Labyrinth Lord (5): The Call of the Deeps

The players explored map. Tracing paper from the master map

#5 Dry weather and water rationing continues at Brunberg. The delivers of water have continued over the last week, funded by diligent scavenging along the strand. Rumours of a delegation from the Shogunate arriving in Whiteport are brought by uncle Chu. The lord Oda Nobunja has brought 2 dozen red jade templars with him. One of these templars is Hojo Soun, the very lord of the village the PC's escaped from (including all the villagers) and Elrond stole his armour. A very deep stain upon his armour. Already some questions have been asked of refugees from the Shogunate. Chu asks where the group is from and is told Xian. When he suggests that they keep an eye out for the refugees in order to collect the reward, Elrond slaps him and tells him that they will not sell humans to the shogunate.

Zander continues to be haunted by dreams of underwater and has now been caught sleep walking towards water. Elrond takes it on to ensure he is wrapped in bed sheets to prevent this. Bruno too has noticed strange goings on, with a barely audible whisper heard when he is in the grotto of Brunberg.

Moshii or andrew. The player didn't say...

Elrond and Zander visit the hag Moshii and her fresh husband Andrew, who continues to lose weight and looks haggard, although spots a large goofy grin and hints at salacious nights. Moshii agrees to honour their deal and teaches Elrond and Zander a new spell, Refulgence of Sagacity. While the tutelage occurs, Wendyberg and Bruno investigate the grotto. Wendberg is unable to detect the whispering Bruno notes, but at one point she notices a glowing mark upon his forward. Casting detect magic she can see the sigil of Jangaru upon his brow. The grotto faintly glows all over with magic as well. None of the other villagers sport the mark, but hurrying to Moshii's she manages to spot the sigil on Zander, as well as a general mark of enchantment upon him. Interestingly the hags hut as well as the tea service tray have the mark of enchantment as well.

Back at the village a bountiful harvest of fish has occurred. A never encountered type has schooled in great numbers and been pulled in and harvested. A small bladder contains fresh water as well. A celebration occurs. During the feast Zander goes to the grotto and take a long piss into the waters. Watching the patterns in the water he suddenly sees a vision of being underwater with a loud crashing voice he doesn't understand demanding something of him. He feels it comes from the west and great rewards will come to him. He suddenly comes to, grasping his nether region too hard. His candle has burned many inches down. As he emerges from the cave into the village the lack of sound worries him. The villagers and PC's are all motionless lying upon the ground, stiff. After panicking for a bit he manages to detect the breath of Wendyberg. He mutter's “sorcery” before marking his forhead with the sigil of Jangaru. The roaring voice returns and Zander stumbles off towards the water.

Wendyberg and others had been consuming the fish stew when suddenly wracked with stomach pains. The village was stricken with paralysis. After a long period of time Zander appears, checks on her, mutters 'sorcery' marks his brow and stumbles off towards the ocean. As the villagers recover mobility, one observes wryly, why they didn't test an unknown fish before devouring it in a massive feast. Wendberg follows Zanders footprints allow the wet sand towards the west until an incoming tide defeats her tracking and she returns to the village to sleep.

Zandar finds himself emerging from a haze and overlooking the alluvial muckrakers delta. A single hut is lit and he approaches it. As the door opens he begins an evangelical tirade against the muttering old man in the shack. He works a charm person spell into the tirade. Despite his deep trust in Zander the old man declares that the cult of Jangaru is bad and into human sacrifice. It certainly yields material rewards, but at what cost he asks, he is clsoe to shuffling off this mortal coil and fears for him soul. He breaks out a small icon to Keega, the green mother of transformation and endings, and they both say prayers to one of the 9 immortals until they pass out. In the morning the old man offers Zandar 3 gp as material goods seem to be swaying him from the 9, Zandar instead gives the old man some money and heads to white port to find a cleric to the 9.

