April 27 2024
Hogs in the Woods
Present:
Unnamed Elf Thief Level 1
Unnamed Half Elf Magic User / Thief Level 1
The MonoParty is Dead!!!
I got to hang with two of the DadBros that I usually (Once every 4 months or so) play Pause-Time 5e D&D with. The guy who DMs for us (Leroy Stonebraker) wasn't available, and nobody had anything else prepped so I said, well I have a 1e game going and I already have a setting and we don't need to prep anything other than making your characters.
So that was the first 2 hours, characters just scratched on a sheet of paper. You don't get a character sheet until you survive the first session.
Elf Thief rolled 2 hp, opted for the cheaper Padded armor over Leathers and bought a Ranseur (think a pole with a Raphael Ninja Turtle Sai knife on the end). His backup skill is Animal Husbandry (it's not what is sounds like).
Half-Elf MU-T got 5hp, also opted for the padded armor and a scimitar. For spells he rolled Shocking Grasp, Dancing Lights and Message. He's a Farmer.
Half-Elf had to go help his son, while I gave Elf the rundown on the setting. You guys are from this town, Folton on the Hill.
Rumors:
There were some Brigands that were camped outside of the palisade, but now they are gone and the Folton Cemetery Gravedigger's house has burned down.
The scuttlebutt with the teamsters (animal husbandman overheard) is that there was a shipment of silver ingots that never arrived. It was supposed to come down the road that passes near the Icky Forrest.
It's weirdly cold for the season, there have been animal stillbirths, and one sheep was born with two-faces. Some people complain of the pattern of frost on their windows looking like a long-haired bearded face looking down as if reading.
Gerrold the RopeMaker swore he saw his dead wife dancing at the edge of the Icky Forrest.
The party decided to travel the road northwards to try to figure out what became of the shipment of silver. But they recognized that two thieves may not be the most formidable force for open travel, and they began to plan on hiring henchmen. HOWEVER, they were all but penniless having spent their money on clothes and food and such.
Well, what are a couple of thieves to do to raise mercenary money but a tad bit o' the ole thieving?! They went to the Tavern and got to hatching a scheme! I rolled 3d12 to see how alive the place was and got 26 patrons! The joint was JUMPIN'! Elf Thief asked the barkeep for three cups and a folding table.
"Ye can buy three drinks, and the cups come with, fer a time! As fer tables, they do not fold, but the room's full of 'em!" came the reply.
Three cups of the cheapest beverage on the chart were ordered (small beer) and Elf Thief got to drinkin'. Meanwhile, Half-Elf MU-Thief wanted to case the crowd for a likely mark. So what is a #NoPrep DM to do? I turn to the City/Town Encounters Matrix in Appendix C (DMG p191). I ask them what time of day they are doing this and they say evening, and they roll a 46: Harlot.
Oh SNAP!!! I get to roll on the infamous Harlot Table! [DMG p192] They roll a 4. Slovenly Trull.
So, Elf Thief sits down opposite her and starts talking, and I can tell they want to roleplay it out (5e players, what are you going to do?) so in my most slovenly yet lilting soft feminine voice I ask him if he's looking for a good time (ugh, how do theater kids enjoy this so much, something's wrong with them!). He makes a big show of putting a button under one of the inverted cups and sets the other two next to them. He tells her that she can put 5 copper pieces on guessing which cup has the button and he'll pay her a silver. Then does a slow job of moving the cups around. I had 3d6, two white and one red. I said, I'll roll them and if the red comes up highest, she has successfully spotted which cup has the button. So, I rolled, and all three dice came up 5's.
She's confused and she's going to guess. 1-4 she's wrong, 5-6 she's right and she rolled a 6. So, she won a silver piece and was delighted! Elf Thief asks her if she wants to take her silver piece or let it ride for 2 sp and she's down! But this time she's into it and he's going faster so her attention is totally fixed on the game.
That's when Half-Elf MU-Thief attempts to pickpocket her. He's got some pretty dope bonuses, and I give him 5% more because she's so distracted so he's got a 50% chance of picking her pockets. He rolls a d100 and has to get 50 or less. He rolls an 83. And that's a problem! If a pickpocket fails by 21% over target, not only does it fail, but the mark notices! (PHB p28)
She immediately grabs her hefty pouch (the business business must have been good today) and gets ready to scream. Half-Elf MU-Thief, thinking rather quickly, says, "Oh, I'm sorry I just bumped into you!" I made him roll on the ever-useful reaction chart (DMG p63), and he got a 48 - Neutral - Uninterested - Uncertain. So she narrowed her eyes at him and told him to keep walking, and didn't take her eyes off him until he walked away. At which point Elf Thief reached across the table and nabbed her pouch by rolling a 4!
She turned back to him and I rolled the 3d6. A white one was high die, and so she lost her silver piece (actually it was 5 coppers that she let ride). And then she said, "I want to play again!" and reached for her pouch. Which was gone. Because he'd just stolen it.
Now she screamed and she tore off through the crowd to get Half-Elf MU-Thief because she was sure he'd gotten it. Elf Thief calls out to her, but it's too late! The Knight's Watch have entered the tavern and they shut down all the fun!!! Booo!!!
While that's happening Elf Thief reaches under the table and tosses her pouch under her chair. In no time there are two guards on him, one on her and one on Half-Elf MU-T. They start getting the story from her and it's not looking good, HE MU-T sees the pouch under the table and says, "Is that your pouch?"
