Session Report--May 16, 2015: Two Dragons, One Conspiracy, and a Near-Death Experience

This is my first entry in nearly four months. Four freaking months. That's a long time. Unlike in my previous posts, I will not offer some lame excuse for this long interruption. Now, I was busy over the summer. That's true. The family did go on vacation for a week and a half, and work is picking up. But, I've also sat on my butt a lot too. There are always books to read, and my new HDTV won't watch itself.  I have no real excuse. So, instead of trying to justify myself to the handful of people who actually read this blog, I'm just going to plow ahead with the May 16, 2015 session report.  The session reports for July 31 and August 29 will follow shortly. (I promise!)

The May 16, 2015 session began with the PCs deciding to head southwest toward Cormyr after their "long-distance call" with Amalric the night before. After traveling a couple of days, they noticed an old man following them at a distance of a few hundred yards. The PCs soon stopped and just talked to him. The old man said his name was Hassan, that he too was headed south, and that he was a refugee from Neustria. He also suggested that they could travel together. A little suspicious, Peyton, the cleric, surreptitiously cast a Know Alignment spell and determined that Hassan was Lawful Neutral, tending toward Good. Zhuo Xuan, the monk, then used his recently acquired Empathy ability. This revealed that while Hassan wasn't telling them the whole truth about himself, he didn't mean them any harm. The party decided that Hassan--despite his secrets and "Old Ben" Kenobi-style vibe--could join them.

Hassan and the PCs traveled together for another couple of days. On the evening of the third day, an unholy keening startled the second watch around midnight. Luckily, the moon was full, and the stars were bright. The two PCs on watch immediately saw six indistinct patches of vaguely human-shaped darkness flying towards them at breakneck speed. Wraiths!! The watchmen roused Hassan and the others and engaged the undead in hand-to-hand combat. One of the wraiths struck Zhao (I think) right off the bat and drained him of 4 hit points, including 1 permanently. Two rounds passed with neither side gaining a significant advantage. Then a couple of the wraiths bunched together. Sensing an opportunity, Hassan cast a Fireball that took them out in one shot. That proved he wasn't just an old hermit after all. He was a spellcaster. The PCs began to wonder if that was all he was hiding.

Hassan answered that question in the next round. One of the remaining wraiths struck the old man on a natural 20. The hit caused both 12 hit points of damage--six of which were permanent--and disrupted the Polymorph Self spell that had kept Hassan in his human guise. He instantly changed back into his actual form--that of a Huge, Very Old blue dragon. His cover blown, Hassan used his breath weapon to eliminate two more wraiths, and the PCs quickly finished off the rest.

The next morning, Hassan explained that, unlike most blue dragons, he had turned away from his Evil nature many years ago. He had lived for centuries in the extinct volcano about 100 miles from Neustria. After the last session's earthquake, he had investigated the ruins, learned about the PCs and their success against Jacob, and decided to follow them. In turn, the PCs told Hassan about Amalric and his plans for Faerun. Hassan agreed that Amalric had to be stopped.

Having found a new ally, the PCs decided to consult the Orb once again. A vision swirled into view after a few moments. It was a royal funeral. Toran, the Ranger and a native of Cormyr, recognized the castle and its grounds as the royal palace in Suzail, Cormyr's capitol. Two corpses wearing crowns lay on the pyre--presumably the bodies of Azoun IV, the king of Cormyr, and his queen. Standing next to the pyre was a sinister-looking man holding the hand of a weeping girl. Courtiers and soldiers stood in grim and silent rows. And, in the background, smoke was rising from the palace grounds. Suzail was burning.

The PCs barely had time to digest this somber scene before it dissolved away. A new vision appeared. The Orb now revealed a mighty host of lizard men and savage humans riding dinosaurs and other fantastical creatures. A vicious fighter--a member of Gawain's old party--was at the head, riding a dragon. Worst of all, enormous mountains hovered above these armies, suspended by some unknown magic. These crawled with even more soldiers and bristled with siege weaponry. By focusing more intently on the Orb, Peyton soon realized that this army was laying siege to Calimport, the capitol of the ancient country of Calimshan far to the southwest of Cormyr. Eventually, the Orb went dark.

The PCs and Hassan now faced a terrible choice. Should they travel to Cormyr to learn more about King Azoun's death, or should they go farther south to face that invading army? They decided to do both. Since Hassan could fly, he would investigate the situation in Calimshan (which was much farther away) while the PCs would continue on to Cormyr. That way, they could tackle both crises at once. Hassan did give the PCs a lift, though. He flew them several hundred miles to a clearing less than a day's walk from Tilverton, a medium-sized town in the Dalelands. There, they could take the well-traveled road south to Cormyr while Hassan flew to Calimshan.

