Help Help I'm Being Subverted!

Winter hardly touches the depths of the Dreadwood, where my team and I continue to tame the wilderness in the name of Pelor and under orders of my commanding officer Knight Captain Dawes. I have much to report and will strive for brevity and concision.

Fr. Cassian, June, Zimon, and I intended to continue expanding our reach in the region, beginning with the territory immediately surrounding our fortress. Refurbishment is well under way, to be completed by month's end, but no peasants will stay on if monsters stalk nearby. I hired a surveyor to appraise the land and assess it's capacity for lairs.

We received a message at our villa from a dwarven captain named Nemo who wanted to discuss one of our recent acquisitions. The runner was a cheeky sort who inexplicably scoffed at our offer to meet the captain at the finest restaurant in town. Regardless, that was where we chose to meet and Nemo could show or not at his leisure.

The dwarf was carried in with buckets of water on his feet, having sworn an oath to never touch dry land again. He takes his seafaring life seriously. He made a very generous offer to trade dwarven contraptions for the hammer we had recovered from the hags, but we were uncomfortable with the nature of the strange things. He offered a less generous but fair price to buy it right out, which we accepted and sent him on his way.

A faction following an unfamiliar heathen faith had reached out looking for the aid of a party much like ours, but our attention was focused on securing our domain. Fr. Cassian responded to this Patrick of Sirlios fellow, a heathen priest I suspect, with magical prayer and through similar means we were encouraged to visit a port town to the south called Bastia for more detail on the mission. This is the second mention of the place we've had in the past weeks. I am intrigued by the opportunity to thwart evil and we will pursue it when able.

Upon returning to the keep, our surveyor located a welcome surprise nearby, an old graveyard and monument to past battle. It bore a consecrated, if overgrown and filthy, altar to Pelor which protected the brave men buried nearby from reanimation or worse. Fr. Cassian intends to take over as custodian of the holy grounds.

Zimon was keen to press the red button beneath the elven temple we had visited some months back. We set off for what we expected to be a quick delve into a mostly cleared dungeon. We were mistaken.

A candlelit creature called from the darkness within birthday wishes to Zimon (Happy Birthday brother), marking this as the second time we'd been inside this dungeon on someone's birthday. I unfurled my flail and prepared to smite the thing since the last time this happened it was goblins who threw the cake in June's face and then tried to kill us.

What emerged from the shadows was none other than Boblin the goblin, who I had slain on our previous delve here. His rightfully executed sentence had apparently been commuted by strange time dilation, interdimensional travel, and interference from the heathen deity Sirlios. His journal indicated that he was a human wizard turned goblin by the Scarlet Brotherhood, which did not explain his complicity in the previous goblin battle against us and did not absolve him of behaving as a goblin during same.

I relinquished the dialogue to Fr. Cassian as the more temperate and reasoned communicator, my answer to goblins being prompt extermination. What followed was a long conversation I didn't quite understand and excuses for why the goblin was oppressed and should be forgiven. Weak foolishness, but Fr. Cassian allowed the thing to accompany us to the room containing the button, which the goblin claimed no prior knowledge of.

Before Zimon pressed the button, the deceitful creature indicated by flinching that he did in fact have some knowledge of what might happen, but it was too late to stop our bounty hunter. The room took on a strange aspect before snapping back to itself and Zimon began screaming in pain. June grabbed the goblin while I throttled Zimon to calm him.

He had seen Sirlios, or met it, or something? Many different paths and dimensions and possibilities and my head hurts just recalling it for the report. Ultimately, something strange is going on. The heathens in Bastia may know more. Fr. Cassian opted to free the goblin from the dungeon. My exasperation cannot be put to parchment.

Once we exited into the forest above, Zimon's long lost horse Springer floated down from the sun and materialized before him, clearly a blessing from Pelor to ease his troubles from his experience with the... whatever happened to him. Praise be. Apparently the creature is supernatural and can fly. This provides us with welcome tactical and logistical flexibility.

