Tavern Tales 3 & Deadly Dungeons 15: The Funny Tea Room

The room is simple, largely conforming to the architectural style and level of dilapidation of the surrounding rooms. It is good if this room can be placed adjacent to a dining hall or kitchen, as when the dungeon was active, this room produced a drink which (for some reason) was favored by the lord or lady of the place.

It is dominated by a large pit in the floor, 5ft deep, filled with a swirling, bubbling, steaming liquid of a faintly brown color. On the wall of the room is a large rack covered in pegs, and from many of the pegs hang wooden mugs with a copper inlay. The mugs themselves are essentially worthless, being worth ~3cp each, for a total of 20-60 cups in all. The liquid in the floor both smells, and tastes, like a mild tea. If any one drinks it, they are affected by one of the following, determined by rolling 1d12. All effects are permanent, unless noted otherwise.

The liquid is poisonous to your body. Roll a save v. poison, or a fortitude save DC 15. Failure causes death.
A -1 to a random ability score. Use 1d6 to determine.
Spend 10 minutes vomiting and shaking violently.
Burn the roof of your mouth really, really badly.
Antlers sprout from your head.
Tiny, inefficient wings sprout from your back. They might be of *some* use keeping cool or jumping an extra 3-4 inches, but that’s about it.
Skin turns orange.
Feel pretty good about yourself for the rest of the day.
A scorpion stinger grows in your mouth. It is not harmful to you, nor does it interfere with normal tasks. It can be used to sting anything you put your mouth on, delivering a poison which deals 1d6 CON damage per turn, for 3 turns.
+20 to your strength for 1 hour.
A +1 to a random ability score. Use 1d6 to determine.
+1 level.

Players may continue to drink from the pit as many times as they like. Effects will stack with each other, and any effect rolled twice for the same character should be properly “enhanced” according to GM discretion. However, once a character has rolled a 9 or higher, their body will have adapted to the effects of the brew. From then on, regardless of the mixture they create (see below), or what they roll, no magical effect will occur. The drink is still quite tasty, though. They’ll find they enjoy it even more than before.

Adjacent to this room is a room filled with barrels. These barrels each contain a mixture which, when combined with the tea-water in the previous room, will slightly alter the random roll. If a barrel is completely dumped into the tea-water pit, then the additive will become inert after 10 minutes. If any two of these are mixed together, then their numerical bonuses or penalties will average. Orange spiral overrides anything it is mixed with. If any of these are consumed without being combined with the tea water, it tastes so awful the players will reflexively spit it out. Forced consumption causes death.

The symbols on the barrels, and their effects, are:

Blue Square. Smells like meat-juice. -4 to the random roll.
Purple Triangle. Smells like a bowl of raw egg. -2 to the random roll.
Red circle. Smells like beets. +2 to the random roll.
Black “X.” Smells like coffee. +4 to the random roll.
Orange Spiral. Smells almost sickeningly sweet. The random roll is replaced by a 1d6 roll to determine the player’s skin color: 1. Bright Red, 2. Blue, 3. Green, 4. Purple, 5. Orange, 6. Transparent. This effect functions even after the player has become immune to the tea-water’s other effects.

The above room appears in the megadungeon my players are currently exploring, Castle Nalew. They discovered it yesterday, and I think we probably spent an hour or more there. They tried every concoction they could think of, and much of the above information is stuff I had to improvise when they asked questions I wasn’t prepared for. Other information I had to improvise was: what happens when you become transparent twice, and what happens when you feed the liquid to a green ooze?

I could write a rather lengthy post about how much fun we had with this, but much of it would probably come across as “you had to be there” humor. However there is one story which is so impossibly perfect, I could not resist sharing it.

The very first character to dare drinking from the tea was the party’s monk. He rolled a seven, meaning his skin turned orange. Later, when they discovered the barrels in the next room, the monk was the first to try the orange spiral concoction, rolled a 5, making him orange a second time. I said that while he had been “Trump Orange,” he was now a wholly inhuman neon orange. After popping around to a few different colors, he again hit orange twice in a row, causing him to actually begin to glow orange with the strength of several candles.

