More Goblins for 'We Be Goblins, You Be Food'

This coming weekend, more than half of my group is unavailable for our normal game. I don’t want to send the Rogue and the Barbarian on an adventure all by themselves, so I’m arranging something a little different for this session. Late last year–before the Rogue or the Barbarian joined my gaming group–I ran a free Pathfinder module called “We Be Goblins.” It was immense amounts of fun, and the whole group agrees that we’d like to return to those goblin characters and play some more, but we’ve yet to get around to that. However, since neither of the players attending this session were there when we played through the module the first time, I figure this will be a good opportunity to introduce them to goblin culture.

The adventure was pretty easy with four players, so I don’t imagine it will be overwhelming with only two, and I’m trying to rustle up a third. However, I don’t really want to let these players use three of the four pre-made characters which come with the module. Chuffy, Mogmurch, and Poog. Because if we ever do get around to playing the goblins as a full group, I don’t want more than one person in the group to feel attached to a given character. The guy who played Rita really didn’t like her and has already asked to change characters, but that still leaves two potential players who wouldn’t have characters of their own to play.

To that end I made two new goblins in the same style used in the module: Gork Stabslicer the Barbarian, and Yrt Gutmuncher the Ranger. I even filled both of their inventories with garbage, and wrote little songs for them to sing, like the four original characters had. And given that a lot of people find this site by searching for the module in question, I thought their sheets might be of interest to anyone who will be playing the module with a group of more than four players.

Gork Stabslicer
Male Goblin Barbarian 1
CE Small Goblinoid
Init 4; Senses Perception +5; Darkvision 60ft.

Defenses

AC 21, Flat Footed 16, Touch 16 [10 + Dex(4) + Hide Armor(4) + Size(1) + Dodge(1) + Shield(1)]
hp 14 (1d12 +2)
Fort +4 Ref +4 Will +1

Offense

Speed 40ft
Melee Warhammer + 5 (1d6 + 3 /20 x3)

Stats

Str 16 (+3) Dex 18 (+4) Con 15 (+2) Int 8 (-1) Wis 12 (+1) Cha 9 (-1)
Base Atk +1; CMB +3; CMD 17
Feats Dodge
Goblin Trait Advanced Distraction (1/day use a swift action to gain +2 AC for one round.)
Skills Ride (+8), Stealth (+12), Acrobatics (+8), Perception (+5), Survival (+5)
Languages Goblin
Gear Warhammer, Hide Armor, Light Wooden Shield (Old barrel top), 32 silver pieces, loaf of stale bread, Book with all the pages torn out, 3 iron ladels, pet toad in a birdcage named “lil’ Gork,” a wizard’s hat, a small jar of jelly beans.

Song

Gork like slicing, Gork like stab,
Cut up longshanks into ham!
Make the dogs and children flee,
On their faces I will pee!

Yrt Gutmuncher
Female Goblin Ranger 1
CE Small Goblinoid
Init 4; Senses Perception +6; Darkvision 60ft.

Defenses

AC 19, Flat Footed 15, Touch 15 [10 + Dex(4) + Hide Armor(4) + Size(1)]
hp 11 (1d10 +1)
Fort +3 Ref +6 Will +2

Offense

Speed 30ft
Melee Handaxe + 3 (1d4 + 1 /20 x3)
Ranged Shortbow + 5 (1d4 /20 x3)(60ft)

Stats

Str 13 (+1) Dex 19 (+4) Con 12 (+1) Int 11 (+0) Wis 15 (+2) Cha 7 (-2)
Base Atk +1; CMB +1; CMD 15
Feats Point Blank Shot
Goblin Trait Color Thief (+2 on Stealth checks)
Skills Ride (+8), Stealth (+18), Craft(Fletcher)(+4), Heal(+6), Perception(+6), Survival(+6), Knowledge(Dungeoneering)(+4)
Languages Goblin
Gear Handaxe, Shortbow, 24 arrows, Hide Armor, 40 silver pieces, small steel mirror, Pet Toad “Jog,” Jingle Bells, Dull Shaving Razor, Bundle of 12 rat tails, Empty wine bottle, Wooden holy symbol of Kord

Song

Yrtie fire arrows sharp
Pointies pierce you in the heart!
Axe will rend and tear and bite,
Yrtie hurt all beasts in sight!

Twittertop RPG

I’m pretty active on Twitter. For the longest time I thought a 140 character blog was the dumbest idea ever. After some odd circumstances led me to join it, though, I discovered that it’s less of a blogging service, and more of a giant instant messenger conversation. And while I’m not a huge fan of the kind of self-centric social media which prompts people to write about every mundane event occurring in their lives, I am quite fond of finding new ways to connect with people. I’ve made a number of friends on twitter. Several of whom I would even call very close friends!

One of my Twitter friends is a Scottish kid named @Mocharaid. He’s been a supporter of my writing ever since I first started Comma, Blank_, and often served as a source of encouragement for me in those first few months when my readership was much smaller. He’s never played a tabletop RPG himself, and often pesters me to run one for him. Its become something of a joke between us, but I know he’s really quite anxious to give this type of gaming a try. So the other night, when he was taunting me about how the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are going to be aliens in the next film, I asked him if he wanted me to GM for him. My intent was to crush him with falling rocks the moment he accepted, but then I got to thinking: just how hard wo0uld it be to run a tabletop role playing game on Twitter?

Two or three hours of typing later, I had produced this. It’s completely unrefined, and hasn’t been through a single playtest yet, but I think it could prove fun.

TWITTERTOP RPG

By @LS_GM

Twittertop RPG is a simple adventure role playing game–like Dungeons & Dragons, or Pathfinder, designed to be played on Twitter. Given the extreme limitations of tweets (140 characters) the game is minimalistic in the extreme. But don’t let that fool you into thinking the game lacks options. With a good Game Master, and spirited players, endless amounts of fun is possible.

The Primary Rule of Twittertop RPG is that all game-related actions must fit within a single 140 character tweet, and must begin by being directed at the GM. In my case, that would mean that all tweets relevant to a game session (excepting my own) must begin with “@LS_GM” which is 6 characters long, leaving 134 characters for any actions to be described.

CHARACTERS

Like everything in the game, the character sheet must fit within 140 characters, minus the GM’s name. They should be formatted thusly:

@GM’s_Name [Character Name],Class[Level]([Current Experience Points]);HP[# of max HP],AC[Current AC];ATK+[Attack Roll Modifer]/[# of Damage Points];[Profession];GP[# of gold](SP[Spells[# of times spell may be cast]])[Inventory]

Here is an example:

@LS_GM Magar,Mage0(4);HP2,AC6;ATK+0/1;Carpenter;GP100(SP:Fball3)ProtRing1

This is Magar, a level 0 Mage with 4 experience points. He can take 2 points of damage before death, and an enemy must roll a 6 or above to hurt him. When attacking physically, he does not get to add anything to his roll, and deals one point of damage. He was a carpenter, and has skills related to that field. He currently carries 100 gold pieces. He can cast the spell of Fireball 5 times, and wears a ring of protection +1 which increases his armor class–which is 6, but would normally be 5.

CLASSES

When beginning play, a player must select a class for their character. At level 0, the character gains all of the abilities listed under “First Level,” and “Each level.” At subsequent levels, characters gain only the abilities listed under “Each level.”

Warrior
First Level: +1 AC, +1 attack, can wear armor, attack roll of 10 is a crit.
Each Level: +8 HP, +2 dmg

Rogue
First Level: Can pick locks, can hide in shadows, can attack a distracted or unaware foe with +1 atk, and double damage, attack roll of 10 is a crit.
Each level: +4HP, +1 dmg

Mage
Each Level: +2 HP, can select one spell

Cleric
First Level: Can wear armor
Each Level: +6 HP, can select one spell

LEVELS

All characters start at level 0. The maximum level in Twittertop RPG is 9.

EXPERIENCE POINTS

Each time a character starts a new level, they begin with 0 experience points. As they overcome challenges, the Game Master will grant them experience points. When they recieve their 10th experience point, their level goes up, and their XP returns to 0. This means that experience points should always be represented by only a single digit.