Back at the keep, Fr. Cassian attempted to remove Boblin's curse, which succeeded so well that Pelor's hand reached out, this time to bless the blighted creature. Robert the Wizard has stayed on at the keep in some unknown capacity? I don't trust him, but I cannot deny the word of Fr. Cassian that he is touched by our Lord of Light and Flame. Robert told us of the Scarlet Brotherhood cabal that cursed him and roughly where he thought they were. They've made it onto our list of problems to solve.

Our next task was to eliminate a lair of giant lizards nearby. We had a map that would lead us there and the will to get it done so we set off. We found some moss that was apparently quite valuable when used in potion brewing. Zimon retrieved a detail from the fort to help tote the material back.

A settlement of barbarians was discovered by air. Zimon spoke to their leader Crazy Wolf and left on good terms. We found the lizards fairly easily and, using a potion, Zimon was able to talk to them and bribe them with food to leave the area, at least temporarily. We found what little treasure there was and returned to the keep.

I intend to begin the construction of a road to Bonevale soon. Sanji and Fr. Cassian intend to build here locally, but we have not hammered out the details yet. Sirlios and the Scarlet Brotherhood are both looming. We will engage with them as soon as possible and report our findings. Until then, may Pelor bless you and hold you in the Dawn's warmth.

Knight Sentinel Percival
Forward Operating Base Horizon

Musings:

We had a lot going on this session, with a lot of exposition from the DM and sekrit garage time for Zimon. We failed to engage with the DM's self-insertion of dwarven automation, opting for a cash payout instead. He loves the stuff but our group of players isn't there. Yet anyway, who knows. I imagine our pirates would be more open to it, if they had the resources this group does. 

We had no choice but to engage with the "but no really the goblin's a good guy" thread which I thought we put to bed the first time. Two different timelines cross-pollinating could get messy. It's tying into the Sirlios stuff and drawing this party into that sphere a bit. Our other party has had all the interaction on that side of things so far and it's clearly an important world event. I think as players we're mostly just confused. We'll learn more as we dig deeper into it and hopefully fix it before it gets out of hand. This party is actually heroic and will care. Big world events might be wasted on the lolpirates so it's good to have the good guys involved.

I'm enjoying the potential we have in the domain building side of the game. The random encounter of the barbarian village is a prime example of how interesting opportunities emerge during play. How does the Crusader (cleric) Cassian deal with faithless heathens next door? Can he convert them and roll them into our growing domain? Do they follow some heathen offensive gods of their own? It'll be fun to play out.

We've pulled off of the Oligarchy idea, as most of our players don't really care about domain management. I'm gonna run the primary domain and Sanji may develop his own nearby. The others will pursue their own interests within that framework with divine power and syndicates and whatever else they get up to.

We're having a lot of fun with this team right now and will probably keep at it for another session or two before time jail gets us. The pirates are selling off goods and likely drinking away the profits, you know, as pirates do. They can wait a while longer.

We need a party name. Team B is just not it. Holy Rollers has been floated, which would give us the Jolly Rogers as the pirate team and the Holy Rollers as the Pelor team. Could be worse? Also need a name for the domain. Calling it FOB Horizon right now, but as it evolves it'll have to get a more permanent designation.

 

So Anyways, We Started Blasting

I am certain that this report on the efforts to bring Pelor's light to the heathen frontier West of Bonevale will find Knight Captain Dawes in good health and spirits.

I, Knight Guardian Percival, have led my team to establish a forward operating base at the ruined elven keep. Laborers toil to restore the keep to it's former glory while our principal members expand our hold in the area. There was a brief interruption in productivity due to an unsuccessful attempt by dopplegangers to infiltrate our ranks. 