Bruno and Elrond set out to track down Zander based on Wendybergs report. As they head to the delta a 2 person boats hails them. Again attempting his sleep trick Elrond creates a disaster. One sailor passes out on the tiller, and as the boat swerves the boom smashes the other over board. The ship immediately founders on the prevalent reefs that surround the isle. Bruno shucks his armour and swims effortlessly to the boat and hunts for the sunk man. After escaping an undertow he spots more of the creepy structures, like the watchtower seen in the river, far underwater. Bruno pulls the one survivor on the boat to the shore. The sailor notes he thought that Elrond was from the shogunate, and questions him about the hell king worship. Elrond quickly loses patience and threatens the man into declaring his undying worship of the maker, before quickly sketching out some of the prayers and restrictions. The man, dubbed with the new name Sho-ol, leads the duo to white port before making good his escape.

Wendyberg casts purify on the fish and watches as a small portion of them wither into black scabs. It's discovered that a part of the swim bladder isn't completely removed with gutting and likely the source of the paralysis. The villagers cut out that portion of un-purified fish and continue to dry the rich bounty of new food.

Zandar finds a small shrine to Keega in whiteport, with an old man who begs and lights incense tending to it. He prays for hours and the old man approaches him to commend his piety. Under questioning the old man tells Zandar that any priest of the 9 would help such a pious follower of Keega, but the city has driven out the truly holy. He suggests he travel 2 days inland following the river to Otanu, the city where the old faithful of the shogunate still keep the faith of the 9. He councils Zandar to steer wide of the cursed city of Zushi, where a dark terror stalks the broken streets. As Zandar bounds to his feet to make best time his exhaustion over comes him and he passes out crashing to the floor.

XP 500

Labyrinth Lord (4): Jang-Aru's storm of displeasure

#3 A storm is blowing in on the island. The PC's go to the crone's hut to complete the marriage of the charmed Andrew to the crone. Wendyberg completes the ceremony, and the crone can hardly keep her hands off her new husband as she explains she has esoteric knowledge and can train Zander. She also has knowledge of the island near and far. She warns the group that terrible things can be blown off the ocean with a storm like this. She also notes that Xander has a evil mark upon him, explaining his poor sleep, and that it is likely caused by a cursed object. Xandar suddenly thinks of the threatening note on the drowned boy, but doesn't have it anymore.

The group goes back to the camp and gathers people from the beach where they forage. Uncle Chu reports recovering his boat and drops heavy hints about being rewarded for not simply absconding with it. Elrond dubs him Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, and Xandar pays a small retainer to him. He is tasked with finding a productive use of the 2 remaining evil prisoners. He quietly suggests getting bribed by them to spirit them away, and then seeing about turning them in for a bounty from White port. If there is no bounty then at least they are gone. Elrond commends his outside the box thinking and approves.

The village battens down and guard rotation of 2 each on the front and back gate is arranged. Xander searches the grotto for the note but can't find it. One of the 2 women who find the grotto reassuring suggests that he look for it in the rag picker bags above, but he can't find it there either. Overnight Xander is unable to sleep and guards the back tunnel with a villager. In the depths of the night Kwong (the confessing cultist) awakens Wendyberg in a panic, during his watch he has spotted the beacon (the bonfire that attracted the ship) aflame on the beach. He begs her to awaken everyone while he goes back to the palisade gate. The village is awoken and prepares for the worst. Bruno organizes the clan at the camp, and notices that Uncle Chu and their prisoners are gone. Wendyberg checks the grotto and awakens the women, one of whom she swears has glowing eyes for a moment, before joining with Xandar to update him. They walk out the secret entrance and espie the fire from a hill and decide to head towards it.

Meanwhile Elrond makes haste from the village to the beach and spots 5 men at the fire. He casts sleep from a distance, downing 4 of them, but as he closes some are awoken by the resistor. Putting down 2 of the sleepers to even the odds, he faces two well armoured and competent swordsmen. The third hunts in a bag while the fight rages. As Zandar and Wendyberg rush into the fight from another direction, Elrond takes near mortal sword strikes. The third enemy manages to cast a gourd into the fire before Zandar brains him, and Wendyberg manages to heal Elrond and the pair eliminate one enemy before driving the other off.

