Enemy in Shadows - Warhammer Fantasy (Inactive)

Game Master Aubster

i'll ask around as well

Not everyone has responded but the sentiment has been "nice to ve thought of, but I can't take a new game on right now".

How far up is the winged mutant, Aubster? Need to know for potential ranged attacks.

How far up is the winged mutant, Aubster? Need to know for potential ranged attacks.

It’s not a mutant, remember there’s no such thing ;)

The non-mutant is staying at medium range which is 60 yards above the deck.

I went back and read what we decided to do about the minor corruption caused by mutants. It was decided that 1 check to resist corruption at the end of the encounter per type of corruption is sufficient. And since you’ve fought mutants before it’ll be an Average Cool Test instead of challenging.

Page 294 of the rulebook says that a pick has the qualities damaging and impale, but doesn’t say slow. Does this mean that for now on I should be rolling initiative?

That's weird. Mine says the pick has slow. What is the date on your file? I know they've updated the rulebook at least once. Mine is dated 28 February 2019.

Mine is 2018, so it seems that yours is more up to date. It would explain the confusion

Aubster, the other game has been moving lately. If you have time to look that way, it would help.

Not gonna lie. A flying enemy with a crossbow kind of has me worried. Especially when the best plan is "hope he runs out of ammo."

My other plans are something like:

1. Hope he fails more on reloading
2. Hope he runs away when we defeat his buddies
3. Hope he gets frustrated/desperate and comes down to fight
4. Find some cover?

But yeah, there's a lot of hoping in there. Also, crossbows are NASTY if they connect & we can't do much to stop it in the way of Fortune or other tricks since it isn't an opposed roll.

Some sort of ranged solution beyond the throwing knives is going on the shopping list.

I think that this round is over? "Mutants" charged. Only Valghaz and Landolf passed cool check and they acted. So we are up to the next round?

I just read over the Surprised Condition to be sure, and yeah it looks like Adelaida & Ruprecht lost their turns due to being Surprised. I'll add in here that it seems VERY strange to have new combatants entering the fight apply Surprised.

It's harmless-ish here, but consider a situation where we were able to respond to the flying mutant overhead. The mutants charging into the fight on the deck could interfere, but it's odd to say that they'd get to rob an archer of their turn with respect to the whole fight rather than just the new combatants. Maybe the book called for exactly that though. Just because it seems weird to me doesn't necessarily mean it is wrong.

With a minor caveat that Ruprecht & Adelaida could spend Resolve to get their turns back, I think we're onto Turn 3. Technically, Landolf's attack would have to be a Turn 3 action since he acted defensively on Turn 2.

Found us a new player! Zamanda. Whom I highly recommend as a great RPer, solid poster, and all around awesome player. I’ll be helping with the rules and the like as they come.

Hey everyone.

DM, should I use the recruitment tab to roll up my character?

Welcome!

Welcome!

One thing I'd recommend to new players is to not shy away from a Career that seems odd to you on your first roll or three. It isn't about having an XP reward: especially at this point in the campaign, those aren't a big deal.

Some careers like Townsman or Artist have some neat features to snag even if you want to end up somewhere else. Also neat story possibilities.

So definitely don't feel held to your first rolls but don't be too quick to throw them away either.

Has Valghaz told you what the rest of the party is like yet?

Thanks for the advice, and yeah... I've never played Warhammer before, so I think I'll try to go with whatever I roll and then build backstory from there, unless I duplicate someone else too much. :)

Valghaz told me this:

* Human noble (trying to pay off his family debts)
* Human aide turned boatman (we unfortunately found a corpse that looks just like him, which has gotten us caught up in the machinations of a cult)
* Human soldier, soon to be warrior priestess
* Dwarven miner, soon to be inducted into a religious order

That's pretty much all I know so far, but in a way that is good, right? A new person you meet on the road won't know a bunch about you, and so we'll have to see how I fit into things.

Hey Everybody, just letting you know I’ll catch up tomorrow. RL interferes at the moment.

