Let Slip The Dogs Of War (Part I)

In which I discuss in detail the games I ran at Cauldron 2025, spoiling secrets and providing insights into the cracked mind of a geezer DM....

FRIDAY BLOCK I: Silver Temple of Transcendent Flame

Friday Block I was billed as a “Temple of Doom/Sidekick:” a short gaming session (only three hours in length compared to the other, four-hour time slots) designed to ease people in as they arrived for the con. People were given time to check in, find their rooms, gather their bedding (we made our own beds), and snack and coffee-up prior to the session, which ran from 4pm to 7pm (at which time dinner would be served). Quickly dressing my bed (deducing…correctly…that I’d be in no shape to do so at the end of the night), I discovered that my room had been stuffed full of Americans, many of whom I knew by reputation (and voice) from the internet, but whom I’d never met. Great guys, all around. Gus has a tremendous mustache of which I am tremendously jealous.

Silver Temple of Transcendent Flame is not a “Becker” original; it is, rather, a tactical exercise Anthony Huso designed and wrote as an introduction to his players when he first re-booted his AD&D campaign some ten or so years ago. He details this on his blog: as a campaign starter, he had his players create new, 1st level PCs, but then RAN them through a high mid-level adventure using EVIL pre-gens of his own design, sacking a temple of goodness. Following the scenario, he returned the players their original character sheets and kicked off the campaign proper with the PCs dealing with the aftermath of the destructive raid.

It's a fine idea; quite clever, in my opinion. The adventure itself (the map and his game notes) are freely available on his blog, and I decided to run the thing at Cauldron…something different, something fast, something that I knew had already been play-tested by one of the modern masters of the AD&D craft. Easy-peasy.

Unfortunately, Huso long ago lost the character sheets for the pre-gens, and I was forced to recreate them (best as I could) from the notes he provided. This was the bulk of my prep, made more than a bit challenging by his use of three evil NPC classes (the anti-paladin, the necromancer, and the witch) from Dragon Magazine. I am familiar with these, but I’m not particularly enthused by their implementation or execution in the mag. As such, I altered the classes rather drastically from how they appear. Here’s what I brought to the tournament:

• Caul, Flayer of Men: 8th level “Anti-Paladin:” abilities taken from Hackmaster…basically as a paladin except with reversed abilities (cause wounds instead of heal, befriend undead instead of turning, protection from good instead of evil, etc.).
• Vessvka Vith, Drow “Witch:” female Dark Elf cleric/magic-user of 6th/6th level.
• Tergomant Glim: 7th level cleric and a monster of a man (18 STR, 6’1”, 270#; wields a footman’s mace with one hand).
• Ergonin Hews: 6th level half-orc fighter, wielding double-fisted hand axes. Agile for an orc (Dex 17).
• Nicodemus Plath: 7th level half-elf assassin, based loosely on my son’s main PC of the same type.
• Sable Croft: 7th level human fighter; exceptional strength (though less than Caul) with a magic bardiche. More beef.
• Vlaimir Sush: 5th level Necromancer; totally unchanged from the Dragon mag entry and given a scythe for a weapon because evil necromancers with two-handed scythes are the height of coolness, even if the class kind of sucks.
• Barthax Brunst: 6th level dwarven fighter/thief. NOT one of Huso’s originals (he only lists seven characters, probably because he only had seven players). I wanted more PCs in the party because Huso throws psionic couatls, silver dragons, clay golems, and magic-user/monks at people (he’s a bad, bad man). Also, the fighter/thief built in some skill redundancy for the party.

For the adventure itself, I reformatted and (partially) rewrote what Huso had done. Anthony, God love him, has a penchant for writing the purplest of prose…he is an actual author, after all…but I needed things terse and punchy, both to match my personal style as well as the three hour widow with which I was working.

Likewise, I had to remove the various “Huso-isms” throughout the text: monks getting DEX bonuses to AC, or bonuses from wearing “silk armor,” anything that appeared to come from the UA, nutty magical “eye traps” that had multiple effects and would be a bear to adjudicate without a battle map (something I don’t use). Huso loves nothing better than a protracted siege battle a la The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun, but I didn’t plan on forcing the PCs to charge in guns ablaze. Why would they, when so many of their party members were more powerful in subtler ways? 

Besides, the adventure was plenty deadly as is.

Oh, yes…I also removed encounters #29-#33 and their associated sections of the map (too long, mostly empty, and redundant) and axed some of the other weird, none-too-normal weirdness (room #27 is simply empty and I switched the "Starfire Neonate" for a more Golden Child-like "Celestial Being").

[everyone knows the old Eddie Murphy “Golden Child” movie, right? The adventure gives off quite a bit of that vibe anyway]

Thing is, Huso made a divine being in need of slaying, but then gave it immunity to weapons of less than +3 while only arming his pre-gens with +2 weapons (come on, Anthony!); as such, capture/kidnapping had to be on the table, unless I really wanted to spend time re-stocking the dungeon (but, then, that would have made the adventure more drawn out as PCs would have to search for items to use to destroy the child and yadda-yadda-yadda. No).

Interested people who want my pre-gens and the re-tooled/formatted adventure I used at Cauldron can download them HERE and HERE, respectively. In play, I changed/improvised the last paragraph of the “START” to explain their mission: find and destroy…or capture…the “Celestial Child” (with no more information given as to what exactly a “Celestial Child” is).

So how did it actually go? Great! The players decided NOT to charge into the dungeon, but scouted ahead with their assassin instead, who was able to completely surprise and recon the couatl and monks in room #1 and report back without sounding the alarm. Using silence to first neutralize the spell-casting ability of all within the chamber, the PCs then charged into battle and put paid to the initial guardians without sounding the alarm. Pretty good start.