June, Zimon, Sanji, and I set forth to explore the immediate surroundings. We had encountered several points of interest nearby and were confident that we could free the area from any remaining evil on this expedition. Our search quickly revealed an idyllic meadow featuring a cottage, bleating goat, and freshly baked blueberry pie wafting a tantalizing aroma in our direction. I had to snatch Sanji's collar before he ran forward to grab the pastry.

Evil stalks the land in many forms, often tempting the unwary to their dooms either spiritually or physically. In the darkest, most dangerous forest in the land, one must be suspicious of even the most innocent-seeming interactions. This was no different and we retreated to consider our options.

Suspicion was not enough to justify immediate violence. Tales of witches and faeries using illusion to lure travelers were many and varied, but if this was just some innocent farmer or forester's home we couldn't just kick the door in. I crept forward to get eyes on the scene again and prayed for Pelor's holy vision to show me any evil within. Our Lord of Light never fails to guide me and this time was no different, revealing several Chaotic auras floating within.

Armed with this knowledge, our rules of engagement were determined. Chivalry is only owed the chivalrous. No quarter to Chaos. Sanji and his henchman established an ideal line of fire for his magical staff while the rest of us positioned to engage any enemies that might show themselves. I covered our mage's firing position which would turn out to cost us dearly.

Sanji launched two fireballs in rapid succession into the cottage, the second after hearing some casting within. There was some sort of witch or sorcerer aiming to retaliate. Our first tactical error was not applying as much firepower into the situation as we had. Sanji let off to conserve ammunition which gave the occupants time to recover while the rest of us advanced on the building.

A magical column of fire erupted around the mage's position, knocking him out of the fight effectively as he retreated for cover. Zimon was first in the building to confront the enemy, a deceptively beautiful young woman. The fireballs had vaporized most of the furnishings, leaving some smoke but no massive house fire to drive her out. I entered in shortly thereafter and we battled the clearly monstrous woman, who through dark magics repelled some of our attacks and was more stout than any human had a right to be.

She cursed Zimon with black lightning that flowed from her fingers, shriveling his legs and manifesting the "rickets" disease that allegedly plagues the southern ports. She also struck him down with supernatural strength following up to cave in the skull of Sanji's henchman. June and I were able to finish her off before any further damage was done.

As we investigated the aftermath, we realized these were not minor fae or witches, but hags, some of the most dangerous monsters to roam the dark places of the Oerth. Our reticence to apply every bit of firepower that we could as fast as we could nearly cost us as the surviving one had time to heal and buff herself with protective magics. If all three of the present ones had done the same, I would not be writing this report, but through Pelor's grace and wisdom we were able to overcome. Such formidable monsters stash quite a bit of treasure over their years, which we liberated and retreated with back to civilization. 

A mercenary lieutenant in command of a platoon of longbowmen stopped us en route and sought employment. Due to the notoriously disloyal nature of mercenary officers, I suggested that he swear oaths to Law and the Light of Pelor before joining my service. He declined, as he did Sanji's attempt to recruit him as a more permanent henchman. LT Leon valued his independence apparently and we wished him luck and no ill will on his travels.

Fr Cassian was able to interrupt his meditations to cure Zimon's rickets and we spent some time shopping in Bonevale which is of no consequence to the honorable and busy Knight Captain Dawes.

Under the Light of Pelor and in the warmth of his embrace,

Knight Guardian Percival, Bonevale

Musings:

Well, we were nearly all killed. Hags are no joke.

It was a weird session in that mental energy wasn't there across the board. DM missed some things and so did I, which I feel is a failing on my part as the more experienced player/DM at the table. The mistakes this time went pretty much all in our favor so the very good score feels like it should have an asterisk by it.

The beginning of the encounter with the hags was TOTM, so some leniency was given with positioning and ranges of spells (Discern Evil). There was also a liberal interpretation of the Discern Evil which, while beneficial to me, I think is too generous. It's been acting as somewhat of xray vision, but I believe I should have solid line of sight to a target to see any aura about it. We weren't given descriptions of any occupants of the building so in hindsight I think my information about Chaotic entities within was too favorable. I will try to remember that going forward and police myself.