I just read over the Surprised Condition to be sure, and yeah it looks like Adelaida & Ruprecht lost their turns due to being Surprised. I'll add in here that it seems VERY strange to have new combatants entering the fight apply Surprised.

It's harmless-ish here, but consider a situation where we were able to respond to the flying mutant overhead. The mutants charging into the fight on the deck could interfere, but it's odd to say that they'd get to rob an archer of their turn with respect to the whole fight rather than just the new combatants. Maybe the book called for exactly that though. Just because it seems weird to me doesn't necessarily mean it is wrong.

With a minor caveat that Ruprecht & Adelaida could spend Resolve to get their turns back, I think we're onto Turn 3. Technically, Landolf's attack would have to be a Turn 3 action since he acted defensively on Turn 2.

The reason for the surprise was that the group ignored the noises coming from inside the cabin and was focused on Adelaida’s situation.

Aubster, the other game has been moving lately. If you have time to look that way, it would help.

Sorry, I’ll post later today.

Hey everyone.

DM, should I use the recruitment tab to roll up my character?

Welcome Zamanda! Sorry for the delay.

"A search of the bodies will reveal: 2 Mail Coats (which will fit two of the adventurers), 2 Mail Coifs, 3 Swords (one broken), 1 Crossbow and 13 Bolts, 4 Daggers, 2 Clubs, and a total of 30 shillings in mixed coinage."

Ruprecht: TB4, Chain Shirt (armor 2, 6 total) BS35
Adelaida: TB4, Breastplate (armor 3, 7 total), BS37
Landolf: TB4, Leather Jack (armor 1, 5 total), BS40
Valghaz: TB5, Leather Jack (armor 1, 6 total), BS24

Now, looking at this we have 4 of us. And 2 chainmail shirts, 2 chainmail coifs. We all have roughly similar defenses. I think that this might be fair:

Reprecht and Adelaia: Each get a chain coif. They both have solid body armor already, so this would give them better head protection.
Landolf and Valghaz: Each get a chain shirt. This can go over our leather armor. Plus I'll need it for my new career.

---

This leaves us with the crossbow. Valghaz is the last person who should get it. All 3 humans have roughly similar ballistic skill...so I suppose it should go to whomever is most comfortable being outside of melee.

"A search of the bodies will reveal: 2 Mail Coats (which will fit two of the adventurers), 2 Mail Coifs, 3 Swords (one broken), 1 Crossbow and 13 Bolts, 4 Daggers, 2 Clubs, and a total of 30 shillings in mixed coinage."

Ruprecht: TB4, Chain Shirt (armor 2, 6 total) BS35
Adelaida: TB4, Breastplate (armor 3, 7 total), BS37
Landolf: TB4, Leather Jack (armor 1, 5 total), BS40
Valghaz: TB5, Leather Jack (armor 1, 6 total), BS24

Now, looking at this we have 4 of us. And 2 chainmail shirts, 2 chainmail coifs. We all have roughly similar defenses. I think that this might be fair:

Reprecht and Adelaia: Each get a chain coif. They both have solid body armor already, so this would give them better head protection.
Landolf and Valghaz: Each get a chain shirt. This can go over our leather armor. Plus I'll need it for my new career.

---

This leaves us with the crossbow. Valghaz is the last person who should get it. All 3 humans have roughly similar ballistic skill...so I suppose it should go to whomever is most comfortable being outside of melee.

The GM would probably suggest Ruprecht to take the crossbow as he’s the worst of the melee characters. He can hang back in a fight and shoot at bosses that are lots of trouble. Remember there’s no defense against a crossbow so even if the opponent has a Melee skill of 100 it doesn’t help them against a crossbow and no matter how tough and how much armor they have a hit always does at least 1 point of damage AND taking that 1 point gets rid of any Advantage they have. Imagine you’re fighting for your life against a huge demon who’s wiping the floor with you all and has built up +10 Advantage, well one little shot from a crossbow and all that Advantage goes away.