"Oh." she says.
HE MU-T rolls crazy high on the reaction table, and the guards stinkin' LOVE this guy. The Slovenly Trull picks up her pouch and the guards escort our heroes out of the Tavern.
HE MU-T says to the guards, "I'm new in town. Is there a better tavern to go to?" And the other player and I crack up!
Dude, you are FROM here! I'm picturing his best friend the guard, "New in town? After we played together at recess every day for three straight grades? You stood up and said those really nice things at my Great Grandmother's funeral? Our wives are in a scroll club?"
HE MU-T's player gets surly: "I wasn't here when you told him that and you didn't let me make a backstory!" lolzlololzlol!!!
Anyway, the guards being so enthusiatically pro-player gave them just the opportunity they needed and they mentioned going after that missing shipment of Silver Ingots. The watch spares 5 men at arms and they are off to the races! Oh boy!!! A party is finally going to make it to the dungeon!!!
First encounter check in the scrubland: 3, no encounter
Second hex entered, forest: 1, ENCOUNTER!
So I roll on the Temperate and Sub-Tropical Conditions Uninhabited/Wilderness Areas Table [DMG p184] and go to the Forest column. And roll a 38. . . a 38. Lycanthrope!
"NO!" I say and stare in horror. Remember, I put WereRats in the first session stealing the bodies, because that's what was happening. I didn't look closely at their stats in the MM and realize that A). Lycanthropes are immune to nonsilvered or nonmagical weapons, and B). They are way too tough for level 1 characters! So that was me being a n00b and putting the wrong thing in. THIS was a natural roll in overland travel. I went to the Lycantrhope subtable [DMG p186] and rolled a 43, WereBoar! [MM p63] Rolled 2d4 for number appearning and got 7!!! These things are 5 +2 Hit Die creatures! They are bags of hit points and strike for 2d6 damage! So here's the thing. I made a ruling. I ruled that the silver/magic weapon thing only holds when they are in their animal or boar man form, but when they present as totally human they are still vulnerable (though taking damage may make them alter). Maybe that wasn't fair of me, maybe that didn't live up to RAW, but come on!
No surprise on either side. Encounter distance is 5 yards.
So I really sell the menace of these guys as they saunter out of the woods. They look like ugly rough berserkers. Elf Thief, decides that he's going to invite them to come along and help. The reaction roll is hostile. So he decides he's going to walk through them, knocking their shoulders out of the way like some BrOSR Chad on his way to the gym.
Which doesn't go well and it's on. Initiative by side and you have to declare before the roll, baby! The 5 men at arms are going to set spears for a charge. It's broad daylight and everyone can see him and Elf Thief declares he's going to hide so he can backstab. HE MU-T decides to run into the woods and try to hide behind a tree, in broad daylight, with 7 people watching. I blame 5e backstab mechanics. For their parts, the WereBoars are easy. They gonna charge!!!
Well, cool! Charging means we don't need initiative yet, right? The spears are longest so they go first. Only one hits, and does double damage. 6 points! Take that fell beastman! Oh you have 22 hp? nevermind. Then it's the WereBoars turn and they immediately kill 3 men at arms. Let's go again!
4 WereBoars in mele will keep fighting, while 3 go into the woods to search for HE MU-T. Two Men at Arms will keep fighting, and so will Elf Thief with his 2 hp! HE MU-T declares he is going to cast Dancing Lights, and merge them to look like a flame elemental.
Good guys win initiative and can't hit water with a pool noodle standing in a boat! The WereBoars kind of stare at the Dancing Lights Elemental thing, but they are clearly not scared of it. The ones in combat butcher everyone immediately. The injured one turns into a Boar and heals. Elf Thief got hit for 8 points damage.
Next round HE MU-T just hikes up his robes and runs for it! I roll a d6 and it's a 1, the WereBoars pursue! Now here we get to a weird thing. They each have the same 12" of movement. And HE-MU-T started with 5 yards on them. So we keep rolling initiative and if they win, I rule that they close, and if he wins, I rule that he pulls away. If he ever wins initiative twice I check to see if they keep pursuing. So it goes like this for a while! Elf Thief's player went home. And HE MU-T is just runinng like Indiana Jones from the Hovitos as hard as he can. Finally, over a mile away from the protective cover of the forest, out in Rohan-like Scrubland, the WereBoars rolled a 5 and stopped pursuing.
5 dead men at arms, 1 dead PC, and the other one just had to run for his life for over a mile. No treasure, no XP and the player still can't bring himself to name his character. I'm tempted to just call him Helmut for Half Elf Magic User Thief. I don't know if either of these bros really dug 1e.
But here's the thing. I told the other players that disaster struck! And word has come from a lone and tattered Thief, running all the way to Folton on the Hill, that 5 men at arms are dead and a thief killed by men who could change into Boars. And my regular players were like, "where is this Thief, we want to talk to him." One even said, "That's a good idea, bringing the thief in to remind us there's more going on in the world than these Brigands." I think they thought he was an NPC and I had made up the whole encounter. I replied, "I haven't invited him to the discord yet."
There is more going on. There's a lot going on, and I don't feel like I had to plan or create much of any of it. The game is starting to spin up and self generate and it's amazing! Now all I have to do is figure out why all this Lycanthropy is showing up in this region? Does it have anything to do with the dread book and the face in the frost???
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