ACKS encourages initiative and surprise rolls per entity involved unless there are many of the same types of monsters. DM rolled surprise for the hags as a single unit. Due the their potency, he lamented that after the fact. They should have been individual rolls that likely would have resulted in us not getting our early fireballs off.

So what to do about it as a DM? Well, there is precedent in Uncle Gary's AD&D that treasure and xp can and should be modified by the ease in which it is acquired. A clever plan to overcome daunting odds is one thing, beating up on goblins for their lunch money at 5th level is another. It doesn't say much in the way of errors in play resulting in unlikely outcomes. ACKS also isn't AD&D, but when in doubt, you can't go far wrong by referring to AD&D for guidance.

I suppose if I was in his shoes, I could justify modifying the treasure a bit, since we began to realize some of our mistakes during the fight. Historically, though, I probably wouldn't have, so it's really just speculation about possibilities. I've made the same kinds of errors without adjustment in the past. It really depends on the situation, your mileage may vary, make a judgement call in the moment, etc etc etc. The key is don't make the same mistakes twice and treat every encounter as its own thing. You can't justify punitively adjusting a future encounter because the last one went sideways but you can speak to past experience and avoid the same pits.

We are well on our way to establishing a domain here. We intend to rule by Oligarchy, which are optional rules in the JJ to "get along gang" our domain growth. It's less efficient but should still be fun. It treats the "domain ruler" as its own entity with relevant domain management stats averaged from the Oligarchs. I've never used the rules so I'm excited to try them out. It'll let us pool resources to more quickly build something meaningful.

Beeeeees!!!11!!1

From the journal of Namor, Captain of The Trident:

Feb 2: Hired some men in Monmurg, set them to training with Bjorn as elite marines. Someday soon we're gonna go a-Viking. Need to find a river to terrorize.

Met a sailor called The Bandit on the docks, captains a black ship with strange mechanical additions. Said he bought them off of an "iron whale", which we've heard many rumors of cruising around the area. Interesting, but when pressed for pricing it sounded extravagant. Maybe another time.

Set sail for Bastia with the intent to follow up on Soto's mission to kill a Redcap. We had our three war galleys and one of the sailing ships. Admiral Captain Morgan, Usopp, Farland, Vee, Zorro, Rogar, and I made up the primary crew.

Six merchant ships lightly armed looked like a promising catch. We suggested that they halt, pay a 25% tax, and no one would get hurt. They chose violence and we obliged, easily capturing two of the vessels. They flew a flag from far off Oberholt and none of us cared at all. The ones that escaped will spread our name and likely warn others. We'll have to consider that going forward.

During the battle Usopp boldly boarded and struck at the enemy captain only to be poisoned and killed. We chalked it up to the chaos of battle at the time. Vee the venturer displayed some uncharacteristic divine healing ability and helped the assassin back to life, but when prompted for additional healing attached a price tag to it. There was some strife between the two.

We returned to Monmurg with our prizes and booty. Usopp paid locals for magical healing and rested, and Farland mastered the quarters.

Feb 5: Set sail for Bastia again. This time we arrived without further complication. Soto's man Hollander gave us directions to the Redcap lair and we planned our away party.

Usopp's ship The Red Dragon had developed an advertising problem during the recent overhaul. One side was labeled Usopp in giant red letters, while the other said Usopp SUCKS. How he didn't catch it before leaving Monmurg is beyond me, but he was pretty sour with the crew who was laughing about it and being generally disrespectful. He put forth an ultimatum that it should be cleaned and other provisions for them before we returned from faerie hunting, or there would be hell to pay.

Feb 6: Left out for the mission, most of a day's walk inland. We found it easily enough, a strange faerie cottage of overgrown thorny foliage that dripped blood. I tracked around and found fresh tracks headed away from the place. We took that to mean he'd be coming back so we set an ambush, painstakingly concealing ourselves in the nearby terrain and covering our tracks.

