Another day of delving one of my favorite dungeons. This time as a one on one with a friend, M (see also: the Fever Swamp session).
I did next to no prep for this session, as Iron Coral is more less a complete adventure as is and I didn't feel any particular urge to fiddle with the aesthetics or content. That said, because I can't let things lie, I hacked together a pseudo-ItO chargen to plug into a Hits & Fatigue style mechanical base.
Chargen was roll 2d6 for STR, DEX, and WIS and note a +1 or -1 or the like if it was a particularly low or high score. Characters started with 4 hits and 0 fatigue. Then rolled on the ItO equipment tables.
I codified Short Rests as taking a turn and replenishing hits entirely but doing nothing for fatigue, which required a full weeks recuperation. This turned out to be an excellent choice.
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M played as:
Creed (DEX +1), armed with a sword, pistol, and crude armour (armour-1, bulky).
Her two companions were Bob (STR +1), who carried a halberd, and Doug (WIS +1), who had a rifle. (1)
Together the little band was collectively in debt 100g. Creed was nominally their leader, by virtue of Bob and Doug being in a feud.
The party found itself on the cove-like shore of the IRON CORAL, facing a passage into its depths. They left their little rowboat behind and entered, Doug going first with Bob and Creed behind (2), and found themselves in a complex little junction room. (3) As they entered, they caught a glimpse of warty thing disappearing down a foam filled passage to the south. (4) They pursued!
The room into which the passage let out was filled with foam up to their chests and they couldn't see head nor tail of the creature they'd chased. Creed had them spread out in a line and begin systematically searching the room. About halfway across, Doug felt himself step on something, which made a croaking squeal and then spit a weird barb into Doug's leg. (5)
The thing went scampering off through the foam (they still couldn't see it) and Creed pursued, managing to corner it in a corner, and it spit a barb at them too but the dart bounced harmlessly off Creed's breastplate. (6) They fired their revolver, the gunshot echoing off the metallic coral walls, but missed. (7)
The party decided to beat a hasty retreat (8) and fled further south, into a room where a metal pipe in the floor was spewing out more foam. A grill in ceiling babbled something in an alien tongue. They ignored it and kept moving south, stumbling out into a cave with a weird shell-man at the center. Creed approached and the shell-man peeped its eyes out from the bottom of the shell and with grunts and gesticulations, indicated a chute to the south. Perturbed, Creed chose instead to investigate the doors on the west wall.
Shying away from the left door (which was warm) they opened the right door and entered a room with a meaty wall. After prodding it a bit (the wall twitched) they decided to rest there. (9) The barb was finally pulled out of Doug's leg (he had been limping along with Bob's help) and patched up. While resting they heard distant scuttling noises, like something chitinous moving.
Now they tried the left door, looking through into a room full of metal cages. Creed sent Bob on ahead, who carefully walked over to the far door and opened it. Then the rest followed and they passed into a room with a big shaft in the center. Peering over the edge, they had Bob drop his lantern into the darkness. As it fell it briefly illuminated a carapaced thing, which started moving!
Retreating from the edge of the shaft, they formed up around the door they'd entered and faced the pit. Over its edge climbed a weird, chitinous human shape, crawling on all fours; a hollow carapace with a gnashing maw. It began scampering back and forth towards them but Creed and Doug opened up with their pistol and rifle respectively and the beast died in a hail of gunfire which echoed down the strange metal passages. (10)
Investigating the corpse, Creed noted a little drip of some sort of poison from the maw and collected a bit of it in a vial to look at later. (11)
They moved north through a door into a weird misshapen room and noted strange glowing symbols on the north wall. Creed copied them into their notebook and then cajoled Bob into touching them at which point a secret passage dilated open with the scraping of stone and coral.
They entered a room filled with metal boxes, dominated by one big ceramic box. Before they could examine anything, a person emerged--derby hat first--from a crawlway to the west. He stood up, revealing himself to be a mustachioed man in a workingman's suit with a cudgel, and eyed them warily. He was named Nigel and was a fellow "treasure hunter." Half-ignoring each other, both parties began to search the room.