Upon reaching their destination, Hassan gave the PCs a magic stone. If they ever needed him, they should concentrate on the stone, and it would summon him. Likewise, if Hassan ever found himself in more trouble than he could handle, he could summon the PCs to him. Hassan and the PCs then said their farewells, and he flew away. The PCs walked the last few miles into Tilverton.

They stayed in Tilverton a couple of days. The PCs picked up news and rumors in the usual D&D way--by visiting taverns and chatting up the locals. They learned that, yes, Azoun IV and his queen, Filfaeril Selzair, had been assassinated. A band of elves led by the elven emissary to Azoun's court, Luvon Greencloak, was supposedly responsible. The assassins had somehow entered the king's throne room, viciously assaulted him and the Royal Guard with unknown spells and magic weapons, and killed Azoun and his queen in the ensuing chaos. The murderers were eventually hunted down and eliminated--but not before making a last stand on the palace grounds and fighting the Royal Guard and the City Watch to (supposedly) the last man.

The PCs also learned that, even before the smoke from these battles had cleared, the king's old adviser and court magician, Vangerdahast, had installed himself as the Lord Regent of Cormyr. The only surviving member of the royal family was Azoun's 11-year-old daughter, Alusair Nacacia. With the crown princess too young to rule in her own right, Vangerdahast was (apparently) the only choice to be Lord Regent.

This was all enough for the PCs to surmise that skullduggery was afoot in Cormyr and that their assistance was desperately needed there. After three days--it was now late October and turning colder--they set off down the main road to Arabel, the closest city in northern Cormyr and the home of their original patron, the merchant Thond.  The first couple of days were uneventful. On Day 3 or 4 (I can't remember which), they encountered a party of 10 humans traveling north on the road. This party had horses and a couple of wagons and were led by a swarthy, unfriendly looking fighter. He began to question the PCs about a variety of topics, including where they were going, why they were headed south, and so on. After a few minutes of this interrogation, the PCs became suspicious. Sensing that the jig was up, the fellow announced that his name was Xerithraxis. He helpfully explained that Amalric himself had dispatched him to eliminate them once and for all. Xerithraxis then appeared to fold in on himself before exploding into the form of a Great Red Wyrm--the oldest and most powerful of all red dragons in Faerun. The PCs were in for the fight of their lives!

Despite this admittedly unexpected development, the dice favored the players, and the PCs were not surprised. Neither was Xerithraxis. The players subsequently won initiative--another lucky break. Toran and Erik, the two fighters, drew first blood, striking Xerithraxis with their swords for several hit points of damage. Peyton then hit the dragon with his mace while Theodric (the magic-user) prepared a spell. Fearing that they were done for, Endenowen (the druid) used Hassan's stone to summon him to aid them. Zhuo Xuan's strike failed. Bloodied but not severely injured, Xerithraxis responded by doing what dragons do: he used his breath weapon. He breathed a cone of fire worth a whopping 110 hit points of damage. Fortunately for the party as a whole, only one PC was standing in the way when Xerithraxis did this. Unfortunately for that one party member--Peyton--even making his saving throw was not enough. He was just a few feet away from the dragon's maw when it breathed. Peyton took 55 hit points of damage and died instantly.  The scene probably looked something like this:



















Interestingly enough, though, the fight didn't last much longer. In the very next round, both Toran and Eirik rolled natural 20s, causing double damage to the dragon. Theodric's spell--a Lightning Bolt--also went off, and even the monk scored a hit.  At the end of the round,  Xerithraxis, one of Amalric's mightiest minions, lay dead. The PCs had slain a Great Red Wyrm in a mere two rounds!! It was an astounding victory.

Of course, it wasn't without cost. Peyton was still dead, and his player seemed resigned to having lost him for good. Yet, it was not the end. Hassan appeared two rounds later, just as he had promised. The PCs immediately climbed onto his back, and in mere hours he flew them to within a few miles of Arabel, their destination. (Hassan then left again for the south with only the briefest of farewells.) The PCs immediately located the temple of Tyr and convinced its high priest to raise Peyton from the dead. Peyton's player made the all-important Resurrection Survival roll, and Peyton was back in the land of the living. Though weak and terribly scarred, he was alive. That was all that mattered.

While Peyton convalesced, the other PCs beat the bushes in Arabel for more information about the state of play in Cormyr and Azoun IV's assassination. They learned that things were even worse than they had thought. The lords of Cormyr's northern cities, Arabel, Eveningstar, Turluk and Espar, had all come to believe that the story of the elves' assassinating Azoun IV was a lie and that Vangerdahast himself might have had a role in the deed. Rumors abounded that the "elves" were not elves at all, but disloyal members of the Royal Guard. Suspicious of Vangerdahast's subsequent move to seize power, the northern lords mistrusted his intentions and publicly rejected him when he demanded that they pay him fealty as Lord Regent. In response to this open defiance, Vangerdahast and the lords of Cormyr's other cities declared war against the northern rebels. In other words, Cormyr was not just in the midst of a succession crisis. One of Faerun's most peaceful kingdoms--a bulwark of the forces of Good--was at war with itself. Amalric's fingerprints were all over this.