In the great hall, however, they were forced to decide on a course of action…and had trouble doing so. Eventually they decided to just start “opening doors” and seeing what was behind them, which led to them alerting the four clerics in room #7, the bulk of whom would sell their lives while the other two retreated through the many redoubts of the map to alert the temple proper. The players pursued, but the need to unlock doors (and getting hit by fire glyphs, etc.) slowed them down. They managed to NOT activate the clay golems in chamber 14, found the secret door, and the corridor that led to the trapdoor in area #6 (wherein resides a silver dragon). However, before going through that they waited for Chomy (playing the necromancer), who had been gathering dead monks and clerics to make maximum use of his one animate zombie spell. The party waited below while they sent a pair of their “undead soldiers” up the ladder to scout around.

And then watched as the zombies were vaporized with fire.

By this time (of course) the bell had started sounding in the grand hall, the temple was on alert, and minions were rallying to their battle positions, as they had been trained to do. The party knew that time was of the essence, but they were still trying to compose a battle plan of their own, arguing the virtues of one form of action or another.

While they were doing that, the trapdoor opened above and the magic-user launched a fireball into the narrow corridor below. So much for the necromancer and his zombies.

The PCs returned fire…perhaps Nicodemus with his poisoned darts and/or Barthax with his crossbow…slaying the magic-user. The group then decided to posse to head up the ladder and not wait around anymore. Of course, they saw the dragon, as well as the other magic-user (with a wand of lightning). Much hilarity ensued as more PCs were cooked but, in the end, they slew both and made their way to the battle royale with THE TWILIGHT PRINCESS herself. Much fun, but the forces of evil eventually triumphed (I think Marcellia was felled with a hold person spell, a common theme of the con...), and the remaining survivors (which I believe only included Caul, Tergomant, and Vessvka), made their way to the Child, who was fairly obvious considering the lilac skin, single blue eye, and enormous halo of light. All good: they removed the child, the temple started to shudder, and everyone headed for the exits (including the surviving defenders of the temple).

A good, solid game and just a few minutes over our three-hour time slot…we still made it to dinner with plenty of time to spare. 

*****

FRIDAY BLOCK II (Friday Night): the Battle Emridy Meadows. 

As I described in my prior post, I played in Settembrini's Chainmail game…at least until I could no longer physically stand without the risk of collapse. I bowed out around midnight and hit the hay at roughly 12:30am. I was then awakened at 6:45am by several successive members of the American contingent marching through my room to use the shower (the one bathroom being located nearest to my bed). The person occupying the cot next to me slept like the dead and snored like a chainsaw (so loudly that individuals from two doors down commented on it)…fortunately, for me he was a bit of a “white noise generator” and actually led to a fairly restful repose.

I finally dragged myself out of bed around 7:30, as much to use the bathroom myself (which I had to go down four flights and leave the building to do, given the person occupying the shower), and headed for breakfast.

*****

SATURDAY BLOCK I: Rivers of Blood, Death, and Glory. 

I will talk about this in a separate post.

*****

SATURDAY BLOCK II: Caul’s Dark Citadel

The afternoon session, after lunch, and this time I would be doing a “Becker Original.” Ever since seeing WotC’s use of “the D&D kids” (from the 1981 D&D cartoon) as “content” for their new 5E 2024 books (and on the cover of their Stormwreck Isle starter set), I’ve wanted to write my own adventure that featured these characters. And for Cauldron, I decided that I would use them in a sequel adventure to Huso’s Silver Temple of Transcendent Flame.

My plan was to make the adventure more of a stealth/infiltration in contrast to the Caul's destructive raid to showcase different styles of play. The PCs would be tasked with the recovery of the Celestial Child’s remains: a mercy mission fitting their 'good guy' ethos, as opposed to a task of vengeance. I figured the PCs could return the ashes (or whatever) to the Silver Temple, where the surviving monks would use the power of "transcendent flame" (or whatever) to raise it from the dead. This was my idea for quite a while, even after I realized it was a long shot that Caul and his buddies would actually figure out a way to kill the Child.

And yet, that wasn’t my main problem. The main problem was the actual adventure site, i.e. the map. I needed a stronghold for Caul...and while it couldn’t be too large, it still had to feel like an “epic evil fortress.” Or, at least, weird. Or both. But with a capped number of encounters.

*sigh*  Let me explain.

In a convention time block...even a four hour one (which is long enough that you need to give the players at least a break, in my opinion)...there’s a limit to how many encounters they can get through. An excellent example is the tournament scenario found in Dave “Zeb” Cook’s module I1: Dwellers of the Forbidden City. The scenario is a linear gauntlet: each encounter area needs to be bypassed, one after another. There are no branching decision points, no side treks, no work arounds. You have ten encounter areas…TEN…and that’s it. I’ve run this scenario countless times over the years, but the last two times were for Cauldron 2023, one in playtest (at home) and once at the convention itself, and both times with strict attention paid to the time limit. And in BOTH instances, I found it impossible for the players involved to navigate the entire length within the time frame…NINE encounters was the most anyone ever got through in four hours.

Dwellers is pretty dastardly, and it’s a good example for study: you have two large, “set piece” encounters. You have two “tricky” encounters that can be avoided through cleverness. You have one “trick/trap” room, you have two “small” encounters that should be resolved quickly, and you have one “medium” encounter that would normally be okay, but due to its position (at the end of the adventure), the party will be low on resources like hit points and spells and so it will PLAY harder than it might otherwise play. The last two encounters are (effectively) “empty” locations with nothing there except possible time wasting by the party. Generally speaking, a good overall formula…but, again, still too long for the time slot (it runs about 15-20 minutes over four hours, and I run the thing like a machine).

And anyway, this is supposed to be a fortress…a CASTLE, not a linear gauntlet. Dwellers works because of the scenario itself…you are burrowing through a mountain following a tunnel into the heart of the forbidden city. But I wanted something that could be explored with branches and loops and whatnot…an environment for exploration in other words. Where and how to even begin. So, I started thinking about what Caul’s castle would like like…something gifted to him by Dark Patrons (of course) since he was only 8th level and not stout enough to build his own. As such, it could be as twisted and fantastic as I wanted. And, of course, it would need ways to sneak in (because, duh, stealth mission, not “Avengers Assemble” frontal assault). So probably through a cistern or catacomb or something.