Inside the ceramic box were a bunch of jars full of green beads. Creed and the rest were hesitant to touch them, but Nigel came right over, curious, and plunged his hands in, revealing them to be frictionless. They party investigated a grate to the north, then quickly retrieved a single jar of beads, before removing it and heading through, leaving Nigel struggling to haul jars out of the box. Behind them they heard a curse, a shattering noise, and then some beads went rocketing away underfoot. (12)
On the other side of the grate was a room like an aquarium with transparent walls looking out on a sea of dead fish and writhing worms. A pallid, naked corpse lay on the floor. After prodding it, they passed through a metal door which slid up into the ceiling and into a room covered with yellow slime. At its center was a pulsating, balloon-like sack. Creed prodded it and it rippled with light and the party felt a pressure increase in their head. (13) They chose to not mess with it further and passed down a passageway to the east and into a huge room with a glass dome in the center.
As they entered, the glass seemed to bulge, almost tidally, towards them. Warily they crept along the edge of the room to the stairs in the south. As they did they saw a great, undulating yellow shape within the dome.
Down the stairs, the coral changed into a weird marbled kind. They exited into a sort of coral garden, whose delicate, colorful growths crumbled underfoot. The party broke through a blocked passageway to the south. As they did, a strange insubstantial water snake with a human face swam out of the wall and pleaded with them, in a whispering voice, to destroy coral. (14)
It eventually left them be and, shrugging, they finished clearing the blocked passage. On the other side was a sort of pit with a half-man half-coral gladiator armed with net and trident, pacing in circles. It challenged them to fight, but only if they could come up with an entertainingly twist. Much thought ensued, but they decided it was best to move on. (15)
They passed through a room of soothing stones and into a long cavern of sticky, white stone with a big white stone in the corner. Creed prodded this and received a glutinous slapping for it, getting knocked back into Bob and Doug. (16)
They fled down a dog-legged corridor (17) and stumbled out into a room with two corpses on the floor and suit of Violet Armour standing against the wall. They took the opportunity to rest here, then examined the bodies which turned out to belong to two treasure-hunting types--killed with some sort of bludgeoning and tearing weapon. Eyeing up the violet armour, Creed sloughed off their own (rudely gifting it to Bob) and disposed of the shriveled up corpse inside the Violet Armour. As they put the new armour on, they felt little tendrils dig into their flesh through their clothes and intuited the Arcana's function (it couldn't be removed without surgery but could shift a blow in combat onto an ally).
Feeling exhausted, the party followed the scent of fresh air to the shore of a huge underground lake. Without anywhere else to go, they began backtracking, and made it as far as the coral garden room. But as Bob, at the party's front, was about to step through the passage, he sensed danger and jumped backward--narrowly avoiding the bite of an overgrown coral snake. (18)
Quickly the party backed up, keeping Bob up front to block the passage. He dealt the snake a blow with his halberd as it struck again, but it bit down on his leg. Yelling, Creed convinced the panicking Bob to go limp and fired their pistol into the beast's head, killing it. (19)
They pried the injured Bob free and, with him leaning on Doug, climbed their way back up the stairs, circled round the bulging dome, passed through the room with the pulsating sack, and the aquarium room, and finally into the room with the boxes (now emptied out). (20) Figuring that Nigel had come almost directly from the entrance via the crawlway, they followed it out into the first junction room. But before they could leave, they were confronted by a crate with a slug like foot slowly edging its way across the room.
Intrigued, Creed walked over and rapped on it with their sword hilt. It went off like a flash-bang, dazzling everyone, and sending Bob nearly catatonic. But otherwise everyone was alright, so Creed shrugged and they left--rubbing their eyes. (21)
Sky, fresh air, and lapping waves. The party boarded their little rowboat and began the journey back to HOPESEND, along the edge of the LIVID MARSH.
