Vecna: Eve of Ruin (#3) - The Mines II

The party got together again last night and we carried on with our exploration of the Dwarf Mines so that we could get to the bottom of the mystery.

The Mines - Day 3 (Dawn)

There were no incidents overnight that affected the watches, so we awoke refreshed and fully healed. It was still raining and the water levels had risen overnight. The sky was still gloomy and overcast; the sun barely making its presence felt. We decided that we would systematically search each of the remaining caves in this area outside the mine before plunging into the cold, wet depths of the torrent pouring into the entrance.

It was a bit of a chore to get ourselves across to each of the intervening islands between the one we were on and the one in the north-east as the current was still swift and the jumps were too far for everyone bar myself and the magical boots I was wearing.

We managed to get onto the northeast island without incident and was greeted by the sight of many more dwarf bodies. Taking our cue from what the dwarf warriors had told us earlier, we began to place the bodies into the water. After the second one slipped below the surface, the rest began to stir and we heard a series of groans from behind the rocks in front of us.

The number of zombie dwarfs was quite large, so Gladreth launched a Fireball into their midst destroying most of them. The groans appeared to come from a red haired dwarf female warrior in plate armour. We took no chances, hit her a few times and threw her into the water. She sank under the weight of her plate armour.

The remaining zombies managed to hold their own against us for a while and then suddenly Drakkon could no longer move. At this point the red-haired dwarf warrior woman pulled herself from the water and tried to get into combat with the remaining zombies shouting a war cry in her own language that Gladreth understood; she was not a zombie, but on our side!

Several more zombies emerged from the cave we were headed towards, so to cut them off I ran forward and tried to destroy them with my god's radiant holy powers. It had no effect on them whatsoever, and I was swamped by the horde.

The Entrance to the Mines (second cave)

Luckily, the dwarf warrior stormed to my rescue, taking many hits that should have struck me. I was feeling terrible for striking her earlier when we did not know she would be an ally. At some point in the melee, a weapon appeared out of thin air but I managed to duck in time to avoid injury. Not knowing what this new threat was, I cast my single Fireball spell and destroyed a large number of the zombies; Druss and Navda destroyed the remainder.

Unfortunately, just as we thought that we could lick our wounds and take a rest, a drow sorceress appeared and tried to Hold me. My god was with me this time and I shrugged off the charm but she ran back into hiding within the cave as a fresh wave of zombies bore down upon us. The fighters in the party managed to down a few but even more appeared. This was becoming ridiculous. We must have fought and seen at least thirty or more undead dwarfs in this cave alone. Luckily Gladreth still had a few spells up her sleeves and her last Fireball destroyed most of them.

Drakkon, annoyed by the drow priestess as she had charmed him twice, managed to get up close and finally dispatch her with Druss's help. Dharion and the dwarf warrior maiden completed the demise of the remaining zombies.

When the last zombie fell, I Healed the party as much as I could, including the dwarf warrior. She was grateful for the attention and opened up a little by telling us that she was with a couple of other fighters sent to liberate their countrymen. We mentioned that we had seen the other two and had rescued them from the island that they had got stuck on.

We searched the drow priestess but only found a few useful items: a very nice warhammer, a spider emblem round her neck and spider rings on her fingers, as well as two vials of what looked like Potions of Healing. We stuffed these into our sacks and got ready to move on.

Midgard Heroic Battles : Britannia - miniatures update 1

Following on from a recent post stating that I need to get cracking on some figure painting, I decided to chance my arm at daubing some paint onto the remainder of the unpainted Midgard Heroic Battles : Britannia Celts in my collection. I played the whole campaign with many of the British units unpainted or partly painted - my thoughts at the time were that I would rather play a game with unfinished models than not play at all. It worked for me then, but now I have an itch to get painting again as I would like to complete this particular army for future gaming and also to get me in practice for the many other armies I would also like to start working on over the summer.

Here is a full list of all the Celtic figures that I have in my collection and their state of play...

List of all Celtic figures that were based for Midgard...

• 4 bases of standard warriors (40 figures)
• 2 bases of elite warriors (20 figures)
• 1 base of female warriors (10 figures)
• 2 bases of mounted warriors (8 figures)
• 2 bases of archers (8 figures)
• 2 bases of slingers (8 figures)
• 2 bases of skyclad warriors (8 figures)
• 1 base of hounds (4 figures)

And here is a list of all my other individual figures...

• 36 standard warriors and elite warriors still on their sprues
• 7 leader types
• 4 druids
• 8 spearmen
• 2 mounted warriors
• 2 slingers
• 3/6 chariots and crew

Over the coming weeks I am going to try to paint as many of them as I can in readiness for starting on my other unpainted legions for a variety of settings. I am hoping to get my eye back in so that I can begin to improve on my last few attempts. I am never going to be able to paint to Golden Demon levels (I have never had that level of skill by any stretch of the imagination anyway), but failing eyesight, limited time, patience and energy means I will try to do what I can. I am more of a looking reasonably good at tabletop distance standard type of painter, so if I can match that ethic again then I will be happy.

Here are the only completed bases/units so far - they were painted many moons back when I first bought them. Going forward, I am hoping to match their style and neatness if I am able to, but will cut down on some of the colour work - basic paint jobs only for them. There are a few more figures that were painted back in the day but I have not photographed them yet as the bases are not completed. Once those bases are completed, they will appear alongside the newer painted ones.

Picture of the, so far, three completed Celtic units...

