January 2014 RPG Blog Carnival Wrap-Up

January 2014's RPG Blog Carnival was hosted here at the Hereticwerks blog. The topic for the month was Transitions. Several RPG bloggers participated in the Carnival. Thanks to all of you who participated!

Here's a round-up of the ones we know about:

Alesmiter contributed a post looking Behind the Screen in '14.

Book Scorpion discussed some of the transitions currently taking place in her Endlands and 7th Sea campaigns.

Big Ball of No Fun shared recent revolutionary developments in their gaming group--the players are making the transition over to running games and becoming GMs, offering them a chance to regroup and experience things from the other side of the screen for a change of pace.

Grimnir talked about Feast and Famine in terms of how their group has been impacted by real-life commitments and schedules. Losing a particular character/player for a while can really shake things up.

G. K. Coleman has just made the transition to becoming an RPG Blogger. Welcome to the blogoverse G.K.! We're looking forward to reading about your blogging adventures.

Rick Hammell offered some very cogent thoughts about various real-world transitions that could be ported into an RPG environment and he provided a d20 random table as well!

Martin L. at Warehouse of Trinkets has also transitioned from being the GM to being a player for a while...and it looks like he might not like it. At least not yet. This can be a particularly tough transition for some folks. A lot of us get used to being the DM/GM, making it difficult to surrender the control, to step back from the screen, and let someone else take over for a while. For whatever it might be worth, I have always found it energizing and inspiring to switch-over to being a player from time to time. Even at its worst, no matter how badly a game session gets botched, you come away with ideas for how to do things next time, and it is valuable to gain some insight into what it feels to be on the other side of the screen. I've found that has helped make me a better referee/DM. But it isn't necessarily an easy transition.

Porky gave us Near Future Wor*fare; a look at a world where Zonetech has brought about a transition that has horribly mingled and mangled the boundaries between consumerism and violence in unsettling ways. This is also part of the ongoing From the Zones community project hosted by FATEsf.

Speaking of FATEsf, John Till's contribution 'Thursday Night Punctuated Equilibrium,' came in just under the wire. He wrote about some of the transitions his gaming group has gone through in the last year, and some of the exciting things in store in the months ahead.

NukeHavoc/Ken Newquist over at the Nuketown blog posted about the various and sundry transitions his gaming group is going through in 2014, moving into new systems, new roster of members, and a new venue--2014 certainly does appear to be a real Year of Transitions for these folks!

---

February's Blog Carnival will be hosted by Enderra, and the theme is 'The Icy Embrace of Winter.'

---

Everything you might want to know about the RPG Blog Carnival is available all in one place, including How to Participate, How to Sign-Up to Host a Carnival, as well as some handy advice for How to Host a Carnival if your topic gets accepted. You can also browse through the Archives of Past Carnivals and check to see what's coming next.

The RPG Blog Carnival is sponsored and supported by the RPG Blog Alliance. You can find out more about the RPGBA by clicking these links:

The RPGBA site
The RPGBA FAQ

Bujilli: Episode 76

Previously...
Bujilli, Leeja and Gnosiomandus by-passed the trapped doorway and found an alternate means of entering the Master Oneirist Sprague's inner sanctum only to discover that Sprague was being held prisoner by an impostor...

The False Sprague rose from his sarcastic bow with a fluid grace no body made of meat and gristle could hope to emulate. He, it, literally flowed as it moved. There were faint after-images in the wake of each movement. He was clearly amused by Leeja's reaction to his pantomime flirtation. He reached forth. Moved his left hand through a series of languid motions. A gesture that crackled and sizzled with growing power...

Warning

Leeja snarled. Extended the claws of her left hand. Gripped the crystal stiletto in her right. Glanced at Bujilli...

Warning

Bujilli instinctively shifted his perceptions, immediately alert and aware of the energies surrounding him, the echoing pulses and fluxes within the oneiroplasm. Like his Uncle taught him. Hostile spaces. Dangerous places. Pay attention to the traces. It was a handy mnemonic. He sensed the malevolence emanating from Not-Sprague's hand like ripples of scalding bleach. Bujilli reached out...

Warning

Gnosiomandus stared down at the trapped form of his colleague in stunned disbelief. It was a bad habit. One that had already almost gotten him killed multiple times this last year. It was something of a hazard of his profession. Perhaps. He hadn't been sleeping very well for some time now...

The Oneiroplasm went black.

Not-Sprague laughed. His voice echoed weirdly through the gelatinous, miasmic oneiroplasm.

Leeja lunged. The blade of her stiletto sparkled as it sliced through the blackened oneiroplasm. The laughter stopped abruptly. Everything went red...

Bujilli pushed away the little spells surrounding Sprague. They were old, frail, run-down and buzzing about like so many blind moths. A twist, a gesture, several of them collapsed into static and evaporating figments. Low-level spells could be renewed, but each time ran a risk of degrading their structure. They weren't meant to be maintained for weeks, months, at a time. Doing so tended to make them fragile. Brittle. Corrupt.

Gnosiomandus watched Bujilli brush away the accumulated debris of over-extended spells. It reminded him of dandruff...

The oneiroplasm surrounding them quaked. Shivered. It began to flow back towards the other room. No. It wasn't flowing out of the room. It was accumulating around Not-Sprague. Thickening. Dark scarlet matter that resembled coagulating blood.

Not-Sprague lost his attack spell when Leeja stabbed him. Now he was concentrating on pushing Leeja back by a brute-force manipulation of the oneiroplasm in the room. Fear curdled his sweaty features. His eyes glimmered like faceted black stones. The resemblance to Sprague was slipping. The entry-way Bujilli's spell had formed flickered then collapsed in a slow-motion vortex. Tendrils of oneiric matter connected it to the stuff flowing towards Not-Sprague. Perhaps he was somehow forcing the collapse.

Whoever, whatever this thing was; it exerted considerable control over oneiroplasm. Bujilli wondered if it wasn't some sort of rogue figment or ambient nightmare escaped from the mind of some spell-caster or scholar. 

Leeja stabbed the thing once more. Her blade slid smoothly through the dough-like dream-matter. It struck Not-Sprague in the abdomen.

She was hurled back towards the bed before she could register what had happened.

She only barely retained her grip on the blade.

Gnosiomandus stopped her. Not by any flashy maneuver. He looked up as she rammed into him.

They fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs that only just missed snagging Bujilli as they went.

Bujilli began to cast Zone of Normality.

Not-Sprague sagged against the lintel. Mauve ichor running down from his wounds.

Leeja untangled herself from the old man. Gnosiomandus helped the young lady to her feet.

He shook his head. Something hovered just on the edge of his recollection. It felt like his brain had been removed and packed in thick swaddling folds of gauze like one of the mummies he'd discovered in Parjang--

"Scheiss!" Gnosiomandus looked directly at Not-Sprague. Three quick little spells rolled across his field of vision in rapid succession followed by a torrential horizontal geyser of smoldering green mud that struck Not-Sprague full-on before he could recover enough to begin casting any more of his own spells. Gnosiomandus hadn't used that particular wand in decades. He wished he hadn't been forced to use it this time. It was messier than he liked.

The green mud destroyed all the oneiroplasm it touched.