Yeah, though he's got to enjoy the physicality of fighting up close, and been somewhat successful, Ruprecht will gladly take up the crossbow !

You all need to pick a name for your barge and pick a captain.

Captain Ruprecht! And we should name the barge "the lucky lady", given that our new companion was lucky to have been kept alive and rescued before she was eaten.

Wouldn't hurt getting Landolf one of the mail coats. Giving it to Krizta would also be an option, but I'm uncertain whether Flagellants wearing armor is really a thing. Ugh, those things are heavy though. Will need to upgrade sometime.

As far as the crossbow distribution goes, giving it to Ruprecht makes a lot of sense for now. I'm guessing that once we get a good shopping opportunity again we'll want to replace it with a bow, possibly more than one. Both Ruprecht & Landolf have some advances in Ranged (Bow) and none in crossbows. Plus, bows are just better.

I'm happy with Valghaz's suggestion of 'Lucky Lady' for the new barge if everyone else is fine with it. As far as determining a captain for the Lucky Lady (or other name) goes I am planning to get further into Landolf's original Seaman career at some point, but even if I do the Sail advances I'll be taking are already locked into Sail (Caravel) unless I do something weird to change that. So even then, he wouldn't get any better than Agility in Sail (Barge). If Ruprecht's Sail advances are in Sail (Barge), he's probably the better one to pick for Captain.

Landolf does want his own ship someday, but he wasn't planning on a barge.

Quick sidenote: it suddenly occurs to me that it's really weird that Reiklanders can't take Sail as one of their Species advance options.

Good point on our new flagellant getting some armor. I don’t know of any lore reason which says that they can’t be armored. While the artwork shows them unarmored, I think it’s just because they are thematically crazy murderhobos. Could give her armor now, and Valghaz could wait to buy some with party funds.

Aubster, while I'm thinking about company funds, did we work for Josef on this trip long enough to earn a wage?

I'm fine if Josef considers the new barge to cover our wages, but I need to check.

*

If we're giving armor to Kritza, Landolf will forego for now. He's taken to charging into the fray lately, but he's able to play more defensively if he needs to.

I don't think there is any need to give Krizta any of the loot yet... go ahead and use it for someone who earned it, and we can ease her into something better than tattered robes before we have her put on armor over them. :)

Here’s some information about your new boat

Typical Barge stats
Cost - 225 Crowns
Vehicle Encumbrance - 100 (the weight and bulk of the boat)
Carries - 300 (the number of Encumbrance points that the boat can carry)
Availability - Rare
Motive Power - Oars/Sails
Move - 8 (to be honest, I’m not sure how to use movement rate yet)
Toughness - 45 (yes boats can be wounded)
Wounds - 60
Length - 20 feet

Going off your current character sheet, it looks like you are shorting yourself on Fate & Resileince, Krizta.

Humans start with 2 Fate & 1 Resilience. They also have 3 'Extra Points' that can be distributed among the two. So you should be ending up with something like 4 Fate/2 Resilience or 3 Fate/3 Resilience...other combinations are possible.

Your Fate score is also your maximum Fortune and your Resilience score is your maximum Resolve. See page 170 for what they do & let us know if you have questions. These are important values, so ask questions if you have any.

Thanks for the tips.

Just FYI for all, I'm not done making the character or spending XP, and it might take me a little while to get there since I am pretty busy this weekend. Trying to jump in and play with the limited stuff I have, but I wasn't, and still am not, finished even with knowing who the character is all the way.

Which reminds me... what are the group's short term and long term motivations / goals?

We completed our Party Short Term Ambition at the end of the last adventure (before this barge-with-mutants thing). Aubster advised us to hold off on picking a new one since the situation would be changing soon. I'm not sure whether that 'soon' was getting our boat or not. I think we're supposed to have a freeform part of the adventure coming up soonish.

We haven't ever had a Long Term Party Ambition. I think we're waiting to get a better handle on what the adventure is like longer term. If we lean hard on the letter that we found from Etelka Herzen, we might be able to pick a long-term ambition like "break up the extended Chaos Cult" but we haven't started talking about it yet. I think our characters are mostly still recovering from the Bogenhafen incident.

