Classic Traveller Solo - Play Report - #1

Foroan (0101) C59A366-9 Ni

 

The aqueous moon of a gas giant, host to a small colony of political dissidents, exiles, and jelly harvesters from Pavat (0104). Toxins in the atmosphere required the use of a filter mask. Of the few thousand inhabitants, most live in the single starport-city, or on isolated seasteadings and jelly harvesting rigs.

 

Prad Nadja (884798, Rifle-1, Shotgun-1. Air/Raft-1, Cr1,000) is twenty-two years old. The last four years of her life, she has spent in a skullduggerous line of work she does not often speak of. Currently, she is stuck on Foroan, with dwindling funds.

 

To alleviate the problem, she has engaged herself with a certain clerk (who did not give a name) on the promise of some Cr5,000 for delivering a package to a remote seastead. The job was negotiated over drinks at scummy bar—the kind the jelly harvesters frequent after a long spell working the rigs—amidst flickering holographic phantasmagoria and thumping music. Into her charge went a sealed courier bag and the keys to an air/raft, parked in Bay 18.

 

Wasting no time, she left the bar, shrugging off the wispy illusions as she stepped into the fluorescent lit corridor. It was midmorning, local time, and she’d promised to be prompt. But first, she decided to look into some protection; the business seemed a touch risky, better to be on the safe side.With less hassle than she’d worried, she bought a shotgun and box of shells (wildlife attacks were not unknown on the moon, apparently).

 

[-Cr160]

 

She arrived at Bay 18, with the shotgun underarm, wrapped in waterproof cloth, and the courier bag in hand. The bay was a private garage, of sorts. An attendant gave her a cursory nod, and directed her to the air/raft after she showed him the keys. It was an older model, salt-scoured and open to air. Hopping in, she stowed the courier bag and shotgun, buckled up, and ran her hands over the controls.

 

The vehicle thrummed to life. She eased it gently out of the bay and into the open sky. The weather was fine; cloudy, but with shafts of sunlight breaking through, and rents giving view to the ruddy gas giant looming above. Flying low, then climbing, the starport quickly dwindled away behind her, becoming a vague greebled sprawl floating on the calm ocean.

 

The air was sticky and dense, the filter mask dug into her cheeks and made her breathing loud. Settling in, she cracked open a thermos of coffee and sipped it through a straw-port in the mask.

 

[encounter check: negative]

 

After a several hours easy flying, the sun and gas giant having made their stately progress across the sky, she picked up the seastead’s radio beacon, and began her descent.

 

The steading jutted out of the sea like a stalk, surrounded by a halo of lesser structures: docks, storehouses, generators, and the like. She circled in and touched down on a landing pad, where two women were waiting for her. They were heavyset, white-haired, and could have been twins save for the scars. One patted her down while the other searched the vehicle, lingering on the wrapped shotgun, but making no comment. They led her inside.

 

It was a relief to doff her mask, and breath in the seastead’s crisp, conditioned air. The two goons took her along an enclosed walkway, which connected halo to stalk, and into a sumptuously decorated room. She ran her eyes over the wood panelling and upholstery, feeling out of place. There was a snort. A furry, dog-like creature sprang off a couch and came bounding toward her. She tried, awkwardly, to fend it off with the courier bag, while it snuffled and drooled. Its face was grotesquely human.

 

A man entered. At his command, the dog-thing heeled. He wore a loose silk robe, with nothing on underneath, his lithe, angled body on full display. Like the two women, he had a shock of pure white hair, but his face and body were unmarred—as if he had never known a blemish in his life.

 

She tendered over the bag, which he took without a word, like she wasn’t even there. He opened it, pulling out a thick sheath of paper, and immediately began to pour over it, spreading documents out onto the wet bar.

 

Nadja waited patiently, then impatiently. Her stomach gurgled. This, at last, caused the white-haired man to look up. He examined her for a moment, then turned back to his papers. A wave of his hand: Feed her. The goons escort her down a ladderway, to a kitchen, where one of them began to slapdashedly fix her a bowl of rice and squid. She ate thankfully.

 

An hour later, they were summoned back upstairs. The papers had disappeared and the man stood, waiting, with the courier bag in hand. He smiled at Nadja. Do you know who I am? To which she shrugged, and answered truthfully: No. He laughed and said, mostly to himself: Good, good. Then he handed her the bag, newly heavy. Take this back to the clerk. And with that the two goons escorted her out.

 

The weather had taken a turn. The wind plucked at her hair and clouds were gathered on the horizon, blotting out the setting sun. The waves had begun to roll, making the seastead bob and putting her off her balance. She got back in the air/raft, stowed the bag, cracked her knuckles, and prepared for the flight back.

 

An hour in, and the winds were even worse. Below, the ocean heaved. The air was humid and heavy; a storm impending. It was taking all Nadja’s concentration to keep the vehicle on course.

 

[surprise: none; range: medium]

 

That, at least, was the excuse she gave herself for not noticing the other air/raft until it had dropped suddenly from on high, in the clouds. A loudspeaker blared out: Halt and heave to. The other raft was enclosed, maybe even armoured. It certainly looked heavy. There were police markings on the side.

 

Nadja slowed, allowing the other raft to catch up. Then, just as it was above her, she accelerated and shot off!

 

[roll of 11 +1 vs 9]

 

She was away, racing low and fast, almost skimming the wave tops. Lights were in the red across the controls. Then a clunk. One of the impellers faltering. The raft veered, nearly going into a spin.

 

[roll 2 +1 vs 5]

 

She crashed through the crest of a wave, swamping the vehicle. Worse, she watched helplessly as the courier bag came loose and was swept overboard.

 

Sodden, suddenly freezing, she managed to stabilize the raft and bank around. She searched the heaving sea for a glimpse of the bag while cursing herself for not securing it better. Then she spied it, bobbing and tumbling, mercifully afloat. At the same moment, the police air/raft appeared in the distance, sirens flashing.

 

Hesitation. Desperately trying to think up a way of retrieving the bag without wrecking the raft. Then resignation. She chose flight, abandoning bag and police behind her, and zooming off over the open ocean.

 

It was night, by the time she made it back to the starport, and landed in Bay 18. There was a new attendant, who looked at her askance, as she got out of the waterlogged raft shivering and swearing. She threw the keys at him and trudged off, down the city’s labyrinthine corridors, to her hostel. She left her wet clothes on the floor, the shotgun on the on bed, and took a hot shower—some relief to her sore, taut body—then passed out.

 

The next morning, she muscled her way through a knot of tryworkers fresh off the night-shift and into the back of the dimly lit bar, to the booth where the clerk was waiting for her. He had her money, but was confused as to the lack of a return package. Wasn’t given nothing, she lied.

 

[+Cr5,000]

 

With five-thousand in her pocket, she quit the scummy dive and bought herself a nice, fancy lunch on the upper level, from the starport’s only restaurant. The administrators and managerial types looked at her askance, as she sat at her table, wolfing down imported Kareenian beef.

 

[-Cr50]

[encounter check: positive; bandits]

[surprise: no; range: short]

 

While walking home, Nadja noticed she was being followed. Her awareness came too late, however, and as she ducked down a corridor she found her way blocked by several men and women in rubberized coveralls and rain jackets. Behind her, an equal number had filled up the corridor, preventing escape. Knives and lengths of pipe appeared.

 

The foremost thug smiled at her, not unkindly, and parted his jacket to reveal the butt of a pistol. With a sigh, Nadja surrendered herself into their keeping. They lead her down twisting passages and gangways, deep into the bowels of the starport, somewhere below the waterline, so that the tramp of their feet mingled with the groaning and creaking of old metal.