The character’s name?

“Karrot.”

Sometimes the dice are the best comedians at the table.

Tavern Tales 2: Ooze, Poison, and Near Death Experiences

It’s been awhile, but I have a few more Tavern Tales to tell, if you’ve got the time!

Underwater Ooze

Over the last few months, Brendan‘s Vaults of Pahvelorn campaign has become one of the best parts of my week. I love the game, I love the group, and I love having the opportunity to be a player as a change of pace. I’ve also enjoyed the challenging, and high-mortality style of Brendan’s GMing, despite the fact that it cost me one of my favorite PCs ever. As a group, we’ve learned to be cautious, and when its best to simply run away. I think we’ve become quite skilled at navigating the depths, but our explorations are far from done. And just this past week, we encountered a challenge which very nearly defeated us entirely.

In a large cave, amidst a forest of glass trees, we discovered a series of ziggurats. I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice to say, we had reason to believe there was treasure in those ancient structures. We ventured down the stairs which led into the first, and were immediately confronted with an octagonal room filled thigh-deep with water. We could see a dry passageway leading further into the dungeon straight across the room, as well as a stone slab with a body atop it that we wanted to investigate. But the water was murky, and even a first level adventurer would know not to step into any water you can’t see the bottom of.

We tested the bottom of the water with our 10ft poles, and felt only thick sludge. We thought perhaps it would be safe to trudge through–but when we withdrew our poles, we noticed that the metal hooks mounted on the ends of them were completely gone. Our rat catcher, Beni Profane, pulled a rat forth from his pouch and tossed it squarely into the center of the room, and we all watched expectantly. At first the tiny cr5eature frantically swam back towards us, and dry land. But the rodent didn’t make it three feet before a grey, gloppish ooze rose up from the water, and came down on the rate, dragging it beneath the surface.

Now thoroughly convinced that we didn’t want to step into the water. we broke some of our 10ft poles in half, and used rope to tie foot hold knots to each half, thus constructing a crude pair of stilts. We tied a rope to Beni–as he is our most dextrous party member–and sent him staggering through the mucky black waters to the other side. Once he had successfully made it there, he used an iron spike to mount the rope to the wall, then tossed the end back to us. We constructed a crude bridge of two ropes–one for our arms, and one for our legs–and began to cross one by one.

The dice were not with us, though, and the second to cross–our beloved hireling Levis–caused the rope to snap from the wall. He fell with a splash into the water, and lost all composure. He miraculously managed to flee from the water without too much injury, and continued fleeing towards the ziggurat’s entrance, where we later found him dead from an unknown source.

The rest of us managed to reattach the bridge and make it across. The entire process took at least 40 minutes of game time. But it was well worth it!

…I’m kidding of course. We didn’t find a single copper piece in the entire Ziggurat. And in addition to losing Levis, one of the player characters–Satyavati–also lost his life while fighting a monster in that next room.

Without question, that was our most dismal delve into the depths yet. And I adored it.

Poisoned Journal

I’m not sure whether I’ve mentioned this or not, but recently my younger brother asked me to introduce him to the hobby. I threw together a quick amalgamation of OD&D rules I gleaned from playing in Vaults of Pahvelorn, made a dungeon, and told him we’d play for three hours on the the following Saturday. Six weeks later, it has turned into a running campaign which I’ve dubbed Dungeons & Dragons & Little Brothers; or D&D&LB for short. Running the game has unfortunately pushed back a few other projects I wanted to work on, but I’ve also been having a great deal of fun with it, so I don’t mind.

In a recent game the party found part of an ancient manor house which had fallen into the earth in ages past. Most of it had been destroyed, but a few rooms remained largely intact, and could be accessed directly from the caves they were exploring. They had good luck finding treasures here, and when they encountered a largely intact, luxurious office room, they started to get pretty excited. Too excited to check under the desk as they normally would have. They didn’t notice the dire rat nesting there until it leapt out to defend its territory. My brother’s character, Garret, took a bite to the face which dropped him to -2 hp.

