Solo FTR Crawl 2; Part 2

Solo FTR Crawl 2; Part 2 

   Ny searches the room for treasure, which generates the treasure result. He's not searching individual pieces.  Mordvey takes a moment to study his spells, relearning his Melee ones.

     Ummork is moving forward toward the next area, when a hideous creature emerges from the doorway.  A Hollow Spawn! Ummork flails his sword at it, but with no effect. Fortunately for Ummork the Honorable, his helm muffled the high-pitched scream he let out.

    The Spawn slaps at Ummork, but does no damage.  Then it swipes at Mordvey.  Cazio tries to cast a boost to his Armor but fails, the spawn succeeds in slashing him for 2 wounds! (he only has 3) Mordvey is in deadly danger!

            Cazio stumbles, the Oppressive Darkness keeping him from moving effectively.  But he then gains his footing and charges the Spawn, to no result.  Cazio borrows two dice to attack again in a desperate bid to keep the vulnerable wizard alive, but still does nothing.

            The Hallow Spawn strikes back, it's tail clanging off the clerics armor.  Seeing the Spawn turn its attention to Mordvey, Cazio borrowed his last die and cast a curse on the Spawn, lowering its Melee ability by 4!  And yet, it still struck Mordvey. The wizard barely managed to parry the blow, but he did!

    Ergon is no longer paralyzed, but he can't reach the monster past his friends. Ny's magical cloak lets him slip past Mordvey to at least reach the Spawn.  Stabbing and slashing, he finally strikes the creature. Mordvey borrows his only die to enhance the thieves Strength by 3, letting him Wound the creature but not kill it.

    The Spawn again attacked Mordvey, and then Ummork, but because of its reduced Melee ability it was unable to harm anyone.  Ummork manages a wounding thrust, it's minor, but it's enough to finally kill the Spawn.

XP: 25

TheWatch – 5, no addition

    Ummork has one die left, so strides forward into the next area, a short hallway.  Mordvey and Cazio do nothing, they borrowed everything they had so these Activations are already done.

    Vela screams and runs through the room, yelling “Zombies are coming up behind us!”, which they are.

    Ny moves into the unexplored area and finds some sort of meeting hall.  Benches, a fireplace, a platform to speak from,  and a massive Lizardman Ogre lounging before the fireplace.  It doesn't see him enter.  Ergon positions himself to guard the rear and wait for the zombies.

TheWatch – 4, no add

Initiative – Evil 4, Party 6

    Both Cazio and Mordvey take the activation to study/pray.  Mordvey's previous attempt was thwarted by the Hallow Spawns attacks.  He still learns nothing, no doubt due to the pain of his Wounds.  Cazio once again receives both of his spells.

    Ummork moves closer to the audience room, but doesn't enter.  Nearly losing both Cazio and Mordvey in such short order has made him a bit cautious.  At the other end of the room Ergon moves toward the zombies, and triggers a trap!  A snare loop just misses closing around his foot, but the barbarian was too quick and managed to avoid it.  With a roar, the massive man charges down the hall, his claws flashing in the torchlight.  One after another the zombies fall, until all five have been returned to death.  Ergon is becoming quite adept at zombie killing.

Here I use the Enquiry resolution Table to see if the Lizard Ogre notices the party.  I set it as “A Possibility”.  Result – Yes, And...

    The massive lizard turned to face Ny.  Had he heard Ergon fighting?  Did he smell the humans?  Impossible to tell, but the result was the same.  Not only did he know they were there, but a loud grunting snarl summoned four smaller lizards from the rooms doors.  The massive lizard charged across the room, and despite some amazingly nimble maneuvers by the thief, Ny was wounded.

TheWatch – 5, no add

Initiative – Evil 5, Party 6

    Using the abilities of his cloak, Ny slips away from the beast without triggering the free attack, and past the two smaller lizards.  Again, he’s no coward, but he knows he is no match for this thing.  Cazio heals Mordvey back to full, and Mordvey re-learns three of his spells. 

    Ummork charges ahead to engage the closest of the small lizards, and just as he reaches it, a spear thrusts from the wall.  It hits his shield and does no damage.  He wounds the lizard, but can't finish it.  Ergon moves in and wounds the Ogre Lizard.

    The small lizards fan out, attacking the party but not causing any wounds.  The Ogre lizard hacks Ergon for 2 Wounds, leaving him only 2 left!