The gourd in the fire ignites, causing the large bonfire to grow and take on an ominous green cast. The smoke gathers above it and moves towards the ocean, contrary to the winds. Zandar scoops wet sad with a rusting shield to try and put out the fire while the other 2 watch. A strange phosphorescence is noted offshore, and then a constellation of glowing green dots. As the PCs back away, a horde of 20 rotting, coral encrusted undead sailors lurch from the sea. Wendyberg calls upon the Maker and turns back half of them, but the others lurch ominously towards the village as the party races them back.

The villagers are moved into the cave and Elrond takes place in the cave mouth to defend it. Wisely it turns out, as the undead drop over the cliff edges and pour through the pallisade towards him. He stands cutting down enemy after enemy when word comes from below that the door to the Grotto has been closed from within. Wendyberg and Zandar go below to investigate and spot one of the woman who finds the creepy grotto soothing standing at the pool, rocking back and forth while back lit. Zandar casts a pot of oil at her, igniting her and knocking her into the pool. Wendyberg with her keen hearing notes a soft chanting that sounds as the tide in the grotto.

Meanwhile Elrond takes a final enemy strike as he misses with his 2 handed no dachi sword and he collapses. Bruno leaps forward to guard the breach as villagers pull the mortally striken Elrond within the cave.

Zandar casts charm person and talks to the stranger in the grotto who reveals himself as Lo Pan. The man wears a soaking gown in blue and a coral ringlet on his head. He is saddened his 'good friend' Zander is caught up with the unbelievers who must be punished. He instructs Zander to make the symbol of Jang-aru, the god of tides, upon his head to spare him from the vengeance. He is even coaxed into showing him the symbol itself. Zandar returns to the villagers and instructs everyone to make the mark in charcoal on their forhead. The undead ignore the villagers and move down the cave to the barred door and begin attacking it. In the larger area the villagers fall upon the undead and destroy them.

Zandar attempts to convince Lo Pan that the remaining villagers are worshippers but he will have none of it. He spots Kwong and gets into a towering rage calling him a betrayer and defiler. Kwong drops to his knees in fear. Lo Pan casts sleep and everyone but Zandar and Wendyberg fall asleep. He notes that the Maker must some some element of power and encourage Zandar to flee to the west and that “our agents will find you if you don't find us. Wear the mark of Jang-aru!”. Lo Pen escapes from the group as the morning dawns and the fury of the storm is spent.

Labyrinth Lord Red Tides (3): Robinson Crusoe ville

Zantar

A child is missing from the group that was originally abducted by the seaside bandits. Bruno and Zantar go to "Bandit valley", bringing along all 8 village men. Toshi and Zacary accompany Zantar. Toshi is craven and won't enter the cave. They discover 600gp in 3 foot lockers but the fourth is open and looted. Footprints show up and down a hallway and into the previously unexplored drowning chamber, a cone shaped room with a spiral walkway that decends into a sea water fed pool. It's quickly determined that between all the small holes and tunnels the water level must fluctuate with the sea level.

The missing child is in the
chamber at bottom of the pool. Zantar dives in and recovers the child. After removing a silk string wrapped pouch around the childs neck, it opens glowing red eyes and attacks. Bruno knocks her
into the pool, and Zantar tosses flaming oil on the surface. Regaining the surface and now on fire, the child attacks bruno, bites lump of thigh out. The Pouch around the childs neck is a threatening message by Lo Pan.

Zachary the villager is fearless and checks various tunnels by crawling down them. He finds an escape out into entrance under a bramble bush. Hunting around they find, then lose foot tracks though.

Elrond

Back at the strand the woman and children forage. One brings word to Elrond and Wendyberg of a man on poling boat. He approaches and waves, then Elrond sleeps him and he collapses into the ocean. An adolescent manages to save him, but not the boat. He awakens to Elrond's sword and pleads neutrality. Uncle Chu is from a village about 12 miles to the north west. It's called stormspite, hope, or mostly just the village. A hard scrabble living is to be had there. Elrond impresses (in the imtimidating way "good health benefits if you join us") Chu as a local scout. White port is reported to the northwest about 24 miles and engages in some commerce with the shogunate. There are rumors of renegade Kueh Samurai in the interior of the island who wish to topple the shogunate. Overland routes and sea routes are known to be very treacherous.