 

They ushered her into a disused airlock—murky water on the other side of the viewport—where a woman was waiting, sitting on a plastic chair, smoking a cigarette. She was dressed like the thugs, in the heavy coveralls of a jelly harvester. There was a union badge pinned to her collar.

 

Luciette. She introduced herself, offering a hand. Nadja. Nadja replied, not bothering to shake it. You were supposed to deliver a package back to the clerk, where is it? Nadja considered her reply, then said: Give me another five-thousand and I’ll kiss and tell. Luctiette shook her head. Oh no, you’ll tell me, or they’ll find your body floating in the surf at sundown. She put her cigarette out on the viewport for emphasis. Oh well, it was worth a try; Nadja explained what had happened, in detail. And you didn’t see the police pick up the bag? No. Luciette seemed satisfied. Well, be seeing you.

 

Before Nadja could ask any questions, the thugs had maneuvered her out of the room and away down the echoing corridors…

 

+++++++

 

Was bored the other day and played a little solo Traveller game. Didn't note down all the little places I rolled reaction rolls to determine things like "how's the weather" or "are these thugs going to jump her or be polite." The whole exercise ended up very noir. 

Lair of the Lamb - Play Report - Geas'ing Yourselves Free

It's been a while since I've run anything, been busy, so leading up to this session I spent far too long vacillating over what to run the game with, so, at the penultimate moment, I said fuck it and just went with the GLOG rules that come with the module—although we cut leveling, after some discussion, and just started the player characters with CON derived HP. This worked great. Turns out all you really need is something to roll for adjudicating some situations. Who would have thunk it. 

+++++++

Initial Characters :

• Millicent, a militant wetnurse.
• Otily, a handsome, but gloomy, scribe.
• Wendelfred, a philosopher.

Replacement Character :

• Naomi, a brutish, but serene, deserter.

+++++++

The last thing any of them remembered was being fed a warm, soporific draught. Otily wakes up naked, cotton-mouthed, bound in a sack. There is a clasp-knife in her hands, with which she cuts herself free, along with the other three prisoners struggling in the shallow stone bowl. As they all stand up, feeling around, they hear the door creak open and a huge, lumbering shape squeeze itself inside; fetid, heavy breathing; wet, slimy noises. Silently, they find the wall, and creep over to where they thought the door was. As they find the threshold, they hear a strangled scream and the sickening crunch of break bone. Stumbling out into the pitch black of a corridor, they smell a barnyard stench coming from the east.

Otily, being the only with a knife, decides to go back for the others, and Millicent follows her, while Wendelfred stays at the door. They manage to sneak over to one of the stone bowls easily enough, but just as they've freed someone, the Lamb takes notice. A bite from out of the dark removes a chunk of her arm (dropping her to 1 HP), but she and Millicent and the newly freed prisoner manage to scramble away and bolt out the door, which Wendelfred slams shut on the Lamb. It hits the door full force and squeals in pain, but the door holds. The next blow is heavy, however, and Wendelfred knows he can't keep it shut for long. They all dive into the room to the east, following the barnyard scent, with Millicent in the lead. She trips over a goat and into a pile of hay. Everyone goes to ground and listens to the Lamb snuffling and sniffing in the corridor. Groping, Wendelfred finds a wooden bowl on the floor and flings it out of the room; the Lamb pursues the sound, south and away.

Silence. Breathing easier, Wendelfred and Millicent (now in charge of Sam and Gert, the two others freed) search the room, while Otily slinks back into the room with the bowls to free the remaining prisoners. The group sorts itself out, quietly, amid the cold, damp stone. The goats' collars and bells are collected and muffled, the living goat brought along on a piece of twine, and Millicent tasks Sam and Gert with carrying one of the dead goats between them. They also collect scraps of burlap and twine from the bowl room. Then, heading south, the party comes to a junction, with light coming from the east, and a vinegar scent from further down the southern corridor. They choose to pursue light, and come out onto the landing.

The burning torch is seized, as is the fire-striker, while one of the new henchlings is delegated to carrying the tar-soaked chest. Wendelfred and his lackeys also take the time to pry the metal pole free, while Millicent soaks some of the burlap scraps in the leaking pitch in order to augment the already guttering torch.

Moving further east, in pursuit of a truely repulsive stench, they come out into a huge, vaulted room, dominated by a slimy, effluvia-slick pit at its center. Listening at the north door, they hear irregular splashing, which greatly tempts them, cotton-mouthed and dehydrated as they all are. But first, they circle round to check the south door. As they do, a croaking voice rises out of the pit, asking if anyone is there. Initially they are suspicious and don't answer, but as the voice pleads and begs, they change their minds. They learn that the woman is named Akina, and she has been living at the bottom of the pit and surviving by eating parasites off the Lamb and drinking vomit. They also learn that they are beneath the White Temple. Wendelfred, a philosopher, is thus able to supply some lore about Vandoh, the god the temple is dedicated to, leading to much speculation. They promise to free Akina later, when they have rope or some other means of getting her out. She is dejected, but hopeful. They also think to toss the dead goat they've been carrying into the pit for her to eat.

Opening the south door reveals a room full of piled bone pellets. They shrug, and circle counter-clockwise around the pit to the north door and Millicent (who has been leading, carrying the burning torch) opens it. The first thing they see is a slimy pool and a fountain of a fish with hands. Then they notice the huge, wallowing bulk within it. The Lamb emerges out of the water and for the first time they see the beast, illuminated by the flickering torchlight. It is huge, grotesque, resembling an obese cow, covered in nodules at its milk lines. From out of the fleshy coil where its head should be, a bloody horse skull peeks out and tastes the air.

At the same time as they see this, Millicent, who had just stepped over the threshold, collapses to the ground, flopping as she violently hallucinates drowning in heavy armour. Someone manages to snatch the torch and drag Millicent away; they retreat along the eastern edge of the pit as the Lamb squeezes through the doorway. But it hesitates on the edge of the torch light. Thinking fast, they glance into the room to the east, and upon determining it has exits, retreat into there. The Lamb crawls after them. They pass through crab mural room and into the abacus mural chamber, still dogged by the Lamb. Seeing the pole supporting the sagging ceiling, a plan is rapidly devised.

Wendelfred positions himself with his iron pole to batter the post down, while two of his henchlings (Naomi and Ithel) confuse the Lamb with ringing bells to either side. As the torch light recedes behind them, the Lamb enters, squeezing its way into the room, but hesitates at the onslaught of noise. Wendelfred hits the post. Once. Twice. Thrice. It gives way. Naomi makes it through the door first. Poor Ithel trips and falls. And Wendelfred leaps to safety just as the roof collapses in a chaos of masonry. Everyone—save poor, crushed Ithel—is alive, if dusty. They take a moment to breathe. They can hear the Lamb slowly digging itself free underneath the rubble. Then they explore the room, noting the moldy door to the east, the door to the west, and the cobweb filled crack on the south wall, from which comes afresh breeze.

They bash the moldy door in, and investigate the room beyond, but are turned off by the corpse-shaped fungus mound on the floor, and don't go any further. The western chamber proves more fruitful, revealing an unused torch, a crawlspace, and a stone sarcophagus. Wendelfred reads the inscription on it ("Shadrakul, who will not meet her apprentice in this life."), noting that it is written in Elegiac, the language of the greater undead and magicians. Upon opening the sarcophagus, they hear a mechanical noise, but find it empty, save for a seam along the bottom. First, they put their living goat in, and are pleased when they hear it bleat in alarm briefly, but then hear the tinkling of bells as it moves about somewhere below. Next, they convince one of Millicent's henchlings (Jody) to climb in, taking the torch with her. She reports back that she's fine, having landed on some soft rugs and that there's a skeleton in robes down there. They then contrive to turn the sarcophagus lid so the weight is pushing down the rim (surmising that that was how the mechanism worked) and manage to crack the bottom open enough that they rescue Jody with their iron pole and some climbing.

