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The Wayfinders: Part Three: Danger in the Drift

Last year I shared my family’s experiences creating their first Starfinder characters. We had a lot of fun making a kooky crew, and tried them out a bit before deciding they would join the Starfinder Society. There were some changes that needed to be made. Tucker was a halfling, which would have to change, but otherwise the transition went smoothly. Then we sat down and played Into the Unknown. Life got busy. We moved on to play Starfinder Scenario #1-03: Yesteryear’s Truth, which was great fun (for details check out this blog post).

But, my kids have WAY too many characters and not enough focus.

I’m a fan of creating a character and playing them through consistently right to the end. I want to play them every week. I want them to accomplish something amazing over the course of a long campaign. And when their story is done I want to know what happened to them. Did they retire? Get married? Ascend to godhood? Go insane? When their story’s complete I’m ready to make a new character and start all over again.

But, my kids? My kids love making new characters. They like hopping from story to story. But they also don’t like letting characters go. They want to play them all at the same time. There’s tons of them. An unattainable goal if I ever heard one! Haha.

In short? We rarely have time to take our Wayfinders for a spin.

The other day my daughter informed me that she wanted to create her own adventure. This isn’t the first time. She’s GMed for us before and brutally slaughtered us all. It’s partly because she doesn’t have much experience determining appropriate CRs, but it’s also because she’s incredibly lucky. Too lucky. It’s great when she’s a fellow PC but when she’s the GM? Look out! Monsters have awesome aim, enemies are so stealthy they might as well be invisible, and no opponent ever fails a saving throw. It’s not that she’s cheating! We don’t use GM screens in my house so we can all see her rolls, and I help her every step of the way. She’s just that damned lucky.

So when she said she wanted to GM something everyone groaned.

She looked so sad.

“Oh, no! She’s going to kill us again!” my son wailed.

“Be nice!” I scolded my son. Then I whispered to my husband, “She totally is…”

But, I smiled at my daughter and said, “That sounds exciting. Let’s do it.” Because it is exciting. Of course I want my kids to want to imagine, create, and GM.

So my daughter and I went to my room and peered at my bookshelf. Making a one-shot would mean everyone would create more characters, which we didn’t really have time for at the moment, so I suggested she create a mini adventure for Starfinder. Our Wayfinders were in the middle of a journey through the Drift from the radioactive planet Elytrio to Absalom Station. The timing couldn’t be better!

But, they were SFS characters… We decided to play the entire scenario off the books, using the stats for our characters but leaving our actual SFS characters entirely untouched. And while we were at it? Tucker might as well be a halfling again (in appearance).

My daughter thought about the Drift a bit, pulled down the Alien Archive, and got browsing. She stopped on creatures she took a liking to and we chatted about them, brainstorming ideas together. Some she liked and some she didn’t. She wrote down notes in her little Pokemon notebook. When she hit the end of the book she narrowed down her ideas and made some more notes and drawings. An hour later we were picking out miniatures and prepping the table. It was game time!

I started off the session by reminding everyone what we were up to. Where we’d been, where we were going, and who we were with.

Our crew consists of four Starfinder Agents that belong to the Wayfinders Faction. Hoponisa (Hops for short), is a ysoki technomancer from the dark side of Verces who loves to dance. She’s on a mission to find herself the ‘perfect mate’ and is handy both in the pilot’s chair, the engineering bay, and at a computer console. She has a robot rabbit dubbed ‘Snowball’ who is a glorified computer with some minor mobility that she crafted herself, then wrapped in fuzzy faux fur for ultimate cuddle-ability. It’s also her spell cache. Hops has been a Starfinder for a long time and is the person who recruited the rest of the crew into the Starfinder Society (before that they were mercenaries who did work for the Starfinders on a regular basis). Together, the gang travels the Vast, deploying drift beacons for credits at the behest of the Wayfinders. After discovering new planets, collecting data on their environments, and deploying drift beacons, the group prepares a report on the planet for the Wayfinders, which allows the spacefaring faction to better prepare proper Starfinder teams for further exploration on these locations.

Hops and the crew of the Pegasus Class ship, Infinity, have gone on plenty of missions together. Led by their Captain Aya, a wise, enigmatic kasatha mystic who believes that every life is precious, they’ve charted planets and discovered new places. Their roles on the starship change a lot, with the rest of the crew rotating between pilot, engineer, science officer, and gunner as the mood strikes them. Aya and Hops are joined by Tucker Aetherfoot, a ysoki (originally a halfling) operative with the daredevil speciality who’s nimble, acrobatic, and full of boundless energy. He wears a t-shirt with a shirren design on it (to represent his long-time friendship with the shirren Vishkesh), and wears a racing helmet with a rose-tinted visor and stylized mouse ears on the side (which was given to him by Hops as a birthday gift). Tucker’s insatiably curious, and runs a blog in his spare time about his experiences exploring the Vast. He’s a devout Desnan from Absalom Station, prone to dancing when he’s idle too long. …Even in the middle of a mission. Lastly, there’s Vishkesh, a shirren mechanic with a little flying spy drone named Rijin. Rijin is trained to help Vishkesh with repairing starships, and is also outfitted with a flare thrower. He’s a chipper little thing, with a bubbly artificial personality. Vishkesh has a fondness to caring for (and rescuing) larval shirren, and currently has a dozen dangling off of him in their protective canisters at all times. Vishkesh is the proud owner of a pig stuffed animal — a rare creature he’s never seen in in the flesh! He’s also from Absalom Station, and is a long time friend of Tucker’s. Vishkesh worships Hylax.

When they joined the Starfinders the crew of Infinity decided they needed a helping hand. They hired two rookies to assist them and round out their crew: Gizdara, a half-orc technomancer who’s a whiz with computers, and Diggs Drifthopper, a burly ‘rabbitfolk’ whose planet was conquered by the Vesk years ago. Diggs was forced into the military, but was recently allowed his freedom and was looking for work. He’s good with a gun, but not much else (which he can’t use in SFS play, as a non-combatant hireling, haha). Still, my daughter insisted on hiring him because he was destined to be Hops’ mate. (Uhhh… Okay? Haha). Diggs’ job is mostly to watch the ship while we’re away from it.

There’s one other person on their ship at the moment: the Membrane Ghibrani Klarima who they were bringing from her home planet of Elytrio to join the Starfinder Society. For now she was a passenger, but the group was teaching her everything they could of the universe as they travelled the Drift.

Travel aboard the Infinity — The crew of *Infinity* soars through the Drift!

With the recap out of the way my daughter took over, explaining that we had been in the Drift for a few weeks. All of a sudden the alarm blared and there was a strange flash of red light nearing the ship. LAVA!

Wait, what? How could there be lava in space?

My daughter gleefully asked for a Computers check from our Science Officer — Vishkesh at the moment — revealing that a piece of the Elemental Plane of Fire had been torn off and stranded in the Drift (quite recently by the look of it)! We were about to do some more research on this phenomenon when there was a burst of light. Lava and powerful heat blasts from the shard of the Plane of Fire was flying at our ship! Our pilot, Hops (which I was running on behalf of my daughter since she was GMing), flew like a pro, dodging lava balls, and super heated waves of energy. But a few moments later Vishkesh identified that our air lock had been opened. Something was on the ship!

We turned for the elevator only have it DING pleasantly.

As the doors opened Captain Aya ordered Hops, Diggs, and Gizdara to remain at their posts. Gizadara took over as Science Officer while Diggs took on the role of gunner and blasted through the hunks of rock flying at our ship. Vishkesh, Rijin, Aya, and Tucker leapt to their feet — too late!

A trio of fire elementals roared off the lift and slammed into the kasathan captain — the nearest target.

“The elementals are so angry! They must be lost and confused!” my son (Vishkesh) pointed out. Unfortunately, his understanding did little to calm the creatures. The fire elementals tore into Aya and scored multiple critical hits — curse my daughter’s luck! Haha. My kashathan mystic went down before she even had a turn.

“Sorry, Mom!” my daughter said a little guiltily.

“It’s alright, baby. Aya will be fine.”

The battle continued, and wow was it a tough one! The fire elementals tore into Tucker while Aya slowly recovered on the ground with her SP. By the time she rejoined the fight her healing magic was sorely needed! Tucker was hanging on by a thread and Vishkesh was in big trouble! Not long afterwards the group rallied and took down the last of the exceptionally lucky elementals. But not before Tucker suffered some luck of his own — bad luck!

Crit Fail for Tucker — A critical fail for poor Tucker!

With the fire elementals defeated Vishkesh hurried to the airlock to get it locked down while Aya healed the wounds of her crew. Hops flew us out of the range of the planar anomaly and the journey returned to normal.

For a time…

Not much further away we came upon a strange group of asteroids that looked like they were all part of some kind of large complex — a metallic castle of some sort. It was clearly another broken planar shard torn from another world and deposited in the Drift by Drift Travel. Hesitantly, the group scanned the planar wreckage and detected signs of life. Not wanting to leave anyone stranded in the Drift, Aya ordered the ship to investigate the asteroids.

They flew past chunks of reddish rock, through space strewn with shards of glittering metal. Suddenly they saw a ship! It looked like a hunk of junk cobbled together from — well, junk! They turned on the comms to hail the ship only to be fired upon!

Battle stations!

Hops sailed the ship through space, dodging meteors and make-shift torpedoes, Vishkesh boosted the ships guns, Tucker fired upon the enemy, and Aya encouraged her crew. Although the battle shouldn’t have been challenging, it was — once again my daughter’s good luck conspired to destroy us.

Suddenly Vishkesh noticed incoming projectiles from somewhere other than the ship! One of the chunks of broken castle was inhabited! They fired cannons at the Infinity. Cannons that held… goblins in weird globs of goo! The goblin bombs splattered against the hull of Infinity! Unfortunately for the goblins our ship’s shields were too tough for them to penetrate! Most splattered on impact like giant bugs! But, armed as they were with sharp implements and hacking kits, it’s likely the goblins would have attempted to breach the hull or hack into the air locks to gain entry had our shields been depleted.

Suddenly a voice crackled over the intercom. “AHA! You smart-heads are good! You foil our goo-guns good! But we goblin pirates! Goblins attack and goblins snack! Or…. goblins want to snack! We hungry! Hand over your food and we let you go!”

Snowball Easter Bunny Chocolate Soop — Image discovered on Pinterest and chosen to represent Snowball in my home game. Art by Canadian artist DaCosta! under the studio name Chocolate Soop. Click here to check out their website.

Aya sighed in a rare show of impatience. “All lives are precious…” It sounded like she was reminding herself of this, instead of teaching the others as was typical. “We came here to lend aid to any stranded in the Drift. Surrender, Goblin Pirates, and we will forgive your attack. We have food to spare and tools to repair your Drift Engines. …If you have any.”

The goblin pirate laughed. “AHA! We win! We no shoot and you give us food! Yes! Come! Come to our home and give us many many food!”

“…” Aya decided it was best not to argue with a goblin. “Yes. Exactly. We’re coming in for a landing.” Looking at Hops she ordered. “Hops, take us down.”

“Yes, Captain!”

The gang flew their ship to the strange broken castle and landed — as best as they could. Floated nearby was a better description. After a space walk, Aya, Vishkesh, Tucker, and Rijin set out to meet the goblins. They were greeted by a snivelling, friendly little goblin — not the goblin pirate from before — and given a tour. The castle was hollow and without gravity except around its outer walls. Along these outside walls were small rooms that had both air and gravity — an anomaly the goblins couldn’t quite explain. Up near the broken ceiling (and any holes in the walls) there was a massive makeshift net — to prevent any goblins from accidentally drifting off into space.

On the tour the group discovered that the goblins weren’t just hungry, they were completely out of food! No wonder they had attacked!

But, the goblin had a plan. “Oh, you look so fat and not starving! Oh! Yum! Uh… Yum to your food! Not yum to you!” The goblin laughed, but Tucker was a little nervous. “We have much money to give you! Yes! Lots of shinies! Came here to steal shinies from castle, but ship broke! And shinies not good to eat! Nope! We have tried!” the goblin nodded. “Our King has shinies! You go see him and kill him and take them! And his pet! Must kill it too! Very smart it is. Smarter than King I think!” The goblin nods. “Then you take shinies and give us many many food! Yes! YES! Good plan! See?”

Rijin Jessica Madorran — Image discovered on Pinterest to represent Rijin in our home game. Art by Jessica Madorran. Check out her website for more information.