After speaking to the lord of Arabel, Cassius Letholdas, the PCs decided that they needed to reach Suzail, Cormyr's capitol, as soon as possible. Although the war had just started, it wasn't going especially well for the rebels. The "loyalist" forces controlled more territory and had more troops. Although the rebels were holding the line in Cormyr's central forest region, time was not on their side. Sadly, the PCs also learned that Thond, their patron, had died in a suspicious fire at his home mere days before they had arrived. Cassius suspected foul play, but the PCs didn't have time to investigate. They had to leave while the front lines were still far enough away for them to get out of Arabel in one piece.

The PCs left Arabel a few days later--after Peyton (and everyone else) was fully healed and rested. They initially headed off west toward the citadel of High Horn. They (understandably) wanted to avoid going straight south through the front lines. After one day's ride, they reached the foothills of the mountains that border the western edge of Cormyr. Around noon on that day, they blundered into an ambush. The road the PCs were traveling on at that time ran through a narrow gorge. Steep mountains stood along either side. It was a perfect place for an ambush, and that's exactly what happened. Eight stone giants were lined up on either side of the road. They gained surprise and started chucking rocks at the PCs. Although the giants enjoyed one surprise segment to attack, they rolled poorly. (I can't remember if they even struck one PC.) In the next round, the PCs gained the initiative and fired arrows and other missiles at the giants. The battle was joined. It took a few rounds of fighting for the PCs to finish the job, but finish it they did. They eventually killed all the stone giants. Although the fighters were a little banged up by the end, no one was severely injured.

With that encounter concluded, the players and I called it a night. It was an exciting session to say the least. Until the fight with Xerithraxis, no one had died since the very first session (when everyone was still first- and second-level cannon fodder). That had changed. Had it not been for Hassan, the PCs might not have reached Arabel in time to raise Peyton from the dead. In fact, were it not for the PCs' lucky rolls, Xerithraxis could have easily killed them all. As Lord Wellington said about the Battle of Waterloo, it was a close-run thing. Worse yet, the PCs realized that Amalric was now targeting them personally. The hunters had become the hunted. It was all pretty sobering. Still, everyone--even Peyton--had come through it all. And, the PCs had defeated one of Amalric's deadliest henchmen. That was worth celebrating. In the end, it was a session full of ups and downs. It also made a great segue into the next session where the PCs would learn even more about the dark conspiracy that has plunged Cormyr, Faerun's last, best hope for peace, into chaos and civil war.  

April 18, 2015 Session Report: Where the Players Free Jacob's Slaves and Receive an Offer They Can Refuse

The last two months have gone by in a flash. I can hardly believe it's the end of May. April was crazy. I was out of town two weekends in a row, work has started ramping up, and the kids have had something going on just about every weekend. This "tyranny of the immediate" has left me with little time either to prepare my AD&D sessions or blog about them afterwards. I'm now two sessions behind. Oh well. All I can do is write up the reports one at a time.

The April 18, 2015 session began once again in the ancient desert city of Neustria. In the last session, the PCs had destroyed Amalric's generals, Sabnock and Theron, and had sparked a great earthquake that had knocked down the city wall and leveled the few buildings left standing. Although the players now intended to travel to Cormyr's capitol, Suzail, to find out what had happened to its king, they still had some mopping up to do in the city. The PCs couldn't just leave the slaves to starve to death or die of exposure in the middle of nowhere, and several of Jacob's toadies were still in control of large sections of the city. So, the players decided to lead a slave revolt.  

One by one, the PCs attacked each of the remaining encampments where Jacob's slaves were still being held. In the process, they killed scores of ogre-slavers, defeated Jacob's sand giant captain (a new type of giant described in Black Blade's Monsters of Myth), and freed the remaining slaves. Their last fight involved a huge, set-piece battle between the PCs and 200+ freed slaves on one side and over 40 ogres and a smattering of human mercenaries on the other. This encounter ended in a rousing victory for the players and their allies. 

Success left the players with a dilemma. The slaves were free, but they were still in the middle of the Great Desert, Anauroch. The PCs had to ensure that the slaves returned safely to civilization. Although no one questioned this obligation, Peyton, the (Lawful Good) cleric, also insisted that the PCs accompany the freed slaves back to the Dalelands. The other players disagreed. They suggested that the PCs merely confirm that the slaves had plenty of supplies and equipment and enough competent fighters to protect the group on their way home. These players did not want to waste time escorting the slave caravan when they needed to reach Cormyr as soon as possible. A lengthy discussion ensued. 