Chu recognizes some of the bandits as being exiles form his village, for breaking the few rules (regarding murder, rape, food and water theft, etc). One cries out that he will share info if taken away from the others.

Wendyberg casts discern evil intentions, and finds 3 of the 5 are evil. One not evil is the man crying out. She questions him and he reveals that Lo Pan gathered in the exiles and they engaged in rituals to 'the gods'. Rewards were obtained, random ship crashes and wanders found and taken when needed. The rituals worsened and victims send to the caves. Kwong (the confessing bandit) panics when he finds out that Lo Pan isn't dead and begs to be protected. Wendyberg offers him a holy symbol of the maker and converts him.


The entire clan heads to the bandit valley to take up residence. Water is a scarce resource so far. The bandits try to trade their knowledge for freedom, but Elrond has none of it. He manages to trick them into revealing 2 sources of intermittent water (Rain gathering pools). Rationing is instituted. One of the captives is totally simple and can only say Hodor. They release him and try and chase him off, but he hangs around like a dog and is eventually accepted.

Zantar, Bruno, and Zachary find a grass hut while hunting around the surrounding area with a stout cauldron and rank midden pit near the escape tunnel. They encounter a hunchbacked crone by the name Moshi. She makes fine tea for Zantar and explains she is a trader. Zantar doesn't have enough money for her 'rarities', but she explains she'd be very generous to one whom could find her a husband. She loses her husbands to bad luck and freak accidents she claims, and suggests the gods might be cursing her. Zantar observes it would be unwise to oppose the gods will and then quickly backpedals from her dark look. The hag appears to be a frequent victim of bird dung.

Zantar charms a bandit and sneaks him away from the camp so Elrond won't murder him during his 'escape'. The bandit agrees to woo the fine woman, although is certainly less excited once he sees Moshi. Zantar agrees to return the next day with a priest to marry them.

Labyrinth Lord Red Tides: A rude welcome (2)

Two of our four PC's are from a small town:

Elrond

Elrond Hubbard (elf) is an indentured servant to the village head who discovers correspondence that the village has not met it's tithe quota. The shortfall will be made up for by sacrificing members of the village to the Hell Kings to illustrate the consequences of failure.

Zander

Zander the Hermit (human mage), a shaman who resides near the village and a friend of Elrond help organize an escape of many of the villagers.

A lawful itinerant cleric of the Maker, Wendyberg and her companion Bruno the Hunter (human fighter) are part of an organization set of freeing slaves. They hail from Hohnberg and are culturally opposed to slavery and generally hostile to the Hell King worshipping Shogunate.

The group has escaped onto the ship the Free Gull, and is heading south to the Mandarinate of Xian when a storm storm brews up driving them away from the land. The captain is challenged by the risk of being driven back to the Shogunate, or being driven far enough to sea that the Red Tides will engulf the ship. At last they espie an island of about 20 miles wide, and a beacon of light welcoming them in. Believing it to be a light house of some sort the ship closes in the driving rain, and the dying light of the day.

Shy 200 metres from the shore there is a horrific grinding sound and the boat lurches to a stop. They have hit an undersea object. The crew reports the ship is taking on water and beginning to sink. As the crew prepares the one longboat (insufficient for the entire passenger contingent) the villagers begin to panic.

Zantar, with help from Wendyberg, attempts to light a lantern and signal the shore. Shortly after cries of 'swing to shore' float across the expanse of water.
Elrond attempts to board the first boat, but the crew insist that woman and children go first. They pointedly suggest that if he helps organize the panicking villagers, then perhaps he will get off the boat faster. Zantar, while helping Elrond, botches his diplomacy and ends up enraging the ladies, who accuse him of picking favorites to get off the boat so he can woo them. A quick charm spell on the village elder helps defuse the situation. The village eldar now looks to the PC's often for suggestions and direction.