Not-Sprague gurgled and gasped fitfully as the torrent unleashed by Gnosiomandus' wand carried him backwards, out of the room, burying him under close to a ton of super-heated green mud. The carpets were ruined. So was the wand. That had been the last charge.

Gnosiomandus turned to see what Bujilli was doing. Caught himself mid-spell. Waited.

Leeja moved toward the doorway. She intended to stab Not-Sprague if the mud hadn't finished him off.

The Zone of Normality shimmered into place. Bujilli expunged the lingering traces of the contaminated oneiroplasm. He forced it to evaporate, leaving behind an oily blotchy film on the furniture, walls and ceiling. The once-sumptuous room was a disaster.

Bujilli ignored the room's distress. Focused on Sprague. The sorcerous bonds on the instructor were subtle, clever and insidious. He would almost have sworn it was the work of his Uncle. Black barbed-chains of shadowy non-matter were run through the back of Sprague's skull, through the so-called 'Medium's Door,' and entwined about his brain. Another series of similarly twisted chains ran around his heart. Both sets extended deep across the Lower Oneiric, into regions far more nightmarish than wondrous. Dark, ponderous regions resonant and pregnant with terrors too well imagined.

He looked at Gnosiomandus; "No one gets this entangled..."

The old man nodded.

"...without some level of cooperation in the process."

"What are you saying? Did Sprague do this to himself?" Leeja glared at Gnosiomandus briefly, then turned back to keep an eye on the other room.

"No. He did it for a reason." Gnosiomandus cursed himself for a fool, for not realizing the extent of things before now. He felt old. So very, very old.

"But why would anyone do such a thing?" Leeja asked without turning back.

"Power. Revenge. Some sick thrill..." Bujilli started to run off the list of usual motivations for a sorcerer.

"Love."

"Really?" Leeja scoffed.

"Yes." Gnosiomandus reached out. Placed his hand on his former friend's arm. If only. If only so many, many things. He shook his head as the regrets flooded past. Truth could grow toxic if it remained bottled-up by denial and silence.

"Fine. For whatever reason this senior instructor has allowed himself to be imprisoned and replaced. For quite some time now, as I interpret the impressions coming off of these deeply invasive, deeply embedded spells."

"How long?" Leeja asked.

"Months. Nearly a year, possibly longer. All the oneiroplasm that had been allowed to settle and curdle in this room has corrupted things drastically--" Bujilli stopped. His eyes widened in shock.

"Yes. you sense it now, don't you?"

"We're trapped!"

"No. We have an option."

"This room is teetering on the very brink of Unreality. We have to get out of here before it falls out of synch with anything we know or recognize--"

The mirror cracked. Shards cascading to the floor.

The walls pulsed. Throbbed languidly.

"No. We have time. If we move quickly."

"What do you have in mind?"

"We follow the chains back to their source."

"But then we'd be trapped. Dragged into the Unreal when this room goes--"

"We can't leave him like...this."

"Like hell I can't." Leeja scoffed. "Oh scheiss."

"What now?" Bujilli reinforced the Zone of Normality's outer perimeter.

"All the green mud that buried the fake Sprague is congealing, hardening. If we're going to go this way, we'd better get going right now. Even so, I'm not sure we can force the door as it is..."

Bujilli considered the room full of steaming mud, the shattered mirror, the black chains leading down into darkness of the worst sort.

"Whatever we're going to do--we need to do it quickly!"

Which way should they go?

1. Try to escape via the door in the other room, past/through all that super-heated green mud? That's assuming they can successfully force that door open, of course. And that the Not-Sprague is down for the count.
2. Try to somehow re-open the sorcerous passage that brought them here. Of course, since this was a spontaneous bit of spell-hackery on-the-spot, the chance of this working is pretty slim. Bujilli has not had sufficient time to really study this cobbled-together spell, only cast it once, and never fully incorporated it into his repertoire via practice...so just trying to re-cast it might take a few attempts, and each try will have a definite, negative effect on the room. But it does make for a long-shot sort of option.
3. Follow the black chains down into nightmare. The overlapping effects of Oneiric Bubble, Zone of Normality, the encroaching Unreality of the room, and all that recently dispersed oneiroplasm make this eminently do-able...as if diving headlong into the nightmarescape of an imprisoned oneirist like Sprague could ever be construed as a 'good' option.
4. The mirror could *maybe* be reassembled, but it would lead off on a tangent that could prove worse than the other three options.

If someone wants to suggest another option, we can discuss it in the comments. Staying in the room is not an option, as it will shortly no longer be a room, and as it falls into Unreality, anything contained within it will be trapped within a very small paracosm that will ultimately collapse into oblivion. Not much of a future along those lines.

There is not a lot of time left to the trio, so a decision needs to be made. Like Bujilli's Uncle taught him: dithering is deadly. Especially in this current predicament...

---

Bujilli, Leeja and Gnosiomandus all three need to roll a Save versus Spells. See p. 55 of Labyrinth Lord for the Tables. Bujilli and Leeja both need to roll an 8 or higher on a D20. I'll roll for Gnosiomandus and post the result in the Comments.

Whatever happens next, we could use a few Initiative rolls for (1) Bujilli (2) Leeja, and (3) Gnosiomandus, thanks.

Anyone/anything readers don't roll for, I will. As per usual.

Remember:Bujilli receives a +1 bonus to his Initiative, Leeja gets a +2 bonus. Gnosiomandus gets a -1 penalty for being distracted. The girls both receive +1 bonuses due to their DEX. (as per P. 50, Labyrinth Lord.)

---

As usual, anything readers don't roll for, I will roll.

• We could use 1-2 D20 rolls,
• Three D100/D% rolls,
• Three sets of 3d6, just in case...

What happens next is up to you, the readers.


You Decide!

---

Previous                                Next

---

Series Indexes

One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six

---

Starting Page  |  Central Index

---

About Bujilli (What is This?) | Who is Bujilli? | How to Play

---

Bujilli's Character Sheet | Leeja's Character Sheet | Cast of Characters

Bujilli's Spells | Little Brown Journals | Loot Tally | House Rules

---

Episode Guides
Series One (Episodes 1-19)

Series Two (Episode 20-36)

Series Three (Episodes 37-49)

Series Four (Episodes 50-68)

Series Five (Episodes 69-99)
Series Six(Episodes 100-ongoing)

---

Labyrinth Lord   |   Advanced Edition Companion

Technical Difficulties

Our computer is in the shop. We will be back as soon as we are able.

1d8 Quacks: Questionable Medical Specialists from Wermspittle

A quack doctor can kill you without a knife...

Unknown

---

Eight Quacks (1d8)

1. Sirondas Balthazaon. Short, hairy, twitchy-fingered; he looks like a shaved weasel in a not terribly convincing man-suit. His specialty is colorful elixirs that can cure baldness, impotence, even diarrhea, at least for 3d4 hours, after which time the symptoms or complaints come back, often doubled. His prices are one-third the going rates. He rarely stays in one place more than 1d4 hours. Just enough to stay ahead of the Constables of the Red Watch, his creditors, and his previous customers.
   
