the original moon-elves of the Purple Order. Though the party dispatched the guardians at the cave entrance, much remains to be discovered here and anything is possible; after all, this is a dungeon crawl.
Characters present included: Revan, human Paladin of Khadgar; Gemberlion Miragonian,gnome Dragon Shaman 7/Silver Dragon BL3; Cap'n Fergus Dowrimple, human evoker 10/rogue 5/arcane trickster 1; Geena, dwarf archer; Nightsong Sharpfang, kobold bard 12; Taito, level 15 human monk/drunken master; Black Eyed Bill, human ranger; Lola Kick-Butt Girl, human fighter; High-Inquisitor Joseph Prax Cleric 7/Inquisitor 8; Balthizor, level 7 Bralini fighter; Dante, 8th level githzeria monk; Noctorium, human wizard 13.
No xp or treasure yet awarded; TO BE CONTINUED...

Monday, September 25, 2006

More Mayhem

We moved the usual Sunday session to Saturday (Sept. 23rd) this time. Our next session is at noon on Sunday October 8th.
The entire session was spent on D&D, using the same terrain setup as previously, in another large-scale battle against the forces of evil. Characters present included: Revan of Khadghar; Joseph Prax-High Inquisitor of Cuthbert; Taito-Drunken Master of the "How Dry I Am" Palm; Neptorium-Mage of the Eagle's Claw; Balthizar "Wendy" of the Great Gust; Capt. Fergus Dowrimple; Mick the Gangly; Telpin, Bard of the Stolen Wands; Nightsong Sharpfang, Songrider of the Giant Hamster; Aiko, Shirikin-Thrower of the Red Way; Geena of the Dwarven Arrow; and anybody I forgot. A few members of the Moporian Militia tried unsuccessfully to hold off the invaders as the party arrived.
Among the villians were: lots of Jaramonian (highly transmuted) lizardmen, shahaugin and merfolk; drow eldrich-knights, high-priestesses and arch-shaman; mind-flayers, kraken-folk, two huge blue dragons, a rat-ogre, two giants, at least one high-level wizard of unknown race from the depths of the ocean or perhaps another plane of existance; and a myriad of others.
All were defeated by the party in the 6-hour session. Thank you to Rob for running part of the session. Also, please accept my apologies for the lack of roleplaying lately, and for not fitting a Star Wars game into the session.
The party is now 12th to 16th level. Some of the characters (of players who have not missed sessions, especially Revan and Joseph) are getting very powerful from both experience and magic items. As it should be. Fergus is looking and acting more like the higher-level version I generated of him; and is appraising, buying, selling and creating magic items in a very serious way.
Experience: 5,000 XP. Treasure: 15,000 GP
--Dave

Sunday, September 10, 2006

Seaside skirmish at Moporia

In my campaign world of Aarde, Moporia was once the only city occupied by humans. Though that is no longer the case, it is still a great and old city. In today's session, the Elves of the Purple Order invaded Moporia from the sea. Among their troops were a variety of transmuted reptilian humanoids that amounted to mongrelmen made from lizardmen. Drow spellcasters, mindflayers, dryders and creatures never before identified rose from the waves in the large-scale attack. The party repelled the attack, at least in the district they were responsible for.
I ran today's adventure as a set-piece miniatures battle (but with standard D&D 3.5 rules). With Revan and Joseph Prax leading the now-powerful 12th-15th level party, I can throw a heck of a lot at this group, without worrying too much. Besides Rod and Rob, Phil and Jon made it today, Bel played Lola quite a bit, and Aaron joined us by conference call to play his wizard. Captain Fergus Dowrimple, my NPC wizard, is now very interested in the business of the magic trade. Marshall even showed up toward the end of the session, and I handed him Mick the Gangly to play. Does Marshall roll "1" every time? Wow, some casino should hire him to be a "cooler." Anyway, the party really romped all over these bad guys, sometimes with a single character dealing over 300 hp in damage in one round. It's really amazing what players familiar with the finer points of the rules are capable of. It was a fun session, with the powerful surprise actually being not the enemy, but the surprising power of this group. 6,000 XP, 6,000 gp.

Monday, September 04, 2006

Titan Staves & A Double-Double Cross

WELCOME AARON
9/4/06
For today’s D&D and Star Wars sessions, it was me (Dave) running, plus Rod, Rob, Carson, Bella, Penny (for a bit) and Aaron E. (who came 3 hours up from Oregon just to play). I feel very flattered about this, thank you Aaron!