Wendelfred decides to climb down, landing on a pile of fancy rugs. There is indeed a a seated skeleton in robes, offering up a black iron spellbook and balancing a delicate crystal goblet on one knee. He takes the spellbook briefly leafs through its pages, barely grasping the arcane formula put down on the metal pages. Then, he reaches for the goblet. Something stirs within the skeleton's rib-cage; he grabs the goblet nonetheless. A skeletal serpent darts out and strikes, sinking its fangs into him. The poison floods Wendelfred's body and he collapses, dead.

Meanwhile, everyone else was busy using the sarcophagus lid to break open the tarry chest they'd been lugging around, and find a flask of oil and another torch inside. Eventually, one of Wendelfred's henchlings, Naomi (the new PC), decides to go down into the sarcophagus hole to see what became of him. She finds the goat munching on a corner of rug and the dead Wendelfred prostrate on the stony ground. From him, she retrieves the spellbook, and chains it around her waist. She also loots the skeleton for its black art-deco-esque robes, which she puts on.

After helping Naomi climb back out, the party investigates the crawlspace, sending Millicent through first. They discover it opens up onto the bone pellet room. One by one, everyone files through, and begins searching the pile for anything of value—save for Naomi, who sits down to run her fingers over the metal pages of her new spellbook and feel arcane secrets pushing at the edge of her mind.

Nearly an hour passes. With all their rooting around, they turned up a silver bracer styled like veins, and a mysterious vial of black fluid. From the whispering words of the iron tome, Naomi has gleaned the secret of casting fear (and one magic die to cast it with).

The party decides to sneak out of the bone pile room and around the edge of the pit, heading westward to the landing. Their plan is to seek out the vinegar smell, because it would be something to drink, hopefully. Stopping at the landing, however, they decide to explore the corridor southward. From a closet along the passage, they loot a broom, small hammer, and gong. Then they investigate a chamber which is dominated by a fish with hands holding stone discs with numbers on them; a tumbler lock. There is also an acrid, milky pool of liquid—prodding it with the broom sizzles and burns the straw.

Shrugging, they head back north, but as they come out onto the landing, they see the Lamb squeezing its way out of the eastern corridor. It does not seem deterred by their torchlight any longer. Panic. Naomi steps forward, feeling the formula come unbidden into her mind, and word fear rings out like a tolling bell. The Lamb writhes, squeals, and calls out "father!" before turning and fleeing. Disturbed, the party makes haste westward. They re-explore the bowl and goat room, but don't discover anything new. Then, while passing the junction, they meet the Lamb once more. Again, Naomi casts fear, this time with even greater effect, but she can feel the magic has sapped her of strength (no more MD for the day). She uses the Lamb's ongoing terror of her to pin it in the northward passage, while her companions hasten southward following the scent of vinegar.

They find two rooms. The eastern room behind a locked door, which one of Naomi's henchlings, Theobold, begins to break down. Everyone else crowds into the western chamber, where they find two stone troughs—one is filled with vinegar, in which bobs a wine bottle. Quickly and greedily they drink it up, ignoring the burning sensation, happy to have any kind of refreshment (vinegar has electrolytes; the -4 modifier for dehydration is at last banished). They also fill the wine bottle for Naomi and Theobold, then bustle over to the now opened eastern room.

Inside, they find a table with a weird fruit on it, a wooden chest, and an iron and lead chest bolted to the floor and wrapped with linchpinned chains. The wooden chest contains some sort of masked helmet with a pipe that slots into it, purple powder, and a torch. They grab the whole chest to carry, and toss some excess items inside it. Then Otily goes to open the iron and lead chest, and gets a splitting headache as she removes the first linchpin. A nosebleed follows the second linchpin. She decides to put on the masked helmet and light the pipe, thinking it is some sort of defensive measure pair with the iron chest. The smoke makes her drowsy. She finally opens the iron and lead chest, and what looks like a deformed elephant's skull shoots up into the air. She—and the others standing round—watch as parts of their skin violently sloughs off and spirals through the air to begin wrapping around the floating skull. Rapidly, the demon head reconstitutes itself, bellows out "I, Davok, am free at last!" and then geases Otily to carry him out of the dungeon, and drops into her arms.

Everyone runs north, reuniting with Naomi just as her torch gutters out. The Lamb is lurking somewhere in the darkness. They take the junction eastward, booking it as fast as they can, pausing only to briefly ask if Davok can blow open the locked door on the landing (to which it grumbles something about being tired). Finally, they make it back to the bone pile room and hastily crawl one by one back into the safety of the sarcophagus chamber, where they catch their breath.

Someone passes the bottle of vinegar to Naomi, who slakes her gnawing thirst. They take stock. The room is fairly safe all things considered. And they are dead tired after however many hours creeping and running through the dungeon. It is decided that they will all sleep together in the safety of the sarcophagus hole (while leaving some people above to keep watch). First though, they spend some time making a rope out of the carpets, with Otily cutting strips with her knife, and everyone else tying then together. Naomi reads her spellbook. The living goat (still down the hole) is hastily butchered and eaten, the hot blood further quenching their thirst. Eventually, they sleep, and a night (or possibly day?) passes in the damp, cold dungeon.

They wake, less tired, if still aching and sore, and variously wounded. Climbing out of the sarcophagus hole and heading into the room with the city under water mural, they consider the crack running along the south wall. Millicent takes the lead and begins burning cobwebs away, causing a flood of little red spiders to wash over her. She makes it all the way to the far end of the crevasse, glimpsing daylight from a small, fist sized hole, and hearing the shouts of a chicken vendor, before one bites her. The party drags her out as she wheezes and coughs mutely.

They confer. Chipping away at the hole with the iron pole is considered, but it would take far too long. Then Otily has an idea: she lifts up the demon-head and entreats with it, trying to convince it to geas the chicken vendor so that he will go forth and hire some labourers to widen the crack. Davok grumbles, but remarkably, agrees. So, Otily squeezes her way into the crevice and holds the demon-head up to the hole, so that it can call out, imperiously commanding the chicken vendor and promising him rich rewards. Overcome, the vendor cries "of course master!" and dashes off to fetch labourers. By the time Millicent's wheezing fit has worn off, he has returned and the party hears the sound of picks breaking stone. Bit by bit, the hole widens. And then, all of a sudden, it's big enough to pass through. With delirious cries of joy, they clamber out into the sunlight, blinking and squinting.

They find themselves on the edge of the market square, beneath the walls of the White Temple, behind a line of stalls (somewhat hiding them from the bustle of people). The labourers standing around with their picks and prybars look on them with wonder, while the chicken vendor looks expectant.

But it's not over yet. Naomi and Otily and Millicent agree, they need to go back in for Akina, who is still down in the pit. A few of the henchlings have already slipped away, and the others are hesitant to go back in the dungeon, so they rally the labourers and go charging inside, taking the coil of carpet-strip rope with them. Through the sarcophagus chamber, along the crawlspace, and out into the bone pile room. They pause here, and peek out the cracked door into the chamber with the pit, to check for the Lamb, and found it empty. Skulking out, they call to Akina and lower their makeshift rope into the pit. She clambers out; a bedraggled, wizened, filth covered woman looking desperately happy. Hastily, they beat a retreat they way they came, with a quick detour by Otily to grab the skull of the robed skeleton in the sarcophagus hole. At long last, they escape the dungeon.

