A Long Overdue Adventuring Recap

Its been a while since I've posted online. Last year I ran a short lived in-person DCC campaign with some friends starting with Nebin Pendlebrook's Perilous Pantry by Mark Bishop. There were hijinks and many deaths. Some of the highlights include a pair of individuals becoming trapped in another dimension, and one player going through about eight level zeros in the final battle. Thankfully there is a convienent spot to refill one's PC pool outside the final confrontation. Solid planning there, Mr. Bishop.

Having braved the underground lair, the surviving party members decided to head east, Always... into the East. Their journeys were spurred on by visions of a fair Elven lady that had come to afflict one of the dwarves, Guiness. Along they way they met new PCs as a new player joined to take part in Winter's Daughter. Together as they strode through the woods getting ever closer to the Elven maid, they came upon a young woman about to be ritualisticly sacrificed in by a pair of men. A brief conversation was had, and then the party carried onwards. Rationalizing lack of knowledge of the culture as a reason for not interferring. Anyway, the entered the nearby burial tomb, had a few close calls, but discovered a secret, and visited a far away place. While in the distant, cold lands the group heard out the fair elf's plea and decided to perform an act of kindness despite being played for fools.

But not every PC was happy with this, and the deeply besotted Guiness felt most betrayed. As the group went about their effort, the dwarf plotted revenge, and nearly had it. He attempted to burn down the location of the Elf, but was stopped short by the guards. Some quick action on the part of his companions saved him from being stuck with many a spear and sword. In the end, the group completed the elf's request then once again traveled further into the east. Always... into the East.

After some travel, the group came upon the bastion of hope for good and law, that Keep on the Borderlands. Here, I tried my hand at doing more of sand-boxy hexcrawl. Previously I had been seeding the adventures with two to three hooks and using those to select the adventure. Now I decided to turn the grid map in KotB into a hexmap and start seeding it with sites, encounters, and adventure modules. Looking back on it, I went overboard and started myself down the path of burnout. I seeded far too much, and invested way too much prep time for the effort. For example I included the Hole in the Oak, the Incandescent Grottoes, Shadows of the Beakmen, and about a dozen other modules through the map, and read everyone of them, along with creating multiple encounters per hex.

Not all of it is wasted as I can reuse much of the content, but the toll was far too great. In the future, if I run another hexcrawl I'll do something closer to the Three Hex Starter, or run a premade hexcrawl like Evils of Illmire.

At the famous Keep, the group made the rounds and heard some rumors, and decided look into the gnomes who prayed to an idol made of solid emerald who were said to be out in the distant woods to, you guessed it, the east. Before departing they met some new PCs (who would not be long for this world), and employed a few hirelings. Of particular note were young Wybert, who sought revenge against a band of tiny giants who killed his friend, and Wilmot, who needed some funds to buy back his soul from a demon to whom he traded it for a magical dagger. The party seemed to really enjoy playing with hirelings, but their importance was soon eclipsed by a badger.

Yes, a badger. But before that tale, the group travled the land and discovered the entrance to the Hole in the Oak. I must say it was quite fun to run that dungeon. I know not everyone loves the bulleted list style come to OSE dungeons, but I find it so much easier to run at the table than long winded prose. But back to the party. After losing a few of the adventurers to battle and traps, including the dearly loved Wybert, and deciding not to search for one of the ones who went missing due to a teleporter trap, they returned back to the keep. They did not return empty handed though and spent lavishly upon arriving back at the keep. Unfortunately for the missing PC, the party never returned to the Hole in the Oak.

During their next travels the party came upon a badger being hung by a rope. Showing the soft side of their hearts they let the little guy down, and embraced him as one of their own. It turns out this badger was none other than Lord Chunt, the royal badger of the rolling hills. The group really took to gilding his backstory, and he quickly became their mascot, and Guiness's version of a ranger pet. Their next encounter was also rewarding, but ultimately was a pain for me. They discovered a powerful weapon whose lacked a significiant enough drawback to not become the primary weapon of the PC who found it. Pretty much from this point forward the PC would wield this thunder spear and roll through encounters. To be clear, I have no problem with PCs kicking ass and taking names, but when the same solution is employed in every battle it gets boring to me. Eventually I had a disccusion with the player about the weapon, but by then it was too late, I was already burnt out.

Next, the group encountered a ballista with that famous phrase BREE YARK painted upon it. Shortly afterwards that phrase was bandied about among the players like it must have been by the players in 1980s. Most of the group has little knowledge of the TSR era of Dungeons & Dragons, so it delighted me to hear them repeat it over and over again and use it the upcoming combat with the goblins. The PCs tore through the goblins, and decimated the Ogre before deciding to call it a day. On the next adventuring day they once again returned to the goblin caves and killed pretty much everything there and in the hobgoblin portion all the while seeking a magic wand that didn't exist. For the next adventure they were going to go back into the caves nearby, but by then I was tiring of this.

I needed to mix it up to make it still enjoyable for me, so this time I had them deliver a box to a nearby village (a la Cecil's quest from Final Fantasy IV). Surprisingly they never once tried to open the box, only asking about its contents at the end of the session. Anyway, the arrived at the village to find it under the Shadows of the Beakmen. I quite like this adventure for a nice slugfest. Having delivered the package to the mayor, the group is persuaded to deal with the Beakmen. Accepting the quest, the party headed in to that black obelisk and meet an doom they could not foresee. Within they battled Beakmen, freed a demon, and made a horrific discovery. Then sadly they lost Lord Chunt in battle. When this occurred the party's wizard pretty much went ape-shit and spellburned himself into shrivled husk to burn his foes to ash.

Then the party met their greatest foe. No, not locked doors. Greed. In the obelisk there is a room with 3 pools of water. Drinking from them has a chance at something great, and a chance at something bad. Once they discovered the great effects they couldn't stop themselves from trying to gain more despite the punishment that was mete out. Two of the adventures ended up dying from their greed. Demoralized the party headed back and left the village to its fate.

After this adventure real life got in the way, and my burnout was strong so we stopped playing for a bit and the campaign died.

A couple months later we started up a Monster of the Week campaign. The hook was they were working for a secret organization that was dealing with extra-terrestial and supernatural forces. The first session was a twist on the X-files pilot. The next was Creature Feature from the Tome of Mysteries. From there I was planning to spool out the threads from the agency, and reveal an overarching conspiracy of aliens taking over Earth (in a mix of the arch in X-Files and the Half-Life games). But life was getting in the way and sessions were cancelled repeatedly. Finally I decided to end it with the group returning back to HQ to find it being overrun and with their actions the cause. They had fun moving through the compound and learning a bit more of the lore, defeating some low level henchmen, before confronting the doctor they had kidnapped in the first session. It seems the doctor was more than meets the eyes, but they double-crossed him during the truce and walked out victors.

Ultimately, I think they had fun with MotW, but it wasn't their type of game. The group seemed to prefer more old school adventures and less world building, unless it was world building for absurdity's sake. After I finish moving, I hope to restart the group again, but this time I'm going to tackle my ttrpg adventure module pile of shame. Going to begin with Beneath the Well of Brass. After that I'm leaning towards Frozen in Time or Grimtooth's Museum of Death.