IN FACT, my original idea was to simply re-purpose the Pax Tharkas mission from DL1…even using the map from that module. How easy! (mmm…now that I’m remembering I was ALSO planning on using warped version of the DL heroes as the pre-gens before I finally decided on the D&D Kids). But after looking over Pax Tharkas, I realized that it was really, really crappy. I needed something else.

Eventually, after bouncing off several different ideas (including a Harold Lamb description of the Hashashin's lair..and having my daughter draw me a castle map), I finally decided on something I could live with: the castle from the Jim Henson film, The Dark Crystal. It had everything I needed…a way in through the tunnels beneath (in addition to a front gate), a crazy-ass interior, vivid rooms/chambers (from the film), verticality, etc., etc. A place for Caul to set his throne, a lab for Caul’s evil wizard to do apothecary stuff, a “temple room” (the crystal chamber) for the witch to perform her dark rites, etc. Now all I needed was a MAP of the place…and I found THIS on-line:

Look at that thing, ain’t it a beauty? Except of course, it’s got the cutaway floor plan that doesn’t work for me and actually making the thing make sense was going to require a whole bunch of scribbling and erasing and scribbling on my part.

SO…I procrastinated. I detailed the actual encounter areas, numbered at 15. 'Hey! 15 is more than nine,' you say…heck, it’s more than ten! Yes, but this is not a "linear gauntlet." I wrote the thing in such a way that there were some nine-ish encounter areas for the PCs to surpass to both A) reach the Child’s destination (which would be determined by the results in the earlier “Silver Temple” adventure), and B) escape the dungeon. Because…stealth, right? We don’t need to confront Caul and his minions (though, if you do, it's frosting…). In addition, I threw in a bunch of slave areas (people for 'good guys' to rescue) because, of course there are slaves (like the podlings in the movie) AND...because I wanted to go “full Henson”...I also stocked in all the DC’s “Garthim” (giant black crabs…same stats as the MM) as Caul’s mutated guardian minions. Chef’s kiss.

HOW’D IT GO? Well, I'd hoped to get some of the same players from my Friday, Silver Temple adventure (continuity), but no such luck. Sign-up sheets filled FAST. And "Best DM" winner Grutzi…who had contacted me before the con and left this session open specifically to play this adventure at my table was unable to get a spot! Crap. I had only seven pre-gens (my other games were all 8+) because, of course, there aren’t all that many “D&D kids.”

[no, there was no “Uni the Unicorn;” my characters are a decade older and Uni has long since left ‘em to join a herd or something. The seventh pre-gen PC was a grown up version of Varla the Illusionist, a minor character introduced as a love interest for Presto in an episode I believe is called The Last Illusion. Yeah…an illusionist girlfriend. Suck it, Hank!]

Adult Varla

But at the last second, I decided that I was being stupid and I just went and grabbed Grutz and told him: get one of his own pre-gens and join the party. We went with eight and he brought a cleric, which was a welcome addition...although I had converted the older “Sheila” into a (dual-classed) thief/cleric to ensure the party sported some divine power. Now they had more.

ANYway...despite finishing the maps only two days before I hopped a plane and not getting a chance to play-test the thing…it played surprisingly well! The players decided to climb the castle (forgot to put rope on their equipment list…whoops!) and enter through the highest tower, working their way DOWN rather than UP. Which was fine…that, too, was a way I'd coded my encounters for the con. Their first encounter was with the assassin Nicodemus Plath, contemplating his life choices in the lookout. They got into a scrap with him and should have been poisoned five ways to Sunday, but my die rolls were pretty horrendous, and they beat the snot out of him. I had him surrender and then they got to tie him up and do some "role-playing" as they interrogated him about the layout of the place. “Well, it’s kind of hard to describe...”

Thing is, my map was all wonky with “non-Euclidean geometry:” due to me trying to crib together a vertical map into something horizontal I just ended up using no corners (nor even many straight lines), just a lot of “bendy,” wrap-around tunnels and a great many stairwells and changes of elevation. It worked well to make the whole expedition confusing, frustrating, and painful for the characters, as the slaves they encountered had only partial information and even then could only say, “Well, it’s kind of hard to describe…” Much hilarity.

However, the players were determined to kill Caul, Divine Child or not. One of the players, Dillon, was a self-professed Huso fan and knew all about Caul and really wanted to off the guy (Dillon was very enthusiastic about everything, actually…I think he was having a pretty good time as his first Cauldron…). They figured out where Caul’s throne room was and hatched some cockamamie plan to disguise themselves as a Drow (Diana wearing the witch’s clothes from a ransacked bedroom) and a slave (Varla using change self) with an invisible Sheila in tow to backstab the guy or some such. Caul wasn’t buying it of course…everyone in his castle was cleared by him and he knew there wasn’t any other Drows or “new cultists,” and also knew that slaves weren’t allowed in the throne room (other than his chained up scribe), so he dispatched his cadre of gnolls to round up the obvious imposters.

Fighting ensued; damage was done, Bobby stunned the hell out of everyone with a thunderclap (including his own people), but Sheila got off a hold person on Caul and the party carried the day to much fanfare. They found Caul’s hidden treasure vault, trapped with a necrophidius (credit to ChatGPT for that idea), but still: no Divine Child.

“We’ve got to find that temple with the witch…maybe we need to keep going lower.” But the party really did not want to end up in the catacombs…they had a sneaking suspicion that would be a BAD IDEA (and they were right because...you know...Garthim). But a little lower they went and ended up in the slave pens and fought and killed an ogre with a big old whip (not as dangerous as it could have been) and then said “AHA! Let’s cast speak with dead on the ogre and see if he can tell us where we find the Child!” Okay, cleric, you get two questions:

“Where’s the Divine Child, dead guy?” With the witch…

“How do we get to the temple?” Well, it’s kind of hard to describe…

Hahaha…no, just kidding. He told them go up the stairs to the main hall and take a right. How hard is that?!