Three bases of already painted Celtic Warriors

Here they are individually. I think I have mentioned previously that the shields got a bit washed out with the matt varnish spray - if anyone has an antidote to restore them to being a little brighter I would be happy to hear about it....

Base 1 of Warriors

Base 2 of Warriors

Base 3 of Warriors

I am going to try to complete a unit/base per week if I can, so I have lined up a few easy wins to begin with. I will then move onto some of the smaller units (4 figures per base rather than 10) so I can complete some bases more quickly and feel that I have at least achieved something each week. Then I will checkout the 10 man bases again to get a few of them done. Let's see how I get on over the next few weeks.

Hopefully, by the end of the next week, I will have a dog handler completed to add to the base of hounds I have already painted.

Vecna: Eve of Ruin (#2) - The Mines

Last night saw the regular D&D crowd get back together on Fantasy Grounds to play the next installment of the new campaign, Vecna : Eve of Ruin. It has been a few weeks since the last game as real life has taken priority, but hopefully we are back now for another run of games.

The Mines - Day 2 (Dusk)

We approached the dwarven mines by heading downhill alongside a torrent of water. The entrance to the mines had flooded from what we could see, and the water was very fast flowing. On many of the raised areas of drier land just outside the mine entrance we could see a number of dwarf bodies lying strewn around where they had apparently been slain.

Whilst we checked the bodies to see if any were still alive, and for clues as to what might have happened, we began to hear chanting coming from beyond a clusters of rocks. Some of the bodies began to slightly twitch so we moved forward to investigate further. A dwarf magician emerged from behind the rocks and Held Navda in place with an enchantment. Gladreth let fly a Fireball that reduced half of the rising bodies to ash. A short-lived fight ensued wherein Druss killed the dwarf mage, but he managed to throw an enchanted red gem at the floor that exploded into a Wall of Force causing a great deal of harm both to the party and to the remaining dwarf zombies before he died. The remining four dwarf zombies were quickly dispatched by Dharion, Navda and Gladreth's Firebolt.

Just as we finished off the last of the zombies, we heard the final clattering of a combat emanating from a small island a short distance away. The two dwarf warriors had just defeated a small number of adversaries. They beckoned us over, but I was the only one who could get there, using my Boots of Striding, without being swept away by the swift current. They explained that the dead dwarfs should be placed into the River of the Gods (the waters around our feet apparently), and that the river held powers over the dwarf dead. They also explained that the flooding and rain would stop if we could defeat the evil wizard. The strong current in the surrounding waters led directly to the mines.

As we didn't currently have the means to rescue the dwarfs we said that we would return and save them later. We placed the dead dwarfs reverently into the waters as requested and left the two living warriors on their island. We headed towards the north-west where we found a small entrance that led into a very dark cavern. Inside, Dharion's superior dark vision could make out movement but not a lot else. Fearing that it would be more zombies, I cast Light on a large stone and hurled it into the cavern.

Entrance to the Dwarf Mins

The light from the stone allowed us all to see the numerous zombies within the cave. I rapidly moved in and called upon the grace of Pelor to return these souls to their proper place, and four of the undead collapsed to dust whilst another four retreated from my god's awesome power.

A tall, very thin humanoid, whose head was covered in spiders emerged from behind a rock and also moved away from me, but not without first firing a poisoned arrow. The rest of my comrades moved in and combat ensued. Gladreth's Lightning Bolt made short work of the zombies but the drow was made of sterner stuff and did not appear to be affected by the lightning. A few moments later another drow dropped from the ceiling and blew a strange powder into Dharion's face, blinding and poisoning him. Dharion and I were able to remove those curses from him using our spell-craft, but moments later the drow did the same again to him.

Druss, in a Rage, charged the drow located deepest within the cavern and was treated to a cloud of the same dust, but it had no effect on him. In a few moments he had cut the drow down, whilst Dharion (even though still blinded), Navda, Gladreth and I dealt with the other drow in short shrift.

As we searched the body of the first drow, the spiders from around his head tried to run away, but we crushed them all under our boots. On the two drow bodies we found two capsules of powdered malice, four poisoned crossbow bolts and some very nice studded leather armour. We stashed everything away for future use and returned south to see about setting the two dwarfs free from being stranded.

A quick return to the camp outside where Drakkon kept watch allowed us to grab his water breathing helm and a length of rope. We pulled the dwarfs across and through the waterway one-at-a-time and bid them farewell.

As night was now rapidly approaching we made camp and set watches for a long night's rest to heal up and recover our spells.

Framlingham and Orford Castles

On Wednesday, in the scorching 33 degree heat of the English spring, I was able to take the kids to a couple of castles in Suffolk: Framlingham and Orford. I usually visit these two castles on the same day as they go together historically. I have visited these castles on a couple of occasions previously, but not for at least 30-35 years! The sites have been thoroughly modernised in the intervening years and there is more to see at both sites than I remember seeing when I last went. 

Framlingham Castle was originally built in timber by Roger Bigod in 1101 after being granted the manor by King Henry I. The Bigods were a lowly family when they arrived with William I to conquer England, but rapidly rose to power. The first stone castle was built around 1154 by Roger's son Hugh who, via a variety of machinations and side-swapping during The Anarchy, eventually became powerful enough for King Henry II to want to reclaim East Anglia for himself to reduce the Bigod's power. The king confiscated the castle and all of the other Bigod holdings in Norfolk (this included two other castles (Walton and another) I think) in 1157, but he returned Framlingham in the 1160s. Hugh Bigod did not learn from his mistakes and supported a rebellion against the king in 1173 which was defeated, so lost teg castle again. He died on pilgrimage to Jerusalem around 1176.

