| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Since the beginning of history, the mortal world has measured time in ages. Ages of Glory, of Dreams, and even of Great Sorrows mark the human tally of years, giving a sense of order to the events of past centuries. But one Age has yet to occur—an age of darkness, of decay, and of writhing doom. Astrologers, diviners, and the servants of Fate believe that the Age of Worms may begin at any time. The canniest among them fear that it has already begun and the Herald of the Eternal Night calls...
Hello, potential applicants and readers! First off, I want to introduce myself. I have been around on the Paizo boards for many years now. Last year I had to step away to help my significant other through a hard time she was having medically, but we made it out the other side. During this time I spent my free time researching the retro-clones in my nostalgia for the “good old days” of gaming.
After a few interest checks I have finally stuck upon the following game idea. Using the Age of Worms. one of the best Paizo APs (imho) chalked full of nostalgic goodness and using the Sword & Wizardry Complete.
So without further ado...
I present Herald of the Eternal Night (Age of Worms Sword & Wizardry Edition). This game will be Episodic, much like a TV Series, we will focus on each module and replace any fallen players during the transition from episode to episode. Part I is "The Whispering Cairn".
The Sword & Wizardry Complete rules are available for download on this very site!
Sword & Wizardry Complete
We will be using standard character creation rules for Level 1. Though you can shift your attribute scores around to be control the character you want to play. I have access to the Player's Companion which includes the Anti-Paladin and the Bard class... No one can play an Anti-Paladin.
I will be accepting 4 to 6 players.
There is a bit of details in the spoiler's below that should help to generate a small background. We will add more background once characters are accepted using the "Backdrop: Diamond Lake" suggestions for character ties.
I am only using a single House Rule for now.
The first one is a slight adjustment to Assassin. Their backstab has a 25% chance to kill the opponent, provided the opponent's hit dice are no more than 1 higher than the Assassin's level.
And now to the story...
Welcome to Diamond Lake, a small mining town nestled in the rocky crags of the Cairn Hills, three days east of the Free City of Greyhawk to which it is subject. Iron and silver from Diamond Lake's mines fuel the Greyhawk's markets and support its soldiers and nobles with the raw materials necessary for weapons and finery. This trade draws hundreds of skilled and unskilled laborers and artisans, all hoping to strike it rich. In ages past, Diamond Lake boasted an export more valuable than metal in the form of treasure liberated from the numerous tombs and burial cairns crowding the hills around the town.
These remnants of a half-dozen long-dead cultures commandeered scandalous prices from Greyhawk's elite, whose insatiable covetousness triggered a boom in the local economy. Those days are long gone, though. The last cairn in the region coughed up its treasures decades ago, and few locals pay much mind to stories of yet-undiscovered tombs and unplundered burial cairns. These days, only a handful of treasure seekers visit the town, and few return to Greyhawk with anything more valuable than a wall rubbing or an ancient tool fragment.
In the hills surrounding the town, hundreds of laborers spend weeks at a time underground, breathing recycled air pumped in via systems worth ten times their combined annual salary. The miners are the chattel of Diamond Lake, its seething, tainted blood. But they are also Diamond Lake's foundation, their weekly pay cycling back into the community via a gaggle of gambling dens, bordellos, ale halls, and temples.
Because work in the mines is so demanding and dangerous, most folk come to Diamond Lake because they have nowhere else to turn, seeking an honest trade of hard labor for subsistence-level pay simple because the system has allowed them no other option. Many are foreigners displaced from native lands by war or famine. Work in a Diamond Lake mine is the last honest step before utter destitution or crimes of desperation. For some, it is the first step in the opposite direction: a careful work assignment to ease the burden on debtor-filled prisons, one last chance to make it in civil society.
Despite its squalor, Diamond Lake is crucial to Greyhawk's economy. The city's directors thus take a keen interest in local affairs, noting the rise and fall of the managers who run Diamond Lake's mines in trust for the government.
This is the place you grew up in, this is the place you plan to leave behind for a better life once certain financial obligations have been met.
The lively mining town of Diamond Lake, a muddy smudge on the map of the hills east of the fabulous Free City of Greyhawk. Diamond Lake's inhabitants are predominately miners and laborers, serious folk who spend most of their lives toiling below ground. When not working, the miners celebrate along the Vein, a seedy road lined with ale-houses and brothels. Overall, the village is a sooty, sullen place prone to unpleasant bursts of violence and passion. But Diamond Lake holds plenty of opportunities for adventure, for the uplands surrounding the town are rife with the ancient tombs and burial cairns of long-dead cultures.
Idly chatter around the village speaks of a trio of richly dressed adventurers who frequent the taproom of the Feral Dog, Diamond Lake's most notorious tavern. The confident heroes of Greyhawk spoke of hard-won battles on their journey to Diamond Lake, and of their intention to explore the long-abandoned Stirgenest Cairn on the lake's distant southeastern shore. The natives of Diamond Lake, know that cairn is oft explored by the community's youth, who always find it completely empty of marvels and perfectly harmless.
Not so another cairn within a day's ride of the village. This cairn lies near an iron mine that went dry about 50 years ago. The mine's charter lapsed when its manager died a few years later. Situated in a sort of no-man's land, the cairn was all but forgotten, its yawning entrance overgrown with weeds and choked with debris. Rediscovered by a curious teenager a decade ago, the cairn has since been a sort of community secret held by Diamond Lake's youth, who dare each other to disappear into its cyclopean entrance to prove their bravery. Occasionally, when the wind is just right, haunting, almost magical tones emerge from the depths of the forlorn tomb. Those who know of its location call it the Whispering Cairn.