In D&D, Taito finally battled the drow and won the Key prize, an amulet that stores 21 levels of arcane or divine spells, and contains one true resurrection. But the main adventure dealt with the fact that transmuted “mongrel men” variants, many including golem parts, have become so common, the party felt certain Jaramon himself, founder of the Cult of Transformation, must have been brought back to life. As it now appears, this may--or may not--have been the case. The party rode Cap’n Fergus’ spelljammer to the pyramid site on the Isle of Ancients and fought a huge battle there, decimating a large number of a huge variety of mongrel men warriors, many of which were giant-sized. To cap it off, the pyramid itself was subjected to Rock to Mud, and Efreet variants were summoned (At Joseph Prax’s suggestion) to search the site for treasure (a type that could move through the mud and detect magic easily).
As it turned out, the pyramid itself was causing transmutations in the surrounding area, one of which caused Black Eyed Bill to take on the nose and other aspects of a snapping turtle. Four metal 20’ ancient epic titan-made custom staves of transmutation (probably actually worth about 850,000 gp each) turned out to be embedded in the pyramid itself. At Revan’s suggestion, the party ended up selling all four to the god Khadgar for 425,000 gp total, for safekeeping (and due to a lack of other well-heeled buyers). Aaron’s character is a wizard, Nephrim or something like that. The party is currently 13th-15th level, mostly. XP:5,000.

Star Wars was interesting. On Alzakak, an Imperial-controlled world, the party was sent to assist Blastsmoke, another of Dabbo the Hutt’s agents. Destro went under cover, using his forged identity as Imperial Captain Jarvis, to train cadets at Damachatron City. Garik Gracus, also with Imperial credentials, went looking for Blastsmoke at the encrypted distress signal coordinates, along with Jaina Brioli. Pieda Bowmon II (played by Aaron today) and Jackpot searched the officer’s mess hall/lounge. Garik found him, and on Blastsmoke’s urging, the party joined him and his assistants Duville and Horacio, in order to be certain to secure hard credits and data files from an administration building. As it turned out, Blastsmoke had already been caught, and had cut a deal with local authorities to lure additional Hutt agents here and trap them. An Imperial sleep gas grenade proved ineffective on the party, however, as did the 25 or so storm troopers arrayed to capture or kill the party, who wiped nearly all of them out. With 3 storm troopers remaining, Destro arrived to instruct one of his classes of 25 on procedure, and instructed them to stun everyone in the room. Destro, suddenly the ranking officer in the room, examined the warrant data pad and declared it faulty in procedure, since with special agents involved this would situation would require an inter-agency investigation (and other such matters). He then invited his class to join him on a field trip to follow the matter through. Once all 25 were on the ship, they were easily disarmed and sold into slavery to the Hutts for 1,000 credits each. The party was also able to sell holovids of Imperial training procedures to the Hutts for a hefty 20,000 credits. As Akbar’s Trap departed, Jaina’s typical parting gift went off, leaving several blocks in ruins. Current party level: 5-8th. XP:2,000

Sunday, August 20, 2006

Mordheim and Star Wars sessions

Yesterday, in our Mordheim session, my Osterlanders (rating 165) chalked up a couple of wins. First, vs. Rod's fledgeling new Skaven warband (rating 60) in a straight Skirmish scenerio, not a single Osterlander was taken out of action, and three of the rat people were on the sidelines when they routed. Tactically, I bunched all my guys up into a building right before being charged, and then executed a counter-charge. You never know how it's going to go. It could easily have gone badly for my human mercenaries, but the dice went my way. Even though the Skaven were smaller in numbers and experience, having five heroes to start with is enviable at exploration time, and underdog bonuses will have their rating higher in short order. Also, those warplock pistols have a strength 5, so they really pack a punch, and Rod's a really good player, so I'm sure the Skaven will be beating the crap out of everybody else before long.

The second scenerio, Treasure Hunt, was a three-way battle between my Osterlanders, Rod's Skaven and Rob's mighty Cult of the Posessed (rating 227). In Treasure Hunt, your guys are looking for a valuable chest, which shows up in the first building somebody explores where 12 shows up on 2d6, or the last building on the table if this does not occur. Then as a victory condition, you have to drag the chest off your table edge. We had about 16 buildings on the table, and when there were 3 left, I lucked out and two Osterlanders who had split off near Rob's table edge found the chest. I was very concerned, because they were pretty far from help, and outnumbered. Since we were both underdogs and Skaven have such great movement, I allied with Rod. From my perspective, it looked like the Osterlanders had just handed victory to the Posessed's horrifying cadre of Beastmen, tentacled mutants and other unspeakably frightening monsters. My henchmen group of two, each armed with two-handed swords, was immediately cut in half by three beastmen. The remaining guy, reduced to half movement by the heavy chest, was luckily not stuck in, so he moved just out of the way. Help began to arrive; the rest of the Ostlanders weren't quite as far away as I feared. My alliance with Rod's Skaven allowed them free movement closer to the big fight near the chest. The bulk of the Posessed were starting to arrive. Swampy, one of my heroes, held off being taken out of action by making an amazing three Step Aside skill rolls (a 5 or 6 on a d6 allows an unmodifyable extra armor save). I was able to get a more guys over to help with the chest, as my ogre and a couple other guys executed a fighting retreat. My captain was taken out of action by a terrifying tentacled thing. The Skaven ended their alliance and blasted all my guys around the chest with a powerful area-of effect fireball-like spell. Swampy succeeded in stepping into the role of captain and made the route check for the Osterlanders. Later that turn he himself was taken out of action. But through sheer luck and guts (yeah I know, a lot of luck), the Osterlanders, with two guys carrying the chest (and a lot of guys knocked down or stunned) dragged the chest off my table edge and achieved victory. With the spoils, the warband was able to buy three shiny new double pistols for its jaeger henchmen group.