Framlingham Castle

Framlingham is also famous for housing Queen Mary during the Lady Jane Grey fracas; it was here that she gathered support and later learned that she was to be crowned the first female monarch of England.

Orford Castle was built by King Henry II to counterbalance the power of Hugh Bigod in East Anglia whilst he reasserted his authority in the region.

Orford Castle

From the top of the castle you can see why the position at Orford was so strategic - the views over the Ness are amazing; you can see for miles. In fact, on a good day and without a few trees in the way you should be able to see Framlingham Castle.

Song of Blades and Heroes - Dragon!

My youngest son was with me over the Bank Holiday weekend just gone so we decided to play a quick game of Song of Blades and Heroes. I was in the mood to try something a little different from normal so decided upon using a dragon figure I painted up several years ago to see how fielding a single big monster would affect the way the game plays.

My son used one of his old warbands again, and to make up the points I added a ghoul to the 268 point dragon to make my warband the 300 points required. To be honest I didn't really want to and it nearly cost me the game at one point.

The dragon and the ghoul...

268 points of dragon (and 32 points of ghoul)

The humans...

The barbarians

The humans won initiative and moved up to try to grab the magic item tokens before the dragon could do so. The dragon rolled three successes and due to its Long Move quickly landed on a token that turned out to be the treasure (a Belt of Strength - that could be used in the next game if we so choose). The ghoul followed on slowly to give support and maybe to carry the treasure off the board in case something went awry.

The humans moved up to attack the dragon in the hope that they could wrest the treasure from its steely talons.

The barbarians, not being susceptible to Terror, were able to charge the dragon and ghoul and give combat. Despite the huge advantage that the dragon had in combat it could only manage to push back one of its opponents this turn.

The following turn, however, this changed and the first of the barbarians fell to the dragon's magical abilities.

Over the next few turns the barbarians began to fall at a rate of one a turn. However, at one point the ghoul was killed and, as the dragon's army had reached 50% of its original size, had to take a Morale check. This got me worried as I only had to roll a single one on the three dice and the dragon would have to retreat a Long Move, which would have taken it off the board and granted victory to the humans. Luckily I didn't roll a one but it did make me ponder how to use small-sized armies in future.

The dragon steadily mopped up the barbarians until they had to take a Morale check for the loss of their leader. One or two retreated away (one off the board) and directly after that they took another Morale test for hitting 50% of army size due to the desertion. Two more ran away leaving just a couple of archers. One advanced to take on the dragon from a vantage point at the ford on the river - he was turned to steam by its breath weapon along with half the river. Somehow the last remaining archer avoided retreating despite the Gruesome Kill and tried his best to attack the dragon, but the Initiative roll for the next turn went in favour of the dragon and the archer was stomped on.

So, it was a victory to the dragon with the entire barbarian army being killed or routing.

Observations from this game:

• During the entire game of 10 turns, I (the dragon) only won Initiative 3 times, and then not until the 7th turn!
• Ganging up works, as does volley shooting (unfortunately not well enough to take down a dragon)
• 268 points for one figure is a lot to spend, but it seemed to work
• Keep to the middle of the board if you only have a few warriors on your side to prevent routing, especially with a Long Move figure

Going forward, I think a dragon should be a solitary creature - the ghoul nearly cost me the game. I also think at this level the game becomes a little unbalanced. Maybe the opposition needed to have more men or the values of the warriors against the dragon needed to be more heroic with Traits that negate some of the dragon's abilities (e.g. barbarians are immune to Terror, which really helped)?

My son was not upset at all by losing this game - he was happy to see how it played out as he wanted to find out how a dragon would fare too. I guess he will want to take a dragon next time we play.

Dragon Rampant : my first game

Over the last few days I was able to set up and play a game of Dragon Rampant Second Edition. This game was a play test for, hopefully, a forthcoming magazine article. I will not put too much detail into this post, other than to say I ran it and enjoyed playing the game.

I haven't put videos up on the blog yet, so here are a couple of very shaky run throughs (taken from my phone) of each army as a test of how this all works - I will take more time and care next time I try to shoot videos for the blog.

The "Goodies"

The "Baddies"

And, here is an overhead or two of the game before play started....

There are a lot of proxied miniatures in each unit, but I was able to cobble together enough to at least get the game played. That said, fun is the main criterion with all my gaming, so who cares if the figures are not what they are supposed to represent? It was the mechanics of the game that I was testing, and then the story behind the game that are the main points here.

My take aways from this are that the game played well, with a few surprises due to some dice roll effects. At least it told a story that can be put into some light prose for the article.

More details in the forthcoming magazine article hopefully.

Goblin Raiding Party

Harking back to yesterday's post, the picture I used of a little band of goblin ne'er-do-wells really got my nostalgic juices flowing; enough to warrant a post of their own (and probably several more to come in the future).

These figures are from a very early Citadel box set - Speciality Set 4 - Goblin Raiding Party. The details for them on the Stuff of Legends website has the names I came to know and, erm, love, but their designation does not match up with my memories - the figures listed in The Stuff of Legends entry for them is here in this linky and in the image below...

Image from the back of the box, words by SoL

When I bought the set, this was how I remember them being labelled (basically all the same except SoL have the Warlord and Lieutenant round the wrong way)...

