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Black Days of Kor Kammor
Game 19

A stunned silence creeps over the group, broken only by Mhyssi's sobs, and even they begin to fade. Daronelle leaps in to try to dig Juiren free, and Voronex gamely goes to help. But the task is clearly impossible. Daronelle and Voronex dig through the rubble for several minutes, but there is too much rock to even find Juiren's body. The Twins try to comfort Mhyssi, the three collapsed in a silent hug. Auriji, stoic, stands watch.

After a few minutes, Mhyssi stands and pulls herself together. The Heralds are now lost, keep in the ancient mines, and wasting time searching for Juiren isn't going to help. Mhyssi asks Voronex if he can tell how deep they are, and he confirms they're hundreds of feet below the surface, lower than the base of the mountain. This is the Deep Rock, and aberrations rule such places. In all honesty, a vampire foe is not at the top of their concerns anymore.

Mhyssi sets her posture, pulls her sword, gets the Heralds ready to move. She doesn't issue orders, instead asking questions and letting the answers guide the party. No one, even Daronelle, believes they can find Juiren's body, so they agree it's time to move on. Ryssa takes point, quietly scouting, while Daronelle brings up the rear. A grim determination settles over the group.

From the site of their arrive in the collapsed (and now closed) shaft, there are dozens of tunnels. Voronex guesses which paths lead up, whispering his information to Lyssa, thus informing Ryssa as well. The caverns are rough, wet rock that look like piles of sand. Crystals of a hundred hues sparkle in the torch light and fungus in cracks and across the ceiling flutter as if struck by wind when the group's illumination strikes them.

Covered in blood (though healed, they aren't washed) and sweat, the Heralds are easy to find through Scent, and keep taking tunnels with air currents flowing out. As a result, their scent as wounded prey is sent throughout the lower Deep Rock complex. The smell reaches a large colony of monstrous centipedes, who stalk down and attack the heroes. The 8 Large vermin burst out from two cross-corridors, and sting and bite at the heralds. However, their poison never effects anyone, and the Heralds win handily. With no serious injuries.

Deciding more advanced scouting is called for, Ryssa begins stalking through the darkness, well ahead of the Heralds. Eventually she a chittering noise in the caverns, before her. Eyes straining with darkvision, she creeps ahead slowly. Ryssa wants to get within 60ft so she can identify the possible threat. In the main group Lyssa warns the other Heralds, who ready to sprint into battle.

Ryssa finds herself at the lip of a small cliff. Stretching out before her is a vast, curved canyon of rounded rock columns, thin waterfalls, and large interconnected rock. Within the network of pools, evil-looking needle-toothed fish swim, each with a dangling natural green light probe. The fish bathe the whole cavern in the dim, greenish light, dancing on the walls as moving flickers through the rippling water. Crawling across the floor are dozens of beetle-like creatures, with carapaced bodies, multi-jointed legs, and long feathery feelers. None are within 60ft of Ryssa and the green light is dim and full of shadows, so Ryssa can't see the crawlers clearly. In a pool near here, Ryssa can clearly see what appears to be an old, skeletal hand, long since picked clean of flesh and now petrifying.

They back out and the Heralds confer. Mhyssi recommends caution, given the large numbers and unknown power of the crawlers. Voronex agrees, but isn't sure they have an option. The cavern has many in-bound water-ways and its openness suggests it's a major junction for the natural caves. If there *is* a passable way up, this is the most likely place to find it. Auriji feels caution is a mistake. Caution sent them into the hidden passageways that led to the fight with the delver, and that got them lost and Juiren killed. Caution, the barbarian women opines, is the way to a slow death.

"Lets us fight boldly, and either win through with glory, or die with bloodlust in our hearts and smiles on our faces."

Daronelle is hurting at the loss of her cousin, and wants to kill *something*. The Twins, oddly, are feeling the need to *do* something as well. The group respects Mhyssi and her advice, and all agree it may be a mistake, but they don't want caution. They want to leap into the cavern, kill everything that attacks them, and fight there way out of the deep rock. Mhyssi smiles at them, and agrees. If they are going to die, they'll do it on their own terms. Mhyssi intones a war-chant to the glory of Hyarl (prayer), and the Heralds charge, screaming, into the cavern/.

(Aside: At this point the Twins' players says "Wow, how dramatic of it. Aren't we going to feel like idiots if they're just giant beetles and flee from us?" We all laughed. That's *not* what happened.)

The creatures turn at the sound of the Heralds, and immediately begin to swarm toward them, chittering and clacking, waving their feathery feelers in great excitement. Voronex, who was working on a description of the creatures before, suddenly recognizes them.

"Rust monsters!"

The party has a conniption fit, as weapons are swapped and plans suddenly change. Voronex breathes a mighty gout of fire, clearing a whole cone of the creatures, but others keep coming. The Twins use grease spells and their (leather) whips to slow the creature's charge, but can't stop it. Auriji flips Majah Gada, and begins using the butt-end as a club. Mhyssi yells for Daronelle puts her weapons away entirely, and run ahead to find a way out - preferrably one they can block to prevent the rust monsters from following them.

There is, just, enough room for voronex to make reasonable flying passes, so he begins to do so. This keeps up above the rust monsters, and lets him breath on sections of them, but the cavern is still full of the creatures. The trick is not just to kill them, but do so before they ruin Mhyssi, Daronelle or Auriji's armor. Even so, the group begins to feel they'll make it out without too serious a loss of equipment.

Then, one of the fish leaps out of a pool, and bites down on Lyssa. She screams, and slips on the fungus-covered floor. The fish appears to be made of living crystal, and is much harder and stronger than it looks. Suddenly, the fish are leaping out all over. Dozens of them spring from the water, trying to slide their needle-sharp teeth into soft spots. Mhyssi realizes once the rust monsters have eaten any metal, the fish must take the flesh and blood of now unarmored targets. Only bones remain, in the bottom of the pools.

Daronelle is tumbling, dashing and leaping through the vast chamber, carrying a torch and looking for a likely way out. She finds an angled shaft with water pouring out of it, and slides up to see if it can be climbed. As she does so, her torch touches the water...

And turns to stone.

Daronelle screams to keep away from the water. Voronex hears just as he's about to dive through a waterfall (even as a good flyer, he has a limited number of turn options and wanted to line up a particular cone for breath weapon). He hears her, but still flies through a partially-filled waterfall square. He fails his Reflex save to stay dry by 1, and then fails his Fortitude save to not petrify by 1. The rolls were so close (and he spent an action point on the terrible Fort save), rather than turn entirely to stone, his left hand is caught in the water and petrifies (-2 Dex).

Now the fight takes a new tone. The party has been leaping over pools and running beside the waterfalls, staying dry but not being worried about a little dampness. Now, suddenly, their carefree attitude ends. A single slip could mean death by petrification. The twins quickly decide to trip a rust monster into a nearby pool, only to discover the aberrations are immune to the water's effect, and the fish ignore their armored hides.

The rust monsters begin to crowd the heroes, and Voronex no longer dares fly, as he might pass through a waterfall on a poor turn. He takes the rear of the party, hammering with his morningstar (which quickly loses its spikes and becomes a club) and his already-stoned fist. The twins grease the sides of the path the Heralds are taking (eventually running out of 1st level spells, and then casting the spell with 2nd and 3rd level slots). Mhyssi focuses on using magic missle to finish off wounded rust monsters, and directing the group to stick together.

Lyssa spots an area with very little water, and screams for Daronelle to check it out. It's a rise in the cavern floor, thus the water doesn't flow up into it and the ridges can provide some cover against attacking rust monsters and crystalfish. Daronelle, now with sun-rod in hand, dashes over and confirms not only does it seem safe, there's a narrow rock chimney they might be able to climb up.

The Heralds rush for the clear area. Mhyssi sends Voronex ahead, as if he falls his wings can save him. This leaves Auriji and the Twins to hold the rear in melee, and the Twins can't do real damage with their whips. Auriji tries to hold the position with the butt of her spear, but just can't do enough damage. Suddenly, she tells Mhyssi to hold the back with spells for just a moment. Mhyssi fires off two scorching rays (action point) to keep the rust monsters back, while Auriji runs to a pool and thrusts the metal head of her spear into the waters. Since a Fort save is called for on equipment, I have her rolls one, and she gets a natural 20.

On the other hand, Auriji *wants* her metal spear head to turn to stone, and I don't want to penalize her for being clever and rolling well. So, the metal head first turns to grey granite, then at the last second as she pulls it out becomes sparkling crystal. Auriji now rages, charges back into battle with a crystal spear head, and begins to kill rust monsters left-and-right.

Voronex, and then Daronelle, climb up the chimney of rock. It isn't an easy climb, but they manage to get up out of the lower cavern, into an upper chamber. Voronex sees that the rock here was worked once, roughly, collapsing a more gentle ramp into a vertical drop. He looks out over the glowing green cavern of rust monsters and crystalfish. From this vantage, he can see rubble across the far wall, where the cavern has collapsed and expanded over and over. He realizes the rust monsters are eating the rich natural ore out of the walls with their delicate feelers, and as the ore is eaten the rock walls collapse, revealing more ore. Meanwhile, the underground rivers pour down from points all over the mountains, but by the time they get here can petrify, suggesting some great magic exists within the rock, and only the crystalfish have adapted to it.

Remembering the rune that marked the passage to the delver/gargoyle chambers, voronex whispers to himself "Rust Plague." He can't imagine a worse fate for a dwarven mine. But the rust monsters are small, despite being numerous. Why didn't the dwarves just drive them out in leather armor and sharpened wooden spears?

As Daronelle yells the upper chamber has a way out, V decides it is a question for later. For now, the other Heralds still need to escape. He throws down a rope, and tells them all to start climbing. Daronelle tosses her sunrod partway down the tunnel out and draws her blades, guarding V from any new threat at this level.

The Twins begin to climb the rope, Lyssa having trouble (bad rolls, but we chalked it up to her bitten arm.) Mhyssi decides Auriji is going to have to carry Lyssa, and takes over guarding the rear. She casts spiritual weapon so she can fight rust monsters without losing her metal magic items or short sword (as she's now in black leather armor, and lost her greatsword to the delver already), but also has the sword drawn for emergencies. Auriji puts away her longspear and fires up the rope, catching Lyssa when she loses her grip and falls.