   Sirondas (Escaped Hybrid, Expert Lvl 4) [AL N, MV 30', AC 6 (Lesser Showman's Vest), HD 4 (24 hp), #AT 1 (Verbal/Acid), DG Save or Baffled (1d4 Turns)/3d4 per Turn for 1d4 Turns (Save for Half Effect), SV F4, ML 6. Special: Pronounced musky body odor repels werms (as Protection From Werms in 20' radius). Travels about with a push-cart loaded with bottles, flasks and jars of various elixirs. Not on the best terms with the local authorities since he falsely framed an Almas Glandculler for one of his less fortunate failures in producing a cure for Scarlet Plague. Claims to be half-Pruztian, on his mother's side, but that's probably a lie, despite his carrying a Pruztian Five-Pence Piece that he claims is a 'family heirloom.' Has no identification papers, licenses, permits nor even a diploma.]

   ---

2. Mak Dallarak. Tall, thin and cadaverous, Master Dallarak is quite proud of his (alleged) Nagrothean heritage, and tries his best to keep up appearances, despite the connection being extremely tenuous, and possibly spurious. He wears only dark green, prefers velvet frock coats, and requires corrective lenses when trying to read anything of a sorcerous nature due to a lingering curse inherited from his great-grandmother whom he claims fought in the Midwives' Rebellion. He specializes in peculiar unguents and salves, balms and ointments concocted by hand from traditional materials based upon a secret compendium of recipes bequeathed to him by his aforementioned grandmother. No one has ever seen the book. But he does get his formulas from somewhere.
   
   Master Dallarak (Simulacrum, Expert Lvl 3) [AL C, MV 30', AC 5 (Armor-Paneled Long-Coat), HD 3 (18 hp), #AT 1 (Talons or bludgeon), DG 1d4x2 (treat as +2 weapons, affect immaterial)/1d4+2, SV F3, ML 8. Special: Untrained Oneirical talent: Reads his recipes in a dream-book. He replaced the actual Mak Dallarak years ago, during a particularly harsh winter, and has been regretting it ever since. Suffers 1d4 damage per Round if exposed to a silver mirror. (His crossing-over was incomplete, his Replacement rite only 'just' worked. The actual Mak Dallarak survived the Transition and may be attempting to undo the swap.) He can concoct just about any sort of salve, if the customer can clearly articulate what effect they are after; sometimes these formulations require exotic ingredients or other esoteric factors will make the process more difficult or costly.]

   ---

3. Drushma-mama. Heavily cloaked and over-dressed in too many layers, even in Summer, Drushma-mama is always complaining about the cold. She piles her dishwater-gray hair into elaborate coiffures inspired by the cranial topiaries she remembers seeing among the decorative slaves kept on the underestate of her bond-cousins in Aman Utal. Her bloodline was declared unfit and cast out while she was still in training to become a Noblewoman's Confidential Concierge. Now she peddles disgusting fungal broths and mold-brews to the Refugees and Wrertched, the Afflicted and Outcast in the shanty-camps along the Low Streets.
   
   Drushma-mama (Lowborn Half-Morlock, Expert Lvl 5) [AL C, MV 30', AC 4 (Layered Clothes, Ring of Defense +3), HD 5 (48 hp), #AT 1 (bite), DG 1d4, SV F5, ML 10. Casts spells at 3rd level ability. (Spells per day: 2,1), Spells Known: Cure/Cause Light Wounds, Detect Malady, Remove/Instill Fear, Charm/Repulse Person, Charnel Breath, Vile Residue, Rat's Teeth. Special: She is in communication with a pair of Lesser Nosferatus with whom she has been bartering favors for spells. She also possesses a scroll of Dirt to Meat, but it is above her current level, and she very much wants to gain the ability to cast it before winter. Drushma-mama has an encyclopedic knowledge of fungi, molds and slimes. Jelly-hunters come to her often, both to barter, and to identify newfound blobs. She can call on 2d4 Feral Children, Jelly-Hunters, Foragers or Morlocks to come to her aid once per day.]

   ---

4. Ulin-Kala. She lost her face to an accident with her former mentor's ectography chemicals. The mask she wears came from a boarded-over shop in the Burned Over District. If you bring her foam-ivory or oneiroplasm, she'll craft something unique and special just for you. She's talented that way. A real Prodigy. Her people, nomads from the Western Plateaus, traded her to the Ectographer three summers ago. She's never forgiven any of them. She is gaining a reputation for how she mixes-up Dim Ichor, Black Liquors, and other things into non-damaging cocktails that sometimes have a positive effect. People flock to her in hopes of convincing her to mix them a drink, and most ignore her trinkets, which frustrates her to no end. What no one realizes yet, is that her emotional state has a direct and immediate effect on the drinks she mixes-up...
   
   Ulin-Kala (Abandoned Plateau-Nomad, Expert Lvl 3) [AL C, MV 30', AC 4 (Layered Clothes, Ring of Defense +3), HD 5 (48 hp), #AT 1 (Staff), DG 1d6, SV F3, ML 8. Special: Intuitive Detritus-Sculptor. Has base 30% chance to temporarily animate or awaken her sculptures, trinkets or toys. Can cast Cause/Cure Light Wounds (only for lesser mechanisms/contraptions) twice a day. She also has the innate ability to Transmute Liquids on touch.]

   ---

5. Borsk Halij. The Mostly-Proportionate. Born to a family of Wretches, Borsk ran away from the Circus and apprenticed to a Distiller who taught him about that aspect of the Corruption Trade. He was dismissed when he let the still explode. He tried to be a Forager (got his crew killed), a Scavenger (collapsed a building on his team), and Pit Fighter (accidentally killed his trainer), but none of that worked out for him. Now he steals rusty old barrels and containers of unlabeled Spectral Brine and uses it to fill whatever bottles or containers he can dig out of the local rubbish-heaps. Even he isn't sure what all is in these bottles, he just works with what he has available, and every one is unique.
   
   Borsk-Halaj (Wretched, Expert Lvl 4) [AL C, MV 20', AC 5 (Half-Chain and Hide), HD 4 (17 hp), #AT 2 (Fists), DG 1d6+3 (STR), SV F4, ML 8. Special: Gains +3 Bonus on all Saves. Can attempt to Save versus any/all poisons, toxins, and venoms. CHAR 4, STR 18. Heals at double normal rate.]

   ---

6. Jeeva. Downy-haired acupuncturess from Kathru-Val. She grinds-down various unsavory trimmings and dried herbs into noxious-smelling powders that she foists upon the unsuspecting and gullible as medicinal teas. Most of her 'brews' tend to be harmless, if terribly disgusting. However, she recently tried using some dried worms in one of her 'teas,' and it has caused quite a sensation among her customers who swear the stuff cures the Grey Pox. It's only a matter of time before she runs afoul of the Medical Establishment. Her workshop has been ransacked three times this week. She could use some protection and a little advice. But the local Nest-Mothers will have nothing to do with her since she lacks all spell-casting ability. Perhaps she can convince Hedrard at the Academy to give her a few minutes of her time...
   
   Jeeva (Strixin, Expert Lvl 2) [AL C, MV 20', AC 6 (Greaves, Bracers, Girdle), HD 2 (9 hp), #AT 2 (claws), DG 1d4/1d4), SV F2, ML 6. Special: Has not achieved adulthood, and thus remains wing-less. Suffers -4 Reaction roll with all Harpy-related beings.]

