AD&D 2e Play Report: Session 14

We played the 14th session of our AD&D 2e campaign last night. The previous session's play report is here.

To recap briefly, the party returned to Grimerun with ankheg shells in tow, where they were joined by the elf fighter/mage Corym Vadercast. They decided to head back into the forest to investigate the sunken shrine of the Dark Sun. The shrine was believed to house a blasphemous altar to the god of lies, which Bernhardt Dalton has an interest in sanctifying.

On the way there, Corym felt himself being watched by an invisible entity. The party was attacked by a pair of territorial stags.

Upon reaching the shrine, the party deduced that a number of statues there were guardians which would attack them if they tried to enter. Karven Stone attempted to topple one of the statues, which caused them to animate and attack. In the ensuing battle, Haymond Baylor's trident shattered after striking one of the statues, but the party ultimately emerged victorious. They looted the religious treasures from the shrine, and Bernhardt performed certain holy rites to consecrate the unholy altar, and that's where we concluded the session.

Meet Magicheart

The party left the shrine and headed back the way they came. They didn't get far before I rolled a random encounter. I had decided that their first encounter on the way back would be with the pseudodragon which had been invisibly watching the party on their way to the shrine. I had in mind that the dragon was invisibly following the party in order to assess their character, and had seen Bernhardt consecrate the unholy altar. That was a good enough act for the dragon to feel comfortable introducing itself.

The pseudodragon remained camouflaged for now, until the party could properly prove themselves. Telepathically, she introduced herself as Magicheart. I used one of my favorite name generators, Fantasy Name Generators's Fursona Name Generator.

My girlfriend has been playing The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and I find the voice acting - for Zelda in particular - to be hilariously bad. I decided to channel that in my portrayal of Magicheart. I conceptualized her as being like the cutesy dragon that an elementary school girl would draw in her diary (maybe that's more apt for a faerie dragon, but whatever).

Magicheart told the party that she had seen what they did at the evil shrine, and asked if they would again prove their goodness by ridding the forest of yet another evil presence. There was an ancient elf burial ground to the north, just across the river, which had become inhabited by flesh-eating ghouls.

The party wondered how they could trust Magicheart without seeing her, and asked if she was even real. She allowed herself to be seen, just a bit, in the form of a translucent shimmer against the forest backdrop - think of the cloaking device in Predator. In exchange for their help, Magicheart said she would become their companion, and provide them with her magical protection. 

Karven grumbled that it didn't sound like there was any material gain from undertaking this quest. Haymond pointed out that having protection from a magical creature would sure be nice, and waxed poetic about the various benefits that friendly forest spirits could provide to crops. The party said that ghouls sounded dangerous, but Magicheart assured them that they were competent, brave, good-hearted adventurers (a little encouragement/egging-on from the DM never hurts).

Ultimately, the party agreed to help Magicheart, but they wanted to return to Grimerun first. Haymond needed a new trident. Magicheart provided them with a location in the forest where she could be found in the hollow of a great tree. They parted ways.

The First River Children

Later, while setting up camp, the party heard a group traveling on foot from the hills above them, to the northeast. A group of tribesmen came into view. I determined that the tribesmen were Lawful Evil, but friendly. They began to gently question the party as to their purpose in the forest.

The party told the tribesmen that they had been in the area to deal with an ankheg infestation, and that they were headed next to the elf burial ground. They didn't mention the shrine, so the tribesmen asked if they had been there. Bernhardt's player asked if the tribesmen looked like they had any association with the shrine. I said that they didn't bear any holy symbols to indicate they followed any organized religion. The party said that they had been to the shrine.

I decided that the tribesmen would lay claim to any treasure found in the forest, so they began questioning the party as to whether they had found anything. The party played coy and denied having taken any valuables. Since it was a friendly interaction, it wasn't difficult to convince the tribesmen.

Bernhardt introduced the party, and the tribesmen identified themselves as the First River Children (Fantasy Name Generators's Tribe Names Generator). Bernhardt asked about their name, and the tribesmen explained that their people believed that the river the party was currently traveling on was the world's first river, which gave birth to all later civilization. They warned the party about the dangers of the Second River Children, but admitted that the Third River Children were alright. 

The party asked about the elf burial ground, which the First River Children said was ancient and abandoned. Recently, a pack of dead-eaters had moved in. The Children had been careful to protect their own burial grounds from such monsters, but wished the party luck in dealing with them. With that, they parted ways.

Eyes in the Dark

The night passed without incident, and the party rose the next morning and had an uneventful day of travel. That night, Karven and Sheyla the thief were on watch when they noticed two sets of glowing red compound eyes in the dark, near where Derrell the druid was sleeping. By the dim light at the edge of their campfire, they could see the silhouette of hairy legs creeping closer.

Karven sounded the alarm, waking the party from their sleep. The party took up arms and readied to fight. They saw four giant spiders - eight to twelve feet in diameter - encircling their camp.

Giant spiders (not to be confused with large or huge spiders) have Type F poison, which causes instant death if a saving throw is failed. I was prepared for a (literally) very dicey encounter. Fortunately for the party, they won initiative resoundingly. Several ranged attacks struck one of the spiders at once, reducing it to fewer than half its hit points. This meant that I had to make a morale check when its turn came around. Of the spiders, it was the first to act. It failed its morale check and retreated back into the darkness.

This meant that the remaining spiders had to make morale checks as well. Two of the remaining three failed and fled. The last one passed its check and pressed the attack, but missed its target. The party surrounded the spider and slew it easily. Karven took the spider's thorax so that he could get someone in the village to extract its venom glands.

This obviously did not go how I anticipated when I rolled up the random encounter, and I'll admit that I was a bit disappointed by the results of these morale checks. At the same time, it does feel like the party is constantly flirting with disaster - whether they want to or not. They've had a few encounters now which should be very dangerous, where the dice end up more or less rolling resoundingly in their favor. They were pretty close to a brutal slugfest with an ankheg queen a few sessions ago, before their chad elf henchman bailed them out. 

The way I see it, sooner or later they're going to run into some very bad luck. Until then, they can have these wins, even if they feel a little unsatisfying to me at the moment.

Grimerun Again

The party had an uneventful day of travel and made it out of the forest. By the end of the following day, they were back in Grimerun. They had an encounter with a patrol of halfling bounders from the village, and warned them about the spiders in the forest.

In the village, the party restocked on supplies. Haymond got a new trident, and Karven got a dose of Type F poison from the dead giant spider, courtesy of the village alchemist. They also spoke to Shaelie Bouldershadow about the elf graveyard, though she didn't have much more relevant information to impart. Being a priest, she did give them some vials of holy water, however.

The party spent the night in the village, and embarked the next day for the burial ground.

Greetings, Boys and GHOULS

The party had an uneventful two-day journey to the burial ground. It was late afternoon when they got there, and they didn't see any ghouls roaming about. There was a large mausoleum in sight, so they concluded that the ghouls most likely hid in there during the day.

Proceeding across the boneyard, they noticed several graves had been dug up, the bones cracked open, and the marrow sucked out. The bones had teeth marks on them.

The party entered the mausoleum and found it seemingly empty. There were a number of sarcophagi with the lids cracked open, and gnawed bones littering the floor.

As the party moved inside, five emaciated undead creatures with long, clawed hands, sharp teeth, and lolling tongues emerged from the sarcophagi. I had determined that the ghouls' reaction was unfriendly, so they would not immediately attack. Instead, they went wild at the smell of fresh flesh, giving me the opportunity to delightedly yell "Fresh flesh!" over and over again in my best ghoulish voice.

The biggest and strongest of the ghouls beckoned the party closer, demanding only a "morsel" of flesh from each of them. Then, the party could remain here as the ghouls' prisoners, until they "ripened". Obviously, the party was not enthused by this possibility, so we rolled initiative.

Yuliana the cleric stepped forward to turn undead (which has a speed factor of just 1, making it one of the faster actions in the game). She failed her roll by 1, so the ghouls were not turned. Corym leapt forward to attack the ghoul leader, but missed. The leader attacked him in turn, scoring a hit with one of its claws. Corym failed his saving throw versus paralysis, and would be paralyzed for 6 (1d6+2 rounds)! The remaining ghouls charged in for a feeding frenzy on the helpless elf. Karven moved in and backstabbed one of them, killing it instantly (I had rolled minimum hit points for that one).

This certainly seemed like the end for Corym (whose player had just lost their other character, Ash, to the battle with the ankheg queen). At the top of the following round, Bernhardt stepped forward to try his own hand at turning undead. He rolled a 19, meaning he could turn something as powerful as a wraith! He rolled 4 on 2d6, turning all of the remaining four ghouls.

As far as we could tell, turn undead has no duration in 2e. So long as the cleric continues using their action each round to maintain the turning, the turned undead must flee from the cleric at top speed until they are able to break line of sight. The ghouls shrieked and fled into the shadowy corners of the mausoleum. The party pursued them, with Bernhardt following to ensure that the ghouls could do nothing but flee each round.

