Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#26) - The Spire II

Day 61 - Continued 

Navda, our trusty rogue, was quick off the mark with a well-placed arrow-shot that brought down the first of our assailants, before the main melee was joined. Our fighters, Druss, Drakkon and Dharion, went toe-to-toe against the three remaining Sahuagin. It was a bloody affair that required the use of my Healing skills, but the fighters dominated the combat and won through quite quickly with the aid of Navda's archery skills and Gladreth's magic.

There were three exits from this chamber, and after taking a quick peek along each corridor, east, west and south, we decided to travel eastwards. Dharion set an Alarm to alert him of any being that passed through that room.

After a short while, we came across a side chamber that was different to the rest of the complex; rather than the usual very well-dressed white marble that was throughout the complex so far, this room was completely covered in dark green tiles. It contained four coffers, one of which glowed blue, and a well-worn sledgehammer. Not knowing what this all meant, we just opened the coffers and took a look at the contents. One contained a pile of white sea-shells, two contained plain green and red-brown seaweed and the blue-glowing casket contained a blue-glowing seaweed. All of the seaweed was damp to the touch but not sodden. We pocketed a small amount of each.

Inside the Spire

Whilst the rest of the party investigated the chamber, Dharion and I were supposed to be watching the corridors. Unfortunately, my attention must have been elsewhere as I completely missed seeing the true-thrown spear from the southern corridor that hit me. Three Sahuagin warriors followed straight after.

I retreated into the room to nurse my wound and the fighters stepped forward to block the entrance. Druss took the first Sahuagin warrior down very quickly and then Drakkon joined the fray. Unfortunately another Sahuagin warrior, very well armed and armoured, joined the melee from the south, and Dharion was sorely pressed in the northern part of the corridor as a few more Sahuagin warriors attacked him; for some unknown reason he missed the Alarm that he had set in the last chamber we left.

Navda, shot his trusty bow from the shadows and managed to take down another one of the warriors, and Dharion's retreat from the Sahuagin in the north part of the corridor brought him face-to-face with the armoured Sahuagin warrior. He didn't break stride as he slew the champion and joined us in the room.

The last part of the melee was a bit of a blur. I cast a Prayer of Healing on my compatriots whilst they dispatched the rest of the Sahuagin warriors: Gladreth with a series of Magic Missiles, Navda with his bow, and Druss and Drakkon with their trusty swords.

After the melee we paused to catch our collective breaths, but just as we thought that we should get out of there, the padding of feet and war cries filled the air from the south, and Dharion's Alarm screamed at him that more warriors were on their way from the north. So much for sneaking in and out unnoticed.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#25) - The Spire I

Last night we managed to get together to start on the next chapter of the Saltmarsh campaign. It was a two-part session as we levelled up (to 6th level) part-way through - we will most definitely need that HP and skills boost if any of our past dice rolls and luck are anything to go by.

Day 60

It was inevitable that our days of rest and recuperation would come to an end. We were summoned to a secret council meeting in the marsh where the underlying threat to the lands around us was discussed. It was a long moot session, with the local lizardman and merfolk populations also involved; hence the location. Although we were there primarily to be on guard, we did pick up on the gist of the meeting; none of the local populations were involved in this threat - it seemed, from the evidence gathered, that there was a threat from a band of Sahuagin raiders.

Day 61

Just as we thought that we would not be called upon to act in this latest kerfuffle, we were summoned by the mayor of Saltmarsh to a council meeting. The town hall was heaving with dignitaries, guards, adventurers and general members of the town, when we got there, and we were announced to loud cheers. The mayor took us off to a side room to discuss the latest plans. From the meeting held in the marshes yesterday it was ascertained that a large Sahuagin insurgency had taken up residence in the swamp to the south, and the threat needed to be observed and calculated so an appropriate reaction and defence could be formulated. We would be needed to go to the encampment, a tower in the swamplands about an hour's journey south of the marsh border, and observe enemy movements, numbers, armaments and so on and then report these details back to the council within a two day period.

After some negotiation we settled on a suitable level of recompense and requested a restock of supplies, ammunition and means of getting there. We were given all we needed as well as a crude map for directions and a keel boat with two guards to take us here.

