Session 57: Bob Cedar’s Greatest Hits

12/4/23-12/13/23, rest 12/14, active 12/15

PC: Gwendolyn, Galt, Legany

Hench: Amadayo, Mahin, Madroff, Chase, Terry, Mike, Freddy

#ACKS

This week’s session started off with a bit of time skipping to await the arrival of the first crop of recruits of various stripes for various endeavors. Once the shopping was done, the party set to trying to figure out where to adventure. I generally try to encourage all shopping type things to be done in downtime. Win some, lose some.

I was certain that the group would return to the Black Shaft dungeon, despite their recent struggles, but the owner of their boat was not at the session. They tried to find another crew to take them to the cursed waters but rolled abysmally low. No local sailor was going near there especially after all the bodies that were retrieved from just that spot mere weeks ago.

They had a treasure map leading to Merlantis, Redcorn the Cleric had treasure maps on offer, and he also had a standing bounty on the lairs of fantastic creatures that he might add to his domain. They figured that was their best bet for a score since Redcorn’s player was at the table and assured them that it was going to be a score. I'm still on the fence about handouts from name level characters. I set a limit of how much he was allowed to pay, but I suspect it was much too high and am likely to revisit.

ACKS II is on the horizon and there’ll be an adjustment period when it drops. I intend to hold most procedural rulings until that time to align better with the fresh rules. The time’s, they are a changin. A big thing to always have top of mind with ACKS is that the limits set by the system are very frequently economic. It doesn’t always require a heavy handed ruling.

They learned from a drunken dwarf about a failed attempt by his kin in Stonehelm to capture and train an aerie of griffons. Redcorn just loves griffons and this had to be the move. They bought up the cheapest horseflesh they could find because griffons can’t resist horse meat and set off in search. A few irrelevant random encounters past Vennor and they got to their first lair of the hex in question.

ACKS lair searching is pretty cool. You get a target roll to find a POI in a hex per hour, with the value set by your movement speed. A random encounter roll accompanies the search so you can find the lair AND an encounter all in the same hour. If you’re really unlucky, then you’ll find them all at the same time. This was a mountain hex with some absurd number of lairs, 7 or 8? So even if they found a lair, it didn’t necessarily mean it was the griffons that they were after.

While taking their lunch in the shade of a small copse, the unusually large trees started opening their eyes and just observing. It was a lair of treants, which in ACKS are Lawful and I play pretty benevolent most of the time. They were not concerned with seemingly peaceful folks resting under their branches.

The table has seen quite a few treant lairs in their day and always enjoy the experience. This was no exception. Gwendolyn the Bard immediately started playing music for them which they just loved. I mentioned that their leaves and branches were swaying, even against the wind in the mountains, so it had to be Bob Seger the tree. While I was taking this note down, Gwendolyn’s player could barely contain herself before she informs me that it’s Bob Cedar, which evolved into Bob Cedar and the Silver Bullet Stand of treants to much laughter around the table.

We had a great time making puns based off of Bob’s timeless hits, including that treants hate Turn the Page. The group laid the groundwork for Redcorn to potentially visit and become friends with Bob’s stand. Spirits were high as they set off again in search of the griffon lair. Daylight was burning, afterall.

A short time later, they found themselves staring down the barrel of a trio of frost giants on a very nearby hill. The big swole 18 foot tall Frutzii (notViking) and were bemused by the little people below them. Gwendolyn went to her quiver of songs and fired off Chad the Giant, which these guys nodded along to. They talked over the music and chatted about how they know guys like Chad just like the crowds in the dive bars I’ve played open mics in.

It was clear to everyone that the time purchased with song was running low and these guys weren’t just gonna be best friends. The party did not want to fight the creatures and took it upon themselves to snatch Gwendolyn’s reins midsong and run for their lives. I rolled the 50% chance of the creatures to pursue fleeing PCs and failed. Added to their already indifferent demeanor, the giants laughed and mocked them for cowards but let them heroically reposition their party.

The next search led them to a very large cave mouth which they presumed to be the lair of their frost giant friends. They quickly sent their assassin hench Mahin in to investigate, who reported a very large cavern with a bunch of Hill Giants in it. The decision to nope out of that encounter was pretty easy and off they slink, slank, slunk. It wasn’t long after this that the group came across the griffons nested atop an old tower.

The two groups saw each other a long way off, fortunately outside of the 120 foot range where the griffons would just automatically attack horses. The adventurers retreated and stowed everything but one of their poor sacrificial draft horses. They sent a small party ahead to try to make introductions, which went as one might expect. The current alpha on duty dove on the horse and mauled it gruesomely, while one of their casters used a scroll of Tongues to communicate with the creature.

