Big Ticket Mystery Theatre

The second post about questions posed by G+ readers. It's a few days late as I was away at the weekend at a birthday party, and I had a very busy week in general. However, here we are. This weeks question was from Chris Kutalik of Hill Cantons fame. His question was this:

What about the big ticket mysteries? Without spoilers, what are the strangest and deepest unexplained things about the world the players might encounter in their adventures?

The primary game mystery (or mysteries, really) revolves around the island of Thyle. What really happened there 200 years ago? What caused the Cerulean Plague, aka the Blue? What happened to the people who didn’t get off the island before the cordon was put in place? What happened to the Dwarves (and their goblin slaves) and the Elves, who retreated into their Vaults and forests respectively? What happened to the previous expeditions?

Then there are some less immediate mysteries:

What’s going on in distant Lutha? Once, Luthan merchants brought spices, foreign metals, woods and cloths to market from the far West. In recent years this trade has all but vanished, and no-one seems to know why. There are rumours of conquest and war, but no concrete information has filtered down to the ears of the common folks.

What do the Dwarves do with all their gold? Dwarves *never* make payments in gold. They will merrily make purchases in silver, gems and other valuables, but gold is strictly a one way deal. What do they do with it?

How does someone become a Saint? Pretty much everyone knows that the Saints were once mortals and that they somehow achieved apotheosis. However, there’s little or no information about how they managed it – even those Saints who have manifested to their followers are hazy on the subject.

Who are ‘The Makers’, the gods of the Dwarves?

Who or what is behind the Drachenmen? (Think Reavers from Firefly)

A fistful of magic

Following on from my previous entry, some of the nice folks on Google+ came up with some things to write about. The first, courtesy of Jez Gordon, is:

"Alright... how about Unique Magic Items for your players to uncover. And if you don't want to publicly give out the stats (cause you know, players can read too) maybe write it up in terms of legends about the items and possible clues to their attainment."

So, here are some items that are 'unique' to my game. They're not necessarily unique items though. There aren't many, just what I've bashed out when I've had ideas or notes I've written up.

The Tesseract

More properly a legendary artifact than mere magical item the Tesseract was kept at the heart of the Imperial prison, The Citadel of Ulan Gor, for centuries before even the rise of the Thyllian Empire. Of the Tesseract itself, it is said to be a nexus of magical flux energy, a physical manifestation of a rift in reality. The most powerful, dangerous, or insane criminals of the Empire were cast into the rift, sent to who knows where. Even now, tales are told of the banishment of Bargle the Usurper, who stole the throne for a dozen years before the rightful heir reclaimed it with fire and sword. In the aftermath of The Blue, none know what happened in the Citadel, or if the Tesseract is still protected by its supernatural guardians and ten-fold traps.

The Heart of Flame and the Heart of Sol

According to the liturgy of Sol, she was once a mortal woman who sought to bring light and warmth to the world. She and her warband travelled deep into the Underworld at the behest of a seer to find Draugha, the first and mightiest Dragon. They were opposed by servants of Aum, who had encased the world in ice and perpetual twilight. When Sol found the cavernous lair of Draugha, she found that the minions of the Moon had beaten them, and Draugha was mortally wounded. In an act of supreme self-sacrifice, Sol cut open her own breast and replaced her heart with that of Draugha. In doing so, she was filled with power and flame and upon her return to the surface ascended to heavens, engaging Aum in combat, putting out one of his eyes and beginning the eternal chase that continues to this day. Rumour suggests that Sols true heart continues to beat, even to this day, and if it were to be pierced, the sun would go out, darkness would fall, and Aum would be once again encase the world in ice. If it could be found, of course.

Saint Stephens Aegis

Saint Stephen was a humble goat herd who joined his people’s army to fight against the Zaharan Empire. Poor as dirt, he went to war armed with only his knife and sacrificed his last goat to make himself a shield. In war Stephen found his true calling as a both a leader and a warrior, and he used the shield both as protection and as a weapon, even hurling it at his foes with deadly accuracy. The spirit of the goat is said to have lived on within the shield, lashing out against the Zaharans and dealing powerful blows. After his ascension, the shield is said to have passed from warrior to warrior until it was taken and placed in Saint Stephens Shrine, in the Golden Mountains of Thyle.