The journey only took a few hours to get to the drop-off point, where our guides told us to return to the following day at dusk. They would not wait for us either at this point or when it came to the pick up - we would be on our own. This would give us a little over a day in which to find the tower, reconnoitre the base and return with our information.

Luckily, the map showed our path would be along a wooden walkway that headed due south through the marshlands. This made the going quite easy despite the thick mists laying around about. After about an hour, the temperature dropped quite dramatically and the fog thickened. We began to notice small lights moving through the fog in the distance that winked in and out of sight on occasion, and the muddy ground to the side of the path showed the occasional set of footprints, that could have been from Sahuagin or, perhaps, crocodiles.

It was at this point that Dharion and Navda decided to scout ahead just in case we were heard; especially me in my heavy armour. After about an hour the scouts returned. The sun was beginning to wane meaning we only had a few more hours of daylight left to get to the tower and investigate what we could. They reported that what appeared to be the tower was only a short distance away, and that the flickering lights were torches carried by pairs of well-armed Sahuagin sentries - they had worked out the sentries' patrol patterns.

The Spires of Saltmarsh

We made our plans to infiltrate the tower and, when the guards had moved away from the man entrance, we headed for the large ledge upon which the smooth stone doors were ensconced. It took our rogue, Navda, but a few moments to work out how to open the doors and we made our way safely inside. It was pitch black, so I cast Light on a number of objects to help those of us in the party without infravision to see. 

Unfortunately, the Sahuagin in the room were waiting for us and attacked without mercy. We were stunned to begin with but soon took the guards down before any of them could sound the alarm on the large gong in the room. After the melee, we moved the bodies into a corner, out of sight, and mopped up the blood. We also disabled the gong and closed the entrance doors.

The walls and floor of the inside of the tower were very well made and not as rough as the outside of the tower would have us believe. We readied ourselves again and headed to the south as that was the only way that we could see to go. Unfortunately, the way was blocked by a heavy wicker portcullis. However, there was a mechanism on both sides of the portal that allowed us to raise it high enough for us all to pass under it. A counter-weight kept it in position so it did not fall back to the ground and block the corridor again.

Map of the Spire

Just as we began to pass under the wicker portcullis, we were made aware of several more Sahuagin in the room beyond. We would be in for another fight.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#24) - The Isle of the Abbey V

Thursday's gaming session was a relatively short one as we managed to complete this particular campaign section. If our rolls weren't so dire in all of the other encounters prior to this session we would have got here much sooner. I have never known so many sub-5 rolls (and more 1's than pretty much anything else) in a campaign. These dire rolls meant that not only did encounters take probably three to four times as long to play out than they should have done, but we went through all of our spell slots, and had several character KO's in each session meaning we had to take so many long rests to recover. I am dreading the next part of the campaign as, apparently, the danger level ramps up for us. TPK in the first session?

Day 52 - continued

The two figures within the heat-hazed room looked like they were made of iron; a smooth round ball of a head upon broad, squat shoulders. These beings were not tall but were powerfully built. The addition of a sword and hammer in place of arms and hands made for awe inspiring enemies.

Most of us still carried injuries from the previous encounters, and we were pretty much depleted magic-wise prior to this encounter, but Gladreth, Dharion and I still, thankfully, had one or two spells left each.

The fighters stormed straight into the room and attacked the metal beings but were sorely pressed and often knocked prone due to the strength of the metal constructs. The rest of us piled on missile pressure from our bows and slings, taking small chunks out of their iron hides. The fighters hacked away and also caused many great clefts in the statues' metal skins.

On one occasion, one broke through the ring of fighters and got to the second rank where it proceeded to spin its top half to great effect; the sword and hammer causing great damage to those unlucky enough to be caught by them. A Prayer of Healing restored most of us to full health but the battle raged on.

At one point I yelled out to Gladreth to use her Magic Missiles. She cast the spell within the next few moments and the first of the constructs, the one that had begun the spinning attack, finally fell with a loud clang.

A short while later, Gladreth spotted that the second iron golem had just run its top half into a spin whilst fighting Druss and Drakkon. Thinking that it too must be close to being destroyed, she cast her final Magic Missile spell and that one also fell to the floor with a clang.