Mhyssi is holding the bottom of the rope alone. Ryssa gets to the tops, and uses animate rope to get the rope to wrap around Mhyssi's waist. V can't haul her up until Auriji and Lyssa are off the rope, however. The crystalfish begin to hop out of the pools, forming a slow, vast swarm headed Mhyssi's way. She tries to drive it off with a sound lance (her last third-level spell slot for the day), and kills one swarm mass, but its only a third of the total crystalfish. The swarms overrun the rust monsters without damaging them, and Mhyssi suffers dozens of bites as Auriji finally gets to the top, and she and V haul Mhyssi to safety, bleeding but not quite unconscious. Her short sword is gone, but no other metal lost.

The group take a breather, and Mhyssi burns what few lower-level spells she has left to heal them. As this drains her cleric powers, and the heralds are still injured, this brings home the loss of Juiren more firmly. The Twins and Mhyssi has nothing but a few arcane cantrips. Everyone is wounded. Auriji doesn't even have a rage left. But, given the rust monsters *might* be able to climb, given time (they are scrabbling and clawing at the bottom of the rock chimney) the heralds decide to press on, trusting to V's endless breath weapon, and their own weapons.

Except Mhyssi, who doesn't have a weapon beyond a dagger anymore. Daronelle offers her a short sword, but the scout only has two left and is built on two-weapon fighting, so Mhyssi declines. The Twins have only daggers and whips, and V is down to a club. Then, Auriji produces a battle-axe she has been carrying (without ever using) since the group left Liberty. Thus armed, Mhyssi takes point behind Daronelle, as the Twins are a bit wrecked emotionally.

The group continues through the wet-sand looking stone, ignoring crystals and being suspicious about fungus. They find a large chamber that has many old, brittle rust monster carapaces in it. Many show signs of wooden weapons being used to do them in, making V wonder aloud why the dwarves couldn't deal with the "rust plague." They created a lower area to hold the rust monsters, and obviously could kill them. Why abandon the mine? No one answers.

Not much further along, Daronelle finds signs of tracks. They appear dwarven, but are coated in thin lairs of clay, and show signs of spiked boots. Voronex identifies the spikes as likely belonging to tomiknackers, a kind of evil dwarf-like fairy. They often make mischief in mines, but are normally rooted out. If these showed up after the place was abandoned however, they might have taken up residence. He can't explain the clay, however.

Nor does the mystery last long,. The Heralds come to another larger cavern, this one showing signs of dwellings having been set up with old mining equipment. As they try to pass quickly through, the tomiknackers stagger out of the doorways and deep shadows, moaning for help even as they attack. Each appears to be only half flesh, with half their body turned to clay. (Coal goblins with the half-golem, clay template). The heralds swing into battle, but discover the creatures cannot be hurt by slashing or piercing weapons. Voronex's fire works normally, and he tosses his club to Auriji, who does good damage with it two-handed. As the creatures start fighting with sudden bursts of speed, Mhyssi direct Daronelle and the twins into particular positions, the tomiknackers follow, and then suddenly Mhyssi has tricked them into all lining up in a big cone. Voronex sees the opportunity, and dashes over to attack. His fire scorches all remaining foes, and they drop. The fight is over.

As the chamber is defensible, and there is bedding and food, the heralds opt to stop here for the night. V finds a tomiknacker journal he can read, and discovers they moved in centuries ago. After a generation or two, they discovered the petrifying waters from below were changing them with each generation. They drank only the "sweet water" (non-magic), but proximity to whatever has created the petrifying rivers slowly turned them into living clay. They wished to leave, but the "King of Broken Swords" wouldn't let them. He demanded they forge for him, in endless tribute.

There is also a crude map, showing the forges, and the way out. Sadly, the only way up to the Mines is through the Great Hall of the King of Broken Swords. With no clue what that creature is, the Heralds set guards, and try to sleep. The twins seek comfort with Mhyssi, but she gently rejects them. Mhyssi, however, asks Voronex is she can share his bunk, and he agrees. They take no physical actions, just sharing the comfort of mutual warmth.

End Game 19.

...eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek!!

(Kicks feet)

Dungeon Grrrl wrote:

OMG Mikey is the Whispering Tyrant!

*whisper whisper*

*whisper whisper*

*whisper whisper*

EEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee....

Hey folks!

Yeah, I'm alive though busy, busy, busy. I had originally planned to just work this info into game 19, but seeing as it's been a month (now I'm falling behind how often we actually play them game, I *had* been catching up) I thought I should take extra time to crank out this snippet.

And we have NOT seen the last of Aaston. He got away clean, after all, and still has a lot to answer for...

Aberzombie wrote:

....takes up 2 parking spaces with one car.

I do that all the time at the office here. He he. ^_^

OMG Mikey is the Whispering Tyrant!

[off-topic]

Well, at least we know Mikie *saw* this thread!

;D

Dungeon Grrrl wrote:

(We also gave monks a 2:3 progression, which makes monk/clerics and monk/sorcerers surprisingly reasonable).

Odd ruling, although Monk multiclassing is now more possible with 3.Pai. I would also give 2:3 to Bard, Paladin, and Ranger. Although you might want to call Bard a major spellcaster, I wouldn't.

Good point, and one that would have to be settled. Our games use the bard prestige class from UA, so we didn't really have to deal with that issue.

Interesting phenomenon is that a Cleric 3/Sorcerer 3 becomes pretty formidable, with caster level 6 in arcane and divine spells and the diversity of both spell lists up to spell level 2. Not bad for a 6th level character. They don't have the full power output, but they don't suck totally either. They still suffer when it comes to save DCs, but to me that's the price of multiclassing.

Exactly. We found it solved, honestly, *all* our multiclassing problems. I wish we had thought to do it long ago (we still have some games we began before this ruling that don't use it, and they feel hurky now)

airwalkrr wrote:

I think if you lowered the size modifier to Stealth, then made the size modifier to Perception commensurate, the compromise would be ideal.

Hence, a halfling would receive a +2 on Stealth and Perception checks while an ogre would receive a -2 on Stealth and Perception checks.

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

Seconded, and swiped

I find multiclassing characters work fine as is, except major spellcaster. We just give every class a Caster Level Progression. For major spellcasrters, it's 1:1. for fighters, it's 1:3 (+1 caster level for every 3 full levels.) thus a wizard 3/cleric 3 only has spells per day and spells known of 3rd level in either, but casts them all as a 6th level caster.

A wizard 3/fighter 3 has spells per day at 3rd, but casts at 4th caster level.

This fixed all our problems, and is simple.

(We also gave monks a 2:3 progression, which makes monk/clerics and monk/sorcerers surprisingly reasonable).

hardness, hp, AND BREAK DCs, would be HUGE additions to the weapon, armor and equipment charts!

Jason-pookie? Mikey? Someone listening?

...eats Cthulu Sushi.

Black Days of Kor Kammor
Game 18 ½

I'm working on Game 19, so this is just an appetizer.

I honestly don't have many details on this "session," because it didn't happen at my normal gaming venue. I was hanging out with the players of Quince, Tiera and Glidda, when it was revealed the other Heralds were going to be gone for longer than I had thought. Quince's player decided to take this opportunity to ask around about Glidda's temple, and the demon attack on it. This lead to research by Quince and Tierra in Hallowfaust, which left them convinced that the demons were working for a higher force, likely a mortal spellcaster of considerable power or a demon prince. That news was sent to glidda, along with an update that everyone else was missing.

Glidda, then, got a wizard to do her a "favor," teleporting her to Hallowfaust. There she joined in the research, and attracted Aaston's attention. She maintained a friendly flirt, but nothing more, which began to drive him into obsession (he doesn't deal well with rejection). This caused him to pressure Tiera for information on Glidda, though the two don't know each other that well. Tiera became suspicious, and sent her spirit totem to spy on Aaston. Though the totem's descriptions of Aaston's activities were sparse, they were odd enough for Tiera to bring them to Danar.

Danar then goes to Quince, to ask his opinion of Tiera's abilities as a spy, as she does not want to accuse a major guildsman on an outsider's say so without strong evidence. Quince, being too dang straightforward, suggests they just go ask him about the research, and see how he reacts to Danar's polite inquiry. Since Danar has tons more Sense Motive than Aaston has Bluff, and he has no warning she's on to him (the normal politics involving lots of beating aroudn the bush), he is caught by surprise. Even so, he starts to get around it when Quince asks, point blank, if Aaston has broken any unforgiveable laws of Hallowfaust. Aaston plays offended, but danar sees through him and orders his arrest. Aaston leaps at her, and Quince crosses blades with the now-outlaw necromancer.

Tiera and Glidda burst in, having followed Quince. Then Danar's guard bursts in. Then Aaston releases all his undead experiments to cover his escape, and flees the city. His most cunning creation is a series of ghouls who he has molded to look just like him, garbed in identical clothes. As a dozen of these rush about, Aaston manages to escape the city.

Glidda and Quince convince Danar to let them go after the other heralds, with a group of Stygian Guards. Tiera decides to stay in hallowfaust, unconvinced Aaston is the only problem in the ranks of the guildsmen.

Not sure where they are, but convinced glidda can find them, two more Heralds head into the woods around Hallowfaust.

End game 18-and-a-half

So, I've been asked a lot of questions about how much I planned Juiren's death. Here is the answer.

A little.

Juiren was always supposed to be a temporary character, since the player didn't figure on being free to game with us for more than a couple of weeks. He and I had discussed early that eventually either Juiren the healer would decide adventuring wasn't for him (he's just barely a young adult after all, with no real offensive powers), or I would introduce a town that really needed a healer, and he'd feel a divine calling.

The problem developed that neither of those made sense to the player anymore. Juiren had come to believe he was an important part of the Heralds (saving heroes' lives will do that) and the player couldn't see Juiren going quietly into retirement. So we talked, and agreed Juiren would enmd up putting himself at risk by refusing to heal himself if he though others needed it more. Heal checks could keep him from looking seriously wounded so Mhyssi wouldn't think to heal him. Thus, we set him up, together to get killed.

And then, I got Mhyssi's prayer, and noticed he wasn't in it.

Did I skew who decided to attack Juiren? Sure, a little. Not so much it broke verisimilitude, but any smart foe could see a healer was a rank 1 target. Then, Voronex played into my needs by deciding to knock over giant pillars *without* architecture & engineering checks (which would have reveal the weakness of the floor), and I knew Juiren was ready to die, so...

<cue Taps>

And then, the wounded and lost heralds had to face the lower levels of Guttek Khir *without* a healer.

That said, I'm a huge anime fan and a relatively big fan of kung-fu and wuxia movies, so you can expect a lot of over-the-top wacky stuff as well. :)

Hey Mikey!