HP

A character sheet always reflects that character’s current max amount of hit points, and their hit points return to max at the start of each new play session. Any time a character takes damage, their hit points will be reduced. If their hit points reach 0, the character is dead.

AC

AC stands for Armor Class. When a character is being attacked, their attacker must roll one 10 sided die, and add their ATK number. If the result equals or exceeds the target’s AC, then the attack is successful and damage is dealt. If the result is lower than the target’s AC, then the attack fails.

Base armor class is 5, and that number can be raised by class abilities, armor, or magic items.

ATTACK

The first number is your attack bonus. When you attempt to physically attack a creature, the GM will roll one 10 sided die, and add this number to see if your attack overcome’s the target’s Armor Class. The second number is the amount of damage the target takes if your attack is successful.

Characters begin play with +0/1, and these numbers are modified by the player’s class, and by any items they hold. A roll of 10 is always successful. For Warriors and Rogues, a roll of 10 also doubles their damage.

PROFESSION

Each character may have one simple profession. When the character attempts a to perform an action which has a chance of failure, and is not related to the character’s class, the GM should judge the effectiveness of the action based on the character’s profession. For example, if a character’s profession is Sailor, then they will be more successful in tying knots, navigating by the stars, or swimming. If a player so pleases, a non-human racial selection can be substituted for their profession, such as Dwarf, Elf, or Kobold. The selection of a profession or race has no effect on mechanics defined elsewhere in this document.

Some possible professions include: Carpenter, Bricklayer, Miner, Sailor, Scribe, Tailor, Blacksmith, Steward, Architect

GP

This is the character’s current gold. All characters start with 0 gold pieces, and may carry may carry up to 999 gold pieces, and use these gold pieces to purchase items.

SPELLS

Only Wizards and Clerics may learn spells. Since spells take up space on their character sheet, this reduces the amount of space which these classes have available for equipment in their inventory.

Both classes learn only one spell per level. The spell must be written on their character sheet the same way it is written here, followed by a number. The number indicates the number of times per day a spell may be cast. A spell may be selected multiple times to increase the number of times per day it can be cast. The first time a spell is selected it may be cast 3 times, the second time it is selected it may be cast 6 times, and the thired time it is selected it may be cast 9 times.

WIZARD SPELLS
Fball – A ball of fire envelops a 10ft radius, dealing 10 damage to all within its area. Caster is immune.
Necro – Raise a dead body as a skeleton under your command.
Tport – Teleport you and any of your allies up to 100ft to a location you can see, or have been to.
Mbolt – Magical bolts of energy fly from your fingertips, dealing 15 damage to a single target. Can be cast from 30ft away.
Ice – Freeze enemies in place for 3 rounds. Target cannot move, but can otherwise act normally.
Haste – Your allies may act twice in this round. You do not gain a second action.
Illus – Create silent illusions.
XRay – See through one wall or door to what is on the other side.

CLERIC SPELLS
Cure – Restore a number of hit points equal to your level.
Heal – Remove diseases, poisons, and other harmful effects.
Turn – Cause undead to cower for 3 rounds.
Smite – Call down the wrath of your god, dealing 15 damage. Must touch foe to accomplish this.
Fear – Foes flee in terror for 1 round.

INVENTORY

Characters begin play with nothing but the clothes on their back. They have no weapons, and no armor. They attack with their fists, and defend by dodging. When a character finds an item, they may add it to their inventory. At the end of each ession of play, the GM should ask for everyone’s character sheets. At this time the player must drop any items which cannot fit into the tweet.

All items must be written into the inventory in the same way they are written when the GM gives them to the player. Some example items include:

ProtRing+1 – A ring which adds 1 to the Armor Class of any who wear it.
Sword+1 – A sword which adds 1 to both attack, and to damage.
Armor+1 – Armor which adds 1 to the Armor Class of any who wear it.
Wand+1 – May cast 1 spell which has already been expended for the day.

GAME MASTER SECTION

Twittertop RPG is a game which relies heavily on the game master. Lacking mechancis for many situations, a Twittertop GM must be able to arbitrate situations liberally. Simple actions should be able to be performed by anyone, while more complex actions should be judged based on the character’s class, profession, or race.

COMBAT

At the start of combat, roll 1d10. If the die is 6 or above, then the players go first. If the die is 5 or below, the player’s foes act first. Allow all members of a given “side” to act before switching to the other group. Each individual within a group is allowed three actions on each turn:

Move: The character can move throughout the battlefield.
Fight: The player may attack or cast spells.
Prepare: The player may prepare a simple non-Fight action, which they will perform on the enemy’s turn IF the enemy meets certain conditions. For example, a Warrior’s prepared action might be “If the zombie tries to move to the Mage, I block him.” while a Mage’s prepared action might be “If the zombie tris to move to me, I run!”

Lacking a visual grid on which to do battle, Twittertop GMs must rely on description to communicate positioning to their players. This means that the tactical combat style found in games like Pathfinder won’t be found here. Instead, allow players to describe how they would like to position themselves relative to an enemy. Warriors will want to stand close, while Mages will want to stand far away. Rogues will want to get behind a foe, and clerics will likely want to move close to whoever needs to be healed. Allow players to move anywhere in the current arena of battle as a “Move” action.

Given how simple it is to create Twittertop RPG characters, combat can be very deadly. If a player reaches 0 hit points, the player is dead, and should create another character to join the party after the combat has ended. Any players who survive combat should be given either 1 or 2 experience points, depending on how difficult the combat was.

Poker Comics: The Natural Order of Things

Today I learned that the newest player at my game table, Poker the Rogue, is an artist. Now I’ve got two of them! The comic above depicts a scene which took place early in his first adventure, when I rolled “Worg” on my random encounter table, and “Wounded” on Trollsmyth’s “Monster Motivation” table. I think the party’s reaction is documented rather well.

Two of the members of my group (both of the artists, actually) have a large interest in ecology. So when one of them mentioned that it might be an invasive species, I confirmed that Worgs (along with any “Magical Beast”) could be considered an unnatural, and thus invasive, species. It was funny to see sympathy for the creature completely dry up once the players realized it was harming the game world’s ecosystem.

The whole exchange took perhaps ten to fifteen minutes of game time, and the fact that it was memorable enough to make a comic about just goes to prove what I’ve always said: the best kind of fun is the kind which players create for themselves. The game included several well crafted NPCs, a dungeon filled with rich lore, and a few very impressive landmarks. But the #1 thing this player latched on to, and wanted to share, was a moment when a randomly-rolled encounter gave birth to some quirky party interaction.

This comic tickles me absolutely pink. I hope there are more of them forthcoming!

A Learning Experience

This past Saturday was a day of firsts for me. It had been awhile since I’d been able to get a group together for a gaming session, so many of the things I’ve been thinking about and writing about got a test-run during this weekend’s game. I edited everyone’s character sheets before the game to make note of their current encumbrance, and I made sure all of my treasure had encumbrance noted. I prepared a few hex-crawl sections for the game, complete with detailed encounter tables. I also made an attempt to include time tracking in my campaign, which I really had no idea how to do, but I tried to work off of some supposition. I also tried a few things which I haven’t written about; including weather in my games, using poker chips to track the party’s resources, and writing down treasure on index cards. I believe those last two were originally proposed by Telecanter.

Like I said, it was an entire day of firsts. Some things worked well, some things didn’t, and most others fell somewhere in between. So now that the game is over, it’s time to review, and revise. Experience is our greatest teacher so long as we take the time to listen to it!

Encumbrance

(Using my Encumbrance system). As I mentioned, I went through everyone’s character sheet and put a red underline under everything which would add to their encumbrance, then put their totals, as well as their light/medium/heavy load ranges on their character sheets. When everyone arrived, I explained the new system to them briefly. I asked them to keep track of their encumbrance during play and let me know if they started carrying a medium or heavy load. I was somewhat surprised that this did not really impact the speed of play even slightly. There were a few conversations about who should carry what, but they were brief, and entirely appropriate. Looking over their character sheets now (this group always leaves their sheets with me, for some reason. It’s not something I normally require), it seems like everybody did a good job. I can tell that the number was erased and increased whenever appropriate.

