Random Blog Post Topic - Four Demons

A short while back The Rusty Battle Axe posted another random blog post topic generator, and this one was so damn inventive that I vowed to roll and respond honestly this time.

So here goes.  The rolls:

Initial d10 roll = 1 :  "Roll on Table 2 then on Table 4"
Table 2 roll 1d12 = 6 : "Four"
Table 4 roll 1d100 = 26 : "Demons"

Four Demons
Note that all these demons have the common "demon" abilities listed on p. 108 of the AEC, to wit:
Infravision (90')
Half damage from cold-based attacks
Half damage from electrical-based attacks
Half damage from fire-based attacks (all)
Half damage from gas-type attacks
Telepathy (allows all languages to be understood)

Gark, Demon Prince of Hobgoblins 
 # Encountered: 1 (unique)
Alignment: chaotic (evil)
Move: 120’ (40’)
AC: -3
HD: 99 hp (20 HD)
Attacks: 1 (special weapon)
Damage: 3d6 (+ special)
Save: F20
Morale: 10
Hoard Class: XVIII
XP:  10,250

Gark appears as a huge (9' tall) demonic hobgoblin wearing black chain mail and wielding one of his preferred weapons: his long sword or his morningstar.  Gark's Long Sword and Morningstar each inflict 3d6 damage per hit when wielded by him, and also have the following additional effects:

Gark's long sword - when struck by the sword, the target must save vs. magic or experience fear (as per the 4th Level MU spell, see AEC p. 62 or PH p. 76).

Gark's morningstar - when hit with the morningstar, a saving throw vs. magic must be made or the victim is confused (as per the 4th-level MU spell).

Gark can also Teleport without error at will.

[Note that Gark, Demon Prince of Hobgoblins, is very loosely based upon Yeenoghu, Demon Lord of Gnolls, described on p. 19 of the Monster Manual.  The "Demon" descriptions and stats in Goblinoid Games' Advanced Edition Companion (p. 108) were also incredibly helpful in statting Gark.]

Nazzeb
# Encountered: 1 (0)
Alignment: chaotic (evil)
Move: 90' (30')  Fly: 120’ (40’)
AC: 0
HD: 10
Attacks: 3 (2 claw, 1 bite)
Damage: 1d4 / 1d4 / 2d4
Save: F10
Morale: 10
Hoard Class: XVIII
XP: 3,100

The demon Nazzeb fancies eating manflesh, but is allergic to magical (or even magically inclined) beings.  Thus he prefers eating dwarves, non-magic-using humans, and halflings.  In exchange for being provided with dwarves to eat, Nazzeb sometimes grants loyal followers on our plane special physical powers.

Indeed, Nazzeb is a shape-shifter who can assume many forms in our dimension -- he can Polymorph Self (MU 4) at will.  No one knows for sure what his true form is (or if he even has one), but he most often assumes the shape of a Nalfeshnee (AEC p. 112).  Further at-will powers include fear (MU 4) and the ability to gate (50% chance of success) a vrock, hezrou, or glabrezu demon (determine randomly).  Nazzeb also has Limited Wish (MU 7) three times per day.


Note: These next two demons threatened to rip out my soul if I revealed their vital statistics publicly, so a short descriptive paragraph for each will have to suffice.



Slor, the Snake Demon 
Imagine Jubilex (AEC p. 111) but made out of snakes instead of slimes, oozes, and puddings.  That describes Slor, the Snake Demon, who non doubt lives in a snake-infested lair surrounded by demonic snakes of all descriptions.  I would probably stat Slor like a slightly weaker version of Jubilex, say, 9-10 HD instead of 21 HD -- but again, that is just supposition and you didn't hear it from me.

Gorbeezak, Demon of the Gates
This powerful, invisible demon is believed to haunt stable gates in order to to ambush and make trouble for planar travelers.  No physical description of Gorbeezak exists, because (a) it seems to be invisible most of the time, and (b) only one mortal has ever encountered Gorbeezak, and that mortal, Morag the Arch-Summoner, has lived in total secrecy for the past hundred years -- he may even be dead or residing permanently in another dimension for all anyone knows.  Further, even before his disappearance from human society, Morag was known to be quite insane, therefore his records concerning Gorbeezak should be treated with healthy skepticism.

No Session Last Night

Last night's was our first canceled session, due to one prior engagement, one illness, and one out-of-town trip.  So the party took a breather this week, I went to bed early after pulling a late-nighter Sunday night, and we will be back in the saddle and delving away again next week.

