Barrowmaze #4: Three Times Unlucky

This may be obvious but these AARs contain spoilers for those wanting to go into the Barrowmaze.  The message is that if you're going to, don't take advantage of them.  They're called spoilers because they spoil the fun.  DON'T BE A DICK!

We had three short, ultimately frustrating, delves into the 'Maze on Sunday.  The write-up for the first one is a little longer, so I'll post that today, and the other two together tomorrow.

Barrowmaze – 7 Apr 2019 (First Delve)

Player	Character	Class	Henchmen	Notes
John	Dungeon Master
Ash	Grump	Fighter (Lvl 1)	Beatrice Swinn (Lvl 0 Fighter)	First ‘Maze delve. Died by misadventure.
Edwin	Kindroleth	Elf (Lvl 1)		First ‘Maze delve Killed by skeletons.
Jacob	Galmar	Dwarf (Lvl 3)
Laura	Petal	Druid (Lvl 1)	Theown Smith (Lvl 0 Fighter)	First ‘Maze delve
Lizzie	Natalia	Acrobat (Lvl 4)	Esme (torch-bearer)
Sophie	Sorlof	Moss Dwarf (Lvl 1)

The Rainy Season

Six months had passed since the last delve due to the rainy season flooding the Barrowmaze.  We have now entered 843CR.

Galmar (Ranger) had gone to Ironguard Motte for research in the archives to see what lore, maps or other information could be found on the ‘Maze.  He had written back that the lore-masters kept their secrets close, but that he had met a disreputable ex-archivist who was going to sell him some maps.  Nothing more has been heard from him since.

Moonwhisper (Mage) and Blake (Cleric of St Ygg) had gone off to a newly-opened pyramid in search of the fabled lost city beneath it.  There they had partied with Grump and Kindroleth and seduced them with tales of the riches to be found in the ‘Maze.  A third new member of the party, Petal (Druid) had seen the posters Cedric had put up around Helix and joined along with her potted plant.

Natalia has built a house in Helix: 60x60ft made of stone, and with an attached gym, it is much more substantial than Galmar’s House.  Galmar keeps furtively disappearing into his cellar with a shovel.

Galmar has developed an interest verging on obsession with the liquids recovered from the room with three pools which form Chaos Potions.  He has been mixing various combinations and recording the results.

Pre-Delve

The Silver Standard Caravan Company’s base in Helix is now closed.  To the party’s surprise, Merg, their former hireling, has returned with his family.  He has realised that delving is a mug’s game and that the true wealth will be made by the middle-men and service-providers.  Accordingly, he is now running Merg’s Mercenaries, introducing hirelings and henchmen to adventuring parties.  Merg couldn’t provide a discount, but would advise his people that the party were a reputable one.

Good old Merg!

The party recruited three hirelings:

Esme Walder of the Wold, a non-combatant torch-bearer (11sp per delve)

Beatrice Swinn, somewhat venerable and ill-equipped fighter (2gp per delve)

Theown Smith, a former member of the Ironguard Motte garrison (21gp per delve)

The Delve

The pre-delve plan was to go back over some old territory and fill in the gaps in the maps – several options for further exploration were discussed and it was finally decided to go through the ‘Front Door’, to proceed to the room where Ranya was killed by the giant snake and then head north (possibly joining up with other, known territory to the east.)

The journey through the Wilderness was uneventful.  Due to the season it was hard going (4.5 hours).

 

Five Finger Mound

Reaching Five Finger Mound the party entered and found the familiar tripod over the hole in the floor. 

Kindroleth and Esme examined the mound for surprises while Natalia checked the integrity of the tripod.  As expected the rope, having been underwater during the floods, was slippery.  As Natalia began to fix her own rope up, Grump, our barbarian-like fighter, lost patience and attempted to climb down with a lantern.  He immediately lost his grip and fell, smashing the light.  There was no answer to our shouts to him.

Natalia finished fixing her rope and descended the 40ft to the ‘Maze proper.  Next to a pool of burning oil she found Grump’s dead, broken body.

She was suddenly attacked by two giant centipedes.  Having been bitten, venom took effect and she collapsed.  The rest of the party used ranged weapons to kill the centipedes from above.

Having seen her employer killed and Natalia attacked, Beatrice lost courage and refused to enter the ‘Maze.  She declined the suggestion that she stand guard at the entrance and return to Helix with the rest of the party, instead heading off on her own.

The party went down into the entrance room, tried to assist Natalia and stripped Grump’s body of anything of use. 