If adventurers from the Free City expect to discover hidden passages and riches within the Stirgenest Cairn, it stands to reason that the Whispering Cairn might also hold a genuine opportunity for profit. In the rough-and-tumble mining village of Diamond Lake, where desperate folk slave in dank tunnels to profit wealthy masters, an opportunity for profit is an opportunity to escape.
Looks cool!
The 'standard' is 3d6 per stat, yes?
And by shift attribute scores, you mean that we roll 3d6 and can put those in any order, not that we can substract some points from one score to add to another, right?
Edit: 1 thing I'm 'good' at, one thing I'm bad at, and one thing I can work around.
3 things where I'm 'meh'.
That's all right, I guess. Now the question is what to do with it. I might do fighter/mage/thief elf in all its (probably broken) glory for s!!!s and giggles.
Yeah. 3d6 and you can assign them instead of going straight down the line.
Oh yes, time to scrump some dices up. Will do it a bit later since having problems from my phone
Lets see what the dice give !
1-
2-
3-
4-
5-
6-
Not bad I will work up something for this weekend!
Well, that looks good. I guess Fighter or Thief will be my pick
Working on Human Druid..
Rolling of for wealth
110 gp not bad
Need to know how detailed are we going to get? For example if I don't purchase chalk to mark something, then I don't have it right.
Fighter is up and ready statwise (equipment, gold stats etc)
x 10 = 60 GP... well, this is fun
Here we go....
Hmm....
mumble grumble 17s grumble.
All right, I've decided to go with the elven fighter/thief magic user.
Should be fun times.
Any special rules about starting wealth, or just what it says in the book?
If so: x10=110
Keeping it random:
Male -even
Female - odd
Race:
Human 1-10
Elf 11-20
Dwarf 21-30
Halfling 31-40
Half-elf 41-50
Class:
Assassin 1-10
Cleric 11-20
Druid 21-30
Fighter 31-40
Magic User 41-50
Monk 51-60
Paladin 61-70
Ranger 71-80
Thief 81-90
So a Male, Human Monk.
gold [ooxc]x 10 = 100[/dice]
DM, Are we rolling hp ?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Max HP at First. I like sport in my murde... GMing. :)
Here's Spazmodeus' Monk.....fluffy bits to follow.
Kenderkin here....
a work in progress.
I'll be looking to start accepting characters on Friday the 29th of May.
We have the following characters so far applied...
Erwin Blackwind (Human Fighter)
Koross (Human Monk)
Artemis Atredies (Human... Fighter?)
We have the following characters so far applied...
Erwin Blackwind (Human Fighter)
Koross (Human Monk)
Artemis Atredies (Human... Fighter?)
I think Artemis is an Assassin.
I'm thinking of either going with a halfling thief, a human cleric or a human ranger. Any thoughts from the DM (or prospective party members) on which would be more helpful?
Erwin Blackwind (Human Fighter)
Koross (Human Monk)
Artemis Atredies (Human Not-Fighter)
Thantor Spelloak (Human Druid)
At this point... We have a "Not-Quite-Thief" and "Nature Cleric" now. So really... anything will add versatility. Hopefully a Magic User will come along.
We have one in theory.
No characters have been accepted so you certainly have time to put a character into the pool. There are vurrently only 4 completed characters but a few are still being worked on. I will be accepting 6 characters in the end on Friday the 29th.
DM:
Should we just wait for the recruitment to do it's job or actively look for a fighter/cleric/magic user to round out a solid party?
I don't like playing Magic-users (certainly not the weak a%% Magic-users from the old days) but I would be happy to play a fighter/ranger or a cleric. Which one does the group want most?
The druid can't cast CLW until 2nd level, but a cleric only gets 1 first level spell and that's IF the DM uses the optional rule of allowing a cleric with a 15+ WIS to have a bonus 1st level spell, so I wouldn't provide a LOT of healing ability.
@DMDunjinnMasta: How are you handling leveling in this game? Will you be using actual XP or just using the "milestone" approach to leveling? If you are using standard XP, are you also using XP bonuses for high stats (e.g. +5 for high WIS, +5 for high CHA) listed in the rules?
Not thrilled with stats, but if Spazmodeus is making a character after his rolls, I may have to take the challenge.
Doesn't even qualify for illusionist by 2E rules. But running around with 4hp as a mage would be a thrill ride!!
Ha, good to see Gnobby again...miss the old TOEE crew :)
HAven't had a chance to get my background etc done...will try to do so tomorrow.
@Kenderkin
Well... there is an Illusionist... Question answered!
@Logan1138
I will look at the optional rules and make a decision about the XP too. But considering the way multiclassing works and XP works I will likely track it with bonuses for milestones.
@Gnobby the Gnome
Welcome!
@Spazmodeus
I won't do selections until tomorrow night... I am not sure if we even have more than 6 completed characters at this moment.
Need to roll for gold...
* 10 = 130 gp
I decided to go with a HP tank and play a Ranger (two HD at first level FTW!).
Logan1138's submission for this game: Tiberius "Ty" Darkmoon, human ranger.
Looks like a good group!
I can also see this group has a lot in common.
Erwin Blackwind by Grovo
Koross by Spazmodeus
Artemis Atredies by KenderKin
Thantor Spelloak by DM Ashman
Tiberius "Ty" Darkmoon by Logan1138
and
Assuming they move their Illusionist/Thief back down to 1/1
Gnobby the Gnome by Chainmail
That will be our party of six. You are invited to come to the discussion boards now.
That will be our party of six. You are invited to come to the discussion boards now.
Bump....discussion thread open...
Hmmm....discussion thread disapeared....