The party found itself on the cove-like shore of the IRON CORAL, facing a passage into its depths. They left their little rowboat behind and entered, Doug going first with Bob and Creed behind (2), and found themselves in a complex little junction room. (3) As they entered, they caught a glimpse of warty thing disappearing down a foam filled passage to the south. (4) They pursued!
The room into which the passage let out was filled with foam up to their chests and they couldn't see head nor tail of the creature they'd chased. Creed had them spread out in a line and begin systematically searching the room. About halfway across, Doug felt himself step on something, which made a croaking squeal and then spit a weird barb into Doug's leg. (5)
The thing went scampering off through the foam (they still couldn't see it) and Creed pursued, managing to corner it in a corner, and it spit a barb at them too but the dart bounced harmlessly off Creed's breastplate. (6) They fired their revolver, the gunshot echoing off the metallic coral walls, but missed. (7)
The party decided to beat a hasty retreat (8) and fled further south, into a room where a metal pipe in the floor was spewing out more foam. A grill in ceiling babbled something in an alien tongue. They ignored it and kept moving south, stumbling out into a cave with a weird shell-man at the center. Creed approached and the shell-man peeped its eyes out from the bottom of the shell and with grunts and gesticulations, indicated a chute to the south. Perturbed, Creed chose instead to investigate the doors on the west wall.
Shying away from the left door (which was warm) they opened the right door and entered a room with a meaty wall. After prodding it a bit (the wall twitched) they decided to rest there. (9) The barb was finally pulled out of Doug's leg (he had been limping along with Bob's help) and patched up. While resting they heard distant scuttling noises, like something chitinous moving.
Now they tried the left door, looking through into a room full of metal cages. Creed sent Bob on ahead, who carefully walked over to the far door and opened it. Then the rest followed and they passed into a room with a big shaft in the center. Peering over the edge, they had Bob drop his lantern into the darkness. As it fell it briefly illuminated a carapaced thing, which started moving!
Retreating from the edge of the shaft, they formed up around the door they'd entered and faced the pit. Over its edge climbed a weird, chitinous human shape, crawling on all fours; a hollow carapace with a gnashing maw. It began scampering back and forth towards them but Creed and Doug opened up with their pistol and rifle respectively and the beast died in a hail of gunfire which echoed down the strange metal passages. (10)
Investigating the corpse, Creed noted a little drip of some sort of poison from the maw and collected a bit of it in a vial to look at later. (11)
They moved north through a door into a weird misshapen room and noted strange glowing symbols on the north wall. Creed copied them into their notebook and then cajoled Bob into touching them at which point a secret passage dilated open with the scraping of stone and coral.
They entered a room filled with metal boxes, dominated by one big ceramic box. Before they could examine anything, a person emerged--derby hat first--from a crawlway to the west. He stood up, revealing himself to be a mustachioed man in a workingman's suit with a cudgel, and eyed them warily. He was named Nigel and was a fellow "treasure hunter." Half-ignoring each other, both parties began to search the room.
Inside the ceramic box were a bunch of jars full of green beads. Creed and the rest were hesitant to touch them, but Nigel came right over, curious, and plunged his hands in, revealing them to be frictionless. They party investigated a grate to the north, then quickly retrieved a single jar of beads, before removing it and heading through, leaving Nigel struggling to haul jars out of the box. Behind them they heard a curse, a shattering noise, and then some beads went rocketing away underfoot. (12)
On the other side of the grate was a room like an aquarium with transparent walls looking out on a sea of dead fish and writhing worms. A pallid, naked corpse lay on the floor. After prodding it, they passed through a metal door which slid up into the ceiling and into a room covered with yellow slime. At its center was a pulsating, balloon-like sack. Creed prodded it and it rippled with light and the party felt a pressure increase in their head. (13) They chose to not mess with it further and passed down a passageway to the east and into a huge room with a glass dome in the center.