“Did some of you want to come with us?” Vishkesh asked.

Tucker groaned. “Oh, I don’t like that plan…”

The goblins around all cheered. “Yes! Oh, give us ride! But first take shinies! You take for food! And if you not want we take it and use it to buy more food when you get to… where you go! Me not care! Me want FOOD!”

With a sigh the group headed up to bargain with the King. “All lives are precious,” Aya reminded everyone. “This need not come to a fight.

Unfortunately, Aya was wrong. It did come down to a fight. The quartet faced off against the goblin king and his (definitely smarter than him) tashtari pet. For once my daughter’s luck didn’t trump our own and we made quick work of the angry pair. With the shinies and a ton of goblins in tow, the group reboarded the Infinity for the longest, most irritating trip they would ever endure.

Words of wisdom: Never let a pack of starving goblins on your space ship!

Our family had a lot of fun playing my daughter’s Starfinder adventure. Best of all? My daughter was happy she didn’t kill everyone. (Yay!)

Space goblins and fire elementals are from Starfinder: Alien Archive while tashtari are from Starfinder: Alien Archive 2. Pawns for all the mentioned creatures are available in Alien Archive Pawn Box and Alien Archive 2 Pawn Box. The statistics we used for the goblin spaceship came from Starfinder: Core Rulebook.

Thanks for joining us today! I hope you enjoyed hearing about my daughters adventures in GMing as much as we enjoyed playing it.

Jessica

5-Minute Dungeon

Welcome to d20diaries!

5 Minute Dungeon

Today we’re taking a look at a board game my kids recently got for their birthday: 5-Minute Dungeon! This real-time card game tasks up to five players with working together to escape a dungeon in under five minutes. Each dungeon consists of a randomized deck of cards that features obstacles, monsters, people, and events to overcome. At the end of each dungeon is a powerful boss to defeat. To beat the game you’ll need to triumph over five separate dungeons.

This game is frantic, fast-paced, and more than a little chaotic! Communication and teamwork are essential to your success. Player’s win or lose as a team. 5-Minute Dungeon is intended for players ages eight and up. Although a single dungeon takes five minutes, playing through a whole game takes about thirty to forty-five minutes, depending how many times you fail to escape a dungeon.

Box Contents

Players take on the role of one of ten characters by selecting a character board. Each board is colour-coded and double-sided, with one male and one female character per board. Every character board makes use of one of five matching decks, and every character has their own unique ability which can be triggered by discarding three cards from your hand. That means that up to five people can play at a time.

Characters include the blue sorceress and wizard, green huntress and ranger, purple ninja and thief, red barbarian and gladiator, and yellow paladin and valkyrie. Most of the special abilities of these characters fall into two types: those that help get someone in your group extra cards and those that automatically defeat a certain category of card. There’s also the wizard’s unique ability to stop time. We found that it was very helpful to play with the wizard and a character who can help the group draw cards, with the rest of the players taking on abilities that can auto-defeat either monsters, obstacles, or people. Once you’ve got your character picked out you place the matching deck on their board.

Next you set up the dungeon. Start by selecting a boss. There are five to choose from and each is numbered 1 though 5. You simply start at Boss #1: Baby Barbarian and work your way up to Boss #5: Dungeon Master. Each boss also has a number of cards written on it. Baby Barbarian has 20, The Grime Reaper has 25, Zola the Gorgon has 30, and so on. This is the number of dungeon cards you’ll randomly select and place on the boss board. Then you’ll pick out two challenge cards per player and shuffle them into the deck of dungeon cards. This is the boss’s dungeon. You simply place the deck of cards into the space marked with the dotted line and you’re ready to begin.

Boss

Player’s begin by drawing a number of cards. This number is variable and determined by how many people are playing the game. Chances are you’ll start with three or four cards. Then you start the five minute timer, flip over the first card in the dungeon deck, and get adventuring!

Cactus wants a hug! — To reach ‘The Grime Reaper’ you’ll need to defeat the ‘A Cactus that wants a hug.’ Oh, no! I hope you’ve got some shields….

This game doesn’t come with a physical timer. Instead there’s a timer app you can download on your phone, tablet, and other handheld device. It’s a quick download and easy to use. You simply select a voice for the announcer (I love the ‘fearful’ voice, but my daughter’s a fan of ‘spiteful’) and click start. Sometimes you’ll need to pause the game (such as with the wizard’s ‘time stop’ ability) in which case you simply push pause. If you defeat the dungeon you click ‘We Won,’ if you lose you click ‘We Lost’ and if you run out of time you don’t need to click a thing. It’s an enjoyable, humorous little timer app and my kids really like it.

Boss #1: Baby Barbarian. He takes two swords, two arrows, and three dash to defeat, and his dungeon contains twenty cards.

Baby Barbarian and an example of Challenge and Dungeon Cards

There are four major categories of dungeon cards: event, person, monster, and obstacle. Events are the simplest to resolve. They each have a sentence explaining what you need to do, you do it, then you move on to the next card. Examples of events are ‘Sudden Illness’ which forces every player to discard their hand, or ‘Trap Door’ which forces all players to discard three cards. The rest of the cards — monster, obstacle, and person — have circular symbols on them. These symbols match the cards that you must play to defeat them. These cards can be played in any order and by any player. There are no turns. As soon as all the needed cards are played you have defeated the card, it gets moved to the discard pile, and you flip over the next dungeon card. Once all of the dungeon cards are defeated you will see the symbols needed to defeat the Boss.

This makes gameplay fast and chaotic, with players slapping down cards, shouting out what they’re playing, and calling out what’s still needed to defeat the card. It’s the sort of game where everyone feels a sense of urgency and excitement, and get’s a thrill of triumph when a card is defeated.

Enemy Types — The four types of cards you’ll find in a dungeon.

So what the heck are all these symbols?

There are five major symbols in the game, which are colour coded. These same symbols are seen across all the boss cards and all character decks. Called ‘Resources’ they include the red sword, yellow shield, green arrow, blue scroll, and purple jumping person (which my family always calls ‘sprint’ or ‘dash’ but is probably called ‘leap’). Every deck will have cards of these five types, although they will have them in different combinations. The red barbarian/gladiator deck will have a lot of red swords, for example, while the blue sorceress/wizard deck will have a lot of blue scrolls. In addition to these single symbol cards there’s double symbol cards — cards that have two red swords, two blue scrolls, and so on. These are seen in much lower quantities than the single symbol cards, and not every deck will have them in every kind. While the sorceress/wizard deck may have a few double scroll cards, the huntress/ranger deck won’t. One of the decks — the red barbarian/gladiator has special double symbol cards which consist of a red sword and a second other symbol.

The rest of the cards found in the character decks are black bordered and have a special ability written on them. The most common are abilities that let you auto-defeat a certain category of dungeon card. ‘Fireball’ defeats a monster, ‘Backstab’ defeats a person, and ‘Mighty Leap’ defeats an obstacle. These are super useful cards which can be found throughout all of the different coloured decks in differing quantities. While the sorceress/wizard has a lot of ‘Fireballs’ the ninja/thief has more ‘Mighty Leap’ and ‘Backstab’ cards. Finally, every colour deck has some unique black bordered ability cards. ‘Enrage’ from the red barbarian/gladiator deck lets you choose two players who may draw three cards each. ‘Divine Shield’ from the yellow paladin/valkyrie deck pauses time until someone plays a card and lets every player draw one card. ‘Magic Bomb’ from the blue sorceress/wizard deck counts as one of each type of resource. My personal favourite card? ‘Heal’ which lets you select a player who can put their entire discard pile back on top of their draw pile. Awesome!

Card Types 2 — The many card types found in 5-Minute Dungeon

As mentioned, every deck is different but equally useful. You’ll soon discover which play style you prefer and find a favourite, so I highly recommend trying each deck out. I love the yellow paladin/valkyrie deck best — particularly when played with the valkyrie character who can help her fellow players draw cards. The yellow deck has a lot of different healing cards, which I find can be incredibly helpful. My son, on the other hand, prefers the to play as the blue wizard. He’s a huge fan of the wizard’s ‘Time Stop’ ability — which is so helpful I’d go as far as to call it a necessity. He also loves the ‘Magic Bomb’ card which can only be found in the blue deck. Finally, my daughter prefers to play as the green huntress — solely because she loves the art. To each their own, I guess. Haha.

With all the decks in their places, cards in hand, and the timer started, play can begin. There’s a few other rules you need to know, but not many. Whenever you have less cards than your opening hand consisted of you can immediately draw cards to fill your hand back up to maximum. Discard piles do not get shuffled back into the draw pile once the draw pile is empty. This means that if your deck ever runs out you can no longer draw cards — unless someone plays a card that gives you cards from your discard pile or something similar.

Winning will take teamwork, speed, and luck. If you win you reshuffle your decks, select your character (you do not need to keep the same character throughout all the dungeons), set your boards back up, and build the dungeon for the next Boss. When everything’s ready you begin play again. If you defeat all five dungeons you win the game.

If you ever fail to defeat a dungeon you’re supposed to reset, going all the way back to the Baby Barbarian and his dungeon again, but my family didn’t like this rule. Instead we just replayed the dungeon we were on.

We’ve played this game quite a few times. Sometimes we finish it all the way through, and sometimes we only play a round or two. My kids and I really like it. They enjoy the teamwork aspect, and that they can always be playing. There’s no waiting for your turn or getting beat on by your friends. It’s fun and fast. It’s not a game for everyone, though. My husband doesn’t really like it. He’s a fan of strategic, complex games. Chances are whatever game we’re playing he’s going to be that player taking the longest turns. Unsurprisingly, the chaotic, real-time gameplay of 5-Minute Dungeon is not to his tastes. It’s also not the kind of game you can play anywhere. Players are going to get loud. Although you could bring to a party, family gathering, or friend’s house, it’s not the sort of thing you’re going to bring to play at the library, local coffee shop, laundromat, or airport. Finally, it’s not the sort of game you want to let the kids play late at night. Mine get antsy, excited, and leap and jump around. Not really a relaxing, winding-down sort of game.

The board after my kids and I defeated the final boss!

Victory!

All in all, we really liked 5-Minute Dungeon — especially my son. It’s fast paced, easy to learn, and enjoyable. My only complaints? I wish the boss cards were double sided so you could choose which of the two to face off against and I wish there were more dungeon and challenge cards included in the game so the dungeons felt more varied. But, I suppose wanting more of a game isn’t much of a complaint. More like a wish list. Haha. 5-Minute Dungeon is a pretty easy game to find that currently retails for around $30 Canadian. Our copy belongs to my eight-year old son, and made an excellent gift. He loves it.

Happy gaming!

Jessica

Dungeon Mayhem

My kids love games of all kinds. Not surprising, I know. Most kids love games of one kind or another. But mine REALLY love games. This year for their birthdays they decided that they have enough toys. What they wanted was some new board games.

“But, awesome board games, Mom. Really good ones.”

So they did some research, made lists, did some more research, discovered a love of Dice Tower, and revised their lists until they each had a (much too long) list of board games they wanted. Although our birthday celebrations aren’t over yet, they’ve both had a few parties with family and were thrilled to find they got some new games. Most of what they asked for are large, complex games. But a few are short, easy to learn card games. You can expect to see a lot of board game reviews in the coming weeks, but today we’re starting short and sweet, with Dungeon Mayhem!

Dungeon Mayhem

Dungeon Mayhem is a Dungeons & Dragons card game for 2 to 4 players. Games are short and fast-paced, with a round averaging about five minutes. It’s a small, portable game, with the rectangular box about the size of my hand. It’s the perfect size to bring with you on the go or play in compact spaces. We bring it to the laundromat, for example. Intended for ages eight and up Dungeon Mayhem lets players take on the role of an iconic hero and battle it out.

The game is super easy to learn and surprisingly fun to play. First, you choose a character. Each comes with their own unique deck of cards, hit point card and tracker, and a reference card. Youngest player goes first and play continues clockwise. You start with three cards in your hand. On your turn you draw a card and play a card. You start with 10 hp and when you reach 0 hp you’re out of the game. Last adventurer standing wins.