Peyton eventually conceded the point once a real leader emerged from among the slaves (a wise old elf named Lorien). Lorien knew the way home and had identified enough competent soldiers from among the slaves themselves (viz. 20-30 1st or 2nd level fighters) to defend the caravan from most dangers they might encounter along the way. Personally, I appreciated the role-playing over this issue. I expected a kind-hearted, Lawful Good priest to want to protect the freed slaves even at great personal inconvenience. By the same token, it also made sense to me that the other party members--especially the fighters--would take a less misty-eyed view of the situation. 

With that issue resolved, the PCs and the freed slaves stripped Neustria of its remaining supplies (which included food, water and horses), said their goodbyes, and went their separate ways. Although I'm sure that the players thought the session was almost over by this point, that crafty old DM still had one more trick up his sleeve. That evening, the PCs were startled awake when, at about 9:00 p.m., the PCs taking the first watch saw a tall, pale, dark-haired man striding toward their camp. The PCs recognized the stranger immediately from the Black Orbs and the statues in Olynthus Kios. It was Amalric!! Unfortunately, after their attacks passed through "Amalric" without affecting him, the PCs realized that they were looking at a mere projection--a sort of long-distance call for them only. 

Amalric began his speech by complimenting the PCs on their intrepid efforts so far. He then proceeded, as one player described it, to offer the PCs "minion status" in his New World Order. If only the PCs would follow him, Amalric would give them each their heart's desire. Peyton could lead legions of fanatical believers as the high priest in Amalric's new Apophis Cult. Eirik the fighter could have all the power, money, and women he could ever want, and the chance to win a thousand battles. Amalric would share vast magical knowledge with Theodric, the magic-user. The ranger, Toran, could lead Amalric's human vanguard against the elves and the other inhuman forces that oppose humanity. And so on.

Suffice it to say, the players did not take Amalric up on these offers. After letting him talk for a while, they finally told him to get lost (though not in those exact words). In response, Amalric laughed, told them they were all dead men, and disappeared. The whole encounter lasted about 10 minutes. At that point, the session ended. 

In their discussions afterward, the players all agreed that Amalric's little "visit" proved that he knew both who the PCs were and how to track them. No one doubted that he would use this information to do everything in his power to keep them from ruining his plans. From this point forward, the PCs would be both the hunters and the hunted. The campaign had now shifted into a more dangerous phase.

And the next session would reveal just how dangerous this new phase would become..........

February 28, 2015 Session Report: A Fitting End

This session report will be a little shorter than most because it's been so long since we played that I can barely remember what happened. Waiting nearly a month between holding the session and writing the report is not optimal, to say the least. From now on, I resolve to post these reports no more than a week after the session is over! (We'll see how long that lasts....)

In any case, the February 28 session started right where the one in December ended. The players were excited, having survived the last, furious battle. They quickly searched the bodies of Jacob, Robert, and Amelia and found several magic items (including two Bags of Holding), a bunch of gold, and Robert's journal. In a brilliant stroke, the players decided to stuff the three Big Bad Guys into the Bags so that the cleric, Peyton, could use Speak with Dead later to learn more about what Jacob and his entourage were doing in Neustria. The players then escaped from the burning tent. They killed a few of the guards remaining in Jacob's camp and eluded the rest. 

After wandering around the city for about an hour, they found an abandoned building that was sufficiently intact to serve as a good resting place. Theodric, the magic-user, was in pretty bad shape. He had fallen to -7 hit points during the fight and still hadn't fully recovered despite the liberal application of Potions of Extra-Healing and Cure Light Wounds spells. The other players had also suffered pretty badly and were nowhere close to full strength. Everyone needed a break. They posted a watch and slept for the rest of the day and through the night.

The next morning the players examined their loot and read Robert's journal. They discovered that Amalric had sent Jacob and his minions to Neustria to find the tombs of Amalric's two most powerful generals: a Type VI demon named Sabnock and a death knight called Theron. The elves had imprisoned them at the end of the Olynthian war 10,000 years ago. At that time, Neustria had been an Olynthian city and the site of one of the last, most desperate battles in that apocalyptic conflict. When the war was over, the victorious elves had imprisoned both Sabnock and Theron in magic chambers deep below the city. Since then, many cities had risen and fallen above them. Sabnock, Theron, Amalric, and the Olynthians themselves were eventually forgotten. Neustria was the last city-state built over these ruins, and, in the end, even it was abandoned to the encroachments of Anauroch, the Great Desert. After Amalric was inadvertently freed in Olynthus Kios, he sent Jacob to excavate Neustria's ruins and release Sabnock and Theron so that they could again take their place at Amalric's side.