I'm In Love With My AEC

My hardbound copy of Daniel Proctor's Advanced Edition Companion arrived a couple of days ago, and while I have been too busy to post about it until now, I sure have been enjoying the hell out of it.  What follows will be more rave than review, but allow me enumerate why I think this is an important, must-have book:

First, as is typical of Goblinoid Games publications, the presentation is very clear and professional.  This renders the book extremely easy to use.  If I have a minor complaint on this front it is that there is no index -- I am a big index user -- but on the other hand, that may not really be necessary here since (I think) the book to some extent presumes an audience familiar with the organizational scheme of the Labyrinth Lord basic rules, which AEC emulates.  That is, generally speaking, both books begin with attributes and character classes, then money and equipment, then spells, then encounters and monsters, etc.  There are some minor differences, e.g., AEC puts "New Magic Items" before "New Monsters," but this is made clear on its Table of Contents and I haven't actually had any trouble finding what I wanted to in the AEC yet.

Oh, the monsters!  I suppose as a referee it is inevitable that I would be getting a lot more mileage out of the "Monsters" section, than, say, the "Character Classes" section. . . but wow, I really think the "New Monsters" section alone is practically worth the cover price of this book.  It basically gives us all the old Monster Manual classics -- the Beholder (er, Eye of Terror, which by the way is an excellent re-name), the Shambling Mound, the Xorn, the Remorhaz, and, of course, the demons, including Our Lord Orcus -- statted for OSR play.  On a purely practical level, from the referee's point of view, all the number-crunching that must have gone into this part of the AEC equals a major time savings to me, and I am grateful for its existence.  Maybe my desire to have other people do the number-crunching makes me a lazy referee, but if so, then the New Monsters section of the AEC -- and arguably the whole AEC -- is a great gift to lazy referees everywhere.

To top this off, the AEC includes a complete list of Labyrinth Lord monsters by HD, an incredibly useful tool for referees who want to see the best options for stocking a given dungeon level in an at-a-glance format.  Very useful indeed.

In truth, I haven't ventured much past the monsters and new spells yet -- I told you this wasn't going to be a full-blown review.  I look forward to inspecting the sections on old AD&D classes like druids and rangers very soon, but right now I am stuck on my beloved demons and their nefarious associates on the pages of the "New Monsters" section.  But in a way, this speaks to one of the great strengths of the AEC: its modularity.  The AEC embodies the quintessential spirit of the OSR precisely because it is intended to be used differently by every gamer who picks it up.  Along this line, allow me to close with a few words quoted from Dan Proctor's "Foreword" to the AEC:

[When] I think about the way my friends and I had always played the "advanced" [AD&D] rules it was essentially like the original classic game (i.e. Labyrinth Lord) with the added monsters, treasures, classes, and some other rules from first edition. So the goal in writing the Advanced Edition Companion (AEC) was to create an expansion of Labyrinth Lord that is a natural evolution (with compatibility) of advanced first edition but keeping the slick original game engine. [. . .]

This book presents the essential first edition rules, all as open game content, and combined with Labyrinth Lord there is a vast sum of open content available to everyone, forever.

That is an admirable achievement.  THANKS DAN for providing the old school community with this invaluable resource.

"Feat of . . ." For The Arandish Campaign?

Take a look at this post.  Does Ryan's level-based "Feat of . . ." system make the PCs too powerful?  Would it help if PCs only got one "Feat of . . . " every other level, say, the even-numbered levels?

I like this idea because I like the PCs to lean a bit toward the heroic fantasy side of things, to be a little larger than life, a bit more able to have an impact on fate and history than the average 0-Level peasant or shopkeeper.  But I do not want to overpower the PCs, either.  Hell, the PCs in my campaign already get to roll a d30 for any roll they want to once per session!  Why should they need to perform an amazing class-related feat once per level as well?

Any thoughts?

DM-Only Hardbacks

As I have recently commented, the Labyrinth Lord rules have been working out just wonderfully for my role-playing group so far.  I really couldn't be happier.  In fact, the only house-rule amendments I have felt compelled to make to Labyrinth Lord as writ are these two:

1.  I allow players to search for secret doors multiple times in one area.  

2.  I have a very generous character generation procedure, including allowing players to roll up six attribute rolls and order them as they wish.  This does give the players a bit more leeway to craft their own characters and it eradicates the random factor in character generation that James M. and others have blogged so eloquently about.  Note that I am generally pro-"risky" character generation (as in Traveller) and I probably wouldn't be so generous if I were refereeing a more "standard" (i.e., non-Arandish) campaign or adventure.  But given that much of the fun of adventuring in Ara (for me anyway) comes from playing the interesting new races (e.g., rodians) and classes (e.g., sword-clerics) specific to the setting, I wanted my players to have a wee bit more control so they could play those types if they chose to.  (It must have worked to some degree because we have two rodians in the current party.)