1. D'glish Sharpcut, Ubar's Lieutenant
2. Urag Legeater attacking with Warpick
3. Discipline Master, Snurd Hideflayer with whip
4. Bulbug Orcleaver with warhammer
5. Warlord Ubar Earbiter - Goblin Chieftain
6. Goblin Champion, Torg Dwarfsmasher
7. Norgus the Flatulent attacking with Spear
8. Shaman Pogo Wildchant
9. Gigblad Childsplatter with Morningstar
10. Zurguch Wartpicker with Sling

Here, again, is the picture I took yesterday of the warband all painted using Humbrol enamel paints and based on artists board, with Tetrion and cheap flock for the bases.

Goblin Raiding Party

Goblin Raiders

More Goblin Raiders

Apologies for the poor photo quality - they looked fine on my phone but they lost a lot of detail when I transferred them to my PC to re-size.

What brought these figures back to the front of my mind was their place in one of my gaming worlds from long ago. I saw them as the ideal faction to face off against my dwarf army (Bugman and his Dwarf Rangers got to be included in this army too), which I also bought around the same time. In addition to these, I also picked up dozens of Night Goblins and various other goblins that seemed to fit with this warband - some even had the same shields!

My thoughts when I was totting up the pile of shame was that I would love to re-do these for my more modern gaming sensibilities. Unfortunately, so many of the figures have been affected by the dreaded lead rot. I will need to look into how to arrest the decay of the remaining miniatures so I can get them painted before they become unrecognisable. I just hope the paint on these ones has preserved them.

Another strange thing I noticed - why is Torg Dwarfsmasher on a round penny base whilst the rest are on those square home-made ones? I really don't know is the answer. I will eventually get them all rebased onto pennies for uniformity and to be able to use them for Midgard and Dragon Rampant (I may need to add one or two more from the collection mentioned above to make up the numbers).

If anyone has any tips on how to arrest the dreaded lead rot, I am all ears. Also, what would be the best method for removing the existing paint jobs? They are enamels, so not sure if there are any special methods or particular brands that are better than others. I will do some searching on t'internet but if anyone can help out in the meantime I would be happy for the input.

Painting Summary - all my 28mm miniatures

I have been buying miniatures for nearly half a century now and I have amassed quite the collection. Unfortunately, like most gamers, I am subject to the "ooh shiny" syndrome, and buy far more than I should do, and rarely get to use or paint them before the next impulse purchase comes along. That said, I have bought relatively few miniatures in the last few years - the vast majority in my collection are well over a decade old!

Goblin Raiding Party

So, over the last few days I have been going through my hoard (or should that be horde? 😉 ) and listing them on a spreadsheet in order to see what I have got, and what does or does not need painting. The numbers have spurred me to get my paint brushes out and begin working on them - I would like to get two sides for each theatre of war, so I can play my sons when they come over or at least have two factions for solo gaming.

Here is a break down of the figures that I have catalogued so far. This is not the full total as I have a few more in bags and packets that I will either sell as they were freebies from gaming shows or magazines, or throw away as they are broken and cannot be cannibalised for parts...

• Romans                          283      (192 of which are painted)
• Britons                           180      (43 painted)
• Roman-British               71        (45 painted)
• Anglo-Saxons                88
• Vikings                          89
• Runequest                      18        (18 painted)
• Undead                          45        (38 painted)
• Frostgrave                     96        (7 painted)
• Other Fantasy                96        (2 painted)
• Old Skool Stuff             569      (357 painted)
• Rohan                            175      (60 painted)
• Isengard                         212
• Gondor                          207
• Harad                             52
• Rhun                              85        (22 painted)
• Dwarfs                           77
• Goblins                          58
• Free People                    119

This gives a grand total of (gulp!) 2520 miniatures, of which 784 are painted – a 31.1% completion rate. That is an OK tally, but I am going to have to pull my finger out to make the total more respectable. I will start by getting paint onto some of my Midgard : Britannia troops as they are still fresh in my mind from the campaign. I know it is a case of closing the stable door after the horse has bolted, but it will get me started, and hopefully inspire me to continue onto the Lord of the Rings stuff and so on.

I guess my concern now is ROI (Return on Investment); I would like to get some play out of them all in a fully painted state. As each faction gets completed, it will mean I can play more games in that era/setting and I can then do some whacky cross-over stuff like Romans versus Undead or make up Frostgrave or Rangers of Shadowdeep bands from Lord of the Rings factions etc.

Over the coming months, hopefully, I will get more of the pile of shame reduced and some more games played with my "newly acquired" miniatures. Midgard, Dragon Rampant, Rangers, Frostgrave and 5 Leagues are all calling out to me, as well as some return visits to MESBG and general skirmish fun using very old home brew rules.

Chronicles of Midgard

My Midgard : Britannia campaign finished way back in January of this year but I have had thoughts bubbling away in my mind since then on what to do next with the ruleset as I really enjoyed where it led me last time.

I did start painting a few of the unfinished Celts that I used in the Britannia campaign in the hope that I may play another one-off Romans versus Britons scenario at some point soon, but my enthusiasm has dropped off for them as that campaign is in the past now. I also dug out my GW and Medbury Lord of the Rings style orcs to see if they would get my creative juices flowing again, but I am experiencing a bit of painters block at the moment - I think mostly due to my slowly diminishing eye sight; I just cannot seem to fine focus anymore even with decent glasses. 