There are four heroes to choose from: Sutha the Skullcrusher (a female half-orc barbarian), Azzan the mystic (a male human wizard), Lia the Radiant (a female elf paladin), and Oriax the Clever (a male tiefling rogue). Each adventurer has their own deck that plays differently, but with the same basic mechanics so it’s easy to pick up any one and just play. Each card features illustrations by Kyle Ferrin showcasing the different characters in a fun-loving, cartoony style. Many cards have clever, entertaining, or familiar names. The cards each have a variety of symbols on them which tell you what each card does. The symbols are all easy to understand and, if you ever forget what they do, each character has their own unique reference card to remind you.

There are five symbols that appear in every character’s deck. A swords deals one damage to an opponent, a shield blocks one damage dealt to you, a heart heals one hp, a card lets you draw one card, and a lightning bolt lets you play one extra card. Although some cards in the decks contain a single symbol on them, most have a combination or two or three symbols. These symbols appear in different combinations and quantities throughout the decks, making each one different. The paladin’s deck has a lot of healing, for example, while the rogue’s lets you play a lot of cards, and the barbarian is the only character who can do four damage at once to a single enemy. In addition, each deck has a few unique symbols and cards. Sutha the Skullcrusher can deal one damage to each enemy and then gain that much hp with her Whirling Frenzy while the wizard Azzan can swap life totals with another player by playing Vampiric Touch.

Contents

There’s a few other rules to the game, but not many. Typically when you play a card it gets discarded, but if you play a shield card it instead is placed on the table in front of you. For each damage it prevents it gets a damage counter, and when it’s been completely destroyed the shield card is removed from play and placed in the discard pile. If you happen to use up all the cards in your hand (you’ll need lightning bolt cards to do this, which let you play an extra card on your turn) you can draw two additional cards. And if your deck ever runs out you simply reshuffle it and keep playing.

Pretty simple!

While playing we found that this game was super simple to learn, teach, and understand. You get the hang of it quick, and games are fast and exciting. Since you’re battling each other there’s definitely a ‘take that’ feel to this game. Some rounds you’ll feel picked on if you get defeated quick, but others are more balanced. It just depends on the strategies of your opponents at the time. My kids often decided the best strategy was to kill me and then duke it out themselves, so I was brutally ganged up on a lot. Haha. They quickly realized this was a poor strategy when my husband also joined play, as he often teamed up with me so that he didn’t have to combat a pair of allied kids on his own. (How the tables have turned!) My daughter is an expert at the old ‘kick them when they’re down’ strategy, very often dealing ruthless finishing blows against whoever happens to be doing the worst. …Even if it might be against her brother who she was supposedly allied with. Clever girl. Haha.

The decks are fun, varied, and balanced. No one deck it better than the other, they’re just different. Although it’s not immediately apparent what the differences are between the decks it becomes clear pretty quick. Lia, the paladin, deals a lot of damage and heals a lot of her own wounds. Her special abilities include Divine Inspiration, which lets her put any card from her discard pile into her hand and then heal two hp and Banishing Smite which destroys all shield cards in play and then lets her play an additional card. This was my daughter’s favourite deck, and my second favourite deck. While my daughter prefers Divine Smite and her beloved steed Fluffy, I’m a big fan of the Finger-wag of Judgement and Divine Inspiration. This deck is tough to take down and enjoyable to play.

While my daughter and I loved the paladin, my son and I both decided the rogue, Oriax, was out favourite deck. Packed full of cards that let you take extra actions, this deck often lets you play more cards than your opponents. It’s also got some enjoyable tricks, particularly with Clever Disguise, a card that prevents you from being targeted by any cards until the start of your next turn. It’s particularly great for forcing your allies to duke it out at the start of the game, which is likely to result in them retaliating against each other in subsequent rounds. A nice little start! We also really like using Pick Pocket to play a card from someone else’s deck. Need healing? Grab a card from the paladin. Want to wreck your opponent? Snag a card from the barbarian. Want to get a nice full hand or play something tricky? Take a card from the wizard. Sure, it won’t always be what you were hoping for, but I’ve never seen it not be useful. One downside to the rogue is that he only has one way to heal himself: Stolen Potion. Although it lets you heal one hp and play another card (which is great) it does mean that when you’re low on health it’s hard to save yourself. One hp once in a while doesn’t do much. I also love Sneak Attack. It’s art and theme bring a smile to my face every time. Haha.

It should come as no surprise that the barbarian’s deck deals a lot of damage. In fact, they have the only card in the game that can do four damage against one enemy (Rage). They also have the awesome Whirling Axes, which we mentioned earlier. What might be surprising is how balanced it is. It’s got some solid shield cards (my daughter loves the dogs Riff and Raff), ways to draw cards (Open the Armory and Snack Time), ways to heal (Snack Time and Whirling Axes) and ways to destroy a shield with one card (Mighty Toss). Although none of us named this deck as our favourites, it also turned out to be the most played deck and both my son and husband’s second favourite decks. Sutha is a fearsome foe!

Which leaves us with the wizard. At first glance, Azzan’s deck is the most balanced. He can do everything well, but doesn’t have the most of anything either. Burning Hands and Lightning Bolt are some of his most reliable damage dealing cards. Magic Missile is my favourite, as it lets you deal one damage and play an extra card. Stoneskin and Mirror Image are great shield cards. Knowledge is Power gets him a lot of extra cards while Speed of Thought helps him play those cards fast. His one downside is a lack of healing cards. Eventually we came to realize he does have the most of something very important: TRICKS. His three unique cards include Vampiric Touch, which we already mentioned. This card lets him swap hp totals with another player — which can be game changing. Charm lets him take someone else’s shield card that’s on the table and use as his own — also awesome. And Fireball deals three damage to every player (including himself). My daughter’s prone to hoarding fireballs, using Charm to steal someone else’s defences, and then blasting a bunch of fireballs to kill everyone at once while she hits behind her stolen shields. Cheeky thing. Haha. Although Azzan’s deck is just as easy to use as everyone else’s, it’s also the deck that is most rewarding when played with some forethought.

We really enjoyed Dungeon Mayhem. It’s not a complex, tactical game like some of our others, but it’s a fun, quick, romp you can bring with you anywhere. We hope they come out with an expansion that contains another two or four decks. It’d be great to have more deck choices and play with more than four players. Happily, this deck was quite affordable. Our copy was only $18 Canadian. Well worth the money.

Jessica

My son playing as Sutha

My husband playing as Lia

Myself playing as Oriax

Dungeon Mayhem Contents — Some of our favourite cards for each deck.

Many Happy Birthdays!

My kids have a birthday this month.

Both of them.

It’s on the same day (although they’re not the same age) but that doesn’t mean their birthday is over quick. My husband and I have a small house but a big family, so it’s not just one birthday party for the pair of them. It’s one birthday party for the pair of them at least four times. Add to that a convention, work dinner, and parties with their friends, and suddenly the whole month is gone. Plus there’s my brother, grandpa, niece, and nephew, who all ALSO have a birthday this month.

March is crazy around here.

But today I’m taking the time to say ‘Happy Birthday’ to the two goofiest, sweetest, most imaginative kids I know. Why on my blog? Because they wanted the world to know they are now the very dignified ages of seven and eight.

Milestones, I know. Haha.

While we’re at it, why not spread the cheer further? My birthday kids want to wish a Happy Birthday to all of you, no matter where you are or when it falls.

All the best!

Jessica
(and family)

Shackled City: Part Eight: Reunion

Welcome back to Cauldron, home of the The Shackled City Adventure Path! When we last left off our heroic musicians were investigating a series of missing person cases which recently culminated in the abduction of four children from a local orphanage. Fate led to our characters taking the rescue of these people upon themselves! Although they’ve defeated the kidnappers, and rescued the children, there’s plenty of other missing citizens of Cauldron to save. And their captors? Slavers! They’ll have to work fast if they want to save their fellow citizens before they’re sold!

If none of this sounds familiar you can read this blog post, which details our characters, or continue on with this article to hear a quick summary and jump right into the action! You can also check out our previous adventures in Shackled City: Part One, Shackled City: Part Two: A Mystery!, Shackled City: Part Three: Jzadirune, Shackled City: Part Four: Enter the Malachite Fortress, Shackled City: Part Five: This Place is the Pits!, Shackled City: Part Six: Kazmojen, and Shackled City: Part Seven: Bad Luck.

The Shackled City Adventure Path is available for purchase in its entirety here. The first volume, Life’s Bazaar, is available for purchase here.

shackled city adventure path d20diaries — The Shackled City Adventure Path is a 3.5 Dungeons and Dragons Adventure originally printed in Dungeon Magazine by Paizo Publishing.

The Heroes

Our eccentric heroes are all members of ‘Dinorabbit,’ a musical band that changes its name frequently and was most previously known as ‘Boople Snoot.’ The band’s lead singer and song-writer is Falco Rhiavadi, a foppish noble bastard of mixed Tien descent whose father was devoured by a dragon when Falco was just a boy. A well-groomed, handsome man with an easy smile and a winning personality, Falco’s a black sheep among his family. Mechanically, Falco is an oracle of life whose familiar is a jealous and demanding thrush named Ruby. Falco is played by my husband.

Mick Frimfrocket is a gnome with dark blue skin, bright pink hair that stands straight up on his head, and light blue eyes with flecks of red around his pupils. He’s energetic, bold, and loves nothing more than a good laugh! Mick acts as the band’s pianist and creative director. He’s the driving force behind the band’s constant name changes, and over-the-top performances. Mick was born in the gnomish enclave of Jzadirune but was brought to the city of Cauldron to escape the Vanishing. Orphaned by the mysterious events and with few memories of those early years, Mick was raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same orphanage that recently had four children kidnpapped right from their beds! Determined to save those little scamps, Mick was very excited to take up this missing person’s case and follow it to its conclusion — particularly when he realized that it led through his one-time home. Mechanically Mick is a monk / bard (prankster) who attacks with wild kicks while playing his piano in battle. Partway through exploring Jzadirune he came into possession of a broken magical construct. He’s played by my seven-year old son.

Rabbity Castalle is a rabbitfolk waitress who works at the Tipped Tankard Tavern. A dancer and singer for the band Dinorabbit, Rabbity also has a pet panther named Panthy. She’s lucky, nimble, and quick, but a little skittish. One of her co-workers is one of the people who was recently abducted, so she’s very keen to solve this mystery and return him home. Rabbity is a hydrokineticist played by my six-year old daughter, using the rabbitfolk race. Rabbitfolk are a Pathfinder Compatible race created by my daughter (with some help) which will soon be published in the upcoming Realms of Atrothia: Primary Expansion by Sunburst Games (Kickstarter coming in February!). Rabbity recently ‘befriended’ (she thinks) a vicious howler named Prickles. What could go wrong?!

The final member of our party is Aeris Caldyra, a local locksmith who was cajoled by her roommate, Rabbity, to join the band as a percussionist and set designer. With few friends to call her own, Aeris relented to the rabbitfolk’s request and is the least talented member of the band. The last worshipper of Alseta in Cauldron, with more than a few secrets and regrets, Aeris is a suli bloodrager with a chip on her shoulder. Always one to lend a hand, like her Grandfather Marzio once would have done, Aeris is determined to rescue the missing citizens of Cauldron. Aeris is my character for the Shackled City Adventure Path.

Although that’s the last of our PCs, that’s not the last of our party. The members of Dinorabbit are also travelling with a half-orc janitor named Patch, and an ex-guard named Krylscar Endercott! Patch is a big, stuttering, fool who works at the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same place he was raised. Patch recently got recruited to the Last Laugh Thieve’s Guild and was asked to watch over an orphan named Terrem. Unfortunately, Terrem was kidnapped on the very evening that Patch went out to meet with with the guild. Distraught over the boy’s disappearance, Patch was pressured by Falco and Mick into helping them rescue the kids. Patch has gone from a meek coward to a stalwart companion. He’s currently acting as protector of all of the citizens we’ve liberated, keeping watch over them in a secure location while our heroes continue to forge ahead.

Krylscar was abducted from Cauldron over a month ago, and was only recently freed by the team. He was found unconscious in his cell, beaten by his captors for impertinence. When they healed him they discovered Krylscar was bloodied, but far from broken. He demanded gear, equipped himself, and insisted on helping the members of Dinorabbit explore the rest of the Malachite Complex. Occasionally helpful and always reckless, Krylscar is stubborn and brave.