There were plenty of places for the ghouls to hide, and with the party pursuing them into these nooks and crannies, the ghouls inevitably got a few more attacks in, but only Yinvalur Sparkguard was injured, and even he wasn't paralyzed. The party handily mopped up the cowering, slavering undead.

Once again, this is an encounter that could have gone very poorly, but quickly and decisively swung (or should I say turned?) in the party's favor due to a good die roll. I'll get 'em eventually!

With that, we concluded the session. Corym gained a level in fighter, and is now a 2nd-level fighter/2nd-level mage. Haymond leveled up, and is now a 4th-level fighter. Yinvalur the henchman leveled up, and is now a 2nd-level fighter. Corym gained half a d10 hit die, and Haymond and Yinvalur each gained a full d10 hit die. All three gained a THAC0 improvement.

I'm not entirely sure what the party will do next session. First, they will probably return to Magicheart, then head back to Grimerun. After that, I imagine they will either investigate the City of Oni, or return to Grasshold and deal with the ogre den near town.

I'm realizing now that this session introduced (or at least threatened to introduce) to the players both save-or-die poison as well as paralysis, two notoriously swingy and incredibly deadly effects in old school D&D. It also gave us our first experience with turn undead, which is much more powerful than its 5e counterpart, and really drives home the value of having a cleric in the party. Without it, I'm pretty confident that Corym would have died. I'm excited to finally be getting to the good stuff and to see where it takes us.

AD&D 2e Play Report: Session 13

We played the 13th session of our ongoing AD&D 2e campaign last night. The previous session's play report is here.

To recap briefly, the party pressed on through the ankheg burrow, following a trail picked up by the NPC ranger, Jakayla. Along the way, they encountered a friendly gremlin, Weasel, who enlisted the party's aid in the gremlins' conflict with a tribe of urds. The two group of creatures were vying for control of a sunken shrine from the surface world, which they believed to hold great big people treasures.

The party agreed to help the gremlins, if Weasel would lead them to the ankheg nest and pay them in treasure from the gremlins' hoard. Weasel agreed, and showed the party on their way.

The party arrived at the ankheg nest, where the ankheg queen had laid a fresh clutch of eggs on a pile of corpses. The party began smashing the eggs, and the ankhegs soon emerged to stop them. In the ensuing battle with the ankheg queen, the elf fighter, Ash, was killed, but the party eventually triumphed.

The party harvested the ankhegs' acid and shells and looted some treasure from the ankhegs' victims. Bernhardt Dalton found the corpse of a cleric bearing the holy symbol of an evil god, as well as a mostly-intact journal.

The party decided to return to Grimerun, then come back to aid Weasel's people. They parted ways, and the party went back the way they had come. Along the way, they encountered one of the urds, and learned the location of their lair and the name of their leader, Zabu. The party kept the deal with Weasel to themselves. Later, they encountered more gremlins, who intended to rob them, until Karven Stone informed them of the deal with Weasel, at which point the gremlins left the party alone.

The party finally arrived back at the entrance to the ankheg burrow and found that their halfling hirelings were still waiting for them, despite the party being a few days late returning. We ended the session there.

Running Back to Grimerun

The party arrived back in Grimerun without incident. The halfling locals saw that the party came with several ankheg shells strapped to their mules, and rejoiced that the beasts had been slain. The party spoke with Shaelie Bouldershadow, the village's religious leader, who gave them a slightly larger reward in light of the fact that one of them had died.

At this point we introduced Ash's player's new character, Corym Vadercast, an elf fighter/mage. As I've explained before, I try to introduce new characters as quickly as possible - "plot" be damned - and in the case of a player character's death, the sooner the better. In this case, Corym was an adventurer who "happened" to be in Grimerun looking to join a party. Convenient!

The party spent the night in Grimerun, where they were the guests of honor at a proper halfling celebration. 

In the meantime, they discussed their next course of action. There was some interest in returning to Grasshold to deal with the ogres in the area. Since the party had recently had a resounding triumph against a pair of ogres, they were now confident that they could handle these ogres, too. Still, Bernhardt was curious about the sunken shrine at the ankheg burrow.

Bernhardt had been reading the journal he found on the corpse of the cleric. The journal belonged to one Brother Laurentius, who had come to the burrow in search of the lost shrine. The journal described a "true shrine" hidden by secret doors within the "false shrine". The true shrine contained a sacrilegious altar to the Dark Sun, God of Lies. A blood offering and a blasphemous prayer uttered at the altar would grant the supplicant certain dark powers, or so Brother Laurentius wrote.

Bernhardt wasn't interested in dark powers, but felt that the party should visit the shrine so that he could consecrate it. Karven, on the other hand, was very much interested in dark powers, and treasure. Haymond Baler needed some persuading, and Corym hadn't been with the party when they made the deal with Weasel, so he was indifferent to the idea.

The party consulted Shaelie, who didn't know much about the shrine, except that it was something of an myth to the locals. When the party told her about the gremlins and urds and expressed hesitance to return to the burrow, Shaelie said "Well, at least you didn't spit-shake on it." Which, of course, the party had done. Shaelie suggested there could be some cosmological consequences for breaking such a pact, but I was just ribbing the players. I made it clear that they could do whatever they wanted.

Ultimately, they decided to travel overland back to the location where the shrine had sunken, bypassing the gremlins and urds altogether.

The party's route to the sunken shrine

Somebody's Watching

The party set out in the morning for the shrine. They would travel north around the edge of the forest before diving into its heart and making for the shrine. They would attempt to pass directly over the top of the gremlin's lair without being noticed. They still didn't trust Weasel's intentions. The journey would take about three full days.

The first day of their journey brought them up to the edge of the forest. They could press on into the forest for the rest of the day, but that would mean camping in the forest, where there would be a higher chance of random encounters, so they decided to end the day early and camp on the forest's edge. The night passed without incident, and they pressed on the next day.

They ended the second day atop the gremlin's burrow. They didn't see any obvious entrances (remember, the gremlins are tiny), so they decided it was safe to camp there. They set up camp a little way's away, just in case.

During Corym's watch, he got the eerie sense that something was watching him, but couldn't find the culprit. He woke Haymond and let him know. "So you woke me up because you think something might be looking at you?" Haymond irritably asked, then went back to sleep. Corym spent the rest of his watch patrolling the area, his sword drawn. The night passed without incident.

In reality, Corym was being watched by a pseudodragon. 

The pseudodragon's reaction roll was friendly. It's Monstrous Manual entry contains the following details:

The pseudodragon that searches for companionship will stalk a candidate silently for days, reading his thoughts via telepathy, judging his deeds to be good or evil. 

 And:

Pseudodragons have a chameleonlike power that allows them to alter their coloration to blend with their surroundings. They can blend into any typical forest background with an 80% chance of being undetected by creatures which cannot see invisible objects.

 So essentially, I decided that the pseudodragon was curious about the party and their intentions, and would watch them, invisibly, to discern their true nature. If they passed its "test", it would later present itself as a helpful companion.

Red in Hoof and Horn

Later that same night (actually the wee hours of the morning), Haymond was on watch when he heard movement nearby in the forest. He waited cautiously until a small herd of deer appeared, led by a pair of stags. The stags seemed agitated, pawing at the ground with their hooves, shaking their antlers, and grunting at Haymond.

I had rolled that the stags were unfriendly, and decided they were territorial. Haymond tried shooing them away, waving a torch at them, and grunting back. I made a few subsequent reaction rolls, and the stags kept getting more and more ornery. Finally, I got a result of hostile. The stags charged.

Haymond braced his trident to receive the charge, which would grant him a +2 initiative bonus, and double damage if his attack hit. The stags, in turn, would have an Armor Class penalty of 1. Haymond's attack unfortunately missed. One of the stags crashed into him, doing 5 damage. The other one charged past him.

The rest of the party woke to the sound of angry stags trampling through their camp. They gathered themselves quickly and tried to drive them off. The stags' morale broke quickly at the sight of a large campfire and brandished weapons, but it was too late. As they tried to flee, the party cut them down. The rest of the herd fled as soon as the fighting started.

Kind of a dumb encounter, but it was funny. The party rejoiced at the unexpected source of fresh venison.

The Sunken Shrine

By the end of the following day, the party arrived at the shrine. There was a 30-foot pit in the ground. Below, the party could see a floor mosaic of a jawless skull on a purple-black sunburst. Just as they had heard, it seemed as though the entire building had been swallowed up into the earth. Dead gremlins and urds littered the floor, appearing as though they had done battle with one another.

The party lowered a rope and climbed down. A flight of cracked stairs led up to the shrine's entrance. Karven crept inside to check for traps. The far wall had a pair of arches flanked by a trio of seven-foot-tall stone columns, carved to resemble lithe assassins in jawless skull masks. 

The floor was another tiled mosaic like the one outside, but the eye sockets of the skull were iron bowls containing a foul-smelling, murky grey liquid. One of the bowls had cracked, and the liquid had spilled out. The stone around the cracked bowl had somehow turned into putrescent flesh.