Star Wars was crazy. Jon had arrived while we finished the second Mordheim scenario and built a Jedi Guardian character, the Trandoshan Drael Gracks. Through a long series of wheeling and dealing, the party has been smuggling Hutt weapons to rebel groups on several worlds, earning tidy profits in barter, which then had to be sold in order to cash in on the credits. Using forged Imperial agent and vendor identification and hacked computer codes, the party has been able to avoid problems for the most part. Accustomed to war zones, Akbar's Trap flew to Fivepoint, which is a highly populated Hutt/Rebel world under Imperial invasion. The group found themselves fighting to protect one of their customers, Governess Thora (at least until her credit could clear) from Imperial forces supplemented by the giant building demolition creatures genengineered on the Imperial research island of Dr. Balfir, as well as the Emperor's darkside droids, tanks, and stormtroopers. In the chaos of war and destruction could be seen gargantuan atomic monsters resembling a rancor, diablo, a giant spider, and a great slimy, shadowy creature that seemed to dissolve any building it touched. Destro S'Xauron disarmed two of the powerful darkside droids, causing them to go insane yet harmless. Jaina Brioli used her demolition skills to blow up some of the bigger threats, including the giant diablo, who easily picked up the power station building and crushed it. Meanwhile, Pieda Bowman II was directing a neighborhood militia while talking on the comlink to Garik Gracus in the ship, directing air strikes. The ship, maneuverable, yet heavily armored and armed to the teeth, contributed heavily to the battle, dropping powerful missiles and firing powerful energy weapons with deadly accuracy. Drael Gracks found himself dueling a darkside droid version of Darth Vader, then jumping on top of a rancor-like creature just before it would have crushed both duelists with one stomping foot. The Vader droid was crushed. Drael then started hacking away at the head and neck of the beast with his lightsaber, felling it just before it could destroy Governess Thora's transit center headquarters, and just as Destro grabbed Thora and tumbled her away to safety, and just as Jaina ran to a safe distance and detonated her charge on the giant diablo's feet. Meanwhile, allied forces had ignited the slimy shadow creature, and it burned away into harmlessness. Jaina salvaged the ruins of the Imperial tank, and the party clambored aboard Akbar's Trap and flew away.

I awarded 3,000 experience points for this adventure, even though we only actually played Star Wars for two hours. Technically the party earned no credits but everyone's reputation will go up by one.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Short Session--Star Wars & Mordheim

After a gig playing cello at the Mason County Fair, I ran Rob, Rod & Bel through a short Star Wars RPG session. We didn't use minis this time; there was a lot of roleplaying involving trade. After about 12 hyperspace jumps, the party's ship fund now stands at about a million credits after brokering a sale of Hutt weapons to one of the few remaining rebel-controlled worlds. Dabbo the Hutt even threw in a few extras, forseeing more long-run profit in weapons if the rebels are not wiped out. Just so long as nothing can be traced back to him, of course. I awarded 2,000 xp per character present.

We had hoped we might see Jon for D&D or Mordheim, but he volunteered late at the fair, and Carson didn't make it. So I played my human Ostlanders against Rob's Orcs, while Rod worked up a Skaven warband (you should have spoken up Rob, we could have easily included Skaven in the Defend the Find scenerio...sorry). I lost, but you wouldn't think so by the underdog bonuses and 6 shards of wyrdstone my scrappy warband raked in! Unfortunately, Sister Jess Ulricson will be out 3 games and Bubba Ulricson will be out for the next game.

I picked up some Magic: The Gathering cards recently and they look pretty good. Dissension has some pretty cool green cards, and Coldsnap has snow covered lands and picks up where the old Ice Age set left off; it's really cool. For example, the Rimescale Dragon is a 5/5 flyer for 5RR that taps target creatures for 2S (where "S" is any snow-covered land), and this ability does not require the dragon to tap. So... I'm considering asking around about a booster draft game soon.