Fires of Sol

The priesthood of the Sun Goddess produce a potent elixir that, it is said, is capable of curing any malady, healing and wound and even restoring the dead to life. It is also deathly poison to the undead and servants of Aum the Destroyer. Whilst the chattering tongues of the peasantry often exaggerate the actual powers of the Fires of Sol, there is truth in their words. The Fires of Sol are created by senior priests who are capable of imbuing the magical waters with increasingly potent effects. The divine liquids can be used as healing draught, as holy water and also as a light source as they glow with the very fires of Sol herself. More powerful versions can cure diseases or atrophied senses, and those blessed by the Illuminata Vita are among the mightiest curatives known to exist.

Illuminata Vita – The most senior ranking Priestesses of Sols church, leading the direction of the faith alongside the Illuminatus Grex, the Illuminata Hasta and the Illuminatus Hoplon.

This blog isn't dead, it's just resting

It's a bit quiet around here isn't it. Well the good news is that the blog isn't dead. The bad news is that my game is currently on a hiatus because my job has gone bonkers busy.

In theory this gives me a little bit more time to do prep-work and write up ideas about my campaign world. In practice what happens is that I lack any kind of focus to concentrate on one idea long enough to finish it so I end up with lots of half-finished bits of nothing. This is deeply frustrating, and rather demoralising. If that wasn't bad enough, I'm a very analytical thinker which means I often over think ideas - this does not help to get ideas completed either.

So.. I came up with an idea. It may or may not work but it's worth a try.

The power of the Google+ Hive Mind. Give me a topic to write about, and a word limit. Anything you like, within reason. 

Preferably related to my campaign. I'm running ACKs (Adventurer Conqueror King) with a few house rules. I've answered Jeffs 20 Questions previously, which can be found here. I'll queue up ideas and knock them off one by one, at least once a week. 

If this works, it'll give me some focused ideas to write about. If it doesn't, I've not lost anything.

Session 23-24 - Paige 12

So much has happened since the last time I had a second to stop and think. I could talk for a while about all of the little things - the stuff we found behind secret doors, the death machine experiment, potions and unguents and make-believe gems, plus some more tinkertalk at an archmage - but all of it's stuck behind this huge shadow of Bomani turning to stone right. in. front. of. my. eyes.

In fact, right in front of my eyes right as I was pretty much telling him not to put on the cursed glasses.

I don't know whether I should be kicking myself for not speaking faster, or kicking him for no- I know, I know, kicking him right now would hurt.  Stone.  Got it.  Either way, one second he was there mostly intact and breathing, and the next he was solid rock.

I could more or less deal with it when we dragged him back to Sunstep and turned his corpse back into a proper person, but this seems one step removed - he's not flesh anymore, let alone alive.  Quill and Sister Stare and the archmage have all said that it's more expensive and complicated than "just" bringing someone back from the dead, and we're waiting to find out just how much we'll have to find to make it all happen.

So there's that.

After we brought back Yannick's Ornamental Dead Cat from Zod's dungeon, the archmage has gotten more interested in what's still there and has saddled us with his minion Quintus.  We're still without Ildis and Thowick, who haven't returned since selling the potions in Sunstep, so while we follow up some leads to find out where they headed Quintus can make himself useful - having someone around with some magic smarts might help us figure out how to get into more secret rooms, if nothing else.

I made some money by selling Stuff to the archmage.  I don't think it'll be enough to bring Bomani back this time.  I hate the idea of leaving him back here, and Faruk is limping around and needs some money spent on fixing his leg - there's always something going on that'll cost us some money and push us a little bit further away from bringing Bomani back.

Session 23 - First he was afraid, he was petrified...

Yannick the Ox

When asked for final words... I would not have chosen "Oh look, a pair of glasses" to be among them.

Bomani is gone.  Only a statue in his likeness remains, cast low by a vile curse upon these "glasses", seeing lenses, that we found.  Or else there is power to them that he could not control... yet I feel no need to try myself against it.

We set forth to search those parts of this level of the dungeon that we felt held secrets from us.  Where Halessa had felt the wall move we put our shoulders to brutal use... straining against the force of the door-that-was.  Yet to no avail, for it resisted us.