Now, the way I handle death in this game is thus: If the character reaches 0 hp, then they are unconscious. They can be revived after 10-60 minutes, but cannot fight or move quickly, lest they risk reopening their wounds and taking 1 hp of damage. If the player ever falls below 0 hp, they must make a save versus death. If their save succeeds, then they return to 0 hp and are unconscious. Characters who succeed on a save versus death also receive a permanent disability, based on the manner of their near death. If the save is failed…well…roll 3d6 for your stats, in order.

As it so happened, Garret succeed on his save. He was left with a permanent hole in his cheek which cost him 1 point of Charisma, and was reduced to limping around at 0 hp, but was otherwise none the worse for wear. Garret’s companion, Drako, urged that they should return to the surface so he could recover. But Garret insisted that they had cleared the room of danger, and it would be a shame to go back without looking through the room to see what they could find. As it turned out, Garret was correct. That single room held more treasure than the party had yet discovered in the rest of the dungeon combined. They found ancient books of law from before the fall of human civilization, and even managed to procure a piece of fine sculpture, dedicated to a powerful goddess.

Unfortunately, Garret had been wrong about clearing the room of dangers. For while there were no more vicious creatures there to attack them, there was a vicious poison dart trap. One which stung Garret in the palm when he attempted to open a locked journal. He failed his save versus poison, and had to be dragged back to town by Drako. Even before they made it to the surface, Garret’s mental state had been reduced to that of a vegetable, and it cost the Party every penny they had earned that day, just to restore his mind.

Near Death at the North Tower

For the most part, I’ve been very proud of how quickly my younger brother adapted to the dangers of OD&D. Despite his actions in the previous story, he’s made more good choices than bad ones. But even good players sometimes have bad tactics. And no player is immune from the occasional wrath of poor fortune.

While investigating those underground manor houses, the players came upon a deed to the “North Tower.” They did some investigating, and discovered that the building was still standing, the deed was still valid, and their new property was only a half day’s travel from the town they were residing in. Truth be told I didn’t expect them to find that deed as quickly as they did, but that’s the nature of the game. Sometimes players surprise you.

They decided to go investigate their new property, and promptly found themselves in a pitched battle with the bandits who had claimed the tower as their hideout. It was an absolute route. The magic user was the first to go down. His “Shield” spell gave him an AC of 3 against normal missiles, so he tried to stand in front and offer cover for his companions. The first volley of arrows overcame his increased armor class, and he went down, barely making his save v. death to remain unconscious at 0 hp. The players barred the door from the outside, dragged their companion around a corner, and tried to revive him so they could flee. The bandits immediately succeded on their first 1-in-6 chance to break the door open, and charged out swords and arrows blazing.

Drako held up a leather tarp to obscure her form, and ran for the trees, but an arrow hit her in the leg for 3, which is exactly the amount of HP she had at the time. Garret held out a good while longer with the help of the party’s two hirelings, but he and one of them were both dropped to 0 hp within a few rounds. The remaining hireling wasn’t about to fight on alone, and surrendered. For a moment, I thought my brother was about to learn what TPK stands for. But then I noticed something: Every single member of the party had miraculously ended up at 0 HP. Only one of them had even needed to make a save vs. death.

I couldn’t see why a group of bandits would kill a group of potentially valuable prisoners, so a few days later, the party awoke in a prison, and began to plot their escape.

Tavern Tales 1: Hot Rocks, High Rolls, Whores, and Higgins

I don’t like posting play reports on Papers & Pencils. It’s not that nothing worth sharing happens in my games, because that’s not true. My games are awesome and you would be lucky to play in one. But typically the really great stories I tell about my games cover maybe 10 minutes of play. And while I might get multiple 10-minute stories out of a single session, I don’t like retelling the other 8 hours of gameplay which surround those cool stories. Exploring rooms and successfully fighting monsters is a lot of fun when you’re doing it, not so much fun when you’re reading about it. If I wanted to dress it up and turn it into a story I could probably make it entertaining. But at that point I’m just writing fiction. And I’ve got The Girl and the Granite Throne to work on if I want to write fiction.