While I know you and Nickie aren't even officially working on this (and Owen wants in?! talk about my favorite hit parade!), I did want to make one polite request.

It falls in the area of knowing what I want, and having no idea how to do it.

If you could make a wuxia fighters *feel different* compared to any other combatant, I would kiss you. The idea of a knight standing side-by-side with a ghost tiger assassin, and their game mechanics working differently enough that at a GAME level people felt they were doing different things, gets me all tingly!

If different fighting styles could also feel different from each other, that would rock an another, higher level.

Just a bug blown in your ear with a soft kiss.

DG

Okay, since you all had to wait so long for the last one, I brewed a fresh pot of tea and cranked this out before I go collapse in my futon.

Black Days of Kor Kammor
Game 18

The Heralds awaken to discover Auriji has watched over them throughout the night – if their break occurred at night. With no timekeeping experience, Auriji can't tell them how long they've slept, and no one is sure how long the previous day lasted. A full day at least has passed since they entered the caverns, as the spellcasters are able to prepare their spells, but whether it's been 24 hours or 31 or 46 1/2 no one is sure.

There is a brief row over Auriji staying up without letting anyone else take watch. Juiren suggests it was irresponsible of her to risk falling asleep from exhaustion, which would have ut them all at risk. Auriji asks him first, how was she to decide how long the watch had been, and how would he have tracked time if shed woken him, what experience he has with situations were falling asleep means death (as is always the case for her people when making long runs through her native jungle, often punctuated by hiding for hours from dinosaurs), and why is he wasting energy complaining about something they have already done successfully, when there is so much deadly work ywt to be done he could save his energy for?

The Twins declare Auriji the victor of that exchange, and Daronelle takes a moment to cheer up her cousin, and explain to him how to pick his battles with more care. Voronex makes sure everyone is fully healed (they aren't, but Juiren fixes that), checks the bunkroom for anything of use (finding nothing but the mine's dwarven name, so ancient he doesn't recognize it), and asks if everyone is ready, as it may be more than a day before they have even this much safety again. Everyone is ready. Except for Mhyssi.

She's still praying.

Because her player wrote down her prayer, I have it in my notes. Remembering that she worships Hyarl, a neutral giantish god of war, here is the devotion made by Mhyssi in the depths of Guttek Khir, the ancient Blood Mine of the dwarves.

Blade of My Heart, Father of my Wrath,
I did not ask to be your servant, nor did those who trained me ever desire me to become an instrument of your will above their own. But I have served you faithfully always, and I thank you for the blessings you have given me. I glory in the arts of war you reveal to me, and lust heartily for your favor and greater enigmas.

I find myself surrounded on all side, and at all times, by my enemies, but I cannot wage war against them. Our forces are not an army, and the field of conflict is not that of war. Those with me are not your agents, and it is not your way to protect. But hear me, oh terrible lord. Grant me the power to bring these, my friends, from this horror I have convinced them to follow me into. Allow me, the power to bring Voronex, Lyssa, Ryssa, Daronelle and Auriji out to the sky again and I swear,

On my soul I swear,

I shall fight a mighty war in your honor, and raise your banners over the skulls of a host of enemy generals. And with the spoils of that victory, i shall build a school where we shall elevate the ways of war to an art to challenge even the powers of the archmages.

Hear my plea, divine commander, and know that if you answer them I shall dedicate myself to becoming the mightiest of all your stewards, and training all my line to follow your laws forever, to the last drop of our blood.

So I, Mhyssiveren Heart-of-War, vow.

As the other heralds watch, Mhyssi draws herself up from her devotions. While most of the heralds are 9th, Mhyssi has kept her 2-level lead, and is now 11th. More importasntly, she now casts spells as a 6th level battle-sorcerer, giving her access to 3rd level spells. She takes sound lance (spell compendium), but always refers to it as Hyarl's Battle Drum Additionally, moved by her prayer, Hyarl gives her access to the cleric spell spiritual charger (from Heroes of Battle).

As if all that weren't enough she takes Practiced Spellcaster, causing her to *cast* sorcerer spells at 11th level, unlike before when her caster level was just 7th. He eyes flash gold and green, and everyone realizes Mhyssi isn't the same girl who collapsed in this room the night before.

Not exactly fresh, but restored compared to the fights and trials of the previous day, the Heralds head out from the old bunkroom. Voronex takes with him a sigil he cut off one of the old chairs, as it should let him identify the dwarf clan that build Guttek Khir if he can ever get to a dwarven city again, and examine the clan archives. He's concerned that a whole clan of dwarves may have been forgotten, and wants to restore their name if he can.

Daronelle leads the group again upward and inward, toward Agdrenel. Soon they find the temperature cooling, and the air current picking up. They also find less and less stirge guano, and theorize the stirges stick to the lower, warmer caverns.

Not half an hour later, they come across a group of 6 gnouls, though this time the Heralds arent surprised. Mhyssi gets initiative, and hurls her sound lance at the lead gnoul. As undead have crap Fort saves, and sound lance specifies it injures objects the gnoul takes full damage from 10d8 (more than 60 hp, as I recall), and it blows apart.

As the gnouls rush in, Voronex catches them all in a fire breath, badly damaging them. Auriji manages to charge one, but then get paralyzed. The Twins take up positions around Juiren, and use whips to trip any attacker. Daronelle dashes back and forth to weaken some, but Mhyssi lets rip a scorching ray (now getting three rays!) and Voronex breaths again, and suddenly the fight is over. Auriji recovers, and the heralds find that prepared and rested they are much more able to deal with the gnouls. After a few minutes Auriji recovers, and the Heralds press on.

The twins realize the corridor they are going through used to be trapped, but the traps havent been functional for centuries. Even so, it worries everyone. First, what was being guarded? Second, if there were deadly traps, *and* stirges *and* slimes and spores, why is there no sign of *any* previous adventurers. Mhyssi suggests that maybe the cave dwellers waste nothing– flesh, bone and metal are all eaten or absorbed by *something.*

A skittering, black scorpion the size of a horse comes at the heroes from a side-corridor. It takes many solid hits, but ultimately can't get past Aujir's longspear and Vornoex's breath, with Mhyssi and Daronelle lending support.

Just after, the Heralds hear another gnoul patrol, but the Twins hear it so far in advance the Heralds actually manage to hide themselves, hide the scorpion corpse, dowse their lights and let the gnouls pass. The gnouls are rushing and sniffing, clearly searching for something. Even Auriji admits, the element of surprise is likely gone. She does, however, take some trophies off the scorpion.

While hiding, Voronex spots an old dwarven sigil warning of plague next to one for "decay" or "disrepair." V shares this the others, who focus on the plague rune. As plague would explain why dwarves lost contact with the mine, most Heralds become convinced that's what happened, but V and Mhyssi are neither one convinced. If it was just plague, why the other sigil?

Mhyssi happens to notice a conceal passage as they move on (elven senses and all), and the group agrees to try it. This leads to some more finished passages, with less sign of fungus or dust, but the air is still and hot. Even so it seems undisturbed by gnoul prints, and the heralds decide to take it for as far as they can.

As they enter a large domed room of statues with swords and 70-foot free-standing columns topped with grotesque figures, they heralds stop to detect for magic. The statues seem obvious guardians, but there's no sign they can, or ever have, moved. Convinced, the heralds move across, only to have the column figures swoop donw on them. It's a gargoyle attack!

The horned horrors swoop down on the group and immediately try grabbing Juiren and the twins to fly up and then drop them. Juiren is scouped up, but the Twins both manage to wriggle free with Escape Artist checks. As Juiren is dropped Mhyssi throws a feather fall on him, and thus becomes the primary target of the gargoyles. Auriji leaps to her defense, while Voronex takes to the air. When a gargoyle is wounded it tries to escape, but Daronelle begins leaping about and picking off the badly injured foes. After a few rounds of combat, it becomes clear to the gargoyles they are losing, and they all swoop high and begin screeching.

Voronex goes after them, and Mhyssi throws magic missiles, but the screeching is not just a sound of fear. From one of the side corridors an ancient, Huge delver shambles forth. It's hide is studded with bones and leather, almost like decorative piercings, and its color is dark brown to almost black. The roars a battle-cry in Terran, and makes right for Auriji.

Suddenly, the herald have their hands full. Mhyssi swings her sword at it, but the blade dissolves immedaitely against its corrosive hide. Auriji does better, scoring a hit, but is slamed and then burning with acid herself. The twins try grease, but the delver just eats a layer of the floor and is on slid footing again. Voronex moves to strafe it, but the gargoyles can now focus on him while the other heralds are busy, and swarm him.

Mhyssi hits it with a spiritual charger (socring a crit!) and then summons a spiritual weapons which is a force effect, and does not dissolve. Auriji slings Maja Gada onto her back, and picks up two gargoyle claws from dead foes, and attacks with them. Even as improvised weapons, she does decent damage. Daronelle makes strafing runs, losing a short sword to its acid, but quickly drawing a spare.

But this is an old beast, and it has many, many hit points. Soon Juiren is spending all his time healing daronelle and Auriji, while Lyssa and Ryssa turn to assisting Voronex. V defeats the last gargoyles with the Twin's help, just as Auriji rage goes down and she collapses. Juiren keeps her alive, but daronelle goes down the next round. Fearing he can't kill the thing with fire before it kills his friends. He yells for the heralds to move to a given section of the room, then flies to a column. With a massive Strength check (action point and a heck of a roll) he tips the free-standing, 70-foot-tall column over. He just misses, but his a second column, and that one slams squarely on the delver. The delver screams, and dissolves the column. Auriji, up again, gets all the rest of the Heralds to tip a third column, which also smashes the delver.

Then, the Twins see the floor is cracked, and the delver's acid is seeping into the cracks. They yell a warning to Mhyssi...

But it's too late. The floor collapses, and Heralds, Delver, and a few tons of rock plummet into the depths of Guttek Khir.

Mhyssi throws another feather fall on Auriji, and gets one on herself. The Twins have feather tokens they use. Voronex swoops down to grab Juiren and Daronelle...

But misses Juiren.

The young healer, already injured, falls to his death, just as the ceiling caves in. Rocks pummel the surviving heralds, and many pass out. The survivors must struggle in choking dust and a rain of debris to move the survivors to safety. Voronex manages to get everyone to a side-cavern and sees Juiren's body. He heads for it, but the whole 100-foot shaft collsapes. Juiren's body is crushed, and lost forever. Voronex is stunned speechless, unable to think of any way to undo what he just saw.