Distracted by the statues, Paige reminds us that we haven't robbed the "wooden fighter" we met earlier.  For reasons I can't quite recall (I don't remember being Beered up at the time) we decided to place the thing in the "danger room" and activate it.  It seemed adept at evading the spikes and charged at us.

I intercepted it and held it off while Paige deactivated it again, somewhat chagrin.

Rather than risk further foolishness I smashed it's head in with an axe and we retrieved the Gem from it.

Reivigorated... I swear we didn't drink more between the two attempts... we put our shoulders to the door again and this time Bomani buys us time to recover between heaves using his crowbar.  We force the door back and back until it slams against its limits and shifts to the side... allowing us to access the chamber within.

This showed us a room with a statue, who held its fingers up to its eyes.  Sober as we are now, this could be considered a hint: the statue was unfeasibly realistic and seemed a strange thing to put up next to the table.  But we were distracted by the vague things, including the pickled cat.  I wanted the pickled cat for the mantlepiece of our hold in the village, but we fell to arguing about whether or not we had a mantlepiece at all.

I'm not making a good case for our sobriety right now, am I?

There was another room with a few bits of furnature, including a chest and a locked set of shelves.  The chest had a few bits and pieces, as well as an Amazing Ring of Power... which we discovered bestowed upon me the power to open secret doors!  Well, secret door to this pair of rooms: I hadn't managed to make it work on the other doors yet, but I'm sure it will.

Distracted again, we relied on Paige to force the lock on the cabinet and lucky for us that we did, for it revealed a dozen or so large jars with mysterious liquids in them.  I think at least some of them would have been broken had I been called upon to force the door, and that would greatly decrease the chance that I could convince the band to keep the pickled cat for our mantlepiece (when we got one).

Feeling without direction, we explored the magically-sealed doors of the kitchen!  Which proved to be a room-that-is-always-cold, leading to a room-that-is-always-very-cold.  There was some cheese there, that Bomani swears was still fresh, but I did not wish to try... we may never know if it will repeat on him.

Investigating again, we set eyes to find the door to the proposed room by the portcullis... the door was simply concealed and when found, pushing brought us out into a storeroom: some building materials, old stone and mortar, barrels and boxes and an amphora: left alone in the middle of of the room.

Bomani looked to the Amphora while we searched and he found a single gold coin... and the lenses that were his doom.

Demoralized, we selected a few of the jars and decided that we needed to speak with the wizard again.  Perhaps he would know how to restore Bomani, perhaps he would by our magic jars.  Either way, we're off to see that wizard...

Paige 11

Paige 11:
Y'see?  THIS - exactly THIS - is why I should be an all-powerful wizard(ess) with my own underground lair.  This is exactly why that should be happening and why I shouldn't be saddled with an utter lack of magical brilliance.  Because -I- figured out that the dark corridors which magically extinguished all torches and lanterns (and glowbug parts) as soon as they entered it, were all to keep the room with the stargazing ossuary nice and dark so that the planets and stars and everything else shone like bloody diamonds.  I figured that out myself.  Did the magical overlord Zod figure out that this was a great idea which would make his ossuary (still not sure if that's the right word, but Yannick insists it is) all the more impressive?  Well, did he?

No he damn well didn't.  