   ---

7. Dralik Mozirre. The Graft-Master of Garlondire. Fat, sweaty, smells of peculiar cheese and strange chemicals. Has been observed eating moth balls. Likes to stay in the shade, mostly operates at night. The local gang of Feral Children stole his pale yellow-satin mask. All his fingers move like sentient jelly, which makes sense; Dralik died last winter. There's a Mucoid inhabiting his not-so-well preserved corpse. The Mucoid makes sure that there's a little piece of itself in every grafting it sells to the wounded, injured and crippled who come to it for help.
   
   Not-Dralik (Grood Cadaver-Shell) [AL N, MV 30', AC 6 (Square-Studded Leather), HD 5 (21 hp), #AT 2 (Fists), DG 1d4/1d4, SV F2, ML n/a. Special: Hollowed-out cadaver-shell, used as a disguise and vehicle for Mucoid. Must make a Save each day or suffer permanent 1d4 damage. Upon reaching zero HP, the cadaver-shell becomes an inoperative, putrid mess of rotting tissue.]
   
   Silisisi'ak (Mucoid, Expert Lvl 5) [AL C, MV 10', AC 7 (Mucous-sheath), HD 5 (31 hp), #AT 2 (Sting or spells), DG 1d4/1d4 or by spell), SV MU5, ML 9/4 (if cadaver-shell is breached). Spell-Use: Spells per day: 2,2,1. Spells Known: First Level: Cause/Cure Light Wounds, Staunch Bleeding, Cause/Remove Fear, Resist Cold/Heat, Charm Person, Protection From Vertebrates, Sleep. Second Level: Hold Person, Speak with Molds, Continual Haze, ESP, Web (Mucous). Third Level: Animate Dead, Cause Disease, Protection From Firearms. Special: Regenerates 1 HP each Turn, unless exposed to salt, fire or acid.]

   ---

8. Ruthiko. The Leech-Monger. Short, broad-hipped Urushian dowager who openly wears the green and blue checkered-pattern of the Usurper, mostly to cover-up the increasingly obvious mauve spots and splotches spreading across her face and hands. If you watch closely, you can sometimes see things writhe and move about beneath her skin. She sells a wide variety of leeches collected from various cellar-swamps, fountain-pools, cisterns, even the Low Marshes. Every leech is selected for its specific medicinal uses and murderous application.
   
   Ruthiko (Leech-host, Expert Lvl 6) [AL C, MV 20', AC 6 (Greaves, Bracers, Girdle), HD 6 (38 hp), #AT 1 (Vomit Leeches or Blood-drain), DG (see below) or 1d6 per round if Attached (rolls 19 or 20 To Hit), SV MU6, ML 9. Special: Can use Vomit Leeches up to three times per day. She also Commands Leeches as a Cleric of 6th Level (as per Turning table, swap leeches for undead). She also has a form of ESP that applies only to Leeches. Even when coerced by spells, Leeches will not attack her. Vomit Leeches produces a stream of 3d6 large, wriggly leeches with a range of 12'. Each leech has 1d4 HP, does 1 HP damage (+1d6 blood drain on a roll of 19 or 20 to hit), is AC 9, and takes double damage from fire attacks.]

   ---

Bujilli: Episode 75

Previously...
The group has split-up. Sharisse and Gudrun have gone downstairs to deal with the MirrorBorn. Bujilli, Gnosiomandus and Leeja are using the new route formed by Bujilli's spell-tinkering to by-pass what was surely a trapped door. Now they go forth to confront the Master Oneirist Sprague...

Shattering glass. Screams. It sounded like the two young women were keeping themselves busy downstairs. Bujilli grinned. Those two had really come into their own. He was thankful for their friendship. It all could have gone so very, very differently. Choices and repercussions. Just like his old Uncle used to yell at him before a beating. He survived all that. And better. Much better. He'd learned the lesson and gone well beyond anything his Uncle could envision or imagine. Then he smelled the vomit. Yeah. Maybe he'd learned a lot, grown a lot, but he still had a long way to go. That's pretty much why he was here.

"You ready for this?" Gnosiomandus rolled his shoulders. Adjusted his grip on the fighting-wand. Glanced at Leeja.

She smiled. He shivered. Bujilli almost laughed.

"As ready as I'm going to be." he shifted the hand-axe into a more comfortable grip. It might have been Stril's a long time ago. It was his weapon now. And speaking of weapons. ///Machine?/// Bujilli tried to internalize his communication with the Counsel etched into his bones.

Active

///Good. Keep an eye on things for me. Especially those things that I can't see so well myself. Let me know if you spot anything I ought to know about.///

Engaged

Bujilli took a deep breath. Nodded. Stepped forward into the breach his spell had made in the wall. Gestured to Gnosiomandus to bring up the rear. Looked to Leeja, motioned for her to let him go first. she nodded, grudgingly. Then he broke into a run. The By-pass twisted upwards and to the left, then the right, zig-zagging at random for what felt like close to a mile. Bujilli slowed down to a trot. Leeja was keeping up with him easily. They waited for Gnosiomandus to catch-up before going any faster again.

The By-pass wound around, past, over, under and back again, again and again until finally they could see a
deep purple gloom filling the air ahead. At first it had the look of a curtain of mist at the foot of a waterfall. As they drew closer it took on a thicker, heavier appearance. Gelatinous purple light.

It was sluggishly beginning to seep downwards into the breach-path created by Bujilli's spell.

///Machine?///

Analyzing...

"Analyze faster damn it!" Bujilli hissed. Stopped. Watched the purple stuff.

"What?" Leeja touched his shoulder.

"I'm fine. The machine-spirit is figuring out what this stuff up ahead might be."

"Oh." She looked back at Gnosiomandus; "We should probably let him get caught-up with us again anyhow."

Terminus-Point of Breach-Path Saturated by Stratified Oneiroplasm

"That purply-stuff up ahead is some sort of dreamstuff."

"Wonderful."

"What did you expect?" Gnosiomandus kept going. Leaving them behind for a change; "It's the stuff that dreams are made of--Sprague's a Master Oneirist. I expected him to be prepared for our little home invasion. I would have been disappointed if he hadn't been..."

"So what do we do now?" Bujilli jogged up beside Gnosiomandus.

"Depends."

"On what?"

"What do you want to do?"

"You're not much of a mentor."

"You're not much of a student," Gnosiomandus laughed; "You haven't even officially attended a single class and you've already picked a fight with one of the senior instructors, not to mention all that business with Hedrard and Mistress Eberhard..."

"I did what I thought was the right thing..."

"No doubt. Then there's Sharisse. And Gudrun. And Leeja, of course...and Unfred..."

"Funny time to start criticizing my decisions--"

"No criticism intended. I'm telling you that you do just fine making your own decisions. I'm not interested in meddling. I'm here to help out as need-be. You're the one who should keep on making the decisions."

"So you approve?"

"Who cares? You don't need my approval, nor anyone else's, at least not until Finals."

"Fine. This stuff, this Oneiroplasm up ahead; I've run into something like this back under Zormur's Palace. I'm going to cast Oneiric Bubble and you both stay close behind me. It should let us move through this dreamstuff a little easier."

He cast the spell effortlessly. It was becoming extremely familiar to him. He'd used it so many times. It was comfortable.