But I don’t see any reason why I can’t share shorter stories about the awesome stuff which happens in games. So pull up a chair, order a pint, and let me tell you about my recent adventures…

Hot Rocks

In the most recent session of my ToKiMo Pathfinder game, the players were exploring the largest dungeon they’ve encountered to date. They were prowling through the bottommost levels of the dungeon when they found a crazy guy who had been lost there since he was a child. He warned them to stay away from the “hot room” several doors to the south. He was very insistent that he didn’t like the hot room, and they would not like it either. Little did he know, he was talking to Player Characters. So the first thing they did was make a beeline for the hot room, and discovered that it was nothing more than a functioning sauna.

Curious as to why a sauna would function with no one around to care for it, the players tried to figure out how the place worked. They quickly discovered where the water was dripping into the room onto hot coals. The source of the water was unknown, but far more interesting to them was how the coals could possibly be hot. They hadn’t seen any living creatures in this area of the dungeon, aside from the crazy guy. And he clearly wasn’t responsible for maintaining the room. The players asked the sorceress, Phoenix Darkmatter, to take a look. And she discovered that the rocks were, indeed, magical.

Deciding that magically heated rocks would probably earn them some nice coin, the players asked if they could take some of them to the surface to sell. I told them the rocks were not held in place at all, but they were far too hot to hold, and would cause severe burns. Likewise, trying to put them in a backpack would be a lot like putting a lighted torch into a backpack. I was curious to see if my players could figure out a way to transport the stones, and they did not disappoint. After a few moments of discussing between themselves, Phoenix spoke up, and reminded me that since she had the Red Dragon bloodline, she had a minor resistance to fire damage. She asked if it would be safe for her to hold the rocks, and I said yes. In fact, the stones just felt pleasantly warm to her–but her clothing and equipment was still vulnerable.

This left the players to ponder some more, until Poker, the party’s rogue, suggested that Phoenix just swallow the rocks. Which she did.

The party plans to ‘retrieve’ the stones at a later date, so they can be cleaned, and sold. In the meantime, Phoenix has a pleasant warmth in her stomach, as though she’d just eaten a bowl full of hot soup after coming in from the snow. I was so impressed with their problem solving, I gave both Phoenix and Poker 1 point of experience.

Not That Kind of Corner!

A little earlier in that same ToKiMo session, I was describing a room to the players. It had been used as a library in the past, though most of the books here were burned and unreadable. Part of the room above had collapsed into this one as well. The only other notable feature in this room was a hole in the corner, which led deep down a winding shaft, into a sewer below.

While describing that last feature, for reasons I still don’t fully understand, I said “There’s a whore in the corner.”

Needless to say the next 10 minutes of play time were lost as the entire group tittered and joked about what kind of business she must get down here, and how they didn’t want to play ‘that kind of game.’

Sigh.

Badass Minotaur

Near the end of that session, the players freed a minotaur from imprisonment. It’s a bit of a long story as to why the minotaur was there, and why she didn’t rip them limb from limb the moment she saw them, but the important part is that she agreed to work along side the party until they found a way out of the dungeon. Also her name is Bessy, because I made the mistake of mentioning a joke name before giving her a real name. She stayed at the back of the formation, and didn’t really do much. She wasn’t a hireling–the players weren’t offering her any gold or any shares of treasure. All she wanted was to get out of there. Plus, I’m not too terribly fond of running NPCs along side my players. None the less when the party was under attack she would pull out her axe and help, while doing her best to stay out of danger.