Sunday, July 16, 2006

DD 71606

D&D 7/16/06
Amalgaville Redeux: Dryders from drop-ships, who had landed under the city 6-9 months previously had grown in strength. Capable of powerful transmutation and trickery and large numbers in brute force, this situation required the party’s attention be taken away from the battle at Ponoblish Bimpitigora. Amalgaville, the once-abandoned city of self-aware non-evil golems built by Tenneous’ arch-rival Signatious ages ago, was being cherry-picked by the drow for items and weapons of value and power. Entire buildings were being sunk underground for piecemeal harvesting of golem components, which were in turn incorporated into a new breed of Arachanoid Mongrel Golems. Messenger 31, Amalgaville’s ages old golem Herald, assured the party the golems of the city would be grateful for any assistance. The Arachanoid/Golem Mongrels proved to be challenging in the skirmish that followed, but the party was victorious. XP:2,000. GP:2,000 (per each)

Star Wars 7/16/06
Tivilion was the port of call today. The group also visited Waltlion, Dayerlion and the Zarlion Plateau. Just before arriving, Garik, Pieda, Destro, Jaina, Archu, Mike Skayuyabutavich and Jarn Thro had defeated three pirate ships, destroying one and capturing two (one to keep, one for parts). While “dirtside” the group battled the elements, including a tide-sensitive geyser, giant midnight blue flying manta-ray bats, and saurian lions. XP as the D&D session as I recall…


Lost Entries from 6/24/06
Dave:
D&D Summary: Revan investigated a drow infiltration of the church of Khadgar. Taito dualed an ogre and a hobgoblin in a once per 20 year all race/all stakes martial arts tournament, winning each easily but the defending champion & key-holder drow was a no-show. Joseph Prax interrogated drow for tactical information (see previous & following entries). Gemberlain Miragonian used his flying bicycle to battle the drow in the clouds over Ponoblish Bimpitigora.
Star Wars Summary: the group fought “Emperor Droids” on a tip from Tilliduaynus, and blew up a building that was actually a droid firing at the party’s ship. We used miniatures in a Necromunda-style skirmish climaxing in a dual between the plant-based Tilliduaynus and a droid version of Darth Vader, controlled by the ghost of Palpatine. The group, however, did not see this amazing duel.

Player D&D log entries (also from 6/24/06):
Rod:
  • Called to church of Khadgar cause infiltration suspected.

  • Met up with a cool high priest guy who was really trustworthy.

  • Went investigating—found named elf high priest swimming, talked to her, suspected something, both of us cast dispel, turned out to be dark elf.

  • Her f*** buddies came to support her, she said Revan was trying to force himself on her and that he had turned her into a dark elf.

  • We interrogated her, offered her a chance if she would help us but she just lied.

  • Found 2 more drow agents, got info from 1 and got her to repent.

  • Others thrown into a burning pit with a giant gold statue of Khadgar in the center.

Jon:
Gemberlion was on the base ship when an enemy ship had come upon port aft and began to let arrows fly and attempt to hit our ship. He activated his bicycle of flying, flew to the enemy vessel and began melee combat with his Morningstar as well as breathing his cone of cold in an attempt to become victorious.

Bel:
Drawing of a pink smiley-faced girl.

Carson:
Taito was approached by a representative from the world championship arena to fight in the name of all humans, and win the Silver Key trophy from the current champion (who is a drow). I fought an ogre who kept me at bay with his long reach, I managed to tumble through his defenses and start a grapple to stay close and bring him down. After that I took on a hobgoblin who hid behind a large fence-like obstacle and made range attacks, but by using my magical pants to make myself larger and stronger, I overcame the barrier quickly and crushed the hobgoblin. Now I’m off to find the AWOL champion to bring her back for a fair fight.

Robby:
Joseph Prax Inquisitor of St. Cuthbert. He was summoned (not magical) to the local temple of Cuthbert to interrogate a dark elf prisoner. In the temples dungeon the interrogation began simply. But the first few questions he asked only met with defiant backtalk and sexual propositions. Not wanting to take lip from a captured evil dark elf witch-whore, he punched her right across the face. This did not make her more cooperative so he held her foot down and smashed it with an iron mace.
   The interrogation went smoothly after that, until she made one more sexual proposition. As she was speaking, Joseph grabbed some big pliers and snipped her index finger clear off. The interrogation proceeded smoothly. It seems a shifty gnome general and an increasing number of elves and gnomes are simply Dark Elves in Disguise. The witch will be burned by weeks end.

Sunday, May 28, 2006

More roleplaying today

Jon, Phil, Rob, Rod and I made an effort to increase our roleplaying today, and I think it improved the session. Also, with the holiday Monday we were able to have a longer game session, including a more relaxed time to just reminisce about old characters, players and situations, movies and whatever. As usual of late, we opened with D&D, then played Star Wars.