As those members who hadn’t been in the ‘Maze before were acclimatising and examining the wall carvings, they heard a sound from the corridor and were attacked by six skeletons.  These were defeated, but not until Kenroleth and Galmar had both been severely wounded: Kenroleth, it turned out, fatally.

With two members dead, one severely wounded, one poisoned and a hireling having deserted, the party had no choice but to call it a day and attempt to return to Helix safely.  Nobody thought to examine the skeletons’ remains.

Post-Delve

The return journey took 6 hours but there were no encounters.  There was no sign of Beatrice.

Natalia was taken to Brother Othar for healing, but he prescribed bed-rest.  She and Galmar healed-up over the next 8 days.

The gold recovered from Grump’s body was added to group funds.

Group Funds

	Income	Expenditure
Recruitment		10gp
Wages		24gp, 1 sp
Recovered from Grump’s body	14gp

Encounters

Location	Nature	Casualties	Notes
Entrance room	Giant Centipedes (x2)	Natalia poisoned.	Only Natalia in melee. Centipedes killed by ranged fire.
Entrance room	Skeletons (x6)	Kindroleth killed. Galmar severely wounded.	Skeletons defeated.

Treasure

	Where and how acquired	Value	Notes
None

Score: 90

Barrowmaze #3: My Player Characters

In which I try to remember and enumerate the various characters I've played over the last year...

Forgotten

I have actually forgotten both the name and class of the the first character I took to the Barrowmoors (we didn't get as far as the Barrowmaze!).  This session was almost a TPK - the only survivor was a Halfling who was knocked out early in the fight.

Fate: Killed by Living Statues.

B'Loxi (Elf)

B'Loxi was a bit Old Skool

B'Loxi was my longest surviving character.  He made more than half a dozen delves before being killed.  He was famous for his mapping in those crazy early days when scale didn't matter, and for brokering a truce-like arrangement with the Mutant Men after mending a statue for them.

For some reason he is fondly regarded by the other players and is still occasionally mentioned by NPCs.

Fate: Killed by Spectral Hound.

An honorable mention should go to B'Loxi's hireling, Merg the Dwarf.  Merg survived and actually got as far as retiring on the proceeds of his delves.  In my mind, he went off and opened an inn called the Loxi Arms.  However, our GM says were might not have seen the last of him.  If I was ever to GM a one-off it would start in the Loxi Arms.

Fate: Retired.

Good Old Merg!

Ranwald the Strong (Knight)

Ranwald WIP (RIP)

Our group has been lucky enough to play-test various bits and pieces for Necrotic Gnome.  One of these was the Advance Classes for their Old School Essentials range.  Fortunately, the high death-rate meant that we got through quite a few of these!  In hindsight I wish I hadn't decided that Ranwald was a Knight.

I  went as far as giving him a back-story, intending him to be an old comrade-in-arms of B'Loxi's, a captain of the guard appointed an Esquire of House Loxi through merit.  However, my interpretation of the Knight class as written was that he would always choose to be in the front-line of a melee and would attack the strongest opponent.  Unsurprisingly this resulted in the grizzled old veteran dying on his first outing.

Fate: Killed by Ghouls.

Rugg (Barbarian)

Rugg had a lot of scope and I was looking forward to playing him (normally I need a few sessions before I get on with a character, but I liked Rugg from the beginning).  He managed three or four delves over one gaming session.

Fate: Killed by Rot Grubs

Stolen from Deviant Art

Elezier (Druid)

Not to mention his companion, Robbie the Robber Fly.

Another character I really liked.  He was a devotee of King 'Shroom, which was quite fun - I had him rubbing mushroom spore into any suitable medium he found in the dungeon.  He had a special session when he went into the woods (on Midsummer Night) and found Robbie - his first encounter was with a Blue Dragon, but he made his excuses and left.

Fate: Killed by Giant Scorpions.  Robbie had earlier tried to sting a Grey Ooze (which didn't go well).

Gerran (Ranger)

Another enjoyable character (and another follower of King 'Shroom).  He was hardly ever surprised and used his wilderness skills to great advantage.  When Galmar the Dwarf built his house, Gerran pitched his tent by a mushroom ring in the grounds.  He donated most of his acquired loot to the underground followers of the Old Gods.

Fate:  MIA on a mission to Ironguard Keep (I lost his character sheet!).

C'Loxi (Elf)

Not another F**king Elf!

Some sort of relative of B'Loxi.  Killed on his first delve.