Mhyssi struggles to her feet, blood streaming from a wound on her forehead, then collapses into terrible wracking tears. She suddenly realizes, only now, she forgot to include Juiren in her prayer to Hyarl.

End game 18

Wonderful! Thank you again for posting, what an incredibly fun game this sounds like and a great story to be retold!

Honestly I had forgotten about some of these details before I dug up the notes, so it was fun for me to retell, too!

DG your still one hell of a storyteller.

[BLUSH] Thanks, Phally![/BLUSH]

Likewise. I'm still very impressed, both with your skills and those of your players. At least 3 times during that session I thought to myself, "Well... now they're dead. No way are they getting out of that." And I'm guessing that should the players (and their characters) ever give up hope, you would have little compunction about slaughtering them. :D Bravo.

I have done the TPK. Heck, I'v done a TPK to *this* group of players (though not in this campaign). When I do pull that off, I either respectfully end the game (often with a round-rboin storytelling session allowing players to help me decide how everything turned out), or we pick up with new characters. I once ran a game we called "Bastards & Brothers" because *every* character was a secondary relative of a character from the TPK earlier in the campaign, each looking for revenge on the villain who killed their original characters.

The group dynamics are really interesting to watch, especially in regards to how particular pairings/triads/etc form among the members of the group and what it does in terms of their behavior.

I think that's my favorite part of this group too. That, and watching them escape Certain Doom (tm) again and again.

Not to mention the Shrieker Fungus. I swear, I used to think that it was the most useless monster in the entire MM, but I stand corrected. I take off my figurative hat to you, DG.

Thanks!

Yeah, I have used shriekers more than once to create sudden, massive battles with reinforcements coming on the bad guy's side every few minutes. They're useless by themselves, but GREAT as an esxcuse fot eh heroes to suddenly realize they're in trouble!

How many hit points of Damage did Voronex take? That is one tough Dwarf.

I don't know exactly, because we didn't keep track of that in the game notes, but it was a whole heck of a lot of damage. It's worth noting that Voronex is a dragonfire adept, and the DC of their main ability (breath weapon) is based on Con. Therefore, Voronex maxed his Con as a starting character, bought it up every time he could, and took Con items as treasure or custom-ordered items whenever possible. He also rolled really, really well for hit point.

I -think- that at this point he had about a 22 Con, and a total of 94 or 96 hp as an 8th level character. I -know- he had more than 100 by the time of game 19, since he had leveled and we commented on him being the first person to crest 100 hp.

For the record:

That's *my* princess Leia outfit. No one kidnapped me, I wear that thing at geek get-togethers all the time.

Those werent girl scouts. they were women in their early 20s stuffed into girl scout outfits that didnt quite fit. They "rescued" me days ago, but I just now got loose from *them*, and boy am *I* exhausted.

Mike wasn't in the Leia outfit because he was leading the rescue Girl Scouts. And he even managed to get a merit badge out of the deal!

(Smooches, Mikey!)

I vote the blade ability have it's duration be able to be broken up, but NOT into rounds. In other words, if you want to use it for a round, you use it for at least a minute.

This allows you get it for more than one encounter, but not forever. Also, I think you should then be able to "over-write" your duration with a re-use of the power, if you need a different power set.

As Promised!!

Black Days of Kor Kammor
Game 17

The group swims hard and fast through the black waters of the underground river, desperately hoping they'll find air before their breath gives out. They must make Swim checks, and take damage from each failure as the turbulent currents bump them against rocks or twist their limbs. They do find a small opening, but it is just inches high. Each Herald, in turn, sucks up one or two gasps of air, and then dives back down. The long river has many such small air pockets, but none allow for more that half their heads to break surface, and the air is rarely fresh. Soon, endurance becomes an issue, as does cold.

Voronex and Auriji are able to make every con check called for, but Daronelle and Juiren, as well as the twins, begin to struggle. Juiren becomes fatigued, but manages to brace himself in a small pocket of air and cast <I>minor restoration</i> to renew himself. The Twins take turns being in front of each other, each finding the path of least effort for the other. But Daronelle simply falls to exhaustion, and is nearly wisked away down river. Auriji manages to sense her rushing past, and grabs her. Not long after, just before Daronelle would drown, the Heralds come up in a larger cavern, and drag themselves out of the water. They are alive, and seem not to be followed. But this place is clearly a feeding warren for the undead, as bloody bones lay scattered everywhere. They are alive, but far from safe.

Voronex brings forth the undead gnoll body he hauled throughout the long swim, for the priests and healers to examine. This is clearly no common zombies, but a gnoll filled with black power to be a flesh-eating, self-willed undead of some power. Given it's stench and paralytic bite, the Twins quickly dub it a gnoul, a gnoll turned into a ghoul. Mhyssi and Juiren are both concerned, since the power to create unique, self-willed undead is the sign of a powerful necromancer. Agdrenel is either more skilled in true death magic than most vampires, or she has a necromancer working for her. They find this disturbing.

The Twins look at the spiked leather armor phallus on the gnoul, and ask why the fact a Vampire can make Undead is what the clerics find disturbing?!

Daronelle and Juiren only know about Agdrenel from stories. Auriji was dead last time they faced her. Mhyssi and Voronex want her destroyed, but with his Wisdom fully restored Voronex now has doubts. There is no sunlight here to defeat her, and she only approaches near the cave mouth at night. She is far less vulnerable than she was on the ship, and they never really knew how powerful she was then, since they avoided actually fighting her. Her presence here, with the undead gnolls, can not be a coincidence. She must be looking for the Heralds, and her intentions cannot be good.

Mhyssi doesn't care. She's full of rage about what Aaston did to her that she swore not to reveal. Her Brand of Metroba is throbbing in constant pleasure/pain in the presence of so much undead energy. Mhyssi wants to hurt something, and decides its better to take her wrath out on the undead than risk attacking her friends. She tells Voronex she refuses to leave without taking on Agdrenel, and for her sake, he acquiesces. Mhyssi realizes he's only agreeing for her, and in a moment of tenderness all too rare recently, kisses his cheek.

Auriji doesn't care if they attack or not, but now that they have decided to do so wants it done quickly. The element of surprise is one of their only advantages, and they may not even have it anymore given the encounters further back in the mountain. The gnouls may or may not report regularly, and given she has magic powers Agdrenel may have scryed out their purpose. The heralds' best chance is to press on as fast as possible, by the barbarian woman's reckoning, and hope they can catch the vampress unawares.

If that seems impossible, Auriji warns this may be a suicide mission with no upside. Ryssa and Lyssa opine, for the first time ever, that if there is no likely hope of success, they will NOT follow Mhyssi and Voronex into a deathtrap. Auriji will follow her blood-brother. Juiren will follow Mhyssi. Daronelle will follow Juiren. The Twins shrug, warning they're not kidding about fleeing if things go bad, but for now they continue on with the rest of the team.

Daronelle is instructed to try to find a path that heads up and in, toward Agdrenel's mine entrance encampment, but if at all possible avoids areas heavily traveled by the gnouls. The scout gamely sets out to try to find such a path, and soon discovers areas with higher build-ups of stirge guano have fewer signs of the undead horrors. She leads the Heralds, there being no question now of not carrying a light. Behind Daronelle is Rysaa, then Voronex, Juiren, Lyssa, Mhyssi, the Auriji. The Twins both have everburning torches, and Aurtiji carries an actual fire torch.

Though the caverns they go, moving deeper into the mountain. The tunnels of rough, natural passageways cut through larger natural caves, across raging underground rivers, and past stagnant pools. The water carved these caves long ago, though Voronex is bothered by the patterns. There are no stalactites or stalagmites, and the water seems not to have always gone the route of least resistance.

The air remains foul with guano but breathable, and periodically a gust suggests they are following the winds toward Agdrenel. Voronex also notices some bore holes in the floor, old but clearly made a test-bores for dwarven miners. He manages to examine one while the rest of the group argues about whether or not to climb a 45-degree incline filled with dribbling water, slime, and mushrooms. The bore holes are very old, but also incredibly smooth. He determines they must have been made by adamantine drills, or magic–either of which means the dwarves were looking for some ore of great value.

Meanwhile, Mhyssi and Auriji argue to climb the dangerous shaft, as it seems to be the largest air shaft up. The twins, Daronelle and Juiren fear the climb is too dangerous. As the debate comes to a head, Mhyssi suggests the climb is less dangerous than being in the mines too long, and ends with "Right, Voronex?"

The malformed dwarf was paying no attention, and doesn't want to admit he was examining ancient dwarven mine marks, so he shrugs noncommittaly. The while group takes that as a reluctant agreement with Mhyssi, and decide to take the hard climb.

When Voronex looks up at the shaft, he is horrified by what he suggested, but now can't explain why without revealing the bore mark, which his instincts tell him not to do.

(Aside, the player had no idea why he was keeping it a secret, and marked it down to racial dwarf greed. The other players were okay with that, if curious. The whole thing had been handled by passing notes, and the player really hadn't realized what he was agreeing to.) Worse, his wings can't work in the twisting, jagged, tight passage.

The climb is slow and treacherous. Auriji and Daronelle lead the way, each wedging pitons (not hammering them) to which ropes are looped. The rest of the group climb along behind. The angle is not too steep, but the drippling water (that originally cut the passage anyway) makes the sides slick, and slimes and molds worsen that situation. Even so, the mushrooms show where there are little ledges, and the group manages to climb up 500 feet before a serious problem strikes.

One of the mushrooms screams.

The shreiker lets loose a horrid cry, and its fellow fungus take up its refrain. Auriji instinctively kills the shrieker near her, but the damage is done. The distant sound of wings comes from above. Mhyssi is the only oen to make the dungeoneering check to realize what's coming, and yells "Down, now!"

But it's too late. A flock of stirge swarm onto the Heralds of Dawn.

Ryssa is hit immediately, and loses so much Con she falls unconscious. She falls free, and her rope pulls at Daronelle, who has to brace herself to stay upright. Voronex is also hit by several, though Auriji is missed by all the attacks. The heralds start to climb up, hoping to find a ledge. Voronex puts u0p a fire aura, forcing the stirges to take fire damage every time they bite in. No one stirge stays hooked on for long, but the flock keeps replacing those that flee the burning targets.

Over a few rounds, things go from bad to worse. Lyssa passed out from con loss, and Juiren doesn't have three rounds to cast a <I>lesser restoration</I>. Mhyssi nails one with spells, but has very little left for the day. Voronex is hit time and again, but constantly takes very little Con damage, and continues to climb. Then, the sounds of climbers below them echoes up, and the heralds realize the shriekers have alerted the gnouls. A squad is climbing up at them.