Karven did not find any traps, but he did detect a pair of shifting secret doors built into the two archways. He also noticed that the column-statues held razor-sharp swords, coyly concealed behind their outstretched arms. The statues had the edgy dungeon-punk aesthetic of a 4th edition rogue - all superfluous belts and buckles. Karven noticed that one of the center column's belt buckles was actually a button.

Bernhardt followed after Karven and cast find traps. With his magically-augmented trap detection, Bernhardt noted that the statues seemed enchanted. As a cleric, he was able to conclude that the statues were likely magical guardians, enchanted to protect the temple from heathens and do-gooders. There was no obvious means of disabling them.

Karven stood back from the statues and - using a 10-foot pole he had purchased in Grimerun - pressed the button on the center statue. The secret doors opened. Beyond them, the party saw the blasphemous altar they had read about in Brother Laurentius's journal. The altar was surrounded with religious items - treasure! - and long-ago spoiled offerings of food and libations.

The party was certain that the statues would animate and attack if they tried to get into the altar room. They deliberated for some time as to how to disable the statues. Could they topple them? Probably not. Could they slip past them, grab the treasure, and get out? Maybe. Could they smash them with Bernhardt's magic warhammer?

That seemed like the best option to them, so Karven took the hammer and approached the statue on the left to smash it. He struck true, and the impact reverberated through the hammer's haft and rattled the bones in Karven's arms. It felt like the hammer might shatter, but it held true. The statue cracked and chipped, but didn't fall.

Suddenly, the statues brought their swords down to block passage through the archways. They animated, and stepped out of their alcoves. We rolled initiative.

May Thy Knife Chip and Shatter

This was a pretty straightforward, but long, combat. The statues were caryatid columns, which take only half damage from nonmagical weapons. Each time a weapon strikes them, there is a 25% chance that the weapon breaks (-5% for each +1 of a magic weapon). This was only slightly relevant, as most of the party relied on ranged weapon attacks (arrows and such are breaking and getting lost all the time anyway). Karven broke a few daggers, but he's been hoarding them, so it was inconsequential. However, the first time Haymond attacked one of the columns, his trident shattered into a million pieces. He had to retreat and resort to using his sling, instead.

For the most part, the statues attacked the party members closest to the entrance to the true shrine. Once Bernhardt starting casting his cleric spells, the statues turned their attention to him. Corym and Haymond took a few hits, as did Derrell, the druid henchman, but the party was never at risk of losing.

As a side note, the liquid in the iron bowls in this room was actually stone to flesh oil. Caryatid columns can be instantly destroyed by a stone to flesh spell, so I included an oil which duplicates the effect of that spell as a possible clever solution to the problem posed by the statues. I did my best to telegraph the fact that the liquid turned stone to flesh (via the one cracked bowl surrounded by stone tiles that had mysteriously turned into meat - weird!), but for whatever reason, the players never asked any questions about it.

With the statues eventually destroyed, the party looted the treasure inside the altar room. Bernhardt performed some sacred rites to sanctify the altar, and purified the spoiled food and libations surrounding it. The players seemed satisfied that their work here was done, and that's where we ended the session.

I'm happy with the direction this session took. I like to offer the players mechanical incentives for doing evil things, just to see how they react. In this case, there was some discussion about the merits of receiving a dark boon from an evil deity, but ultimately, the party is mostly good, and usually does the good thing. 

I enjoyed the lengthy discussion of how to approach the trapped shrine, even if it dragged on a bit long, and even if the players missed the easy solution which (I thought) was somewhat obvious. I would say that about half the players regularly zone out when we get into the weeds with traps and puzzles, but the other half seems to enjoy them, and I enjoy them too.

Between now and the next session, I have to determine if the gremlins or urds are likely to come across the party before they exit the shrine area. In the back of my mind, I knew that either group was likely to betray the party, even if the party helped them, so I imagine they'd both be pretty peeved to find that the party had gone (literally) over their heads to loot the shrine for themselves. Ultimately, I think they'll probably get away with it.

I'm especially interested to see what happens with the pseudodragon. It's definitely keeping an eye on the party. The butchering of the stags was grisly business, but it wasn't evil to do, I don't think. The pseudodragon would certainly be impressed by the party's rejection of dark boons and the sanctification of the unholy shrine.

All of that is for next session. I imagine the party will return to Grimerun, and then probably travel to Grasshold to deal with the ogres. Or maybe they'll stay in Grimerun and travel next to the City of Oni to rescue the kidnapped villagers. Time will tell.

AD&D 2e Play Report: Session 12

We played the 12th session of our AD&D 2e campaign last night. The play report for our last session is here.

To briefly recap, the party spent some time in town to recruit henchmen to help them root out the ankheg nest plaguing the halfling village of Grimerun. Ash recruited Derrell, a druid, and Haymond Baler recruited Yuliana, a cleric. The party returned to Grimerun and hired two halfling bounders, Panster Keenblossom and Sylyra Softleaf, to watch their mules, dogs, and supplies while the party went into the ankheg's den.

While camping outside the ankheg's burrow, the party ambushed a pair of ogres who wandered unawares into the party's camp at night. They handled them easily. 

The party descended into the ankheg den and followed a trail which Jakayla, their temporary ranger companion, picked up. They traveled through the tunnels for a full day before needing to rest. 

In the middle of the night, Haymond and Yuliana were ambushed by about a dozen shrieking, stinky gremlins that leapt out of the shadows and attempted to subdue them with tiny clubs. Both Haymond and Yuliana were seriously wounded in the attack, but the party collected themselves and killed most of their attackers, with the few remaining fleeing into the shadows.

Bernhardt Dalton cast some healing spells to aid the wounded in recovering, at which point the party finished their rest.

Pop Goes the Weasel

The next morning, the party left the scene of their nighttime ambush and pressed on ahead. They didn't get far before they heard the sound of dozens of tiny feet scampering about in the walls of the tunnel all around them. The party braced themselves for another attack.

To their surprise, one of the gremlins stepped out into the open, declaring in broken Common that he meant them no harm. The gremlin's name was Weasel, and he apologized for the attack from his fellows the previous evening. They had to "test" the party's "mettle" to see if they might be strong enough to help them.

I rolled another random encounter with gremlins - I think it was 15 this time. Luckily for the party, I rolled a "friendly" reaction, and decided that the gremlins wanted something from them other than a fight.

Weasel explained that his people were at war with another clan of slightly bigger creatures - though still small, in comparison to the party - with wings, who roosted in the tunnels' ceilings and dropped rocks on the gremlins from above. Bernhardt made an Intelligence check and concluded that Weasel was referring to a winged species of kobolds known as urds. He didn't think they would be a problem for the current party to handle.

The gremlins and urds were at war over a "big people shrine" which was once on the surface in the forest above, but had sunken into the earth due to the tunneling of the "armored worms". Both groups had concluded that the shrine held immense wealth from the surface world.

If the party would help Weasel and his people defeat the urds, the gremlins would reward the party with a trove of treasure collected from the armored worms' victims (the armored worms have no use for treasure, so the two groups sneak into their nest for loot and fight over that, too).

I had already determined when prepping this adventure that there was conflict between the gremlins and urds. Any time more than one type of intelligent creature is found in a dungeon or other adventure environment, I try to determine their relationship with each other, usually with opposed reaction rolls. In this case, both groups were hostile towards each other, and the shrine was right between their two lairs, so I decided that it was the cause of their hostility. When I rolled a friendly reaction for the gremlins, I knew instantly what they were after.

Bernhardt was secretly motivated to investigate the sunken shrine himself. Haymond did not want to trust the gremlin, but gave in to the rest of the party. They told Weasel that they were here to kill the armored worms - they taught him the word "ankheg" - and asked if he could show them where the nest was. If he did, they would help him. Weasel agreed, and proceeded to lead the party in that direction. 

It was difficult for Weasel, as a tiny creature, to scramble over all the roots and rocks in the tunnel, so he asked if he could ride along on one of the big people's shoulders. Bernhardt said yes, and Weasel climbed aboard, delighted by how tall he now was. The gremlin smelled awful, and sang a vulgar little song in his own language, kicking his feet with delight.

A tiny, friendly, smelly little monster should always ask to ride on a larger person's shoulders or head. The party will agonize for several minutes over who is willing to actually grant such a request.

They're Coming Outta the Goddamn Walls!

After almost another full day of traveling, the party reached a large, open cavern, honeycombed with tunnels and smelling of rotten fruit. In a depression in the center of the cavern was a mound of small, dead ankhegs, plus the corpses of wildlife, farmers, and foresters. The heap of bodies was bristling with insect eggs, which were coated in glistening acidic slime.

The party decided that the eggs had to be destroyed, and wished they had brought some flasks of oil. Weasel protested, saying that the eggs were delicious and that the party should try eating them, or at the very least bring them to the gremlins' lair for a proper feast. The party was not enthused. Bernhardt cast bless on the party in anticipation of a fight. Bless grants everyone in a 50-foot cube +1 to attack rolls, saving throws vs fear, and morale checks.