As they entered, the glass seemed to bulge, almost tidally, towards them. Warily they crept along the edge of the room to the stairs in the south. As they did they saw a great, undulating yellow shape within the dome.
Down the stairs, the coral changed into a weird marbled kind. They exited into a sort of coral garden, whose delicate, colorful growths crumbled underfoot. The party broke through a blocked passageway to the south. As they did, a strange insubstantial water snake with a human face swam out of the wall and pleaded with them, in a whispering voice, to destroy coral. (14)
It eventually left them be and, shrugging, they finished clearing the blocked passage. On the other side was a sort of pit with a half-man half-coral gladiator armed with net and trident, pacing in circles. It challenged them to fight, but only if they could come up with an entertainingly twist. Much thought ensued, but they decided it was best to move on. (15)
They passed through a room of soothing stones and into a long cavern of sticky, white stone with a big white stone in the corner. Creed prodded this and received a glutinous slapping for it, getting knocked back into Bob and Doug. (16)
They fled down a dog-legged corridor (17) and stumbled out into a room with two corpses on the floor and suit of Violet Armour standing against the wall. They took the opportunity to rest here, then examined the bodies which turned out to belong to two treasure-hunting types--killed with some sort of bludgeoning and tearing weapon. Eyeing up the violet armour, Creed sloughed off their own (rudely gifting it to Bob) and disposed of the shriveled up corpse inside the Violet Armour. As they put the new armour on, they felt little tendrils dig into their flesh through their clothes and intuited the Arcana's function (it couldn't be removed without surgery but could shift a blow in combat onto an ally).
Feeling exhausted, the party followed the scent of fresh air to the shore of a huge underground lake. Without anywhere else to go, they began backtracking, and made it as far as the coral garden room. But as Bob, at the party's front, was about to step through the passage, he sensed danger and jumped backward--narrowly avoiding the bite of an overgrown coral snake. (18)
Quickly the party backed up, keeping Bob up front to block the passage. He dealt the snake a blow with his halberd as it struck again, but it bit down on his leg. Yelling, Creed convinced the panicking Bob to go limp and fired their pistol into the beast's head, killing it. (19)
They pried the injured Bob free and, with him leaning on Doug, climbed their way back up the stairs, circled round the bulging dome, passed through the room with the pulsating sack, and the aquarium room, and finally into the room with the boxes (now emptied out). (20) Figuring that Nigel had come almost directly from the entrance via the crawlway, they followed it out into the first junction room. But before they could leave, they were confronted by a crate with a slug like foot slowly edging its way across the room.
Intrigued, Creed walked over and rapped on it with their sword hilt. It went off like a flash-bang, dazzling everyone, and sending Bob nearly catatonic. But otherwise everyone was alright, so Creed shrugged and they left--rubbing their eyes. (21)
Sky, fresh air, and lapping waves. The party boarded their little rowboat and began the journey back to HOPESEND, along the edge of the LIVID MARSH.
(A short break ensued. Me and M discussed the game, we decided we were feeling lively and would play out the downtime segment)
At the docks, amid the crowded steamboats and tall ships, the yelling captains and bustling stevedores, they met with Dorrett--the fisherman whose boat they had borrowed in exchange for a share in the treasure they found. (22)
The party made its way along the dock front (where most of Hopesend's notable establishments are located) to the Sipping Hole, where they crammed themselves in around a table and ordered a round of Fire Beast rum.
The rum hit hard and fiery in their bellies, causing hallucinations on the edge of their vision, but only Dorrett seemed really to be effected. (23) The party debated whether to simply fence the jar of beads (their only treasure, discounting the armour now stuck to Creed) at Paridiso Park or to spend a week finding a buyer. (24)
After getting Dorrett to loan them three shillings for housing at a local dormitory, they decided on the latter course, and lurched out into the foggy evening, the alcohol sitting like fiery lumps in their bellies.