Then, the green slime begins to drip down on them. It's acidic burns sear flesh and metal, but the stirges seem to have evolved a natural immunity. Juiren and Mhyssi pass out, and Auriji is left hauling them up by brute strength. Daronelle and voronex must carry Lyssa and Ryssa, and the gnouls are clearly gaining. Voronex actually fills a stirge to blood-capacity, and is still up and kicking. As the green slime begins to pool on the largest ledge they must get past, Voronex asks Auriji if she can carry Lyssa as well, and the barbarian gamely claims she can. She now climbs the slick walls whiles hauling a ripe with three unconscious comrades, making Str and Climb checks *every round* while Voronex begins to hammer at the large ledge from below it.

He makes a Knowledge (architecture and engineering) check to aid his own Knowledge (dungeoneering) check, and hammers at the ledge. He can *just* slam past the hardness of the stone (which is halved as a result of his skill checks), and must take many rounds to do much damage.

Auriji keeps climbing, and Daronelle is forced to follow her. The stirge focus on Voronex, because he's making the most noise, but none can stay on his burning body long. After many rounds, the girls manage to get to the top of the shaft, and look down, they can just see Voronex, engulfed in his own flame, constantly bitten at by stirges, no more than a hundred feet above the oncoming patrol of a dozen gnouls, hammering as a ledge of green slime trying to burn his face off. Daronelle turns to try to revive Juiren, while Auriji prepares to rope to help her leap down to fight to the death with her blood brother.

Then, Voronex cracks the ledge. The next round, he breaks it. And a long strip of stone, filled with green slimes, collapses onto the gnoul patrol. Not a single gnoul makes its Climb check, and the full squad slip free and fall down the hundreds of feet of shaft, as green slime burns their dead flesh. The huge cacophony attracts the stirge flock, which flies down after them.

Voronex climbs up, and joins the other Heralds. They stagger away, using potions to bring Juiren and Mhyssi around, then tapping any healing those two have left. When Voronex finds an old bunk-room, concealed in cunning stonework, once used by dwarven mines ages ago, the group decide they must risk bedding down. Auriji takes first watch, but never rouses anyone else. She simple makes Con checks all night, and then uses her last lesser restoration potion to remove her own fatigue.

Everyone in this group gains a level.

End game 17

For the record.

I do NOT insist that half of all characters in plate mail be women. I want *one* obvious picture of a woman in plate mail. Being an iconic would be great, but is not required.

I want APPROXIMATELY half of all positive character illustrations to be male, APPROXIMATELY half to be female, and ONE to be a woman in full plate.

And I want APPROXIMATELY half of all negative depcitions to be of each gender.

And I want a mix of fantasy races and cultures, as well as a mix of things drawn from real-world bloodlines and cultures.

And the question of how common adventurers female who look like knights is irrelevant to the real world because all fighters can wear plate, even if not all choose to. Yes, a female fighter might not have access to a belt of giant strength and mithral plate at 1st level. She doesn't need to. She can wear chainmail until higher levels, like a lot of characters do. But since at some point she DOES have access to strength-enhancers, and DOES have access to mithral plate, logic dictates some female clerics, fighters, paladins and even barbarians are going to end up in full plate at some point in their career, and we need a picture for that, because it is the ONE and ONLY character concept I still *see* women get *denied* the ability to play in game shops and basements.

And, especially since Eric and Paizo already seem to be on the same page with me on this one, I think that's about all I have to say on that topic. ;D

Negotiable Affection,

I was thinking the exact same thing! That scene from the 13th Warrior popped into my mind while reading the post.

Oh and Dungeon Grrrl! Bat Guano! I have always prided myself on having a serious attention to 'dungeon dressing' in my games and with trying to make it act as it really would IRL, but I have never thought about having little guano fires! Well done!

Thanks!

And it's *stirge* guanno. Very important, among other things because I can then decide how it works without anyone knowing better. ;D

If I were to add anything to this debate, it would be that I want the artwork to LOOK GOOD.

Why would anyone get hung up if there was one picture more or less of either gender? I won't count if you won't.

Clearly, I want good artwork too. But since I have never seen Paizo artwork I didn't think was good, I felt no need to call that out. But it's true, and worth mentioning. Cruddy art is unwelcome, no matter what it depcits.

I don't care about gender ratio so much that having it be off by one picture is going to bother me. What I *do* care about is making sure the one missing picture isn;t a woman in full plate mail. Because a lot of young female players want to run that character, and if they don;t see her in the book, they end up deciding this game isn't for them. And, honestly, when they face some of the Our Gang no-girls-allowed rpg groups 9and if they're new to the hobby, they may not know what their other options are), the NEED a picture IN THE RULEBOOk so they can say "I can to play a female Fighter in heavy armor. Look, there's a picture."

These things happen.

Now, I do not want to get into an argument about whether women can put on plate mail and swing a longsword along with the men in the real world. It's pointless. And the reason it's pointless, is that nearly every 7th level fighter in plate mail I see has a belt of ogre strength, and mithral armor. So, real world is irrelevant. If a woman CAN become a fighter in heavy armor in an rpg game, even if it's NOT THE NORM, then you need a picture of that.

Because otherwise, some women will be disinvited from ever getting into the hobby. As soon as I run into a group, just once, that refuses to let a young male player run a wizard because "Men can't multitask or act cautiously enough to realistically be a spellcaster in any fantasy campaign world," and have him flip through a rulebook looking for some evidence they're wrong, I'll take up the Gandalf Picture cause with equal fervor.

Do whatever you want in your own campaigns. Goodness knows I have. But don't shoot down the one piece of visual support I have actually seen, more than once, in different states and different game with different groups, prevent a woman from being able to play the first rpg character that interests her.

Not that I need to point it out but CotCT has a pretty kick butt female paladin.

Link

Yep, and she's perfect., I just need to see her, or someone like her, in the final pathfinder RPG core book.

And cartoons. Even in the core book, ESPECIALLY in the GM section, we need some old-time cartoons! Let's remind people these games are supposed to be FUN!

Seoni is, and should be, sexy. 14-year-old boys should look at her and pant. That's her role, and it is a valued on in fantasy. I would hate to see her toned down even 1 degree.

We need *other* strong female character in action poses as well, of course. I'd love to see the iconic cleric (page 8) actually fighting, jumping, and adventuring. And, we need a female warrior in plate mail.

P-L-A-T-E M-A-I-L. Not heavy chain. Not a few bits of armor inspired by the movie <i>Heavy Metal</i>. Real, honest-to-Arthur plate mail.

And we need to see her more than once.

Strongly seconded.

And it won't suck if you called that class a "bard"

For an rpg game to maintain mass popularity, it appears to need new releases. The OGL allowed many companies to create vast waves of support for D&D. Since WotC is going to allow 3.5 to go out of print, we'll need both physical rulebooks, and a new baseline for *other* companies to refer to as they produce their own 3.pi support books. Not many companies have a shot of being universally accepted as the 3.pi baseline, but Paizo does.

Since we'll need a new book, we might as well fix those few things that DO bog down games, if we can do so without making my 5-foot high pile of 3.pi books obsolete.

I know we're only worrying about rules right now, and that's as it should be. But I have some visual concerns, and I know art and art design can take a long time, especially if you're suggesting an unusual look. So I want to bring some things up now.

Women: There should be pretty close to 50% female representation for any important category. This includes sexy (half the sexy pics should be women), heavily armored, monsters (Grendel had a mom, remember?), and competent-looking. I don't want to argue about other books, I do want to say if a young woman decides she wants to play Joan of Arc in plate mail, and she opens Pathfinder, I would hate for her to decide she has to be a cleavage-baring sorceress or she can;t play.

This happens. You want more girls who understand your paladin stories? Make at least one iconic a heavily armored female. Sexy sorceress are good TOO, but should not be the sole, or even primary representation of women.

Culture: Paizo has some cool non-European cultures out there. Make sure they, in all their multicolored color, get some solid visual representation in the PRPG.

Cartoons: If this book is supposed to boil down the essence of D&D, it needs some funny cartoons. Preferably, like the ones in old 1st edition D&D books. This helps bring the old feel back in places, allows us to poke fun at ourselves, and breaks up the visual look in a way that tells DMs and players they can use these rules to tell THEIR stories, not just Paizo's.

I STRONGLY recommend both Stan! and Rich Burlew for these.

WotC seems to have forgotten D&D can be used for all kinds of stories, and their art shows a single, corporate, unified, intellectually protected, commercially identifiable, homogenized fantasy look. I personally think thyat's a HUGE mistake, and one Paizo is uniquely positioned to correct. A varied, colorful, inclusive art design is a good start for that.

Black Days of Kor Kammor
Game 16

It takes more than a day for the Heralds to track down an entrance into the mines, through a series of natural caves low in the mountain from which a spring runs. There is much difficult climbing even once within, and there is the distant smell of wet decay, suggesting bodies are rotting in the river. The farther in they go, the stronger the smell gets. Also, once they are around the first two turns of the caves, there is no light at all.

This results in a debate. Voronex and the Twins can see with darkvision, and Auriji proves able enough moving in total darkness (combination of Blind-Fighting and good d20 rolls), but even Daronelle has difficulty with no light, and Jurien and Mhyssi are constantly barking their shins in total black. The Twins don't want to be spotted, and argue any light is too great a risk. Daronelle and Jurien argue their falling and curing is making enough noise to echo down the corridor and give them away in any case, and with no light they are close to useless in a fight. As the rotting flesh smell is getting stronger even as they just stand around and argue in forced whispers, they feel combat at SOME point is inevitable. Finally, the group agrees a few candles worth of shadowed illumination is better than no light at all. They pull three candles out of their packs, and Daronelle lights one with a tindertwig.

Revealing the cavern they are in is crawling with undead gnolls, creeping silently along the walls and ceiling.

With a howl, the gnoll-corpses fling themselves down on the Heralds in the surprise round. All the Heralds are flat-footed, though the Twins do receive special DM permission to scream in total panic as a free action as a pack of undead gnolls with spiked phalluses built into their armor leaps out at them. However, even flat-footed, Auriji is not about to let the gnolls attack without hurting them. As she has Combat Reflexes, she can make attacks of opportunity while flat-footed, and Majah Gada is always in hand, a reach weapon that happens to cover every line of attack the gnoll-corpses are rushing along, especially those undead leaping down from above. As we allow the longspear to trip in our games (to soup-up it's usefulness), Auriji throws a trip at every one of six attacking gnolls-corpses. She succeeds five times, forcing the gnoll-dead to the ground. As they were charging, their actions are wasted with them left prone. A single gnoll-dead beats Auriji's trip, and she is forced to drop Majah Gada. The sole gnoll-corpse standing bites Lyssa as a charge, and in addition to a horrific critical hit, it paralyzes her.

