KEEP ON THE BORDERLANDS
Bob’s GMing obviously
Willie’s playing DARCY + KAGE (Warrior + Thief)
I’m playing VERNER + ZASSOS (Cleric + Magic-User)
Dakota’s playing BURT + GYORN (Warriors)
Somewhere in the nation of Lyturk – right along the edge,
in fact – lay the Keep on the Borderlands. We’ve come to explore the nearby
Caves of Chaos along with twenty-five or so folks as part of a caravan. We introduce ourselves and make small talk,
discussing our plans for the days ahead.
Rumors.
1. Entryway to the lair of a great lich, who knew the
secrets of life and death. Ancient scrolls worth thousands of gold! (Zassos)
2. A great maggot lives in the ground, and its milk can
grant everlasting life. (Verner)
3. A well-paying, anonymous stranger said someone was
planning to build another set of fortifications out here. That would end poorly
for some local nobles whose lands would be seized by the king, should the king
decide to go through with this… Wealthy. Local. Nobles. (Burt)
4. There’re good heavy oaks out here in the wilderness.
You can make a ton of money chopping down trees and selling the hardwood. Some
of those trees might be part of druidic groves, though. (Gyorn)
5. The Keep is well-known as a place for would-be
adventurers to make a living. There are constant issues with monsters,
especially this close to the river. Plenty of monsters to fight for a bounty!
(Darcy & Kage)
Gyorn meets an old friend, a blacksmith, whom he
remembers from his time serving in the Legion. His friend tells him that some
orcs attacked a caravan recently and stole a real quantity of steel. He’d pay well
for its return. He suspects that the orcs came from the Caves of Chaos.
“Ill tell ya what,” the blacksmith says. “The Innkeeper,
old Johan, owes me a favor. How’s this sound: I can guarantee you and your
compatriots a full three weeks room and board if you get my steel back. Help
you get started out here. And some extra gold, of course. Not gonna leave you
hangin’ without any money. How’s this sound: I’ll give you and everyone who
comes back 100 gold apiece if you bring back the bar stock? Sound fair?”
We say yes, that sounds eminently fair. We are overjoyed
to envision the blacksmith shaking down the child he paid 2 gold coins to post
his job offering for him, now that we’ve accepted it.
We check out the other buildings, and we’re fairly
impressed. Some of the guards carry magic weapons. Some of the traders’ goods
are blades proof marked from the forges of Zazu; good Hyperborean steel. Smoked meats
in the tavern. A windowless guild hall with a secret knock required to get in.
(Zassos writes down the knock). This place is intriguing.
Lord Grundy rules the keep. He’s a war hero from a
20-year-old conflict, and now he’s a castellan. The Keep’s rules forbid walking
around with weapons untied or casting spells within the walls, and they punish
folk with exile or hanging, generally.
At the tavern, we notice that they’re serving fruit that’s
out of season, but it’s remarkably fresh. It’s noteworthy, as we suspect
druidic magic. The bark tea is piney and delightful. Burt smokes his pipe.
Darcy eats a nice meal of roast pheasant and pudding. It’s a fine night.
We notice a couple odd folks in the tavern…
•A skunk-trapper. A fur-covered man with 15 wooden mugs
containing various drinks. He smells like a dead animal.
•There are a pair of staffed and hooded long-bearded wizard
or druid types speaking in hushed tones over some sort of parchment in the
corner, glancing at everyone furtively.
•A swaggering caravan-master who seems quite content to sit
in the corner and smoke.
Kage looks over at the wizards, and strolls past
nonchalantly… (THIEF ABILITY) He
notices a strange drawing of a standing stone with a tree and an eye and a fang
drawn over it. It’s in a language he doesn’t comprehend, but it’s very
interesting.
Zassos and Verner believe the language might be Druidic.
The standing stone is telling – we’re not sure what it’s about, but runestones
aren’t uncommon in the wilds. In some places, they’re not uncommon in towns. But
we’re not aware of any nearby rune stones. Why these two men out in the middle
of nowhere would be so furiously talking about this – and under such secrecy –
raises a lot more questions.
But we decide those questions will need to be answered
another time. We decide to retire early, get a good night’s sleep, and prepare
for tomorrow’s expedition.
The next morning, we set off for the Caves of Chaos! But
not until after breakfast. We wake up with some wine and some small beer, a bit
of bark tea, and a plate full of eggs. Then we gather our gear and head out.
The Caves of Chaos are only about two miles down the
road. We make our way to the first cave on the northern part of the ravine, and
immediately spot the remains of the caravan the orcs sacked.
Inside. Darkness. Zassos lights a lantern. We see heads on
spikes. Darkness coming from the left (west), so we go west. It lights up
pretty damn far into the room on the right as well, and reveals quite the cave
complex. We hear guttural language, and orcs approach us quickly. A fight!