I don’t feel as though the system has been sufficiently stress-tested, though. Nobody is yet carrying anything other than a light load, so penalties have not come into play. However, for now, I’m completely satisfied with my encumbrance system, and look forward to seeing it in action more often.

Resource Tracking with Poker Chips

I actually did talk about this once before, way back in November when I said I didn’t like it. But the more I’ve thought about it, the more it seems completely reasonable, and the less my objections seemed to be relevant. That’s what I get for doubting Telecanter’s genius. I used white poker chips to represent arrows (and gave the ranger 24, which I only just now remember should have been included in his encumbrance. Whoops!), red poker chips to represent torches/lantern oil, and blue poker chips to represent rations. I had a large bowl on the table where everyone could toss their chips when they consumed a resource, and pull them out when they renewed that resource.

It worked fantastically. Better than fantastically; it worked perfectly! Everyone quickly got into the habit of tossing their rations into the bowl at the end of the day. They even did it when I forgot to tell them to. The ranger and I both forgot to toss his arrows in the bowl, but that’s only because it took a few hours for the party to engage anything in combat. Tracking torches has been a little bit trickier, but only because of my difficulties relating to…

Time Tracking

(Using my suppositions on the subject) Time tracking didn’t work as well as it could have, but it didn’t not work. During the first few hours of the game, while the party was hex crawling, I kept track of the when the day began and ended, which I think is plenty. I didn’t really take into account any time spent in combat, in town, or otherwise interacting with NPCs, but maybe that’s unnecessary. Later in the game, once the party entered the dungeon, my original plan was to keep track of time in 10 minute turns. I was only somewhat successful in this. I took a page from Magic: The Gathering and used a 12 sided die to keep track of time. After the first 10 minutes, I set it in front of me with the 1 facing up. After another 10 minutes passed, I turned it to 2, and so on. Once it hit 12 I would note that two hours had passed, and start the count over. When I decided to turn it was this issue. I typically assumed that each combat required enough rest afterwards to count as 10 minutes, and that if the players spent more than a few moments in a room it should count for 10 minutes. I also moved the counter up twice when the rogue took 20 on a perception check to find traps.

The whole thing felt messy, but I’m not entirely certain how I could do it better. This will require further in-game experience to fully evaluate.

Weather

I totally spaced on this. Didn’t even mention it during the game, let alone have it affect combat in any way. GM fail.

Treasure on Index Cards

I believe this is something I first red on Telecanter’s blog. Before the game I spent $1.18 on a pack of 300 index cards. Anytime I added a pile of treasure or a chest into my notes, I would write everything down on an Index card. A typical card would be headed with something like “Crypt of Bonegut the Stone Fisted; Chest in room 8” and would include the number of gold pieces, gems, and other oddities the characters found. I also wrote a number in red next to any item which would increase a player’s encumbrance.

I really think these cards improved play by a great deal. Anytime they made a discovery, I’d toss a card over the GM screen, and one of them would read off the items to the others. It was really fun to hear them wonder “what are these bottles of blue liquid?” (Healing Potions), and “A stick with a tiny ruby at the tip!?” (Wand of Fireball with 3 charges left). Fortunately the party’s sorceress, Phoenix Dark, was more than capable of identifying all of these objects. Having something visual seemed to help the players in dividing up the loot amongst themselves, and I really don’t think my encumbrance system would have worked anywhere near as well without these cards.

Obviously it would be more difficult to use these in randomly generated dungeons, but they were so useful in this game that they will certainly have a place in any future games I run.

Hex Crawling

(Using my thoughts on how to make travel more engaging, as well as my thoughts on creating an encounter table.) This did not go so well. At least I don’t think so. The players understood the concept well enough, and I won’t say that anyone appeared to be excessively bored. But with all the rolling, marking down of terrain type, and slowly moving the piece one hex at a time, I think everyone was getting a little impatient. More than once the player who was controlling the party’s marker would absentmindedly move it several spaces at once, which says to me that they were more eager to reach their destination than they were to know what they encountered while getting there.

I believe that part of the issue may have been the way I was marking down the terrain type. A friend of mine got me a nice table-sized, wet-erase hex map for Christmas, so I gave the party a little red bead to represent themselves with, and had them move one hex at a time. Once they entered a hex, I would quickly use one of my markers to identify what the terrain type of the hex was. It was a clumsy method of doing things. One of my players suggested that I let her mark the map, which now seems like a much better idea. It would both involve the players more in the process, and would force me to verbally identify each terrain type (which I was failing to do after awhile.)

If anybody has advice on this, or perhaps an audio recording of a successful hex crawl, I would be very appreciative.

Skills

This isn’t exactly new, but it is something I learned. The more I play with skills, the more I agree with my friends in the OSR movement: the elaborate skills system used in Pathfinder is bad. It’s better than D&D 3.5’s, but it’s still in severe need of being redesigned. Not only does it serve as a source of confusion for new players, but it can be a pain-in-the-ass during play. Having the rogue roll to search for traps at every door quickly became a source of exasperation. And often when I knew I “should” be asking for skill checks, I instead simply allowed players to perform tasks. The sorceress was able to identify magic items, the Ranger with Knowledge(Dungeoneering) was able to identify statues of gnomes as being real gnomes under a petrification spell, etc. I’m not ready to completely abandon a skill system, but I’ll certainly be devoting some attention to it in the coming months.

Funny Story…

That’s everything I’d like to share about what I learned from this most recent game. However, before ending this post, I would like to share one funny story / word of warning for other GMs.

The first boss in my dungeon was a skeletal orc with some fancy fighter abilities. When the players entered the room, it would be lying dead on a slab the way a good corpse should. On the floor around it was scattered a great deal of treasure. The idea was that the players would recognize that as soon as they touched the treasure, the orc would come alive and attack them. So they’d prepare themselves for battle, and carefully grab some of the treasure. When the orc never stirred, they’d figure they were wrong, and go on their way. 20 minutes AFTER they took the treasure, the Orc skeleton would come alive, and start hunting for them in the dungeon. It would be particularly good if he found them whilst they were engaged with some other creature.

When my players finally enter this room, they suspect a trap. So my party’s rogue, Poker, inspects the stone slab the orc is lying on. This I had not expected. Given that rogues receive the “trapfinding” ability at level one, which allows them to detect and disable magical traps, I figured the rogue might have a chance to notice something was amiss here. I told him that he detected a very faint, dormant necromatic aura. Upon hearing this, my players did the logical thing:

The Ranger, whose favored enemy was undead, smashed the skeleton’s head with his sword.

All I could do was bury my face in my hands and give the ranger 3 XP for killing the boss.

Behind the GM's Screen: ToKiTiMo 3

First thing is first: If you are one of the four people playing in my ToKiTiMo campaign, you should not read this post. It contains information from this past Saturday’s game, as well as information which may be used in future sessions. I believe at least two of the players in that game do check this blog occasionally, and reading this post will ruin some of the game’s upcoming surprises. Fortunately for me, I don’t play with any child-minded buffoons who would actually cheat at a tabletop RPG, so I can rely on the honor system for this kinda thing.

Moving on; I recently got around to doing what most other GMs did back in the 90s: I started preparing my game notes on a computer rather than by hand. It was a difficult decision. I’ve always loved the tactile feeling of a pencil scratching across paper. Plus, since I don’t own a printer, it saved me a trip to Office Max and a few dollars on prints. The downside, though, is that it can be difficult to make changes. Sometimes mistakes can force you to scrap an entire page and need to re-write it. And with the way I grip pencils, my hand tends to cramp up after a few minutes, which limited the progress I could make in a given evening.

Plus I type about four times as fast as I can write on paper, so there’s that.

Anyway, now that my games are neither trapped on sheets of paper, nor written in indecipherable chicken-scratch, it occurs to me that I can easily share them. The question is: should I share them? Is this something people would be interested in reading? I certainly have fun writing it, but whether anyone else is interested in them is something of a mystery to me. I think I would like to read other GM’s game notes. I could certainly learn a thing or two from GMs who are better than I. And, hell, if somebody wants, there’s no reason they couldn’t just run my adventure for their own group. That last part might just be my ego talking, but I like to pretend that people find my small contributions to gaming helpful.