They found the temple, the child, and the her cultist acolytes worshipping a stone obelisk, roughly shaped like a spider, that floated above a red glowing pit (Dark Crystal, right?). Eric was dressed in Caul’s armor, Varla was doing her illusion thing and they got close enough to the witch to trap her INSIDE Erik’s “dome of force” (that his magic shield could project 1/day), while the others blasted the cultists and Diana grabbed the Child and ran like hell (as a 6th level monk she was uber-fast) up to the top tower where she could feather fall off. Pretty sure Shiela ran behind her as backup.

Well, that wasn’t so hard…what the--?! As the GIANT MUTANT CRABS in the shadowed alcoves came out to attack. More combat but they won the day, the witch surrendered, and the party made her divest herself of all her gear and commanded her to return to the UnderDark, never to return.

All with minutes to spare before the dinner bell. Good stuff.

[to be continued...]

A moment of unbridled joy...

Cauldron Prep

What day is it? Thursday? Whatever...it's 5am (or, rather, it was...I scrolled reddit looking for a worthwhile post but it all just made me want to vomit...) and I'm up thanks to some ungodly "beeping" that went off in our house this morning. No idea what it was. Checked all the fire alarms (and it didn't sound like them anyway). Hasn't repeated itself. But now I'm up.

Status update on "stuff:"

• The Family is doing well. Adapting to our "new normal" of having a high school kid. So far, so good. D came down with a bit of a cold (not COVID), probably from the amount of stuff on his plate, but he's gotten over it quick. Sofia's getting pretty good at rocking Take It On The Run (REO Speedwagon) on her guitar. Wife hasn't murdered me yet. All's fine.
• Soccer: I'll have a better idea of all teams after this weekend.
• Seahawks: hey! I went to the game last week which was...terrible! Not just because they lost (always bad to drop a home game), or that they lost to the Niners (which makes it even worse), but because of how they played...oh, man. It is orky football for sure but, in Blood Bowl terms, they're like the ork team that has ONE goblin catcher (that would be Smith-Njigma) and no one else with any speed/catching ability. The offense failed to stretch the field at all. And "Riq" Woolen was awful. Really, really frustrating to watch. Also frustrating to have to pay $8 for a bottle of water at the game. *sigh*
• Legal Disputes: I might have found a way to resolve my civil suit as early as next week, fingers-crossed. The events that led to the irritation I expressed last Friday turned out to be a blessing in disguise (maybe). We'll see.
• My father was in town. Had a nice visit. He's pretty hale and hearty for an old codger (pushing 80), but I worry about his mind a bit. *sigh* That's life, right?

Okay...onto gaming stuff.

Cauldron is barely a month away, and other than my day-to-day affairs (see above), this is my primary concern at the moment. Despite being on opposite sides of the globe, I've been in rather constant contact (through discord, natch) with the Euro-folks (helps that I don't get much sleep...) and things are getting exciting. Man, I'm so glad I'm going back there. Even if it SUCKS somehow, it'll still be fantastic to see everyone again.

This year they've got six gaming blocks going: two Friday (the first is a shorter, three-hour "sidekick" for folks arriving early), three Saturday, and one Sunday (after breakfast and awards). This year I'm signed up to run games in five of the six, including (*shudder*) Saturday's "night block" (9pm - whenever). In Cauldron 2023, I used that time to sleep, but retrospectively that's silly:

1. My sleep cycle is already out-of-whack from the travel.
2. I'm too keyed up by what's going on (hard to get to sleep and tend to wake before dawn).
3. I'm making the journey to play games, not nap!
4. I've got a nice long plane ride home on which to sleep (and I will).

SO: night block, here I come!

I am also the "tournament director" for this year's "Blackrazor Cup" which does not entail a whole lot of work (thankfully)...now that the adventure's been written, anyway. Probably I'l be tallying scores and whatnot in the wee hours of Sunday morning. No paper certificates this year...the con organizers got real life medals and trophies (I've seen pix). Amazing! I'm sure it will be a good time. 

[we'll see if all the players hate me after this year. It's their own fault for complaining last year's adventure was "too easy." This, however, may have been due to the way the adventure was DM'd...when I ran it for my home group  it ended in a TPK]

For my free block, I will be doing my darnedest to get into Settembrini's Chainmail game (yes, this Settembrini) which he is advertising as having space for seven, Even if I don't I might hang out and watch...regardless, I have that particular time block cleared specifically for that particular table.

Originally, I'd also kept the Night Block clear, partly out of a vane hope at sleep, but mostly because I was considering the possibility of one of Prince's epic night games (he usually brings some 10+ player extravaganza). Unfortunately, this year he ain't. Not because he won't be drinking through the night (au contraire!) but because he has games he wants to play in, for a change. However, he IS offering his own "tournament adventure" (with prize!) that he will be running himself in three different time blocks. It's called "Assault On The Beckerdrome;" the description reads:

Over the last years, you have endured and triumphed in the Blackrazor Cup, the most prestigious event in the history of the known world. Its lustre has endowed you with divine fire, but each night you weep, for lack of worlds to conquer. Yet there is hope. The earth shakes and is split asunder. An ancient fortress lies beneath. You have conquered the Blackrazor Cup, but how will you fare against the one who forged such a contest?

The ultimate challenge awaits.

So, yes. It appears I am the BBEG of his adventure. Sly devil.

[he will be paid back! In spades!]

Of the time slots I'm signed up for, four are nailed down. I'll be running a modified version of Anthony Huso's Silver Temple of Transcendent Flame in the Friday afternoon "sidekick," the BRC tourney module for Saturday morning, a new adventure that I haven't even drawn a map for yet (*headslap*) called Caul's Dark Citadel for Saturday afternoon, and MY version of I3, Legacy of the Pharoid, in the Sunday brunch spot. Of course, that one's not complete yet, either. 

[wait...checking. Checking. Yeah...no]

I'm actually probably going to have to scrap Legacy from the docket. I was only going to run the Body Banks section, but it's still 64 encounters (waaaay too many for a four-hour time slot) and less than half have been keyed. Too big, too long, too un-finished for this year's Cauldron...but I've been in contact with Kelvin Green about some collaboration on the project and it might be cool for a later Cauldron con (maybe as a multi-part running...as I did with Forbidden City in 2023). I certainly doubt I'll have time to write AND play-test the thing before con time, not with needing to do the same with Dark Citadel. I just have too many irons in the fire.

