Rusty Dagger, City of Ice

 Prologue

Arzag, Allendale and Jill are relaxing in the local Rusty Dagger tavern discussing their next opportunity. “If we don’t find a new job soon, we will need to take up a role with one of the caravans leading town.”

“Burke is organising the most caravans.”

“I’m not sure I want to be a carter for Burke, I don’t trust him.”

“Shhhh, here he comes”

After some drinks, Burke advises that he has not heard back from one of his caravans. “It might just be that a hawk ate their carrier pigeon, but I’d like you to check it out.”

After further drinks, the team agree to go and look for the caravan. Burke provides the details of the planned route and Arzag and his companions set off on the rescue mission.

After about a week of travel, the group come to look upon scenes of battle. Overturned and broken wagons were scattered about the trail. Bodies littered the roadside.

“Hey Arzag! It looks like we go a survivor!”

The party move over and surround the unconscious woman. Arzag addressed her wounds and applied a water flask to her lips. After a few moments the woman regained consciousness.

“Our caravan was attacked by bandits and creatures, suddenly everybody was running and screaming. Something hit me and I was knocked unconscious.”
“It will be dark soon. Let's search the wagons and we can build a fire to keep warm and cook some food.”

The party make a small fire and after dinner make camp.

In the morning the party spread out to search the attack site for anything useful. Everyone is spread out amongst the rocks when Allendale spots some rough looking men approaching.

Hesperina identifies them as bandits. This gives the party an advantage to match the advantage the bandits had.

The Bandit leader advances followed by one of the men

Arzag moves up and Allendale moves back

Hesperina moves into position

The last bandit moves up then gets the bonus action and takes a swipe at Arzag missing 1-12

Arzag hits the bandit 14-2 and then has his second attack parried 8-8, that’s a max defence roll from the bandit.

Arzag hits the bandit 7-1, the bandit’s desperate counter misses 2-8

The Bandit leader moves to attack Arzag but misses 8-11

Arzag then finishes off the bandit he has been fighting 7-1

The last bandit moves up, initially he was chasing after Allendale but the obstacles mean Arzag is now closer. 

Arzag misses the leader 8-10, proving the leader is there by merit rather than politics.

The bandit moves up and their first attack is parried 7-7.

Arzag unleashes a flurry of attacks on the bandit leader hitting 11-3, 11-10 and 14-10. The last being a double 6 which can’t be defended.

The Bandit leader now bleeding from several cuts misses 10-12. That’s the third 8 in a row the bandit leader has rolled. The bandit leader is now down to one health and starting to regret their life choices

Arzag misses the bandit leader 4-6 that’s a double 1 from Arzag.

The bandit hits Arzag 8-6 that’s another maximum roll from the D8. The bandits are certainly trying hard.

Arzag finishes the bandit leader 13-7 and then hits the bandit 7-5.

Now Arzag is focussing on the bandit, the bandit's next two attacks miss, 6-8 and 1-11

The bandit misses Arzag 3-12 however Arzag’s return strike misses 4-6, that’s another double 1.

The bandit redoubles his efforts but misses 3-10 and 6-14, that’s a max defence roll from Arzag.

Arzag spies an opening and stabs the bandit 6-2 but is then parried 6-6. The last bandit is down to one health.

Arzag misses 7-8 and then finishes the last bandit 10-2.

Allendale comes over to help loot the bodies. We roll a 10 on the treasure chart and find a small healing potion and 5 gold.

“Right that was a good warm up, now who’s for second breakfast?”

“Slaying always makes me hungry!”

The party set off after the tracks of the bandits in search of any other survivors or at least to flow the tracks back to the bandit’s base and deal with their threat.

Encounter 2

While navigating some ancient tombs made from dripping stone blocks the party encounter some slavering ghouls and a giant spider. Fights on!

The party need to reoganise themselves so that the right people are facing the monsters.

Allendale moves

Hesperina moves

Arzag moves. 

The spider scuttles forward and tries to bite Arzag, missing 4-5.

The Ghouls move up

Arzag hits the spider 9-7, he then dodges its dripping fangs 5-9

Arzag finishes the spider 12-5 and then moves to engage a ghoul.

The Ghoul misses Arzag 4-14, Arzag rolls a double 6 for defence.

Hesperina shoots at a ghoul but misses 3-4. Turns out she isn’t a great archer.

The Ghoul moves up and attacks Hesperina missing 3-9

The Ghoul hits Hesperina 7-2 when she rolls a double 1 for defence

Arzag hits the Ghoul 8-6, the Ghoul misses Arzag with a swipe of its claws 3-10

Arzag hits the Ghoul 7-4 and again dodges its return strike 5-9

Arzag hits the Ghoul 11-5 however it then regenerates and gets back up

Arzag hits the ghoul 7-3 which then gets back up a second time. This thing just won’t stay dead.

Arzag parries the Ghouls next attack 8-8 and the Ghoul parries Arzag 6-6

The other Ghoul misses Hesperina 3-8

Arzag finally lands a killing strike 11-5 and the ghoul fails to get up again due to a lack of a head.

Hesperina parries the attack of the last ghoul 5-5

Arzag now engages the last ghoul and hits 11-4

The Ghoul hits Hesperina 8-6 and then Arzag hits the Ghoul 8-7.

The Ghoul is focussed on eating Hesperina and hits her 8-7

Arzag decapitates the last Ghoul 12-3 and it fails to regenerate.