So here’s the deal: below is act 1 of the third adventure in my ToKiTiMo campaign. Or, if you’d rather, you can download all three acts of the adventure as a PDF file. If you read it, leave a comment. Let me know if you enjoyed it, and if you’d like me to continue posting my adventures. And if you’d rather I not do this again, speak up! I can take criticism, and if nobody tells me they hate this, I’m going to keep doing it.

ACT 1: Journey to Overton

Part 1: Mahudar Kosopske’s Tower

When the previous adventure ended, the players had just returned from the goblin village with the special tree branch the gnomish wizard would need in order to ward the town of Honon against fire. He allowed them to stay the night, and to drink from his curative fountain to restore their health. The game will begin the following morning.

In the morning, Mahudar is eager to begin his journey to Honon. He ushers the players out of his tower. As he locks the tower, he asks the players if they have any pressing engagements. Assuming they say no, he asks them if they would like to do some work for him. If they agree, read the following text.

“There is an artifact–a small golden orb–which I would like you to retrieve. It’s an item of great importance to the gnomish peoples, but is hidden deep within an underground keep which is warded against our entry. Despite my best efforts, I was never able to dispel them. You lot seem to be trustworthy folk, and as humans the wards would have no effect on you. If you would retrieve this artifact for me, I would reward you handsomely.”

He intends to pay each party member 200 gold for their trouble, and will allow them to keep or sell anything they find. If the players Haggle, Mahudar offers only moderate resistance. We still want to encourage haggling. He will go no higher than 400 gold pieces.
If the players do not mention it themselves, Mahudar offers them 4 days rations, which he pulls from his bag of holding. In the future, rations should be up to the players, but I haven’t been strict about ration tracking in the past, so they should not be punished for not thinking of it this time.
Since Mahudar used “teleport” in the last game, they may ask for one. He has not prepared it that day, and he must begin his travels to Honon immediately, so unless they wish to accompany him that far, he cannot help them. If they press, he will require payment for the spell (8,000 gold).

When the players ask how to get there, read the following text.

“You will first need to travel to Overton. Two miles south of my tower is the river Bynt. Follow its northern bank through the forest. Overton is built where the Bynt meets the mighty River Yosregal. Your journey should take no more than four days time if you don’t stray. In Overton you can rest and resupply. Once you are ready, seek out the man known as Geary Therman, and ask him to direct you to Ursnol, a gnomish settlement a few days travel from Overton. In Ursnol, you will have no trouble finding a guide to lead you the rest of the way to the dungeon entrance. After that, you will be on your own.”

Part 2: Hex Crawl

The area between Mahudar Kosopske’s Tower and Overton has long been the domain of a tribe of Gnolls, known as The Spotted Bull tribe, which is led by a minotaur named Korakus. Recently, an evil Wizard named Dheef Gason moved into a nearby dungeon. He has been using unholy magics to merge captured Gnolls with his Ogre servants. He sets the twisted abominations free in the forest, and they have gathered into a loose society, directing their rage at anyone they find.

While winding through the hilly hexes, the river is at the bottom of steep hills on both sides. This makes it a great place for an ambush if combat is rolled. This first leg of the journey will work off one encounter table for the hills, forest, and plains hexes.

Remember to track the character’s food closely. Also track their movement (they should have 24 movement points if they do not attempt to acquire a mount.) Lastly, make sure Rosco (the ranger) rolls survival to avoid getting lost, in accordance with this table:

Terrain	Examples	Movement Cost	Becoming Lost
Easy	road	4	No Check
Average	clear, city, grasslands, trail*	6	Survival DC: 10
Moderate	forest, hills, desert, badlands	8	Survival DC: 15
Difficult	mountains, jungle, swamp	12	Survival DC: 20

Weather: Day 1 is Cloudy and Windy, Day 2 is Rainy and Windy, Day 3 is Rainy, Day 4 is Sunny, Day 5 is Sunny, Day 6 is Cloudy, Day 7 is Sunny

Time Tracking: This is the first game in which we will be tracking time. For simplicity’s sake, the adventure will start on the first day, of the first month, of the 3999th year of the common era. Day, Week, and Month names can be determined at a later date, but start keeping track now of how many days have passed.

Kobold Adventuring Party: In the first adventure, the players attacked a Kobold encampment. Despite being given an opportunity to negotiate, they attacked. 6 survivors, separated from their clan, have vowed vengeance on the party. They are stalking them. They will not attack the players outright, as they have not yet become powerful enough. However, they do attempt to lay deadly traps along the party’s suspected paths.

Undead: A lich named Erstic Von Kolt lives not to terribly far from here, though he is not along the projected hex path. Years ago, while he was still alive, he passed through this area and created a number of undead goblins. He’s long since forgotten about them, and they roam aimlessly now. If the players investigate the undead, they might discover a distinctive mark on all of their chests. Showing that mark to anyone in a leadership role will get the players some basic information on the lich.

Part 2 Subsection A: Random Encounters

Each day, roll twice. Once for the morning, once for the evening. Roll a third time for the evening, but only accept results which have mobility (such as monsters). All other results for the nighttime roll should be considered “Nothing of particular interest occurs.”

Monsters: When rolling a monster, use Trollsmyth’s purpose chart. 2d4 for bestial monsters, 1d10 for intelligent monsters:

1. Diplomacy
2. Patrolling Territory
3. Hurt
4. Horny
5. Hungry
6. Napping
7. Fighting (Roll again to see which creatures it is fighting.)
8. Home
9. Raiding
10. Art

Kobold Traps

1. 10ft deep pits. Perception DC: 16
2. Trip wires onto leaf-covered sharp sticks. Perception DC: 17, Attack +8, 1d6 damage.
3. Snare. Perception DC: 18. Failure causes characters to be pulled up 10ft off the ground.
4. Falling tree. Reflex save DC: 14 or be hit for 4d6 bludgeoning damage, and be trapped under the tree until you can be rescued.

Part 2 Subsection B: Fixed Locations

Garok Torar

This dungeon is represented by a dungeon icon in the center of the forest, one hex north of the river, and two hexes east of the large mountain. Parties entering this hex have a 10% chance to encounter this location.

Garok Torar is a collection of ruins in a large clearing. Made of blue-white stone, the ruins are heavily overgrown now, and no structure save one rises above the first floor–or even has a roof. In the center of the ruins, however, is a larger building. A stairway leads up to the large double-doored entrance–though the doors are long gone. Within appears to be some manner of courthouse, or other official building. In the large central room, an ornate staircase winds downwards.

The staircase leads to the first sub level of a 3-level dungeon. This is where the wizard Dheef Gason has taken up residence. His ogre minions can be commonly encountered throughout all of Garok Torar.

Mount Suvisar

The tallest mountain in the region is located near the western edge of the forest, next to the clearing where Overton can be found. The mountain is heavily forested. It is a little known fact that this is where the roost of Kolgoth’Ronnomaktar The Red can be found.

Castle Nalew

This mega dungeon extends 6 levels above ground level, and 15 levels underground, ending in entrances tot he underdark. However, it is currently sealed up tight, and none know how to enter it. It can be found on the southern edge of the Overton fields. Locals know of it, but none have ever been within its walls.

Part 3: Overton

CN Large Town (Population: 3k; 98% Human, 2% Half Elf, 1 Gnoll) Government: Mayor

Basic Info
Overton is built at the joining of two rivers. The town subsists primarily as a fishing village, but also serves as the central hub for the many frontiersmen who live and work in the nearby forest. It also trades with the gnoll and elvish tribes which live there. The people are generally friendly and honest, but hard from a life in the wilderness. The town’s official patron deity is Obad-Hai, but the town’s population is not particularly devout.