Karven Stone threw a handful of darts at the eggs, which wriggled when struck, then burst into slime. The party heard movement in the tunnels around them, and decided to move into the large cavern to avoid being ambushed in a tight space. They could hear large creatures converging on the cavern from the surrounding tunnels. They readied themselves to attack. Weasel hid in a hole. Bernhardt cast aid on Yuliana (which doubles the effect of bless and grants d8 temporary hit points), and Derrell cast shillelagh.

An adult ankheg emerged from the northwest. Karven threw a few darts at it and Yuliana fired with her sling. Before the bug could react, it was dead. 

Another emerged to the east, and Ash moved to attack it. He missed. Since one ankheg was already dead, I made a morale check for this one (-4 for being outnumbered 3-to-1, -2 because the ankhegs had already lost 25% of their numbers, -2 because none of the party had been slain yet, +1 for a defensive terrain advantage, and +3 because the ankhegs were defending their lair, so -4 overall). The ankheg failed its morale check. I had decided that if they lost half their hit points or failed a morale check, the ankhegs would use their acid (which they can only use once every six hours, so it's reserved for desperate situations only) and retreat into the tunnels. Since this was their lair and they were protecting their eggs, they wouldn't flee - they would just retreat and emerge elsewhere to make a more advantageous attack.

The ankheg spewed acid at Ash, who failed his save vs poison, taking a whopping 19 points of damage. He had 12 hit points left. The ankheg turned and fled, so Ash attacked it, dealing about half its hit points in damage.

Another ankheg emerged from the northeast. Haymond charged it and missed. It also failed its morale check, so it spewed acid at Haymond. He successfully saved versus poison, taking just 6 damage. Haymond attacked the ankheg as it fled, again dealing about half its hit points in damage.

Game Over, Man! Game Over!

Finally, the ankheg queen emerged to the south. This one was huge - about 15 feet long. I decided that it wouldn't make morale checks. It would die defending its eggs. Seeing Ash covered in acid and brought to a knee, the queen attacked him. Ash was caught in the queen's mandibles, which crushed him and burned him with acid. He took another 10 damage, dropping him to 2 hit points, and he was trapped in the ankheg's jaws unless he or someone else could pry him loose, or the ankheg was slain.

The party moved to surround the queen. One of the wounded ankhegs emerged behind Haymond to attack, and the other targeted the henchmen, Sheyla and Yinvalur Sparkguard, preventing these three from focusing on the queen. The rest of the party landed some hits on the queen, but she hardly seemed to notice. Ash fought desperately, but was unable to escape.

On the queen's turn, Ash took damage from the mandibles and acid automatically, since he was still trapped. He took another 16 points of damage, killing him instantly (our house rule is death at -10 hit points for player characters - Ash was at -14). The party watched in horror as Ash's body was cut in half. The ankheg sprayed digestive acid over his body, melting flesh from bone, then slurped up the liquified elf like soup. It turned to face the rest of the party, who had been attacking it from behind, and spewed Ash's sizzling bones all over them.

Immediate morale checks for the henchmen were in order. Despite having a +3 bonus (+1 for aid, +1 for bless, and +1 for being Good-aligned), Yuliana failed. She began screaming like Hudson from Aliens (how could I resist?) and turned to flee. The ankheg queen attacked her and seized her in its jaws. If not for the bonus hit points from aid, she would be dead immediately (the dead at -10 rule doesn't apply to NPCs).

Bernhardt beseeched everyone else not to run. The remaining NPCs passed their morale checks and pressed the attack. I gave Ash's player access to Derrell's character sheet so that he could keep playing - it's what henchmen are for!

The two smaller ankhegs missed their attacks and attempted to flee again. Haymond slew one as it fled, and Yinvalur the other. It was now Yinvalur's turn, and since he has specialization with the longsword, he would have two attacks this round (specialization at low levels grants three attacks every two rounds, so one attack on the first and two on the second). It was time for everyone to be amazed by the chad elf NPC.

Yinvalur ran over to the ankheg queen and attacked twice. He hit once and landed a crit with his second attack. The first attack did 14 damage (he rolled an 11 on d12 and gets +1 damage from Strength and +2 from specialization) and the second did 21 (he rolled two 9s on 2d12). I kid not, the queen had exactly 34 hit points remaining. She was dead.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a bit disappointed that the 1st-level henchman upstaged the player characters here, but the players didn't seem to mind. Yuliana would have been dead next turn, and any one of them could have been next.

The ankheg queen collapsed, and Yuliana wriggled free from its jaws.

Looting the Lair

The party went about smashing the ankheg's eggs, much to Weasel's dismay. While Haymond hacked up the ankheg carcasses for their shells, Bernhardt searched the pile of bodies, and Karven snuck over to (the lower half of) Ash's body to see what he had. Luckily, his coin purse was still there, which Karven nabbed while no one was looking. Ash wouldn't be needing it now. Then, Karven harvested the acid from the two ankhegs who hadn't managed to use it during the battle.

Haymond used some rope to secure the ankheg carcasses so that the party could drag them back through the tunnels on their return trip. Bernhardt collected some sentimental trinkets from the corpses in the pile, with the intent of returning them to the victims' families in Grimerun. Among the bodies was what appeared to be a cleric. Though the body was badly eaten by acid, Bernhardt could make out on its tabard a symbol of a jawless skull on a purple and black sunburst. With an Intelligence check (with a hefty bonus for being a cleric), he was able to identify it as the symbol of the Dark Sun, the Chaotic Evil God of Lies (Cyric, in the Forgotten Realms pantheon, which again, I use for its generic D&D-ness). 

On the body was some treasure, including a bejeweled eyepatch worth 3,000 gold. Bernhardt also found an acid-eaten journal, which he decided he would read when he had some downtime. 

Weasel tried to convince the party to accompany him to his home, but they preferred to return to Grimerun first. They asked the gremlin to give them an idea where his lair was, as well as the location of the shrine and the lair of the urds, which he did. They said they would return via the surface and reunite with Weasel in order to lend the gremlins their aid, as promised. Weasel demanded to shake on it, and spit a big gross loogie into his hand. Bernhardt reluctantly shook his tiny, slimy hand.

Getting Back

The party turned back the way they came. It would take them the rest of the day, plus another day and half to get back. 

On their first night camping in the tunnels, Bernhardt heard a voice calling to him from a tunnel in the ceiling above. One of the urds had found them. Its reaction was indifferent, so it simply engaged in small talk (in this case, I totally forgot that the urd wouldn't speak Common, and the party would likely have a hard time communicating with it - oh well).

The urd asked what they were doing, and seemed impressed that they had killed the armored worms. It asked if they had met the "puny, stinky" gremlins, to which Bernhardt responded in the affirmative. They had been attacked by the gremlins and had killed them - he left out the deal with Weasel. 

The urd seemed delighted by this, remarking that it was fun to drop big rocks on the gremlins' heads and watch them burst like melons. Afterwards, apparently, the urds lay their eggs in the headless corpses. Whether or not this is true is unclear - I just thought it would be a disgusting little detail to add on the fly.

Since the urd wasn't friendly, it did not invite the party back to its lair or attempt to recruit them in the war against the gremlins. It simply talked with them for a bit and then left, but at least now the party has met the other faction. Before it could leave, Bernhardt asked who their leader was, and got a name - Zabu.

On their second night camping, Karven heard another voice - this time a gremlin - calling out to him. These ones were unfriendly, so they demanded that Karven hand over all his gold, or else they'd "call the worms on him". Karven informed the gremlins that the worms were dead - the party had killed them. The gremlins didn't believe him. Karven namedropped Weasel, and the gremlins' demeanor changed. "Oh, you know Weasel? You gonna help us get those nasty winged jerks? You know they drop rocks on our heads and lay their eggs in our headless bodies? Well I guess you're alright then. Sorry for bothering you." Karven tossed the gremlins a gold piece and they scampered off into the dark.

On the last day of traveling back, the party noticed some stalactites hanging down from the ceiling above, which was odd - they had come this exact way before, and there weren't any stalactites. Haymond was suspicious, so he stood back and slung a stone at one of them. He hit it, and the "stalactite" trembled and fell to the ground. Suddenly, an eye blinked open on its side, staring at Haymond. The party noticed the rest of the stalactites on the ceiling slowly shuffling towards them.

Since piercers are so slow, and the primary "dramatic question" of an encounter with them is simply whether the party notices them or not, I ruled that the party could simply wait for an opening to run quickly past them, which they did. If we weren't close to our ending time, I might have wanted to spend more time on it, but it seemed inconsequential. 

With that, the party finally made it back to the entrance to the burrow. They had paid the halfling bounders for three days of work, and it had been five days by now, so I made a couple of morale checks to see if they had stuck around or returned to Grimerun. They passed both checks, so they were still there waiting for the party, although they were worried, had nearly left. Panster reminded the party that they were owed two days' pay.