The party continue their investigations and arrive at a large structure built of crumbling stone. This speaks to its great age. Within the structure stands a large dome built of greenish stone, unlike the rest of the complex, this dome seems untouched by the ravages of time. The party make their way towards this edifice.

While travelling through the building the ceiling cracks and parts fall on the group.

Arzag’s steel cat reflexes see him jump clear in time with an 8.

Hesperina rolls a 3 and while getting out of the way trips over a rock. She gets up limping and her curses have alerted any nearby creatures.

Allendale rolls a 9 and gets out of the way. Jill manages a 7 –way to go. That’s not bad with a -2 modifier.

The temple fight.

The crew finish picking their way through the rubble outside the dome. This room is dominated by a huge daemonic figure and a couple of ghouls. Allendale is immediately entranced by the sight of a pile of gold. Jill and Allendale have ended up rushing ahead brains filled with the thoughts of riches undreampt of. 

Round 1

At the sight of the temple denizens Jill and Allendale start backing away.

Jill moves

A Ghoul moves up and misses Allendale.

The Daemon moves up and lashes out with his chain at Allendale who dodges out of the way.

Allendale misses the Ghoul 7-8 and puts his token back in the bag for an extra turn

Arzag moves up and primal rages while Allendale dodges another flailing attack with the hooked chain.

Arzag hits a ghoul 13-6

Arzag gets hit by the ghoul 8-7 cancelling his primal rage

Arzag hits the ghoul 8-3.

The Daemon lashes out with its chain and Arzag dodges.

The last ghoul moves up and misses Hesperina 3-9

Arzag hits the ghoul and it fails it’s regeneration test due to its lack of head.

Arzag uses primal rage

The ghoul misses Hesperina 3-11

Arzag moves up and then hits the daemon 9-8 and 10-5

The daemon then hits Arzag 7-6 cancelling primal rage.

The third action goes to the ghoul and this misses Hesperina.

The Daemon misses Arzag 3-8, that’s the third miss in a row.

The Ghoul misses Hesperina 7-9 but then hits 7-5.

The Daemon parries Arzag 10 -10

Arzag then misses 7-13 but hits with his follow up attack 8-3

Arzag misses the daemon 7-9 but his second attack is a double 6 no defence allowed, it’s a hit 14-11

Tired after that last performance, Arzag misses 5-12

The Ghoul misses Hesperina 4-10

The Daemon then misses Arzag 6-9 and 4-6

The Ghoul misses Hesperina 4-10

Arzag hits the daemon 9-8, parries the daemon 11-11, then hits again 11-9

Hesperina parries the ghoul 3-3, both of these fighters were not displaying much martial prowess.

Arzag misses the daemon 6-10, the Daemon is down to its last 2 wounds.

The Daemon misses Arzag 3-8, that’s the third miss in a row.

The Ghoul misses Hesperina 7-9 but then hits 7-5.

The Daemon parries Arzag 10 -10

Arzag then misses 7-13 but hits with his follow up attack 8-3

The Daemon misses Arzag 8-10

Arzag misses the daemon 11-14 and 7-12

The Ghoul misses Hesperina 4-6

The Daemon hits Arzag 7-6

Arzag hits the daemon 10-8 its down to its last wound.

Arzag hits the Daemon 10-8 taking its last wound he then rushes over to Hesperina who is still fighting a ghoul.

Arzag continues his charge across the map and hits the ghoul in the back for a point of damage with a score of 9-5.

The Ghoul misses Hesperina 4-7 but then hits 7-6

Arzag misses the ghoul 5-7. The Ghoul turns and attacks Arzag missing 7-9 

The Ghoul misses Arzag 6-8

It then takes a Swipe at Hesperina and she just parries 4-4

Arzag hits 10-5 and 9-8 killing the ghoul. He then chops of its head before it has any chance of regenerating.

Prologue

The Party are victorious. As usual Allendale is the first to help with loot location and distribution.

We get 20 gold. Hesperina identifies a silver ring as the ring of the arrow which means you don’t take penalties for shooting over low obstacles.

Arzag also gets 2 more skill points.

When we get back to town we get another 10 gold for bringing Hesperina safely back to her family.

The party try to track down Burke but he has apparently left town. So we plot our next moves over a beer back in the Rusty Dagger.

Some things I have noticed about the game. With the emphasis on combat encounters there is little incentive to construct your characters with a significantly different allocation of build points. Even the Necromancer is best built as a combat monster and gains no advantage from having a high arcane skill level.

Javelins are listed as a weapon that can be used in both melee and ranged combat, you only get three shots with each javelin compared to 5 with a quiver of arrows. However each javelin does 2 damage. If the rules intended you to be able to use your javelin in melee (where it never runs out) and always do 2 damage everyone would use javelins all the time. I’m choosing not to interpret the rules that way and have them only do 2 damage when thrown. This is also because I don’t want to have to paint up another model.

These adventures also remind me a lot of the Conan adventures, since I have all these stories I have started creating my own adventures inspired by the Conan stories. So expect to see more princesses rescued, battles with giant apes and evil villains dispatched by heroic swordplay. I think getting kidnapped and taken to a foreign land is the Overseas Excursion in the Hyborian age. I’m not sure who will accompany Arzag on the next adventure, the party is getting quite crowded.

There isn’t much for adventurers to spend their loot on. The main consumable is potions and arrows. I did notice that there is a potion of invulnerability which ignores the first wound. This will hopefully allow Arzag to make more use of Primal Rage. Arzag also picks up the skill Heavy Blow. This takes 2 actions but a successful hit will do 2 damage. Very useful when grinding against a foe with a lot of wounds.