Jon built a gnomish dragon shaman, 10th level (including silver dragon bloodline) out of the new PH2, and Phil generated yet another new character, a dwarven fighter we helped him with. Rod & Rob's characters, Revan and Joseph Prax have been regular characters in this campaign since at least 2004; each of them found themselves in the position to be able to build churches at Ponoblish Bimpitigora (for Khadgar and St.Cuthbert), where the gnomes and their allies continue to successfully repel the continuing nightly raids of the drow invaders. The party has earned great respect from the gnomes for their role in these battles, and for taking the fight to the drow and returning alive. The roleplaying situations included Phil's character drinking at a whiskey bar, and Revan assisting in bringing a thief to justice. Character introductions were a primary element of the session, which climaxed with another (exciting but predictable) battle against the drow. Jon had to leave early, but the session was done about then anyway. XP: 2,500. GP: 0 -- but some post-battle items of value to be resolved later.

For Star Wars, I used my "Generic City Outlines" chart from March, and the simple notes resulted in a good starting place for an outstanding session. After finishing up "legal" details from the previous session with the attorney Milas in regard to the Wallathilla events, Pieda Bowmon II piloted Akbar's Trap to the Imperial-controlled world of Janthidor. The group donned their best "Special Imperial Service Operations Agent" personas as stormtroopers, officers and technicians at the Imperial slave city of Pholon on the world of Janthidor. At Janthidor's orbital station "Minuseight," Destro used an amazing elicit barter skill check to sell remaining cargo (scrap metal and electronics parts) along with bogus information Jarn Thro had, to earn over 100,000 credits for the ship fund over the true value of 13,000 credits worth of scrap metal. How? By bundling it together and naming it as "Sliced Credstik Parts" to the corrupt Imperial officer. This line of thinking worked so well, the group used the idea again (now as sliced credstik investigators) to infiltrate the Empire all the way to their rebel contact, Cap'n Verona at the duty station in the slave mines of Pholon. Having (as NPCs) a computer technician (Jarn Thro) and a mechanical/electronics technician (Mike Skaruyabutavich) helped things along in terms of credibility, especially when deep searches revealed punishable inproprieties in the monetary records of local Imperials.

Jaina was able to scrounge some really useful local information (over dumpster berry-cake) from Urchin, a homeless young Janthidorian; a bright colored and observant semi-warm blooded reptilian native. Ultimately, the party met with Cap'n Verona and along with the explosives expertise of Alpha Vega were able to detonate a large Imperial slave mining guard station, freeing hundreds of starving and mistreated slaves. Additionally, Cap'n Verona got a promotion in his Imperial rank to Colonel (thereby increasing his ability to help the rebels) and the party got over 100 tons of precious ores. Later, the party might want to investigate Urchin's description of high-level Imperial meetings involving "people in red armor" on this world. XP: 2,500 Credits: over 100,000, plus 100 tons of precious metal ores cargo for the ship fund.

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Rob's Star Wars at Rod's

Rann Daak flew the Crimson Vulture to Dantooine, and the party flew in the Ebon Hawk to answer a distress call from a jedi colony there. After a huge space battle with Sith warships and tie fighters (the old, old Republic versions of these ships), the group was able to touch down, only to learn that everyone dirtside had been slain by the Sith just a few hours before the party arrived.
Rann took out nearly a dozen tie fighters, but had to do emergency hull repairs on the Vulture to fix battle damage. Now, he is in the process of transforming his ship into a "privateer" Republic ship of war, adding shields and a lot more weapons. His intention is to fly as an armed escort for larger, more vulnerable cargo ships. Having a couple of wookie soldiers to fill out his crew turned out to be useful in terms of keeping stations manned, and hauling 100 tons of useful hulk warship salvage into the cargo bay.
I updated my character sheet to reflect the Solo bloodline, which helps Rann to be better at what he does by virtue of genetics: it turns out he is one of Han Solo's ancesters.

Sunday, April 23, 2006

Star Wars at Rod's

After holding out for a couple of years, thinking a 3rd edition would soon arrive, I finally got my new revised Star Wars RPG book yesterday, as a 13th anniversary gift from my wife. Thank you Penny! I encourage anyone in a relationship who is reading this to take our advice: support each other in your hobbies.

I made a level 10 Soldier/5 Starship Ace, and played last night in Rob's Old Republic campaign at Rod's. Rob has built his campaign from thousands of years before Episode 1, using a lot of ideas from a video game set in that era.