"No (party) ambitions right now" probably isn't helpful but that's where we're at.

*

I'll try not to be overbearing, but a few notes that might help as you are considering how to spend your experience:

* Willpower/Cool has been very important in this campaign. We seem to trip over mutants at every turn and run into daemons WAY more than I'm comfortable with. So we make a lot of checks against Corruption. Toughness/Endurance is also a good skill for this, but we're rolling that with lower frequency.
* Outdoor Survival is a skill in the Flagellant progression that none of the rest of us have I think.
* your starting XP is probably enough to complete Flagellant tier 1 & either get started on Flagellant tier 2 or get most of the way done with tier 1 of a different career (if you feel like bouncing around). Maybe you could complete tier 1 of another career if it shares a lot of features with Flagellant.

We completed our Party Short Term Ambition at the end of the last adventure (before this barge-with-mutants thing). Aubster advised us to hold off on picking a new one since the situation would be changing soon. I'm not sure whether that 'soon' was getting our boat or not. I think we're supposed to have a freeform part of the adventure coming up soonish.

We haven't ever had a Long Term Party Ambition. I think we're waiting to get a better handle on what the adventure is like longer term. If we lean hard on the letter that we found from Etelka Herzen, we might be able to pick a long-term ambition like "break up the extended Chaos Cult" but we haven't started talking about it yet. I think our characters are mostly still recovering from the Bogenhafen incident.

"No (party) ambitions right now" probably isn't helpful but that's where we're at.

*

I'll try not to be overbearing, but a few notes that might help as you are considering how to spend your experience:

* Willpower/Cool has been very important in this campaign. We seem to trip over mutants at every turn and run into daemons WAY more than I'm comfortable with. So we make a lot of checks against Corruption. Toughness/Endurance is also a good skill for this, but we're rolling that with lower frequency.
* Outdoor Survival is a skill in the Flagellant progression that none of the rest of us have I think.
* your starting XP is probably enough to complete Flagellant tier 1 & either get started on Flagellant tier 2 or get most of the way done with tier 1 of a different career (if you feel like bouncing around). Maybe you could complete tier 1 of another career if it shares a lot of features with Flagellant.

Thanks to Krizta and Landolf for reminding me that I had suggested holding off an a party short term ambition. Since you are all the proud new owners of the Lucky Lady (not sure the previous owners would feel the name is well-earned) your circumstances have changed. With some smart and/or lucky trading you all can actually start making serious money. You also now have mobility and the ability to go where you want. Maybe an ambition that combines those somehow, like trade in each of the great cities of the Reikland (Altdorf, Dunkelburg, Kemperbad, Auerswald and Ubersreik). That’s just one idea, I’m sure you all can come up with something better.

How would running a hauling boat work in practice, Aubster? In the real world, a lot of the profit of trading is made because prices in one city (or whatever) are different than in another. The rulebook doesn't have a way of simulating that, though: everything has the same price everywhere.

We could rely on straight Haggle checks to push the prices around (and Evaluate to know what the relative value of the goods are) I guess. Could we use Gossip to try to gather trade rumors as well?

I guess it depends how complex you want to make this.

Evaluate is an advanced skill & Haggle is basic, so:
Landolf has 35 Evaluate & 36 Haggle (no advances so he can't assist)
Yvonne has 46 Evaluate & 36 Haggle

Yvonne might be our best Evaluate in the party, but someone else is probably better than my two characters in Haggle.

Didn't Landolf want to start doing business at Karak Azgaraz?

http://www.gitzmansgallery.com/shdmotwow.html

Looking at this, we could take the barge from Altdorf down to Ubersreik and from there to Karak Azagaraz. The one thing that the Karak seems to be known for is it's "Goat Kicker Ale." I think that we could do business, selling goods at the Karak which would be hard for them to come by, and using the proceeds to buy the ale. If we use our barge to take it further afield than it would normally go, then we could probably fetch a pretty decent price for it. I'd think that getting it to Kemperbad would be plenty far enough, as it could be shipped from there by others to places like Nuln and Wurtbad.