Services Available
Carpenter, Butcher, Blacksmith, Small temple (Obad-Hai), Brothel (“The Comely Castle”), Alchemist’s Shop (“The Crimson Elixer”), Stable (6 horses for sale, left by previous adventuring party who didn’t come back), General Store, river transport, tavern/Inn, leatherworker, tanner.
Town’s Total Purchasing: 4k gold

Notable NPCs
Geary Therman – The town’s mayor. A broad-shouldered huntsman with graying temples. Highly respected, always willing to do manual labor, and to help those in need, even outsiders. Tends to be anywhere he’s needed within the town. When the players ask for him, he’s on the docks talking to Ester Thomas about fur prices.
Hyerman Devon – Manager of the general store. One of the scrawniest men in Overton, but polite and willing to haggle. Sticker price is a few gold more than normal costs.
Old Berman – The high priest at the temple of Obad-Hai. Able to cast 4th level spells. Is not very friendly to those who do not follow his god. Will help for a hefty price, unless anyone offends him or his nature deity.
Melina Ayvon – Wizard in charge of the alchemist’s shop. Sells a variety of concoctions, and able to sell 2nd level spells for a fee. Acts more like a wheedling salesperson than a scholarly wizard. If the players seem capable, she might ask them if they want to find a rare herb for her
Anita Whyk – Half-elven Madam at the Comely Castle. Works as an information broker on the side. Advanced in age now, she still cuts a dashing figure, but does not work herself. She’s protective of the sex workers she employs. She’s a little distracted because one of her girls is missing. (Detective sidequest. she was taken by Gnolls. will be dead by day 7)
Ester Thomas – Ferry captain. A six-and-a-half foot tall woman with beefy arms and a bellowing laugh. She can be brutish and rude, but she’s much smarter than she lets on. She and her sailors are spending a week at rest in Overton whilst they wait for a delivery of animal furs to take south.
Bittereye – Geary Therman’s old hunting companion, a gnoll whose tribe is no more. He helps barter with the nearby gnoll tribes, and serves as an enforcer for the town guard when they need some extra muscle. Doesn’t want players help locating missing brothel girl.

When the players eventually seek out Geary Therman, he’s only too happy to direct them where they need to go. Read the following text:

“Well, easy way is ta cross th’ river here, and hoof it due west until you reach The Forest Queen–that’s a big hulkin’ statue of an elf lady. Can’t miss it. From her, ye can go north until ye reach th’ grasslands. Follow them nor-east. Iffun ye reach the forest’s edge, ye’ve gone too far.”

And that’s Act 1. If you’re interested enough that you’d like to read more, you can download the entire adventure. It’s 22 pages long if you include the three maps. And don’t forget to let me know if you would like for me to continue doing this!

Goblins Redux Illustrated

Way back in November I wrote about a game session in a post which I had entitled Goblins Redux. To quickly recap, it was a Zalekios Gromar game, which is usually one-on-one with me and the GM, but since my ladyfriend had moved in with me we wanted to get her involved in the game. Rather than creating a level 12 character to join in, however, she suggested that she play the four level 1 goblins from Pathfinder’s “We Be Goblins” module. The game ended up being extremely entertaining, and she even described it as “the most fun I think I’ve ever had playing D&D.”

She recently made this drawing of the campaign’s final encounter. There were these large flying dragon-things which Zalekios was fighting. Being level 1, nobody really expected the Goblins to be much help. That is, until Mogmurch managed to throw an alchemical bomb directly into the creature’s mouth. The act was so remarkable that even though we decided against leveling the goblins up, it has been decided that Mogmurch will forever after get a +4 bonus when attempting to throw something into a small space. I thought my readers might get a kick out of the drawing. And if you do like it, you can check out more of her work on her deviantart page.

By the way, I was totally planning to do an April Fool’s Day post. It was going to be about how one of my players accidentally bought the 4th edition rulebook instead of Pathfinder, and asked if I would give it a try since they spent all that money on it. I would then extol the virtues of the system, and how I had completely misunderstood it previously. In the end I decided that I really needed to use this weekend to recuperate some of my energy and finally get around to doing my taxes–and I didn’t even do that latter part! I’ll just have to plan something really original for next year…

How Players Make Enemies & Influence People

In my experience, NPCs are an underutilized element in most role playing games. They serve a few very limited, very one dimensional roles. That NPC is a quest giver, those NPCs are vendors, and this NPC is a villain. GMs tend either to treat NPCs as “their” characters (a bad idea), or as static game world elements which exist to serve the player. The king would never be found outside of his throne room unless it serves a specific purpose. And once an NPC’s immediate usefulness has ended, or the players have moved on to a new location, the NPC’s notes are filed away, or crumpled up and forgotten. This later method isn’t entirely bad, it’s just not as good as it can be. The basic premise of it is true: non-player characters exist for the sole purpose of serving the players in one way or another. The trick, though, is that the players shouldn’t realize the NPCs exist only to serve them. There are a number of ways to accomplish this which I may discuss at a later time, but for today I’d like to discuss Contacts and Foes.

One of my favorite GMing tricks is one which I admittedly stole out of the online comic Goblins by Tarol Hunt. When I’m first dealing with a group of new players, I like to start things out on the stereotypical side. Taverns, villages under attack, or any typical plot hook will do. Eventually this hook will lead the players to a tribe of typical level 1 monstrous humanoids, such as Kobolds, Goblins, Orcs, etc. Now I should point out that I always go out of my way to avoid having these creatures be responsible for anything evil, and I make sure to drop four or five hints that negotiation is an option. Most of the time, the players assume these creatures are evil, and attack. And in another GM’s game, this might be the right choice, but in my games the only creatures which are evil incarnate are creatures like demons or devils. In matter of fact, the creatures the players are attacking are usually neutral. The creatures defend their home, and then they die. I then point out to my players that they, not the monsters, were the aggressors in this situation. I don’t force any alignment change or anything like that, I simply let the players know that, in the future, they’ll want to pay more attention to the specifics of a situation. It’s a learning experience for them, and the hope is that they apply their learning to all aspects of the game. Players who pay attention are players who survive.

The game moves on without the players being aware of the secret penalty I’ve given them. A group of creatures escaped the destruction of their tribe, and have vowed revenge. After acquiring a few class levels, they’ll hunt the PCs down, and attack them at a later date.

If you think about it, players are making friends and enemies every day. Every person they kill is a person that other people card about. Every plan the players foil is a plan other people were invested in. Every treasure they recover is a treasure other people want. And it works the other way as well! Every person the players help is a potential ally in the future. That doesn’t mean that every creature the players encounter ought to show up at a later time, that would just be a clusterfuck of self referential bullshit. But if a character is interesting, or a quest is particularly engaging for the players, you can reintroduce those elements into your game in a completely different place an time.

Not only does this give your game world more coherence, but it enhances the player’s sense that they’re having an impact on the world. Just don’t make the mistake of expecting your players to remember your pet NPC. I recently made that mistake myself by assuming my players would remember a halfling scout named Tacha. When they first met her she had been a bandit, but after briefly joining the PCs’ party, she decided to settle down. When she had been in the game, they players had loved her, and talked about her for several days afterwords. But even that level of involvement in the character didn’t mean they remembered her when they encountered her as the captain of a city’s guard a few years later.

Magical Marvels 6: Succubic Shield

Going through some old notes recently, I discovered the character sheet for a succubus named Setya. She’s the mother of the notorious Zalekios Gromar, and a former general in the Blood War under Malcanthet. After being taken as a prisoner of war, she was disgraced in her lady’s eyes, and ventured to the material plane to seek redemption. It was there that she sired Zalekios, and began shaping him into a paragon of chaos, which she hoped would please Malcanthet. On the character sheet I found a number of magical items I had created specifically for Setya, including this shield which I thought was interesting enough to share with all of you.