As the first regular round of combat begins, a waive of nausea overcomes the Heralds. The gnoll-dead are the source of the horrid stench of wet decomposition they smelled, and now it is overpowering. Voronex actually fails a Fortitude save, as do Juiren and Ryssa, and all three are sickened. Mhyssi is unaffected, and Daronelle and Auiji resist the effect. Auriji wins initiative, and quickdraws Phrit Fi, her punch dagger, and assaults the standing ghoul, Power Attacking for all she is worth. She even spends an Action Point to double the value of her Power Attack. Her attacks all hit, and she manages to destroy the gnoll-corpse in a single round of attacks. She then flips Phrit Fi to bury itself point-down in the foul corpse, and uses Quickdraw again (it's a free action) to kick Majah Gada back to her hands.

Mhyssi goes next, and throws a turn at the creatures. To the group's horror she manages a maximum turn, but does not affect a single gnoll-dead. Mhyssi realizes the entire cave complex has been desecrated, and all undead have high levels of turn resistence here. Her efforts are a waste. She whips out her greatsword from her charm bracelet.

The undead gnolls leap to their feet, but in doing so all draw attacks of opportunity from Auriji again, and she stabs 4 of 5 remaining foes wounding them. Mhyssi also gets one AoO, and slashes at the one Auriji misses. Then, the dead gnolls get attacks. Mhyssi is bitten twice, and Auriji once. Auriji has to save vs paralysis, but Mhyssi does not. Auriji succeeds, and is still up, though the gnolls are mostly inside her spear's range now. Jurien is also bitten, and instantly paralyzed.

Daronelle grabs Juiren and dashes outside the main circle of fighting. Ryssa leaps to Lyssa's defense, and tries to trip a gnoll-dead with her whip, but fails. Lastly Voronex goes, positioning himself to catch three wounded ghoul corpses. They are injured badly by his fire, but a secondary effect also occurs. The cave is revealed to be full of stirge guano, which burns easily. The cone of flame breath lights up vast piles of it, and the fire begins to spread quickly. Daronelle and Juiren are caught in the spreading fire, and take 1d6. But as the fire intensifies, that damage will grow.

Auriji suddenly can't easily get far enough away from ghouls to use Maha Gada without getting into a fire. Ignoring the d6 of burn damage, she tumbles into a small fire and stabs a ghoul-dead that is already burned and slashed and drops it, leaving 4. Mhyssi decides she'll need her spells later and just slashes at another wounded one, damaging it further. The ghouls are dripping wet (having swum just moments before climbing onto the walls and ceiling) and ignore the guano fire damage for now. Three focus on Auriji, tearing at her with long claws and snapping their long yellow fangs at her flesh, but they do little damage. One tries to grapple Mhyssi, thrusting its hips at her as it does so. She runs it through, but discovers that while these undead don't have Improved Grab, their lack of pain receptors allows them to continue a grapple even if they take an AoO, and it successfully grabs her.

Six more ghoul-dead rush into the far end of the corridor, also dripping wet. They rush through the slowly spreading guano fire to attack. Voronex and Ryssa take multiple hits, and must constantly save vs paralysis.

Daronelle gets Jurien into the river, standing waist-deep in the water to put out flames that had begun to lick at the hem of his tunic. In doing so, she fails a Reflex save (rolled a 1), and drops the only lit candle in the room. The cave is thrown into shadowed darkness, the only light the dozens of tiny fires flickering. Auriji shouts for light, and fights on anyway, but misses even with her Blind Fighting reroll. Realizing no else is likely to be able to, Mhyssi beats a grapple check (!) And using an action point summons up a <i>light</I>, throwing green-and-gold rays of illumination through the cave.

Gnoll-dead bite and claw, the 10 of them trying to surround the Heralds. Voronex can't risk another fire breath attack, and knows undead are immune to cold and Strength drains. Instead he wreaths himself in a fire aura, and tackles the ghoul between Ryssa and the river. He bares it into the spreading guano fire, and manages to do some burn damage through its wet fur. Ryssa gives herself <I>darkvision</I> and hauls Lyssa into the water by Daronelle.

Auriji intentionally cuts herself off from the Heralds, raging and screaming at the gnoll-dead. Able to see them again, she hammers at a wounded one and drops it, Cleaves into another wounded one and drops it, and stabs a third. Mhyssi is no longer convinced this battle can be won without spellfire, and opens up. She uses <I>whirling blade</I> to throw her greatsword at five of the gnolll-dead who line up, then begins to retreat to the river herself.

The ghouls surround Auriji and Voronex, biting and clawing but unable to paralyze them (they have the two best Fortitude saves in the party). Three gnoll-corpses slip into the river, where they show they have Swim rates and, since they need not breath, can shoot back and forth through the water with only ripples to reveal their location. Daronelle is pulled under by grapples,a nd ryssa must use both arms to keep either Lyssa or Juiren from sliding below the surface and drowingin.

Auriji throws caution to the win, and fights in a purely offensive style. She allows herself to get flanked so she can use Maja Gada on the ones about to bring down Voronex, then takes 5-foot steps in a fighting retreat so she can keep her foes in Majah Gada's reach.

Daronelle slashes and stabs, but can;t break free of 3 gnoll undead in the water, beneath the surface. Knowing how deadly underwater fighting can get, Mhyssi begins using <I>magic missile</I> anytime she gets even a flicker of a gnoll-corpse under the water, spending Action Points for Sudden Maximize each time to hurt them fast. She actually burns higher-level spells for more <I>magic missiles</I> once she runs out of 1st level sorcerer spells. She kills one Auriji and Voronex had wounded, then another on pure magic missile damage. Daronelle manages to escape from the third, but is BADLY battered.

Auriji is a bloody mess, actually kept up largely by Voronex's vigor aura. She and he finish off another Gnolls, and then rush to the river. And as they do so, *another* group of 4 undead gnolls swim in, remaining below the surface.

The Heralds are now all standing waist-deep in the river, as the dead water gnolls swim around them. The walls and ceiling are alight with burning stirge-guano, the flickering red illumination of which battle Mhyssi's green-and-gold <i>light</I> spell. No patch of ground isn't doing 2d6 fire damage a round, but the gnoll-dead can fight from below the surface of the water. All the heralds are damaged, three are sickened, and two are paralyzed. Voronex sparks two sunrods to life, dropping one to illuminate the gnolls from the bottoms of the river.

As their shadows are cast up onto the surface, the gnolls rush in, trying to bring down Auriji. She spies their approach, and skewers one. Daronelle jumps a second, just to draw its attacks. The gnoll-dead try to slip backl away from their hit-and-swim raid, but Ryssa nails them all with a <I>glitterdust</I> (action point for Still Spell). So the dark water no longer lends them cover. Voronex jumps on the one Daronelle is wrestling with, and Auriji throws Maja Gada at another, drawing Phrit Fi for close-in water fighting.

A few desperate round of hammer-and tongs fighting pass, with the Heralds grimly stabbing and slashing for their lives. When only one gnoll remains, it suddenly turns and tried to flee. Auriji grapples *it*, and is them paralyzed, while holding it. Before it can wriggle free, Mhyssi decapatates it. Voronex grabs a dead gnoll, and turns to flee back out of the cavern. But as he flies to the bend of the cave system, he hears marching feet. More undead, a patrol of them, are headed into the cave system, blocking their escape. Most herlads and single-digit hit points, the healer can;t mvoe, and Mhyssi the sorcerer is out of offensive spells.

Without hesitation, Mhyssi grabs Juiren, and tells daronelle to find them an escape deeper in. The Heralds rush down the river, only to find it flows out of solid rock.

Ryssa: "Since we can't survive another fight, we can safely assume there's air within swimming range."

Voronex (puzzled): "Why's that?"

Ryssa: "Because if there isn't, we're all going to drown."

Auriji: "Right!" (Grabs Juiren, dives into the underground river)

End Game 16

BTW Dungeon Grrrl, be sure to give a hullo to Lilith, she posted this past weekend on your LJ. I'd be willing to bet at least a few of us have meandered over there from here...

I know! I am soooo pleased! I think there's been some traffic the other way, too!

::blushes:: Thanks, I have always had a soft spot in my heart for the Ladies of Negotiable Affection.

Who doesn't?

So do you have a list you use on which spells are restricted or is it more a case of deciding when it comes up?

There's a list. In pencil. ON a very worn legal pad, that I really have to type up someday.

Have you tackled this issue before? And how did you handle it if you have.

Yes, we have. for note, healign affects both mother and child (if a paladins steed is close enough for one spell to get two people, a fetus definitely is!). However, there's is a DC 15 Massive Damage Fort save to avoid miscarrage. It's 50 hp in one attack in the first trimester, 40 in the second, and 30 in the third.

Dungeon Grrrl wrote:

No worries there. As far as impact in my real life goes, you're words spoken by a tiny plastic head. I grant you no power, and thus you cant belittle me in my world, no matter what you think you've done in yours.

I can respect your attitude. But I think you might have misunderstood me. It would be easy to do, as I see I left out a few key phrases in my post last night.

I was trying to convey those you referred make me look to be a saint in comparison.

Ah.

Yep, I misunderstood. Sorry about that. :D

However, I think the general point (sticks and stone may break my bones, but bad marketing cannot hurt me), is still something I am glad I said.

We use action points in all our games. It allows players to decide when their characters are drawing on an extra determination or effort. We love them.

But I know not everyone does. I really think the pathfinder RPG is going to HAVE to have some optional rule sections, and this is a perfect place for those. Add action points, but as something you can use or not at your leisure. Dont have class abilities or feats that require action points to work. make them something a group can bolt on, or not, as they prefer.

Psionics are another good example of a fully-optional rules set.

Using truly optional rules, that *aren't* woven through everything else in the game, lets gamers customize the game to their tastes without creating pure chaos or making things incompatable with each other.

For the record, my current thought is that each player AND THE DM should get one UA style-action point each game session, plus one for every 10 FULL levels the character has (or highest level NPC the DM is using that night). This encourages people not to hoard their points, so they have fun with them, but also prevents players from spending 8 in one encounter with the Queen of Skulls and turning the BBEG into a cakewalk.