They learned that the true leader of the pride was named Aquilor, but he was injured and sick in the tower. The stand-in griffon would allow them to approach if the party agreed to feed the entire aerie of 13 of the creatures, which is a lot of meat. More than they had brought, in fact, which started the discussion of how to get more meat. The idea to hunt like the other party had for the hippogriffs some sessions back was quickly discarded since none of their party had hunting skills. They assured the griffons that they would return with adequate food and bounced.

Much discussion was had here. They settled on going back to town to buy a few cows to supplement their horse stock that they were going to offer. The day was long, however, so they camped and jammed with the Silver Bullet Stand and left in the morning.

I was eager to see what kind of trouble leading livestock into the mountains was going to cause. Unfortunately, random encounters are random. Very soon after leaving, the party tripped over a hippogriff encounter with maximum reaction check. I struggled for a second to figure out how the creatures would be especially friendly and realized that it didn’t necessarily have to be the creatures themselves, it could be the scenario. It turned out that the hippogriffs had attacked and mauled a herd of goats, much more than they could eat. While the creatures flew around and played with their food, the party was able to scoop up a bunch of free meat and stow it on their sacrificial draft horses to carry.

This was one of those times where I really appreciated what can happen with random encounters and how it forces you to be creative in how to run them. Maybe it was a soft interpretation but it was a cool scenario for the party and the next one will be a dragon or something that kills everyone. It all evens out in the end. Either way, they went back to the griffons with the meat.

The creatures honored their agreement and let them in, but only after diving on the meat and ripping it to shreds in a truly devastating scene that caused the henchmen to roll morale checks or flee. Everyone was a little green but able to pass by and into the tower, which simply led up a few floors on rickety old ladders that collapsed. The adventuring party with tons of rope had no trouble ascending, where they encounter Aquilor laid up, panting, shivering, and scowling over the manticore stingers stuck in him.

The wounds were corrupted and the griffon’s behavior was strange, but the newly recruited cleric tried to heal the creature and got bit in the process. The damage seemed healed now, but the corruption and spikes remained. Something was wrong here, punctuated by the mage hench nearly losing his mind when trying to communicate with Aquilor telepathically. The party regrouped to wait for Redcorn to arrive.

It occurred to me that we were on different pages in how communication was sent to Redcorn to notify him of the lairs in question. Apparently the party had purchased a homing pigeon which the campaign uses for simple messages at distance. I missed this and assumed they were going to return to the nearest town for that. Once we ironed that out, it was just a waiting game for Redcorn to arrive.

The treants agreed to be friends with Redcorn in exchange for improvements to be made in their location worth their average lair treasure value. Redcorn wanted them to relocate to his domain, which they agreed to for a much better location (double). This mechanic comes out of Dubzaron where Bdubs generated ways for solo players to interact with nonHostile creatures during downtime actions. I stole it.

When the party returned to the griffon tower with Redcorn, they were allowed entry. Once confronted with the creature, Redcorn went to work. Now, since Redcorn was acting as a Patron, I was playing him during the session rather than his usual player. I allowed a roll under his wisdom score to have some idea of how to approach it which succeeded, so he went through a series of detection spells before determining that the manticore spikes were the cause of the corruption and were exceedingly evil.

I made a scene out of him casting dispel evil which I am prone to do with big caster types, most notably the Bishop of Bellport Dante Relos who brained a guy during an exorcism. Several of the stingers shattered but one remained which Redcorn snatched out while the griffon was dazed. Aquilor thanked them for their efforts and agreed to move his aerie to Redcorn’s domain once a suitable lair was built. Redcorn put the stinger in his pocket.

The party bounced back to Millon with no interesting encounters, where the town’s lord met them and paid them his bounty for two lairs secured. Turned out it was a pretty solid haul including some magic items. The session ended there, crumbs still on the PC’s lips from Martha’s bakery.

Musings:

It was a fun session with a big payoff. I worry if I’m too gentle sometimes, but I try to play the reaction rolls as straight as I can. The frost giants could have been hostile, as could the hippogriffs and griffons. Sometimes it shakes out that way and I’m glad they got a win. There’s an asterisk by the reward, though.