The Adventure

Kneeling in the wreckage of their battle, Aeris gasped for breath. She and Falco had narrowly avoided being crushed to death and devoured by a mimic disguised as a gong in a well-stocked treasure vault. The gold had not been worth it. Not to them, anyway. Their teammates may think otherwise…

“WOW! Look at all this gold!” Rabbity exclaims. “Oh, gems! I LOVE gems! Can I have them all, guys?” Without waiting for an answer, Rabbity scooped up all of the gems and jewelry, and dumped them into her bag. “Thanks!”

“There’s a lot of neat things in here, Rabbity, not just gems,” Mick remarks. He was in the process of carefully examining everything, packing it up in trunks and bags, and then giving it to his magical, half-broken, construct to carry. He had packed up weapons, armour, and plenty of gold. With a cock of his head he picked up a crumpled piece of paper. “What’s this?”

At our gaming table, I handed my son a crumpled up piece of paper. He grinned, and unscrunched it, leaving him with a wrinkled letter. More than a little pleased with this turn of events, my son studied the letter carefully, then read it out loud.

son - mick - reading the note — My son reading the mysterious letter.

Kazmojen,

There’s such a thing as being too good at your job.

Lay off taking your product from Cauldron. You’re pushing your luck. Any more get snatched and you’ll find yourself the target of jealous competitors or offended do-gooders.

Don’t say I didn’t want you.

The letter was signed with an image of a stylized bird, which Rabbity recognized as a kingfisher.

Now, my kids adore player handouts. Everyone does, I know. But, my kids really get into them. They read, re-read, and re-read again the handouts. They search for clues in everything. This letter they worried over the words, the potential meaning behind them, the kingfisher, and even any pictures hidden in the paper crinkles. They keep notes and wild theories in a notebook and go back to compare new handouts to old ones. They’re obsessed with player handouts.

Which is awesome! No handout is ever under appreciated.

So when I handed them this letter they freaked (in a good way). It was a solid ten minutes of conspiracy theories and excitement before they settled enough that we could continue the game.

letter 1

When we were finally ready we moved on, backtracking through all the hallways and rooms we’d already explored until we only had two left. The first chamber was a fine bedroom, complete with nice wooden furniture, a chain wrapped iron trunk, food, refreshments, and …. infernal guardians!

A pair of quivering, nasty mounds of flesh surged to life as soon as Aeris opened the door.

“Lemures!” she shouted. “They’re resistant to damage. You’ll need to hit them really hard to have any effect.”

“Or use silver,” Falco added. He pulled out his silver holy symbol of Shelyn and passed it to Mick. “Try this.”

Aeris rushed into battle and swung her sword, but her blade struck the lemure and bounced off their flesh. Not hard enough.

Rabbity peeked into the room and launched a blast of water at one lemure. Unfortunately, she rolled low and dealt only minor damage to the foul outsider.

With a shrug, Mick followed the others into the room and tossed the holy symbol right at the wounded lemure. Capable of turning anything into a lethal weapon, Mick was pleasantly surprised to see he not only hit, but he defeated the creature! With a critical hit he took down the lemure. It shuddered, quivered, and lost its form, turning into a nasty puddle of goo before being torn back to its home plane. All that was left behind was the shining holy symbol. “Ha!” My son shouted loudly as he jumped out of his seat and danced around the living room. “Don’t mess with Mick! Yeah! Dance party! WHOO!”

Falco stepped into the room, sure to stay near the back, and cast some hexes at the remaining lemure, lowering its defences. Krylscar hurried into the room to help Aeris combat the creature in melee. The pair both managed to trike, dealing some minor damage to the devils once DR was taken into account. But, it was a kinetic blast from Rabbity that slammed into the lemure with massive force that finally brought the creature down. My daughter joined my son in their victory dance.

lemure battle - malachite fortress - shackled city — Battling lemures.

They sifted through the room but were disappointed in its contents. The trunk contained the personal effects of someone short and prone to colourful attire, and plenty of shackles and chains. Deciding it must belong to that weaselly gnome-like slave merchant who fled when they fought Kazmojen and Prickles (in Part Six: Kazmojen), they discussed whether finding his things was good or bad.

“Hmmm… If his things are here maybe he hasn’t really ran away yet,” my daughter said.

“No,” my son disagreed. “I think he was so scared he left without any of his stuff. That means that he probably left without taking anymore slaves or anything with him.”

“We should chase him in case he has my friend Griffin!” my daughter decided.

“No! We should finish looking around in here for any more slaves. And Griffin.”

My husband had to weigh in with his opinion to settle the discussion and get us moving again. We continued through the Malachite Fortress, exploring the rooms we still hadn’t checked out. There was only one. The kitchen.

Preparing themselves for anther battle, everyone drew their weapons, and drank a scavenged potion or two. There were voices inside. Two chittering goblinoid voices, and an exasperated sounding man.

“Ugh,” the man’s voice groaned. “That’s a fork. I said I needed a spoon. A BIG SPOON.”

The goblinoid voices sounded like they were arguing some more.

“Hey!” Rabbity exclaimed. “That sounds like Griffin!”

Krylscar looked at Rabbity strangely. “You know Griffin?”

“Yeah!” exclaimed Rabbity. “He works at MY work. We are friends. His fiancé has been so sad since he was kidnapped that she NEVER stops crying. It is super annoying and super sad!”

Krylscar chucked. “Griffin’s been my friend since we were kids. Used to get into all kinds of scrapes. Until he settled down with that girl of his. Never saw him much, after that.” With a grim sort of look Krylscar nodded at the door. “Let’s do this.”

Rabbity and Krylscar opened the door, both leaping through and into the kitchen in a flash. Rabbity blasted one of the goblins with a wave of water before he even had time to react, while Krylscar stabbed the second.

At the sight of a pair of dying kitchen hands Griffin Malek screamed. And screamed. And screamed.

“It’s us, it’s us!” Rabbity said to him.

“AAAAAAAHHHHH! YOU JUST BARGED IN AND KILLED PEOPLE! Oh, I’m going to be in so much trouble!”

“What are you talking about, mate?” Krylscar asked. “You’re free. You’re welcome.”

“Kryl? You’re still alive?”

“Of course!” Krylscar replied. “Thought you were dead, though.”

“No, I bargained with Kazmojen to work as a cook. It earned me warm food and a bed. Plus, he promised he wouldn’t sell me. It’s a pretty sweet deal, by the way, so I’d appreciate you guys getting out of here before you mess it up!”

Krylscar laughed. “Ah, you weasel! Always were the smart one!”

“I thought you’d be dead for sure!” Griffin replied.

Krylscar laughed some more. “Yeah, they said they’d eat me if I didn’t start behaving. I said I hoped they’d choke! HA!”

Griffin laughed for a moment, then paled. “I would have had to cook you.”

Krylscar paused, suddenly thinking it wasn’t that funny anymore…

“You don’t need to worry about Kazmojen. We killed him. And his guards,” Rabbity pointed out. “Like… lots of them.”

“Lots of them or all of them?”

“Lots!” Rabbity exclaimed happily.

“Not good enough!” Griffin replied, crossing his arms. “I’m not leaving.”

“All of them,” Falco corrected.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

The bickering continued for a while, until Griffin finally relented. “Well, alright. But if you get me killed I’ll curse you with my dying breath.”

The group met up with Patch and the other survivors. They double/triple checked the complex, then headed for the elevator. They rode it up to Jzadirune, and then continued, walking through the confusing tangle of hallways and rough tunnels, until they arrived in Keygan Ghelve’s home. With a wave of her hands, Rabbity opened the door, revealing the bright red sun, rising over Cauldron.

The prisoners shielded their eyes. Some wept, some cheered, and some stood stunned. The saddest amongst them were still in shock.

“Welcome home!” Rabbity exclaimed

With shaky, hesitant steps, the prisoners returned to the streets of Cauldron.

We wrapped up there and my kids hopped out of their chairs, dancing and jumping and singing in triumph. We had just completed ‘Life’s Bazaar,’ book one of the Shackled City Adventure Path. Reason to celebrate! Plus? They honestly felt like heroes.

“This was great, Mom!” my son said.

“Yeah, what’s next?” my daughter asked.

“Oh, you’ll have to wait and see,” I told them. “But you should give some thought to what you want to do over the next few days or weeks in Cauldron. Think about it, so you’re ready for the next time we play.”

“Okay!” they shouted. As they started chattering over their plans, my husband grinned.

“XP?”

“Yes, you all get a level up.”

Cue the victory dance from my children.

We had a ton of fun playing ‘Life’s Bazaar.’ Next session we’re slowing things down a bit, and doing some roleplaying in Cauldron, before launching into the next chapter of the Shackled City Adventure Path: Drakthar’s Way.

Wish us luck!

Jessica

life's bazaar d20diaries shackled city beholder — Life’s Bazaar is the first adventure in the Shackled City Adventure Path.

Behind the Screen

The Shackled City Adventure Path is a difficult to get your hands on adventure path published in eleven separate Dungeon Magazines, or available in hardcover from Amazon here or from Paizo Publishing’s website here. The first adventure, Life’s Bazaar is available in Dungeon Magazine #97 from Paizo Publishing’s website here.

Despite being a 3.5 Dungeons and Dragons Adventure Path, we’re running this campaign with Pathfinder (both the campaign setting and the ruleset). Our characters utilize content from many sources, some of which are listed below.

The shaman and the bloodrager classes, as well as the bloodrager archetype spelleater, can all be found in the Advanced Class Guide. The urban bloodrager archetype can be found in Heroes of the Streets. The Kineticist class can be found in Occult Adventures. The monk and bard are base classes found in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Core Rulebook (or in a convenient travel-sized edition: Core Rulebook (Pocket Edition) while the prankster archetype for bards can be found in the Advanced Race Guide.

Shackled City: Part Seven: Bad Luck

Welcome back to Cauldron, home of the The Shackled City Adventure Path! When we last left off our heroic musicians were investigating a series of missing person cases which recently culminated in the abduction of four children from a local orphanage. Fate led to our characters taking the rescue of these people upon themselves! Although they’ve defeated down the kidnappers, and rescued the children, there’s plenty of other missing citizens of Cauldron to save. And their captors? Slavers! They’ll have to work fast if they want to save their fellow citizens before they’re sold!

The Shackled City Adventure Path is available for purchase in its entirety here. The first volume, Life’s Bazaar, is available for purchase here.

The Heroes

Our eccentric heroes are all members of ‘Dinorabbit,’ a musical band that changes its name frequently and was most previously known as ‘Boople Snoot.’ The band’s lead singer and song-writer is Falco Rhiavadi, a foppish noble bastard of mixed Tien descent whose father was devoured by a dragon when Falco was just a boy. A well-groomed, handsome man with an easy smile and a winning personality, Falco’s a black sheep among his family. Mechanically Falco is an oracle of life whose familiar is a jealous and demanding thrush named Ruby. Falco is played by my husband.

Mick Frimfrocket is a gnome with dark blue skin, bright pink hair that stands straight up on his head, and light blue eyes with flecks of red around his pupils. He’s energetic, bold, and loves nothing more than a good laugh! Mick acts as the band’s pianist and creative director. He’s the driving force behind the band’s constant name changes, and over-the-top performances. Mick was born in Jzadirune but was brought to the city of Cauldron to escape the Vanishing. Orphaned by the mysterious events and with few memories of those early years, Mick was raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same orphanage that recently had four children kidnpapped right from their beds! Determined to save those little scamps, Mick was very excited to take up this missing person’s case and follow it to its conclusion — particularly when he realized that it led to his one-time home. Mechanically Mick is a monk / bard (prankster) who attacks with wild kicks while playing his piano in battle. Partway through exploring Jzadirune he came into possession of a broken magical construct. He’s played by my seven-year old son.

Although that’s the last of our PCs, that’s not the last of our party. The members of Dinorabbit are also travelling with a half-orc janitor named Patch! Patch is a big, stuttering, fool who works at the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same place he was raised. Patch recently got recruited to the Last Laugh Thieve’s Guild and was asked to watch over an orphan named Terrem. Unfortunately, Terrem was kidnapped on the very evening that Patch went out to meet with with the guild. Distraught over the boy’s disappearance, Patch was pressured by Falco and Mick into helping them rescue the kids. And so, the poor one-eyed janitor finds himself heading into danger.

gms needs - tea and dice — My favourite mug and dice! Dice are Pathfinder Iron Gods Dice Set by Q-Workshop. Mug is Critical Hit D20 Mug by ThinkGeek.