Not knowing what dangers were still lurking, Dharion and I used our last spells to heal some of those most sorely injured, whilst Navda tested all of the chests and boxes for traps. After the healing was completed and all the chests were checked, we opened them to reveal a great hoard of treasures, that included gold coins, gems, jewellery, potions, fine armour, bolts of fine silk and a wondrous Bag of Holding.

The Abbey Dungeon in full

Not knowing how much more of this dungeon lay ahead of us, we traced our steps back towards the main entrance via the northern corridor. We discovered several more traps, but this time no-one succumbed to them. We had finally searched the entire maze and rid it of all dangers.

A few days later we returned to town and claimed our 2000 Gold Crown reward from the Mariners Guild. They were happy with the job we had done and set out straight away to begin building a new lighthouse and fortress on the island.

We hung around the town's taverns and inns telling our tales of daring and generally relaxing after all the troubles we had been through. We gathered though that it would not be long before we were called upon again to rid the town of some new danger.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#23) - The Isle of the Abbey IV

Thursday last week, we were able to continue with the online Saltmarsh campaign. It has taken a little longer than normal to get the session written up as a lot of real life got in the way over the weekend. Anyway, on with the show...

Day 52

We rested well for the rest of the day and then overnight but everyone had a nagging feeling that things were still going to be rough for us. We retraced our steps back to the large crystal minotaur and continued to follow the southern corridor.

We wound up in a twisted maze of corridors with many more traps. Again, even though I trod as carefully as I could, I fell into a poison-spiked pit. Navda also fell foul of a trapped door that shocked him with a bolt of lightning when he tried to open it. It needed Gladreth to Dispel Magic on the door to enable us to get through it.

The other side of the door revealed a large, square chamber full of chests and scattered treasures. It was presided over, from the centre, by a jade green statue of a beautiful elf maiden.

Navda made a lasso and managed to cast it at one of the treasure chests scattered about the floor, so he would not have to enter the room to retrieve it. Unfortunately, even though his first cast was successful and he began to draw back the chest, it was too noisy and the jade statue's head turned. The elf maiden's visage turned into a hideous be-fanged vampiric demon.

Gladreth swiftly cast a Lightning Bolt at the jade being but it had little effect - maybe we should have heeded what happened to Navda when he attempted to open the door? We would be in for another tough fight again. This time I had the foresight to Bless our main fighters, which helped them in the combat. The statue was damaged severely, but not without it causing carnage on the fighters that required a Prayer of Healing to restore.

Unfortunately, the bites of this vampiric demon led to the blood of several of our party to begin to boil. Luckily Dharion and I were able to arrest its development before it caused serious issues for those affected.

With the demise of the jade demon we were able to search the room, but it turned out that all of the treasure was false - all the coins were base metal painted to look like gold and silver, and all the jewels were paste.

The open way northwards just led back to where we had come from, so we looked for another way out of the room. It had previously been affirmed by the acolyte Odim, although he had proven a liar with other things he had said, that there was a great treasure here, so we kept our hopes up that we would eventually be rewarded for our efforts.

Navda was rewarded for his efforts whilst searching the room for secret exits by finding a false door in the eastern wall. He disarmed the dart trap and opened it to reveal a corridor with a fine granite floor with golden veins running through it. We initially avoided the room directly ahead of us when we found that we could not open the door, but the door that was ajar at the southern end of the corridor looked promising.

The door was slightly ajar, so Navda and Gladreth carefully approached it. After listening intently at it for a while and checking it for traps, they pulled the door open only for the ceiling above to collapse upon them. I used up pretty much all the rest of my spells Healing them. It was only when things quietened down a bit that we began to hear a ticking sound coming from along the corridor.

A bit more of the dungeon below the ruined abbey

Navda and I thought that it may be yet another trap on some kind of timer so we advanced along the corridor as quickly as we could, narrowly avoiding another pit trap set in the south-eastern corner.

The northern end of the corridor ended at a wooden doorway from behind which we could hear the ticking sound. Navda disarmed a trap set on the door and when the portal was opened the ballista behind it was also permanently put out of use. The ticking sound came from a large clock that had a second hand that was ticking but the pendulum was not moving. Gladreth realised that the pendulum needed to be restarted in order to activate it again, so Drakkon reached out and got it back into motion.