Back in the bright sunlight of the market square—the White Temple gleaming in the sun, the crowds loud and bustling, the colours brilliant—they note a merchant conferring with the guard at the temple gate, pointing toward them. Some shirts and cloaks are procured from the labourers. Otily, carrying the demon-head, scurries off, pursued by the chicken vendor eager for his reward, and the labourers demanding their pay. Naomi follows, with her spellbook and skull, trailed by Theobold, still carrying the iron pole. But Millicent lingers, then decides to march over (trailed by Sam and Gert, as well as Akina, who stuck around), to harangue the confused temple guard, before also making off into the crowd.

They meet up again in a quiet courtyard, amid the city's bustle. The chicken vendor was paid off with the silver bracer. Akina tries to give Millicent a ruby ring that must be worth a fortune, and they comfort the poor woman. Meanwhile, Noami and Otily sit on opposite sides of a fountain and interrogate their respective patrons' heads. The necromancer's skull is pleased to finally have an apprentice to teach the secrets of the quiet world too. While, Davok is just happy to finally be freed after a century of confinement, and begrudging offers to take Otily on as his warlock, for her reward. They also learn, from the demon-head, some facts about the Lamb (such as that it is the child of Vandoh) and the dungeon. The sun shines down on them, wonderful and warm.

+++++++

Deaths :

• Unknown (eaten by Lamb)
• Ithel (crushed by collapsing ceiling)
• Wendelfred (poisoned by skeletal snake)
• Goat (eaten by party)

Favorite Quote :

• "We have been set up in such a gameic environment, it is terrifying to inhabit."

Favorite Proposal :

• Since Millicent's a wetnurse and everyone is thirsty, a potential solution presents itself, à la Grapes of Wrath.

Speculations :

• This is all some sort of trial or tribulation.
• The Lamb fears bells, which is why the goats were unmolested.
• The code to the tumblers was in the abacus mural in the room they collapsed.
• The Lamb has been trained to expect something when illuminated.
• Shadrakul, the necromancer, was the Lamb's father.

Lair of the Lamb - Play Report - Two Runs

A while ago, I ran Lair of the Lamb for my girlfriend. She was unlucky and died very quickly with no other freed characters to act as backup. So, impromptu, we decided to play again from the top, adding in a slight time loop feel. Unfortunately, we had to call it quits before the second run really wrapped up.

 

RUN #1

 

The Herbalist wakes up, burlap pressing against her face, cuts her self free, and finds herself in a pitch black room, in some kind of basin, with other groaning, human forms in sacks. She creeps over to the wall, then, as she hears some huge snuffling creature approaching, hides back among the sacks. Unfortunately, the creature goes straight for her basin. She is showered in blood as it messily bites into one of the wriggling sacks. She tries to quietly flee, but catches its attention. It begins to slowly lumber after her while she follows the wall out of the room, into a corridor, down it, than down another corridor—pursuing a glimmer of light. In the landing, she quickly examines the chest that smells of tar, realizes she can't open it, briefly considers taking it with her, then dashes down the south corridor smacking her parched lips together. She can hear the creature in the distance. She passes a closet and comes out into a room with a fish-statue holding tumblers, a lever, a recessed door, and a milky puddle. She tries sipping from the puddle but burns her lips—acid! Then, the creatures bulk fills the corridor above her. Frantically, she pulls the lever. There is an awful grinding noise, then psssht a shower of acid falls upon her. She collapses to the ground, her skin boiling off, and we fade to black as the blurry form of the creature moves into frame.

 

RUN #2

 

The Herbalist jerks awake, burlap pressing against her face and the phantom pain of her boiling skin rapidly fading. She cuts herself free and quickly scrambles over to the wall and presses herself against it. Moments later, she hears the bulk of the creature squeezing itself into the room. She slips out into the corridor and ignores the strangled scream and crunching noises behind her. She creeps south, following the scent of vinegar, and finds two doors—one locked. The other, unlocked door leads into a room. Groping around, she finds two stone troughs: one half-full with vinegar, the other dry and smelling of stale milk. She also finds an empty bottle, which she fills with vinegar. After pouring a few drops into the dry trough and nothing happening, she creeps back out and up the corridor. Then, following the light, she enters the landing. She takes the south corridor to the fish-statue room and tries pouring some vinegar into the milky acid pool, but nothing happens. Then she tries the closet and finds a broom, hammer, and gong. At first she goes to take the broom, but thinks better, and instead grabs the torch from beside the landing's metal doors. With this, she follows a horrid stench eastward and comes out into a large room with a fetid pit at its center. She skirts it, heading towards a door in the south wall, and hears a faint voice asking if anyone is there from the depths of the pit. The Herbalist ignores the voice and slips into the room south. It is heaped with hundreds of bone pellets, from which glisten fragments of metal and scraps of cloth. She exits, creeping again around the pit's rim, and heads east into a room with an elaborate crab mural. Then south, into a room with a sagging sealing held up with a pole. Carefully, she passes through, and into the room to the south, which has a corridor west, a door east, and a huge crack on the south wall—splitting a mural of a city in two—from which a breeze is blowing... 

Violence - Prohibition Era Skirmish

(This is from a while back, last year I think, thought I'd post it since it was mostly done).

St. Louis, 1929. 

Dusk. The glow of the city in the sky. A railroad bridge looms over a little riverside cemetery; fireflies darting between the gravestones. Higher up: the road. Lower down: reeds, mud, and the Mississippi's turgid waters. A car is parked on the slope,

Three racketeers stand in and around a shallow grave, freshly dug up: Camille, a butch lesbian type, stands with her hands on her hips looking down on the sweating, pudgy Vince, while Tommy, his hair slicked back, chews on a toothpick and leans against a headstone. Wood splinters as Vince pries open the coffin, revealing nestled bottles of liquor. Before they can take satisfaction in the unearthed cache, headlights flick on, drowning them in light.

Up on the road, a car has pulled up, facing down at them. They hear the slam of car doors. And shadows move across the bright headlights. A voice—Dutch accented—rings out and they immediately know who it is. Their nemesis: De Graaf. 

He's standing up on the verge, looking down into the graveyard, his right hand man Nico standing beside him, a sawed-off BAR resting on his shoulder. Two more goons flank them: Lenny and Howard. 

Camille began walking toward the car, hands raised, presenting a sympathetic figure. Tommy edges towards the cover of a thick clump of headstones. Vince, still standing waist deep in the grave, slides his revolver out of its holster. 

Vince fires, Camille and Tommy both dive, Nico lets out a wild shot from the BAR only to grunt and go stumbling back—catching Vince's slug in the shoulder. Howard and Lenny go running left and right respectively, while De Graaf goes to earth. 

(intermediate details lost to history, seems like everyone's taking potshots and Camille creeps up to the gang's car; trying to get a shotgun maybe?)

Camille pulls the back door open, using it for cover, while yanking open the passenger side door. De Graaf fires, shattering the back door's window, but the bullets merely fly over the crouched Camille's head. 

(details also lost)

Suddenly the BAR opens up and chews through the back door, perforating Camille with slugs. She goes down, slumped half over the passenger side seat. 

(further missing details; the rival gagsters were advancing or had split int two groups I think; definetly one or two were downed)

The BAR opens up again, turning the top of the gravestone to stone splinters and downing Tommy who was hid behind.  