The Adventure

Leaving behind Patch to watch over the children, our eclectic crew of musicians headed out onto a mysterious bridge, intent on saving as many people as they could. Falco casts a spell, sinding a trio or glowing orbs of light along the length of the bridge, then under it. The span was over thirty feet across, and below was a drop of nearly fifty feet into frigid, flowing water. They crossed in silence, finding themselves on a narrow landing. Ahead was a sturdy double door flanked by two massive statues of dwarven warriors. To both the left and the right the ledge continued, eventually ending at a smaller door. Unsure which way to go, Aeris approached the left doors.

Mick, followed by his stolen, unreliable, half-broken construct — whose primary job now was carrying sacks of loot — placed a hand on Aeris’ elbow. “Be careful of those statues. I have a bad feeling about this.

“I can put those fears to rest, I think,” Falco remarked grandly. Ruby, his colourful, demanding thrush sat perched upon his shoulder. He wove his hands around and cast another spell, causing his eyes to glow brightly. With his vision now capable of detecting magical auras he examined the statues. “They not animated constructs. No magical auras of any kind.” With a nod, he winked at Aeris. “You’ll be fine.”

“Unless they’re trapped,” Mick pointed out.

“Yes. Well, they’re not magically trapped,” Falco clarified.

“Maybe just the normal kind,” Mick worried.

Aeris sighed. “I can handle a few traps. Besides, we don’t have time for this.” Aeris approached the far left door, looked around cautiously, and opened it.

No traps. Yet.

The door opened into a large guard post, with a set of stone bunkbeds, a table, and some chairs. Another two doors exited the room at the far side. Sleeping in two of the beds were a pair of hobgoblin guards. Two others sat at the table playing some kind of gambling game involving stones and a rough dice.

Aeris leapt into action, charging into the room and swinging her sword at the nearest hobgoblin. Unfortunately, she wasn’t fast enough! The hobgoblins shouted out a loud alarm, waking their sleeping brethren and surely alerting any other enemies nearby. Aware that the last time a hobgoblin shouted an alarm down here they ended up fighting wave after wave of guards, the members of Dinorabbit knew they had to end this quickly!

From outside the room, Rabbity smiled at Prickles. “You stay here, okay? I’ll go check it out.” Rabbity rode Panthy into the room, took a quick peek around, and urged Panthy up onto one of the stone bunkbed’s top beds. Prickles listened and stayed behind.

That’s where our good luck ended.

You see, this past session we had the worst luck. Absolutely, the worst. We constantly — all four of us — rolled critical misses. Yup! A whole lot of ones. And our enemies? Critical hits! SO many critical hits! Despite coming up against weaker enemies nearly the entire session, we barely survived. And you know what? We counted ourselves lucky! It was brutal! Haha.

Back in the guard room the hobgoblins launched into action. They found chinks in our armour, gaps in our defences, and took advantage of our distraction! In short, they dismantled us! And those two armoured hobgoblins? They scored a whopping three critical hits before Aeris and Falco brought them down. As for the two sleeping hobgoblins? They leapt out of bed, grabbed a weapon, and fought unarmored. We missed them over and over again until — finally — Rabbity got a streak of luck (really, it was a pair of average rolls, haha) and took down those two wily hobgoblins in one kinetic blast a piece.

Heavily wounded and more than a little discouraged, our heroes remained alert for further enemies. Thankfully none came.

malachite fortress - d20diaries - crop — The Malachite Fortress!

They took a moment to loot the room, heal what wounds they could, and then moved on. Through the other door they found some swords swinging right at their faces! Yup, there were enemies on the other side of that door, and they were more than prepared for our heroes! With crossed fingers we headed into battle…. only to face more bad luck! Two hobgoblin guards battled Aeris in tight quarters, while another hobgoblin — this one with only one arm — brought a burning hot iron near the face of a captive female human woman across the room.

Aeris tried to get into the room and past the hobgoblins — no luck! She tried to distract the one-armed torturer — no luck! She resorted to fighting her way past the hobgoblins — no luck! Curse their fine armour!

Really, it was curse my luck! I never rolled higher than a 2, and those were the good rolls! We’re a fan of using critical hit and miss cards in our sessions, so my constant 1s caused me to stab myself, exhaust myself, and lower my own AC due to clumsiness.

Perfect.

Aeris’ allies offered support from behind. Falco threw hexes to curse the enemies, Mick performed some inspiring music, and Rabbity… Well she didn’t help Aeris. Instead she shot kinetic blasts past Aeris, through the doorway, and past the guards, in an effort to hit the torturer in the back.

Which miraculously worked. It was our only good roll of the fight! Angry, the torturer turned and left the prisoner alone, turning his attention to… Aeris. Cause she was in the way. Haha.

As the battle raged on Aeris was forced to retreat, and the hobgoblins filtered into the next room. This exposed the weaker party members to melee combat, but it also allowed more of them to attack the hobgoblins. In the end the members of Dinorabbit won the fight, but only due to greater numbers. And an angry howler who bit a hobgoblin’s head right off!

My daughter was very proud of Prickles. Until he leaped into the fray like a maniac and started eating the hobgoblins alive. The others backed up in worry. But, it wasn’t until Prickles approached the chained up human that Rabbity started to get nervous….

With great effort and distractions she managed to get the howler under control. Aeris quickly freed the woman — whose name was Coryston Pike — and helped her out of the room. They chatted with the poor woman for a short time — turned out she was an ex-adventurer — then brought her out to Patch. They repositioned the half-orc and his charges a bit, and asked them to wait. Mick called over his construct and searched through his sacks of loot. He pulled out a shortbow, arrows, quiver, short sword, and leather armour, and gave it to the woman. With well-practised hands she strapped on her armour and gear.

In a final parting, Falco asked Coryston, “How many others prisoners are there?”

Coryston looked grim. “Not nearly enough. Plenty were sold.” After a moment of thought she added, “No more than ten.”

My kids and husband checked their list of missing persons then frowned. If they only found ten more, lots would go unaccounted for. Rabbity hoped her friend, Griffin, would be among them.

Continuing on they found the cell block. Cell after cell was empty. Finally, near the end, they found a few prisoners. The first was a man who had been beaten unconscious. The second was a young man named Deven Myrzal who was huddled in the corner of his cell, terrified they were hobgoblins coming to eat him — as they had promised they would. The next cell had an equally scared and despondent woman named Irruth Mercadi. Rabbity tried to convince the pair that they were safe, but the sight of Prickles did little to help her cause.

Meanwhile, Aeris freed one more. Jasper Drundlesput, an obsessed mathematician who grinned at the sight of her.

“Ah, the odds! The odds indeed! Not in my favour, were they? And look! Here we are. Such a small chance of rescue! And YOU! Such a small chance of success! Smaller even, yes!”

Aeris gave her head a shake and continue checking the cells, while Mick bonded with the gnome. My son thought he was amazing. Haha.

And the rest of the cells? Empty. There were less than ten prisoners.

My daughter freaked out for a bit. Her friend wasn’t here! Was he sold already? She sure hoped not!

Falco healed the unconscious man and learned that his name was Krylscar Endercott, an ex-guard. The boisterous fellow demanded some gear and insisted on helping them out. With a shrug Mick sifted through the gear and gave him some armour and weapons. Falco and Aeris led the freed prisoners back out to Patch. Thus prepared, they continued on… Finding nothing. It was a dead end.

Mick pointed at the bare walls. “Check for secret doors! This place LOVES secret doors.” After only a few minutes they found one. It led to a strange shaped room with another construct in it! This one had big hammers for hands. The construct reached up and pushed on a lever. There was a loud grinding sound, but they couldn’t see what had happened.

Mick tried to command the construct like he did his own! …And it didn’t work. The construct tried to smash in his head.

“New plan!” Mick shouted as he ducked the hammer blows. “Break it!”

Easier said than done! The battle was tough, and just as they thought they had finally won the fight, Rabbity felt something whack against her ears! She look behind her, but only found a wall. Every turned and stared at the wall suspiciously… A few seconds later they saw a metal hammer swing right through the wall at Rabbity again!

Half of the group was super confused, but Mick grinned. “Illusion!” With a laugh he added, “That’s really clever!”

“It’s horrible!” Rabbity shouted.

Luckily, this construct turned out to be the only fight of the day where we didn’t have horrible luck. We had average luck. Which was a huge relief! Heavily wounded but alive, the group took a break.

“We should rest somewhere,” Mick said.

But Rabbity shook her head. “No! There could be more people here! And if we wait they might get sold! Or DEAD!” She said ‘dead’ with such drama. It was adorable.

With a begrudging nod, Mick agreed. “You’re right. Let’s go.”

Exploring the room they found another illusory wall hiding another room and lever. Nothing else. Curiously, they pulled the levers. A pair of blocks slid out of the way and disappeared into the wall revealing two more cell blocks. With a cheer of excitement, Mick and Rabbity hurried in.

The cells were empty.

Every one.

With a sigh and some frowns the group continued on. In time they found another secret door. Aeris stepped inside and the floor fell out from under her feet.

“Pit trap!” my son shouted with a laugh.

Aeris took a maximum damage — surprising no one — and clambered out. After some further healing the group moved on. With nowhere left to go they did a little backtracking and checked out some other doors. Eventually they discovered Kazmojen’s bedroom — which was disgusting. It was filled with mounds of bones, gore, and plenty of gross furnishings. Prickles wandered in and sat in a mound of mold that was clearly his bed. Deciding to let him relax there for a bit the gang continued on and discovered a hidden treasure chamber filled with gems, coins, armour, weapons, a massive gong, and a trio of treasure chests. My kids were very suspicious of the chests. One was bound in iron, one looked like it had a mouth and was covered in blood, and the third had a fancy dagger on the lid.

mimic - shackled city - malachite fortress — More bad luck!

“Mimic!” My son exclaimed. “That one with a mouth is BOUND to be a mimic! I know it!”

Aeris approached closer. She discovered the dagger chest was trapped, the iron one was locked, and the mouth chest….

Not a mimic!

But the gong behind the chest was!

“AHHHH! I DID NOT EXPECT THE GONG!” my son exclaimed. “But I should count as right anyway!”

The gong-mimic slammed into Aeris, (with a critical hit!) wrapped her up, and chomped on her. She fought and struggled, but couldn’t escape. “It’s like glue!” she told her companions. “Don’t touch it!” As the mimic kept gnawing on her she gave up trying to escape and instead pulled out a dagger, trying to wound the beast as much as she could before she died. The group tried their best to battle the beast from afar, but the mimic surged forward and slammed into Falco next (with another critical hit!). With both of them being crushed by the sticky mimic, it was up to Mick and Rabbity to claim victory.

critical fail 2 Oh, look! More critical fails from our heroes!

In the end the group barely pulled through with both Falco and Aeris a turn away from death. Whew! We were lucky to survive!

Deciding we’d had enough bad luck for the night, we packed up our dice, markers, and papers. Whatever surprises were left for us in the Malachite Fortress would have to wait for another time.

Until then,

Jessica

Behind the Screen

Shackled City: Part Six: Kazmojen

Welcome back to Cauldron, home of the The Shackled City Adventure Path! When we last left off our heroic musicians were investigating a series of missing person cases which recently culminated in the abduction of four children from a local orphanage. Fate led to our characters taking the rescue of these people upon themselves! They’ve tracked down the kidnappers, and discovered an underground complex run by slavers. They’ll have to work fast if they want to save their fellow citizens before they’re sold!

If none of this sounds familiar you can read this blog post, which details our characters, or continue on with this article to hear a quick summary and jump right into the action! You can also check out our previous adventures in Shackled City: Part One, Shackled City: Part Two: A Mystery!, Shackled City: Part Three: Jzadirune, Shackled City: Part Four: Enter the Malachite Fortress, and Shackled City: Part Five: This Place is the Pits!

The Shackled City Adventure Path is available for purchase in its entirety here. The first volume, Life’s Bazaar, is available for purchase here.

The Heroes

Our eccentric heroes are all members of ‘Dinorabbit,’ a musical band that changes its name frequently and was most previously known as ‘Boople Snoot.’ The band’s lead singer and song-writer is Falco Rhiavadi, a foppish noble bastard of mixed Tien descent whose father was devoured by a dragon when Falco was just a boy. A well-groomed, handsome man with an easy smile and a winning personality, Falco’s a black sheep among his family. Mechanically Falco is an oracle of life whose familiar is a jealous and demanding thrush named Ruby. Falco is played by my husband.