Stakeouts are boring, but necessary. Some wild horses trotted by and some centaurs trailing them. Otherwise idle time crouched in the woodlands. Easy for me but restless for some I'm sure.

Feb 7: Overnight we were attacked by killer bees. After a short but costly battle, Vee the venturer and Farland's dog were killed. This mission was turning out to be a right pain in the ass. Zorro and I went to work cleaning up the mess and covering our tracks, setting our ambush again.

Feb 8: Morning came and the Redcap hollered from inside the little cottage. He'd either been in there the whole time or snuck back in some secret way. In any event, he didn't want the smoke. Easy enough, neither did we at this point. He offered to leave if he could take some trinkets with him, we told him nah leave it all or die. I mean, we're pirates?

Redcaps are extremely fast, apparently. He packed up and zipped out the front door, sprinting at supernatural speed out of bow range before we could react. So much for days of ambush. We searched his little weird cottage and found a tree cultivated to drink and disperse blood in little taps around the place. Pulled some copper too which was apparently too heavy for him to take with him before burning the place down.

I dug up Vee and we headed back to Bastia, mission complete but unsatisfied to say the least. There was an amazing super awesome glowing rock on the side of the road that I picked up and it definitely isn't cursed or going to cause me problems later. No, you can't touch it, but I'll show it to anyone and everyone.

Usopp's crew had followed the letter of the ultimatum but not the spirit, still laughing at him and taking shots at him. I suspect he's going to establish order severely, but his boat his problem.

Hollander paid us for the mission and we set an appointment to talk to Soto. We think he's an experienced Crusader that might be able to help Vee. I think Vee is touched by Soto's weird god Serlios so he'll probably help him. If not, maybe my rock will. It's pretty awesome.

Musings: I like the journal format of these reports, but the value in session reports as a practice is as more than a record of events. I'll return to offering some commentary on how the game is running going forward.

Numerical advantage in naval combat is different than I'm accustomed to. If they're just going to split and run, then we need the numbers to account for each ship or they just get away. More effort could have been made to hunt them down, but not like you can track on the ocean and we were laden with slower sailing ships and loot. Naval stuff is definitely a blind spot for me so these are good opportunities to learn.

The PVP conversation came up again this session with one PC interfering with another in a funny but frustrating way. We'll see if the repercussion is as clever. I don't care one way or the other because this party is a group of shithead pirates and petty grievances seem perfectly on role. If our other party of Lawful holy rollers start merkin' each other I'll have more to say.

The Killer Bee fight was an interesting case. They only have 60' "vision" and it's mechanoreception. The PCs were sleeping and hidden in bushes. DM had some misgivings about how the fight was resolved, questioning whether the bees would execute sleeping foes or auto-hit against same. I suggested it's likely the bees couldn't have even detected the PCs, particularly since several were over 60' from each other, and they were likely not intelligent enough to coup-de-grace. They're just buzzy and angry bugs. Ultimately I felt the resolution was fine. If any mistakes were made, they were made both for and against the PCs, but it highlights a scenario with some unusual variables that can be hard to track in real time.

The Redcap encounter was icing on the frustration cake. First the ship stickup complication (quick tax turned into long battle), then the bees (RIP Vee), then the faerie just running away. In hindsight, during negotiations we should have declared held actions so when the little bastard showed himself we'd at least have a shot to respond. He wouldn't have gotten a free run which for such a fast creature is basically free evasion. Shoulda cleared the house too, but the bleeding thorns looked like a trap so we decided to wait based on the tracking.

We need a spellcaster. Glaring hole in our capability during sessions to heal or investigate weird things (cursed rock, faerie plant cultivation) or any number of other things that we just power through as thieves and murderers. Maybe it's time to lift my embargo on playing casters. We'll find out if Namor dies.