chrisairgames

[chrisairgames]

Outer Rim Marches, #0.1

In January, I started a westmarches campaign for Mothership RPG. This is the first post in a series of play reports and mini-reviews I intend to share of the campaign-in-progress.

Let's call this post "Zero Session #1," in a series of Zero Session posts, where I'll get into the how/why of organizing and running this campaign.

Why? Well, I own a ton of Mothership modules. I've been playing and writing for Mothership RPG for over two years, yet most of my sessions became playtests and that "work-only" connection to the game was burning me out.

So, I decided to build a sandbox campaign around the physical MoSh games I have in hand, and to find folk to play at an open table.

For now, ok, sure, it's more of an open table sandbox for interconnected one-shots than a "true" westmarches game, especially since the game has only one GM (me, but I'm hoping to open that up soon). But Outer Rim Marches sounds cool, eh?

Initial Forward Operating Base (F.O.B.)

The PCs arrived at Sater's Redemption. They work for The Company, who hired them to represent their new presence amid a mess of other factions, and leases a ship, The Orpheus, to the Crew.

(We decided the official corporation name of The Company that owns their ship will be revealed in play. That hasn't happened yet, eight sessions later. I love hanging this important piece of worldbuilding in the balance for when it can have a bigger narrative impact. Not knowing wtf is going to happen is one of my favorite parts of running ttrpgs.)

The Crew's job: explore the Outer Rim to establish footholds in new trading hubs (F.O.B.s), discover novel exploitable resources (artifacts), capture profitable exobiological lifeforms, and spread the influence of The Company.

The above graphic might be familiar to folk who follow my substack, the 5 Million Worlds Rokaner Report. Each month, I release a free sci-fi adventure setting, and this station was the featured world in the April edition. A taste of things to come.

Game Organization

When I set out to recruit players, the first important bit was setting a firm, regular playtime. When people reached out, I sent them the Consent in Gaming fillable PDF to get an idea of collective Lines/Veils. Once I got that back, I sent a google survey to gauge interest in modules and game commitment to split folks into ping-able groups.

The playtime is working out well. We had one three week break, I was out sick one time, and only once did we have not have enough folk to play. Ten sessions out of a possible fifteen since January!

I kinda fucked up the module-interest part of the survey though. I listed module names, and without content tags this was pretty useless for the players (outside the BIG names, like Hull Breach). I intend to redo this survey soon, and I'll share a copy here when I do!

The player commitment bit was super helpful, at least. Since I run games on Discord, I split players into three groups: the Command crew who vote on which job to take, the mainline players are the Crew I ping each week to advertise the game (I make an "Event" in Discord), and and a final Cryo group to call on when games don't fill up right away.

This has worked super well for me, even when I drop the ball on giving the players the Event ping in advance.

The Sector Map

I built this hexmap using Sectors Without Number, which is a sector generator for Stars Without Number. I opted for this against the recommendations of Mothership's Warden's Operation Manual because in a westmarches campaign, from what I've understood, the world is meant to be established once the game begins. I think this is especially important should other GMs and player groups begin playing in this world.

To be blunt, I found using this is kind of annoying. There's a lot of irrelevant SWN info to delete, TONS of systems to hide individually, and it's pretty intensive to integrate module info into the systems.

In short, listen to Sean McCoy's advice in the Warden's Operation Manual if you're starting your own Mothership game and don't fucking do this, haha.

And to be honest, I'm not sold on this even being useful as a sandbox tool intended to be shared with other GMs, even. The verdict is still out. To be continued in another Zero Session post down the line.

ANYWAY! This map looks empty, but that's because it's the player-facing starcharts the Company gave them. PCs need to buy hyperspace route maps at various hubs to explore beyond these bounds. So the star and hyperlane layers hold loads of hidden info.

Feel free to poke around the current state of the sector.

And I do like the shift from a web to hexmap. Little swirls of points get me all crossed up. The Jump-drive distances in Mothership are amenable to using hexes, and tracking distance (i.e. time passed) is straightforward.

ORM Campaign Sneak Peek

Mothership space travel takes a long-ass time, in case you didn't know. To date, we've played nine adventures over ten sessions, and over two years have passed in the campaign world.

The players skipped over a lot of systems to go to Hardlight, which they've recently learned is on the edge of the Public Sector (from Hull Breach). Gonna be some interesting sessions coming up.

The next Outer Rim Marches post will be the official ORM#1, in which the players board the lauded Year of the Rat.