Mick Frimfrocket is a gnome with dark blue skin, bright pink hair that stands straight up on his head, and light blue eyes with flecks of red around his pupils. He’s energetic, bold, and loves nothing more than a good laugh! Mick acts as the band’s pianist and creative director. He’s the driving force behind the band’s constant name changes, and over-the-top performances. Mick was born in Jzadirune but was brought to the city of Cauldron to escape the Vanishing. Orphaned by the mysterious events and with few memories of those early years, Mick was raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same orphanage that recently had four children kidnpapped right from their beds! Determined to save those little scamps, Mick was very excited to take up this missing person’s case and follow it to its conclusion — particularly when he realized that it led to his one-time home. Mechanically Mick is a monk / bard (prankster) who attacks with wild kicks while playing his piano in battle. Partway through exploring Jzadirune he came into possession of a broken magical construct. He’s played by my seven-year old son.

the team - malachite fortress — The team!

The Adventure

Our eclectic crew of musicians, janitors, and locksmiths, retraced their steps and re-entered the forge. Our heroes had battled enemy hobgoblins and goblins here two sessions ago in an effort to free three citizens of Cauldron who had been labouring here. With the battle won they sent their travelling companion, Keygan Ghelve, off with the freed prisoners. It was his job to bring them back up to the city and see them safely to the Church of Adabar.

In the time since they had taken down dozens of hobgoblin guards, but knew there could be more. Seeing nothing amiss Mick headed over to the door they had yet to peek through. He listened against it but couldn’t make out anything. Opening the door led to a large dining room lined with benches and tables. It was empty at the moment, but stray dishes on the tabletop and a distant murmuring told them that enemies were not far away. The group quickly did a sweep of the room, listening at all the various doors. Three were silent, one sounded like a kitchen, and the last was very noisy. My family discussed their options. Noise might mean trouble, but the kitchen probably mean someone banging on a loud pot which could sound an alarm. And silence meant…

They weren’t sure.

Curious, my kids decided they should check out the quiet room first. They found a threadbare living room that slept at least three people, a pantry, and a larder. Nothing of interest. They moved towards the kitchen, when suddenly Panthy prickled up her ears. She wandered over to the noisy door and growled….

getting ready for game night - shackled city - malachite fortress — Game night!

“What is it, Panthy?” Rabbity asked. “You hear something?” Rabbity pricked her ears around. “I think… I think I hear a kid crying!”

“Well hurry up!” Mick exclaimed.

“Wait!” Falco proclaimed. He whispered something to his bird.

Ruby tweeted back melodically.

Mick drank a few defensive potions, Aeris drew her sword and Patch worried. When they were prepared, Falco quietly cracked open the door and peeked inside.

The room very large, with a raised stage in the back topped by three iron posts. Chains dangled from the top of the posts, ending at the manacled hands of three children. The kids from the orphanage! On the steps stood a strange figure in ill-fitting armour who looked like a mix between a dwarf and a troll. He clutched a fourth child by a chain around its neck and waved the kids face in front of another figure, this one a soft-looking gnomish fellow with blue skin, orange hair, and massive glasses.

“He’s good!” The troll-man bellowed.

“Oh, I don’t know about that Kazmojen!” the gnome-like creature argued. “I agreed I’d pay fifty gold for each child, but this one… This one is defective! There’s something about him I just can’t put my finger on.”

“Nonsense!” Kazmojen argued. “He’s got… spirit! Yes! Break him and he work harder than others. Forty-five!”

The gnome shook his head. “Oh, much too much work… And he spits!”

As if to punctuate this point the child spit in the gnome-like creature’s face. “I bite too!” he grinned.

Kazmojen yanked the child around by the chains clamped tight around his neck. Behind them a strange beast shifted. The quills that coated its back shook back and forth at the movement. The beast stretched its quadrupedal form and growled. It looked like some sort of quilled dog monster. A very large quilled dog monster.

While the trio argued over the cost of the kids, four other hobgoblins guarded the chamber. Two at a pair of double doors, one at a door across the room, and one at the door that Falco was peeking through.

“That’s Terrem they’re f-f-fighting over!” Patch whispered.

“The child that the Last Laugh Thieve’s Guild wanted you to protect?” Min asked back.

Patch nodded with worry.

“Ruby!” Falco whispered. “Do the thing!”

The bird fluttered into the room, chirping insults loudly in it’s sweet little voice. “HEY UGLY, OVER HERE!”

As the various ugly enemies turned to look at the offending bird, Rabbity shoved an invisibility potion in Panthy’s mouth with a clever grin. Then she pushed the door open hard so it smacked the hobgoblin on the other side in the back of the head. Rabbity clamped a hand over her mouth and giggled. Then she crouched down and whispered into the ear — she hoped — of her invisible panther.

Patch was too worried over the children — Terrem in particular — to wait any longer. He hurried into the room pointed at the people talking and stammered, “L-l-let the children g-g-go!”

Panthy slunk away from Rabbity — although what the panther was doing was a mystery. Mick stepped casually into the room and whistled a little tune. Then he made a funny face at the hobgoblin guard near the door. The guard let out a laugh. Then a giggle. With a confused look on his face he started laughing at the top of his lungs, then fell to the ground and laughed some more. Mick gave the hobgoblin a wink and casually stepped over him and into the room.

Aeris dashed into the room and held her sword out at the two slavers. “Leave the children or die!”

Falco stepped into the room and whacked the laughing hobgoblin in the head with his fine walking stick. Meanwhile, Ruby continued to taunt the hobgoblins. Rabbity managed to send a blast of water at another hobgoblin before the tall figure — Kazmojen — let out a loud laugh. He pointed at Patch. “You can’t have those three,” he said with a gesture at the crying chilling chained to the posts. “Them bought already. But you can have the biter. Forty-five gold!” Then he turned his hideous face on Aeris and pointed at her. “Kill.”

The dog-beast let out a loud howl and took a few paces forward.

“Now, now, Kazmojen. Kill HER you mean! Yes? Not kill me! Certainly not!” The little gnomish fellow hurried up the steps to the back of the room and hid behind an iron post.

Finally the hobgoblins leapt into action. One tried to shoot down the irritating bird, while the others moved to attack Patch. He took a few heavy blows and already looked near death! The battle had barely even started! Clutching his daggers tightly Patch fought back against the hobgoblins, with Mick soon joining him.

facing off against kazmojen — The epic battle against Kazmojen, Prickles, and his minions! My daughter can be seen calculating the results of her rolls on the flip-mat.

Aeris swung her blade at Kazmojen, but struck only his sturdy armour. Seeing her outnumbered, Falco hurried over and placed a hex on the leader, lowering his AC. Suddenly Panthy leapt upon Kazmojen, biting, and clawing, and tearing! His armour deflected most of the blows, but Panthy’s teeth tore a hole in the back of his leg. Kazmojen roared in pain and anger, while Rabbity laugh.

Kazmojen pointed at the Panthy. “Prickles, KILL.”

Prickles looked from Aeris to Panthy, trying to decide which looked most tasty. Apparently deciding the panther was the winner, the dog-beast turned on Panthy.

“NO!” Rabbity exclaimed. She raced closer to the dog-beast, pointed at Kazmojen, and shouted, “KILL, Prickles! KILL MASTER!”

Kazmojen scowled at the rabbitfolk. Meanwhile, Prickles turned to consider this predicament. After a few moments he bit Kazmojen! The troll-man roared in outrage and swung his axe at Rabbity, but the nimble little kineticist dodged backwards. Taking advantage of his distraction Terrem yanked his chain away from Kazmojen’s grasp and made a break for it, running across the hall an out of the main doors.

“I’m out of here!”the strange gnomish fellow exclaimed. Then he, too, turned and fled. One of the guards fled with him.

The battle raged on. Mick and Patch took down the hobgoblin guards with daggers and wild kicks. Falco kept up his hexes, lowering Kazmojen’s defences and foiling his aim. Rabbity shot water blasts at Kazmojen from afar, while Aeris fought him in melee with her sword. It was a tough fight! Patch went down halfway through and, with no time to go heal the poor fellow, all they could do was hope he would survive. Kazmojen turned most of his attention to Aeris, nearly knocking her unconscious multiple times. If not for Falco’s constant healing near the end of the fight she would have died.

A short while after Terrem fled they heard his scream. A deep, gravelly voice told him “YOU SHOULD NOT BE HERE, TERREM KARATYS.”

Mick dashed over to the main doors and whipped them open, hurrying off to help Terrem. He caught a glimpse of a massive floating head, covered with eyestalks and a huge central eye.

A beholder!

“COME TERREM! I SHALL RETURN YOU TO YOUR HOME.”

There was a sudden flicker of magic, and the beholder and Terrem both vanished.

“B… Be… BEHOLDER!” Mick stammered in shock. “He… Kid… OH, NO!”

By the time Mick rejoined the fight, Kazmojen had fallen and Prickles was eating him.

Exhausted and bleeding from dozens of wounds, Aeris dropped her sword and fell to her knees. Falco and Mick quickly gave her and Patch what healing they could. They drank the rest of their potion reserves and searched the room in the hopes of finding more. Aeris freed the children, while Patch gave them all hugs.

“Terrem?” Falco asked Mick.

Mick shook his head. “Kidnapped by a beholder,” he whispered.

“What? Why would — Huh?” After a moment of shock Falco shook his head and hurried over to the other exit. He peered through the door and saw a bridge, but no signs of the gnome.

“We have to hurry and follow that weaselly guy! He might be about to leave with some slaves.” Mick urged.

Falco walked over to the children. “What’s that way?” he asked them.

Most were too scared to reply, but one of the children, a dwarven boy named Deakon, found his voice. “Cells! That’s where they kept us! Over the bridge and through the door. There’s a whole hallway lined with cells. I… I don’t know how many had people in them, but at least some did. I could hear them.”

Falco thanked Deakon, then beckoned Patch over. “We need to hurry and free everyone else. Patch, you’re in charge of the children. Wait here and wait for my signal. When its safe you can cross the bridge after us. We’ll keep it up as we explore, all right? Hopefully we can keep you guys safe, but if not, it’s up to you to flee with the kids. Get them back to the church.”

Patch nodded with a look of determination in his eye. He tried to stammer out an affirmation, but couldn’t find the words. Instead he nodded again. Then he kept Deakon and the two silent girls close.

Rabbity stood over the quilled dog. “Can we keep him?” she asked the others.

Aeris shook her head. “Rabbity, that’s… that’s not a dog. You can’t keep it as a pet. It’s a howler. They’re foul creature from the Abyss that feed on fear.”

Rabbity shook her head. “What? Nonsense! We’re going to be the best of friends! Aren’t we, Prickles?”

Prickles looked at Rabbity a moment. He growled… then stopped. He stretched his legs and back, and growled.

“We can’t keep it Rabbity,” Aeris repeated. “In fact, we should probably kill it.”

“Nuh-uh! He’s my friend! And he’s coming with us.” Rabbity hopped on top of Panthy, adjusted her saddle, and loped off towards the door and bridge.

Prickles watched the rabbitfolk go. Then he looked long and hard at Aeris with eyes that showed far more intelligence than a normal animal. He growled at her.

Aeris adjusted her stance and clutched her blade tightly. Howlers were fierce opponents…

Prickles growled some more, then snorted in derision. It turned from her and followed Rabbity out onto the bridge.

“Well, shit.” Aeris remarked.

And so, having ‘befriended’ a howler, Rabbity, Mick, Aeris, and Falco continue hurried across the bridge, intent on saving what people they could.

As I packed up our gear and calculated experience, my daughter grinned. “Prickles is going to be my best friend.”

I tried to explain just how horrible a howler was. Even pulled out its picture.

My daughter just grinned. “Aww, cutie!”

“It’s not cute at all,” I retorted.

“Yes, it is! And we will be best friends! And Panthy, too!”

Faced with her chipper smile, I laughed. If she wanted to try to befriend a howler, I wouldn’t stop her. It had been raised to be a guard dog. And Rabbity was both great with animals, and diplomatic. Perhaps she could control it. But, control wouldn’t keep a howler alive or content. They lived to sow terror, and kill.

Rabbity would have her hands full.

How could it go wrong?! Right?

Wish her luck!

Jessica

Behind the Screen

Relics and Rarities a True Treasure!