The spell formed a glistening, translucent sphere around all three of them. It rolled forward as they moved. their footsteps echoed strangely inside the bubble.

They moved up to the bleeding edge of the purplish-matter. Bujilli pushed the bubble forward. The Oneiroplasm parted sloppily before the bubble's scintillating outer-surface. He pushed harder. Stepped forward. Kept moving.

The dreamstuff wriggled, squished, gulped, but couldn't--or didn't--restrict their movement.

They entered a boudoir. The walls were hung in black velvet. The bed was huge, carved from exotic woods and luxuriously covered with expensive linens. Very classy. Tasteful. Just as Bujilli had expected. Just like the man asleep on the bed.

"Sprague." Bujilli pushed closer. The Master Oneirist was asleep. His face was anything but peaceful. He was caught in the middle of a silent scream. Trapped. Imprisoned.

The purple Oneiroplasm hardened. Darkened.

Bujilli reached out. Touched the inner surface of the Bubble. He caught flickering impressions of things flashing through the Oneiroplasm. Someone walled-up in a dark and dismal basement. A young girl chained-up inside an attic closet. A boy, his face horribly acid-eaten, bound to his rickety too-small crib with barbed wire. One after another. Dozens. All Dreamers. All prisoners.

Whomever did this was drawing upon the collective nightmares of dozens of prisoners.

The Oneiroplasm darkened. Quivered violently. Bujilli looked out at the room once more, before it got too much darker. There. A mirror. He grabbed Gnosiomandus by the shoulder and pointed.

"Scheiss! That mirror is undraped."

"And how is that significant?" Bujilli started considering his repertoire of spells.

"All mirrors are covered in Wermspittle. It's not just one of the oldest laws, it's a matter of survival. Things come through mirrors..." Leeja stopped in mid explanation. Looked to Gnosiomandus. Closed her eyes. Unsheathed her stilletto.

"Part of what drew the founders of the Academy to this place, all those Adjacent Worlds, especially all the Dead Worlds surrounding Wermspittle, also has some sort of effect on mirrors--"

"These Mirrorborn you said were downstairs?"

"Yes. Warped replicas, simulacras, doubles. There's a whole weird ecology of inverse and perverse things that gain access to this place through mirrors. Not all of them, but enough to make the things dangerous, hence the law."

"So then..."

Gnosiomandus stared down at Sprague's nightmare-trapped form.

"Whomever it was that you've been dealing with...it wasn't Sprague..."

Someone clapped their hands in appreciation. They stood near the door to the boudoir. Golden light streamed in from the room beyond. There was a lovely roaring blaze going in the fireplace. It was fed by scores of old manuscripts, books, portfolios.

"You might say that I'm his replacement. At the risk of sounding immodest, I like to think that I'm something of an improvement." Not-Sprague bowed sarcastically. Blew Leeja a rakish kiss. Smiled devilishly. Gestured.

Warning

The Oneiroplasm went black...

What spell was Bujilli considering when things went black? 

Counsel can only respond to threats/observations based on Bujilli's initiative...so in this case, with his lower roll, it wasn't nearly as effective as he might have liked.

The Oneiroplasm has thickened, reducing everyone's Movement to half the normal rate. Visibility is limited to 5' or less. They can hear nothing outside the Oneiric Bubble at this time, only the echoes of their own footsteps.

There is plenty of air, the Bubble is air-permeable by default.

Bujilli, Leeja and Gnosiomandus all three need to roll a Save versus Spells. See p. 55 of Labyrinth Lord for the Tables. Bujilli and Leeja both need to roll an 8 or higher on a D20. I'll roll for Gnosiomandus and post the result in the Comments.

Whatever happens next, we could use a few Initiative rolls for (1) Bujilli (2) Leeja, (3) Gnosiomandus, and if anyone cares to make one more for (4) Not-Sprague, and (5) Whomever Else Might Be Involved, that would be much appreciated.

Anyone/anything readers don't roll for, I will. As per usual.

---

Bujilli receives a +1 bonus to his Initiative, Leeja gets a +2 bonus. Gnosiomandus gets a -1 penalty for being distracted. The girls both receive +1 bonuses due to their DEX. (as per P. 50, Labyrinth Lord.)

---

As usual, anything readers don't roll for, I will roll.

• We could use 3-4 D20 rolls,
• 1 or 2 D100/D% rolls,
• 3d4, just because...

What happens next is up to you, the readers.

You Decide!

---

Previous                                Next

---

Series Indexes

One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six

---

Starting Page  |  Central Index

---

About Bujilli (What is This?) | Who is Bujilli? | How to Play

---

Bujilli's Character Sheet | Leeja's Character Sheet | Cast of Characters

Bujilli's Spells | Little Brown Journals | Loot Tally | House Rules

---

Episode Guides
Series One (Episodes 1-19)

Series Two (Episode 20-36)

Series Three (Episodes 37-49)

Series Four (Episodes 50-68)

Series Five (Episodes 69-99)
Series Six(Episodes 100-ongoing)

---

Labyrinth Lord   |   Advanced Edition Companion

Strange Places: Glowfield

The glow gets more intense the closer you get. Quieter, too. The silence is eerie. Unnatural. Colors tend to fade, often permanently, after being exposed to the glow emanating from this abandoned, not-exactly-empty lot. If you approach it carefully, like the Feral Kids and Changelings like to do when they're playing their obscure tricks on those passing through, and if you're lucky not to cross-over the oh-so-delicate threshold, you might catch a brief glimpse of...something. No one is sure what it is. The Nickel Dreadfuls and less savory Pulps are filled with the speculative adventures of creative liars who've never set foot in the place. The Yellow Journalists tend to avoid the place, as its color-deadening effect would end their careers, if not their fetid half-lives. The kids and the misfits and the assorted dregs surrounding this place will egg you on, dare you to take one more step, just to see what happens. It's a game to them. They also stand to make a little money selling the translucent bones they are able to pick from the brittle black weeds and stark white scrub surrounding the Glowfield.

---

At 30', if you remain within sight of the Glowfield for more than ten minutes, you must make a Save or lose your perception of color for 1d4 hours. All colors are faded from their person and gear for the next 1d4 days. There is a cumulative 1% chance of the faded coloration remaining permanent. Disorientation due to the strange glow reduces movement by half.

At 20', if you remain within sight of the Glowfield for more than five minutes, you must Save or suffer temporary blindness for 1d4 Turns. Each subsequent exposure at this range incurs a cumulative -1 penalty to the Save, and the duration of the blindness effect doubles each time. Blindfolds, or simply turning one's back to the Glowfield allows you to go for fifteen minutes between Saves. As above, there is a color fading effect, in this case the victim loses all their coloration for 1d4 days, with a cumulative 5% chance of the colorlessness becoming permanent. Disorientation by the glow reduces Movement by 2/3 the normal rate.

At 10', those exposed to the Glowfield for more than five minutes must Save or begin to become transparent. Each failed Save incurs a cumulative -1 penalty on all subsequent Save attempts. The transparency effect is also cumulative, roll a D20 for the % of the victim's body that is now transparent. The effect persists for 1d4 days and there is a cumulative 5% chance per exposure/failed Save of the effect becoming permanent. Those rendered transparent by the Glowfield can sacrifice 1 WIS point to re-roll one failed Save, if they are successful, the loss is temporary, if they fail it is a permanent loss. Those rendered transparent can also sacrifice 1 WIS to overcome the blindness generally caused by the effect. Disorientation reduces movement to 10% normal rate.