#indie ttrpg #ttrpg #rpg #horror #mothership #mothership rpg #role playing games #tabletop #osr #west marches #sci fi

[chrisairgames]

A short video about my solo tarot TTRPG, Death of the Author!

Play as a character fighting for narrative control of their own story, against the wishes of their author.

[chrisairgames]

Tacticians of Ahm - Monthly Update #2!

Full spread art by @helenacore depicting Early Graduation's opening field exercises!

Greetings Tacticians!

Tactician of Ahm's Monthly Update #2 is finally here! With it comes the early access version of the setting book, The Ahmian Almanac, which features its first sample region of Ahm, showcasing the style and structure of setting book I am hoping to create with the Almanac. The book will feature lore and locations, of course, but it will also feature more in-depth maps, new NPCs, unique equipment, a complete new Class, and more! I want to create a book that it as much a sourcebook chock full of new things for GMs to bring to the table as it is information about the world of Ahm and inspiration for adventures.

Thanks you so much for the continued support of and engagement with the game! I used more of the raised funds to commission more art from Helena Santana including a new, full-spread art piece for Early Graduation (at the top of the post) and a piece of Dekkin Von Lopesbane character art (also for Early Graduation). Plus, I've worked with Jean Verne on a second preview spread (see above) of our planned look and feel for the game's final layout, this time utilizing some of Helena's awesome art from Monthly Update #1!

Because of my delay of this update (it was originally slated for last month) and the update overall being smaller than I originally was hoping, I am delaying this month's price hike on the game so if you enjoy Tacticians of Ahm now is still a great time to get on board! Tell your friends to do the same! Next update, the price will rise by $5 USD and that will continue apace (barring unforeseen delays like the one I suffered this last month, of course).

Lastly, I recently ran the opening two hours of Early Graduation over on The Weekly Scroll. Check it out if you'd like to see the game in action and see how I run it as the GM!

PATCH NOTES - v0.8.3

Tactician’s Textbook

Clarified Conditions to apply until the end of target’s next Turn (as opposed to confusing wording regarding Rounds).

Renamed “Shield” Condition to “Ward” to avoid having the same name as a shield, the piece of equipment and updated relevant uses throughout the text.

Ward condition now explicitly blocks all damage AND any/all Conditions while in effect.

Updated Mage Ability - Barrier to include “May be cast on self (1 target maximum per use)”

Added clarifying text to Shields in Equipment section: “(does not block Conditions)”

Added clarifying text regarding applying multiple Conditions to a single target: “A target may suffer one or more different Conditions at the same time. If a target currently has a Condition, they may not be affected by that same Condition again (nor does it add turns of effect to the current Condition) until the current instance has ended.”

Gamemaster’s Guidebook

Added Boar (EL1) to Bestiary

EARLY GRADUATION

Added a massive new piece of art from Helena Santana to the title page, depicting the Tacticians sparring with Imperial Army soldiers during the Field Day exercises!

Added Boar (EL1) to “BATTLE: Wolves in the Woods” and adjusted combatant numbers at various party sizes to more accurately reflect typical intended difficulty.

AHMIAN ALMANAC (NEW!)

Lake Traecine region added, includes the following:

5 Major Points of Interest: New locations for your Tacticians to travel to and explore!

20 Calls for Aid: Adventure hooks and strange happenings across the region!

1 Class: New classes, accessible only to Tacticians who prove their worth!

11 Abilities: New combat skills, taught to those favored by a certain faction!

2 Enemies: New combatants, unique to the specific region or faction!

2 Relics: New guarded/lost pieces of equipment, be they mundane, magical, or corrupt3d!

2 Factions: New groups, wielding political, cultural, or magical power!

1 Shop: A New specialty establishment carrying new and rare items!

4 Characters: New NPCs for your Tacticians to meet, interact with, and fight alongside!

More detailed (placeholder) map of the region with travel paths!

[chrisairgames]

Play-By-Blog #21: The Isle by Luke Gearing

Welcome to my ongoing play-by-blog of The Isle by Luke Gearing! We are playing this adventure with its original system, The Vanilla Game (adjusted somewhat to fit the format). You can check out the Play-By-Blog Repository to get all caught up if you wish.

How Play-By-Blog works:

I write up the situation, NPCs, and more, just like a DM.

You vote in the poll to help decide the character's course of action.

I roll the dice, resolve actions, and write them up next week.

So on and so forth for the rest of the adventure!