Meanwhile Bruno goes below to find the holds filling rapidly, and no way to staunch the leaks. He pulls out a rope and barrels and begins to fashion a barrel/sausage link/pool noodle. The crew drop off one load of woman and children and take a second one. After they land the sharp ears of Wendyberg pickup the sounds of battle, quickly ended, and then screaming and crying of woman and children. The men still on the sinking ship all look at each other and jump on Bruno's flotation device and swim for the shore, 200 metres away.

As they approach the shore a gang of 6 men spread out with swords, but Elrond sleeps the lot. A single man escapes as his friends collapse. The woman report that the children where tied together and marched off inland. Bruno the hunter and Zantar take off after the children while Wendyberg and Elrond secure the captives.

Bruno is able to track the brigands to a small relatively hidden gorge. A spikey palisade with 2 guards stands in their way. Once Elrond and Wendyberg catch up the party rushes the pair. One surrenders after the other is slain. He reports that the master Lo Pan and his men take captives into the cave and they are never seen again. He is fearful and repentant and begs to be tied up and spared. There are only eight men plus the master in the cave. He is tied up and smashed in the head to knock him out.

The gorge is sheer on 3 sides and filled with shacks and tents created from ship materials obviously scavenged from wrecked ships. On the far cliff wall, a na

tural cave opening resides. The party bursts into the first room, filled with 4 beds and foot lockers, and an empty weapon rack. Zantar guards this room as Elrond and Bruno hasten forward. They surprise and slaughter one of the two men carrying the rigid restraint device. The other begs for mercy and reports there are 4 men in the next room praying, if the group is quick and quiet they'll be able to surprise them. Elrond gets the man to lead the way, and his scouting is rewarded with a surprise sword thrust taking him in the neck.

The room has a wooden cage filled with the children, as well as a strange pillar growing from the wall. There are carved symbols on it that cause the eyes to hurt and turn away. A battle develops between the group and the 2 fighters and 2 scum with knives. The group is sorely wounded. During the fight Zantar tries to douse an enemy with oil and starts the wooden cage that holds the children on fire. He manages to open the gate and evactuate the children, including using his bedroll to shield a particularly fearful pair.

After the battle Elrond pours oil on the remaining door and floor, raises a rucus and then retreats while firing the room. The party escapes back to the beach with the villagers in tow. The brigand guard at the front gate has disappeared by the time they leave.

Labyrinth Lord Red Tides: Preamble (1)

After an overly long hiatus, I managed to get some gaming in with my east coast friend. Previously he had run an awesome OSRIC campaign set in allansia and culminating with the ddefeat of the ice queen. Although we didn't really FINISH the campaign, it was obviously a mop up operation, and the characters were getting to such a level that we were highly resilient and deadly (levels around 7 with a few decent magic items). At this point Jason usually tires of running these characters in a game.

It's been far too long since I had a chance to GM myself (my local gaming group has rotated GMs through 2 other people, and the current campaign is long running (almost 2 years). Jason is running 2 weekly games out in Halifax, so I offered to GM the next campaign. I'd been interested in running some fantasy, and the Red Tides campaign setting was intriguing to me. I've mentioned it before (HERE) and was hoping to run it locally at some point. Our local campaign has been on a long tear though, so no dice there. Luckily my turns has come via telepresence.


Deciding I wanted to introduce concepts of the setting slowly, and create my own sandbox area first, I decided starting on an island or coast in a village would be a good start. With hours running out till the game started, I had a stroke of inspiration while looking at the map. The characters would be fleeing the Shogunate, a Japanese type kingdom that turned to the worship of Demons to save itself decades ago, and now thoroughly corrupted. While escaping they would be ship wrecked on the Isle of White Teeth (so named for the reefs that surround much of it). This would give some time to introduce them to new concepts before getting to the single port to escape the island..........or it could be the campaign will strictly be on the island. Time will tell.