Besides these facts, Robert's journal also revealed that somewhere in Sabnock's tomb was a scroll left behind by the elves that could utterly destroy both Sabnock and Theron. Amalric's generals had been imprisoned, rather than simply annihilated, as part of a compromise between Amalric's patron god, Apophis, and the elves' deity, Corellon Larethian. Apophis had threatened to materialize in Faerun and destroy it if the elves had pushed their advantage to its utmost. Sick of war and exhausted, Corellon conceded to the compromise. However, he also had his elven mages hide the magical formula for destroying Sabnock and Theron in the hope that someone might someday finish what the elves had started. 

Although Robert didn't know where Sabnock's tomb was located, the players learned that piece of information from Jacob himself after Peyton interrogated his dead body. This took a while. The players spent a considerable amount of time figuring out exactly what questions to ask because the spell only let them ask two. During this questioning, Peyton also discovered that Jacob had not yet freed Sabnock because Amalric had instructed him to release them simultaneously, and Jacob still didn't know where Theron was.

With this information in hand, the players searched the general area that Jacob had described and eventually found the entrance to Sabnock's tomb. It turned out to be a maze--literally. They wandered around in it for several hours, getting sidetracked here and there and occasionally losing their bearings. They also encountered a couple of zombie minotaurs and twenty 4 HD skeleton warriors. After the last session, these monsters were a breeze. More seriously, the players also tripped a variety of traps--the first time they had ever found so many in one place. These included a spring trap that fired a dozen crossbow bolts, a magical teleportation rune that nearly split up the party, and a magical mirror that cast an enhanced Fear spell on anyone who looked into it. This last trap made the doughty fighter Eirik foul himself and run away in abject terror when he missed his save. Sensing that the mirror might be protecting something important, the remaining, unaffected players searched behind it. They found the scroll that Robert had described. (Interestingly, they never located the chamber where Sabnock was held. In the end, it didn't matter.)

Eirik recovered from his Fear after two turns, and the party, with the scroll in hand, returned to the surface. Once above ground, Theodric read the incantation. The effect was electric. Within seconds, a massive earthquake struck the whole area, and the players heard what could only be described as the wailing of the damned. These were, of course, the death cries of Sabnock and Theron. The players had succeeded! 

The session ended with Peyton peering yet again into the black orb taken from Merek so many months ago. The orb seemed to show their patron, the king of Cormyr, dead on a funeral pyre. The players decided, then and there, that the capitol of Cormyr would be their next destination.  

This February session formed a fitting denouement to the climactic battle in December with Jacob and his minions. It required more problem-solving and role-playing than combat. The players, who are getting really good at fighting as a team, rose to meet this, somewhat different challenge. They also discovered a little more about Amalric's intentions and, having experienced a near Total Party Kill the last time around, learned just how dangerous this campaign could eventually turn out to be. Future sessions will surely hold even more surprises.             

Gaming Conventions and OwlCon 2015

As a general rule, I don't really like conventions. I've only been to handful of these mass gatherings of humanity, and most of my experiences haven't been all that positive. For one example, I went to a Star Trek convention once and hated it. It cost $25 to get in the door--in 1991! And, once you were in, there was nothing to do except walk around, buy stuff, gawk at the weirdos, and marvel at Jonathan Frakes' aplomb when answering crazy questions from the audience. (Query: How does Geordie see through his visor? Frakes:  Well, when LeVar doesn't have a closeup shot, he uses a see-through version that sort of fits over his face. But that won't work for closeups because his eyes would get into the shot... Query: No. I mean how does Geordie the character see through the visor. Frakes: Umm. Uh. I think it has something to do with light particles. It's just "tech" in the script....)

In other words, that convention sucked.

While unique in its awfulness, that long-ago Star Trek brouhaha was pretty much par-for-the-course as far as my experiences at conventions went. They just weren't all that fun. The fact that I've lived in Houston since 2002 and have never attended the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo should tell you something about my general attitude toward conventions.

However, I don't feel the same way about gaming conventions. Maybe it's because games are a hobby of mine. Or maybe it's because, at a gaming convention, you're actually there to DO something besides buy a bunch of junk in the exhibition hall and watch celebrities make a quick buck. Or, maybe I've just had good experiences so far. In any case, I've always enjoyed the (admittedly) rather limited number of gaming conventions I've attended. Indeed, my experience at GenCon in 2011 was a catalyst for my renewed interest in role-playing games in general.

One convention where I always have a good time is right here in Houston: OwlCon. OwlCon is held every year in February at Rice University. I really like it. It's big enough to have many different gaming options, but small enough that the attendees don't get lost in the shuffle. I've been going since 2013. This year, I signed up to GM two role-playing sessions--one on Friday, February 6, and the other on Saturday, February 7. I ran an AD&D 1e/OSRIC mini-adventure for six characters of levels 5 through 7. I had an outstanding time. I won't go into too much detail here about the actual sessions because I intend to reuse some of the encounters in the OwlCon adventure later on in my own campaign. Recycling isn't just a good idea for empty milk cartons and newspapers, after all.