HIS idea for the best use of magically dark tunnels wasn't anything like as brilliant as mine.  HIS idea was to get people to wander through his little maze and find the occasional statue and fancy chair - and then to emerge into a room filled with murderous fungus.  Even if it wasn't filed with murderous fungus at the time, and even if the people back then weren't scared stiff of paralysing witch-hags clawing their way out of the darkness as they had done a week or two ago when we last stood outside the entrance to the tunnel, his idea is still nowhere near as good as mine.  If the friendly Gods and Saints want magic to be used in brilliant new interesting worthwhile ways, well, here I am.  Bestow away.
For what it's worth, I'm glad the tunnels were dark, since my hands were shaking so bad that the lantern light bouncing everywhere would've made people sick.  There is absolutely nothing enjoyable about wandering through the darkness, lit up only by weird flowers which Bomani insisted on picking and strewing on the floor in front of me - sorry, glorious leader, not even with your miraculously restored parts - while you just know that the hags had their nest in the tunnels somewhere around here.  Finding the room of fungus was almost a relief, though I didn't have time to see whether the little stash of coins still had anything left to give.
Still - positives.  We figure there are two or three secret rooms on this floor and we have a good idea where, even though there's no visible way of accessing them.  If we can write down descriptions of the statues and so on (I think Bomani and Farok can write) then the wizard back in Sunstep might have a bright idea - but that's a few days' walk away and we're so close to hidden rooms which just must be full of interesting and valuable things.  We've cleared this floor of the place of nasty creatures and dogfolk, and though we know that there's hip-high rats down the stairs that's a long way forward from our first few visits.  We've got a magical wooden man which tries to push you into disintegrating rays and spinning blades if you pull the wrong lever, which must be worth something to the right (or the wrong) person.
And by some sort of miracle, most of us who found this place a month or three ago are actually still alive.

Session 19/20

The past couple of sessions have seen a new player who has rolled up another fighter! These two writeups chart his arrival and meeting of the party.

Farok - 1

It took a while to get away cleanly, but I finally found myself aboard a ship headed toward Thyle. All was well, I was used to the cramped conditions and even if the sailors shot me glances every once in a while I had paid my way as a guest of the captain. It all went wrong the night before we were due to land, the gods had obviously tired of the crew and sent a storm like I have never seen before against them. I had to see the fury of the sea for myself so I went on deck, that may have saved my life. No sooner was I on deck than I was swept away by a wave, as I struggled for air I saw the gods strike down the ship with a bolt, it burst in to flame and that was the last thing I remembered of the night.

 

Next I was woken by some rough hands slapping me on the face, as I came round I could see some ugly men sorting through some debris on the shore. As I came round I asked them were I was, that earned me a fist in the face, that was the last thing I remembered of my first day on Thyle.

 

Obviously I had needed the sleep, I was woken by the men as they threw water in my face and then manhandled me and tied me to the back of a donkey. I should say, tied me very badly to the back of a donkey. I could escape at any time, although unarmed and facing six assailants armed assailants would require good timing, so I chose to go along with it. Three sailors had survived through the ship blaze and the rest of the night, although they looked like beaten men and I wouldn't be able to rely on them for any help escaping, in fact they looked like they would be about as much use as a pickled fish if it came to a fight.

 

I heard the bandits talking about taking me further inland to their boss, for what purpose they had need of taken men I still do not know, the land we were walking through was wild and untamed and I did not think it would be to go back to the pits again. This made my desire to leave all the stronger, but I still had to wait for the right moment. As we followed a small stream, with a pond (that is apparently much deeper than it appears) a small army charged out of the woods towards us, this was the moment. The men who had taken us captive seemed to be quickly overrun, with I noticed 2 dogs tearing one of them to pieces. By the time I had managed to free myself and grabbed a weapon to defend myself from either side only the leader of those that had taken me remained standing, although he had taken down one of the war band. A quick assessment of the situation gave me only 1 plausible action for now, so whilst the leader of the slavers was surrounded and fighting off the war band single-handedly I charged up and shoved a spear in his face as hard as all my training had taught me. I fear I may have been shouting some profanities as well. Suffice to say, he did not survive my brutal attack.

 

As the adrenaline calmed from everybody it became obvious to me that this war band did not appear to hold the same ideals of slavery as either my previous masters or those who had taken us. After a brief conversation with them I learned that their leader appears to be a Stygian so now I am very confused why he didn't put me straight in to irons. Also, travelling with him is a fellow Kemetian and a Sunspear to boot. Although I am having my doubts about that now given that she can neither read and offered me some rotting beetle to eat, I had thought the sunspears to be glorious warrior women who cared greatly for their brethren, at least that was what the stories always defined them as. This Quill seems more like a charlatan. The final two, Paige and Yannick seem competent despite looking like ghosts. For now, I am hoping that if I keep quiet and go along with them I will at least keep out of trouble and away from any seekers.