With that avenue on hiatus at the moment, I decided to look at the system from an actual gaming perspective. I felt that the original rulebook needed just a few extra scenarios to give more options for the gamer to stop things from becoming a bit samey. I was able to write my own scenario for the final battle of my Britannia campaign, but that was hard work. Something "official" would be nice.

And, in answer to my thoughts, along comes James Morris, the Midgard rules author and of Mogsymakes fame, with a brand new supplement called Chronicles of Midgard that has arrived in the nick of time. It is choc-full of new scenarios and ideas, as well as a mini-campaign set in the period of Alfred the Great's battles against the Viking incursions of Guthrum, that will give me the impetus to get going again with this rule set.

Chronicles of Midgard

Again, like the original rulebook, the production values are extremely high; lots of lovely colour paintings and pictures of miniatures in action. The layout is easy to navigate, and the inclusion of an Index again makes things so much easier to find.

With regards the content, as mentioned above, we get 15 new scenarios with this supplement, bringing the total available for use now to 20 - a goodly amount in anyone's books. They are also written for use with a variety of geographical locations in mind, as well as a couple of them being final stand options to bring a campaign to a neat close.

There is also the inclusion of a system, as mentioned above, for running a King Alfred versus Guthrum campaign. Actually, the campaign is presented in two formats, so the campaign can be run either as a map-based set of scenarios or as a liner campaign where scenarios follow on one from the other in a set sequence. Both are well thought out and both will be very useful depending on how you want to run your gaming world.

Both of the participating armies are carefully limited in certain ways to make troop choice more "realistic". If only I had some Anglo-Saxon and Viking figures to make up the armies. However, as Midgard is so easy to manipulate into what is needed from a game system, there is nothing to stop me from using other armies as proxies for the two presented. I am itching to get my orcs sorted to fight against either my Rohan or Gondor armies. Many figures still require a fair lick of paint, but this could be my major project for this year provided my eyes are up for it. The figures can then also be used for other games system I want to get off the ground - Five Leagues from the Borderlands and Rangers of Shadowdeep for starters.

Vecna (#1) - The Outpost

The usual crowd got together again on Thursday for our latest D&D outing on Fantasy Grounds. I actually thought that the Saltmarsh campaign had finished completely, but I think this seems to be a continuation as we started in Saltmarsh and the theme seemed to carry on. I will try to find out by next week whether this was a continuation of the Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign or something that the DM has cobbled onto the end of it.

EDIT: It look like this is a new campaign - Vecna. I won't go looking anything up about it as I don't want to spoil anything. I will update the post headings a and when I find out more.

After a big battle at the Spire, the denizens of Saltmarsh narrowly overcame the sahuagin threat. 

A few months later...

Life began to return to normal in Saltmarsh, but we had become more well-known in town due to our exploits. As a result, we were invited by the local dwarf population to the one hundred year celebration of some copper mines that they were currently working.

The trip to somewhere called something like Duvagoia took several days by sea, and when we had landed, it took us and our three dwarven guides a further half-day on foot to reach an outpost, where we rested up for the night to get out of the heavy rain. We were generously plied with food and ale and left to our own devices - we did our best to escape the downpour.

The Dwarf Outpost

Gladreth was the only one of us that didn't get too drunk on the alcohol offered. Maybe because of this she was the most alert and therefore the first to be hit by an arrow that was shot from the undergrowth to our west.

It took us a while to come out of our drunken stupor, but by the time we had we were on the back foot against the attacking drow warriors. Gladreth, however, cast a Fireball that severely injured several of their warband thus buying us a little time to recover.

The fighters in our party rapidly gained injuries as the arrows sent our way were coated in some sort of green-gunk poison which added to the pain inflicted upon them. I managed to cast a Prayer of Healing to undo some of the damage, but the injuries kept piling on. As things looked like they were about to get worse for us, Gladreth spotted an opportunity to use a Lightning Bolt and some Magic Missiles to even the odds a little.

After the Drow encounter

It was a tough fight, but we eventually overcame the drow warband. We gathered their bodies for burial and stripped them of their belongings, amongst which were some small coins/medallions embossed with the likeness of a dwarf god. We drew lots for the watch rota and settled in for the night.

The night seemed to pass uneventfully, except for the constant rain, but when the dawn finally broke we noticed that somehow all of the drow bodies had been removed and our three dwarf companions had been taken. The place was covered in spider webs and a set of tracks headed off westwards towards the mines.

We followed the tracks for about two hours before we arrived at our destination. Many of the huts outside the mine had been burned and were still smouldering, and there were several dead dwarfs lying around the place in amongst pools of blood and silk cocoons. Many of the bodies had the same green gunk we saw on the drow weapons in their wounds. It was obvious that the celebrations had been interrupted by a savage attack which appeared to leave everyone dead or missing.

We scouted the area and managed to find a few maps of the mine and the surrounding area and a few ledgers of the mine's output and expenses (the mine seemed to be very profitable from the records).

Six hours later, the rain was still coming down, so we decided finish up our search and head towards the mine for some shelter. It was whilst we searched the last few huts that we managed to find a single dwarf survivor amongst the carnage - he had escaped by burying himself beneath a mound of his dead friends. He told Gladreth what had happened as she was the only one who could speak Dwarfish; the mine had been attacked out of nowhere by drow and spiders whilst the workers were celebrating the finding of a new, very rich, vein of copper - there were no survivors, and the rainstorm had washed away most of the blood by the time we got here. A short while later, the slain dwarfs rose from the dead and headed towards the mine.