Just as the pendulum began to swing, we heard a shout from the rest of the party still at the unopenable door that the door had actually just swung open. We hurried back to join the rest of the party and found that the chamber beyond the door contained two massive pillars. The floor was covered in bags and stuff but what mainly caught our attention, were the two shimmering figures that were moving around.

Midgard : Scenario 6 : Aftermath

This post is a brief summary of what happened in the last game of the campaign and how I felt the campaign panned out overall. I will also discuss a little about Midgard going forward for my various world settings (Britannia, Doggerland, Lord of the Rings etc.).

Midgard : Heroic Battles

The Final Reckoning scenario saw relatively few casualties on the British side compared to the Romans, but those that were casualties made for an interesting ending to the narrative overall.

On the Roman side, Caecilius Rufinus Pulcher was killed but the other two Roman heroes survived. The rest of the Roman army was reduced to just one unit of auxiliary spearmen, one scorpio battery and the onager - these would most likely not have survived another round of combat if the game had continued on.

The Britons lost relatively few units again, but the death of their army leader, Vellocatus, tipped the balance down to a Narrow Victory, thus securing the Britons fewer campaign victory points.

The Britons' losses (155pts):

• Vellocatus (47pts)
• 2x mounted warriors (32pts)
• 1x hounds (22pts)
• 2x Skyclad (32pts)
• 1x warriors 3 (22pts)

The Roman losses (189pts):

• Caecilius Rufinus Pulcher (43pts)
• 2x legionaries (68pts)
• 2x archers (58pts)
• 1x scorpio battery (20pts)

This final scenario made for a good ending to the campaign; the Romans won the campaign overall, but only narrowly. The objective was to get some troops home safe, and that was accomplished - but very nearly was not on a few occasions.

The scenarios, and numbers of troops available to fight in them, needed relatively little fudging to make them work together. I am going to mark this campaign as a successful one from that point of view. I will also mark it as a successful introduction for both myself and my son to the game of Midgard. My compliments to James Morris for writing a great game.

So, the campaign scenario order went thus...

1. Battle (book scenario 1) - played in May 2025
2. Encounter in the Mist (book scenario 4) - played in May 2025
3. None Shall Pass (book scenario 2) - played August 2025
4. Take the High Ground (book scenario 3) - played November 2025
5. Last Stand (book scenario 5) - played December 2025
6. The Final Reckoning (my own scenario) - played December 2025

Campaign take aways...

• A unit of Roman Legionaries is a very tough nut to crack, especially with the Spears as Tribute trait and a decent hero to lead them
• Being on a hill and having other units around to make those vital saving rolls when outnumbered is a massive boost for defending units
• The British units were numerous but quite brittle - Reputation got eaten up more quickly than I thought it would and games were soon over due to quick losses rather than tactics. Using a brittle force will require a bit more thought in future - at the end of at least two of the games the Britons were about to make the killing stroke but their Reputation ran out just prior to the plan coming to fruition

The future for Midgard in my gaming calendar

I will most definitely be using the game system in other settings as well as a few more Roman versus Britons/Celts games. I understand that a new, official, scenario book will be released for the game soon, so maybe those new scenarios can be used to tell the ongoing stories of Marius Pollux and Gaia Pomponia Thrax (a rename of this hero is on the cards after a very interesting discussion on the Lead Adventure Forum with member dadlamassu - here )?

As mentioned above, I am slowly de-icing my old setting of Doggerland - I have played numerous games and campaigns (play-by-email strategy games, AD&D etc.) in this setting over the years, and will be starting a fresh Five Leagues from the Borderlands campaign later this month. This will then, hopefully, lead on to a mini-campaign using the Midgard rules to move the world narrative on a little further for maybe another D&D campaign in the future?

I also have nigh on a thousand of Games Workshop's Lord of the Rings miniatures that are itching for more than Strategy Battle Game usage. I don't really have any completed armies, so that will be a task for me this year - to paint some miniatures for use in further games of Midgard.

In addition to the Lord of the Rings miniatures, I have several small forces of fantasy figures that need a bit of time on the table. These are part of another world I have in mind separate from Doggerland, Roman Britain and Middle Earth. More food for thought for those future battles and campaign world building.