With that, we ended the session. The party earned a chunk of experience points for the fight with the ankhegs and for finishing the quest, but still no one leveled up. Next time, they'll return to Grimerun, collect their reward, and decide what to do next. They might keep their word and return to help Weasel and the gremlins, mainly because they want to investigate the shrine themselves, or they might investigate the City of Oni to see about rescuing villagers who were kidnapped by hobgoblins and taken there. In either case, it seems they'll be in Grimerun for a bit.

Ash's player is working on a new character, and is currently planning on playing an elf fighter/mage. He asked about playing a bladesinger, which I'm not enthusiastic about, because I don't want to open the 2e splatbook floodgates. He asked if maybe bladesinging is something he could learn from a quest, or an ability he could acquire through a magic item, and I quite like that idea. Maybe he could find a bladesinging sword which unlocks those abilities for him. Something to think about.

Overall, I found this to be a very enjoyable session, with delightful roleplaying, weird little guys, and an intense combat which quickly swung in the players' favor after seeming for a moment like it could be disastrous. 

That seems to be a pattern in 2e, at least how I've been running it. No encounter has felt like it had a foregone conclusion. In the early stages, the players are often fearing for their characters' lives, but they're usually only a fortuitous roll of a die away from triumph. It's been very satisfying. We'll see if their luck holds up.

On Random Encounters: Men

In a recent play report for my AD&D 2e campaign, I wrote about how the player characters keep having random encounters with merchants and tribesmen, and how I'm struggling to keep these encounters interesting on repeat occurrences. It got me thinking more broadly about how to make all types of random encounters with men more interesting.

I use the term "men" here because I've been using the AD&D 1e wilderness encounter tables from the DMG, which use the term "men" to refer to humans, which I interpret as genderless. One could interpret the term more broadly, treating a roll of "men" instead as "people", meaning that "men" could also mean demi-humans (dwarves, elves, gnomes, and halflings), and depending on the DM's setting and sensibilities, humanoids (gnolls, goblins, hobgoblins, kobolds, and orcs) as well.

I won't get into the weeds as to what is and isn't a "person" here, but suffice to say that I treat all of the above as people in my games, with personalities, goals, ideals, bonds, and flaws as mutable as any human being in our real world. However, the 1e encounter tables have separate entries for demi-humans and humanoids, which I prefer to keep intact, so for now I'll say that in writing about "men", I'm simply writing about humans. The rest of fantasy people-dom will have to wait for another time.

Men for Miles

Our campaign takes place in a temperate region, so I've been using the "Temperate and Sub-Tropical Conditions: Uninhabited/Wilderness Areas" encounter table:

The chances of encountering "men" is as low as 10% is forests (perhaps because there are so many other creatures which live in the forest) and as high as 25% in deserts (perhaps because relatively few other types of creatures live in the desert).

Because they are still low-level, my players have mostly stuck to settled regions near towns so far, so I've been using the "Inhabited And/Or Patrolled Areas" table even more often:

Encounters with "men" are understandably more common in these areas. In the desert, the chance of encountering "men" is as high as 77%!

Hopefully, this is enough to communicate the importance of making these encounters interesting and varied. They will come up often over the course of a campaign.

Persons of Interest

Aside from ordinary animals, humans are perhaps the least fantastic thing to be encountered in a fantasy world, and considering the way most people in the real world live today, encountering wildlife is probably actually more fantastic than encountering other people. However, encounters with humans should be anything but boring. 

Like any random encounter, every chance meeting with humans should present either an auspicious opportunity, a complication, or a threat. These encounters will usually provide an opportunity for social interaction, and occasionally will result in combat. They will sometimes offer a challenge for the players to overcome - a fight, a language barrier, or a tense negotiation, for example. Other times, they will provide information about the world - it's cultures, factions, history, locations of interest, monsters, religions, and treasures - or other valuable resources - directions, goods and services, intelligence about the players' current objective, or potential allies.

Recently, I found myself handwaving some of these encounters, and it occurred to me that I was doing this because I hadn't put enough consideration into how to make them enjoyable, which made them feel like they were not worth our playing time. Any encounter with any human can present any of the above opportunities, complications, or threats, but since I've been running into challenges with encounters with merchants and tribesmen specifically, I started thinking about what sorts of unique opportunities, complications, and threats are offered by each of the specific types of humans on 1e's "Men Subtable":

Below, I'll give my thoughts on each of the "Men Types" in the table above, what distinguishes them as a type, and what is likely to be the most "interesting" element about an encounter with them. Since I'm running a 2e game, I'll be starting by talking about each of the above "Men Types" in that edition, but supplementing that information with details from 1e (since it is more encyclopedic in nature), and occasionally referencing 5e (because it's the other variety of D&D I enjoy, although it's less thorough in its cataloging of "men").

What's this guy's deal?

Bandits

Criminals, gangsters, marauders, murderers, outlaws, pirates, and robbers - all of the above are "bandits" by another name. Just don't call them "brigands" - that is a very specific, different thing!

Bandits typically have a high-level leader. In 2e, this will usually be an 8th-level fighter. Lip service is paid towards them also possibly being led by a rogue, wizard, or priest (although no guidelines are given as to when this is the case). 

1e gives more thorough guidelines (as is usually the case) for generating bandit encounters, such as when they might be encountered with a wizard or priest, the type of lair they have (it is likely to be a camp, but might also be a cave complex with a secret entrance, or a castle), and how many "important prisoners", camp followers, and/or slaves they might have. 

In 2e, bandits are strictly Chaotic Evil. In 1e, they are Neutral by default. In 5e, they are any non-Lawful alignment. I like that in 5e, bandits are characterized by their non-Lawfulness - this allows for Chaotic Good Robinhood-inspired bands at best to murderous cutthroat psychopaths as worst. 

However, since I'm running 2e, my 2e bandits are always the latter type - they're characterized by their individualism and self-serving nature. They are the "So I kicked him in the head until he was dead, nyah-ha!" dirtbags of Baldur's Gate, whose gruesome scalps the player characters can gleefully turn over to the fascist Flaming Fist Officer Vai at the Jovial Juggler inn at Beregost - the Fist's bandit scalp budget is seemingly limitless.

This is important for me to consider, because I modify reaction rolls based on alignment. This means that my bandits have a -3 to their initial reaction rolls, meaning they will never be outright helpful, but might be friendly (2.78%) or indifferent (25%). They are far more likely to be unfriendly (30.56%) or outright hostile (41.67%). Your mileage may vary - it is undeniably more "interesting" to have bandits of variable alignment, but I've decided to work within the constraints of my chosen system, for now.

Hostile bandits will attack on sight. The party might be able to make a desperate effort to reason with some (33.33%), but others will persist regardless of the party's overtures (8.34%). Unfriendly bandits will likely attempt to extort, rob, or otherwise hinder the party. Indifferent bandits are most likely not the type to prey on well-armed adventurers, and will make efforts to conceal their true nature so as not to be meddled with by a bunch of do-gooders. Friendly bandits might recognize the party of dirty murderhobos as kindred spirits, or else they're simply putting on a front in order to gain an upper hand on the party at a later time.

So what's interesting about bandits? What sets one group apart from another, aside from their initial disposition? Based on the above information, I would say their leader, their lair, and their prisoners.

A group of bandits led by a fighter, a wizard, a cleric, or a thief should all be slightly different. Fighter-bandits are likely better armed and more disciplined in their tactics. They fight for fighting's sake. They're probably unemployed soldiers. Wizard-bandits will use spells and may be disgraced scholars or forbidden knowledge-seekers. Thief-bandits are in it for the gold and favor especially underhanded tactics. The party will have to watch out for backstabs.

Cleric-bandits - which are maybe the most interesting to me - will also use spells (of a different kind) and have a religious motivation of some kind. They are probably excommunicated or heretical in some way. Determining their deity of choice will be important to discerning their motivations. Looking at the generic Chaotic Evil Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk deities (which I tend to use in my games, since I'm somewhat lazy in this regard and because they feel very "D&D"), we have Beshaba, Goddess of Misfortune, Cyric, God of Lies, Iuz, God of Pain and Oppression, Malar, God of the Hunt, Talona, Goddess of Poison and Disease, Talos, God of Storms, Tharizdun, God of Madness and Eternal Darkness, and Umberlee, Goddess of the Sea.

The cleric-bandits' choice of deity may further inform their tactics, personalities, goals, ideals, bonds, and flaws. Depending on their deity, they may be more likely to deceive, drown, enslave, inconvenience, poison, stalk, or torture their victims. None of this is fun stuff, but it is potentially more interesting than just "they want to kill and/or rob people".

I would quickly give the bandits' leader a name and some personality traits, goals, ideals, bonds, and flaws - regardless of the edition I'm playing, I would probably use the tables from 5e's Criminal background (PHB, page 129), or another appropriate background depending on the leader type, and/or the tables from that edition's DMG's chapter on creating NPCs (page 88).

The bandits' lair is also a key piece of information - it's type says something about them. In settled regions, a camp or fortress overrun with bandits is likely widely known - the kind of thing the DM should place ahead of time and make the players aware of. It will be a problem for nearby settlements, and the bandits will likely be in conflict - or cahoots - with the nearest settlement's rulers. 