Notation:

[Text in brackets is out-of-character/GM text!] "Non-italicized quotes denote text from the original adventure!" "Italicized quotations denotes NPC dialogue."

Our character: Medon Girou - Magic Cutpurse

Our maps: The Isle, Floor 2, Floor 3

[You can use the links above to find Medon's Character Sheet and map of the Isle and the so far uncovered portions below the surface. On the Dungeon map, you are currently in Floor 3, Room 2.]

Now, back to the adventure!

You look to the strange door and the wheeled mechanism before it. You've seen enough dangers in this place to no longer fear a door alone. You grab the wheel and twist with all your might. [Strength Check (1d20): 11 - Success!]

The mechanism twists silently as the door slides open. In the low glow of your amulet, you can see the opening beyond the door stretch off into a sizeable chamber, some of which falls beyond the reach of your light.

Before you [in Floor 3, Room 3] stand sixteen Legionaries, strange undead in banded armour, bull-horned helms, porcelain wolf masks and a heavy gold medallion imprinted with a man's face in profile. At their sides, they hold short swords and large, rectangular shields. They are immobile, statuesque in their too still stance.

Among the Legionaries are six sea-things, mutilated corpses of once cadaverous, spiny creatures filled with bioluminescent blood now scattered atop the resting water surrounding the feet of the Legionaries. A shiver runs down your spine.

To the north, a stone passage leads off into the dark. To the south, a hall leads into a partially flooded room. Before you though, stand the Legionaries.

[Sorry for the lengthy delay! I started a new full time gig here locally after our move, then I got COVID, then my wife got COVID, then I worked like 6 days in a row, and here we are now. I'm (mostly) healthy and back at it. Apologies for the delay! - Christian]

[chrisairgames]

Play-By-Blog #20: The Isle by Luke Gearing

Welcome to my ongoing play-by-blog of The Isle by Luke Gearing! We are playing this adventure with its original system, The Vanilla Game (adjusted somewhat to fit the format). You can check out the Play-By-Blog Repository to get all caught up if you wish.

How Play-By-Blog works:

I write up the situation, NPCs, and more, just like a DM.

You vote in the poll to help decide the character's course of action.

I roll the dice, resolve actions, and write them up next week.

So on and so forth for the rest of the adventure!

Notation:

[Text in brackets is out-of-character/GM text!] "Non-italicized quotes denote text from the original adventure!" "Italicized quotations denotes NPC dialogue."

Our character: Medon Girou - Magic Cutpurse

Our maps: The Isle, Floor 2, Floor 3

[You can use the links above to find Medon's Character Sheet and map of the Isle and the so far uncovered portions below the surface. On the Dungeon map, you are currently in Floor 2, in Room 15.]

Now, back to the adventure!

[Due to the closeness (when backing out my own vote) and the smartness of both of this entry's highest ranking options, I'm ruling that we'll do both!] The adrenaline leaves your system for the first time in what feels like hours. Navigating these dark chambers, hiding from skeletal patrols, and now having slain a pack of pale cave eels--it has all taken a toll on you. You are tired. You lean against the stone wall at the top of the ramp leading down into the floor below, set your pack at your side and rest, letting the eel bodies continue to bleed out.

You have heard their blood is poisonous and that's why they are so often cooked before eating, even in the wild, but you don't have any way to make a fire here and it's too far and potentially too dangerous to head back to Fionn's chamber tonight. You'll chance it on the eels.

After resting for a while, you cut one of the eels into a number of larger steaks, removing the skin and eat it one slice of your fishgutting knife at a time. [Poison Save: 4 - Under Saving Throw of 8 - Success!] It tastes earthy and strange, but already you can feel it beginning to nourish your body and mind.

You rest for the night. In the chambers around you, all is quiet. Nothing disturbs the surface of the flooded chamber and nothing seems to trigger the oil and spark trap to the north. All too is quiet from below, down the ramp. [Healing Roll - 1d6: 3! 3 Grit recovered (up to a total of 5)!]

In the morning (or what you imagine to be the morning in this sunless space beneath the isle), you pick up your pack, stretch your aching body, and begin down the well worn stairs to the floor below.

The flooding continues, to varying degrees, down in this lower level. You walk down into water, keeping your eye out for more eels, until, at a point, it is nearly reaching your chest. With your pack above your head, you continue forward through the dark, quiet water until the hall opens into a large natural stone cavern, the soft glow of your amulet failing to reach the outer edges or ceiling of the chamber. The water lowers as you rise up onto the cavern's floor.