 

We travelled back to a village the warband called Yannickville or Yannicktown, I am not really sure though as every time I tried to repeat it it was followed by a shhh from them. Whilst here they sorted through the goods, and I pointed out a particularly good drink, however rather than celebrate their victory as I had suspected they added it to the list of things they would send back to the nearest town and sell. Very strange.

 

 

Farok - 2

My earlier tactics of staying quiet appear to have worked, the war band seem to have accepted me as one of their own and are happy for me to tag along on their latest mission. Although it appears their latest mission isn't their actual mission, and I am still somewhat confused by that. We finalised the items taken from those on Thyle that would have slaved me, the band are calling them Bandits and have had run ins with them before. I sense this may be an ongoing fight that I can fully get behind and maybe free some other slaves. After sorting the items out they arranged for two of their trusted number to escort them back to the town along with the three sailors. Soon after this convoy set off Paige and Bomani started to explain to me how the surrounding area was filled with dangerous creatures and how they have nearly been killed several times, and are always happy to have additional bodies along. I am not sure how that works with sending two of your trusted people though these dangerous creatures and with three unknown sailors in tow, but everyone seems to be happy with the idea so why should I complain.

 

We set of for a dungeon, or pleasure palace I'm not quite sure which, that the band had stumbled upon when tasked with finding some lost supplies. When I questioned them about their quest for the supplies they gave very little thought to it and carried on toward the dungeon / pleasure palace. Fortunately there were no dangerous creatures on the way, and I am beginning to suspect some tall stories being told to the newest member to heighten their own prowess. The dungeon / pleasure palace is below ground and apparently home to bandits, like those that had captured me, dogmen, hags, zombie theatre (which I don't know what that is) and rats the size of dogs. I was very wary on arrival, but the entrance way was filled with statues which seemed to me to be of some sort of religious significance, perhaps the veneration of the female form as they were all of women. Mostly they were in a state of ruination so we moved past that to the welcoming voice. This the band explained to me steals part of your soul as it only speaks to each new person. Again I am suspecting these are tall stories.

 

We moved in to the dungeon, it certainly doesn't seem like a pleasure palace now, and the band had a well drawn map of the area. I was surprised how silent Quill was being, perhaps thinking on the things she did the previous day, Yannick I am more used to being quiet. We moved to secure an area that the band had not been to previously, we carefully moved to the new door and Paige listened then Yannick opened it, apparently this is the bands standard way of dealing with doors. Inside was a room that looked like it had become the inside of a furnace, runes covered most of the room. We spend some time looking around but could find nothing useful. The Stygian recognised that some of the runes were still active and may contain some form of elemental. We retreated from the doorway they were active on as it was colder than the rest of the room. As we were leaving Bomani commented that it looked like a kitchen, and on a closer look it did too. So far this dungeons dangers had thrown up a kitchen. We proceeded with care.

 

Around the corner from the kitchen we found more of the statues, fascinated by these and the artwork on the wall behind them I felt there must be something hidden here, much like my master used to have hidden rooms. My investigation showed that indeed there was a doorway hidden in the finely crafted artwork, alas I could not determine how to open it. The band spent some time looking, and in so doing found another door hidden directly opposite the one I had found. The way to open either alluded us all however so we moved on. Maybe danger lies behind those doors which is why they are so difficult to open.

 

After travelling along some corridors we came to a room emblazoned with a big R. Apparently one of the two owners was a warrior and his name started with an R, following standard door opening procedure we entered a room that reminded me of my old fighting studio. Shields, weapons and archery targets were found on the walls, a training dummy in the middle, with a portion of the room having matting I assumed for sleeping. Having found nothing of any real value Paige decided to flip one of the switches on the wall. Lightening, like that which had destroyed the ship, leaped across the room whilst blades slashed down from the roof of the area with mating. Perhaps not a sleeping area after all. But most intriguingly the training dummy came to life and moved toward Paige, trying to push her toward the lightening. Being a well honed adventurer this did not surprise her like it did me, and she quickly pulled the other leaver bringing it all to an end. I suggested putting the dummy under the blades and pulling the leaver again, but the rest of the band seemed to want to move on.

 

After the training room the rest of the corridor ended in a landslide, we moved some of this away so Paige could see what was beyond. She reported seeing several rooms, so we made ready to start clearing the landslide which would take us several hours.