I will say this, though. I loved watching the two groups of players devise different strategies for the same set of problems while, at the same time, responding to the inevitable randomness generated by the dice. For instance, on Friday night, I had a full complement of six players. They were a fun-loving, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants group that spent only a little time scouting out the situation before they barreled in. They managed to accomplish about two-thirds of the adventure's goals, but had a great time doing it. In one encounter, a vampire boss managed to charm one of the PCs after he missed his saving throw. That unfortunate result led to a hilarious situation in which the vampire ordered the charmed PC to give his neighbor a big, sloppy hug and otherwise get in his way during the ensuing battle. Everyone had a good laugh at that one.

By contrast, the Saturday night group was smaller--only four players--and far more methodical. They laid out a strategy ahead of time, executed it, and completed the entire adventure and all its goals by the end of the evening. They planned the work and worked the plan, as you might say. As a smaller group, they weren't as animated as the players on Friday, but they still seemed to enjoy themselves. I particularly liked the fact that one of the players on Saturday, though an experienced role-player, had never played 1st Edition before. I found it gratifying to introduce a game to someone who (I suspect) was probably born around the same time that 1st Edition AD&D reached the zenith of its popularity in the early 1980s.

In all, it was a great experience. I really enjoyed the OwlCon sessions. It was a real change of pace, and I think the experience--especially learning how to run a game for people other than my usual group--will make me a better GM.

I'd now like to know what everyone else thinks. Have you ever attended a gaming convention? How was the experience? What did you like? What did you not like? Would you ever go again? Leave a comment.

How Much Complexity?

Over the last two months or so, I've been reading the new rulebook for Icons: The Assembled Edition. When it comes to this game, a picture really is worth a thousand words:

I like Icons. I decided to pick it up because I wanted a role-playing game that I could play with my two children. I have an 11-year old girl and a 9-year old boy. They know I play Dungeons & Dragons with my buddies and have expressed an interest in it. However, I wasn't so sure that AD&D/OSRIC 1e, with its sword-play and (relatively) realistic violence, would be the best fit for them--especially for the girl. (She's sensitive.)

Instead, I decided that a light-hearted superhero game would be better. After looking around, I settled on Icons. After reading through it, it seems to be just what the doctor ordered. The rules are simple and straightforward. There are only a limited number of powers and options. The combat system is fast-moving and abstract. And the tone is light--more Teen Titans Go! than The Dark Knight. I'm cautiously optimistic that I can get a game going for my kids by summer. (Icons is available from Green Ronin here: Icons)

However, Icons is not a game for someone who desires "realism" in his or her role-playing experience. (Admittedly, realism is an elusive concept in a game genre in which people can fly around and shoot laser beams from their eyes.) Still, compared to, say, Green Ronin's DC Adventures (which I also have), Icons is bare-bones and requires the GM to make up a lot of stuff along the way. Great for some people, but not for everyone.

I mention Icons here because just last week I took a look at a game that would seem to be its polar opposite--at least in terms of game design. That game is Chivalry & Sorcery: The Rebirth (4th Edition). 

Ordinarily, I would never have given this game a second thought. I only picked it up because it was free and I had received an e-mail from Drive Thru RPG telling me about it. I love free stuff. How could I turn it down? (If you want a copy, here's the link:  Chivalry & Sorcery 4th Edition.) Apparently, C&S is an old game. The first edition was published in 1977 by Fantasy Games Unlimited. I never played C&S back in the day, or, frankly, even knew it existed. Based on what I've read about it since getting this new edition, though, C&S has apparently long occupied a particular niche in the RPG world. It was the fantasy game for the RPG enthusiast who thought AD&D wasn't realistic enough and craved, well, more. More rules. More realism. More character options. Just more....

This new version provides that in spades. Consisting of three volumes, it includes rules for damn-near everything. Character creation looks like it could take hours, and I can't imagine trying to conduct combat using its mechanics. C&S also has an entirely different and far more complicated magic system. It makes AD&D's Jack Vance-inspired spells look like childs' play.

C&S does have some interesting ideas. You can create just about any sort of medieval character you can imagine and can outfit him or her to the n-th degree of detail. It also looks like a GM could tailor his or her magic system to a low or high magic setting or to anything in between. And, C&S provides expansively detailed descriptions of the class and social structure of medieval Europe. Unlike AD&D with its never-was-worlds drawn from such scattered literary sources as J.R.R. Tolkein, Fritz Leiber, and Robert E. Howard, C&S assumes that the preferred campaign setting will closely resemble Western Europe in the High Middle Ages in most respects.