Randomly encountered bandits could be from a known encampment nearby - if one exists - otherwise, it's probably safe to assume that the lair is in some out of the way or secret place (a cave, for example, could be a hidden bandit lair inside otherwise inhabited lands). Bandits who maintain a known lair in settled lands are likely more formidable, compared to those who hide in hidden caves or in the wilderness.

In wilderness areas, camps and caves will be in secret locations. Fortresses are unlikely to be secret, unless its an ancient place, the location of which has been lost to time. Hidden bandit lairs of all kinds will be a closely guarded secret which player characters can potentially learn from talkative, friendly, or captive bandits. 

Cave lairs and fortress dungeons might have monsters dwelling deep within them, and ancient fortresses will usually have histories baked into them, which player characters can also learn about from their denizens. These two locations could serve as proper adventure sites even after the inhabiting bandits are driven off or killed, or perhaps the bandits are so friendly because there's a problem at the lair which the player characters could help resolve - again, a monster inhabiting the lair's depths, or a heavily guarded treasure in the fortress's vault. Of course, if the bandits are Chaotic Evil, they'll probably double-cross the characters as soon as the dirty work is done.

Lastly, the bandits' "important prisoners" and slaves are worth consideration. What constitutes an important prisoner? I would hazard to guess that they're mostly merchants and nobles - namely, people that can be ransomed - but this can also be determined by the bandit type: fighter-bandits might have prisoners of war, wizard-bandits might have sages and scholars, cleric-bandits might have rival prophets and missionaries, and thief-bandits might have rival assassins, bandits, thieves, and masters of Thieves' Guilds. 

Knowledge of prisoners like these can also generate impromptu quest hooks - a chance encounter with some friendly bandits reveals that they recently captured a wandering missionary; now, the player characters have to convince the bandits to divulge the location of their hideout, go there, and find a way to rescue the prisoner so that the local church owes them a favor or a reward.

Would you look at that foot...

Berserkers

In 2e, the berserker's main distinguishing feature is that they drive themselves into a frenzy in battle. When frenzied, they attack twice per round, or once at +2 to hit, and they never make morale checks.

This is true in 1e as well, and in that edition they are also led by high-level fighters, and maybe a cleric.

There is no mention of a lair, though in 1e there is a 10% chance of encountering them there, so presumably they exist. I imagine that they're fortified encampments.

In both editions, berserkers are Neutral. In 5e, their alignment is any Chaotic alignment. As with bandits, I'll be using the berserker's 2e alignment of Neutral. This means that the full spectrum of dispositions is possible, with indifferent being the most likely (44.45%), outright helpful or hostile being least likely (8.34% each), and friendly or unfriendly in between (19.44% each).

Hostile berserkers attack in a frenzy. An encounter with unfriendly berserkers might mean dealing with berserkers on the brink of a frenzied attack. Helpful berserkers may join the party on whatever their current quest is, while friendly berserkers may share information or hospitality, or want to engage in an amicable skirmish with the party's strongest warriors. Indifferent berserkers likely want nothing to do with the party, but could be convinced to do something or be plied for information. I use 5e's Outlander background (PHB, page 136) to flesh out their leaders.

If the berserkers are accompanied or led by a cleric, their religion could color the interaction, as with bandits. Looking at our Neutral Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk deities, we have Gond, the God of Craft, Ioun, Goddess of Knowledge, Oghma, also God of Knowledge, Waukeen, Goddess of Trade - none of which I feel work particularly well for berserkers - as well as Kossuth, God of Fire, Silvanus, God of Wild Nature, and Tempus, God of War.

Given their Neutral alignment, I would also argue that it would be just as appropriate for berserkers to be led by a druid, given druids' required Neutral alignment in 2e. In that case, the berserkers would likely worship natural spirits of animals or the land, rather than following an organized religion. 

Berserker's in our own world's history are typically grouped into either the cult of the bear, boar, or wolf - 5e's Totem Warrior barbarian subclass can provide some inspiration as to what traits a berserker cult of a given animal might embody. Or, maybe D&D's berserkers instead worship a gorgon, griffon, roc, or other Neutral or unaligned animal-adjacent monster, and assume the mannerisms of that creature.

In addition to the usual information that human NPCs will have about the region or world, berserkers will have specific knowledge - namely, the knowledge of how to enter a frenzy. Some theories about real-life berserkers suggest that they achieved this state by consuming alcohol or hallucinogenic drugs. This secret is something the berserkers might share if the party convinces them, helps them, or agrees to be initiated into the tribe or warband.

Brigands

Who am I kidding - these are just bandits! Well, not exactly. In 2e, they are "better equipped and will have higher morale". In 1e, they are specifically Chaotic Evil bandits (remember that regular bandits in 1e are Neutral), they are more likely to lair in caves and fortresses, they have half as many important prisoners, something like three times as many camp followers and/or slaves, and they have +1 morale.

Otherwise, they're just bandits. Go reread what I wrote about bandits, but mentally replace the word "bandits" with "brigands". Or don't.

Characters

Otherwise known as "Adventurers", they will have classes and levels and can be as varied as any group of player characters. 1e and 2e both have their own guidelines for generating parties of adventurers, including hirelings and henchmen, which I won't get into here. What I will say is that both procedures are thorough, so my recommendation is to generate some adventuring parties ahead of time and have them ready in the event that the player characters encounter them.

My preference is to generate one party of each "tier" - low-level, medium-level, high-level, and very high-level. Maybe a "Good" party and an "Evil" party of each tier, for variety. Give them a cheeky name - something that will get a laugh and make the players seriously consider giving their own party a silly name.

These are some of my favorite encounters to roleplay. Good adventurers might lend their aid to the party, going so far as to join them on their current quest or otherwise collaborate, or oppose them if the player character party happens to be evil. My players recently encountered a party of very high-level adventurers purely by chance. We all had a lovely time riffing on the situation, with the NPC party offering helpful tips and encouragement, and resolving to clean up a potentially region-altering mess the player characters had made.

Doing that once is fine - if the players make friendly contact with a higher-level party of Good adventurers and want to lean on them all the time to resolve problems they're incapable of facing themselves, shut it down immediately. Even Good adventurers are as capricious, distractible, and fickle as actual player characters. Whenever the players go looking for them, say, to remove the Evil wizard lording over the nearby town, tell them that the high-level party is off doing high-level adventurer stuff - they're plane shifted to Hades, battling the Bone Lord in the Bone Castle, or something. The players have to overcome (most) challenges themselves!

Evil adventurers should be the worst of the worst dirtbags the DM can imagine - draw on any experiences with problem players and adolescent gaming to make them absolutely detestable. Taunt the player characters or lay a diabolical ambush. Use the most OP, social contract-shattering spells available - the ones Redditors complain about. The players will hate these guys more than any xenophobic beholder, pyromaniac dragon, or megalomaniacal lich. My last 5e campaign was derailed for months by the player characters relentlessly pursuing a treacherous NPC party, and I wouldn't have it any other way. The catharsis the players will experience when they finally get their hands on these people is unlike anything else in the game.

Even Good NPC parties can be unlikeable. Have everyone everywhere talk about how great they are all the time. Have them buy all the good magic items at the Bazaar of the Bizarre. Have them rule all of the sweet castles the player characters wish they had, or recruit all of the men-at-arms the fighter needs to man their stronghold. When the player characters show up in town after completing a quest, no one notices because the Big Damn Heroes just saved the multiverse or whatever. Nobody likes Mr. Perfect.

It's not difficult to make these encounters interesting, if the characters are fleshed out ahead of time. I never get to play in a game - at least not for long - so I treat this as my opportunity to create bespoke characters with detailed backstories and motivations. They are all my OCs, and the NPCs in the setting are as obsessed with them as I am, and it is as annoying and obnoxious as players who create characters like that (only kidding - kinda).

Returning to Baldur's Gate, I think about every fight with adventurers in those games. In the second game, right at the beginning, on the second floor of an inn is a party of adventurers who pick a fight with the player character. They're obnoxious and they have good loot, and the fight is pretty challenging because the NPCs have all the same tricks as the player character party. That's the purpose of NPC parties in D&D. That's what I want these encounters to feel like.

Dervishes

The dervish is a Arab-coded religious nomad. In real-world history, they were Muslim mendicants. In D&D, they're roaming desert warriors of a non-specific religious persuasion. They're Lawful Good and led by clerics, with high-level fighters and wizards among them as well. They live in walled fortresses are are fanatics, adding 1 to their attack and damage, and never checking morale. I use 5e's Acolyte background (PHB, page 127) to give their leaders personality traits and the like.

As far as making them interesting goes, it mostly boils down to religion, to a much greater extent than those other "Men Types" discussed up to this point. Again referring to our generic D&D deities, Lawful Good options include Ilmater, God of Endurance, Torm, God of Courage and Self-Sacrifice, and Tyr, God of Justice. Dervishes might be martyrs, valorous warriors, or good-doers and wrong-righters. They can serve as a means to deliver information to the players about the world's religious practices.