In the last room that the players explored that day, they encountered a mummy. Mummies are a challenge significantly above the party’s level, and halfway through the fight things got even worse when a second mummy in an adjacent room shambled out, and immediately attacked a level 1 paladin PC, dropping her below 0 hit points. The situation was grim for the party. After a few rounds they’d gotten the mummies down to about 15 HP each, but several party members were in danger of being killed before the battle was over.

Then Bessy’s turn came up. She was trying to defend the injured paladin, and was already in position from a previous turn. Her high base attack bonus allowed her to make two attacks, so I rolled both at the same time using different colored dice. The party was in bad shape, and they were all watching this roll expectantly, hoping the NPC could pull their asses out of the fire.

A lot of gaming stories reach their climax with the line “and then I rolled a 20.” But that’s not what happened here.

I rolled two twenties.

It’s something I’d never seen before. It will only happen one out of every 400 times you roll two d20s together. It has a 0.25% chance of occurring. I was stunned. It was such a remarkable roll that Bessy not only cleaved straight through the Mummy she was fighting, but she also hurled her axe across the room and smashed the other mummy into dust as well.

Higgins

Come listen young adventurers, heed what you’re told. ‘Bout a wizard named Higgins, and his actions so bold.

Higgins was a magic user in the OD&D game “Vaults of Pahvelorn” which I’ve been playing every Monday for the past few months. Higgins was evil, but he knew he wasn’t powerful enough yet to get away with being blatant about it. He did his best to keep his evil private, while in public he cultivated an image of being both generous and heroic. He once donated an entire share of treasure to the town guard just to apologize for wasting their time when the party reported a crime that was covered up before the guard could arrive to confirm it.

I was proud of Higgins. Pahvelorn is a deadly game, and a lot of my fellow adventurers had died before me. But Higgins was smart, and he was lucky. His risks were calculated, and if he ever did something foolish, the dice were always willing to give him a second chance. Playing 3 hours a week for something like four months, Higgins slowly accumulated greater and greater power. It took me several months to gain access to any spell other than Read Magic, and I think I was among the first in the party to reach second level. I started to think that Higgins might be able the achieve the goals I had set for Margo, before he died. Perhaps Higgins could become the most powerful magic user this campaign world had ever known. Perhaps he would build a tower in the city of Zorphath, and rule over it as the lords of old had done. And he’d do it wearing stylish robes he’d sewn himself, and the 3 horned helm he’d taken from his master’s killer.

I assume you’ve guessed, from my use of past tense, that none of this will ever come to pass.

It all started when the party decided to go to a nearby haunted cathedral. We had been there once before, and survived only by fleeing with our tails between our legs. But most of us were level 2 by this point. We were also much better equipped, and better prepared for the kinds of challenges we would face. Truth be told I felt a little wary, but I was willing to go if my party would be there beside me.

We had a few tough encounters, but we were managing, until we reached a rather innocuous room with a ghost. He wasn’t hostile towards us. He barely even noticed us. He was on his hands and knees, searching for his cat. We thoroughly poked and prodded the room with our 10ft poles, and found the dry bones of his cat, along with several large rats, beneath a table. We prodded the rats in turn, but nothing seemed to happen, so we assumed the room was safe. We directed the ghost towards his cat’s location, and he moved to look. As he peered under the table, though, he reeled back and shouted something about demon rats.

It seems foolish now, but I thought we’d been as thorough as we could be in testing the room for danger. I announced that Higgins would step forward, punch and kick the rat skeletons into dust, pick up the cat skeleton, and return it to the elderly ghost. I was making a big show about being heroic, and the entire group was chuckling over it. Save for Brendan, who was flat-out laughing his ass off. For awhile I thought I was just a really funny guy, until Brendan managed to choke out:

“The rats actually animate and attack you.”

I’m sure my face turned as white as my character sheet as the dice were rolled. Three out of the four attacks hit me, and the damage dice rolled high, reducing me to -13 hit points. I was given a saving throw against death, which I failed.

And just like that, all of my plans to turn Higgins into an evil overlord who would rule for 100 years came crashing down…because he stopped to rescue an old man’s cat.