Nevertheless, despite these and some other interesting notions, I must say that I would never play this. C&S is just too much. I don't want my hobby to turn into one more chore. Life is too short.

In sum, Icons and C&S would seem to occupy two ends of the complexity spectrum in RPG design. One is straightforward and clear, but it might be too abstract and rules-lite for some people. The other is obsessively detailed, has rules covering everything, and promises a sort of hard-core "wargamer" experience for the guy who's played everything and wants a real challenge. I'd like to think that AD&D (especially OSRIC) falls somewhere between these two.

So, here's my question. How much complexity do you want in role-playing games? Is there ever too much? Ever too little? Is there a Goldilocks approach that's just right? Or, is complexity just one of many factors worth considering when you decide to play a particular game? Are there any RPGs that do a particularly good job balancing realism, complexity and playability? Let me know what you think.    

December 12, 2014 Session Report: That Was a Close One

Over the last two sessions, a gnawing anxiety has been growing in my gut. Am I making it too easy for my players? Is my campaign becoming a cakewalk with no real danger? The evidence is mounting. In our October outing, the PCs cut through 3 hill giants (8 HD monsters!) and 10 ogres like a hot knife through butter. Before that, they vanquished a githyanki anti-paladin and a Type II demon without a scratch. This worries me. Now, it's possible that my players are awesome strategists who work well together and know how to plan their battles. Knowing them as I do, this is a distinct possibility. They are outstanding players.

On the other hand, what if instead I'm turning into that most dreaded of DM archetypes: the munchkin master? Have I become that guy who runs the sort of  "Monty-Haul" campaign that the Great Gygax warned us about in the original AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide--a game where "god-like characters boast and strut about" with magic items "adorning them as if they were Christmas trees decked out with tinsel and ornaments." I sincerely hope not.

Wanting to avoid this terrible fate, I redoubled my efforts to make life a little tougher on the players this time around. Although I didn't set out to kill everyone, I did want to shake things up a little.

The December 12, 2014 session opened with the players interrogating the patrol survivor from the last session. Theodric had cast Charm Person on this guy, and the PCs used that very powerful spell to very good effect. Named William, this gentleman explained that Jacob, a skilled fighter and member of Gawain's original party, had led a small army of humans, hobgoblins and other ruffians into the abandoned city of Neustria well over a year ago. Since then, these unsavory fellows had used teams of enslaved humans, elves and other demi-humans to conduct huge, Indiana Jones-style excavations all over the city. When asked what Jacob was looking for in the ruins, William pleaded ignorance. All he knew was that Jacob hadn't found it. William also gave the players the general layout of Neustria, described the defenses and patrol schedules, and generally provided the players with outstanding intelligence that they couldn't have found anywhere else.

All this information led to a lengthy discussion among the players about how to approach the city, how to get in, what to do when they got there, and so on. Eventually, the four players who were in attendance--we were missing a few regulars that night--decided to walk up to the front gate at around dusk and pretend to be the members of William's lost patrol. William had explained that he knew who the lieutenant on duty was likely to be and that he could probably stall this dude long enough for Theodric to cast Charm Person on him too.  The party could then convince the lieutenant to let them into the city.

That's just what the players did. They approached the city from the south and arrived right at dusk. It was just as William had described it. The city had a huge 100' wall made of black granite that sported 150' towers along its length every 200 yards or so. The city looked out over a vast canyon to the north and the trackless desert to the south.  And again, just as William had said, the lieutenant and his men were guarding the city gate. Theodric cast Charm Person while William talked to them. The lieutenant missed his saving throw and promptly led the PCs into the city, convinced that they were William's patrol.

Inside, the ancient, long-abandoned city was mostly in ruins. The only new structures were the many prison camps recently built by Jacob's men. These housed hundreds of slaves and guards each. Faced with searching an entire city, the PCs decided that the direct approach was the best--i.e., look for Jacob and then either kill him (along with his guards) or interrogate him and then kill him. Since William had said that Jacob's entourage visited the different encampments regularly, the PCs decided to start searching the various camps, using William as a guide. The first couple of encampments turned up nothing but hundreds of slaves and scores of ogre guards.

Things turned really interesting, however, when the PCs blundered into Ludtz, a 15' tall, Fomorian giant, and his buddy Fenris, a massive worg. The primary night guardsman for the city, Ludtz was not so easily gulled as the lieutenant. After a brief, failed attempt at guile, the PCs attacked him. Despite immediately rolling a natural 1 and dropping his flail, Ludtz fought hard. The PCs killed him after a few rounds, but not before he pounded Eirik a couple of times with his fists for 16 hp of damage each. Fenris also got in a few good licks. He grabbed the monk Zhuo Xuan in his jaws early on and didn't let go. Fenris used Zhuo as his personal chew-toy for a couple of rounds until the fighters finally killed the wily old worg. Although Zhuo never lost consciousness, he was reduced to just a couple of hit points. Interestingly, despite all the commotion, no one else in the city ever heard what was going on thanks to Peyton's quick thinking. He had cast Silence 15' Radius in the second round. This fight was easily the toughest the players had had in a couple of sessions. Maybe I wasn't such an easy DM after all! 