Fate: Killed by Skeletons

Last Elf Standing

Kindroleth (Elf)

Though not of House Loxi, Kindroleth bears an uncanny resemblance to B'Loxi.

He has Previous.  Before delving in the Barrowmaze, he ventured to the Lost City with others of the party.

Fate: To be determined...

Update

Nine hours later and not only has Kindoleth been killed, but so has his successor.

Barrowmaze #2: Skeletons - Thousands of 'Em!

I've decided to publish the logs of our Barrowmaze delves here (our RPG game using the Old-School Essentials system).  Partly this is down to my decision to start typing up my game notes - I just had too many bits of paper and last month lost one of my characters by (I think) throwing his character sheet out while I was trying to rationalise my file.

Not the session in question, but here I am leaping into action...

We're a year into the campaign, so this will contain spoilers.  The message is that if you're going to delve in the Barrowmaze, don't take advantage of them.  They're called spoilers because they spoil the fun.  DON'T BE A DICK!

This is an Old School game, and while I would deny that we're murder hobos, we are a little light on the role-play.

Game Played 24 March 2019

Player	Character	Class	Henchmen	Notes
Lizzie	Natalia	Acrobat (Level 4)	Lorthak Grintag Dirkirk (man-at-arms)
Stephen	Moonwhisper	Magic User (Level 2)		Levelled up.
Anna	Egila	Magic User (Level 1)	Wythray Luma (non-combatant follower)	First delve. Killed by skeletons.
Edwin	C’Loxi	Elf (Level 1)	Mantagorn Dreggar (man-at-arms)	First delve. Killed by skeletons.

 Pre-Delve

Midsummer had passed.  Rains seem to have come early this year, but the thunderstorms that harbinger the rainy season haven’t yet happened.  The Wicker Man Festival had been poorly attended, partly due to the weather, but also as Fr Othar had been actively campaigning against it.  It's is not known how the money Gerran has been contributing to the preparations for the festival had been spent.

Egila and C’Loxi joined the party at Galmar’s house, having seen the notice calling for more adventurers.  Hirelings were also recruited.  Two lots of 10gp were paid to the village bellman.  On the first day Wythray Luma was hired as a lantern-carrier; on the second, Grintog Dirkirk and Mantagorn Dreggar as men-at-arms.

The pre-delve plan was to return to the site of the last delve, defeat the ghouls, collect treasure and then play by ear.

The Delve

The journey out to the Barrowmoor was uneventful.  Due to deterioration in the weather, it took four hours.

We entered by the Back Door and made our way to the Crossroads of Death, where we found a corpse.  As C’loxi went to examine the body, the party was surprised by a giant scorpion.  During this initial attack, the scorpion killed Grintag.  C’Loxi promptly cast Sleep and Natalia dispatched the scorpion with her dagger.  C’Loxi resumed his search of the corpse and retrieved an ornate, silver-embossed scabbard.

We proceeded to the Octagonal Room as per the plan, where we found the scene of a massacre.  We remained in the doorway, waiting to see if whatever creatures present would reveal themselves.  These turned out to be two large stone warriors, able to fire magma from their hands.  One was killed with ranged weapons and a hasty debate was held as whether to shut the door, cast Hold Portal and retreat.  Moonwhisper cast Protect from Evil.  We decided to fight and eventually defeated the remaining living statue. 

On searching the corpses of the other adventuring party, the only thing of interest found was a silver goblet, everything else being too mashed or burnt.

We then went through the east door to the room with the portcullis.  The plan was to use meat on a rope to draw the ghouls out and then to make an overwhelming ranged attack.  However,  C’Loxi jumped the gun and deployed the lure before the rest of the party was set up.  As a result, much of the combat took place at the portcullis with the ghouls able to fight back.  Fighting through the grating also proved to be more difficult than anticipated.  In a hard-fought combat the last ghoul managed to injure both Natalia and C’Loxi.

We now entered unexplored territory for the first time.

In examining the room, we found that the portcullis mechanism was broken.  There were two doors in the west wall.  The southernmost of the two was ajar.  In moving to examine the northern door, Natalia triggered a pit-trap but was able to get herself out without injury.

Going through the southern door, we found two open sarcophagi containing decomposed bodies.  Natalia and C’Loxi searched the sarcophagi, but found nothing.

Swinging around the pit-trap, Natalia entered the other room.  This was plastered and decorated with a mural of foot-race.  Suddenly three crab spiders on the ceiling attacked Natalia.  Though she was injured, they were killed.  A search of the room uncovered 37cp.