I was originaly running about 10 months behind on these games. It's supposed to get run every week, but obviously that doesn't always happen. The current entries are running about 8 months behind. so there's LOTS more material I need to get to, from the introduction of Gres Grekis to the return of HumTum.

Yeah, the Advanced GameMaster's Guide is the best. Everyone should buy a copy, and thank publisher and writer for creating it, and beg for another one. Promise to pre-order it if that's what it takes.

Silphium exists in most of my games, as it really used to exist, and it solves a lot of social problems in D&D.

And my blog is there to be slobbered on. :D However, out of loyalty Paizo remains the sole place you'll find the campaign journal, even if I post pictures of Mhyssi and talk about elements of Kor Kammor at the blog, the action all happens here.

Okay finished the reread, you know it made so much more sense the second time around. Amazing what actually reading every post can do for comprehension.

First off awesome, awesome, awesome.

Thanks! for the record, I love your avatar and name. Subtle, but awesome.

Tiera cutting her arm off. WOW. That was cool, very wolf like. Were the other players stunned by this action or did they take it in stride?

They were shocked, and one of the reasons they were was that they know how rare upper level healing spells (like <I>regenerate</I>) are in Kor Kammor. If it's 4th level or less it's everywhere, but those spells *aren't* on the universal spell list for any class in Kor kammor.

You chop off your arm at 6th level, you're going to be 1-armed for a while. It's <I>easier</I> to raise someone from the dead that grow their arm back.

The cloakers scene in the delve was great. With the cloakers reproducing via their victims ( btw on a scale of 1 - 10 that was an easy 11) was their a chance that the twin was impregnated? Actually how do you deal with pregnancy in your campiagn? As in do you worry about it at all? As in frollick/be raped as much as you like no worries?

The Twin could have been, as it happens she wasn't this time. But the player got extra nervous, since I *could* stick her with a child without removing her from the game, since she has two bodies. (A fact I had not overlooked, as will be seen later on).

As for pregnancy, it's a risk but not as great a one as you might think. First of all, the game world has vast supplies of silphium, a real-world ancient contraceptive. All the female characters take it regularly, which is a big help. Also, since a <I>remove disease</I> handles anything but magic disease, and removes it even from a host, VD is fairly rare (and easily fixed by adventurers if found, though poorer folks often must suffer if they get it).

Plus, not all races are interfertile. Dwarves, for example, can breed with very few other species and thus are popular as hookers.

Your overall narrative style is very easy to follow and I love the story arc. You may have had help in its theme but you have a natural storytellers flair which is impressive to say the least.

Last but certainly not least thank you for the answer to my question. I am looking to buy the Green Ronin book on DM'ing shortly.

I can't recommend that book enough. It also has advice on campaign themes, and lists of useful things, like fight scenes or NPC quirks or urban scene set pieces. I keep it with me at all times. It's a d20 book, but I've used it for much more than just DnD.

And I'm glad you're enjoying the journal!

Black Days of Kor Kammor
Game 15

Having been captured for breaking curfew, then given an opportunity to turn that to their advantage by working for the Guilds of hallowfaust, the party stalks out into the forests around Hollowfaust. They find it surprisingly lively, with woodcutters, trappers and hunters in the lands within a few days of hallowfaust, though very few farms. Within a day of searching, they come across a wounded woodsman trapped under a log. The heroes free and heal him, and in "gratitude" he admits to knowing what is going on with the undead missing from Hallowfaust.

According to the woodsman, there are small bands of anti-necromancy rebels in the woods, and especially up near the mountains. They strike out at small badns of undead, destroying them in preparation of an attack on Hallowfaust itself. He gives the heroes directions to the rebels main camp in a cave, where he claims they keep local women enslaved as sex toys. The heroes, especially Mhyssi, insist on going and trying an immediate rescue.

Sadly, the poor woodsman is under the charm spell of the vampire Agdrenel, and his tale is filled with half-truths at best. There were rebels in these woods once, a decade or more ago. But they are long since gone, and no threat to hallowfaust. At least, their living forms are no threat.

Those rebels hated the idea of their forms becoming fodder for Hallowfaust necromancers. They used to burn them, but one of the necromancers found a way to create smoke wraiths from wisps of such pyres, and mass bonfires drew the stygian guard down on the place it was set. Desperate, the rebels began chucking their dead into a crevice at the back of a cave. When a disease ran through them, the extremely sick took themselves to the cave to die. The plague wiped out the rebels (thus preventing the Guildsmen of Hallowfaust from ever really understanding how many their had been), and their bodies all lay, festering, in one giant pile.

When Aaston's spied found the place, he began using it as a dump for his own failed necromantic experiments. He also threw massive barriers up, to ensure the undead were contained within the cave. As a result, the cave is filled with a dread blend of bloody bones, coffer corpses, and plague walkers. All of which were contained, until Agdrenel came along in need of an army to destroy the Heralds of Dawn. Older and wiser than Aaston, she quickly overcame his wards and set the undead free. And they began to prey upon units from Hallowfaust, returning to the cave during daylight hours. A foul radiance has taken over the cave, and it is imbued with pure negative energy.

Directing these rotting raiders are three skeletal warriors, each build off the knight or marshal class. As parties of explorers from Hollowfaust came here, they went into the back of the cave and rather than expose its evil, were added to it. For days, their strength has grown. And the Heralds are about to stumble upon them. Worse, this has nothing to do with the undead disappearing from hallowfaust – this is just Agdrenel's first strike at the Heralds.

As the heralds move up a narrow mountain path toward the cave, voronex is worried there is no sign of rebels, scouts, or much of anything. There are some tracks, but no one in the group can determine of what, or how old. A few dark clouds seems to hang around a far cave entrance, and the Heralds move past a smaller, higher cave mouth to scout the strange clouds. Then, Agdrenel's trap closes.

The dark clouds are soul eaters, horrid ceatures summoned (at great risk) to track and kill any mortal creature. They are all set on Voronex, who is forced to fly free of the cliffside to get them away from the other Heralds. Their long claws rend his flesh, and every blow drains his Wisdom by 1d6 points., But he can ignore their DR with his breath weapon, and does not need Wisdom to keep breathing gouts of flame. Though his Wisdom does start sinking toward 0, which at a soul eater's hands is a lethal blow, for the first few rounds he is their match.

The undead rupture forth in an unending stream, bursting from both the far cave entrance to their east and the higher one to their west, and moving to swarm over the Heralds. Even as the other Heralds are physically driven back by Bull rushes, pushed toward the cliff edge on the narrow path, Auriji screams with berserk rage and holds the center of their line, refusing to allow the swarm of undead to overcome her. Though they are immune to critical hits, Auriji simply Power Attacks for a lot, and burns action points to hit any time she misses. As the skeletal warriorsa march toward her, it becomes clear she will be the focal point of this battle.

Ryssa and Lyssa take one flank on their own, much to everyone's amazement. A <i>grease</i> spell from them makes the narrow path slick from the edge of Auriji's spear reach all the way to the cliffside, and more than one undead slips to his doom, often aided by their constant whip attacks.

Darnelle, Juiren, and Mhyssi try to hold the other flank, though it is difficult to do so. The foul radiance coming from the cave makes turning all but impossible, and Juiren is torn between using healing spells to damage undead or heal his rapidly wounded foes. Darnelle finds her speed and accurate attacks of little use against undead on a narrow path, but gamely holds her ground and covers Juiren's back.

But Mhyssi has had enough. She burns an action point to cast <i>divine favor</I>, and jumps into the fray burning her celestial bloodline's smite evil to blow away one of the largest plague walkers. Then she keeps burning action points for actions she uses to generate <I>true strike</I> spells, Power Attacking for full, and begins tearing undead apart, slicing them with her charm bracelet greatsword, which rings like a bell as it slices through putrid flesh and cracked bones. Nearly by herself, she begins to push back the undead hoard and fight her way toward Asuriji and the skeleton warriors.

For the three mighty undead have reach Auriji, and set upon her with sword, hammer and axe. She managed to hold her position, shifting from side to side to ensure at least one skeletal warrior is in Majah Gada's range each round. Though she takes horrendous damage, her rage and refusal to be driven back, as well as focusing her attacks on just one warrior at a time, allow her to begin to overcome them. She picks the marshal undead first, and in dropping it reduces the power of all the rest. Even so, she has few hit points left by the time Mhyssi reaches her side.

Similarly, voronex is defeating the soul eaters, but at a terrible cost., His wisdom is down to 6, within range of death from a single soul eater attack, and his hit points are bled dry. His own healing aura barely keeps him alive, but he has burned all but one soul eater to the ground. When it turns and flees (commanded to return to Agdrenel with a report), Voronex is torn, but opts to let it go. Not only is he too close to death to risk fighting it, he sees his allies are seriously pressed on the mountain path. He turns to begin straifing the undead with cones of fire, while staying out of their range.

Auriji and Mhyssi reach one another, and begin to push the undead back into the cave. They go blow-for-blow with the last skeletal warrior, but bring him down together. Then, suddenly, the Heralds are alone. More than 50 undead are strewn about them, but they have succeeded. Voronex lands, and the group marches into the cave. When they find no sign of any living preesence in the past few years, they know they have been duped. Auriji wants to go kill the woodsman, but the twins point out he is either a low-level tool, or now a trap, either way, no point in seeing him again.

Mhyssi's sword broke during the fighting, so she grabs a golden-hilted greatsword from the last skeletal warrior. Daronelle and the twins loot the bodies, while Juiren heals (as best he can) and Voronex, Auriji and Mhyssi have a war council. They agree they need to tradk down whoever is stealing the undead, who must have left the woodsman as a trap. About then, Lyssa declares she's found a pile of onyx. Mhyssi's eyes glitter, and she says she can track down the undead-stealer in the morning. The group agrees, though Juiren looks worried.

When he tries to ask Mhyssi about her plan that night, she leaps upon him and copulates with the young healer until he passes out.

In the monring, Juiren finishes healing the Heralds. Mhyssi takes some of the onyx, and goes to where the destroyed undead are. She picks some intact skeletons, and casts the animate dead spell she prepared this morning, violating her alignment (but NOT her god's). While most of the group gasps, Voronex and Auriji ask her what's next. Mhyssi instructs the undead to go wherever they feel called to. Immediately, they start deeper into the mountain pass.

The Heralds, some reluctantly follow her. They walk for most of the day, bothered only by an attack of stirges (that didn't last nearly as long as I expected). Near dusk, they come to a small raised valley between two mountains. It is barren and black, and corpses shamble along its terrain. In the center, is an entrance to an old mine, long since abandoned. A red glow, from lava, issues forth from the cave mouth.