Anyway, after the battle, the PCs decided to find a place to rest and recuperate for the night. Looking for Jacob's camp in the dark was a lost cause, and, with the party so beat up, they couldn't have fought Jacob and his guards even if they had managed to find him. After applying multiple healing spells and potions, the PCs went to sleep inside an abandoned building.

The next morning, the city was in an uproar. Ludtz's and Fenris's bodies had been found. The players used the general chaos to quickly search two other encampments in the city. They hit pay dirt with the second. They found a huge, 100'x100' tent in the center of it. William confirmed that this was Jacob's tent. The PCs approached the fighters standing guard outside it. They explained that they had important news for Jacob about potential intruders in the city. The guards ushered them inside.

As the PCs expected, Jacob was there. Reclining on a lavish throne, he was a huge man with black armor and a massive sword. At his immediate right stood a stern-looking fellow with a mace and three black-robed acolytes. This was Robert, a Chaotic Evil cleric and Jacob's spiritual adviser. Four slave girls--including one particularly beautiful blonde--sprawled on velvet cushions in front of the men. Ten other fighters stood guard around the tent's corners.

Jacob started interrogating the PCs the minute they walked in. He was even less impressed with their lies than Ludtz. Jacob quickly suspected that they were not telling him the truth--a suspicion confirmed when Theodric started casting a Fireball. Reacting immediately to this action, Jacob, an 11th level fighter, leaped off his throne and charged Eirik, striking him with his sword. The slave girls panicked--all except for the pretty blonde. She dashed off to the right side of the tent. Robert and his acolytes also moved away in that same general direction. The guards attacked, and a chaotic melee ensued.

The first round see-sawed back-and-forth. Theodric's Fireball never went off. He was struck before he could finish casting it, and the spell was spoiled. On the other hand, the druid, Endenown, cast Summon Insects on Jacob, immobilizing him. An enraged Eirik and Toran used this opportunity to cut Jacob to pieces: he lost nearly 2/3 of his hit points. At the same time, Zhao smartly pulled out his Dust of Disappearance, vanished, and made a beeline for the evil clerics. Peyton engaged a couple of the guards. Except for Theodric's spell, things still looked pretty good.

And then all hell broke loose. The PCs learned that the pretty blonde was not, in fact, a mere bed wench. On the contrary, she was Jacob's wife and closest adviser, a brilliant, 7th-level magic-user named Amelia. (She occasionally dressed as a slave girl both to please Jacob and to fool gullible visitors.)  By the time the PCs had noticed that she was actually casting a spell from her current position, it was too late. She directed a 7d6 Fireball straight into the middle of the party. The result was spectacular. Despite making their saving throws, everyone except for Zhao was in the blast radius and sustained 18 hp of damage each. That was enough to put Theodric in negative-hp territory. He went down. Hard. The explosion also fried William, who was a mere 1st level fighter, and Jacob, who had already sustained serious injuries in his fight with Toran and Eirik. (Based on those injuries, Amelia had figured that Jacob was already dead.) The battle became even more interesting after she fired off another spell, a Web, in the next round and set it on fire. At this point, everyone except Zhao was seriously hurting. He continued to do the Lord's work by keeping Robert busy fighting an invisible foe. The fiery Web inflicted another 6 hp of damage on Theodric. He was now down to -7. Everyone else was still standing, but severely injured. They continued to fight the remaining guards.

Toran and Eirik soon broke through this scrum and engaged Amelia and Robert in hand-to-hand combat. Putting all thoughts of chivalry aside, Toran eventually ran her through, but not before she hit him in the face with several magic missiles. The rest of the party then took about four more rounds to finish off Robert, his acolytes and the remaining guards. Peyton, ever the good cleric, saved Theodric's life by casting Cure Light Wounds on him just before he nearly croaked. Unfortunately for poor Robert, he died without ever casting a single spell.

After the battle ended, the PCs searched the bodies. They found several magic items, but did not have time to inspect them. By then, it was late in the evening for me and the players. We called it a night.

I was satisfied with how this session ended. Though no one died, Theodric came close. Considering how tough their opponents were, the PCs might not have prevailed had they not used the expert teamwork I've come to expect. A few bad dice rolls, and everything could have ended in disaster. In any case, I doubt the players will underestimate their foes in the future the way they did Amelia this time around. They've learned that lesson. In all, I think this session struck the right balance between too easy and too tough.

I hope I can do it again next time.