 

Vince cowers in the grave, the bottles clinking under his feet. He hears the crunch of footsteps and the rustle of grass as (presumably) De Graaf and Nico approach. The two stop at the car, examining Camille's body. She's alive, just barely, but they don't realize it. They move on, edging closer to the grave.

Stooping, Vince reaches down, grabs a bottle, and with an underhand throw lobs it into the river. Gunshots ring out at the plop. As the last echo dies, Vince twists around, popping out of the grave and firing at either Nico or De Graaf—he's not sure which. It turns out to be De Graaf, but the shot goes wide, clipping a fragment of the Dutchman's jacket. Both De Graaf and Nico open up, the first's shots going wide and spitting up dirt, but the second hitting Vince dead on. 

He's not dead though, not quite, and can only look up dazed as the two mobsters stand on the lip of the grave. He has just enough time to notice Nico is cradling the BAR in one arm, favoring his uninjured shoulder, before they point their guns down, and finish him off.

Sirens in the distance. De Graaf and his men beat a hasty retreat, pile into their car, and are off. Later: policemen with flashlights combing through the graveyard. Camille and Tommy whisked away in a police ambulance; one with several slugs in her chest and the other with a nasty head wound. 

A few days later De Graaf throws down his newspaper in disgust upon reading TWO GANGSTERS IN HOSPITAL AFTER GRAVEYARD GUNFIGHT.

+++++

We didn't end up using the suppression rules, which we should have as they would have been useful. As well, there was a couple times when dis/advantage should have been invoked (Nico's shoulder injury, the bright headlights, etc). Furthermore, we didn't roll for each bullet as an Injury Check—mostly we forgot to, but also it would have slowed things down measurably. Without that however, I think that players survived being down with a bit more regularity than if we were counting each bullet as an Injury received. 

 

One thing that was a bit muddled was calling the number of bullets fired. We tried to mainly do this before rolling but sometimes did so after. I think that it would work best if you treat it as a gut/impulse choice. I.e. "I fire of three shots at him!" At least insofar as flow is concerned (since obviously ammunition tracking is an issue as well). 

 

The BAR definitely chewed people up, what with its ability to really commit to firing off multiple shots (a 20 round magazine) and the +4 to Injury Checks for being rifle caliber. 

A small thought. The +1 for each additional shot does not read that cleanly. When running I might just make it a +1 for 1 shot and then an additional +1 for every shot after to a max of six. This would make the target de facto 15, which is fine I think—25% chance to hit as a default—and it just makes everything read more intuitively.

An Offering For The Goat-Mother - Play Report

Per Weird Writers "Just Run It" advice, I decided to run a little horror-investigation scenario I had written up a while back.  

CW: abuse, suicide

WW played as Alice Kent.

Loadout : Phone, wired earbuds, meds, laptop, change of clothes, pepper spray, printed photo of Cheryl (her missing girlfriend), a Leica brand camera, and spare film
Skills : Photography, Homosexual Underground, Botany, Urban Exploration

Cheryl Wayland—Alice's girlfriend—went up north to visit her family for the first time in three years after much cajoling on their part. That was almost a month ago, and Alice hasn't heard from her since.

SATURDAY. After a four hour drive up from the southern, more urban part of the state, Alice found herself driving past a sign for LAUREN, MI; Pop. 755, "Elk Hunting Capital of the Midwest" and a big statue of an elk.

The town was little more than a main street hemmed in by pine forest. A diner, a handful of bars, a gas station, garage, two motels, a hardware store, and a big building emblazoned with WAYLAND SPORTING GOODS on the side.

Tired, Alice pulled into the parking lot of one of the motels and checked in. As well, she showed the receptionist the photo and asked if she'd seen Cheryl recently. The response was cagey. No the receptionist hadn't seen the Wayland's daughter. But Alice was able to get the family's address.

She left some of her belongings in the motel room, then drove out to the Wayland's house on the edge of town. The place looked to have once been a farm, though not any longer, with a sagging barn and big house built in the last century if not earlier. Alice parked on the verge and crossed through the gate, walking up the long driveway, to the house where a new truck and car were parked.

Peering inside, she didn't notice anything interesting in either, and so walked up to the house itself to try and look in the front windows. She'd just caught a glimpse of a living room when an "ahem" turned her head. A middle-aged woman in a floral print dress and apron ("tradwife chic") was standing on the porch, looking down at Alice with a suspicious expression.

Alice introduced herself and explained she was a good friend of Cheryl's and was looking for her. The woman's face twisted into something like worry and she asked if Cheryl was alright. Alice explained that the last she heard she was here with her family and things were going well but then there had been nothing but radio silence since then.

Oh but she left weeks ago! We had a big fight and she stormed out and, well, she doesn't ever call us (this last part said with a note of accusation). Alice nodded along. A boy shouted for mom from inside the house. Just one minute Arthur Jr! Well, if you hear from her please call us... With that Patricia Wayland (Cheryl's mother) closed the door.

Alice pretended to leave, but in fact sidled up against the house to try and eavesdrop. She saw Patricia twitch the curtain aside to look out on the driveway (luckily not noticing Alice pressed up against the clapboard) and then heard muttered conversation between Patricia and a gruff voice, mentioning her name, Cheryl, and expressing concern. Alice decided to slip away and walk back to her car.

Getting in, she didn't yet start the engine but sat and watched the house for a while, pretending to mess with her phone (terrible signal out in the backwoods). All was still, nothing stirring. Eventually, a police car with the words LAUREN COUNTY SHERIFF on the side came round the bend and slowly drove past. Alice took this as a sign and left, driving back to the motel where she parked.

Hungry (it being mid-afternoon) she walked over to the diner, a place which looked like a time capsule of the 50s. Inside there were one or two patrons and a waitress—her name tag said Mindy—serving them while someone else worked a grill in the back. Alice ordered an egg, toast, and coffee and as she was being served showed the waitress the photograph.

Oh my gosh. You know Cheryl? We used to be best friends in high school.

Mindy, it turned out, well, used to be best friends with Cheryl—"even if she did become a lesbo." Was she really missing? I thought she was still at her family's. Yeah they had a fight, Cheryl had come into the diner crying afterward but her mother had come and convinced her to come back.

Alice managed to convince Mindy to meet with her after Mindy's shift finished in two hours. Then she finished her meal and headed out.

At the gas station, she poked the young clerk a little. He vaguely remembered Mindy from high school, couldn't remember having seen her since but hey did you remember what car she drove? I always remember cars. And in fact he did remember seeing Cheryl's car a few weeks back and it being towed later on. When asked where car's got towed to in Lauren he laughed and hiked a thumb at the garage next door. Only one place miss.

The garage, unfortunately, was closed (it being a Saturday). She skulked around and looked into the fenced off lot. There were several cars, in varying conditions, and few under tarps. Not immediately seeing Cheryl's, she tried calling the number on the garage's sign, to get some one to let her in, but got an automated message asking her to call back later.

Moving on, she walked down to the hardware store and, after some fake browsing, showed the old clerk a photo of Cheryl. He definetly recognized the photo but said he didn't. As she was leaving she saw him picking up a phone and dialing it.

At Wayland Sporting Goods, which was open and the busiest place she had yet been to in Lauren, she found a clerk and went about purchasing a handgun. After seeing her hesitancy about waiting for an ID check, the clerk offered a shady deal to get her one now, which she went through with.

She'd killed enough time by then and walked back towards the motel, espying Mindy leaving the diner as did, and caught up with the latter. After some cajoling, she managed to convince Mindy to come along with her and stake out the Wayland's place. They packed into to Alice's battered white sedan and drove off.