Cap'n Rann Daak is a pretty specialized character who happens to fit into the Han Solo mold; since he's a human from Corellia, he could be a distant relative. An experienced Republic soldier who happens to be force-sensitive but has no formal training in it, Daak uses two customized blasters much in the manner of an Old West gunfighter, and pilots the Ebon Hawk, the group's infamous light freighter that is actually painted red and silver, not black as the name suggests. At the start of the adventure, there was something about a delivery mission that would have gone sour, then didn't, then did; and there was a big explosion that the characters would prefer not to be associated with but probably will be. I'm still catching up on the storyline, but there was plenty of action that included Carson's Jedi character, Demetrius's force illusion of a black globe to hide us after we chased an evil warlord from the scene in an airspeeder, only to discover we were outnumbered 50 to 1 hours later, and the bad guy got away. Then, another Jedi mind trick (I can't remember if it was Rod's Jedi, Viesha Marr, or Demetrius) set the bad guys fighting against each other, so all we had to do was wait while they took each other out. Later, Daak flew the party to Kashyyyk, where Lance's wookie Rrolffllbacca would use a legendary weapon to battle an evil overlord who had sold his people into slavery to Zerka Corp. On the way there, Daak was swallowed whole by a collosal snake, something like 165 meters long, and had to cut his way out with his pair of vibro-daggers. Rann later helped deal with bodyguards during Rrolffllbacca's final confrontation with Jandar, the sleazy wookie traitor, and of course Jandar was defeated and the wookies were liberated. At some point, Daak met Candoris, head of a militant branch of Mandalorians, on Duxon, the moon of Ondoran. Also during this adventure, Daak met his new commanding officer, Shawn's recently promoted admiral, Zap Brannagan (yes, just like the guy from Futurama).

Back at Yavin Station (which is owned/managed by Shane's tech specialist, Garth Pancake), Rann Dack owns the Crimson Vulture, an old YT-13 (the 1300 is not made yet) Rann is in the process of customizing; it is painted mostly black and gold, not red, as the name suggests...

Thank you guys, and good adventure Rob. I really enjoyed playing this new character, because even though he has 15 levels, Cap'n Daak is full of new possibilities for later on. I will be running my next game in a couple of Sundays.

Monday, April 17, 2006

Invasion of Phobos

Weary after night after night of defending the gnome city Ponoblish Bimpitigora, the party took the battle to the Elves of the Purple Order on the moon Phobos. Captain Fergus Dowrimple's spelljammer stealthily chased the dark elves in their pre-dawn retreat, a simple task since the party's ship looks identical to the enemy's. From within one of the giant landing bays, the crew watched the drow, driders, mind flayers and umber hulks repairing and re-loading a good portion of fhe fleet. When the time was ripe, the party began the counterattack.

The characters Lola, Alice, Martin, Nightsong, Aiko, Fergus, Mick the Gangly, Henderson and Telpin all fought well, each finding ample opportunities to work in their areas of specialty. Geena, the great dwarven archeress, sniped targets of opportunity, including a drow priestess/sorceresses/general. Revan found enough room to maneuver for several deadly lance charges using his pegasis, while remaining nearly untouchable with his armor and magical protections. Brother Joseph Prax, Brand of Cuthbert summoned a couple of powerful Angels to assist in the battle, while also carrying on the fight personally. Though one angel was sent back to his plane of origin by an evil priestess, the other continued to succeed for the entire fight, and the priestess was defeated. Taito, with a combination of drunken master skills and magic, grew to giant size and went on a rampage, taking out every enemy in sight with whirlwind attacks and improvised weapons. Black Eyed Bill, with a swagger in his step, chose his opponents with more precision, taking out specific threats in a swashbuckling way. Sincony Thipern (Phil's new half-elf rogue) snuck through the shadows to attack a couple of targets of opportunity.

Among the drow were a number of sorceresses, but they were understandably reluctant to use fireballs around their prized fleet of spelljammers. Fergus was not reluctant, and Telpin was okay with using lightning bolts. The drow also had a few Rust Spitters to set upon the party, but these were dealt with before they had a chance to interfere with the party's metal weapons and armor. And thought Eldrich Moon Knights continue to present a challenge in battle, they were caught off guard, having just expended all of their spells attacking Ponoblish Bimpitogora during the night.

As we have been doing lately, we played D&D for about two hours, then Star Wars for about 4 hours (see other entry). Experience: 2,500. Next session: Sunday, April 23, noon.

Pop quiz: what is the name of the party's spelljammer?

Friday, April 14, 2006

Coreward at Wallathilla

The "Akbar's Trap" arrived at the orbital starport of Wallathilla after making a number of unremarkable cake runs delivering goods and passengers. While taking care of the basics of selling off unremarkable cargo and refueling the ship, the group learned more about what was going on dirtside. Wallathilla is a coreward world with an above average law level and tech level and a moderate climate. It is nearly unliveable and hugely overpopulated, but well connected. It is 60% nonhuman, with an insectoid race dominating the census. While self-governed, Wallathilla does have a small Imperial presence, with a slightly larger Hutt and Rebel influence. The Empire, along with wealthy local business families, have stripped Wallathilla of every resource of value, while dumping industrial wastes at will. With nothing left of value and no strong Rebel threats nearby, the Empire removed its forces about 5 years ago, leaving only a "diplomatic" presence. Following this power vacuum, due to the great differences of opinion on culture and government, this world is currently in a civil war.