"A natural stone cavern, barely worked with tools. Ankle-deep seawater, and fresh salt smell. A huge brass door blocks the western exit. The metal is not smooth—the surface is a tapestry of screaming faces crushed beneath a rampant bull. Their blood forms a wave, and the foam atop the wave is all wolf heads. The heads pursue running deer, boar and cattle—crowned and faceless... A wheel, 5' across, juts from the door's face."

The metal door itself has a strange, shimmery quality to it. Being near it feels unnaturally cold. Other than the wheel, you can't see any mechanism, even hinges.

[Sorry for the delay in this entry! I had a SUPER busy week last week, missed the original day and then put it off long enough that it just made sense to skip that week and get it going today. As always, feel free to drop any other suggested courses of action in the comments/reblogs! Thanks for much for reading along with Medon's adventures! - Christian]

[chrisairgames]

Awesome dive into 70s/80s pulp sf

DAWstruck

A Quick Look at Sci-Fi/Fantasy Publisher DAW and My Desire for Cheap Entertainment

If you've ever been to an American used bookstore, flea market, etc., you probably recognize the distinctively uniform yellow (or faded-to-brown) spines of the DAW books pictured above.

From Wikipedia: "DAW Books is an American science fiction and fantasy publisher, founded by Donald A. Wollheim, along with his wife, Elsie B. Wollheim, following his departure from Ace Books in 1971. The company claims to be 'the first publishing company ever devoted exclusively to science fiction and fantasy.'"

Wollheim was active in sci-fi publishing and fandom circles; he published the Ursula LeGuin's first two books at Ace, and as a youth, he was kicked out of the New York Science Fiction League club for getting a group of unpaid authors together to sue writer/publisher/organizer Hugo Gernsback after they weren't paid for published stories:

"It grieves us to announce that we have found the first disloyalty in our organization… These members we expelled on June 12th. Their names are Donald A. Wollheim, John B. Michel, and William S. Sykora—three active fans who just got themselves onto the wrong road."

I've worked in bookstores and libraries for decades, and my eyes always glossed over the shelves full of yellow spines. But I started to reconsider after listening to Sean at SFUltra talk about Electric Forest by Tanith Lee. (Once you're equally convinced, go back his Patreon, which is literally my favorite criticism on the internet.)

I started devouring Lee's work. In my opinion, she outstrips most of the "greats" of that era of sci-fi. Her prose is awesome, her plots are great fun, and she's prolific across science fiction and fantasy. Had I been sleeping on DAW Books? Were they all this good?!

They are not all that good.

DAW Books books run the gamut of sci-fi and fantasy, from alternate histories to barbarian tales to postmodern reactions to the post-war West. And taken as an overview of the sci-fi field at that time, they reflect the good (Tanith Lee) and the bad (libertarian cryto-fascism, coercive sex freaks, tired cliches).

So why am I writing about them? Because they represent a type of publisher that, as far as I know, doesn't really exist anymore. They published authors who'd never been published before, and they printed straight to paperback.

I have no idea if anyone was making a living being published by DAW, but I assume this was a foot in the door for lots of these authors. And the books were so cheap! The one I have on hand was $1.25 in 1976. Adjusted for inflation, that's $6.93.

And listen, I read difficult books. I read literary fiction and academic histories and complicated, confusing cross-genre works. But I also like to read trash! I think everyone deserves to read some trash. But I want that trash to be cheap and easily accessible.

And with modern publishers focusing on established authors and Next Big Things, it's hard to find trash! And when you do find it, it's often dressed up to look like a Next Big Thing and priced accordingly.

Please give me more cheap trash.

And god, look at those covers. Again, I don't know if any painters were making a living by selling work to DAW, but they were definitely putting in the work. You got classic Frazetta horniness, you got '70s psychedelia, you got "what if the Bible was weirder?" classicism.

I want to decorate my walls with these.

The nice part is that they're mostly shorter than 200 pages, and I've never spent more than $5 on one of these, and I can usually find them even cheaper. So next time you're at a library sale and you see a faded yellow DAW spine, take a closer look.

Just stay away from Gor.

(DAW is still in business today, as a subsidiary of Astra House Publishing. I would say they occupy the same spheres as Tor: popular, readable, and usually left-of-center science fiction and fantasy. Such as The Forever Sea, a sapphic ecological fantasy book about sailors on a sea of plants. They cost, unfortunately, more than $7.)