They parked on the edge of a road a ways away and then walked through the woods till they came to the fence/treeline of the Wayland's Place and hunkered down to watch. The evening wore on and nothing much happened. Eventually, they saw a man—Mindy identified him as Arthur Wayland—come out of the house, get in the truck, and drive off. A while after that, around dinnertime, they watched Patricia Wayland come out of the house carrying a big crock pot. She walked across the yard and over to the barn and to a cellar door opened it, and disappeared inside. After a while she came back out with the crock pot and went back to the house.

I think they're keeping Cheryl in there.

What? Mindy was incredulous. Why would they do that. But Alice had already gotten up and was creeping her way out of the woods and across the wide expanse of mowed lawn.

The house's windows watched her like blind eyes and she was acutely aware that any moment someone could look up and out and see her, but she made it safe to the barn and around the backside to the cellar door (which was out of view of both house and driveway). Said door was locked shut with a big padlock and chain.

Unsure what to do at first, she decided to creep around and slip inside the barn. Within, she found some rakes, shovels, deflated inner tubes, tools. Searching the last, she turned up a hacksaw and crept back outside with it and back around to the cellar door. She started sawing.

It was loud and tiring. Within minutes her arms ached. She had gotten two-thirds of the way through when she heard the sound of a car on gravel, coming up the drive. Stopping, she sidled over to the corner of the barn and peeked out. Coming up the driveway was Arthur Wayland's truck followed by the sheriff's car.

She watched five men in total get out of the two vehicles and go inside the house. After a few minutes of silence, Alice returned to the door and began sawing again. She had just finished, the chain falling to the ground, when she heard the slam of a screen door and voices. Again to the corner and peeking out. The men were now dressed in white robes and followed by Patricia. They were walking right toward the barn.

Quickly, Alice ran to the cellar door, opened it, descended the steps, and gently closed it again. She was in darkness and spent a moment fishing out her phone and turning on its flashlight.

Strange carven figures—deer and beasts of the forest—leapt out at her. Then she heard the rustle of cloth and swept her phone light around. In the back corner was an insensate figure in dirty clothes, leashed to the wall with a dog collar. Alice hurried over. It was Cheryl.

There was a dull, glassy look in Cheryl's eyes and she didn't really respond to movement. Some dirty plates sat on the floor nearby.

Alarmed voices from the doors above. Alice quickly shut her phone light off and darted to the other side of the room. The doors were wrenched open, letting in the fading twilight, then silence. No movement. Alice slipped out her handgun.

Down the stairs came the sheriff, his gun out, squinting in the light. Behind him another man. Alice waited a beat, then, aiming at the sheriff, pulled the trigger. The bark of the gun surprised her and the shot went astray. In a snap the sheriff had twisted and shot back at her but missed. She fired again and the sheriff dove for cover while the second man did the same. Quickly, she spun and shot at where the sheriff dived and heard him yelp. She shot again, this time greeted with a meaty thud. Alice ran to where he had fallen in the shadows of the cellar, but as she did the second man came barreling into her and they both hit the wall hard. She kneed him in the groin and he keeled over moaning. On her hands and knees she scrambled over to the sheriff—he was dead, shot twice in the chest—and grabbed his handgun, discarding her own (now empty).

She spun and aimed at the doorway, but there was only silence from up the steps. A minute passed. Two. She crept over and unhooked the leash from the wall and hauled Cheryl to her feet, putting her in front of her. Cheryl stumbled along, mutely. Up the stairs, one step at a time, and then out into the fading daylight.

Someone cried out "Don't shoot, we need her!" To either side of the cellar door: Patricia Wayland, Arthur Wayland (with a hunting rifle), and the hardware store man (holding Arthur back).

Alice demanded to know what was going on. Arthur said it was none of her goddamn business. Carefully, Alice began backing away keeping Cheryl close to her. The Wayland's followed, dogging her. They contained like this around the edge of the barn and half way across the property. Again Alice demanded to know what was happening. Arthur just told her that she'd killed the sheriff and the state police would hunt her down like that. The hardware man rambled something about god needing Cheryl to save them all.

Alice made a decision. She put her gun to Cheryl's temple and pulled the trigger. A blossom of blood and Cheryl's body fell to the grass. Arthur Wayland bellowed in rage and another shot rang out. This time Alice fell, the wind knocked out of her as she hit the turf. It had gone through her shoulder. A long stretched out moment. She managed to look up and see and the Wayland's advancing, Arthur working the bolt of his rifle. Raising her pistol, she fired and caught him in the leg. He fell to one knee cursing and the hardware man grabbed a hold of him. Again she fired and Arthur toppled, shot through the chest. Patricia screamed and the hardware man took off running.

Patricia Wayland ran to her husband, grabbing at his body, and screamed slurs and abuse at Alice. One last time, Alice demanded to know what was happening. Patricia, screamed some more, then began ranting about deer, god's chosen prey, the things in the dark of the woods, her daughter being corrupted, etc. Alice, from the ground, raised the gun again and shot her too.

Silence.

The squeal of a car pulling out and hurtling away down the road.

Mindy running out from the tree line, hand over her mouth. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Alice handed her the car keys and told her to go.

Silence.

She checked to make sure she had a bullet for herself.

Silence.

It was dark now and oddly peaceful. The woods alive with animal song. Alice couldn't quite say how long it had been. She stared up at the stars above. They seemed to be blurring, twisting in on themselves and performing a strange dance. She couldn't tell if it was the bloodless or something else. Out from the tree line stepped tall, shaggy shapes with thin limbs. They were as tall as the pines. One by one they came—a closing circle. Till they stood nearly over her and Cheryl like a ring of standing stones. Then there was a pressure like the pressure of a storm rolling in and the stars disappeared, blotted out by some black descending form and for the briefest moment she felt its alien scrutiny. Then it passed. The tall things turned and left. In the distance a police siren could be heard. Quietly, Alice slipped from consciousness. She would not wake up.

+++

Notes :
The main issue with things was that Alice, a pregen character I had thrown together about ten minutes before play, and her skill set were a bit ill-suited for the scenario. Likewise, there weren't enough threads or leads for WW to pursue to learn more about the cult or interact with the locals. But other than that, it was a good time.   

I Ran The Iron Coral #3

Previous Sessions : 1, 2. 

+++++

 

Once again we have M. playing as...

 

Creed (Dex +1), locked inside their crimson armour (armour 1, defer blow onto an ally), armed with sword and pistol. Rendered listless last session, proscribed stimulants in order to function.

Doug (Wis +1), armed with a rifle.

 

Also featuring: Slob the dog. 

We open on Creed staring out the window of the party's new boardinghouse lodgings at the falling rain and the forest of ship's crosstrees. They are listless, their hair matted. Behind them, in the room's second bed, Doug is curled up with the dog. From a vial Creed takes some white powder and snorts it, immediately achieving a measure of alertness and awareness previously lacking. 

At breakfast (mostly fish and lard) the landlady gives Creed a letter from Doc. Cruette asking if they would like to give a small recounting of their exploits in the Iron Coral to some physician friends of his on visit from Bastion. (1) They decide they'll need a showpiece: an expedition is in order.

 

Asking around for recruits in the dockside pubs, they are met by two men--Suleiman and Piotr. They are rough sorts, washed up out of one of Bastion's armies by the look of their mismatched kit. But they've been in the Iron Coral before, as part of one of Nigel's expeditions. They don't like Nigel much--he got one of their buddies killed and paid them a paltry amount in spite of making it out with two crystal orbs. It's not the danger they mind so much as the lack of rewards. (2) So they agree, in part to spite Nigel, to sign on for no up-front pay but rather a share of the treasure. A seven-three split is agreed upon.