On the plus side, the group found a great new mechanic, Mike Skaruyabutivich, who is like a doctor with any Repair task, though the Balosar does not have a very good engine side manner. So far, the one-armed JP-12 "Jackpot" gambling/protocol droid has been upgraded with more games, and can now accept both credsticks and hard credits. The GT-8 Grav-Toaster, which can burn spy-grade floorplans on toast, can now do the same with "pop-tarts," including raised surfaces such as mountains or walls. Frank, the party's rabbit-eared medical droid, is still waiting for his upgrades. Archu King has developed her four arms into an intimidating martial arts or blaster force. The Codru-Ji is such an asset to the party, that to replace her would require at least three soldiers. Speaking of soldiers, Alpha Vega is one, and he has proven to be alert and stay in line with the orders of... whoever is paying him the most (pretty much the theme of this group).

Speaking of the group, captain Garik Gracus negotiated an excellent trade of whatever crap was in the cargo bay (I think it was booze) for better crap, at a nice profit. I'm a bit out of sequence here, but as a result of one adventure, the party now has about 75 tons of "junkyard" scrap, which actually contains a lot of valuable machine and electronics parts. Along with the talented but grumpy new tech specialist, this could really lead to some items of value. Also, 40 passengers at about 2,000 credits per head, with berths sold at auction at the city of Zendril as Imperial star destroyer turbolasers levelled nearby areas. In the captain's stash are many casks of Zendril rum, also. About 50 additional tons in the cargo bay are occupied by highly valuable luxury goods (see the following for a short account of what lead to that.

Jaina Brioli did what she always does, and that is make a whole lot of trouble, and somehow skate away. She and the Falleen, Destro S'Xauron, with some help from the computer expert Jarn Thro, managed to thieve and ninja their way onto the Palpatine's Boot, an Imperial shuttle. Wearing vac-suits, and after a lot of amazing sneaking, they managed to catch the shuttle's occupants on their lunch break, and opened the airlock, spacing them. They then flew the shuttle to the surface, just as the Imperial garrison they had previously arranged for arrived and began blasting away at "rebel" targets. The rebels, had paid Destro for information on Imperial military operations, and the Empire had also paid Destro for information on the planned Rebel ambush. Additionally, Milus Doritterny, the lawyer for the Rapshadi family (the family that sold off Wallathilla's resources and brought in insectoid workers and industrial waste) bought passage for himself and his clients and their prized belongings on the Palpatine's Boot. After an ugly incident, the end result is that the 50 tons of belongings and Milus are now under the party's control, along with a lot of credits. Call it Hutt justice, if you will.

The pilot/doctor and Jedi counselor Pieda Bowman II, while disturbed by many of the group's methods, held his tongue for many of them. In the end, it all worked out because the greater good was served, and wrongs were righted in their own way. And for once, he didn't really have to patch anybody together.

Sunday, February 26, 2006

D&D & Star Wars

We ran two hours of D&D, continuing the battle at Ponoblish Bimpitigora. The naval based ogre army has taken some ground on the gnomish island, but the drow are have been driven into retreat on each of their large-scale attacks, thanks in large part to the party. Phil and Patrick joined our regular group today. Experience: 1,500

The Star Wars session which followed for the next four hours or so focused mainly on the group's ship, Akbar's Trap, which in many ways has similar qualities to a B-25 of the WWII era. Since the refit by the Hutts, the ship has five twin laser cannon bubble-turret stations, a missile launcher, an Ion cannon, and twin gravity bomb iris bays. Everything was needed against the Empire's ground-launched proximity energy cannons and manta-wing atmospheric fighters, three of which were downed by the party's refitted Mon Calimari light freighter on its way to a successful delivery of supplies to freedom fighters on the agricultural world. Later, Pieda Bowman was able to meet the treefolk jedi Tillidwainus, who was trained by Yoda and survived the Sith purge, only to witness the extermination of his homeworld by the Emperor. Experience: 2,250

Next session: Saturday, March 3.

Sunday, February 12, 2006

Ghost In The Machine

I ran Star Wars instead of D&D today, with Rod, Rob and Carson. Although I don't quite feel caught up with the current rule books, I normally don't have a problem putting together a Star Wars story. The main thing the group accomplished was to gather some juicy information. So it's Episode 6.2 and the Emperor's body is dead, but his spirit has possessed the computer/data world of Byte II. He still has direct contact with his moffs and admirals, and can take over any computer system anywhere. Through pure force of will, Palpatine's computer ghost made an example of a disobedient Star Destroyer by shutting everything off, killing most of the crew just to make his point and continue his domination over the Imperial fleet. For being dead, he's more powerful than at the start of episode 6, except that he is once again looking for an apprentice. Though it's still a work in progress, it has become obvious no clone body can contain his giant psyche. He also has a god complex, and his fleet has started chipping away at Hutt space. The party are now posing as agents for the Empire, electronically at least.