SO...I was looking through my inventory of adventures for a replacement, and I actually have a number of low level (3rd - 5th) adventures that might substitute AND be short enough. There's the Tomb of Bendan Fazier, which was a lot of fun for my home group (though, since I posted it to the blog a couple years back, it could be considered "spoiled"). There's Ice Box which, while written for OD&D is easily converted (it even uses Fiend Folio critters)...except the tournament adventure is already "cold themed." There's Lost Vault of Kadish (a stand-alone 'side quest' in Legacy). Heck, I could even run The Sunken City of Doom, my DL1 re-write; yeah, it's close to 100 encounter areas, but it's for the right levels, has pre-gens (twisted DragonLance PCs), and is mostly keyed...

Oh, wait: here's also Vermin Town, the rat-themed adventure I wrote for my own "Year of the Rat" adventure charity contest...now there's a compilation book I never got around to publishing (*sigh*). Why not? Because I drew my maps by hand and I can never get my damn scanner to work (frigging Paraguayan printer tech...). Ugh. This is a good one, but I'd need to FIND the maps for it (no idea where those are). Ooo...also The Tower of Ybarra Florin. That's an oldie but a goodie.  Okay, I have choices...I'll figure something out.

Then there's the Night Block.

I added an event here because A) sleep is for suckers, B) Prince ain't running, and C) I'm going to this thing to be active/contribute. I mean, Grutzi is running his Isle of the Dead, but I don't have a 9th level character to bring to the party (wish that I did), and pre-gens, IME, are always a bit of a crap-shoot. None of the other games in this block are particularly enticing: I'm already familiar with Black Crag and Black Mark (having reviewed them), the idea of playing a 4th level OD&D pre-gen is...nah. And there's just no way you'll find me sitting down to a game of "Ransack" (sorry, Parti...). No. Better to just run something of my own. I like to run games, after all. And running different games for different people keeps me sharp.

But what to run? Well, what I've got registered for the event is titled *something, something* Doom, but that's just a placeholder. My initial thought, actually, was to run one more session of the tournament adventure. We have eight different DMs runnng the thing (including me), but if I ran it twice, it would ensure that ALL the attendees who wanted to play would get the chance to do so.

[some quick math: there'll be about 80 attendees at Cauldron. The tournament adventure is designed for six to eight players so, with a Dungon Master, that's NINE people at a table. 9x9 = 81, right? But you subtract one ('cause I'd be running twice, and there's only one of me) giving a result that equals the con's headcount]

Plus, I'm kind of loving the adventure, and having already run it twice, I'm getting a good handle on it (there are some tricky bits). Yeah, more and more I'm considering one more session of Rivers...unless I get a message from someone else who wants to run it (which I might...there's still time). And if THAT happens, I'm thinking of running something high level. Maybe Hells Own Temple (which, re-reading it, could really stand some revisions) or Queen of the Demonweb Pits. I don't know. Something challenging. Something AD&D.

Okay, the sun's up and so are the kids...time to make breakfast. It is a perfectly beautiful Seattle morning: grey, misty, and drizzly (we desperately need rain). A little more coffee and I'll be able to tackle those maps...once everyone's out of the house.

Later gators!

: )

***EDIT: I found my maps. Oo-boy!***

Maps And Distance

Driving home from Montana this weekend...a return trip I was making for the third time in the year 2023...I was again struck with wonder by the majestic landscape that stretches along Interstate 90, from the Gem State of Idaho to the Cascade Mountain range. Just incredible vistas of rolling hills and rocky cliffs, forests and mountains, the Gorge, the mighty Columbia, and miles and miles of nothing between the small towns and communities.

Per my Google Maps, the total distance between Missoula and my home in Seattle is approximately 484 miles, in a (more-or-less) straight line, along a well-maintained highway. About 24 days of hiking, if one considers a 20 mile per day march of the typical D&D party. That's a long, long distance.

I use the Pacific Northwest as the setting for AD&D campaign these days. While I've probably mentioned (many times) that I'm rather terrible at drawing maps...especially wilderness or "outdoor" maps...what I probably have not mentioned is that since switching over to actual (real world) geography, I don't even bother trying to do "hex maps." Never was much good at them anyway, and thanks to Ye Old Google Earth, I can chart distances just fine with the laptop and an internet connection. And with those distances (and being able to zoom in on the terrain) I can calculate travel times, resource depletion, wandering encounter rolls, etc.

Who needs hexes?

But here's the thing...the real thing: I know "hex crawling" is a thing: so many internet videos and blog posts discussing it, talking about best practices, extolling the virtues of using hexes to have "true" "sandbox" (i.e. open world) play. People love their hex crawling wilderness adventures...people want those hexes for the play it facilitates. Huge, multi-hundred page supplements/adventures have been published adding "interesting encounters" to each hexagonal shape on the hex map. What a fun, what a useful resource to have at one's fingertips, right?

Thing is: those hexes are too big. Too big to have "one interesting thing" in each one. I don't even care what scale you're using...six mile or twenty or 24 (B/X suggests 6 mile for small scale maps and 24 mile hexes for large). Folks need an idea of just how much space fits into an area this size.

We're all relatively familiar with the Keep on the Borderlands, right? Has a wilderness map in it, remember? One of the complaints I've read about B2 over the years is the tiny size of the outdoor area: 5200 yards by 4000 yards (that's about 3 miles by 2.25 miles). Even following the meandering road, the titular Keep is roughly two-and-a-half miles away from the Caves of Chaos...that's right next door! Heck you could fit multiple B2 wilderness pages inside a single 6-mile hex; there's too much crammed into that tiny, tiny space to be "reasonable" is the protest.

Okay, here's a screen shot from Google Earth of a portion of King County, Washington, including much of Seattle. The gold box on the screen is roughly the same size as the wilderness map in module B2. The northern border lines up with the northern city limits of Seattle proper (at 145th street); the southern border lines up with North 85th Street, two blocks from my home in the Greenwood neighborhood of north Seattle.  You could fit something like 9-10 "B2s" within the city limits of Seattle.