They ship out in Dorett's little fishing boat in the pouring rain. (3) It takes longer than usual to navigate the choppy waters but after an arduous amount of rowing the Iron Coral's jagged form looms and the party pulls into the cove in its side.

 

They enter the gaping passage and after an inordinate amount of time descending find themselves walking through a sort of cavern whose rocky walls seem to bear impressions of cyclopean machinery. (4) Then the tunnel narrows, crowded out by freezing pipes and they squeeze through and out into some sort of engine room thick with even more tangled pipes. They feel a rumble through their feet and the sound of distant machinery churning to life. 

Exasperated at yet another change to the dungeon, (5) they nonetheless press on and encounter a small, rodent-esq creature which spoke to them in oddly comprehensible gibberish. A helper beast: it asked to be given a task. Not knowing what else to do, Creed told it to come along with them and it let itself be scooped up and placed on their shoulder.

The room to the north was bigger, with a tangle of pipes on the ceiling leading into two massive tanks festooned with glowing gauges. The coral in this part of the dungeon has an odd golden color. As they stepped into the room however, Piotr stopped them with a hiss and raised fist. (6) Very slowly he indicated the ceiling and they saw the large, almost transparent, shape of an insectoid creature shift position in the pipes above. (7)

Slowly, Doug, Piotr, and Suleiman raised their rifles, training them on the glassy creature. At Creed's instigation, they began to sidle their way across the room to the door on the east wall, but the creature above shifted to intercept them. 

They made their decision. Piotr and Doug opened fire. The pipes masked it (and it was nearly invisible besides) so their shots didn't quite hit home (8) but the creature is hit nonetheless and falls from the ceiling with a panicked, chittering screech. The gunshots echo against the metal walls. (9) They have just enough time to see the gouts of translucent red blood and then the glass mantis lashes out with its clawed arms, grappling Piotr, who takes a nasty wound and loses his rifle. Creed yells at the other two to take the shot, even if it risks hitting Piotr, and another volley of rifle fire smashed into the creature, blowing its head open and, unfortunately, hitting Piotr as well, who goes limp. 

The glass mantis toppled and the gang rushes over, pulling Piotr free from its clawed embrace. Fortunately, he is till alive. (10) Just mangled and with a cleanly shot-through wound to the flank. A quick debate, then Suleiman and Doug began to drag Piotr back towards the entrance while the dog pranced about wildly and Creed bent over to examine the creature's body. 

Before he can however, they saw a ripple in the wall. Slowly, like a shark's fin breaking the surface, a golden clawed hand emerged and went racing across the floor towards Doug and Suleiman. (11)

In desperation, Creed pulled their sabre free and slashed--at empty air. With a massive swipe, the arm tossed Suleiman aside and he flew into one of the metal tanks with a meaty thud and resonant clang before crumpling to the ground. 

Doug tries to disentangle himself from his rifle strap, still half dragging Piotr as the arm circles round. Creed takes the time to pull out his revolver, aim, fire, and blow the arm into weird metallic droplets. It subsumes into the floor and all is quiet save for the ringing of the gunshot and the churn of machinery in the walls. 

Creed then helped Suleiman up, who is fine if badly bruised (maybe with a broken rib), and then put him back to the task of hauling Piotr out to the boat. Meanwhile, Creed bends over and starts hacking at the body of the glass mantis. After tense minutes of effort, acutely aware of how alone they are in the claustrophobic bowls of this waking edifice, Creed managed to gather up an arm and head of the translucent creature. (12) Its blood gets everywhere, staining his armour a deeper crimson. 

He hurries out after his comrades and, after jogging in darkness, emerged into the pouring rain. The sea is choppy and the little fishing boat bobs in the swells but they load Piotr aboard, covering him with a tarp. Creed gives Suleiman a handful of money, the arm and head (now wrapped up) and instructs him to row back to Hopesend, get medical attention for Piotr, and deliver the "specimens." Then come back and pick Doug and them up. Suleiman gives a salute and shoves off. 

Together, Doug and Creed turn back to the gaping dungeon mouth. They feel a shudder pass through the coral underfoot.

Entering back into the relative dryness, of the Iron Coral, they descend, once more squeezing their way through the cold pipes and into the engine room, then proceeding to the room with the huge tanks. (13) Two of the little helper beasts are there, fiddling with the gauges on the tank that Suleiman collided with. They chatter and ignore the party. At least until Creed tries and fails to snatch one up and shove it in a snack, at which point they scampered off. 

Shrugging, they open the door to east and find a hub-like room with some odd white "leather" chairs on the wall and a shaft in the ceiling dripping foam. Creed sat in one just for the hell of it. Then they tried a door covered in incomprehensible signage to the southeast. On the other side they found a small, bare room with three locked metal lockers on the wall. (14) Finding them locked, they tried a passage leading south that smelled of rot. At the other end was a crude chamber heaped with rotting flesh. They retreated back to the hub room and try, this time, the northeastern door (also covered in weird signage). That hatch opened up onto a long passage which they proceeded down. As they neared the end they noticed the sounds of an immense creature breathing. The dog whines and refuses to go forward. With trepidation, they look out into the huge room beyond. There is a passage on the far wall, but between them and it is a huge, black scaled, six legged monstrosity deep in slumber; nearly the size of a steam truck. 

They retreat quietly and carefully. Back in the hub room, they try the northern door, which opens onto a chamber with several dangling machines and two doors, one blasted open. 

They try the blasted door and find a small, bunker-like room with a splatter on the wall and a hatch in the floor. (15) Then they check the dangling machines, which are some sort of power tool--saws and the like--attached to the ceiling by thick cables. The dog is pawing at the eastern door, so they open it, getting a whiff of rot, and find a sort of dining room with white chairs and an ivory tabled heaped with mouldering foodstuffs. Creed and Doug extract some of the pseudo-ivory cutlery and platters, shoving it all in a sack, then decide they've pushed their luck as it is and began to make their way out of the Iron Coral. 

They pass through the hub, through the tank room, through the engine room, squeeze their way through the freezing pipes (the sounds of machinery are nearly deafening), trot through the dark passage, and finally emerge back into the cleansing rain. 

The boat is not yet back, so they wait in the passage-mouth and watch the choppy sea. Abruptly, Creed realizes that they can see a smear of marshland on the horizon--which should be impossible given the angle of the cove. The Iron Coral is, ever so subtly, drifting. (16) Perturbed, they hunch inward in their poncho, trying to keep warm.

Eventually, the boat returns, crewed by Dorett, and they board and quickly shove off. As they row away, the parry watches the jagged hulk of the Iron Coral slowly moving through the water. 

And that's where we wrapped up for the day.

+++++

(note: sorry for the meandering tenses)

 

(1) Prepped this hook in advance. 

(2) Vaguely had some dissatisfied former-hirelings of Nigel in mind before the session then improvised the rest on the spot after M. said they wanted to hire some mercenaries. 

(3) Random weather roll. Rain and then rain again. When they get back to Hopesend there will be flooding. 

(4) Rolled echo #3: engines.

(5) M. was both exasperated and delighted at the way the dungeon's shifted between sessions.

 

(6) Made an opposed d12 roll for surprise and M. won it. 

(7) So echo #3 states that each room should have an encounter as the Iron Coral "awakes" and this was my initial result, but after the mantis fight I switched over to rolling more conventionally as it felt weird insomuch as pacing was concerned to be having an encounter every room. 

(8) I gave the Glass Mantis 8 hits and had its claw attack do 3 hits. The players would have done 6 hits with their two rifles but I gave it armour 2 for being nearly invisible and also hidden up among the pipes. So it was badly wounded, fell from the pipes, lashed out, and then was finished off. Guns are powerful. 