Last night marked the first episode of the exciting new fantasy role-playing game series: Relics and Rarities! Hosted and DMed by the delightful Deborah Ann Woll who you might (should!) recognize from the shows True Blood, Daredevil, Defenders, and Punisher, or the new movie Escape Room, this show features the talents of Julia Dennis, Tommy Walker, Xander Jeanneret, and Jasmine Bhullar. In addition, each episode features a special celebrity guest which includes Sam Richardson, Janina Gavankah, Simone Missick, Kevin Smith, Matthew Lillard, and Charlie Cox. Relics and Rarities is presented by Geek & Sundry and streams weekly on Alpha (ProjectAlpha.com). They’ll be playing Dungeons & Dragons, set in a world created by Deborah Ann Woll.

Honestly? I’ve been excited about this show since it was announced! And with the recent reveal of the special guest line-up? Well, how could I resist?

“I’m so excited to finally announce my new show, Relics and Rarities,” Woll said in a statement. “We’ve assembled a stellar creative team, along with amazingly intricate set design, props and puzzles, a hilarious and surprising cast – and an original world and campaign of my own creation.” She added, “You’ll have to watch to see what tricks I have up my sleeve.”

“Welcoming fans who have not yet experienced collaborative storytelling is an established mission of Geek & Sundry,” said Legendary Digital Networks (LDN) SVP of Production and Programming, Jason Corey in a statement. Corey added, “Partnering with Deborah Ann Woll has been a dream come true for us. We’re thrilled to be able to elevate and broaden the platform for a female Dungeon Master and to expand the fandom for this unique and exciting genre.”

Relics and Rarities begins in the town of Bellbrook when four adventurers receive a mysterious letter and are summoned to an unassuming curio shop, Relics and Rarities, by Professor Roundland. The good professor informs the team that strange occurrences have been plaguing Bellbrook, and she’d like to hire them to investigate. The first stop? Professor Roundland contacted a seer who has recently helped the R&R (Relics and Rarities) Brigade before only to discover that she was plagued by something… supernatural. The team is dispatched to visit the seer at her home, Benthem Manor, and hopefully put things right. But, the mystery behind this manor is just the beginning. By the end of the episode it’s clear that our heroes will need to foil an unholy prophecy before it can come to fruition. They have their work cut out for them!

The first episode, Haunting at Bentham Manor, was absolutely amazing! The set was spectacular, the adventure was both enthralling and suspenseful, and the props were above and beyond what I imagined they would be. Deborah was a wonderful Dungeon Master, full of enthusiasm and a love of the game. She was an absolute joy to watch. The cast is great. They’ve got enjoyable characters, great chemistry, and every single one of them was hilarious. Guest star, Matthew Lillard, was a wonderful choice for the first episode. As the owner of Beadle & Grimm’s Pandemonium warehouse he’s no stranger to role-playing game, of course, but honestly, he was also just… amazing. Engaging, amusing, the whole deal.

Relics and Rarities was well-planned, inventive, and atmospheric. There was mystery, suspense, problem solving, and some delightful puzzles (my young kids and I particularly loved the puzzle door). The props made my kids gasp in jealousy at every single one (and there were a lot!). The cast was entertaining, and the set was very rich in detail. Best of all, the story was engaging — we laughed a lot, shed some tears (yes, I cried), and my daughter ran away in terror during the first battle. Oh, that creative ghost sound use. Way to give her nightmares, guys! Poor thing. Haha. As for my son, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so amazed with anything he’s watched before. He was amazed and literally captivated the entire time. We were absolutely blown away! Not sure I can stress that enough, actually.

But, in summary: it’s awesome. I honestly can’t think of a single thing to complain about.

Want to check out Relics and Rarities yourself? You really, really should! Episodes air Mondays at 6pm PT on Alpha, but its also available on demand. Not a member of Alpha? Neither was I! New members can sign up for a free seven day trial with the code RELICS. After that Alpha membership costs $4.99 American per month, or $49.99 every 12 months.

I cannot wait to see where it goes from here!

Jessica

Shackled City: Part Five: This Place is the Pits!

Welcome back to Cauldron, home of the The Shackled City Adventure Path! When we last left off our heroic musicians were investigating a series of missing person cases which recently culminated in the abduction of four children from a local orphanage. Fate led to our characters taking the rescue of these people upon themselves! They’ve tracked down the kidnappers, and discovered an underground complex run by slavers. They’ll have to work fast if they want to save their fellow citizens before they’re sold!

If none of this sounds familiar you can read this blog post, which details our characters, or continue on with this article to hear a quick summary and jump right into the action! You can also check out our previous adventures in Shackled City: Part One, Shackled City: Part Two: A Mystery!, Shackled City: Part Three: Jzadirune, and Shackled City: Part Four: Enter the Malachite Fortress.

The Shackled City Adventure Path is available for purchase in its entirety here. The first volume, Life’s Bazaar, is available for purchase here.

The Heroes

Our eccentric heroes are all members of ‘Dinorabbit,’ a musical band that changes its name frequently and was most previously known as ‘Boople Snoot.’ The band’s lead singer and song-writer is Falco Rhiavadi, a foppish noble bastard of mixed Tien descent whose father was devoured by a dragon when he was just a boy. A well-groomed, handsome man with an easy smile and a winning personality, Falco’s a black sheep among his family. Mechanically Falco is an oracle of life whose familiar is a jealous and demanding thrush named Ruby. Falco is played by my husband.

Mick Frimfrocket is a gnome with dark blue skin, bright pink hair that stands straight up on his head, and light blue eyes with flecks of red around his pupils. He’s energetic, bold, and loves nothing more than a good laugh! Mick acts as the band’s pianist and creative director. He’s the driving force behind the band’s constant name changes, and over-the-top performances. Mick was born in Jzadirune but was brought to the city of Cauldron to escape the Vanishing. Orphaned by the mysterious events and with few memories of those early years, Mick was raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same orphanage that recently had four children kidnpapped right from their beds! Determined to save those little scamps, Mick was very excited to take up this missing person’s case and follow it to its conclusion — particularly when he realized that it led to his one-time home. Mechanically Mick is a monk / bard (prankster) who attacks with wild kicks while playing his piano in battle. Partway through exploring Jzadirune he came into possession of a broken magical construct. He’s played by my seven-year old son.

shackled city jzadirune group — The team!

The Adventure

Our eclectic crew of musicians, janitors, and locksmiths, stood in an empty forge which had clearly been the site of a slaughter. Our heroes had battled enemy hobgoblins and goblins only moments before in an effort to free three citizens of Cauldron who had been labouring here. With the battle won they sent their travelling companion, Keygan Ghelve, off with the freed prisoners. It was his job to bring them back up to the city and see them safely to the Church of Adabar.

The group spent a moment catching their breath, whispered a few prayers for the people they had saved, then turned their attention to their surroundings.

“…Right!” my son decreed.

We opened the right door and found ourselves in a cross shaped hallway with a variety of doors. There was the echo of muffled conversation in the air, with at least one of these nearby rooms inhabited. Warily, Aeris led the way forward. But as she reached the intersection she cursed! There were a pair of hobgoblin guards on watch at both ends of the hall! The pulled out their bows and grinned.

“Meal time, boys!” one of them bellowed. The muffled voices from the nearby rooms took up the call.

“Uh-oh,” my husband remarked.

Rabbity shot a blast of water at the nearest guard and leapt off Panthy.

“Eat the next person you see come out of there!” she commanded her panther as she gestured at the nearby door.

Panthy growled and prepared to fight. Meanwhile the guards pulled out their bows and fired arrows at our heroes. Aeris took a few hits, but Rabbity’s quick reflexes saved her from injury. Aeris moved to step forward only to have the ground fall out beneath her feet! Pit trap! She launched herself across the pit and came up in a roll, landing on the far side. With a backward glance she called out, “Watch your step!” Then she lunged forward and moved right up beside the hobgoblins. Finding their bows useless in close quarters they snarled at her.

“This won’t save your friends!”

“We’ll see,” Aeris replied defiantly.

Back on he other side of the pit Mick stood in the centre of the room and cast a magic spell, summoning his grand piano right into the hall. Then he began to play a happy little tune. As he played he danced, kicking his legs wildly. Falco pulled out a tanglefoot bag and tossed it at the guards on the other side of the intersection.

“Patch! Get in here! Are there any more traps?”

“I d-d-don’t know!” Patch stammered nervously. “I’ll ch-check!” He hurried into the room and looked around. “Yup! M-m-m-more pits right beh-h-hind us.”

“Where?”

“Here and there and w-w-well… Everywhere!”

“Don’t moooooove!” Mick sang. “Got it! Hold your grounnnnd, hold your grounnnnd, watch your steeeeeeep!”

“Aww man!” shouted Rabbity. “This place is the PITS!”

My daughter grinned. “Get it, Mom? Pits! And there are pit traps around us! Hahahahahaha! That’s so funny.”

I laughed.

malachite fortress - shackled city - this place is the pits - d20diaries — “This place is the PITS!” (Room M22 with surrounding guard and bunkrooms).

Suddenly a door beside Rabbity opened. Panthy launched herself at the offending door-opener, clamping down on their neck with her jaws and tearing at them with sharp claws.

“I hope that’s a bad guy,” my daughter remarked a little too late.

Luckily it was an enemy. But, even as they fell to the panther, more hobgoblin soldiers gathered in the room behind him. Hobgoblins crowded into the side hallways from the other nearby rooms, trying to get at at the intruders. A pair lunged at Mick only to get a kick to the face for their trouble. Rabbity splashed away with her water blasts from the centre of the group. Panthy fought with tooth and claw, and Patch leaped over the hidden pit and moved into melee with the southern archers. Luckily, as much as the odds were against them, only so many hobgoblins could engage the group at once. The battle was long and fierce, but soon our heroes thinned the enemies ranks until only a pair of hobgoblins remained. Aeris, bloodied and out of breath from taking on the northern guards, leapt back over the pit and helped her companions finish off the stragglers.

They waited for a while…. Out of breath and wounded… Weapons clutched in hand…

“What are we waiting for?” Rabbity asked the others quietly.

“Heroes always wait dramatically,” Mick answered wisely.

Rabbity waited another moment… “But it’s boring.”

“Heroes deal with it anyway,” Mick replied.

Aeris, who hates wasting time, checked out the side rooms, searching enemies and chambers for useful gear. They found a cache of healing potions in a nearby guardroom and drank what they could. Patch leaped back over the hidden pit trap and told the group.

“There’s v-v-voices on the other side. D-d-doesn’t sound like pris-s-soners.”

“We go the other way, then,” Rabbity announced. “We need to find Griffin before he gets SOLD!”

At Rabbity’s insistence the group crossed the northern pit trap and entered the far northern room.

malachite fortress - book - shackled city - d20diaires

It lead to a grand square chamber with a massive chain-draped statue in the centre of the room.

“If that attacks me, I’ll be angry!” Mick exclaimed. “You go first, Aeris.”

“My hero,” Aeris replied with a roll of her eyes. She drew her longsword and moved forward, but the statue never moved. …The chains did! They thrashed and lashed at Aeris! She parried the chains and backed up. “Get out of its reach!”

The gang hurried back out of the hall and attacked it from afar. Being mostly immobile and draped all over a statue, the chains proved little trouble. All it took was time.

The band continued on, finding two secret passages and pair of grand double doors. One of the secret doors they discovered led back to the original entry hall, so they returned to the statue chamber. They pushed open the double door to find a massive bridge. Falco created some magical lights and sent them across the bridge. They illuminated a rough stone cavern that stretched farther than they could see. Far below the bridge was an underground river.

“Hmmm…” Mick grumbled. “The riddle said we would find the kids in the Malachite Hold. That place over there is just… rock.”

“It probably leads to the Darklands,” Falco announced. “It stands to reason. They need to sell their slaves to someone, and there’s no other settlements nearby. Not that would buy slaves, that is.”

Rabbity twitched her nose. “I do NOT want to go to the Darklands…. Let’s turn around. We need to finish exploring the fortress.”

“Agreed.” replied Aeris. She ushered everyone inside, shut the doors, and barred them. Then she listened at the second secret door. “Sounds quiet.”

“I think that prisoners would be noisy. They would cry and stuff,” my daughter pointed out. “And we missed some rooms back near the forge where we found those prisoners.”