Now, I'll give you a close up of the area:

I'm sorry I can't provide more detail, but this area is huge: absolutely enormous. Hills and buildings (not to mention forested parks) block line of sight more than a few blocks in any direction. The area contains multiple schools, libraries, churches, a large hospital campus, movie theater, numerous "big box" stores, supermarkets, parking lots, large cemeteries, the largest shopping mall in north Seattle (Northgate...now the Seattle Kraken Ice Complex), several lakes, and numerous parks, motels, businesses, strip malls, and TWO 18 hole golf courses. Two major arterials (Highway 99 and Interstate 5) divide the area into three vertical strips, each one with distinctly different character. And it's mostly residential: thousands of people live in this area, in houses with yards, duplexes, condos, and apartment buildings (in addition to at least half a dozen retirement/assisted living complexes), as well as homeless tent encampments and RVs parked under bridges and overpasses.

I am intimately familiar with this region of Seattle...I've spent most of my daily life within it and, perhaps, an additional mile radius for the bulk of the last 26 years. And even so there are giant swaths of the area that I don't know, have never visited, and have no clue about. I walk my neighborhood a lot, but I don't usually go more than 15 blocks in any particular direction without a car. And many areas are simply inaccessible by foot. 

It would be easy to drop SEVERAL dragon dens in an area this size...assuming enough food to sustain such alpha predators. Which shouldn't be too tough: the 1910 census showed Seattle to have more than 237 thousand people living within the city limits, and that was long before modern refrigeration technology. The entire population of B2, humanoid monsters included, amounts to only a few hundred...and it's not like the area around the Keep is portrayed as some sterile, desert region.

I will reiterate: this is an area three miles long from north to south. The Isle of Dread (module X1) is 144 miles long across its north-south axis. That's the same, straight-line distance as from Seattle to Portland, Oregon. That's a ridiculously huge amount of wilderness. Only an idiot would attempt to walk through the forests and mountains between those two cities (I-5 actually takes a longer, more circuitous route bending towards the coast). And yet a party of six to eight adventurers are going to try exploring the interior of a dinosaur-infested island with thick jungle and active volcanoes? Really?

Driving back along I-90 Sunday morning, I couldn't help but wonder what it would be like to try traversing such a distance without the aid of the beautiful highway I was zipping along on at 80ish miles per hour. Insanity, I concluded. Miles and miles of wilderness...probably extremely hostile wilderness, especially in the heart of summer and the dead of winter. We don't account for SEASONS in our overland exploration...mountain passes are simply impossible with heavy snow (and spring rains cause avalanches and rock falls). But long before reaching the mountains, all but the most prepared (or fortunate) groups trying to cross the state would probably perish from starvation in the dry landscape.  Lewis & Clark certainly never tried it...they crossed into Oregon from Idaho and travelled down the Columbia River to the coast.

Anyway...

We should not underestimate the distance of distance. I'm sure that sounds silly, but when you're talking about a lost temple, a ruined fortress, or a monster lair (the usual "dungeon" sites)...such places can hide very easily within a landscape. Ye Old Internet tells me most medieval cities took up less than one square mile in area..,though I'd guess that's just the walled perimeter and that the surrounding farms extended much farther. But so long as your local dungeon isn't spewing forth hostile predators looking for townfolk prey on a regular basis, there's no reason such a place couldn't be relatively close to the PCs' "home" community.  

Just my thoughts of the last few days; thanks for reading.

; )

Hell's Own Temple

Here's a little treat for folks on a Friday before Halloween.

Hell's Own Temple is a short adventure I penned a couple months back for Prince of Nothing's No Artpunk Contest. Sadly (for my ego), my entry was not among the contest winners (the top eight submissions were pretty darn spectacular), but Prince still had some kind words for my attempt at a high level, one-off adventure.

Since it didn't make the cut for the compilation volume (Prince does plan on including it in a supplemental book along with all the runners-up), I've decided to make the adventure available to my blog readers. It's short (only about 10 pages) and not tarted up for publication, but it should be complete enough to run; you can download the files here:

Hell's Own Temple

Map 1

Map 2

There is no overland map of the island, although my original model for the thing was Easter Island, whose map can be easily found on the internet. My original concept was actually an island assault, but I scaled the whole thing waaaay back in order to meet the contest parameters (this also helped with the time crunch I was under). More background info can be found in this old blog post, for the interested.

An AD&D adventure suitable for six to eight PCs of 10th-14th level. Happy Halloween!

; )

Just Another Tomb

Well, that took longer than anticipated.

Catching up on my blog reading Sunday, I happened across this post from Joseph Manola about a certain dungeon design challenge put forth by Patrick over at False Machine (whose site I don't peruse as often as I probably should). While I like a good blog-tastic challenge as much as the next dude, after reading the criteria I figured this particular one wasn't really for me: not only was I hopelessly late to the party (it was supposed to be completed a couple weeks before), and there's nothing really "art-punk" about me. Hell, I had to find a definition and visit a bunch of other web sites just to figure out what that term is supposed to mean!  SO...soft pass. 

Then my players got TPK'd fighting kobolds and I needed a new adventure.

Since Dyson's map was still staring me in the face from these open tabs on my laptop, I kept looking at the thing, analyzing the layout, seeing if it would suggest a scenario. And, of course (eventually) one did...and as the map was already drawn (and map-making is really my achilles heel when it comes to this D&D stuff) I figured I might as well use it. So I ended up kind of doing the challenge after all.

No, it's not artistic or "punk;" I am a total hack of a writer with nary an original bone in my body. Most of my adventure ideas come from books or movies I've seen over the years (I seldom draw on adventure modules, preferring instead the easier, lazier route of just running pre-made adventures). In this particular case, I drew on an old favorite of mine: the 1999 action film The Mummy. It pretty much has all the ingredients for a D&D adventure...monsters, magic, treasure, tombs, etc. 