The earlier proposed business deal is something Landolf is still interested in. My assumption is that the fact that Landolf is now wanted for arson and probably murder in Bogenhafen may throw a wrench into those plans.

If we want to pursue that deal with the Haagen family further, one of our early goals probably needs to be clearing our names.

How would running a hauling boat work in practice, Aubster? In the real world, a lot of the profit of trading is made because prices in one city (or whatever) are different than in another. The rulebook doesn't have a way of simulating that, though: everything has the same price everywhere.

We could rely on straight Haggle checks to push the prices around (and Evaluate to know what the relative value of the goods are) I guess. Could we use Gossip to try to gather trade rumors as well?

I guess it depends how complex you want to make this.

Evaluate is an advanced skill & Haggle is basic, so:
Landolf has 35 Evaluate & 36 Haggle (no advances so he can't assist)
Yvonne has 46 Evaluate & 36 Haggle

Yvonne might be our best Evaluate in the party, but someone else is probably better than my two characters in Haggle.

The Death on the Reik Companion has an entire section on trading. To keep it simple the steps to buy a cargo are:

Next post on selling...

Once the Characters have a cargo, they can try to sell it at any place they come to. For this, they need to know whether there is a demand for the cargo, and how much will be offered.

Villages (Size 1 Settlements) typically have no demand for any goods, excepting grain during the spring, when carefully hoarded coins will be spent to stave off starvation.

A Settlement doesn't usually have any demand for a commodity which it produces itself. The exception is Top Shelf Wine and Brandy, for which a buyer of at least d10 Encumbrance points worth will always be found on any given day.

Furthermore, Characters can never sell a cargo in the location at which you bought it — if a buyer were available, the better-connected local merchant would have found them! Characters must move on to attempt to find a buyer for any goods they have purchased or wait at least a week before attempting to sell them in the current location.

The GM determines if a buyer is available (more math). If there’s a buyer the GM determines the offer price...basically the wealthier the place the higher the amount you’ll be offered. If you want to lose money try selling in a squalid place. You’re guaranteed to get less than you paid. However, if you sell in a prosperous location you’re almost guaranteed a profit. You’ll learn how prosperous a location is by vision it or asking people about it.
You can then do an opposed haggle check to see if you can get 10% more than offered or you’d get 10% less. It is always up to you if you want to sell for a certain price.
If you sell in a bustling location you’re looking at a 5% profit without haggling. If you sell in Altdorf you’re looking at a 10% profit without haggling. If you haggle successfully then you can increase your profit, haggle unsuccessfully you can lose money.
Finally, using fellowship skills you can pick up rumors at taverns. For examples you might hear that Ubersreik has a grain shortage because of a rat problem. If you sell grain there you can make a much bigger profit than normal if the rumor is correct. But it may be wrong and then you’ve wasted a trip to Ubersreik which actually doesn’t need grain. Let’s say it is a valid rumor, you might find out that huge walking rats coming up from the sewers stole the grain and they want to hire you all to go recover it since none of the rat catchers will go into the sewer. So now you’ve made a trading profit and have an adventure availability.

Finally, Josef is going to introduce to a buyer in Weissbruck so you’ll have a chance to sell the cargo you ‘inherited’ with the barge. That’ll give you some starting capital to be able to start trading.