Entering the Glowfield for less than five minutes is pretty much like the effect at 10', only with a cumulative 10% chance of the transparency effect becoming permanent. Remaining within the Glowfield for longer than five minutes may or may not have more serious repercussions. No one knows, because no one that has stayed in there for more than five minutes has ever returned, at least that anyone knows...

---

Who Goes There?

(1d20) Encounters just outside the 30' limit

1. A lame child with too many fingers and toes laughs at you as you pass by them. They whisper something unintelligible in what sounds suspiciously like Aklo, if you're at all familiar with the language. If questioned, they will hand you a bloated eyeball with a grayed-out iris dangling several inches of optic nerve. If harassed, the child will make a rude gesture, some obscure imprecation, and attempt to run away. If killed, the child collapses into a frothing mass of nearly colorless corruption that remains inert for 1d4 hours before it slithers off as a form of Lesser Jelly.
2. Three dirt-smeared Urchins are poking ahead with sticks as they move step by step towards the Glowfield. They've been promised a few nickels apiece if they can go right up to the edge of the Glowfield without actually crossing the threshold into the glow itself. None of them suspect that they've each one been told the exact same thing by their underhanded patron; they've each been instructed to push one of their companions into the Glow. They are being watched at a distance by a Yellow Journalist using a telescope from a near-by attic garret.
3. (2d4) Refugees have gotten lost and were mis-directed to this place by some drunken locals. The Refugees are most upset that this is not the public pump house. They begin to argue about which way they need to go to get back to their cluster of shacks. They dislike this place intensely. Their chanters have been warning them for months now that their neighbors have been using this place as an unhallowed burial ground.
4. Translucent scapula. Look a little more closely and you'll spot a tibia, femur and a few ribs as well. Each bone is waxy in your hands, pebbly-textured, translucent. If you pick them up, you can gather (3d6) bones. Every bone you pick-up results in another (1d4) Feral Kids taking an interest in what you're doing over there. If you leave the bones alone, the Kids will pretty much leave you alone. There are no skulls in the grass. Never any skulls. No one knows why.
5. You almost trip over a slightly bloated dead body. Some hidden experimenter has staked-out corpses at intervals of ten feet leading up to the very edge of the Glowfield. Each body is tagged with a yellow card bearing its number. Whoever set this up is probably still out there. Watching. Waiting to see if you disturb the Gore Worms wriggling in anticipation of a fresh host.
6. Someone lugged the heavily weathered and stained limestone corner-stone from some ruined manor out into the weeds. You can still see some of the tracks leading back to the burned Over District. Jerver, the Oddling, has been using it as an altar to unspeakable things. He maintains his dominance over a band of Afflicted through fear and frequent sacrifices. Fail a reaction Roll, and he'll designate one or more of your group as the next sacrifice.
7. (3d4) Changelings have trapped a medium-sized Drab Jelly using some purple-lensed lamps and torches. They've been so intent on capturing the jelly, that none of the Changelings have quiet realized how close to the Glowfield they've been led by the thing that they think they've trapped.
8. Balo-deela, an insane morlock ex-sapper with a wooden leg, has dug-out a few shallow tunnels that lead up to the edge of the Glowfield. Every now and then one of the tunnels caves-in. Usually when someone walks over it. There are 3d6 Questionable Trinkets and Trash items scattered about in these crawlspaces. No one has seen the crazy old morlock in weeks. All the locals know about the sapper's gladius he always carried. Get close enough and you might hear it muttering and swearing to itself in the darkness. You'll need to break the old sapper's glass-like fingers to get the thing out of here, if you do find the corpse and the sword.
9. A jagged fragment of a Petrified Colossi's pinky-nail. Some Forager dropped it when they cut through here as a short-cut. There's a blue tag wired to the fragment, but the burlap it was wrapped in has been mostly removed. This thing might be valuable to someone, but it causes 1 point of damage every hour it remains in contact with living flesh. If you pick it up, you might notice that the ground where it has been lying has become very hard, dry and dead-gray due to the low-level petrification effect radiating from the thing.
10. Three-quarters of an elegantly carved bone staff juts from the dirt like a slender tooth. The upper section is not far off. The ivory Flidder-cage has been smashed. There's no sign of the creature that used to be bound into it. The Perdu sorcerer who carried the staff into this place was knocked unconscious by a gang of Feral Children and overlooked due to their innate invisibility. 
11. Rats. Dozens of piebald, hairless, translucent rats scurry around the place pathetically. They are all blind. Some of the locals kill the rats with sling-stones, but so far no one has been in a hurry to eat one. So far.
12. Those brittle black weeds right where you are standing used to be Red Weeds. Being this close to the Glowfield has changed them. Their oily-gray sap causes 2d6 damage on a failed Save due to unstoppable bleeding wherever the stuff has stained a victim's flesh. If dried, or removed from here, the sap goes inert.
13. Two seriously wounded Feral Children run past you. One collapses only a few feet away. Their companion doesn't look back. Abandons them. If you go to the fallen child, they are crying and in a great deal of pain. Right before falling unconscious from severe blood loss, she whispers 'Horla.'
14. Something hard, yet brittle, snaps under foot. It is a small, tapering and twisted cone of highly polished quartz. There are (3d4) more of the things right near where you are now. Most of them are still arranged in a circle. All of the quartz cones contain a strange purplish stain inside. They are also all cracked and crazed as though they have been exposed to intense heat. Each of the cones will melt away into nothingness within (1d4) hours. There is a base 30% chance that a medium-sized Gloomswallow is near-by, having only recently escaped from the circle of containment formed by the quartz cones. The weird beast needs to get farther away from the Glowfield in order to be able to slip back into the Oneirical layers, but it is confused and disoriented.
15. Dozens of bloated white eels wriggle in and about the frizzled grass surrounding this place. The locals are used to it by now. Some of them are busy catching the eels with buckets and make-shift nets. Those that they roast or poach can be eaten, the ones they don't cook fast enough tend to fade away. The eels have nasty bites (inflict 2d4 damage), but don't tend to live very long out of water.
16. Two Eloi Foragers are arguing over which of them discovered a Brazen Scale of Ylantru. They are so caught-up in their disagreement that neither of them notices you, unless or until you do something to attract their attention. 
17. (2d4) Gunpowder Grubs have been left in an old cardboard box underneath a section of moldy plywood. The grubs are mostly translucent. The gunpowder inside them has turned a peculiar milky blue. It may or may not be inert. 
18. Thaddeus Porzimio, a scholar of Opticks, is complaining bitterly to three Urdiz mercenaries. It would appear that the scholar engaged these fellows' services as protection while he studied the Glowfield. They've decided to rob him and go somewhere less disturbing. You've caught them in the act.
19. A mostly transparent zombie stumbles about, flailing their claw-like hands and gnashing their see-through teeth. They cannot see, due to their eyes being transparent, but they can still hear and possibly smell. There are several more of the things in here; one of the Refugee camps has been burying their dead here because they were sure no one would tamper with their bodies in this place. There's a cumulative 20% chance of a Kallittrian burial party showing up with a recently deceased corpse for every zombie destroyed. They will not be pleased by any of this. (-2 Reaction Roll.)
20. (2d4) Abseen have come here to bathe in the glow. They believe that it will give them visions, or improve their ability to shift between visible and invisible states. Some choose to meditate, others to make offerings or to look for some sort of omen. None of them are interested in anyone else, seeing them as a distraction.