Succubic Shield
Heavy Reinforced-Silver Shield

PHYSICAL PROPERTIES

AC Bonus +4 [Shield(2) + Deflection Enchantment(2)]
Construction The shield is composed of silver, reinforced by mithril.
Weight 25lb
Arcane Spell Failure Chance 15%
Armor Check Penalty -1
(Shield Spike)(Attack) (Treat as one-handed, martial weapon)
(Shield Spike)(Damage) 1d6 (Piercing)(20/x2)

SPECIAL ABILITIES

Anyone who takes damage from the shield spike must make a DC 17 fortitude save. Failure indicates that the shield successfully inserts a tiny demonic parasite into the victim. This parasite immediately bestows one negative level on the victim. The parasite then remains dormant for 9 months before it awakens. The host is then entitled to another DC 17 fortitude save, or the parasite bestows another negative level on the host, before going dormant for another 9 months. This continues until either the host is dead, or the parasite is destroyed. The parasite cannot be discovered by divination magics. Removal of the parasite is difficult. The simplest method is to cast a spell of 6th level or higher with the [Good] descriptor on the host. However, if the host is able to save against three of the parasite’s level drains in a row, the parasite dies of starvation.

APPEARANCE

The surface of the shield is deeply embossed with intricate imagery. The center of the shield is dominated by a man, depicted as helpless against a flock of succubi which surround him. Each entices him in different ways: power, wealth, numerous permutations of lust. The shield spike extends from between the man’s legs, and is engraved to resemble a phallus–though the conical spike shape is not significantly altered by these engravings.

WHERE IT CAN BE FOUND

A succubic shield is an item of exceeding rarity. They are only forged for those succubi who both participate in the blood war, and who choose to do so as members of the martial classes rather than as spellcasters. In all likelihood, the only way a party would encounter an item such as this would be to participate in the Blood War themselves. However, a handful of mortals, after doing just that, have managed to return to the material plane with a succubic shield. So in rare cases, it is possible to encounter these items in treasure hordes, or collections or rarities. It is also possible that one might encounter a succubus on the material plane who carries a succubic shield.

BACKGROUND

Mortals live and die. Empires rise and fall. Planets are born only to crumble again into nothingness. Even planes occasionally fold into themselves, or merge with other planes, reshaping the face of existence. And through it all, the Blood War rages on. The wild hordes of the abyss clash with the regiments of the nine hells without end. Sometimes one gains the advantage, sometimes the other, yet neither can ever hold it for long enough to claim victory. Neither side can relent, nor would either side ever want to. Only the gods remember when the conflict began, and not even they can guess what would happen if it ended. Some surmise that all war is merely a reflection of this one eternal conflict–others think that preoccupation with the Blood War is all that stops either side from completely overrunning the rest of the multiverse.

Every type of demonic and diabolic creature is represented in this conflict. From the mighty balors, to the lowly quaists, every vile creature has a role to play, including succubi. On this merciless battlefield, however, the seductive charms of a succubus are of little use. Most relegate themselves to supporting roles, serving as scouts and spies. Many others tap into their innate sorcerous abilities to serve as battlecasters. Some few succubi prefer to get their hands dirty. Those few train themselves in the skills of martial combat–often as anti-paladins–and wade into the thick of combat swinging a sword or flail. It was for these fearsome warriors that the succubic shield was first commissioned.

Designed by a succubus anti-paladin who had risen to the rank of general; the succubic shield pays homage to the succubus’ primary skillset–with a cruel twist. Oftentimes those injured by this shield’s wicked spike overhear a mumbled comment about “sticking it in,” or “just the tip.” The demonic creatures take great delight in inflicting a deadly ‘pregnancy’ in others, though they rarely speak about it in mixed company. Even with other demons they are cautious, hoping that the long gestation period of the parasite will prevent anyone from realizing that it is their shields which plants it. The secret of the shield’s construction is a closely guarded secret as well, known only to a handful of smiths on the 570th layer of the Abyss.

Note: This entire post is completely overshadowed by Tim Wright’s remarkable succubus art. Damn.

Colorful Characters 15: Mahudar Kosopske

The premature child which was left in the desert had no name. When he was born, he was tiny and weak, and could not easily draw breath on his own. The elders of the gnomish clan into which the child was born deemed him unfit to survive the harsh life of a desert nomad. As was their custom, they left the child in the desert to fend for itself, comforting themselves with the thought that if the gods wished the child to live, they would protect him. As they continued on their way, leaving the child behind them, they sang a grim song beseeching the gods protect the child, or grant him a painless entrance into their midst.

No one expected the gods to grant the former.

As it happened, a traveling adventuring party was crossing the desert in search of the entrance to an ancient dungeon. The party’s bard, a half elf named Arhood, heard the child’s cries in the wee hours of the morning, before the group began its daily march. He separated from his band to search for the source of the noise, and stumbled upon the nameless baby at the same time that a dire scorpion found it. The bard was still new to adventuring, and was not yet an experienced swordsman, but he leaped into battle against the scorpion just the same. The battle was brutal. By the time he thrust the broken hilt of his rapier into the scorpion’s belly, Arhood’s delicate half elven frame was covered in cuts and poisoned wounds. It was hours before his companions found him, legs trapped beneath the scorpion’s body, arms protectively around the young gnomish child.

Fortuitously, Arhood traveled with a paladin of Iomedae who was able to cure his wounds, and return him from the brink of death. But the bard’s once fair features were now crisscrossed with puckered scars, and splotches of discoloration from the dire scorpion’s poison. Arhood, a master of the seductive arts, grieved for his lost beauty. But he did not allow it to lessen his concern for the child he had found. He and his companions, hoping to find the child’s family, returned to the village from whence they had set out to inquire if anyone had lost the child. None recognized the child, but the party did learn that it was customary fro many desert nomads to abandon weak children.

An orphanage in the town offered to take the child in, but Arhood would not have it. Even his companions tried to convince him that the orphanage would be better than the life of an adventurer for the child. The bard replied:

“Perhaps it is foolish of me to think I can care for this child, but if we cannot find his family, then let my scars be an oath which binds me to him. I will raise him as my own.” Arhood purchased some milk from a wet nurse, and the party returned their attention to the desert, and the ancient dungeon they had been searching for. They found it, and plundered its depths. Arhood, who had previously preferred to participate more directly in battles, relegated himself to providing support to his compatriots with his magical songs. It took several days for the group to penetrate to the deepest levels of the dungeon, but when they did, Arhood made an amazing discovery: a book detailing the life of a hero who had long been forgotten. The bard penned a number of songs based on what he read of the heroes life, which would later bring him great fame. More importantly, however, he saw a connection between the life of the hero and the life of the child. Both had been forgotten, both had been found by him, and both–he decided–would be named Mahudar Kosopske.

Arhood raised Mahudar on the road, despite everyone’s objection that it was too dangerous. He none the less took the child’s safety seriously. There were a few close calls, but the group was strong, and took cares to protect the child. The entire group took on responsibility for the child’s education. The child’s first lessons of history and mathematics came during periods of rest in torchlit dungeon rooms, hastily barricaded against intruders so the party could get some much needed rest.They soon discovered that despite the young boy’s weak body, he had an almost unbelievably keen mind. He took particularly well to Daryl’s lessons on the nature of magic, and was even managing a few simple cantrips by the time he reached adolescence.

Everyone agreed that the young man should be given an opportunity to study the magical arts in greater detail. Daryl enjoyed her time teaching the boy, but he had his own research to pursue. That, in combination with the task of adventuring, and resting each day to recover his spellcasting energy, left him with precious little time. Certainly not enough time to turn the fledgling caster into a wizard. They consulted with Mahudar, and decided that the best course of action would be to let the boy remain in the town where the party kept its base of operations. There he could attend a wizard’s academy and receive the education his intellect demanded. It was a tearful parting–the group had spent many years living as closely as a family, but all knew that it was for the best.

Mahudar studied there for many years, and excelled amongst his classmates. But he never forgot the adventuring life of his early years. Staying in a single place, not being threatened by monsters daily, seemed entirely alien to him. His classmates often sought him out for tales of life on the road, and he was happy to relive some of his more exciting memories for them, but throughout this entire education he was restless. When Arhood and the other party members would return to town to rest from an adventure, he would stay with them, and inquire as to their exploits, eager even for second-hand adventure. Soon after he gained mastery over the basic tenants of the arcane, Mahudar left the academy, and returned tot he road with Arhood and the rest of the adventuring party.