“Oh, yeah! I want to go back that way! I had a good feeling about that forge-door!”

My husband, who clearly wondered what was behind the secret door right in front of him, chuckled. “Alright, alright. We’ll go there next.” As the gang got ready to retrace their steps and continue their exploration, we tidied up and got the kids ready for bed. Saving the prisoners would have to wait for another day.

Thanks for joining us, everyone! I hope you enjoyed getting to hear a bit about our crazy adventures. We’ll see you again soon!

Jessica

Behind the Screen

Shackled City: Part Four: Enter the Malachite Fortress

Today we’re heading back into Cauldron, home of the The Shackled City Adventure Path!

When we last left off our heroic musicians were investigating a series of missing person cases which recently culminated in the abduction of four children from a local orphanage. Fate led to our characters taking the rescue of these people upon themselves! If none of this sounds familiar you can read this blog post first, which details our characters, or continue on with this article to read a quick summary and jump right into the action! You can also check out our previous adventures in Shackled City: Part One, Shackled City: Part Two: A Mystery!, and Shackled City: Part Three: Jzadirune.

The Shackled City Adventure Path is available for purchase in its entirety here. The first volume, Life’s Bazaar, is available for purchase here.

The Heroes

Our eccentric heroes are all members of ‘Dinorabbit,’ a musical band that changes its name frequently and was most previously known as ‘Boople Snoot.’ The band’s lead singer and song-writer is Falco Rhiavadi, a foppish noble bastard of mixed Tien descent whose father was devoured by a dragon when he was just a boy. A well-groomed, handsome man with an easy smile and a winning personality, Falco’s a black sheep among his family. Mechanically Falco is an oracle of life whose familiar is a jealous and demanding thrush named Ruby. Falco is played by my husband.

Mick Frimfrocket is a gnome with dark blue skin, bright pink hair that stands straight up on his head, and light blue eyes with flecks of red around his pupils. He’s energetic, bold, and loves nothing more than a good laugh! Mick acts as the band’s pianist and creative director. He’s the driving force behind the band’s constant name changes, and over-the-top performances. Mick was born in Jzadirune but was brought to the city of Cauldron to escape the Vanishing. Orphaned by the mysterious events and with few memories of those early years, Mick was raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same orphanage that recently had four children kidnpapped right from their beds! Determined to save those little scamps, Mick was very excited to take up this missing person’s case and follow it to its conclusion — particularly when he realized that it led to his one-time home. Mechanically Mick is a monk / bard (prankster) who attacks with wild kicks while playing his piano in battle. Partway through exploring Jzadirune he came into possession of a broken magical construct. He’s played by my seven-year old son.

Although that’s the last of our PCs, that’s not the last of our party. The members of Dinorabbit are also travelling with two NPCs: Patch, the half-orc janitor, and Keygan Ghelve, a local locksmith.

Patch is a big, stuttering, fool who works at the Lantern Street Orphanage — the very same place he was raised. Patch recently got recruited to the Last Laugh Thieve’s Guild and was asked to watch over an orphan named Terrem. Unfortunately, Terrem was kidnapped on the very evening that Patch went out to meet with with the guild. Distraught over the boy’s disappearance, Patch was pressured by Falco and Mick into helping them rescue the kids. And so, the poor one-eyed janitor finds himself heading into danger.

Keygan Ghelve is a gnome locksmith and competitor of Aeris’. He’s also the reason people are going missing! Months ago strange creatures came up from Keygan’s basement — which leads to the abandoned gnomish enclave of Jzadirune — and kidnapped his rat familiar! They forced Keygan to forge them a set of skeleton keys that can open the locks he’d installed in Cauldron, and a list of all his customers. In the months since, skulks and dark creepers have used his home as a way station, heading out into the city, abducting people from their homes, and dragging them back underground through his basement. Keygan feels guilty, but he’s more worried over his rat than anything! The members of Dinorabbit followed clues that led to Keygan’s shop and discovered his role in the abductions. Although Aeris wanted to turn him in to the guard, the Falco and Mick insisted he come with them if he wanted to save his rat. He’d need to help rescue the kidnapped citizens of Cauldron and undo the damage he’s facilitated.

Aeris decided that after that she’d still have him arrested. She’s a stickler for the rules. …Usually.

mick frimfrocket construct shackled city — Mick Frimfrocket with his construct. Aeris and Patch can be see in the background.

The Adventure

Our eclectic team of musicians, janitors, and locksmiths, descended through hidden passageways, into the long-abandoned gnomish enclave of Jzadirune, on the trail of subterranean kidnappers! In time they discovered that the kidnappers had been using Jzadirune’s ruins as a base of operations. Although our heroes battled the skulks and their dark creeper minions, my players never found any signs of the kidnapped citizens of Cauldron.

What they did find was a door. The door led to a platform that, with the flick of a switch, descended down a shaft into the darkness. When the doors opened they found themselves someplace else. Someplace new. A place of dwarven construction, made from malachite.

My son and daughter gasped in shock!

“MOM! MOM! The riddle! The riddle says something about that mal-kite! We are almost there!”

My son read the riddle a few more times and double checked the notes that he keeps in his detective’s notebook (which is a copy of Detective Murdoch’s notebook from Murdoch Mysteries). “Hmmm… Yup! Those kidnappers must have been working for a duergar! He’s the true culprit!”

My daughter clapped her hands in glee. “Yes! We are almost there! I have to save my good friend Griffin who I work with! He was supposed to be married! His girlfriend is so sad she cries everyday! We must hurry! He could DIE!” She says the word ‘die’ with such drama. It’s adorable.

Aeris and Falco led the way, with Mick, Rabbity, and Panthy travelling in the middle of the group. Patch and Keygan took up the rear, with the cowardly locksmith strongly debating running away when no one was looking.

Our heroes entered the main hall of the fortress only to realize that the strange stone sculpture in the middle of the room was actually an earth elemental known as a stone spike! The beast slammed into Aeris, causing heavy damage and surprising the party. The battle was over in just two rounds, with Aeris and Rabbity dealing heavy damage to the brute — Aeris bloodraging with her longsword and Rabbity with her water blasts. Mick inspired the group with his wonderful piano music. Falco and Patch had poor luck, not landing a single blow against the creature. And Keygan? Well, he didn’t even try to help. He just lingered at the back near the elevator, ready to flee if the party died.

The battle with the stone creature drew forth an ogre from a nearby chamber. The brute stunk like garbage and wielded a filth encrusted falchion which he swung around clumsily.

“More carrion for my larder!” the brute bellowed. “Very nice!”

“Carrion?!” My son exclaimed. “I know that word! I am not carrion!” He waved his arms around and pointed at the offending miniature ogre on the table. “I am a SINGER! Face the wrath of Mick Frimfrocket!!!”

Unbeknownst to my players the ogre was Xukasus, the fortress majordomo. The ogre was actually an otyugh, polymorphed into the form of an ogre long ago and his room, which was just off of this entry hall, was a massive heap of sewage, gore, and garbage. As the smell trickled out into the entry hall Keygan and Rabbity gagged. By the start of this fight Aeris was already heavily wounded from battling the stone spike. Falco gave her what healing he could and then she strode off, ready to intercept the ogre and protect her fellow bandmates. The battle was a tough one, with Mick urging Keygan to get into the fight and help. The gnome begrudgingly obliged, getting up close and sending a colour spray at the ogre!

Which didn’t work.

Keygan was nearly chopped in half by a falchion for his trouble, and tossed into the ogre’s bedroom for snacking on later.

(…Whoops!)

Aeris too, nearly fell, but Falco and Mick managed to keep her standing long enough with their magic that she took down the disgusting ogre. The group rescued Keygan, healed everyone back up to full hp, and searched the entry hall for anything of interest. After some hesitation they searched the ogre’s room as well. They spotted an iron chest in a massive pile of dung. They debated some more, then decided that whatever look was in that chest could stay there. They didn’t want it that bed. Not if poop was involved!

Which is too bad! It had a good deal of treasure in it. Haha.

malachite fortress - book - shackled city - d20diaires

Mick used his magic to clean everyone up, and then the group looked around. They discovered two secret passages, chose one at random, and continued on. They found themselves in a dead end hallway, which led to another secret door and a secret armoury filled with racks of armour and weapons. The group took it all — being in a band didn’t earn them much income! — and gave the construct some big sacks of gear to carry. Then they continued on again, finding themselves in a hot, stuffy forge.

There they finally found their first citizens of Cauldron! The dwarf, Sondor Ironfold, worked ceaselessly at a forge alongside three goblins. Nearby two other halfling victims, Jeneer Everdawn and the rogue Maple, sat in the corner putting together chainmail suits one link at a time. Four hobgoblins stood watch in this chamber.

As the group entered the room Panthy growled, low in her throat, and Rabbity launched a blast of water at the nearest hobgoblin. “Get ’em, team!” she called out.

The battle had begun!

This fight was a long one, with plenty of characters on both sides of the fight. The PCs and their allies fought the goblins and hobgoblins in relatively tight quarters, with the dwarf prisoner giving some goblins a few swings of her hammer, and the halfling prisoner Maple giving a hobgoblin a knife to the back. Only Aeris ended up getting hit with any frequency — due to her position on the front lines, not a lack of armour — but even then she only took a total of eight damage through the entire encounter. All our others heroes came out of it unscathed.

When the hall fell silent except for the crackle of flames my kids took it upon themselves to explain to the prisoners that they were about to be rescued by Dinorabbit — the coolest band in Cauldron! Maple was thrilled. Jeneer was clearly delirious with fear. And Sondor was… sad, quite frankly. She dropped her hammer to the ground and cried. They thought it was relief, at first, but it soon became clear Sondor was in mourning. She and her husband had been kidnapped together, but her husband had been sold as a slave four weeks ago. She knew she would never see him again.

My kids were quiet for a moment. It was the first time that they realized they might not be able to save everyone. People had been going missing from Cauldron for a few months. If their captures were slavers, surely Sondor’s husband wasn’t the only one who had already been sold…

My husband pulled out his list of missing people and put a little checkmark beside Maple, Sondor, and Jeneer. Then he crossed out Sondor’s husband, Lorthan. The look on my kids faces when that poor guy’s name got crossed off was a strange mix of solemnity and determination. It’s not a look I see on them often. Or ever, really.

“We’re going to get these people to safety right now!” My son / Mick announced.

My daughter shook her head. As Rabbity she said: “No! I’m not leaving here without Griffin! He is my friend and his fiancé cries too much with him gone!”

Mick grinned and pointed at Keygan. “He’s going to do it! Keygan! You get your wish! You have your rat back, and now your job is to bring these people into the elevator, up through Jzadirune, and back to Cauldron. Bring them to the Church of Adabar. That lady named…” My son paused. “I forget her name.”

“Jenya Urikas?”

“JENYA will help you! Now GO! Save people and redeem yourself!” My son pointed around grandly used his ‘serious hero’ voice.

“Yeah! And bring these bags of loot up with you!” Rabbity added practically. “Then the construct can help us fight again!”

Keygan, of course, needed no further encouragement. He groaned in relief, grabbed some bags, and left without even a goodbye. The newly liberated citizens of Cauldron followed after him, with Maple and Sondor lending a hand with the loot.

Our heroes stood alone in the forge for a few moments.

“Aww!” My daughter suddenly exclaimed. “We should have taken the stuff from these dead hobgoblins before sending Keygan away! Now we have to carry it!”

I laughed.

The group took what gear they could from the bodies, and explored the room. There were two doors leading deeper into the complex. My kids started to argue over which door to open, which is a sure sign that they’re getting tired. We paused the game there, with promises to play again soon. After all, they still had people to save!

Thanks for joining us, everyone! I hope you enjoyed getting to hear a bit about our crazy adventures. We’ll see you again soon!

Jessica

Behind the Screen

Despite being a 3.5 Dungeons and Dragons Adventure Path, we’re running this campaign in Pathfinder (both the campaign setting and the rules). Our characters utilize the following: The shaman and the bloodrager classes, as well as the bloodrager archetype spelleater, can all be found in the Advanced Class Guide. The urban bloodrager archetype can be found in Heroes of the Streets. The Kineticist class can be found in Occult Adventures. The monk and bard are base classes found in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Core Rulebook (or in a convenient travel-sized edition: Core Rulebook (Pocket Edition) while the prankster archetype for bards can be found in the Advanced Race Guide.

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