The party crossed the Octagonal Room and went though the west door.  This led to a wide corridor, with narrow passages off it (similar to the room on the east).  As with the other room, the passages had alcoves containing alcoves.  The party divided.  C’Loxi and Mantagorn moved into the centre of the room; the others split into two to examine two of the passages.

The skellies rise...

Simultaneously, Mantagorn fell into a pit-trap and the skeletons revived.  Egila, Wythray, C’Loxi and Lorthak were soon overpowered.  Natalia and Moonwhisper managed to escape from the room and withdrew to the north door of the Octagonal Room, which they shut behind them.

C'Loxi is Last Elf Standing as Natalia and Moonwhisper make for the exit...

They made their way to the Back Door and safely exited the Barrowmaze.

An hour out of Helix, Natalia and Moonwhisper spotted five Giant Toads in their path.  Moonwhisper killed three with his wand of lightening.  The other two fled.

Post-Delve

In possibly the least profitable delve ever, there were no items to be identified or valued.

Natalia healed up.

Natalia sought out Krothos Ironguard to further her plans to have a house built during the rainy season.  She found him in the Drunken Pheasant and played a game of chance with him.  However, she was warned off doing any business with him by his minder, Ollis Blackfell.  The next day Natalia, Moonwhisper and Gerran attended Blackfell’s office.  There, on payment of 200gp, she was given a plot of land and planning permission.  Unlike Galmar’s arrangement with Krothos, this was officially recorded and title deeds issued.  These were deposited at Huffenpuff’s.

Group Funds

	Expenditure	Income
Recruitment	20gp
Hirelings’ pay	16gp
Equipment	12gp

Encounters

	Location	Casualties	Notes
Giant Scorpion (x1)	Crossroads of Death	Grintag Dourkirk killed.	C’Loxi cast Sleep and Natalia dispatched the scorpion with her dagger.
Living Stone Statues (x2)	Octagonal Room		One killed by ranged weapons, the other in mêlée.
Ghouls (x2)	Portcullis Room	Natalia and C’Loxi both injured.	Plan went off half-cocked and fighting through the grating proved to be more difficult than anticipated. An unexpectedly hard-fought combat.
Crab Spiders (x3)	Race Room	Natalia injured.
Skeletons (x24)	Skeleton Room	Egila, C’Loxi, Lorthak and Wythray killed.	No skeletons were harmed (though two fell into the pit).
Giant Toads (x5)	Wilderness		Three killed by Moonwhisper with his Lightening Wand. The other two fled.

Treasure

	Where and how acquired	Value	Notes
Ornate, silver-embossed scabbard.	On corpse at the Crossroads of Death.	n/k	Lost when C’Loxi was killed.
Silver goblet	On corpses in Octagonal Room.	n/k	Lost when C’Loxi was killed.
37cp	In Race Room	37cp

Score: 1292 (two survivors)

Scene of today's action

AHPC IX: First Submission

Before I start, last Sunday was the first bonus round ('Reconnaissance') for the Challenge.  I didn't submit anything, but plenty of people did - and it's splendid work.  Go over there, have a look and vote for your favorites.

My submission took the form of some dungeon delvers and critters, earning me 40 points.  

I've been asked some questions about this, so a little context. As regular readers will know, I started attending a game when a new FLGS opened last summer. It is decidedly Old School (we use Necrotic Gnomes' B/X Essentials and are delving into a mega-dungeon called the Barrowmaze). It's a bit of a meat-grinder - six months in and I'm on my fourth character!

Odds and sods from various sprues

There are no fancy classes or multi-classes; a trap is more likely to be a pit with spikes in the bottom than a portal to another plane; and you're much more likely to meet rats that flying eyeball monsters.  That being so, the guy with the ten-foot pole is probably the most usefully kitted-out! 

We normally meet once a fortnight as an open table. As a consequence, we don't know who or how many will turn up, but it's been a roaring success. This week, for the first time we had too many (16) people and had to split off into two tables. Fortunately, we're lucky enough to have a second DM who always brings his kit and a module just in case.

All the figures are 28mm,  The humans are plastics (a mix of manufactures and bits from odd sprues, including Mantic, Northstar's Oathmark and a Frostgrave Cultist); the dwarf is a metal Oathmark champion; and the giant rats some second-hand lead I picked up last year.

As I didn't post the finished results of the minis I was painting just before the Challenge began, here they all are together.

Oathmark Humans

Oathmark Dwarf Champions

Oathsworn Miniatures' Haflings