(9) Prompting encounter checks. 

(10) Dropped to 0 hits. When the party checked on him, M. flipped a coin and called it correctly so he lived.

(11) This whole thing was a pretty brutal series of encounter checks. 

(12) This begins a streak of very lucky encounter rolls (nothing) that lasts for the rest of the session. 

(13) If I were to run the same situation again, I might bring the "explode if any damage is done to them" factor into play what with all these shots being fired. 

(14) No idea why they didn't try to bust these open. 

(15) M. also refused to open the hatch, citing caution. 

(16) Seemed like a good way of making the "waking up" of this echo have a bigger impact. I will figure out what this means for the next session. Maybe it crashes into the marshland or even into Hopesend. 

So far, this was our shortest session, but it packed a punch. About three weeks have passed, in universe, since the party's first foray into the dungeon. M.'s characters are all professionals at this point. One more expedition and they'll be experts.

I Ran The Iron Coral #2

This write-up will be a bit on the loose side as I wrote it up almost a week and a half after the session and then procrastinated tidying it up, so some detail was lost. Likewise, I don't have as thorough referee notes. 

 

Previous Sessions : 1.

+++++

My friend M. played as... 

Creed (DEX +1), locked inside the Crimson Armour (armour 1, may defer a wound onto an ally) and armed with sword and pistol.

 

With their companions Bob (halberd, crude armour) and Doug (WIS +1, rifle). 

We open on a dreary day. The party is moping about at a table in the Pickled Goose Tavern & Boardhouse. Bob is massaging phantom pains out of his new peg leg, while Creed keeps an attentive ear out for rumours of note.

Three looming men approach the table, almost bulging out of their suits. One removes a little black notebook from his pocket, opens it to a page, and asks: "Messieurs Creed, Bob, and Doug?"

The three look at each-other. "Who wants to know?"

The goon shuts his notebook with a snap and returns it to his breast-pocket. Then, with one swift move, his fellow sweeps all the glasses off the table, sending them smashing to the floor. They lean in and say: "We've heard that you've recently come into some money. Yet you have not begun paying off your debt. Curious. We hope you will heed this reminder." 

 

They left.

Rattled, the party pays for damages and leaves, now uncomfortably aware of the thirty shillings burning a hole in their pocket.

Purchases: prybar, lockpicks, fire oil, and a mutt (named Slob). 

 

While walking the dockside they pass a couple of funny men in cerulean robes hawking pamphlets in front of a blue painted ship. "Join our voyage to the stars beyond! Where you shall transcend and join in the congress of enlightened alien intelligences! We are sure to succeed this time!"

The party decide to engage an expert: Gullwin, the man who'd identified the poison when Creed asked the Pickled Goose's clientele the week before. He asked to be paid up front, at an expert's going rate, and they settled on five shillings upfront, five on return from the expedition, as well as one shilling bonus if any treasure was gotten.

Thus they assembled in the early morning on a mist shrouded wharf. Dorett was there to see them off and Gullwin arrived, out of the fog, polishing his glasses, a hefty revolver stuck in his belt.

After some time on the water...

The Iron Coral sat, a jagged island looming out of the sea. They land on the metallic sand of the cove and find, to their surprise, another little yawl already pulled ashore with footsteps leading into the gaping entrance-mouth.

The party sorted themselves out and proceeded into the depths.

After an indeterminable amount of time spent trudging down the sloping tunnel, they emerged, not into the hub chamber they were expecting, but into a space whose edges their lamp light cannot reach, nor can they feel it. The floor is soft underfoot. They creep about and find, dangling from some sort of shaft leading upward, a rope.

Upwards they climb (Doug hoisting the dog up after them). As they do, a rusty residue accumulates on their joints. At long last, they emerge out of the shaft and find themselves in the pit room where they slew the carapace beast. Sure enough, its corpse was where they had left it in jumbled pile on the floor. They noted that the rope was tied to a grapnel sunk into the pit's rim.

They move north and north again into the room with the metal boxes, retracing their map. North again, through the room with transparent walls and the mouldering corpse. They skirt the psychic ball-sack and enter the room with the bulging class dome only to hear a BANG on the doors at the top of the room. 

After some argument, they decide to open the doors; weapons at ready. The metal doors grind apart, revealing a small room with three crystal spheres on pedestals surrounded by shuffling, pallid humanoids who hardly react to the intrusion. Cautiously, the party sidles into the left side of the room.  

 

They observe the pallid husks for a few minutes, poking them a bit, and determine that they are fairly non-responsive. Creed decides to go for the leftmost orb only for the two husks guarding it to frenziedly attack. They wrestle it from them and the party blasts and hacks them to pieces, only to notice that Creed is now nearly catatonic wrapped around the orb, staring fixedly into it.

Bob pries it out of Creed's hands and shoves the crystal orb in a sack. The party flees, dragging Creed along with them, taking the stairs downward. 

They catch their breath in the colorful coral room and watch some skittering fishbugs. Bob decides to re-enter the gladiatorial pit and this time fight the half-man, half-coral gladiator. His proposal: a grid of flaming oil upon the ground. The combat is tense, but Bob wins and collects the dead gladiators gear. 

They head east, into the sticky room again, and hear slithering from down the dog-legged passage. They prepare themselves and blast the coral snake apart as it emerges; gunshots echo through the dungeon. They take the time to skin the snake and roll the long strip of leather up into a bundle. Then they continue and enter the room where they'd found the crimson armour. They are met with seven or so fish-men all clustered around poking at the corpses on the ground! 

Both sides regard each other tensely but no one yet acts. 

The party decides to slowly advance into the room. The fish-men respond by backing up, but flow around and suddenly the party is blocked off from the way they came in. Cursing themselves, they head north, and three fish-men followed while the rest split off down other routes. 

The party follows the corridor north, dogged by the three fish-men, and end up pushing their way through a bristle-wall into a room with a little salty stream. They try to the room to the east and note that it has weird flexing holes in the ceiling. Nonetheless, they try and cross only for spikes to shoot out! Bob and Doug are injured and quickly retreat. They decide, fuck it, and blast their way through the three fish-men and flee south. 

They make it as far as the dog-leg passage when they are ambushed. Bob, who was in front, puts up a fight but falls under the onslaught of hooked barb-chains. The rest of the party blasts away till the fish-men falter and the survivors retreat. Checking on Bob, they find he is dead. Doug retrieves some items from the body and then they flee back through the rooms and up the stairs, heading for the entrance shaft. 

Somewhere around the box room they hear a gunshot, but ignore. Back down the shaft and then out into the fresh air and they pile into the boat, push off, and leave.

 

Afterward, Doug paid Gullwin the rest of his money, disgusted with how little help the "expert" was. Then he hocked the snakeskin and met with Darius, the port overseer, who gave him a substantial sum (1g) for the crystal orb. Finally, the beleaguered and mournful Doug took Creed to Doc Cruses and got them proscribed a powdery white stimulant in the hopes that it would shake them out of the listlessness that had predominated since the orb incident. 

+++++

M. enjoyed how things went sideways this session, though the loss of Bob was a tragedy. Gullwin could have been better run on my part. M. had stated that she wanted to hire a "naturalist or biologist" but within the dungeon I wasn't exactly sure how run that so he mostly didn't do much. The gladiator was a bit of an odd little diversion that didn't feel totally appropriate, and running combat as sport of that sort is tricky with the mechanics I'm using.

I Ran The Iron Coral! (Again)

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. 

+++++

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.

(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.

+++++

(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."