New Game On

"Chain Gang" by Sam Cooke came on the car stereo. It inspired a chain gang game.

The motorway sign read 'Walmsley Road' so Walmsley entered Trollworld.

I had in mind a game of attrition. We rolled Walmsley up with 8 rolls of 3d6, the attributes in strict order.

The dice had a clearer plan that I did - triples came up for CON and he emerged as a wizard who is a CON specialist.

With a rating of 24, the automatic doubles rule made L5 SRs easy. He casr no spells and manned up to every brutality the guards and the warden served up. He won money from inmates taking punches from big dudes.

I think an escape is on the cards...but maybe the dice will determine otherwise.

I Played D&D at the Weekend

I went to a D&D day at Auckland university with Charlie on Saturday - my character got killed and resurrected in all 3 sessions, as did the whole group. It was good to meet new people and I appreciated the friendliness and the effort put in but...

...there was zero role-playing, mechanical dice rolling and it had about as much to do with T&T-style play as Monopoly!

Then I found this on Google:http://angrydm.com/2014/08/three-shocking-things-you-wont-believe-about-dd-combat/

Not just me then.

I agree very much with the writer in not regarding combat as a separate game and not liking it to be so formulaic and stuck.

It seems to me that 'initiative' is the problem - and what a misnomer :)

The Trollgod has Fallen to Pieces!

Yesterday my new set of miniatures arrived - complete with a Trollgod in four pieces! Time for a Glue You spell.

Darcy has done a great job again as you can see in the photos below...

You can also see the character sheet for my fun-loving dwarf warrior, Meaty Mutt.

There two are Souza Fortescue, dwarf wizard, and House Elf, human wizard. Much written about and featured in the Deluxe T&T rulebook, last seen skiiing...

Random characters from the streets of Auckland.

Man having problems with broken glass.

A submerged countryside my way after a wet summer and a very wet start to autumn.

The Eye of the Kobra

Here's the gist of a T&T game I ran for 7 (mainly D&D) players on Sunday...

The Eye of the Kobra

The Kobratov family’s ancestral estate has lain in ruins for many years. Family members hire the pcs to journey there from Nesstlehaven to search for a diamond they believe has never been removed from their lands which will restore the family to greatness.

The two brothers, Dimitri and Sergei, and their two sisters, Irina and Katerina, buy the pcs tickets on the barge, the Rock Bottom, run by the dwarven captain, Dugmore Graves (L4, +36 adds). Some pcs are hired by one sibling, some by another, all for a handsome fee, trebled for success. The pcs are provided with amethyst amulets which allow communication with the Kobratovs – but it is the Kobratovs who control the amulets and who can see through them.

The journey through the underground canals is some 7000 miles and should take 45 days. The one-way ticket price is 1000 GPs. The contract price per pc varies according to who hired them but is in the range 500-1000 with board thrown in, with the expectation that up to 2 weeks searching of the ruins is part of the agreement.

Graves has mate, Mason Dixie (L2, +12 adds), to help him run the barge. Dixie is a gemcutter and Graves trades in gems as well as carrying passengers (the fare is GPs one way). Dixie is mute. The other crew member is Gnarla Root (L2, +1 adds), an elderly woman who acts as cook and cleaner. She is reputed to know a range of spells but will be very slow to warm to the pcs.

Graves has been warned of trouble on this trip, for he has a particularly valubale diamond he has transporting to the Lord of faraway Portree. For this reason, he has hired two minotaurs as extra secuirty, one named Hornpipe (L3, +30 adds), the other Bullwhip (L3, +30 adds), as well as their controller, a leprechaun called Biddlecombe (L2, +20 adds).

The truth if this voyage is a little different. The Eye of the Kobra contains the spirit of the first Kobratov, Uri, who is quite mad and who can manifest in semi-physical form. The Eye has been in the possession of the family matriarch, Olga, who has hired Graves to take it home to the ancestral estate. She believes once there, Uri will regain sanity and solidity and will join with her in forging a realm to surpass Portree itself.

Her children have learned of her plan. They either wish to take control of the Eye and Uri themsleves or see it destroyed or made safe.