It says a lot that I have felt inclined to modify so little.  Further, it is a tribute to the comprehensibility and playability of the Labyrinth Lord rules system that my players are all picking up on the rules so quickly -- this is true even of those players who have had no prior RPG experience.

However, the players are so jazzed about the rules that they are all referring to the Labyrinth Lord rulebook a fair amount during play -- mostly to look up "to hit" charts and weapon ranges during combat, but probably also to "browse" the spell tables and other goodies as players are wont to do.  Thus I barely get my hands on my (paperback) print copy at all during an average session.  This is as it should be, for I sit at my computer desk during the bulk of session time, and refer to the art-free pdf of the LL rules when I need to look something up.  But I am an avowed lover of real, printed books, and it struck me a couple of weeks ago that I should have nice, hardbound copies of those key texts I will actually use, such as (obviously) the Labyrinth Lord Revised Edition rulebook.  So I ordered a hardbound copy of that book a couple weeks ago; it arrived here Saturday.

As a book lover, what a delight it is to have a nice, hardbound edition of Labyrinth Lord!  Furthermore, leafing through my hardbound copy of the LL rules Saturday afternoon, something really struck me: when you lay an open book down flat -- and when it is a hardback that easily remains open when laid down. . .

 

. . . then you can really see how the book's layout takes frequent advantage of the two-page spread.  Take, for example, the two pages of tables above.  (I have blocked out the original artwork for copyright protection purposes, though it's a shame because it really looks good.)  All the dungeon wandering monster tables and wilderness encounter tables are neatly grouped together.  So convenient and so aesthetically pleasing.

Or consider the "Cleric" pages above.  Again, all the descriptive text, tables, and illustrations having to do with a single character class spread out across two facing pages.  Very satisfying.

I know this must seem like really obvious stuff but what I'm marveling at here is that I did not really notice these finer nuances of the book's layout until I obtained it in hardback and could lie it flat.  I am so glad that I also ordered my Advanced Edition Companion in hardback.  I suppose Mutant Future will be next. . .

Anyway, these hardback editions are going to be my special, DM-only editions that I greedily covet on my side of the screen.  The players can continue to use my paperback copies while I fondle my new, glorious hardbacks.  (AEC please come soon!)

Arandish Campaign 2010 - Session 5

 

Carl is ready for adventure with his handful o' d30s!

We seem to be averaging 3-4 players per session lately, which is actually pretty damn ideal. . . on nights where it is only three PCs, like last session, hirelings get more involved (R.I.P. Porkins!) and the players have to be more cautious and/or selective about how they proceed through the dungeon.  On nights with four PCs, like last night, more carefree combat mayhem can ensue -- though not without some attendant deaths and near-deaths on the party's end.

Tonight's PCs -- Uncle Junkal (Bard-1), Innominus (Cleric-1), Hazel (Fighter-1), and Barbarella (Rodian Duellist-1) -- began the session in the chamber of a huge demonic idol.  Hazel and Barbarella climbed the idol with ropes, peeked inside its hollow "eyes," and found that there was a chamber within, including a ladder down to a level further below.  Noting that the dark orcs in this area apparently had not yet discovered this hidden chamber or ladder inside the idol, the party decided that it would be worthwhile to leave the idol be for now and instead revisit two of the previously unexplored chambers back the way they had come. 

First they came to a storeroom filled with a great many mundane pillaged goods.  The most noteworthy of these items were three barrels of oil, which the party used to fill many flasks and even one lidded stew pot sealed with melted beeswax!  This last was Barbarella's idea, and despite some initial skepticism voiced by other party members, her decision to bring along a whole cookpot full of oil would soon prove fortuitous indeed.  

They returned to the "gong room intersection" from last session, and began exploring the eastern passageway, when they heard whispering orcish voices approaching from that direction.  Innominus and a nameless hireling went after the gong, while Barbarella dumped her cookpot full of oil right in the "dogleg" of the eastern passage.  Then she and Uncle Junkal withdrew into the intersection with oil flasks ready, while Hazel took a rearguard position.