 

Session 56: Of Course the Truck Can Swim

Session 56: Of Course the Truck Can Swim

11/26/23-12/4/23, rest 12/5, active 12/6

PC: Alari, Zektel, Brumdor, Cracaryn

Hench: Elizabete, Mel, Demeko, Kushima

#ACKS

The party showed up without much planning so for the first bit of the session I ate snacks and listened to them go back and forth on what they wanted to do. They settled on a series of treasure maps advertised by one player’s two separate name-level PCs for various rates of return.

Part of this deal was the loan of a deuce and a half military grade truck that the machinist Bigtoe had developed for another Patron. When discussing what route the truck would take to the action, someone mentioned carrying it on a ship up river. I informed them that that wasn’t gonna be an option just before Bigtoe’s player told us the truck has a swim speed. Of course it has a swim speed. I missed that when approving the schematic however long ago which is one of the reasons my instinct is to tell players no. Every time, all the time. I’ve done well fighting that off because I think it makes for poor DMing but sometimes I find myself faced with something I probably should have said no to.

Anyway, the truck and an escort were going to meet the party in Northbridge to carry on while the party advanced at a faster rate to find Redcorn and pick up additional quests. This felt very MMO to me where they attempted to stack hooks from various sources based on location and efficiency. It’s smart use of the resources and time but I think something is lost a little in the execution of it.

Alari bought another bunch of donuts in Millon and made a joke about being the first fat elf which is now canon. Redcorn offered them some portion of a treasure map and a kicker if they’d take his first level cleric follower with them to get him some experience. With Cleric_01 in tow, the group left along the newly constructed Holy Road towards Newbridge.

Travel was pretty uneventful for most of the session. They got through Newbridge and across the river towards the first of their maps. Some kobolds were by a river and the critters were able to evade the party when confronted. Then they found a hippogriff lair in a storm-devastated copse of trees. Their map indicated that this X was the spot but hippogriffs are pretty mean and tough. The party bounced to go have daddy Redcorn solve the problem for them.

When it comes to searching for treasure maps, I usually roll to see what lairs are in the hex then randomly determine which lair has the map. Sometimes I do something weird but in general, the map leads to a lair. I think some DMs treat the map as unguarded or hidden, with the travel to get there counting as the adventure. That could be cool, but I haven’t done that yet.

While in Newbridge and waiting on reinforcements, the group was approached by a “Mr. Taylor”, a well-dressed fellow who offered them a bit of cash if they could orchestrate something bad happening to a heavy trebuchet that was purchased recently in Bellport. The group was curious but not overly moved to act until Redcorn arrived and offered them even more. This moved the needle and got added to their MMO quest log.

The high level cleric escorted the party back to the hippogriff lair, where he attempted to convince the creatures to join his weird menagerie situation in his domain at Millon. They were standoffish and agreed to speak with him only if they were provided with food for their entire nest of 10 hippogriffs. That’s a lot of food. Various PC level plans were tossed about, all framed around apparently delivering this food IMMEDIATELY. Buying some cows in the nearby town was OFF THE TABLE. 

They spent the day hunting and eventually got a sufficient amount of deer, goats, and elk to bribe their way into the hippogriffs’ good graces. Redcorn was able to strike a deal and one day they’ll move over to his spot. In the meantime, the party was stymied because the treasure map led to the lair’s loot and the creatures weren’t giving it up. Fortunately, Redcorn paid them for the location of the lair and they returned to Newbridge.

Next on the list was to do a little vandalism. They left Cleric_01at the house because they were uncertain how devious they would need to be. The group’s thief henchman was able to track down the location of the warehouse but not much else on it, so they did a little live scouting. The guards on the place were alerted but the thief was able to escape. The group planned while rolls were made to see how the guards would respond.

This was an active Patron player’s location. I used his logs to determine what forces were available for security and who the leader might be. I knew how the response would go and when the PCs showed up after purchasing spell casts and such, we were ready. 

The group had had invisibility 10’ radius cast on them, which took a little while to find a mage who wouldn’t ask questions about why they needed it. They approached the place and found it much more heavily guarded and alert than before, with many soldiers and some armored war dogs and hunting dogs sniffing about. They noped out and looked around the building, finding a smaller door in the rear that I rolled randomly for which was less heavily guarded. They waited until dark and ambushed the rearguard, achieving surprise and completely overcoming them before an alarm could be raised. 

Rolls for discovery went their way and they made entry, absolutely coating the trebuchet that was stored within in military oil. By the time the dogs outside smelled the smoke, the group was out and running. I rolled for the leader to attempt pursuit or recovery of property and it came up property so they tried to put the fire out.

The PCs collected their payout at a counting house in the city then fled to Millon, where they got paid again by Redcorn and ended the session.