Daronelle and Ryssa go to scout the area. They cling to the upper cliffs of the valley, moving around the edges to avoid being detected by undead. Mhyssi destroyed her own undead by turning them, but find that power now requires a Will save (the price for violating her alingment), but the player is informed if she becomes neutral rather than good, she can rebuke undead without a Will save at a +1 level bonus. For now, Mhyssi's player declines.

Daronelle and Ryssa manage to get just above the mine entrance, and can hear the hollow howl of hot wind blowing out of it. They see massive Haolowfaust Risen Ones gaurding the antrance. They also see the woodsman try to stagger out of the mine, blood running from wounds on his neck. But a whip lashes out and ensnares his ankle, and before Rysaa or D can react, he is hauled back in, screaming. A second later, hir cries become gurgles, and then he is silent. As the last rays of light fade, Ryssa can see into the mine, and realizes Agdrenel is within, along with a hoard of undead, many drowned-looking gnolls.

Including Mange Mangletooth, his bloated head hanging at an angle from his broken neck, still showing the marks where Rysaa and Lyssa strangled him. And like all the gnolls, he sports new spiked leather armor, equipped with a permanent spiked phallus.

Ryssa, and far away Lyssa, panic.

Daronelle manages somehow to wrangle Ryssa back without giving away their position. By the time they return, Auriji and Mhyssi have agreed with voronex that Agdrenel needs to die, and it's best done now when Quince is not around to fall to her charm spells. (Because while the Players know he has the 2nd-best Will save in the group, the characters have no idea). However,a frontal assault on her new stronghold is clearly suicide.

Voronex reasons for hot wind to come howling *out* of the mines, it must go *in* somewhere. And since hot air rises, it must go in at a point lower on the mountain. With this and his dwarven stonecunning, the heralds set out to find a back door into the Mine of Fire.

End Game 15

The way I see it, the more questions we answer for Dungeon Grrrl, the more likely it is that she'll write more of the actual journal. That is my ulterior motive.

I am, I promise, writing as fast as I can spare the time for.

I put up some notes about things in Kor kammor at my blog. If you're in withdrawal, you might try that for a quick fix.

I love the story arc that the characters are following. I appluad your group for dealing with mature themes, do you find that the group gets squeemish about such themes on occasions?

How would you suggest to handle dealing with mature themes? My group is mostly older players but several members of the group are more conservative and prefer to stick to the straight hack and slash, which does make roleplaying hard.

Has your group been together for a while so that there is no sense of embarassment?

Yasha did cover some of this, and I talk about it at my blog sometimes, but it's worth going over again.

The Kor Kammor group is nothing but close, trusted, well-known friends and lovers. We set out in advance to have an Extreme game, using the guidelines (and warnings) from the excellent Advanced Gamemaster's Guide from Green Ronin. So *this* group is old hands at confrotable and plainly detailing rape, torture, romance, depression, suicidal rage and pigheaded stubborness.

As DM, it's my job to make sure everyone is still having a good time. I check on that both as a group and individually on regualr basis. If we ever went to far for even one of us, we'd step back. Things this intense can actually make people upset. But all the players are cool with the line between reality and fantasy, and make sure they don;t make characters that will steal fun from other players.

But I MUST warn you to move with caution. I went too far once when I was younger (once that I know of), and nearly lost a friend over it. We run lots of games at lower intensity too, so we can play with everyone, not just the perverts in our core group who are okay with breaking the lines between rpgs, LARPING, and dating.

THIS group doesn't have the giggles or uncomfortable silences if I go into detail about the attack of an amorous otyugh on a buxom elven hooker. If they did that would be a sign to me we might have gone too far for that group.

How much of the world is predetermined and laid out? How much is made up as you go and or as needed?

The longer the game goes, the more of it is laid out. this is the forth or fifth full campaign to be in Kor kammor. Even so, there are both little details and big blank sections of the maps I don't discuss until I need something, and then I make up (or steal) whatever I need for the purposes of that night's adventure. often if I see a need coming in advance, I mention it offhand early, so it's not a nasty shock when it impacts the campaign.

on an unrelated side note... I wonder if you've ever not been incredibly engaging and interesting? ;)

Well, I had the flu once, and slept for six days.

I just started to check this out yesterday and couldn't stop till I read the entire thing. This is my first post on the boards (longtime lurker here) and after reading had to post about it. You have done a very excellent job with the characters and the world messing together and making sense. I like when you can take ideas from various sources adn combine them into a nice flowing game world.

Thanks! Wow, if I couldn't do that, I wouldn't have a game. No one makes exactly the world I want to run, but I don't have *time* to everything from scratch!

We also steal and reprupose art. There is now a picture of Mhyssi (from a little later in the timeline) at my blog:
http://dungeon-grrrl.livejournal.com/1098.html

Warning: My blog pulls even fewer punches than my journal here. If you don't want to see and hear about sex and bloodshed, don't go there!

Gee, that's too bad. If you had needed a D&D hussy, I might have been able to help. Oh well, maybe next time. ;D

Wow. A girl posts just on her own blog for a few days, and everything goes to heck.

I have been reading things online for years, and never posting. I have loved the Paizo boards since they opened, but I never posted. Then, one day, I decided these boards were civil and smart enough I could taker the risk. I could post one little thing.

That was more than 300 posts ago, and I still like the boards.

BUT

Some things were getting out of hand on the 4e boards. I stopped going to them after feeling like I was becoming part of the problem. I think gentle moderation is called for, and I understand Paizo only has limited time to make that effort. I'd much rather a post be deleted without notice (even my own) than a single product I can GAME with be delayed.

I, at least, will try to increase my support of Paizo, both with purchases and with posts, in an effort to show this is still a good, open, friendly board where worthwhile rpg disucssion can take place.

And I want to thank Lisa, Erik, Mike Vic and everyone else at Paizo for letting us have this conversation in their living room. I hope we can remeber we are guests here, and act appropriately.

The defenses as targets numbers sounds a lot like SAGA, where I think it works great. I don't know that we need both AC and Reflex though.

But the basic mechanics worry me a lot less than the focus on balance and combat.

Fake Healer wrote:

Did you get the GSL yet? Is it there yet?

Nope

You're a fiendish dinosaur! EAT somebody!

THEN they'll get you the GSl!

Dungeon Grrrl wrote:

I *have* had gamers offend me. I've been told...

I don't want to belittle your experiences too much...

No worries there. As far as impact in my real life goes, you're words spoken by a tiny plastic head. I grant you no power, and thus you cant belittle me in my world, no matter what you think you've done in yours.

And there are some right asses I am very fond of. They just don't do crud like I spoke about.

I noticed these questions this morning. Lilith, Dungeon Grrrl, Tegan: What do you gals think?

Since my opinion was explicitly asked, I'll chime in here.

Nope, nothing insulting there.

You can't talk about any group without making some assumptions. Minorities in any segment tend to feel such assumptions harm them more because they have less power to change or rebuke those assumptions. I think that is probably even true. Girls are a minority in gaming, so we tend to look at any conversation about girls in gaming with a jaundiced eye.

Chris mentioned two things, that they have a book out (I haven't read it, but as long as it was written by a woman that games I don't care WHAT it says, her point of view is certainly more important than the man who just talked about the book, and I don't blame him if she doesn't get *me* as an individual), and that he saw women gaming and even running a game.

That's a positive message. Women are gaming, and he saw no reason to jump in and stop it. Chris' attitude is that women can game if they want to, and I'm fine with that. He never suggested those gaming women needed to be coddled, guided, monitored, or treated differently in any way.

The woman was a bit off, but who cares? She's a little off, so are a lot of gamers. I'm just glad there's a woman working for WotC who is willing to speak on the subject.

If I believed the division of women gamers to me was 50/50 I'd be offended at the idea we needed any special attention. It obviously isn't which suggests that SOMETHING prevents us from getting into gaming as often as men. WotC's response to that seems to be to give one woman a shot to convince her sister's to join, and note a lot of us already have. Nothing that offends me there.

I *have* had gamers offend me. I've been told I can only play a whore, that I should dress more provocatively in return for being allowed to play, and that it is assumed my character has sex with any male character whenever the male character wants, and that I don't even need to be consulted for this to happen. I have had characters gang-raped by paladins, been forbidden to play anything but a servant or a witch for the sake of "realism," and even been informed if I want to cast a spell I needed to act it out, which included stripping off some clothes. A DM once told me if I didn't grant him sexual service, my favorite character was going to be killed.

At one time when I was younger and a lot more confused, I let people push me around like this. Now, I never allow it and know just how abusive such efforts were. Much of it was simple, evil lust on the part of neanderthal gamer grunts. Some of it was a real belief that girls shouldn't (or couldn't) game, or not like boys do. It was all on a totally different level than anything I have seen from WotC, and thus their perhaps clumsy efforts to actually help the situation AT ALL does nothing to offend me.

I am no longer a big fan of WotC, but on this they get a pass from me.

And no, Blue Rose did not offend me. Why would it?

Is my group seeing another DM on the off-nights!?

Honey, players are dogs. They'll tell you youre the only DM for them, then sneak off with some GURPS hussy at the drop of a hat.

Just punish them when they do. At least, that's how I handle it.

I am glad he points out many FLAWS of 4E instead of hearing WotC paying so many of their damned playtesters and employees to speak rehearsed rhetoric.

Where where did you see something saying playtesters were paid to speak rhetoric? I would like to check that out.

Nope.

At this point, Voronex's player thinks they are subject to some sort of mist-based scrying, but never makes a Spot check good enough for V to catch on. remeber, at this point that haven't seen evidfence of her undeathness since the ship.

:D

Okay, my relative newness as a geek is apparently showing.

What's an APA? My google-fu just reveals the American Psychological Association and similar groups

Hee.

Nothing is ever *exactly* what I planned. How can it be, when there are players involved?

That said, yes amazingly this was pretty much my Plan A. Plan B involved UnJohn attacking them if they took too long keeping an eye on him (clearly not an issue). Plan C was to have the Stygian Guard burst in and arrest UnJohn for crimes in Hollowfaust from his last visit, so the PCs still had to deal with the council to get access to him.

Plan D was to cry and go fleeing to my random adventure index box to look for a monster to throw at the PCs where ever they ended up that I hadnt planned for. But that's *always* Plan D.

Most of the rest was flavor I threw in as appropriate, and as players were available (we were having a party, remember), and as player actions suggested.