(1d10) Things Encountered at 20'

1. (2d4) Transparent bones. Mostly animals like bats, rats and eels. No skulls whatsoever.
2. A mostly colorless corpse. Their skin is peeling, oozing a clear fluid that reeks of corruption. Something is squirming around in their guts. Transparent worms.
3. More bloated White Eels wriggle and thrash about in the grass, gasping for air and quickly dying. They can still bite for (2d4) damage, if someone comes within reach in the next 1d4 minutes.
4. (1d4) Abseen have taken-up meditative positions around a small pool of milky fluid that stinks of rotten cabbages. There is a sulfurous rime around the filmy edges of the pool. The fluid is toxic (Save at -2 or suffer 3d6 damage and lose all sense of taste for 1d4 weeks). There are large, three-eyed catfish just barely visible in the pool. The catfish have poisonous spines protruding from their fins (Save at -3 or suffer double damage from all attacks for next 1d4 days). The Abseen will shift into complete invisibility if disturbed. 
5. (4d4) Transparent penguin bones. Completely stripped of all flesh. A jagged shard of hand-knapped whitish stone is embedded in a vertebrae. At first it appears to be a form of quartz, but no, it's some sort of obsidian. Again, no skulls.
6. (3d6) Colorless gulls flutter past. Their eyes are dead, milky-white, yet they can somehow see. They make no sound. Not even the flapping of their wings can be heard.
7. (6d4) Transparent human bones. Quite an assortment. None of them connected, all of them scattered and most splintered, and again, no skulls.
8. (3d6) Colorless slugs slither through the brittle white weeds. They appear harmless, however, if touched by bare skin, they inject a powerful poison (Save at -4, succeed and take 4d4 damage, fail and take 4d4 damage and lose the ability to speak one language permanently, lose language slot).
9. (10d4) Transparent bones. Penguins, whales, bears, seals, various birds, even humans, but no skulls.
10. (3d6) Huge, colorless worms wriggle and rear up from fresh furrows in the increasingly white soil. They exude a nauseating sweet scent. Their mucous saturates everything within a 10' radius of each worm. Anyone coming into contact with the worm-slime must make a Save, those succeeding suffer 1d4 damage and lose their sense of smell for 1d4 days. Those who fail are blinded for 1d4 hours.

(1d6) Things Encountered at 10'

1. A massively muscled albino penguin stands imperiously atop a jumbled pile of whitish slate. The penguin was completely black (even its blood is black if anyone cares to find out) and it is a man-eater. There is a mound of bones behind the huge malevolent bird, all of them cracked and splintered by its powerful beak.
2. (1d4) Abseen stand vigilant, as though listening to some far off thing that you cannot hear. If you ask them about it, one of them will offer to help you. If you refuse, they will smile and wish you a good journey, then go invisible. If you agree, they will reach out and touch both of your ears; there will be a momentary sensation of gentle heat, followed by the thunderous noise of a massive waterfall very, very close by. Your hearing is so sensitive now that you take 1d4 damage per Turn that you remain this close to the Maelstrom or whatever it is just ahead. 
3. Pillars. Three heavily eroded limestone pillars. Each one more eroded and pitted than the last one, each one spaced about three feet apart. A large, transparent python is coiled atop the third pillar. It is sleeping-off its recent meal and is quite sluggish. If you notice the sleeping serpent, you'll also notice that the pillars are inscribed in crude Tsalalian, however none of the markings are complete. (Just in case, the body within the python is that of a Tsalalian hunter. Perhaps there is a foot poking out of the python's still distended jaws? Her obsidian-tipped spear and war-club are somewhere close by. Not that they did her any good.)
4. Roll a Save. Fail and you lose your hearing for the next 1d4 hours, but if you leave Right Now, you can report having heard the distinctive roar of a massive cataract or thunderous Maelstrom. Take one more step forward and you'll need to roll a Save or lose your footing and go tumbling over the unseen edge into the roaring waters below.
5. A Perdu warrior will appear before you, very briefly, only long enough to startle you. Make a DEX check to remain standing. If you fall, you'll notice that the ground is shaking from an intense vibration that is very close. The Perdu will take turns taunting each of your party. They laugh in great amusement, but you cannot hear them at all. Then they are gone.
6. Bones. Hundreds of colorless and transparent bones litter the uneven, rocky area leading up to a sheer cliff-edge overlooking what appears to be a churning, billowing curtain of fog and mist. If you choose to make your way through the haphazardly strewn bones, you'll need to make a DEX check or Save at -1, then again at -2, then finally at -3 penalty as you go towards the edge. Fail and you lose your footing and the bones begin to shift and slide towards the edge; you'll get one final chance to Save, or go over the edge into the yawning abyss beyond. If you manage to make it to the edge without slipping, you'll find a low wall of skulls erected right at the very edge of the precipitous drop-off. Through the mist you can see what appears to be a vast cataract, a waterfall roaring thunderously down into the dark depths below...but there is no river outside the Glowfield. Careful observation from this vantage point will reveal that the 'low wall' is in fact a sort of sloping walkway leading down around the interior face of the great chasm surrounding the massive waterfall...

---

Rogue Space: The Revised and Expanded Edition Now Available

The revised and expanded edition of Rogue Space is out. The NPA (Non-Player Alien) rules have been streamlined, and a whole bunch of new stuff has been added to the game. It looks great. We're in the process of reading through the new edition, and so far, this looks like a real winner!

Click over to the Rogue Space blog to read all about it, or to order yourself a copy. We expect to have some fresh, new Rogue Space content coming your way very, very soon.

Sunday Summary: 1/6 to 1/11, 2014

Here's a quick summary of what we've posted to the blog for the week of  January 6th to 11th, 2014.

Monday

Beware the Scarlet Plague adapted Jack London's peculiar apocalyptic plague to Wermspittle.

Tuesday

We posted our first installment dealing with The Inner Ramparts surrounding The Baffles and the things that the beleaguered Wall Guard try their best to keep contained. There will be more posts in this series, providing encounter tables and other pertinent details in the days and weeks ahead.

Wednesday

Look to the East provided a glimpse into the Eastern Reaches where several small farm-enclaves have been recently established.

We also did an image for Venger's 'Save Versus Purple' thingy.

Thursday

Bujilli: Episode 74 Took Bujilli and his friends into the heart of the Oneirical Studies Section. Bujilli by-passes Sprague's trapped-door with some inspired reworking of some of his less common spells. The group then splits-up; Gudrun and Sharisse move back down the stairs to deal with the Mirror-born and Bujilli, Leeja and Gnosiomandus go to confront Sprague in his lair.

Friday

The Shollog made its way to this blog by way of Zalchis. Maybe it will make an appearance at Con of the north, perhaps not; it depends on the players...