Zassos throws a dagger and it connects with a burly orc,
but it bounces off his armor. An orc chucks a spear at Gyorn, and impales him
for 6 damage! Ouch! Burt responds
with a 1+6+6 and rolls 9 damage,
slaying the vile creature. We ask: Can
you use POA on ranged weapons and on melee weapons on the same round?
Gyorn has a reach weapon (pike), and Darcy’s in melee,
and since they both have heavy armor, they roll really hot and send this orc on
a one-way trip to Fucked City. Darcy does 9
damage and Gyorn does 3. The orc
dies.
Zassos moves so that his compatriots can reform their
ranks. We ask: Can we move through
friendlies? We say yes. Kage moves in and fills the gap left by Zassos, so
he can use his bow next turn. Burt rolls hot, uses his Points of Advantage to
get 2 spite and a hit, and kills another orc. Darcy goes apeshit and gets 6+6+6
and deals 21 damage to the poor little bastard.
We learn, definitively, that three level 3 characters can
beat up four level 1 orcs.
From further down the hall, we hear sounds of panic, and
the orcs cry out that the hobgoblins are attacking again! (Zassos knows Orcish).
They sound the alarm, and another wave of orcs crashes into us.
They’re armed with handaxes and swords. I took
screenshots to describe our movement, because there are a fuckton of orcs.
Essentially, the warriors are rolling their full dice allotment and killing an
orc every turn, and everyone else is moving into an advantageous tactical
position and waiting for an opportunity.
Zassos starts casting a Fireball spell. We ask: Do allies grant cover? Bob says: Underground, they do.
Does a bow do
spite damage on 1 or 2? Bob says: No,
even though it’s a 2 handed weapon.
The Warriors have a really stellar turn and manage to straight-up
nuke some orcs just using their Spite damage. It’s beautiful to watch.
Zassos’s Fireball goes off, killing the target and
singing several orcs, but it’s more of a frag grenade than a supernova. A
couple orcs die horribly, a couple take a bit of concussive force, and one or
two are just fine. Naturally, when Zassos initiative comes up again, he
declares he’s casting another Fireball.
Darcy “tags” an orc with 12” of wood and steel, and…
yeah, he dies.
Darcy and Gyorn each get in with their two-handed weapons
and, once again, murder an orc entirely with Spite.
Gyorn: “I won’t roll a die. You’ll just take 5 damage.”
Zassos’ second fireball kills two more orcs and throws a Spite
damage on the last remaining orc warrior. That last remaining orc falls quicky
to Gyorn and Darcy’s combined assault, and in about 2 minutes, we’ve slain a
dozen of the filthy creatures. Victory!
We explore the big ol’ room in front of us. We encounter
18 female orcs and 9 young’ns cowering in the north-west corner. There’s also a
cowardly old orc who rang the alarm bell. Zassos gives them a chastising
speech, telling them that this only happened to them because they stole from the
Keep on the Borderlands before telling them all to skedaddle and never come
back. He asks for the name of the orcs’ leader, and where he might be found,
and they say:
“Kargrak. Up the tunnel, that way!”
Before they exit the caves in a panic.
We stealthily approach a chamber wherein we suspect
Kargark to be holed up. There’s a rope loop on the door, and voices whispering
from the other side. Burt does a 3-2-1 and bursts open the door, revealing a
big nasty brute and a pair of warriors, as well as their panicking orc-wives.
Zassos throws a bucket full of butterfly knives and slays
one of the armored orcs. Verner moves to make room for better combatants; Kage
trains his bow on an unopened door, just in case. Burt holds his ground in the
entryway, and whom we assume to be Kargark moves to confront him. Darcy pulls
out her javelins and gets ready for an ambush or the sounds of horrible human
death up ahead.
Kargark rolls 4 dice and gets 1 hit on Burt. Burt rolls 3
dice and gets 1 strike, and Gyorn rolls and hits 3 times. Gyorn’s dice are hot,
and he gets 18 damage on Kargark with a beautiful strike, felling him instantly.
VICTORY!
There’s one more room to search, and piled along the
north wall are bars and bars and bars of steel ingots. Wow. That entire wagon
must’ve been full of this stuff. This’ll take a couple of trips at least, and
there are weapons here. 3 shields, 17 spears, and 2 battleaxes in excellent
condition and in excellent quality. Nonmagical, but there’s a crossbow and 60
bolts here, too. Crates and clothing and stuff here, too, but none of it is as
dope as the steel stock.
Kargark had a cool mace, and when Darcy picks it up, she’s
like, WHOA, it’s a +1 mace! A +1 mace provides +1 Point of Advantage in this
system, which is neat. We also find some gold and silver pieces, and a ring as
well. The ring’s got a finely cut gem in it, and it’s probably worth a couple
hundred gold crowns. Neato.
Kage runs back to the Keep and fetches a horse, then
rides it out, and we’re able to bring back the steel using the remains of the
beat-up, battle-damaged wagon that it was stolen from. Woo-hoo! Once we bring
back the goods, we find the blacksmith – whose name is Mark – and he pays us
all a bunch of money and we live happily ever after, or at least until next
Tuesday.