[chrisairgames]

Milk Bar: sci-fi OSR roleplaying in post-Communist Poland

Bełchatów exemplifies what the paypigs called Total Fucking Vertical Integration. They dug out coal from a hole in the ground 300m deep and 10km across, wheeled it 17km across a field, and burned it to produce 50TWh of energy a year. The city, this city, sprang up around it to keep those functions and those conveyor belts alive at any cost; total fucking vertical integration.

Eventually, the coal ran out. The Soviets found a more lucrative source of energy in the south and they would wheel it back here to justify keeping hundreds of thousands of people in the middle of nowhere. An explosion at the plant sent them reeling, leaving only you—the Communards—to pick up the pieces. 

🧑‍🔬sci-fi OSR roleplaying in the vein of Cairn and Mothership 🇵🇱 set in an alternate timeline, post-Soviet Communist Poland 🏠 unique progression system tied to basebuilding 🥟 pierogi

Coming soon! Follow the project on Kickstarter to get updates 👀

[chrisairgames]

In The Lost Bay RPG you can play a zombie Half-Dead character class. Those are Half-Dead's hands.

This last weekend I decided to append the Suburban Gothic genre to the game. People who are playing/writing for the game find that is a good match. I'm overexcited about this, and I'm doing little layouts with Suburban Gothic close to the game illustrations, like a test. If it works with the game art, it works! Well looks like it works.

[chrisairgames]

TTRPG Read-Through: Traveller - Book 1

Here is a read-through I did about a year and a half ago (originally posted on Twitter) of one of the all time classics: Traveller by Game Designers' Workshop! This read-through just covers Book 1 - Characters and Combat from the original Traveller box set trio of books. - Christian

This is the 1981 Second Edition printing of the classic Traveller three zine box set! Been wanting to read this for ages now. It's discussed A LOT in Mothership circles.

Really interesting to see GM-less and solo play options here. Didn't realize that was being done explicitly at this time. Also, nice to see "he or she" language here rather than the just "he" you see a lot in older games.

The UPP is clearly the creation of an utterly deranged mind. This seems like a huge overcomplication of just listing stats (unless all your players are proficient in hexadecimal).

[Hi, it's me from the future here (aka now - 2024): I've learned to embrace and love the UPP (or more specifically the planet stat version from one of the other books). It's complicated at first but really quick and cool once you know how to read it.]

I really like Social Standing as a stat replacement for charisma or charm or other social skills you tend to see. Feels like it would have more impact on the story and less of a "Roll to see if you convince him, I guess" sort of anticlimax social skills have most of the time.

I'm now into the "you can die during char creation in Traveller" bits. Really cool in some ways. Really comical in others. It recommends you enlist your bad stat characters into the Scout service because of it's high mortality rate (so you can roll a diff char before play), lol.

Essentially, you roll stats and that's your entire character but to give them some experience they can enlist in a Service. You have to roll to get in and may get rejected. If so, you submit to the draft (get into one at random). You can die. You can gain skills and promotions.

Honestly, the char creation feels like a solo game unto itself. Risk v reward of how far to push your enlistments to boost your skills and standing and benefits. You could have a whole story in your head by the end of it. Great Session 0 material.

As a 34 yr old, this hurts. Apparently, I have -1 Strength, Dexterity and Endurance now...

I admire commitment but asking GMs to use this full char creator for all NPCs (which means generating chars until you get one capable of filling the role you need) is truly too wild. Best part: at the end, it just says you can also pick whatever you want for stats and skills.

The weapons and intro text have much more of a space as a new age of sail vibe to them than I was anticipating. It's cool. Far more Dune than Alien (so far).

Interestingly (unless I missed something), skills are detached from your stats. Your base stats make getting into a Service easier and help you with Saving Throws and such, but skills have their own modifiers based on the situation and your expertise. It's cool (if a bit dense)!

In case you were wondering, there is absolutely no art in this entire book. I'm hoping we'll get some in one of the other two books with vehicles and ships and such but won't be holding my breath. Gives the whole thing a very Serious vibe.

Always interesting to see how older games chose to handle this (or not).

Here's the UPP in action along with quick listing of other character info. Interesting even if it is just too overcomplicated for my tastes.

Can't overstate how much char creation feels like a whole solo game of its own. You can roll a character at age 18 and have them go through seven 4-yr terms in a Service before retiring and having substantial cash, specific possessions, memberships and social standings. Wild.

The character sheet mentions PSIONICS which is exciting (but I'll have to wait till Book 3 for more on that apparently).