Musings:

This was a great example of how important logs are for Patron players that do not get input during session play. The owner of the trebuchet is fastidious with his logs, but there are a lot since he has quite a few irons in the fire. It took me a while to find what I needed but using his details and randomizing the blank spots got us an interesting encounter with implications immediately and for the near future.

The rest of the session was pretty standard. We started a bit late but the group pulled in a solid payday and no one died. It was mentioned that one of the players has yet to experience significant combat at the table. Every session that he’s present for is a city session or sneaky session or something. Interesting, maybe he’ll be here for the next dungeon delve.

 

On RIFTS

Jeffro Johnson (@johnsonjeffro) started talking about RIFTS from Palladium Games on Xitter a few months ago, examining what was exciting about the system, attempting to solo play within it, and hyping the game up in general. He gets REALLY excited about a thing from time to time and when he does, his energy is pretty contagious. This led to JD Sauvage (@jdsauvage), a talented writer and gamer, to start lore posting with tidbits about the different factions in RIFTS and how he perceived them with tons of influence from video games, anime, and 80s cartoons.

I watched this with some trepidation. I want to play in all the games with all the bros. This spreads me pretty thin through the week and at any given time I'm active in 4-6 games. I didn't really want to get into another one but they were making it sound so COOL. When JD started actively recruiting for session play, I resisted. When the #Riftsbros started feeding it, I resisted. When it actually looked like there were going to be sessions, I couldn't help it. I had to at least see what was going on.

I downloaded some books and rolled up a character. This took a while. There are a ton of skills to choose from and many that modify other abilities. One of JD's posted factions was from Fallout which I've never played, but it sounded cool. I ended up with Captain Jim Hook of the Order of Steel. Captain Hook was the obvious name when my random black market item was a cage of fairies (Tinkerbells). We hammered out what the Order was actually like in-world and JD dropped a starter hook for my PC to chase. I was in the game.

JD is a "yes, and" type of DM. If your idea is cool and he can riff off of it, then he's going to say yes and add to it. This leads to an amazing always-on atmosphere with the DM generating hooks and running small ops with various players throughout the week that lead up to the sessions where someone puts forth an idea for something to be tackled as a group. This is where it got rough for me to watch as a player and I couldn't even imagine DMing. Huge props to the man for keeping his head straight.

There are no procedures to randomly generate anything. Everything has to be handcrafted for the session or event, or some Frankenstein'ing of systems has to happen to give you some tools to work with. JD went with the latter, stealing whatever he could from other systems to give him something to work with in terms of generating within the world to actually interact with. 

Furthermore, the combat mechanics are clunky. It took us a long time to adjudicate relatively simple combats early on. Even with adjustments made and more experience with the system, combats just take forever due to how much rolling has to happen to fire, dodge, parry, multiple attacks per entity, etc. Add in a large party with many henchmen and it's a drag.

Finally, the XP system is subjective, which I absolutely hate. I prefer a tangible value per GP earned, or monster killed, or idk, something. But the advancement is contingent on several subjective criteria like how tough you think a monster was or how smart you think your idea was. It's a terrible mechanic mitigated only by JD's open-handed DMing style. I can only imagine the frustration players would experience begging for xp with a more control-freak style DM.

We had a lot of fun generating our different factions and getting into the setting. We ended up with an Adeptus Mechanicus wannabe, Spuds McKenzie of classic beer commercial fame, a Veritech pilot, an Astartes wannabe, a psyker sekrit agent man, a few spec ops dudes, a dwarven ranger, and I'm sure I'm forgetting others. There were a lot of us. 

It was a powerful party with a lot of resources at our disposal which made our success rate pretty stellar. It was also an insane mix of different power levels and source material that felt like playing with your action figures as a kid. GI Joe riding the TRex to stomp out the Lego base vibes.

We led a task force to neutralize bug alien hives, we nuked a demon tree with mouths by delivering the payload inside, we rescued a princess from vampires, and several other wild schemes. What became apparent in a high tech setting over the classic medieval fantasy setting is that with time to recon, plan an op, and acquire resources, most tasks or objectives become essentially trivial. We had all the toys and the dudes in our group knew how to use them.

I've really enjoyed the deviation from the standard fantasy setting, despite my first love always lying that way. I think I've gotten everything I wanted to out of RIFTS and can't appreciate enough the group of amazing players that I've gotten to game with. I learn something new every day from them and that's a blessing for sure. I wouldn't play RIFTS again unless I got caught up in another swell of enthusiasm from the bros. It requires too much DM fiat and has too few tools to support him.