Along the way, they passed outside the Pickled Goose Tavern, which was aglow with light and sounded rowdy inside. Creed's ears perked up, for they had heard a specific voice. Sending Bob and Doug on their way to escort Dorrett back to his shack, Creed ducked inside.
It was crowded and raucous, drinking and gambling, and the center of attention was Nigel who had a shiny new hat and was stood half on a stool and half on the bar as he bought everyone rounds of drinks and rambled about his adventures in the strange depths and the wealth it had gotten him (he had, of course, fenced the four jars of beads he'd lugged out for a nice profit). (25)
After questioning the landlady, Joy, Creed squeezed their way over and challenged Nigel's story. The room went "ooooohhh." The braggart began to sputter and tugged at his cudgel--tucked into his belt--but before he could do anything Creed kicked the stool out beneath him and the man toppled onto the floor and was knocked out cold. A moment of silence. Then the room erupted in laughter and began clapping Creed on the back and offering drinks and demanding he tell the "true" story.
Before anything else though, Creed asked if there was anyone who could identify the vial of poison he'd found. Luckily, a reedy little intellectual with glasses at one of the faro tables was able to place it as a joint-locking venom.
Creed spent the night partying before meandering "home" to the dormitory where the party was staying and collapsed on the cot next to Bob and Doug's (those two shared a bed).
A week or so passed, during which Bob's injured leg began to grow horrifying red coral nodules and fans. Eventually, they found a buyer, and so one morning Creed and Doug went to the massive Black Flamingo Tradehouse to meet with Darius the Port Overseer.
They were lead by a burly doorman into the warehouse, past stacks of crates and sacks, and up a rickety stair to a windowed office overlooking the work floor. The inside was luxurious, expensive widgets, upholstered furniture, if still an office (a desk piled high with papers). Awaiting them, with his legs up on a footstool, smoking from a long pipe, and a hound curled up beside him, was Darius. The lanky, blonde bearded and headed man greeted them and offered a paltry 20s for the jar. They haggled and, with cunning arguments about quality among other things, got him to pay 55s despite the other jars that Nigel had put on the market. (26)
Darius liked their gall, and bid them a good day, expressing a hope that they could do business in future.
The last act of the session was to use some of their newfound money to get medical treatment for Bob's leg. At Doc. Cruette's (a townhouse apartment up a narrow staircase, crammed with jars, a stuffed alligator) they paid 10s to have the leg looked at and, after prognosis, have it sawn off. Bob was convinced by Doug to accept and they strapped him down to the table, spread some sawdust on the floor, ignored the downstairs neighbor banging with the broom, and off the leg came.
The doctor even paid them 5s to let him keep the leg. Bob got a peg leg out of the whole deal. (27)
And that was it for the session.
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(1) I did a little ad-hoc chargen mechanic here, where she could tradeoff stat bonuses for weapons. I forgot exactly how it worked, but in future I think I will just have companions and the like randomly roll stats.
(2) Marching order was established.
(3) I think the very first room is one of the dungeon's weakest, as it has a surfeit of entrances and exits to describe, each of which is unique, which makes it tricky as the very first/second area the players encounter.
(4) Rolled an omen, rolled for what it was an omen for, and picked the doorway at random. Whole situation was improvised in the space of about a minute.
(5) Converting ItO monsters on the fly was a tad tricky. I decided the barbs did 1 Hit and that the Sprayer Thing had surprise be dint of being hidden in the foam.
(6) I think? I was running armour as reduction rather than extra hits. Either way, in the fiction the barb was negated by the armour.
(7) I had M. make a roll plus DEX to see if she hit an unseen target.
(8) Incurring 1 fatigue each for fleeing an ongoing fight.
(9) I.e. they spent a turn taking a Short Rest and I rolled for encounters.