Also fortunate in my choice is the island is only 50 miles by ~30 miles, so shouldn't be too onerous to chart into a hex map. Once I get a start on working up my sandbox I'll post up some entries on the process with the tag 'sandbox gaming'.



The small island with the beak at the top around 1o'clock is my maybe. Happily further game expansion can occur with nearby islands and the main land.

Isle of White Teeth has a single major port, and is suspected to harbour rebels of the Shogunate who yearn for the days before the Hell Kings were the official relegion. Lots of scope for strife.

E is for.... Echo, Resounding

Although technically labelled An Echo, Resounding I figure I can shoe horn this one into E.
Echo, Resounding is a fantasy RPG toolkit for sandbox gaming. It's published by Sine Nomine Publishing, the same person/folks who brought Stars without Number (available for free download!).

Sandbox gaming is my favorite type of gaming. While it does help having a larger setting that players can be somewhat familiar with, the ability to drop in concepts, villains, move towns, and events around without having to consult and work with the 'Canon' of the 'official' setting is fantastic. It's particularly helpful to not have to listen to Mr. Encyclopedia tell you why that doesn't work, or to simply be vague on the official setting and need to consult published material.

Sine Nomine has designed many of their books around the central idea that you will be making up your own sandbox to play in, within a larger setting they define (loosely). Typically the mechanics they offer up are tags and a framework to help get your creative juices flowing to create points of interest within the campaign. More on this later.

Echo Resounding is listed as a labyrinth Lord compatible product, but it would easily port to most fantasy systems (requiring either dropping or modding a few less critical parts). They offer up an example sandbox, the westmark, with a map and 40 locations of interest, each with about a 1/2 page writeup. The  sandbox is placed within the 'Red Tides' setting, another one of their published products (which I've picked up as a result of getting Echo, Resounding) but again, you can read between the lines and largely use this product (even the sandbox) with almost any fantasy system.

Overview
Sine Nomine suggests that pre-planning should largely only be done if you like that sort of thing. By minimizing the work done to create your setting you are unlikely to get frustrated if your players avoid your mapped out areas, and/or you will avoid rail roading them into those areas.

You start by creating a map and then seeding if with population centres, ruins, resources, and lairs. You then name these spots and add tags/traits (with a large number of tables and traits provided). Obstacles for each area are then generated/added, which explain why the particular location hasn't become an empire/isn't harvested fully/hasn't been resettled.

Examples:
Ruin: ancient armoury, buried treasure, commanding location, forgotten sorceries, great art, rich resources, pre-exile relics (and another 5). Obstacles include: monsters, angry dead,sinister cult, disputed possession, ancient curse, inaccessible (+6 more).

Given that you match 12 options with another 12, you have a basic 144 tags sets that can start to fire your imagination. Some are obvious tropes, forgotten sorceries with sinister cult, but what about the great art with angry dead....how did that come about?

The next step is the Hall of Infamy, which is a great mechanic. The author points out that you shouldn't suddenly hear about the famously evil dragon/liche/whatever when you reach 10th level. Where was he before, why no rumors or legends? Arch villains should be present from the beginning but utterly untouchable by low powered adventurers. So he suggests a hierarchy of evil, with a roster. You place the arch enemy up top and work down. It's easier to down power villains then up power them, so you start the arch villain at the level you think you will let your players reach eventually (level caps are your friends here in my opinion).

In like Flynn has modded this whole process for creating traveller sectors, which was a pretty fascinating read. First post is here.....follow the tags for more reading.

Another feature of the rules are for the players building a domain, taking over that village/town and building it up. Protecting it from raiders, recruiting allies, facing enemies etc. With the sandbox created at the beginning, everything is in place for it to happen.....yet if the players don't care about it you haven't invested extra work. Another feature of sandbox gaming is that players can go where they want.....but the risk is on their head. They need to quickly learn to recognize hazard and learn when to walk (or more likely run) away. 

All in all, I found this to be a great product. Printed copy available for 20$, pdf for half that. On drivethruRPG.