We gave the dwarf directions back to our boat and finalised our investigation. In the final crate we searched we found three wands/rods that contained something that rattled when they were shaken. The box held a warning that they contained black powder.

Byrhtnoth and the Battle of Maldon

The second trip out over the school break also included my youngest daughter (who is actually at university) as well as my youngest son. This time we went for something a little closer to home both time-wise and geographically; we went to visit the town and local environs of the Battle of Maldon from late Anglo-Saxon times.

The Ealdorman of Essex, Byrhtnoth, died at the Battle of Maldon on 10/11th August 991 AD and a tragic poem about the event was written in Anglo-Saxon soon after - we still have over 300 lines of it surviving.

The plaque at the bottom of the statue at the end of Maldon promenade.

Our day started by visiting the small museum in Maldon that houses the Maldon Tapestry (really an embroidery). It costs nothing to enter but I left a few pounds in the collection jar to help keep it running. The first two panels were of most interest to me but the rest of the embroidery was worth a look at and a quick read of the guide book the staff lent me explained what everything meant.

The 1st Panel

The 2nd Panel

These first two panels tell the story of Maldon's foundation and the battle that occurred nearby just over one thousand years ago. I won't go into the details as all that history can be found elsewhere on the web.

After spending a little more time looking at a few more of the exhibits we wandered up the road to view a couple of churches. The first had a statue/carving of Byrhtnoth on the outside, whilst the second has the only triangular tower in the UK.

Byrhtnoth carving on a local church

The only triangular church tower in the UK apparently

I had heard internet rumours that there was a stained glass window in his honour in one of the churches, but I was unable to find that on our travels.

Next we headed down to the estuary, via a local bakery where we picked up some lovely cakes for a snack, to the modern statue of the ealdorman at the end of the promenade. This is a nice little walk as it takes in lots of local historical flavour; Thames barges, historical fishing huts and local crafts stalls, as well as lots of places to eat and a huge recreational park.

We got to the end of the promenade and took a few moments to look at the modern bronze statue of Byrhtnoth. The plaque from the first picture is located here (it can be seen just behind the statue, to the right, in the first picture below).

Ealdorman Byrhtnoth (front)

Ealdorman Byrhtnoth (rear)

The plinth tells the story of the Battle of Maldon

Unfortunately (or fortunately?), the sun was very strong today so none of my pictures of the plinth turned out particularly well (the best of them is shown above).

No visit would have been complete without visiting the actual battle site. This was a lot harder to find than initially expected. We looked all over the place but could not find the National Trust sign that I found on the internet that denotes where it is thought the battle took place.

The National Trust sign for the battle site

We found the causeway (or a modernised version of it) and looked around there for several hundred meters in each direction but only found a modern National Trust sign that only mentioned the battle in passing - it was more about the wetlands recovery and bird species in the area (fascinating in its own way but not what I was looking for today). Maybe the above sign has been removed in favour of the newer signage? If anyone knows about this I would love to hear from you about it in the comments.

Northey Island causeway

My daughter was becoming a little tired from all the walking (at least 5 miles was covered today), so only my son and I walked over the causeway (we had to be careful as it was very slippery), but there was nothing within easy reach that was of interest. What looks like water in the above photo is in fact a huge expanse of mud flats as the tide was out at the time of our visit.

We headed back to the car park after the visit, almost exactly three hours after we left (just in time, as the ticket expired after three hours). We chatted about all that we had seen on the walk back but were a little upset by the fact we didn't see the actual battle site according to the missing signage. That said, we were heartened by a comment one of the ladies in the museum made whilst I was chatting to her about the tapestry - a local historian seems to think that the battle site might not have been where The National Trust sign was but further into town, due to the fact a Viking Age (10th century) sword was found at a construction site a few decades back. This may have been a coincidental find, but nothing has been found at the "official" site anyway to corroborate that theory. Something for future historians and archaeologists to ponder?

Like Tuesday's visit to the Ramses exhibition, we had a wonderful day out and caught some of the spring sun's early rays to boot!

Ramses and the Pharaoh's Gold Exhibition

As it was the school holidays last week, I decided to take my youngest son to see the new Ramses and the Pharoah's Gold exhibition at Battersea Power Station in London on Tuesday 7th April 2026. I had kept it a secret from him until the actual day and he only got to know exactly where we were headed when we stepped outside the tube station close by the venue and he saw the advertising signs.

Exhibition Flyer

I have a passing interest in Egyptology and warfare of the time (hence why I generally comment about these kinds of outings on the blog) but I have never actually studied the period. I have various qualifications in Palaeontology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Archaeology and History (mostly Greek, Roman and Medieval), but the nearest I got to studying Egypt was probably just a few modules on the Levant and its environs.

So, this was going to be fairly new ground for me, and I think I was as exited as my son when he finally found out where we were headed this day. The exhibition itself runs through a potted history of Ramses' life and there is a selection of around 180 artifacts related to the 19th Dynasty and a few items from dynasties either side of his reign.

I won't go into too many details just in case anyone wants to see the splendour on offer, but I can say that I heartily recommend this exhibition for those with any interest in the period at all. It is a limited time-span exhibition, so will most likely nothing like it will be seen again in the UK for several years/decades.

That said, in keeping with this blog, there are a few exhibits/items that I would like to mention; there were a couple of weapons alongside the other dazzling golden jewellery on display, and one hall was devoted to the Battle of Kadesh - Ramses great victory over the Hittite Empire.