TheWatch – 2, no add

Initiative – Evil 5, Party 3

    The smaller lizards again cause no injury to the party, and even the mighty Lizard scores no wounds, as Ergon deftly dodges the blows aimed at him.

    The party goes to work.  Ny fells the lizard he faces, Ummork cuts through the two before him like wheat before he lands a wounding blow on the Ogre Lizard.  Ergon in his weakened state does nothing of use.

    But Cazio rushes into the room, and leaping from the back of a bench, brings his mighty Mace of Bashing down on the Ogres head, ending it. Mordvey zaps the remaining lizard with a bolt of something, it hurts, but not enough.  He is the first to notice the two zombies that have entered the room, though.

TheWatch – 6, add one

Initiative – Evil 6, Party 4

The party kills the last lizard and the zombies with little trouble.

XP – 127  Loot, The Armor of Achilles

    Mordvey dons the leather Armor of Achilles.  He then moves toward the end of the room, to look at the fireplace.  Unfortunately, the ornate decorations he was interested in, aren't.  As he gets closer, they move, then unfold, then slip to the floor revealing itself as a Giant Scorpion!

    Mordvey casts an entrapment spell, but the scorpion avoids it.  He casts a bolt of magical force, but the scorpion avoids that too!  The scorpion charges, Mordvey manages to avoid the pincers but the Scorpion strikes again, it's tail tearing the wizards flesh for a wound, and poisoning him!

    Ummork rushes to the wizards side, and with three mighty blows he ends the scorpion.

    Concerned for the wizard, Cazio moves towards him, the words of a healing prayer coming to mind.

    Then he stepped on a trap, the floor dropped away, and Cazio fell through the darkness to his death.

This really sucked.  I liked Cazio quite a bit.

TheWatch – 1 add one

    Seeing his friend fall, Mordvey steps forward, grabs his chest and drops to the floor, stone dead from the scorpion poison.

Oh come on!

     With the Wizard and the Cleric dead, and Ergon very wounded, the remaining party decide it's time to leave.  Ny carries the wizards body.  The cleric is lost to the depths of the pit, and can't be retrieved.  

    Ummork leads the way out, and encounters a Flintskin Troll, along with a horde of Deep Mites in the hall! 

Of course he does…

TheWatch – 1, add one.  Sure, great.

Initiative – Evil 2, Party 4

    Ummork charges into the creatures, but the Mites being so short causes him problems I guess, because he hit nothing.  Ergon follows, cutting down two Mites, even as another arrives.  Ny, leaving the wizards body with Vela, rushes in and cuts down another Mite.
    The Mites are screeching and snapping, but can't get past the blocks or armor of the party.  The Flintskin Troll doesn't have that issue.  With a grunting roar, it moves forward, two of its arms crashing down on Ergon.  The mighty barbarian falls, and lays still.  Ummork blocks the trolls second set of arms.

TheWatch – 4, no add

Initiative – Evil 5, Party 3

    Ny cuts down the last Mite blocking the path, and Ummork trades ineffective blows with the Troll.

Vela manages to use the stagnant battle to sneak around the creatures while they're fighting, and she makes a run for it with the wizards body.

    Ny uses the magic of his cloak to disengage without issue, and flees past the monsters.  Ummork simply steps away, the parting attack as ineffective as all the others. 

            The three make it to the exit, chased by the creatures, but without further incident.  Ergon's body was not recovered, not that there was a lot left to recover after the Troll smashed him into the stones.

---

    So, five adventurers entered the dungeon, and two returned.  TheWatch cards were filling up and making things very difficult.  Ergon, Mordvey, and Cazio died in TheDeep.

And it all happened so fast!  Things were rough all along, but suddenly it really went downhill!

    I like the new XP method, and I’m liking the new method of determining treasure.  One thing I do need to do is develop (or refine, rather), the monster reactions.  I have a method that I created, I just need to use it enough to get a good sampling of the effects.

    I also went with a “Theme Model” for this dungeon.  Basically, when you draw/roll a monster type, you just check to see if you can swap the randomly determined type with one that fits your theme, but keeps it roughly equivalent. If you can’t, then just use the monster it told you to.

    In this dungeon, I replaced skeletons and goblins with Lizardmen of the same type.  I rolled an Ogre, so swapped that with the huge crocodile lizardman.  I don’t have anything that can replace a Bone Blade or a troll, so I just used those.  Simple, and it gives you the theme without disrupting the random nature.