Uri has managed to separate from the Eye – although – he cannot go far from it - but has kept this from Olga. In fact, the Eye can be used to control him. Graves has realised some of this and has driven Uri into the very bottom of his boat but the strain has told. Finally, fearing Uri is becoming too strong, he has given the diamond to Dixie to hide amongst all the others he is working on, thinking it best to prevent Uri from taking possession of the Eye himself.

All this has happened before the Rock Bottom leaves Nesstlehaven.

Episodes

1. The mission – being hired in the Crippled Sphynx Tavern by the half-uruk, Gratz Fulmer, receiving the amulets; each pc receives a contract from a particular Kobratov
2. Meeting the captain and seeing the boat
3. Attack by goblin archers from a bridge (need 13 to hit from bridge, 3d6 damage)
4. The captain falls into a coma at the tiller
5. The pcs find out about the Eye from Biddlecombe (who has limited telepathy) after 2 shivans attack (MR70), climbing onto the boat from the wate
6. The traps set in the captain's quarters – gas, darts and a ferrethog (MR30) under the bed
7. Losing control of the boat - the rapids (flat but fast and dotted with dangerous rocks)
8. The amulets speak
9. The race for the diamond as Uri stalks the Rock Bottom – WIZ SRs to use Eye to control Uri, CON SRs to survive his touch, INT/CHR SRs to survive his mad wails and hypnotising eyes, LK SRs to strike him while partially solid

Gm Games on the Go

Not sure I can keep a grip on what is happening all around me...

1 -Over at Castle Orinthos, the Duck Wizard is trying to restore his castle and needs to journey to the Jungles of Phantog with his trusty, reexcavated living statue servant, Ronina. After two big run ins with bands of trolls, they are after the very rare chickenite which is reputed to be good for restoration masonry.

2- Leaving the town of Blaghas, the dwarf Maxwell (a mayo fanatic), the second rate alchemist Omuga and the former-L9 wizard-now-talking-Scooby Doo-dog Pawbone are on the trail of Pawbone's cyclops friend, Jawbone. Once again chickenite is in the mix. They have just left the town of Roundsquare with another former-wizard-now-creature, Slowcoach the Snail - who has been enlarged and whose tardis-like shell they are now travelling in. Despite several almost-moments, they never quite entered the annual bowling contest in Roundsquare, despite taking out mutant skinheads, a clackerman et al...

3 - Qadouche - with Studley now king and Runey prince, things would be looking good but there's always a but... van Persie still can't get it together as the new ponifex and has just destroyed the Staff of Rains and the old pontifex at the small town of Bodrun. They are unpopular in Qadouche because of the ongoing drought and are off to the Pyramid of Kafacaca to find the next pontifex down the time chain - but they find a cult of hermits who have all taken his name. Confusing!

4 - Vulgaria - out of the Palace of the Silver Princess with the precious ruby, My lady's Heart, the group are now faced with a take-ever by Lady Dognes of Gulluvia who has hired an army of mercenary ogres. With the Bear Cult in the background, Colin, Conan, Aldeross, Big Hobbie and Dominia need to find the means of stopping Dognes and her ogres.

5 - Deep Space 9 crossover: Garrick flies through a Higgs-Boson field to escape a Dominion ambush and finds himself stranded without technology in a massive forest before befriending a simple jelleton family.

6 - 50 years into the future, just before First Contact: smuggler running forbidden goods through the US/Mexico forcefield wife gets entangled with Government scientist, trying to leak the news of alien threat to the outside world, a fastfood ordinary joe - and then dicovers his lovely Mexican wife has been transferring 90% of his income to her extended family.

And there are more... but I won't remember them until they just resurface of their own volition :)

Caves of Nerja - artwork finished

Yay! Addicted to writing solo paragraphs instead of watching YouTube or being on Facebook so I've started the next one - a rollicking pirate adventure (more later).

Here's a recent illo for Caves:

Games Galore

I've been quiet since I got back from Thailand because I've ust been running too many games! Is this a bad thing? Can't be, can it :)

Here's some artwork doodled recently by a player as the game went along. Pretty cool...