The group continued adventuring for a number of years. Mahudar proved himself a valuable asset to the team, and advanced quickly, guided by Daryl. But Mahudar was reckless. His lifetime of experience had accustomed him to the danger, and as a child he’d never had to worry about defending himself. The others always took care of him. Now that he had power of his own, he felt invincible. The others tried to reign him in, and teach him caution, but each successful encounter only left Mahudar more cocky. It was only a matter of time until something dreadful befell him. Which, in this case, took the form of an axe-wielding troll lopping off the young gnome’s leg at the knee. The healing of his companions saved him from bleeding to death, but their magics were insufficient to restore his leg.

Mahudar, sobered by the loss of his leg, took his leave of the party. He traveled several days South East of the party’s stronghold within the city, and constructed a tower for himself where he could retire. Since that time he has devoted himself fully to the study of magic, breaking only to help those who seek him out for aid.

Personality

Mahudar is a cheerful fellow, but he prefers to be left alone these days. Which isn’t to say that he’s unfriendly, merely solitary. You can expect him to put up barriers to prevent people from dealing with him (hiding his tower behind an illusion, forcing those who visit to pass through a number of challenges, etc.) but it’s unlikely any of his tests would harm anyone, and if someone does reach him, he tries to be a courteous host. And he never turns down anyone in need, even if they don’t have the coin to pay him full market value for his spellcasting ability. He may not always help in the way one expects, however.

Tactics

Mahudar is a wizard, and prefers to lean on his spells if he is in danger. His preference is to avoid combat entirely, either by confusing his foes, or escaping from them. If he is trapped and forced to fight, however, he will attempt to confuse his foes, hide from them, and use damaging spells to attack without being noticed.

Thoughts on Use

I use Mahudar in one of my games as a low level quest objective/quest giver. The party needs a magical spell cast (either for themselves, or for another questgiver) and they go to Mahudar. Once Mahudar tests & helps them, he can give them a new quest, such as recovering a magic item for him. He’s a useful fixture for low-level characters to rely on, providing item crafting services, and spellcasting.

Mahudar Kosopske (CR 10)
XP: 9,600
Male Gnome Wizard 11
NG small humanoid
Init +3; Senses Low-Light Vision; Perception +6

Defenses

AC 14, Flat Footed 11, Touch 14 [10 + Dex(3) + Size(1)] (+4 Dodge v. Giants)
SR 19
hp 77 (11d6 +33)
Fort +6 Ref +6 Will +11 (+2 to disbelieve Illusions)

Offense

Speed 10ft (Due to Peg Leg)
Wizard Spells Prepared (CL 11th; Concentration +16; +1 save DC for Illusion spells)
5th– Baleful Polymorph, Polymorph, Cone of Cold
4th– Beast Shape II, Stoneskin, Dimensional Door, Phantasmal Killer
3rd– Gaseous Form, Dispel Magic, Slow, Fireball
2nd– Fox’s Cunning, Alter Self, Alter Self, Invisibility, Shatter
1st– Expeditious Retreat, Hold Portal, Mage Armor, Magic Missile, Magic Missile
0 (at will)– Mending, Read Magic, Message, Ray of Frost, Detect magic
Wizard Spells Available Mahudar has good library of spellbooks available to him in his tower, containing any spell from the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, level 5 and below. As well as a number of specialty spells which he has researched himself.
School Transmutation
Opposition Schools Necromancy, Divination
Transmuter Abilities
Physical Enhancement (Su)— +3 Bonus to one physical ability score (Str, Con, Dex) Can switch bonus to a different ability score every morning when spells are prepared. Currently applied to: DEXTERITY.
Telekinetic Fist (Sp)— 8/day, may attack a foe within 30 feet with a ranged touch attack. Fist deals 1d4+5 bludgeoning damage.
Change Shape(Sp)–For 11 rounds each day, Mahudar may change his shape as with the beast shape II or elemental body I spells. Rounds do not need to be consecutive.
Gnomish Spell-Like Abilities (Save DC: 14)
1/day–Dancing Lights, Ghost Sound, Prestidigitation, Speak with Animals

Stats

Str 5 (-3) Dex 17 (+3) Con 16 (+3) Int 20 (+5) Wis 18 (+4) Cha 17 (+3)
Base Atk +5; CMB +1; CMD 14
Feats Scribe Scroll, Metamagic: Heighten Spell, Metamagic: Extend Spell, Craft Magic Arms and Armor, Brew Potion, Forge Ring, Metamagic: Widen Spell,
Skills Acrobatics(+6), Bluff (+14), Craft(Bows)(+15), Disguise(+9), Knowledge(Arcana)(+19), Knowledge(Geography)(+13), Knowledge(History)(+14), Knowledge(Planes)(+15), Linguistics(+12), Perception(+6), Ride(+7), Sleight of Hand(+10), Spellcraft(+19), Stealth(+7)
Languages Common, Elven, Gnoll
Gear Robes of Spell Resistance 19, Ring of Friend Shield (Mated with Arhood’s), Figurine of Wondrous Power: Obsidian Steed

Familiar: Kochrin

Tiny Animal
Init +2; Senses low-light vision; Perception +5
AC 19, touch 14, flat footed 17 [10 + Dex(2) + natural(5) + size(2)]
hp 4 (1d8)
Fort +2; Ref +4; Will +1
Speed 30ft, Climb 30ft
Melee bite +4 (1d3 – 4 plus)
Space 2 and 1/2 ft.; Reach 0ft
Str 3 Dex 15 Con 10, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 5
Base Atk +0; CMB +0; CMD 6
Feats Weapon Finesse
Skills Acrobatics +10, Climb +10, Perception +5
Familiar Special Abilities Share Spells, Empathic Link, Deliver Touch Spells, Speak with Master, Speak with animals of its kind, Improved Evasion

Making Travel More Engaging

As of late, I’ve been pondering how I can make travel more interesting for my players. It’s something I’ve always struggled with in my career as a Game Master. Sometimes I’ve tried just fading to black between points of interest, but that’s no good. If the players don’t somehow experience the travel, then there’s no tangible metric for how distant various locations are. And even if that’s not a problem for you (which it should be), it also deprives players of the opportunity to experience the game world outside of towns and plot events. Imagery of adventurers traveling together through a forest or desert fuels our imaginations, we can’t simply gloss over that part of an adventure because it’s difficult to present in an engaging manner! We can, of course, try to give the illusion distance by determining that a certain journey will require X days to complete, but even if you try to spice that up with random encounters, the players will get bored. After an unfortunate extended hiatus, my group is finally going to be able to get back together for a new adventure soon. The one I’m preparing will have a great deal of traveling in it, which has brought this problem to the forefront of my attention.

Of course, utilizing a hex map helps solve many of these problems, which I’ve talked about before. Making the players responsible for choosing each 6-mile step of their journey helps engage them in travel, because progress towards their destination won’t continue without their input. Giving them these choices also increases their player agency, which will always increase their engagement. And, as an added bonus, once you start asking your players to make choices, they’ll start making choices on their own. Before you know it, your players will be directing the course of their own adventure, and that’s when you know that you’re a good game master.

But how does it work?

I mean, when the whole group is actually sitting around the table, and you’ve got your filled-in hex map behind the GM screen, what happens next? How precisely do the players interact with the hex map. How do they know where to go? Does a single player just point to one hex after another until the end of the day? How are you going to describe each hex when the players enter it? These are questions which need to be considered, lest we be caught with our pants down at the table. We’re the GM after all, we need to give the appearance that we’re prepared for anything the players throw at us.

Step one is figuring out how the players are going to keep track of the map as they uncover it. Of course, I have a filled-in hex map which I’ll keep behind the screen, but there’s no reasonable way for me to show it to them without revealing information they have not yet earned. My map, after all, has notes on it indicating the locations of dungeons, treasure, and towns. So the players need a assign one of their number the duties of mapmaker, and that player will need a blank map which they can fill in as they play. A quick google search for “print hex graph” turned up a site which creates hexagonal graph paper for you. I printed off 25 or 30 sheets myself, just to keep on hand. I also have a very nice hexagonal battle mat which was given to me as a Christmas gift by a friend. It’s wet-erase, so I can actually have a nice visual “world environment” for my players as they explore. The only drawback is that the mat needs to be erased at the end of each session, so the players will need to keep a map as well.