Because of their alignment, they will never be outright hostile, and have a small chance of being unfriendly (2.78%). They might be indifferent (25%), but will likely be friendly (30.56%), and especially helpful (41.67%).

Dervishes are also characterized by the terrain they inhabit. There is an especially good chance of encountering dervishes in the desert. In desert wilderness regions, they are the most common type of men. They might join the party to escort them across an otherwise inhospitable wasteland, or invite them back to their desert fortress to rest in safety and restock on provisions. 

Like bandits with their lairs in settled lands, these fortresses should probably already be on the map somewhere, and be known to the player characters - I'm thinking about where to put mine right now! They should be destinations for player characters that need to venture across long stretches of desert. I imagine that these fortresses are like the kasbahs of Morocco and Spain.

Merchants

Merchants are the main reason I started writing this post. They are the most common type of men encountered in all inhabited terrain types, as well as in wilderness plains, scrubs, rough terrain, and hills, so it's especially important to consider how they can be interesting.

In 2e, merchants travel in heavily-armed caravans. Only 10% of those encountered are actual merchants. 10% are drovers, and the rest are armed guards, led by a 6th- to 11th-level fighter, with lower-level fighters thrown in as well. There is also a chance of medium- to high-level wizards, priests, and thieves in the caravan. The caravan has pack animals and wagons carrying trade goods, with 5,000 gp of goods per wagon, although there is no method for determining the total value of goods carried.

1e, again, is more specific - the caravan will carry a hidden pay chest containing gold, platinum, and gems, and the caravan will carry between 10,000 and 60,000 gold worth of merchandise. This information, combined with the huge number of armed guards and the fact that merchants "will always be mounted on very swift, light horses", has made me realize what's interesting about the wandering merchant encounter - the players are supposed to decide whether or not to rob them.

The player characters, coming upon a caravan of merchants, can take stock of the number of pack animals and wagons, estimate the value of trade goods carried, measure this against the threat posed by the armed guards and "special" characters in the party, and choose whether to knock over the caravan for a huge payout. Can they stop the merchants on their swift horses before they escape and notify the local authorities?

Personally, I love this idea, but I love ruthless, mercenary adventurers - my players are usually goody-goodies, and I can't see them ever actually doing this. So then what purpose does the wandering merchant serve?

Well, they can buy and sell things. It's an opportunity for the player characters to unload any weighty treasure and restock on supplies. In wilderness areas, this might be an auspicious encounter indeed, but in settled regions, it doesn't make much sense. The characters are likely traveling from town to town - if they need to buy or sell something, they can simply do it in the next town, which likely isn't far, or, they already did it on their last stop.

So, the wandering merchant has to present some opportunity or threat that isn't present in the normal course of in-town shopping expeditions. I immediately think about magic items. I go back and forth on whether or not they should be available to purchase. If magic items aren't widely available to purchase in settlements, perhaps an auspicious encounter with a wandering merchant presents a rare opportunity to buy them. 

I lean towards allowing my players to purchase magic items in major towns and cities, because that's what my players want, and I'm somewhat indifferent towards the idea. So in my case, wandering merchants need to present some unique opportunity to purchase these items, or else, again, why wouldn't the players wait until they reach the next town to do so?

My inclination is to say that wandering magic item merchants offer items at a discount. Let's say merchants encountered carry 1d4 (65%), 2d4 (20%), 3d4 (10%), or 4d4 items (5%). They might be specialty merchants carrying a specific type of item, or hodgepodge collectors with a varied trove of trinkets and curios. In either case, I'd roll on the magic item tables to see what exactly they've got. Like with NPC adventuring parties, I'd prep a merchant of each type in advance to save time at the table, using 5e's Charlatan or Merchant background (PHB, pages 128 and 133, respectively) to detail their personalities. Whenever the PCs encounter a given merchant, I'd go into my notes after the session and refresh their list of items.

I'm not sure how I'd like to determine the exact discount on offer. A reaction roll is a good way to do it, but what should be the spread? 5% for a hostile encounter, up to 25% for a helpful one? I'm more inclined to roleplay this encounter than a typical shopping expedition - which, as a rule, we never play out. So, whatever the exact rate is, it should be negotiable, based on the merchant's disposition. 

Merchants in 2e can be any alignment. In 1e, they're always Neutral. Either way, the full spectrum of reactions is possible. 2e's variable alignment allows me to more easily add color to the merchants. Chaotic Evil and Neutral Evil merchants probably deal in cursed items exclusively, pawning them off as the real thing and then absconding with their ill-gotten gains. Lawful Evil merchants are probably the real deal, but are sticklers when it comes to prices. Good-aligned merchants will only sell to do-gooders. Neutral merchants will sell to anyone.

This approach ensures that wandering merchants always present both opportunities and threats in equal measure, which is important to me in thinking about these encounters. I would keep intact the wagons laden with trade goods as well, in case the players do decide to turn to banditry.

Nomads

In 2e, nomads are looped in with barbarians, and in 1e, they're filed under dervishes. Go figure.

The defining characteristic of nomads is that they're travelers, which makes them perfect for random encounters. For some reason, in 1e there is a 10% chance that their lair is a walled city (how nomadic!), but otherwise, they lair in temporary encampments. They are led by high-level fighters and occasionally have clerics and wizards among them. Like with berserkers, I'd detail their leaders' personalities using 5e's Outlander background. 

Nomads keep herd animals and slaves, which is a problem, because in 2e they can be of any alignment (in 1e, they're Neutral). I would rule that Good nomads don't have slaves, because slavery is Evil.

If nomads attack the party, they have a good chance of surprising them (a 4-in-6 chance in 1e, or -5 to the party's surprise check in 2e, with a 1, 2, or 3 on 1d10 indicating surprise). That and the special characters with them is what makes a combat encounter with nomads interesting.

If combat isn't inevitable, the nomads pose a secondary threat of imprisoning the party (1e specifies that they have a 75% chance of capturing weaker groups). If the nomads are indifferent, friendly, or helpful, they present the opportunity to obtain information. 

Nomads get around, so they should have a wealth of knowledge about the surrounding area in which they're encountered- they're probably more knowledgeable about the environs than anyone else. They know where the monsters and locations of interest are, where to find food and water, and how to get places. A nomad guide, if one can be recruited, is the best guide there is.

Pilgrims

Pilgrims are on a pilgrimage - that is, they are going somewhere (or maybe returning from somewhere). They're religious. What's interesting about them is their religion, and where they're going (or returning from). They are an opportunity for player characters to learn about a local religion as well as a religious location of interest.

There is a specific table provided to determine the alignment of pilgrims (oddly, because no such table is provided for any other type of men with variable alignment):

d100     Alignment
01-35    Lawful good
36-55    Chaotic good
56-65    Neutral
66-85    Lawful evil
86-00    Chaotic evil

Apparently, there are no Chaotic Neutral, Lawful Neutral, Neutral Evil, or Neutral Good pilgrims. Who knew?

Pilgrims will be led by a medium- to high-level priest, and accompanied by low- to high-level fighters, wizards, and thieves. Fighters accompanying Lawful Good pilgrims will be paladins, those with Chaotic Good pilgrims will be rangers, priests will Neutral pilgrims will be druids, and Lawful Evil pilgrims will be berserkers. I would probably use the 5e Acolyte background for the leader's personality.

Perhaps most interesting is that the pilgrims' priestly leader has a 5% chance of carrying a closely-guarded religious artifact. This is probably meant to be a religious artifact in the historical sense - a saint's bones or some such - but there's no reason why it couldn't also be a priest- or paladin-specific magic item of great power, like a rod of resurrection or a holy avenger sword. I'm tempted to juice that number a bit, or say that an artifact is always present, simply because the presence of an artifact is the most interesting possibility to me. 

Tribesmen

Tribesmen are the other reason (in addition to merchants) that I started writing this post. In wilderness areas, they are the most common type of men encountered in forests, mountains, and marshes. After 10 sessions of our 2e game, the party has encountered four different groups of tribesmen (they spent a lot of time in forests and some time in the mountains, so this makes sense).

I'll be honest in that I don't really see the difference between tribesmen and nomads, except that tribesmen are probably intended to be more "primitive". In 1e, they're lumped in with "cavemen", which seems...problematic. Combined with the fact that they are "typically found in tropical jungles or on islands", led by "witchdoctors", and that they have a 50% chance of keeping captives, which the 1e Monster Manual, uh, gleefully describes with a parenthetical "food!" and uh, yeah, I'm going to stay away from this one.

Tribesmen are just people who live in tribes. They're no better or worse, or more "primitive" or "savage" than other people. They're led by fighters and druids, probably Outlanders in 5e terms. Like nomads, they know a great deal about the lands in which they dwell. They can be formidable enemies as well as helpful guides and knowledgeable contacts.

Let's just leave it at that.