Does this world have the printing press, or are all books hand-copied?

https://warhammerfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Pamphleteer

"The printing press is a new invention in the Empire, and as yet its presence has not changed much of society. Its presence is however keenly felt among agitators, demagogues, and street politicians who now have a whole new way to reach their public. Pamphleteers are more than just tradesmen with a paper-press: They are passionate individuals who research, write, sketch and print political or religious works in order to spread their message, then disseminate their materials across whole cities and provinces. Although printing itself is perfectly legal and increasingly respectable, many pamphleteers print material that is neither, and those who wish to stay in business have to be skillful at escaping the attention of the Watch or more powerful enemies.[1a]"

https://warhammerfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Books

"Five years ago, Gunthur Johans of Middenheim, a devout man of Sigmar in a city of staunch worshippers of Ulric, designed and invented a machine he called the printing press. Essentially, he carved blocks of wood with raised characters. He arranged the blocks to form words, smeared them with ink, and pressed the tray onto sheets of paper by the printing press. Variations on Johans' designs spread to other major cities, and now most printing presses are quite efficient, leaving the illumination processes of the years past to wizards and their books of arcane lore.[1a]

Though the production of illuminated books has dropped, they are still valuable as works of art. Many wizards and their kind see printed books as a travesty, the process lacking the intimacy of the mage and his craft. Most books are glued, further reducing the cost of creating them but making them far less durable than before.[1a]"

Does this world have the printing press, or are all books hand-copied?

The printing press is a recent invention in the Empire, so most books are still hand-written, some with pages adorned with exquisite illuminations, others little better than scribbled notes. In larger settlements, official documents, newssheets, and leaflets are typically press-printed, as are many poems, romances, and important academic texts. The penny novels, My Travels With Gotrek are,particularly popular.

Thanks to you both. I was trying to get a handle on what career(s) Krizta would eventually move to, depending on what happens in her life of course, and I had seen scholar and priest, but I hadn't looked under burghers, so I hadn't seen the Pamphleteer yet. That helps me at least as far as assigning the craftsman talent that I rolled and the associated skill. I'll take Craftsman (printing) and put that into my background. Still working on things, but getting closer.

(Also, I love the trading barge idea, and I think we should do it.) :)

I see Valghaz beat me to the printing press question. Thanks! Yours was a better explanation but you failed to mention Gotrek so I win for that.

Let me know if you have any questions about trading. My plan is to make the process transparent in Weissbruck since we’re all learning this new aspect.

I’ll get a gameplay post up later today.

Also, because Krizta is into spreading the Good Word of Sigmar, a quick crash course on religion in the Old World.

* Sigmar: God of the Empire. Worship is prevalent everywhere but Middenland. He swore an oath of friendship with the dwarven High King of the time. Ever since then, the Empire and the Dwarves have had a strong alliance. Sigmar was a man before he became a God. Founded the Empire. Very militaristic.

* Ulric: God of Winter and Wolves. Worship is prevalent only in Middenland. When Sigmar was a man he worshiped Ulric. The two cults do not get along. Very militaristic.

* Morr: God of Death. Is not evil. Husband of Verena.

* Verna: Goddess of Justice.

* Myrmidia: Goddess of warfare and strategy. Daughter of Morr and Verena. Mostly worshiped in Tilea/Estalia (Italy/Spain)

* Taal: God of the Wilds. Husband of Rhya.

* Rhya: Goddess of Agriculture.

* Manann: God of the Sea, son of Taal and Rhya.

* Shallya: Goddess of healing and mercy.

* Ranald: God of trickery and thieves.

----

Non-Empire Deities

* Ursun: God of bears and strength. God of Kislev (Russia/Poland/Etc)
* Lady of the Lake: Goddess of Bretonnia (France/King Arthur's England)

--Moved up from Zealot to the second tier of Flagellant (also named Flagellant).

Question about that: Krizta has zero money (at Brass 0 she can't roll for anything)... Flagellants go around praying with people and living off of their kindness and donations, so that is what she has done up till now, and even if that is going to change going forward, she can't afford to buy anything at all. Does she automatically get the trappings of tier 2, or will she pick those up along the way?

--Moved up from Zealot to the second tier of Flagellant (also named Flagellant).

Question about that: Krizta has zero money (at Brass 0 she can't roll for anything)... Flagellants go around praying with people and living off of their kindness and donations, so that is what she has done up till now, and even if that is going to change going forward, she can't afford to buy anything at all. Does she automatically get the trappings of tier 2, or will she pick those up along the way?

She'll have an opportunity to pick them up along the way. Sigmar provides :)