(10) This was a tricky situation. I'd decided as they entered the room, that if they'd walked past the shaft, then the Crawling Carapace would have crawled out and ambushed them from behind. Given that they took proactive measures, I let them have a moment to organize themselves which more or less let them win the fight handily. I could, perhaps, have given the creature more than 4 hits. But M. said she liked how the fight was anticlimactic and that she'd been majorly spooked by it nonetheless.
(11) Improvised detail based on the Carapace's statted attack.
(12) I am eliding an incredibly funny conversation with Nigel here. Both parties very quickly established a mutual distaste for one another.
(13) Could have played this out differently, maybe with the party feeling the psychic pressure from the moment they entered the room, but this worked well I think.
(14) A random encounter rolled during the time they spent bashing the passage open. It was a bit awkward to insert, as the players were already focused on one interaction with the world (the passage).
(15) Eliding a longer conversation and discussion here. M initially planned to come back later and fight the guy, even though the "rewards" for such were unclear.
(16) Ruled the slap as 2 hit, so Creed's armour protected them (partially) once again and I characterized it as them receiving a bruising.
(17) I think I gave them fatigue for fleeing? But it felt a tad awkward.
(18) I had M make a roll for Bob here, since it felt unfair to just spring the random encounter on them. In future, I think I would have given them a more in-the-fiction warning to interpret at their own risk.
(19) A tricky little fight. M rolled to see if they could convince the panicking Bob to do something so non-intuitive as dropping to the floor to have a clear shot.
(20) Remarkably they made it through all of these rooms without a single encounter, and I was rolling each turn/room.
(21) I soft-balled this guy I think. In future I would have the flashbang effect pack more of a bunch, they chose to mess with it after all. And it would have been funny if Bob had died from that after almost getting out of the dungeon.
(22) I asked M whether they owned the rowboat or had rented it out from a fisherman, they chose the latter, and then thing's cascaded and bam, now we've got Dorett the fisherman-investor.
(23) Everyone rolled and only he failed.
(24) I asked M how she was planning to sell their treasure and then invented these two choices on the spot, half in dialogue with her.
(25) I just had to bring back Nigel again, especially since he'd made off with a significant chunk of treasure. A rival is born!
(26) I asked M if they wanted to roleplay it out and they did and so they laid out their arguments for why their offer was good, etc.
(27) I'm eliding a good lot here. Doc Cruette was a fun invention.
General Notes :
The cobbled together system ended up working marvelously and hit the exact feel that I wanted. I am particularly proud of the innovation of having the cost of fleeing combat be a point of fatigue. According to M, she felt like she didn't have to think too tactically in the moment of fights, but rather had to think about whether she was going to fight and how it shaped the dungeon crawl as a whole. Fatigue was the real resource pressure, with each fight increasing it.
I definitely soft-balled a few of the monsters as a consequence of converting between my thing and ItO on the fly. I said as much to M, who agreed but said she still felt the fights were tense and the creatures weird and spooky. The perfunctory putting down of a monster (like the carapace thing) felt appropriate to the overall theme and didn't undercut the dangerous feeling.
Also, having rests be a choice that must be taken in order to "renew" hits was a good choice (stolen from ItO). It gives being dropped to half hits a bit of an edge, while still keeping hits as a renewing resource.
At game start I gave M the choice between 1d6 or a 1d12 for rolls and the d12 was chosen. They've got a nice feel in the hand. Operated on "roll 8 or over."
I definitely soft-balled a few of the monsters as a consequence of converting between my thing and ItO on the fly. I said as much to M, who agreed but said she still felt the fights were tense and the creatures weird and spooky. The perfunctory putting down of a monster (like the carapace thing) felt appropriate to the overall theme and didn't undercut the dangerous feeling.
Also, having rests be a choice that must be taken in order to "renew" hits was a good choice (stolen from ItO). It gives being dropped to half hits a bit of an edge, while still keeping hits as a renewing resource.
At game start I gave M the choice between 1d6 or a 1d12 for rolls and the d12 was chosen. They've got a nice feel in the hand. Operated on "roll 8 or over."
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