Dobbo the Hutt beefed up the party's ship with extra laser turrets, shields, electrified plating (vs. zero-g troopers) and fuel scoops (useful when you come out of hyperspace near a gas giant). The group picked up a powerful computer wizard at Byte II when they saved him from a compulsory mindwipe. Also, they ran cargo and passengers, did some asteroid mining, and rescued 50 people (by auction) from a world at the fringe of Hutt space from the Empire. Mostly, the characters are using skills instead of guns to accomplish their goals right now, but it's unlikely to stay that way. The Emperor popped up on the viewscreen after the ship was infected with an Imperial virus, and demanded that Pieda locate an appropriate apprentice and bring him back to Byte II, or come himself. Though initially stunned into likely compliance, the party was able to locate the virus and purge/reboot the ship's computer systems with backups, and pretend to disregard the demands.

Upcoming game sessions will be two Sundays from now, then the first Saturday in March, and then the first Saturday in April. I might update this entry again later.

Sunday, January 29, 2006

Recent & Upcoming Game Sessions

New Year's Eve was on a Saturday, and I had a cello gig, but we still played D&D, and had a long session starting about 9:30. The party discovered that the Drow plan to attack Ponoblish Bimpitigora, the gnome island-city. As such, they were able to get there early and give warning, saving thousands of lives and fighting the toughest aerial parts of the battle, which involved a lot of wizards, illusionists, dragons (real and illusionary), drow spelljammers, dryders, the ogre navy/army, the gnome fishing fleet, gnomish balloonists & steamwork "cannoneers," angels, vampires, and a bewildering array of special units, summoned monsters and great heroics. Needless to say, this game session ended sometime Sunday morning when we started to drop as the sun came up.

In each of the following D&D sessions, this battle has continued. Although the action and variety is exciting, I think I'm ready to move on; I seem to have an internal gaming cycle that vacillates from fantasy to science fiction to keep me from getting into a creative rut.

So a couple Saturdays ago, Robby ran most of the session. We used the DMG to spontaneously come up with stats for a typical adventuring party for a one-shot adventure. I got to name all the characters, and have unfortunately forgotten most of the names, except that my ninth-level elven mage was known by Fromage (cheesy, huh). Oh, and Carson's halfling rogue was from Slippery Cliffs, which turns out to be a small village in Roddy's campaign world. Shane played a vengeful dwarven paladin based loosely on Dolph Lovgren, and Roddy played a crazy cleric with a rod of wonder, somebody..."the good." Our quest was to take a horrible gray ring/roll back to its cursed creator, the silver-faced wizard, and somehow destroy it. Though we succeeded in our quest, each of the characters was captured or slain in the process. But some guy has a gummed-up mess in his clockwork tower, a smear that was one the uccursed gray roll. And the cement and utilities in his basement became a hot muddy gooey mess from rock to mud spells; his staff are mostly dead or in the hospital from lightning bolts, magic missiles and physical attacks, and the constables who arrived in clashing-light topped horseless chariots are scratching their heads, asking questions. And laughing.

Yesterday, I continued my Ponoblish Bimpitigora battle until we had a break; I really do plan to come back to it later on. We filled out the rest of an extended session with a new group of Star Wars characters. It's an unlikely group who met by chance on the starliner Goldenjoy, which was interdicted by the Empire (circa episode 6.1) and the captain ordered everyone to abandon ship. Their small four-person escape pod touched down in a dense jungle. After surviving hostile plantlife on Talisman, the group (a soldier, a force-sensitive scoundrel, a fringer, and another scoundrel; three women and one man of various races) was able to escape the bureocratic trap of the mine/strip mall town of Tevvik and eventually work their way off the interdicted world. They were rescued in part by the temporary good fortune of the opportunist Dabbo the Hutt, who recently orchestrated a hostile takeover of Bowman Shipping, and needed a representative to captain a light freighter in the system, and Carson's Noble character was somehow located and called upon for the task. The ship is of Mon Calamari design, equipped with a licenced "mining laser," accomodations for up to 50 (including a crew of 5-8) and a cargo capacity of 50 tons, and capable of underwater operations. It was piloted to the Perrin III system, to Talisman orbital Mainport, by Pieda Bowman II, a clone with an old braintape, who happens to have one level in Jedi Counseler (and one each in noble and soldier). Dabbo Corp. owns the ship now, along with 15 tons of metals & minerals in the hold.

Next session: Sat. Feb. 11.