One orc, Romano, poked his head around the corner of the dogleg and shot his crossbow at the party, while a second orc, Hooker, dive-rolled across the passage to a nook in the southern wall.  Uncle Junkal and Barbarella hucked their oil flasks, one of which caught Romano in the face, another of which flew past him but nevertheless landed within Barbarella's oil patch, setting it ablaze.  Romano the orc was incinerated, and Hooker fled back down the eastern passage the way he had come.

The party waited a turn or two for the flames to die down, then proceeded down the hallway to the east.  The orcs fired upon them with crossbows, but Innominus and Hazel were carrying the gong between them as a large missile shield, which was quite effective; no party member was hit by crossbow fire.  By the time the party reached the end of the hall, the orcs had shut themselves in behind a heavy oaken door.

Hazel wasted no time in bashing down the heavy door, a feat she accomplished so swiftly and decisively that one dark orc behind the door was thrown backwards a few feet and landed on his back under part of the door.  Besides that dark orc, now dubbed Sprawler, there were five other dark orcs in the room, one of which was a lieutenant wearing chain mail.  Combat ensued.  High points include Hazel sending her pet kestrel into combat to distract the dark orc lieutenant by shitting on his head (this worked -- the dark orc rolled a critical failure that round!), Barbarella's well-placed throwing dart attacks against her comrade's opponents, and Hazel's climactic bare-handed attack on the lieutenant, for which she rolled her nightly d30 roll for the damage, got a 23, and instantly tore him apart. 

With all but one dark orc (old Sprawler!) vanquished, and after a momentary debate about whether or not a dark orc could be productively interrogated, Innominus finally delivered the killing strike to Sprawler.  But before Sprawler died, the crafty dark orc blew a whistle, summoning the party's final challenge: a huge ogre that lumbered into the chamber from an adjacent dark alcove, ready to kill them all with its massive spiked club.   

 

A fearsome ogre!

The ogre gained the initiative, but on its first attack vs. Hazel, it missed.  Uncle Junkal then used his bardic charm person ability (rolling his nightly d30 for the d% roll) to charm the ogre!  The ogre failed its save, and it was pacified!  Uncle Junkal and the party looked forward with some relish to how the ogre would be of use to them in future sessions, though Innominus expressed (completely justified) concerns that the ogre, once free of the charm, would instantly attack the party. 

This was all moot because two rounds later, Uncle Junkal asked his charmed ogre to open a locked room, which (according to the scripted module -- I did not make this up!) had a deadly poison needle trap, which the dim-witted ogre did not notice until it was too late.  He unlocked the door, opened it, failed his poison save, and dropped dead one round later.

Despite some regret at the loss of the ogre, the group cheered up as they looted the treasure chamber they had found.  Barbarella and Innominus carefully checked each treasure chest before opening it and avoided two more traps in the process. 

Now that they have completely "cleaned out" (to the best of their knowledge) this lower level of the orc caverns, it seems the party must decide whether or not to take a brief strategic aside back on the surface, perhaps to hire some more retainers and/or re-supply themselves at a town further away than Vedik.  They have pretty well exhausted what Vedik has to offer and are down to two retainers (Snikrop and No-name; a third, Mikey, died this session). Or, do the PCs throw caution to the wind and simply press on, venturing in to the eye-sockets of that demonic idol they found?  And what will they do with all their loot?  Tune in next time. . .

Session Photos and Arandish PC Guidebooks

 Carter Soles, enthusiastic Labyrinth Lord, with some of his minions.

Back when I was preparing for the start of Arandish Campaign 2010, I assembled some documents that I thought would be of use to my players, especially on the opening character generation night.  I printed up two copies of this Arandish PC Guidebook and put them into report folders for my players.  If you are curious about what went into these folders, I now offer their content as pdfs via the link below!  The Guidebook includes:

Arandish 2010 House Rules
Arandish PC Class Options
Rodian Player Characters
Sword-Cleric of Frey Class Description
Sword-Cleric of Frey Tables

Here is a link to the downloadable pdfs of all the Lands of Ara content in the Arandish PC Guidebook.

Note that in addition to my own original content, I also inserted information  about a couple of key character classes created by other bloggers into the hard copies of the PC guidebook, i.e., the Beyond the Black Gate Thief and the Ode to Black Dougal Barbarian.

 Carter displaying an Arandish PC Guidebook.