The problem was: the map. Man, I puzzled over that thing for nearly two days before figuring out what various rooms were and how they interacted and whatnot. That was tough. That damn river. That giant chamber with the open pits. All that jazz. Plus it had to work for a small party of 1st level adventurers.

Anyhoo, I got it done, and we started the adventure last night. Although the party is in a bit of a pickle at the moment (the cleric failed at his attempt to turn the skeletons...jeez), I wouldn't say they're doing terrible. I mean, no one's died yet...

; )

This morning, I wrote up my notes in a bullet-point format in case anyone's interested in seeing how lame my adventures are (usually I just use a handful of notes on a spreadsheet). You can download the PDF from MediaFire here (do people still use MediaFire?) or you can simply read the text (posted below the map). I call it "The Tomb of Bendan Fazier." Cheers!

[oh, forgot to mention: this is for 1st edition AD&D; suitable for 5-7 1st level characters]

You know how long it took me to figure out
how to add numbers to this thing?
I am soooo lame!

THE TOMB OF BENDAN FAZIER 

The arid, windswept hills east of Akima are known as “the Tomblands” for it is said that the ancients buried many kings, wizards, and high priests among the dry rocks before the Great Reckoning. True or not, searching more than 600 square miles of wasteland for hidden sepulchers is a fools’ errand…and finding one not yet despoiled by treasure hunters is an even slimmer hope. 

But Tully the Dwarf knows one. 

1. Hall of Guardians

• The outer door was spiked shut (by Tully) from his last foray. Putrefying bodies of three companions (no treasure, gear hacked to pieces) lie scattered about the chamber. 
• 12 skeletons (HPs 4, MM p.87) programmed to kill any who enter the chamber; they will not pursue beyond this room. If turned they retreat to the river and are swept away. 
• A bricked up, secondary tunnel has been collapsed at its base by a curious troll (#7). 

2. Desecrated Chamber 

• The door to this room has been smashed open (by the troll at #7). 
• Wet, muddy footprints (identifiable by a ranger) gives evidence of the culprit. 
• Some scattered coins (D6 each of copper, silver, and electrum) indicate the place was looted. 

3. Alcove 

• Careful examination of this dark and dingy alcove finds an ancient bronze wheel set into the wall. 
• A bend bars roll is needed to move the wheel; multiple characters can combine their percentages for a better chance of turning it. On a roll of 00 (99+ with two individuals working, 98+ with three, etc.) the mechanism breaks. 
• Turning the wheel: a loud grinding, stone-on-stone sound echoes in the distance as the mechanism causes the false wall at #5 to lower into the floor. 

4. Hall of Glory 

• Doors to this chamber are stone and difficult to move (normal open doors roll). 
• Each column holds a torch sconce with an ancient torch that may be lit. 
• The eastern wall depicts a fantastic painting showing the reign of Bendan Fazier over an agricultural people, using his wand to conjure monsters and his staff to smite skulls. He doesn’t appear to have been a nice person. 

5. Rod Room 

• Three rods of black metal lay in a heap on the floor; each is about 18’ long and weigh 70#. 
• The southern wall is of different stone than the rest of the chamber; it can be lowered with the mechanism at #3. 

6. Bridge 

• The bridge of ancient wood and rusted metal is rickety but only collapses if more than 150# tries to cross at once. 
• Slots allowing for the insertion of three rods (from #5) reinforce the bridge so that there is no chance of collapse. 
• A rusted iron ladder will disintegrate, dropping any would be climber unceremoniously to the beach below (1d4 damage). The subterranean river is exceptionally cold; its current is sluggish. 

7. Troll Den 

• A river scrag (HPs 27, MM2 p.121) makes its lair here; it wears a silver necklace (120gp) as a bracelet. 
• There is only a 20% chance the creature is here, but it will return D4 turns after a party starts poking around its possessions. Any time the party encounters the river, there is a 25% chance the troll is fishing (submerged) nearby; it will be drawn to their light and sound (surprising 4 in 6). 
• The scrag’s collection of treasure includes five ceramic jars containing 400cp each (each weighs 50#), another containing 250ep (30# weight), an iron strong box (minimal rust) with 500sp, and a dagger +1 used to pick its teeth. 

8. Antechamber of the Sun 

• Massive doors of polished metal greatly reflect light sources, illuminating the chamber. 
• A sun-shaped depression over the obvious key hole allows the door to be opened with the sun key (#9). 
• Attempts to pick the lock sets off an ancient fire trap (1d4+12 damage, save for half). 

9. Hall of Keys 

• Each of the three statues in this chamber portrays a young woman standing at attention with an elaborate headdress (snake, dog, and owl); around each statues neck hangs a metal symbol attached to a rotting leather thong (sun, moon, and star)…keys to areas #8, #11, and #12, respectively. 
• These are caryatid columns (HPs 22, FF p.18); each will animate ONLY if the key is removed from around its neck. Attacks will be focused on the person who holds the necklace. 
• The tapestry at the chamber’s end may be illuminated by a torch placed in the empty sconce near it; it depicts the funerary ceremonies of Bendan Fazier, including the tomb’s construction, his mummification, and the sacrifice of slave workers in the subterranean river that flows past this very chamber. 

10. Hall of the Demesne 

• A globe of continual light (L12) illuminates this magnificent chamber. 
• The floor is an incredible mosaic depicting the realm once controlled by Bendan Frazier: a region north of Akima, including the Akima river and its main tributaries. The image is punctuated by hundreds of sparkling precious stones, cut and set within the image (350 gems worth 10gp each; diligent work can pry up five stones per turn of effort). 
• The map is oriented with “north” towards the eastern wall; the rivers tributaries are made to appear to be flowing out of the three open pits along that wall. 

11. Room of Preparation 

• This level is reached by dropping down one of the 20’ deep open pits in #10. All the mummification equipment was destroyed long ago, its pieces scattered on the floor amongst the shredded crumbling pages of Bendan Fazier’s tomes and scrolls. Empty torch sconces line the walls. 
• The locked metal door in the southwest can be opened with the moon key (#9); it radiates both magic and evil. Anyone inserting the key into the lock must save versus spells to resist the impulse to immediately attack the other party members (attempts to pick the lock have the same effect). The madness leaves the character after one turn. 
• Engraved in the door is a three-line verse in an ancient, dead language. Translated it reads: My Tomb Lies Beyond/Those Who Would Desecrate It/My Doom Will Suffer. 