Combat is straightforward but has some unique bits: a focus on stealth as an option and movement/attacks occur by all parties simultaneously which means everyone (enemies too) gets to move and then everyone chooses who to attack and you roll them all. Sounds really fun.

Stats have cool effects in battle. Your Endurance stat is the number of attacks you can make before needing to rest (can you imagine if DnD just didn't let you do a base attack at a point?). Strength and Dex can boost or lower certain weapon rolls like you'd expect.

If trained in a weapon, you can give your expertise as a negative mod to your enemy's rolls to attack you to reflect parrying and blocking which is cool. The skills also add to your attack rolls. Skills just seem really useful overall here.

I just love that we get stats for broadswords, revolvers, and laser carbines. Plus, there are even special tables for archaic weapons for when encountering lower-tech civilizations. It feels like a really wide open interpretation of what space could look like. Feels exciting.

A few more equipment tables and a final quick reference page at the back and that's all for Book 1. I'll be back with Book 2 and 3 in the coming days!

Main thoughts: Character creation is very involved but really cool - its own game practically. Skills are very deep in a way that feels refreshing when compared to more stat-focused games. Combat has some fun, chaotic twists. Feels like a wide universe of possibility here so far.

I'll add Books 2 and 3 to this thread when I give them their own read-throughs. In the meantime, here's my newsletter (last two months have Mothership freebies): https://meatcastle.substack.com

And here's my website (with links to my games and modules and all that good stuff): https://shop.meatcastlegameware.com/

Thanks for reading!

[chrisairgames]

This study came out in 2009. Why haven't more people heard about this? What has its impact on MRI studies been the past 15 years?

one of the best academic paper titles

[chrisairgames]

A new episode of RTFM! @maxwellander and I continue our quest to find the cure for "D&D Brain." This time, our delicious medicine is Dream Askew/Dream Apart by Avery Alder and Benjamin Rosenbaum.

[chrisairgames]

Tacticians of Ahm is itchfunding NOW!

For the last year or so, I've been designing and playtesting Tacticians of Ahm, a game inspired by tactical combat roleplaying designs meant to keep classic grid-n-minis TTRPG combat but to reinvent it in a way that keeps it fast and exciting without slowing your entire session down to a crawl!

Pick up the rulebook and get all future updates for free HERE!

Tacticians of Ahm is a tactical combat-focused tabletop roleplaying game in the corrupt3d fantasy world of Ahm. A bit-rotten blight has appeared in the Northern Sea and from it flows the Corrupt1on, fractured light and shattered shapes sowing chaos across the realm. As Tacticians, you alone are prepared to face the darkness spreading across the lands and reunite the scattered peoples of Ahm.

Unique Elements of Tacticians of Ahm:

Always-hit, set-damage grid-based combat!

Class-specific attack patterns, abilities, and more!

Easy-to-use weapon and ability diagrams!

Rules light out-of-combat play using a single d20!

A digital fantasy world corrupting with age!

You know it's a video game, but your characters don't!

If videos are more your speed, check out this intro to the game:

Inspired by video games like Into the Breach, Final Fantasy Tactics and Fire Emblem, Tacticians of Ahm was created out of a desire to maintain the rewarding tactical choices and big dramatic moments of traditional grid-n-minis TTRPG combat without slowing the pace of play by removing as many of the frustrating aspects of play as possible and streamlining the rest. Combat is fast and furious! You can always easily read your abilities, know the damage you will do (and when you can do it), and more.

Check the Itch page for more info and pick up the game!

[chrisairgames]

Play-By-Blog #17: The Isle by Luke Gearing

Welcome to my ongoing play-by-blog of The Isle by Luke Gearing! We are playing this adventure with its original system, The Vanilla Game (adjusted somewhat to fit the format). You can check out the Play-By-Blog Repository to get all caught up if you wish.

How Play-By-Blog works:

I write up the situation, NPCs, and more, just like a DM.

You vote in the poll to help decide the character's course of action.

I roll the dice, resolve actions, and write them up next week.

So on and so forth for the rest of the adventure!

Notation:

[Text in brackets is out-of-character/GM text!] "Non-italicized quotes denote text from the original adventure!" "Italicized quotations denotes NPC dialogue."

Our character: Medon Girou - Magic Cutpurse

Our maps: The Isle, The Dungeon (so far)

[You can use the links above to find Medon's Character Sheet and map of the Isle and the so far uncovered portions below the surface. On the Dungeon map, you are currently in Floor 2, in Room 17.]

Now, back to the adventure!