Culture and Conclusions

Obviously, categorizing types of people in this way, sometimes based on real historical cultures, and painting them in broad, trope-ified brush strokes for a fantasy game written in the 70s by a midwestern American man brings with it some baggage. The 1e description of tribesmen is particularly revolting to a modern reader, and the inclusion of other culturally-specific people like dervishes and even berserkers may be uncomfortable to some, but one could say the same about bards, druids, monks, and paladins, all of which are D&D-isms that are close to my heart.

Ultimately, we're playing a game, and a mostly private, individual game, at that, and tropes are often somewhat helpful as a way of categorizing and understanding things. In some cases, as with 1e's tribesmen, the trope is so repulsive as to be completely unsalvageable. At other times, as with berserkers and dervishes, in my opinion, it's worth doing my best to simply think critically about how I use the trope, and consider how to make it interesting and nuanced. Certainly, if I think something will offend my players or make them uncomfortable, I steer clear of it.

I hope that this has been somewhat enlightening. I certainly didn't mean to write all that, but I feel that engaging in the process of considering the role of different types of people in the game has helped me figure out how I want to use them. Hopefully, it will make their implementation more satisfying in play. The next time the player characters encounter some merchants, I feel more confident that I'll know what makes interacting with them worthwhile.

And hopefully, someday, my players will see a caravan laden with loot, do the math, and decide to become highwaymen after all.

AD&D 2e Play Report: Session 11

Last night, we played the 11th session of our AD&D 2e campaign. The play report for our last session is here.

To recap briefly, the party went on a long journey from the city of Southreach to the muddy halfling town of Grimerun in the north. On the way, they encountered a large band of orcs and had to hide in a field of crops until they passed.

Grimerun was being terrorized by a mysterious forest beast which was gobbling up the village's residents. The party met with Jakayla, a local ranger, who took them to the site of the last attack. They found a 30-foot-deep burrow in the earth leading to a series of tunnels. Hesitant to go skulking around down there, the party laid a trap to draw the beast out.

Eventually, the beast took the bait - an 11-foot-long ankheg emerged from the pit. The party sprung the trap, with great success. They hoisted the beast into the air with a giant mancatcher and slew it as it thrashed about. Because the ankheg was relatively small, the party concluded that there must be more where that came from. 

They tried the trap again the next day, with less success. The trap failed, and the ankheg escaped. The party decided they needed more manpower, and promised to return to Grimerun to solve the problem once they had recruited some henchmen. They headed south to the town of Stormhelm to do so.

*Slaps the Top of My 17 Charisma* You Can Fit So Many Henchmen in this Bad Boy

The party spent an evening in Stormhelm and asked around about who might be willing to join a bug-hunting expedition. Haymond Baler met Yuliana, a local cleric of Chauntea, the Goddess of Agriculture. Having been a farmer himself, Haymond liked the cut of her jib, and recruited her. With his 17 Charisma, he can take on 9 more henchmen, should he so choose.

The party traveled another day south to Grasshold, the larger town. There, Ash met Derrell, a druid, which the party took as an auspicious occasion. I use the 2e Monstrous Manual's Character Subtable in Appendix III: NPCs (page 379) to determine demographics, which lists only a 3% chance of encountering a druid. Not wanting to pass up the opportunity, Ash recruited the druid. With 11 Charisma, Ash can have three more henchmen.

Each of the players has a henchman now - Bernhardt Dalton has the elf fighter, Yinvalur Sparkguard, and Karven Stone has the human thief, Sheyla. Their party now numbers eight, and the ranger, Jakayla, was waiting for them back in Grimerun. They estimated that they now had enough numbers to brave the ankhegs' den. They turned back to the north to return to Grimerun.

Filling Out the Party

On their way out of Stormhelm, the party encountered a mounted patrol from town. The party expressed their intent to solve Grimerun's monster problem. The patrol wished them luck, and bid them to also deal with the village's nasty hobgoblin problem while they were at it, then return back to Grasshold to root out the ogres lairing nearby. You know, just reminding the players of all the other stuff they have to do.

The party completed the day-and-a-half journey back to Grimerun without further incident. They reunited with Jakayla, and paid two halfling bounders, Panster Keenblossom and Sylyra Softleaf, to watch their mules, dogs, and supplies while they went exploring the tunnels. 

The halflings are hirelings, so the party pays by the day, and estimated they would need three days' of work from them - one day of travel to the burrow, one day exploring inside, and one day of travel back to the village.

The party was now traveling with eleven members, two mules, and three dogs - now we're playing AD&D! They set out for the burrow. The journey took seven hours, so they had an extra hour to poke around inside the hole. They lowered a rope and rappelled down.

The tunnels were more expansive than they could have imagined, but Jakayla was able to pick up a trail, which she believed she could follow directly to the ankhegs' nest. After a half hour of scouting, they turned back to climb up out of the hole and rest topside.

Ambushers

In the middle of the night, Bernhardt heard a pair of large figures, speaking to each other in Ogrish - and they were heading directly towards the party's camp! 

I rolled that the ogres would be surprised, so I let Bernhardt's player know that they seemed unaware of the party's presence. Bernhardt, Jakayla, and Yinvalur were awake, so they quickly roused the rest of the group, who scattered into the surrounding foliage, intent on ambushing the ogres.

The ogres stumbled into the middle of the camp, surprised to find it there. They said something to each other in Ogrish, which the party couldn't understand. Without hesitating, they launched the ambush. 

Ash and Haymond targeted the smaller of the two, bringing it down with two swift strikes (their two attacks did a combined 24 damage). The remaining ogre was riddled with arrows, darts, and sling bullets from Bernhardt, Karven, Sheyla, Yinvalur, Yuliana, and the halflings, before Jakayla leapt forward and felled it with her longsword.

It was a perfect surprise attack. The players remarked that maybe they could handle that ogre den in Grasshold after all!

Ambushed

The next morning, the party left their halfling bounders and descended back into the tunnels. As they followed the trail Jakayla had picked up, the forest above them thickened. Twisting roots grew down through the tunnel's ceiling and out of the walls, forcing the party to scramble through them, slowing them down. They traversed the tunnels for a full eight hours, covering about seven-and-a-half miles during that time. If the tunnels extended out in a 12-mile radius, as Jakayla suspected, then they were a little over halfway there.

The party would have to rest inside the tunnels, and continue in the morning. They nestled themselves in amongst the roots as comfortably as possible and did their best to nod off.

Haymond and Yuliana were on watch when Haymond heard the sound of tiny creatures scrambling in the dark. Suddenly, the two were beset by at least a dozen tiny, flabby, long-limbed humanoid creatures. 

The gremlins impose a -5 penalty to their opponents' surprise rolls, so the party were now the ones being ambushed. I rolled a 3 for their reaction, so they were hostile - whether they would kill the party or take them prisoner was anyone's guess.

The gremlins launched themselves at Haymond and Yuliana, shrieking a hodgepodge language of Common, Dwarvish, Gnomish, Goblin, and Orcish. They clung to the characters' bodies as they tried to bludgeon them unconscious with tiny clubs.

Yuliana was almost killed in the initial onslaught, and Haymond lost nearly half of his hit points. The shrieking woke the rest of the party, who hastily drew their weapons and joined the melee. 

Ash, Haymond, Jakayla, Sheyla, and Yinvalur began frantically slashing and stabbing at anything within reach. Bernhardt began firing off hold persons, and managed to paralyze a few of the enemies. Karven drew a few of the gremlins off of Yuliana and began tumbling to avoid attacks from the horde. Derrell cast shillelagh and started clubbing the gremlins. Yuliana attempted to escape certain death with sanctuary, but her casting was interrupted when she was clubbed some more.

At this point, at least one of the gremlins had been killed, and others were below half hit points, so they needed to start making morale checks. Since they hadn't yet killed or subdued any of the party, and because they were now facing magic-using foes, the gremlins had -4 to their morale checks, or -8 if they were badly wounded (because morale is rolled on 2d10 and the gremlins have a morale score of 12, a -8 penalty meant they would automatically flee). 

The gremlins began to lose morale, scrambling to escape into unseen passages in the tunnel walls. The party attempted to kill them as they fled. Once they were outnumbered 3-to-1 (i.e. three or fewer gremlins left, since the party numbered nine), their morale check penalties worsened to -12, not that it made a difference. In the end, the party killed twelve of the gremlins, while just two escaped.

Haymond and Yuliana were the only ones wounded, and that was mostly in the initial surprise attack. Bernhardt used his healing magic to restore them to full hit points.

This was a combat that looked very dicey at first, then quickly turned into a chaotic melee which tilted in the party's favor. I was very satisfied with the morale rules here. They kept the fight from degenerating into a boring slog (not counting the initial ambush, it lasted just two rounds), and it felt somewhat realistic that the tiny, evil creatures would lose heart quickly once the surprise attack turned against them.

After the fight, we concluded for the evening. The party gained experience for the ambush on the ogres and the ambush by the gremlins, but no one leveled up. They all need at least a thousand XP for their next level (Bernhardt needs something like 6,000 XP), and they are getting just a small fraction of that number each session, so I suspect that they'll be here for a while.

Next time, the bug hunt continues.