I was quite surprised to find out that quivers used in Egyptian warfare from this period were made of wood and painted to represent animal hide.

Bow and wooden quiver

There was also a very ornate bronze dagger on display.

Bronze Dagger

Some blurb about the dagger

The photos do not do the dagger justice - it really was a thing of beauty.

Anyway, we both thoroughly enjoyed the exhibition - we were in there for just over two hours. Despite it being a school break visit, it wasn't too busy, so we got the time to explore at our leisure and we were able to see and read about every item in that time. For what it was, it was not too expensive either. Unfortunately the exhibition hard-back guide book (that contains details of all the exhibits in glorious colour) was a little out of my reach at £45 - if I had the money, it would have been a must-have memento.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#31) - The Spire VII

In the previous encounter we had taken a battering, so most of the remaining Healing potions were used up trying to get us back to some semblance of good health.

We decided to head westwards first, and the coral pink walled room we next encountered only contained a table and a few benches. However, the mural on the wall was quite outstanding; a large tentacled beast, some whales and giant squid were in action against what we presumed must be some mythological sahuagin heroes. On the table was a silver medallion engraved with a shark and twelve tridents in a star shape. We pocketed the medallion.

The next room was tiled in a deep green. As well as a large bed of seaweed along the north wall there was a spear, a mirror and a coffer with a slot in it the same size as the silver medallion we found in the previous chamber. Navda attempted to open the coffer with the coin, but he somehow managed to miss the trap blade which cut him. Inside the coffer was a bag of rubies, a small stone box with six green potions (which we later found out to be made from Rapture Weed), a gold statue of a shark, a very nice scaled cloak (Cloak of Protection) and a very expensive looking canvas bag. Navda expected the bag to contain something, and his hunch proved correct as his searches revealed a green gem in the lining.

The south wall revealed a hairline crack that denoted a secret door that led to another secret door that opened out into the corridor with the stairs down that we had encountered a while earlier on our travels.

As we had now run out of areas to explore westwards, we decided to head back east and explore that area before we headed down the stairwell. As we moved back towards the main throne room, we heard a bit of a commotion coming from that direction. Navda managed to creep forward and reveal that four sahuagin warriors had entered the throne room and were investigating the bodies and gore floating within it. We decided to go south instead to avoid them as we were not in a fit state for much more fighting.

Unfortunately, as we traversed the corridors southwards we heard more noise from ahead of us; we were about to be trapped. Drakkon could take no more and charged around the corner, the rest of us followed leaving Dharion as rear-guard.

The four sahuagin around the corner were taken by surprise but soon regained their composure when they realised it was only one warrior against them. The sudden arrival of Druss halted them, but one of the sahuagin cast a dazzling light spell that dazed them both. Navda tried to shoot round the corner, but he too was dazed. Luckily, light is my domain and I was able to overcome the spell and used my Radiance of the Dawn special ability. This hurt the sahuagin enough for Drakkon to recover just as one of the warriors rushed past him. He was able to add more hurt to its magical injury as it passed, and between Gladreth's Firebolt and Navda's and Dharion's archery the sahuagin warrior met its demise.

Drakkon was isolated by now and the three sahuagin warriors took him down. To stop any further desecration of our comrade, Dharion managed to kill one of the remining sahuagin with his trusty bow and Gladreth used her magical abilities to stop another from advancing. My Warding Flare stopped me from being attacked whilst tying to administer to Drakkon. Unfortunately, the other sahuagin warrior cut me down.

Whilst I was unconscious, Druss recovered from being dazzled and helped Dharion to kill the third sahuagin warrior. The fourth fell to a combination of everyone else's attacks, with the final blow dealt again by Dharion's archery. Using his last few Healing spells, Dharion brought Drakkon and me round again. We decided that as things were now too dangerous to stay around much longer we should head for the exit.

A final look at where we explored in the Spire

We retraced our steps further southwards towards the stairs out, but in the corridor just before the exit chamber we encountered a school of sharks. Navda and Drakkon quickly dispatched two of the sharks before us and Gladreth and Dharion another that was approaching from our rear. With one remaining shark before us, we could feel a larger commotion approaching the area; it felt like the whole complex was awakening. The last remining shark in our way was killed by Drakkon and we were then, finally, able to climb the stairs out of there.

The upper level was still empty luckily, so we were able to get out of the dungeon and to our rendezvous point in the marsh without any further encounters.

At the rendezvous, we were met not only with the escape boat, but with a small army. We reported to the commander the situation in the spire and gave him all of the intelligence we were able to gather. He called forth his troops and advanced upon the sahuagin hideout.

The return to Saltmarsh was uneventful, and we were ushered straight away into the presence of the town council. We were debriefed and then fully Healed before being given our 1,700 gold crown reward. We were also gifted with a magical longbow which went to Dharion, a magical shield that would catch arrows, and an ioun stone which I somehow managed to acquire, but do not know what to do with just yet.

With that, I think we have completed the whole of the Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign. We levelled up - we are now all 7th level - and updated our character sheets accordingly. We divvied up the treasure and sold what we had found on our adventures. We then bought anything that we had the money for to enhance our character - I bought a stack of Potions of Healing.

I thoroughly enjoyed playing this campaign. Fantasy Grounds worked pretty well in allowing us to immerse ourselves into the adventure - along with Discord for the communications (voice) part, this felt as close to a face-to-face series of sessions as we could get. I recommend this setup to anyone that has a bunch of gaming buddies that cannot meet up often enough in real-life due to time constraints and distance circumstances.