Saturday

Meet Ushnab Belagarg, our elf adventurer from the recently launched Delving Rappan Athuk game over at Unseen Servant. We're just getting started with this PBP game and will post updates as things start to happen.

Next Week...

We're getting ready for Con of the North, so there will be some more posts regarding the scenarios we'll be running there.

Delving Rappan Athuk at Unseen Servant: Ushnab the Elf (Character Sheet in progress)

I recently signed-up to try out a Play-by-Post excursion into Rappan Athuk using the Labyrinth Lord rules over at the Unseen Servant Forums. Each of us in the group used the Unseen Servant Die Roller tools to build our characters. This is my first experience playing a game via a forum, so it should be interesting. I know it's not quite as cool as playing via G+ Hangouts, or using Skype, or Roll20 or any of that sort of 21st Century technology, but it is fairly asynchronous and fits into my schedule a whole lot easier. And that makes it a lot cooler to me right now. I have a ton of deadlines and commitments, and setting aside the same time on the same bat-night just hasn't been workable, so this way of doing things is something of a godsend for someone like myself. In fact, you might consider this sort of a Transition for me, as I've never done this sort of gaming before. I think it will be a lot of fun. The people I've interacted with at Unseen Servant have been really nice, very helpful and very welcoming to someone completely new to this sort of thing.

The Unseen Servant site offers some very powerful online tools for setting up all sorts of special die rolls, including special macros just for your character, or based upon the specific requirements of a particular campaign. Our group's DM posted a special 'Campaign ID' to the Character Generation thread. Using that code allows each of our character sheets to be directly tied into that specific game. Unseen Servant also makes it really easy to show your rolls by way of a link, to cut down on cheating or fudging. It also will show how many times you re-rolled, and I think it will show if you swapped stats around, which is kind of useful, if you care about that sort of thing, which quite a few osr grog-types do care about.

I rolled four or five times for my character's attributes. I wanted to see how this gizmo worked. I also was hoping for a spell-caster. I kept all the attributes in order, as rolled. The first few couple of sets of attributes were definitely fighters. Then a '16' popped up in INT, and I took a closer look. 13 in WIS and CHAR. 12 CON. 11 in STR and DEX. Not too shabby. Not your Conan or Gandalf type, but decent. I've rolled far worse over the years. This character felt like it might be a good character to try out. The stats I rolled, in order, left me with a character that would make either a good Magic-User or an Elf, so I opted to make them an Elf. I flipped a coin, it's a boy. Made up a name: Ushnab. Then I started filling in the blanks, using the online die roller to calculate Starting Gold (3d8x10=150gp), and consulting the Labyrinth Lord booklet for prices, damage inflicted by the weapons, etc. We were each given 8,500 XP which made Ushnab a 3rd Level Elf, since we're using Race-as-Class.

I bought a few things, starting with weapons first (Short Bow, Scimitar and Dagger. Later, I added a Mace, for those times when blunt force trauma is indicated). Old School rules: If you have weapons, you can get the rest of the gear. Thankfully, Ushnab had a decent bit of gold to work with, so I bought Scale Mail, and a bunch of supplies right off of the list in the book. Even had a few GP left-over. But I wasn't done just yet.

Our DM thoughtfully provided some Extra Equipment to each of us based on our picking a number off of a blank table for each class-type on another thread. I picked number '4' under Elf. Thus Ushnab received a set of +2 Chain Mail, a Potion of Healing, and some bonus gold (400gp), plus his spell-book and starting spells. With the additional funds, I bought a few extra items, and I'm considering picking up a guard dog. But I want to see how much a few meatshields, I mean Retainers/Hirelings might cost, first. This being a delve into Rappan Athuk...well...a little extra oomph couldn't hurt. I added all that stuff into the character sheet. It was super easy to update the entries.

All in all, the Character Building tools over at Unseen Servant are a breeze to use and building Ushnab's sheet took only a few minutes after only a cursory consultation with the online User's Guide. Once I had the online character sheet all filled-in and ready to go, I was able to copy-and-paste a link into the forum that provided a copy of the character to the appropriate thread. This copy of Ushnab's Character Sheet will automatically update every time I adjust things on the original, which is very handy. There are multiple options for various formats, allowing you to copy-and-paste a snippet of code over to a forum or bulletin board, etc. and have your character sheet display there, which is what The Unseen Servant was intended to do, and it does a great job. However, there didn't seem to be a good (i.e. obvious) way to extract a version of the character sheet to re-post it to our blog, so I had to copy-and-paste chunks over by hand. It would be even more handy if the characters generated within Unseen Servant were printable or exportable, and maybe there's a simple trick for doing this in javascript, but I don't know it. So this will have to do for now. That's a minor quibble, and frankly it isn't what they're set up to do, so it's definitely an unreasonable expectation. But hey, we're used to that sort of thing...ahem.

We still have a few things to sort out, like the background-fluff and the description, but they're not so important and I'll update the entries as we go along. Our DM has given me permission to post play reports from our sessions, so I'll be summarizing our group's expedition into the depths of Rappan Athuk as we go along.

So, without further ado, here's Ushnab Belagarg...

Personal Attributes Name: Ushnab Belagarg XP/Next lvl: 8,500 / 16,251 Class: -- HP: curr/max 18 / 18 Alignment: Neutral AC: reg/rear/no shield 3 / 3 / 3 Race: Elf Level: 3 Age: Young Height: 4'10 Weight: 130 Gender: Male Description: TBD Background: TBD Abilities STR: 11 (+0) INT: 16 (+2 Additional Languages, Able to Read & Write.) WIS: 13 (+1 Saving throw Modifier.) DEX: 11 (+0) CON: 12 (+0) CHR: 13 (-1 Reaction Adjustment, 5 Retainers, 8 Retainer Morale.) Saving Throws                                                                          Death, Paralysis, Poison: Petrification, Polymorph: Rod, Staff or Wand: Breath: Spell: 11 12 12 14 14 Weapon # Att Damage sm/l 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Short Bow 1 1d6/ 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18    Scimitar 1 1d8/ 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18    Dagger 1 1d4/ 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Mace 1 1d6/ 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Equipment Qty Item Location                 1 Scale Mail Sell to Retainer?    1 Quiver of 20 Arrows Back    1 Backpack Back 1 Bedroll Pack    1 Scroll-Case Pack 1 Crowbar Pack 3 Flasks (empty) Pack    3 Flasks (Oil) Pack 2 Flask (Wine) Pack    1 50' Rope Pack 1 Flint & Steel Belt Pouch 1 Hammer Pack 3 Quill Pens Pack 1 Vial of Ink Pack 3 Wooden Stakes Pack 12 Iron Spikes Pack 5 Parchment sheets Pack 10 days Trail Rations Pack 10 Small Sacks Pack 5 Large Sacks Pack 1 Spade Pack 10 Candles Pack 1 Pair of Gloves Pack 1 Spell Book Belt Pouch 1 Guard Dog? By Side Wealth                                                                PP GP EP SP CP 0 413 0 0 0 Magic Items Qty Item Location Actions (1) +2 ChainMail                          Worn (1) Potion of Healing (1d8)            Pack Spells Level One Erase Message Protection From Evil Sleep Spider Climb Level Two Locate Object