[Shortly after posting the last entry, @wrapping-rags suggested throwing the armor pieces from the corpse in Room 17 onto the pressure plates in Room 18 (instead of casting Sticks to Snakes). Since that's a much more creative and smart solution than the one I originally, suggested I added a disclaimer that the Sticks to Snakes option (which won) would be doing that instead (since I can't modify the poll after posting, sadly). Thanks for the suggestion @wrapping-rags!]

You remember the patrol of Bonded Dead and think again about casting a ritual. Who knows what may come through this area over the course of that time? A better idea strikes you.

You pick up the bent and charred fragments of armor from the corpse at your feet and toss them into the room.

First, the moment the moving metal scrapes across the shimmering plates, sparks fly across the ground - like flint on steel. Second, the armor pieces settle and their weight shifts the plates beneath. From overhead, where you'd noticed the hundreds if not thousands of small hole in the ceiling comes spewing forth thin, jet black oil. It coats the entire floor, splashing up onto the walls.

You've seen traps like this before. Any metal touching the floor with generate a spark and any spark (or other flame) will ignite the oil. Looking down at the blackened husk that was once a man at your feet shows you its effectiveness. If you are to traverse this room, you must tread carefully or die.

With the room already coated in oil and more pieces to spare, you toss 3 more pieces of armor and old equipment from the corpse into the room, landing one on each of the last remaining pressure plates. With each toss, oil spurts down again and across the floor, where it eventually creeps down beneath the plates and into the stone. Still, there is a slick layer covering the room.

You believe you could cross now without triggering the oil, but it will require a careful step. Luckily, you don't wear armor (though you certainly have metal on your pack). You rearrange your equipment as much as possible, placing everything metal you can into you pack and hoping it's enough if you fall.

You creep forward, channeling your stealthiest moments back on the mainland as a cutpurse, when you'd be noticed picking a pocket and have to hide. Town guards were easy enough to fool. They often weren't the sharpest of individuals. Dogs were harder to lose than your average guard, after all.

You step carefully, finding your footing slowly before taking each and every step. After a few tense moments, you find yourself facing the door to the room's east side. It is a wooden door marked with "images of coiling serpents falling into a pit."

You push it open slowly. A dark corridor on the other side turns off the the right. You step quickly out of the trapped room, oily-shoed but unharmed, re-outfit yourself, and continue on.

The corridor heads south, sloping downwards [Encounter Roll: 12 - Nothing]. You smell brackish seawater just before you enter a flooding chamber [Room 12], barely a foot or so of space is visible above the water and beneath the low ceiling. The water is "rotten, black, foul" and eerily still. Your feet rest just barely in the water's edge as the corridor drops even lower into the chamber, you bend down and look as far as you can into the room.

On the north side of this room you see a raised corridor you could clamber into and a slight orange glow coming from further in. To the south, a metal slab - iron perhaps - with no mechanisms or hinges. You can't rightly say what it is.

Suddenly, the "rotten, black, foul" water shifts and in it several [2d4 roll: 3] huge eels with milk-white eyes come writhing across the surface in your direction. They smell your flesh and are moving to feed.

[Initiative Roll: 4 - On evens, players go first.] You have a moment to react as the 3 eels make their way to you, mouths widening as they come. Here, along the water's edge, you likely have an advantage against the creatures, being as used to hunting (and staying) in the water as they are.

[Out of the oil room and into the eel pit! The Isle is full of dangers, but so far, you have navigated them well. What now? See you next week! - Christian]

[chrisairgames]

Tacticians of Ahm is itchfunding NOW!

For the last year or so, I've been designing and playtesting Tacticians of Ahm, a game inspired by tactical combat roleplaying designs meant to keep classic grid-n-minis TTRPG combat but to reinvent it in a way that keeps it fast and exciting without slowing your entire session down to a crawl!

Pick up the rulebook and get all future updates for free HERE!

Tacticians of Ahm is a tactical combat-focused tabletop roleplaying game in the corrupt3d fantasy world of Ahm. A bit-rotten blight has appeared in the Northern Sea and from it flows the Corrupt1on, fractured light and shattered shapes sowing chaos across the realm. As Tacticians, you alone are prepared to face the darkness spreading across the lands and reunite the scattered peoples of Ahm.

Unique Elements of Tacticians of Ahm:

Always-hit, set-damage grid-based combat!

Class-specific attack patterns, abilities, and more!

Easy-to-use weapon and ability diagrams!