As with most party decisions in RPGs, reasonable adults won’t need any GM guidance with respect to making a group decision. In my experience, a party leader most often emerges naturally, and when it doesn’t, players don’t have trouble coming to a consensus on issues like “which direction do we walk.” If getting the party to agree on things like this is a problem for your group, then your problems are outside the scope of this post. Likely outside the scope of anything I will ever write about, because I’m not from the “here’s how to handle your friends…” school of GM advice.

With that out of the way, the second step becomes determining the best way for players to interact with the hex crawl. What is the conversation that takes place between the players and the GM as they move from hex to hex on the way to their destination. For my purposes, in the upcoming game I’ll be running, the players will receive some very basic instructions. The first leg of their journey will first require them to travel in a certain direction until they reach a river, then they’ll need to follow that river until they reach a village. Pretty straightforward. Straightforward enough that it might end up being boring, but I’ll get to that later.

As the players begin to prepare for their journey, the GM should figure out what the slowest party member’s movement speed is. This will be the movement speed for the entire party, unless the faster party members are willing to leave someone behind. If the players are on foot, the slowest will likely be whatever character is a dwarf or halfling. If the players have mounts (which suddenly become a lot more appealing once you’re hex crawling) their speed will significantly increase. Remember also to consider whether the characters are encumbered or not. If you’re like me, you’ve probably never used encumbrance rules before. However, if we’re trying to make travel engaging, then using encumbrance rules gives the players something they’ll need to pay attention to lest their pace be slowed, and that’s too valuable to pass up. If Pathfinder’s encumbrance rules are too complicated for you, I did a mock up of an alternative a few months back which may be more to your liking. I haven’t got around to putting any spit or polish on it, though.

For simplicity’s sake (and also because this is likely what I’ll have in my game) lets say that the party is made up entirely of unencumbered humans, which have a movement speed of 30. According to Pathfinder’s movement rules (found in the Core Rulebook, on pages 170 through 172), this gives the party a daily movement speed of 24 miles. Now, if you like, you can simply say that since each hex is 6 miles, and 24 divided by 6 is 4, that means that a party may travel 4 hexes in a day–and that’s fine. However it fails to take into account that some terrain is more difficult to travel through than others. Fellow blogger Brendan recently wrote a post entitled “Wilderness Movement Costs,” (which itself was based on a post by Delta). In it, he outlines a basic system for tracking a party’s hex crawling movements which I’ve decided to rip off and adapt for Pathfinder/my own purposes.

Movement Points: Convert the number of miles the party may travel in a day into “points.” So, it the party can travel 24 miles in a day, they have 24 “movement points.” This may seem like a ridiculous extra step. However, its function is that it turns the party’s movement budget into an abstraction, rather than a literal unit of distance. This will help players understand the less-than-literal possible uses for movement points.The party can spend movement points on couple different things:

Travel: Travel is the most obvious function. (That is, after all, kinda the whole purpose of this post). The table below shows the cost in movement points for each of the four terrain difficulties. Since the players won’t know if the next hex will put them over their movement cost, it’s up to the GM to warn them when they’re about to do it, and let them know that continuing forward would constitute a forced march, meaning the players would not be able to move as much the following day. Note that traveling on roads actually allows the party to move at a faster speed than the standard rules would allow. This way, roads have an actual in-game purpose much closer to their real life one.

Terrain	Examples	Movement Cost	Becoming Lost
Easy	road	4	No Check
Average	clear, city, grasslands, trail*	6	Survival DC: 10
Moderate	forest, hills, desert, badlands	8	Survival DC: 15
Difficult	mountains, jungle, swamp	12	Survival DC: 20

*There is no Survival check required to avoid becoming lost when following a well marked trail.

The movement cost happens to be evenly divisible for our band of unencumbered humans, though it may not be for all parties. If a party has some movement points left at the end of the day, but not enough to enter the next hex, give them some extra time to spend on other activities. Remember that in Pathfinder, a “traveling day” is 8 hours. So if you divide their total allotment of daily movement points by 8, you can determine how many movement points are spent during each hour of travel. From there you can easily figure out how much time they gain. For example, if you divide the human’s daily allotment of movement points, 24, by 8, you get 3. That’s 3 miles every hour. So if they have 3 movement points remaining, they have an extra hour to spend on tasks such as crafting, foraging for food, or researching spells.

Searching: A six mile hex is huge. A character could spend a week or more in the same hex without discovering everything there is to learn there. Every time they enter a hex, they see only a tiny fraction of what the hex has to offer. By spending one half of the movement points required to enter the hex, they can explore a roughly equivalent fraction of the hex. For example, a character entering a forest hex spends 8 movement points to make a beeline through the hex. If the party would also like to spend 4 more movement points in the hex (for a total of 12) then they can explore a little bit on their way through. They certainly won’t see everything, but they’ll earn themselves a second roll on the encounter table. Maybe they’ll find nothing, maybe they’ll encounter monsters, or maybe they’ll find something worth searching for. See below for more information on encounters.

That covers how the party’s movement through a hex crawl is handled, but how is it entertaining? At this point all we have is a mini game where the players point to a hex, and the GM tells them whether or not they have enough movement left, or whether they need to bed down for the evening. This is a structure, but without putting some meat on that structure, the whole thing ends up being completely monotonous, and players will leave. That’s where the final two elements of engaging travel come into play: survival, and encounters.

Surviving in the wilderness won’t be easy. First off, each party will need to rely on the survival check of one of its members. Each time a hex is entered, that player must make a survival check to avoid getting lost. If the character fails their survival check, then when the party attempts to move on to the next hex, the DM should roll 1d6 to determine which hex the party actually travels to. A roll of one means the party travels to the hex they intended to travel to (though they are still lost). Rolling a 2 indicates that the party travels to the hex one-space clockwise of their intended hex, rolling a 3 indicates they travel to the hex 2 spaces clockwise, etc. The party remains lost until their guide can succeed on a survival check upon entering a new hex. Items such as a compass or a map can help characters improve their survival checks to avoid getting lost. Once a character is an experienced enough traveler, their survival skill will likely rise high enough that becoming lost is no longer an issue.

Players will also need to monitor their rations in order to survive in the wilderness. If you’ve never forced players to keep track of their food supply before, now’s the time to start. Once the players run out of food 4 days into a 10 day journey, you’ll find they’re much more engaged in figuring out how to reach their destination before they die of starvation. Foraging and hunting are always options, but what if they can’t find anything? Will they eat their mounts? Will they eat…each other? That’s the fun! And don’t forget the elements. If the character’s journey takes place during the colder months, they may regret not spending the encumbrance points on those extra blankets when it begins to snow, and they start to freeze to death.

Lastly, there’s encounters. There are all types of encounters your players can have, which you can roll on a random chart. I won’t take the time to come up with a chart here, but I would say the chart should probably be about fifty percent “nothing,” which will allow the players to avoid getting bogged down in every single hex. The other half of the chart should be some combination of combat encounters, and ‘other.’ Other types of encounters can include walking in on a druidic ritual, finding the entrance to a random dungeon, coming upon a village of friendly or neutral wilderness dwellers, discovering a magic well, or any number of things you can come up with on your own. And for those times when combat encounters are rolled, there’s no need for them to be as boring as the standard “monsters appear” nonsense. Whose to say whether the monsters notice the players or not–or whether it’s a few monsters, or an entire village of them! Trollsmyth once posted an excellent chart which GMs could use to determine what monsters were doing when they were encountered. And don’t forget my Spicing Up the Battlemat series of posts to help make these combat encounters more interesting! (I really ought to do another of those. The last one was in December!)

As I’ve said a million times, keeping your players engaged is the number one duty of a game master. And whether want it to or not, travel is likely going to make up a large part of your game. You can either ignore it, or you can try to use it as another opportunity to challenge and entertain your players. After writing this post, I for one feel a lot more confident about running travel for my players in our upcoming game.