The DM has another scenario lined up that we may use these characters again for. Or, maybe, we will roll up new ones if we feel like a change of pace. I guess we will find out what is happening next session.

Ghosts of Saltmarsh (#30) - The Spire VI

We decided to leave the room behind us, as we were only on this mission to gather information and not get into too many skirmishes - we were on a time limit and we had already used up half of our time. We decided to retrace our steps and investigate the other side of the entrance hall.

The first room we encountered from the last time that we had passed that way still had the sahuagin guards in it. We charged into the room in order to rid ourselves of any chance of being blocked on our way out if we needed to exit quicky. It was a short melee; Gladreth was badly hurt by the magic from one of the priestesses in the room, so retaliated angrily by Fireballing the room, which led to a third priestess emerging from the seaweed patch in the corner. Unfortunately for her, she did not get time to cause us any harm and was dealt with by my missile armed compatriots swiftly, as Gladreth Firebolted the last remaining sahuagin warrior. A quick search of the room revealed only a small treasure - a set of thieves' tools and a silver goblet.

We headed south from there and ended up in another chamber similar to so many of the others. This one had dark green walls, a light green ceiling and the usual table, coffer and beds. There was not a lot in here either, only a number of those harnesses we had previously found (but this time with silver buckles), a small bag of gold coins, and a locket on a chain with a picture of a small girl and a lock of hair inside.

We explored to the end of the corridor and eventually reached a door. Again, we could hear a lot of noise from beyond it. Navda stealthily opened the door a crack to take a look inside. It was a very large room with an indigo floor, dark blue ceiling and light blue walls, with three tables, several coffers and at least 30 sahuagin warriors inside. He just as stealthily reclosed it and reported back what he had found. We got away from there quickly.

As we had completed exploring the southern part of the dungeon, we headed back north to the entrance hall and went through the final exit in the north. We explored a few of the newly built corridors and decided upon finally heading westwards. At a north-south junction we cautiously went south and found ourselves outside a room where many sahuagin warriors, champions and sharks were cheering and shouting at a fight between a couple of very large lobsters. We slowly backed away and headed further north within the complex.

Lobster Fight

The corridor ended at a set of steps that headed downwards, but we retraced our steps and explored the corridor that headed east halfway along it. We passed a small chamber that was cut off from the main corridor by a portcullis. Beyond the barrier was a light green tiled room full of live starfish and shellfish, which we assumed was some kind of live feed larder.

The eastward leading corridor ended with a door which opened quite easily. Beyond the door was a huge ornate banquet hall. Several black pillars supported the coral white roof, and the walls were tiled with an array of black, white and coral pink tiles. A statue situated in an alcove above the floor level was of a lizardman head, only it was twice the normal size. Opposite the head was a gold-leaf door, which opened suddenly leaving Navda exposed.

The underwater dungeon so far

Beyond the door was a short corridor that opened out in to a large indigo walled, dark blue floored throne room occupied by a very large four-armed sahuagin lord seated upon a massive pale blue marble throne, a priestess on the dais beside him, a number of warriors and some sharks. 

The priestess performed a small ritual and Dharion vanished from the room. We were all shocked, Gladreth most of all, and she cast a Lightning Bolt the length of the corridor and into the room severely injuring four of the sahuagin. Dharion reappeared as suddenly as he had disappeared and we surmised that he had been Banished. The melee was hard and deadly, but without Gladreth's magic and lots of Healing we would have been defeated.

Upon reappearing Dharion killed a sahuagin warrior very quickly, and seemingly in the blinking of an eye he had killed the second champion. The rest of us helped keep the sahuagin lord at bay, but not before the priestess had cast a Guiding Bolt on Gladreth which felled her. I was on hand to bring our wizard round again and my skills were called upon very quickly thereafter to remove the Curse the priestess had put on Dharion.

Gladreth was really annoyed again by now, so cast a Fireball amongst the remaining sahuagin and sharks causing a huge amount of injury to them, but they all still fought or swam towards us.

The combat with the sahuagin and sharks began to take its toll on the fighters in the party, so I had to cast my third and final Prayer of Healing to make sure that no-one else fell to the spears and tridents of the sahuagin warriors.

Popping out from a shadow somewhere, Navda made a perfect shot with his bow and downed the sahuagin lord. This riled the priestess and she was able to Paralyse Dharion and take down Gladreth again with a Guiding Bolt. Luckily I was on hand to Heal Gladreth again and remove the paralysis from Dharion. In the meantime, the fighters had finally dispatched the last of the sahuagin warriors and sharks.

This just left the priestess to get a taste of her own medicine as I cast a Guiding Bolt back at her and Dharion finished her off straight after with an arrow to the heart.

We were in a mess after this fight but that did not stop us from searching the bodies and throne room for loot. We didn't find much except for the fine looking trident the sahuagin lord had used, a gold earring, some platinum armbands and a gold key; all of which we pocketed.

The Throne Room

The final battle should have been over a lot more quickly and with fewer injuries to the party than what actually happened - we managed to roll so many 1s and 2s in this, and all of the previous combats, we were lucky that we did not suffer a TPK. The use of the big hitting Fireballs and Lightning Bolts, along with plenty of Healing, allowed us to finally overcome our adversaries. The fighters absorbed so much damage it was unreal, and the dice gods (even though the rolls are randomly generated by software within Fantasy Grounds) were definitely not on our side tonight.