Rules light out-of-combat play using a single d20!

A digital fantasy world corrupting with age!

You know it's a video game, but your characters don't!

If videos are more your speed, check out this intro to the game:

Inspired by video games like Into the Breach, Final Fantasy Tactics and Fire Emblem, Tacticians of Ahm was created out of a desire to maintain the rewarding tactical choices and big dramatic moments of traditional grid-n-minis TTRPG combat without slowing the pace of play by removing as many of the frustrating aspects of play as possible and streamlining the rest. Combat is fast and furious! You can always easily read your abilities, know the damage you will do (and when you can do it), and more.

Check the Itch page for more info and pick up the game!

[chrisairgames]

A little spot illustration from my entry for Aaron King's SpeedRune jam, which I think will be really fun once I finish it up. Normally I'm a 'make it, then announce it' kind of girl, but I thought this drawing was too cute not to share.

[chrisairgames]

Finally made time to catch up on MeatCastle's collab playthrough of The Isle. What a saga

Play-By-Blog #16: The Isle by Luke Gearing

Welcome to my ongoing play-by-blog of The Isle by Luke Gearing! We are playing this adventure with its original system, The Vanilla Game (adjusted somewhat to fit the format). You can check out the Play-By-Blog Repository to get all caught up if you wish.

How Play-By-Blog works:

I write up the situation, NPCs, and more, just like a DM.

You vote in the poll to help decide the character's course of action.

I roll the dice, resolve actions, and write them up next week.

So on and so forth for the rest of the adventure!

Notation:

[Text in brackets is out-of-character/GM text!] "Non-italicized quotes denote text from the original adventure!" "Italicized quotations denotes NPC dialogue."

Our character: Medon Girou - Magic Cutpurse

Our maps: The Isle, The Dungeon (so far)

[You can use the links above to find Medon's Character Sheet and map of the Isle and the so far uncovered portions below the surface. On the Dungeon map, you are currently in Floor 2, in the hall to the east of Room 19.]

Now, back to the adventure!

Unsure of the dangers that lie ahead, you once again sit and concentrate, being the Wizard Eye ritual. Over the next hour [6 Encounter Rolls (1 per 10 mins): only 1 triggered an event], you safely conjure the invisible arcane orb.

Midway through the ritual, you hear the crack of brittle bone against stone, new sounds from the burnt smelling room to the south. You send the Eye down the hall.

In the chamber [Room 17], you see 6 Bonded Dead, animated skeleton warriors like those that accompanied Fionn in his chamber only these wear old, rotten furs. Fionn mentioned his brother's penchant for furs and the ornamentation of their forefathers. These are mindless dead, in service of Dainéal. They march to the northern end of the room before turning and marching out the chamber's western door and into the room housing the strange sphere creature you spotted earlier in your scouting [Room 16].

Beside the now-gone Bonded Dead, you see "a burnt figure, huddled by the eastern doorway. Now barely recognizable as human." An open doorway leads east down a short hall and into another chamber.

Here [Room 18], "thick soot blackens the walls and floor." Beneath the soot, there is a slight glimmer, like a layer of flint, on the flooring. Taking several minutes to closely examine the room, you discover several details: "the ceiling has many fine holes bored into it" (nearly impossible to see from standing height) and "the floor is made of four pressure plates." To the east, there is "a door marked with images of coiling serpents falling into a pit."

You let the Wizard Eye fizzle and creep down into the room with the burnt body [Room 17]. You hear the Bonded Dead, Dainéal's patrol, marching further away, to the south [out of Room 16]. There are going away, but you do not know if or when they may be back.

The burnt body has nothing of use. Everything is burnt and charred save the few bits of armor, all missing their straps: gauntlets, a chest piece, and large plate mail boots, all battered and covered in soot.

You look into the room with the pressure plates, clearly trapped, and ponder how to proceed. There's no way to avoid all of the pressure plates by entering the room (although you do not know how much weight may be necessary to trigger them). You could Teleport again, but there's much more risk in teleporting into the next chamber without firsthand knowledge or sight of it and casting as a ritual takes time you may not have with the Bonded Dead about and casting it quickly has it's own risks of miscasting.

You have many options, none of them perfect.

[If you've got another crafty solution to evading the trap, reblog or drop a comment! I'm always up for considering creative new ways for players to outsmart the dungeon! - Christian]

#ttrpg #indie ttrpg #ttrpgs #rpg #fantasy #luke gearing #the isle #choose your own adventure #osr

[chrisairgames]

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