12. Tomb of Bendan Fazier 

• The chamber contains a rotting wooden chest containing 800gp (chest will break if moved), a metal box (with 100pp), and a large stone sarcophagus. The last may only be opened by using the star key (#9); a combined strength of 24 is needed to move the lid which is carved with another three-line verse: My Spirit Has Flown/Yet My Flesh Remains And Will/Rain Vengeance On Thee. 
• A mummy lies within the sarcophagus. A scarab of protection fastens his funeral garment; one hand clutches his wand of conjuration (8 charges), the other his staff of striking (4 charges). His death mask is a mix of gold and precious jade with cut emerald eyes (3500gp value). Removing the mask reveals a horrible rotting face with wriggling green worms crawling in and out of its orifices. The remains, now a Son of Kyuss (HPs 19, FF p. 83) animates and attacks; all characters in the chamber must immediately save against magic or flee in terror. 
• In the northeast corner, an ancient bronze ladder leads to a trapdoor in the ceiling which may be pushed open to allow access to #10. The trapdoor can only be opened from below. 

NOTE: Tully the Dwarf (a second level thief) is a middle-aged dwarf of hardy constitution (15 hit points!) and sour disposition. He brooks no nonsense, but is willing to cut PCs in for an even share of the treasure (he has no choice as he can’t face the tomb dangers alone). He has leather armor, a broadsword and dagger, a stout pack mule, torches, rope, and a couple flasks of oil. His main concern is finding a cleric to take care of the damn skeletons! He has a weathered map to the tomb that he keeps on him (under his armor) at all times.

So Much Wrong (Krynn)

I am really having a hard time figuring out where to start.

"It's all about the economy." Isn't that what people say? Perhaps not with regard to world building (in a fantasy RPG)...but maybe they should. Still: what part of the economy do you want to start with? The people? The geography? The resources? The monetization (or lack thereof)? The nations of the known world?

Maybe I should start with the good. 

No wait...even that's going to elicit complaints. Ah, well.

Currently reading.

The maps are "okay." I can work with some (most?) of them. It's a shame they're so poorly inconsistent from product to product (DL2: Dragons of Flame gives a scale of one hex equals two kilometers...what, is that supposed to be someone's idea of a joke?). But aside from issues of scale and nonsensical placements of some terrain (for example: steppe and grasslands being keyed differently on the world map ...despite being pretty much the same thing...and then locating the steppe along temperate coastlines, negating the main distinction between the terms). But the "dungeons" are somewhat better, at least as pre-drawn adventure sites. Which is something.

Aaaaaand...that's about it. 

I mean, with regard to the world building of Krynn. The Dragonlance story...the characterizations, the concept, the premise...those things are fine. Good enough, really (and better in novel form than in the scripted adventure modules). But other than place names, Cataclysmic wreckage, and invading dragon armies...well, I think I'm going to end up junking most of it. Or rewriting substantial bits, especially regarding the setting history...the legends can stay the same, just being chalked up to "unreliable narrators" and unsubstantiated rumor.

[hmm...though it's unfortunate that the presence of Astinus the Chronicler kind of nixes this idea, seeing as he's portrayed as both immortal and infallible with regard to his histories. *sigh* Something else I'll have to consider. On the other hand, most PCs won't have access to Astinus's archives. But (hmm, again) then why does he exist? Ugh]

There are certainly some people who will wonder why I'm bothering to continue with this reclamation project. Is it just that I dig on Qualinesti elves and "barbaric plainsmen" fighting against masked dragon riders? Um, no...problems abound with all those things (especially the "mounted dragonlance" itself which, while a cool idea, seems pretty damn impractical for aerial combat). Neither is it nostalgia...well, certainly it's not ALL nostalgia.

Thing is, folks, I'm not all that great at originating new ideas. I'm just not. I'm okay with taking someone else's idea and "refining" it...but I need some initial creative spark to work with. I'm afraid, I just don't find my own ideas very inspiring.

Also currently
reading...

And Dragonlance is something I'm familiar with...something I read and collected back in the day, something I enjoyed and supported (i.e. spent money on). So, I guess, that means that I care about it on some level...even as I feel no hesitation to be critical of it. In recent years, my wife has accused me (at times) of being a mean person. Okay, maybe...certainly I can see the way I express myself might hurt feelings. On the other hand, do the makers of Dragonlance really give a rip what I have to say? 

[though I recognize that's probably not a valid justification for being incendiary]

Suffice is to say: there's a world here to tinker with. It's a challenge, it's fun, and it is (once stripped of its railroad story plot) very much "D&D." 

NOW, having gone through all that, I did give my kids a brief rundown of the World of Krynn as a setting in which I want to run a bit. They were very excited (though it might be they just want to play Dungeons & Dragons)...and I didn't even tell them about dragons or Huma or "steel coins" or anything. All I told them was about the Cataclysm, some of its aftermath (including clerics gone missing), and their characters' hometown (Solace, which I plan on discussing in my next post). I told them about kender instead of halflings, and about elves having the potential to be single-classed, and the lack of orcs. The setting has juice...and that's even without some of the good stuff (knightly orders and the Tower of High Sorcery, for instance). There's cool stuff here. 

I think I'll be running it with some form of advanced B/X.

Faking It

Trying to find climate maps of South America from the end of the Pleistocene has been...challenging.

I've got the area of the map I want to work with, but the temperatures aren't quite right (current climate is too warm for the setting I want). Problem is, moving to a colder time period throws off the environment, and while that's...um...kind of fine, I'm not a climatologist or archaeo-geologist and trying to figure exactly how tundra turns into arid desert turns into grasslands (and vice versa) is painfully complex.

I'm on the verge of just faking it.

*sigh* But at least I'm happy with the geography. Finally.

[this is what I was working on most of the morning]

My world...more or less.