Holiday Haul

Christmas, once again, brought me some lovely gifts from the family. Again, I am so appreciative of what they do for me so I can indulge in my hobby. I know output both gaming- and painting-wise has been very slow recently but that will hopefully begin to improve next year. The support I receive does spur me on to achieve more but my enemy is always time.

This year I received a large number of gaming-related items as well as some peripheral items to inspire and spark my currently somewhat limited creative flair - DVDs of The Princess Bride, The Dark Crystal and the second series of House of the Dragon.

I should hopefully be getting a game of 5e D&D in towards the end of January, so Tasha's Cauldron of Everything is a welcomed supplement to get my D&D head on.

I also tend to receive the latest Frostgrave supplement, if one has been released, each birthday or Christmas - these are a great source of inspiration and ideas for future gaming activities. I don't know why, but I am especially attracted to colder climes and wintery settings for my gaming worlds.

The latest(?) Osprey game book When Nightmares Come was also a pleasant surprise - I am also drawn to Cthulhu-style worlds. I like the idea of mankind being almost powerless to defend against the darkness that prevails in the universe but I am still looking for ways in which to portray that in a game. Each rules book or supplement I read adds to my knowledge but my view is that if something gets game stats that players can access it becomes defeatable. Anyway, I digress - this could be an idea for a blog post at a later date.

My figures haul also went up again this year. I got a couple of packs of Games Workshop's Lord of the Rings Hobbit miniatures. I have a small, but steadily growing Hobbit militia that I would like to pit against some goblins/orcs/trolls at some point. If anybody out there could suggest alternative hobbit/halfling miniatures from other manufacturers that scale well with the GW offerings I would be very appreciative. I don't need many (so big boxes of plastic miniatures are out unless the sprues are sold anywhere individually) but for skirmish level games (up to 20-30 a side) I prefer to have each warrior represented by a unique figure (even if that is just a different paint scheme or weapon swap).

Hopefully, I will have more time and be more talkative next year, so I can keep the blog ticking over. I may change the format a little to also include more gaming thoughts and ideas.

Glueing and Prepping

Long time, no post. I have been busy doing lots of stuff other than gaming recently - real life has a habit of taking over sometimes. Luckily, I have been able to dip my toes into my hobby from time-to-time, but not really had much I can comment on for the blog. I have read a few rulebooks and supplements that I received as gifts for Christmas, kept on with my 2000AD and Judge Dredd comics reading, and started re-watching Game of Thrones on the DVDs I have. I have not seen series 8 yet (I must be the only fan not to have done), so I am re-watching them all over again to prep for the final series. I have managed to avoid spoilers thus far. I have heard it is very disappointing, but I have my own ideas for an ending, so I may not find it so.

Anyway, over the last couple of days we have had some very nice weather in the UK. The brighter days have meant that I can actually kind of see reasonably smallish details again. So, in order to get stuff done whilst the light holds, I broke out the most recently purchased miniatures (from the last few months for my son's but up to a few years ago for mine) that have been staring at me from their vantage points on the book shelves.

Alongside his interest in The Lord of the Rings, my youngest son has begun to show an interest in historical gaming; or, more accurately, he likes the miniatures and, as he now gets some pocket money, he decided to buy some. He has recently picked up a box of plastic Dark Age Irish warriors from Wargames Atlantic, some Welsh Archers from Gripping Beast, and a few Roman slave-type minis from Footsore, due to one of their likenesses to Grumio out of  the TV series Plebs.

My figures are from a mixture of manufacturers (Hasslefree, Otherworld and Northstar) that I went to to create some fantasy wabands for RPGs and Rangers of Shadowdeep, and the Nickstarter set of ten pairs of wizards for Frostgrave. The wizards are several years old now, but the Rangers and other fantasy miniatures are maybe only a year or so old. I have kind of set myself a limitation now due to the huge backlog of unassembled and unpainted figures that I have, where I can only buy new figures when I have finished painting my latest additions to the lead and plastic mountains. I am almost there with painting those Otherworld skeletons from a few posts back (if the light holds, I will get them finished in the next week or two), and I have now broken out my other latest purchases in order to get them completed too. Once these are completed, I may treat myself to a few more of the figures to make up the last of the adversaries for some of the games I wish to play.

Anyway, enough chat, and onto the lead (well pewter as it is nowadays). First up are my son's Welsh Archers. As mentioned above, they are from Gripping Beast. There are four poses and he got three of each pose. They are tidy little figures, and will make great standard warriors for any games we play with them...

I still need to glue their bows on (unfortunately we only seemed to get 10 bows instead of 12 - the bag they came in had split). They are shown alongside the Footsore Roman slave figures for a size comparison. My son wanted these mounted on Saga-style bases which came with the Welsh miniatures (I also had some spares in my bits box he could use for the Romans). Here are the Roman figures alongside a pair of plastic wolfhounds he got with the plastic Irish warriors set...

Next up are some of his new Lord of the Rings miniatures. Most of his figures for LotR are second hand from eBay. These are from a few packs he recently bought for himself, that he liked the look of...

The Bilbo miniature is metal, and the Elf warriors and Thranduil models are resin. The Elf warriors all need their shields glued on, and Thranduil needs his sword arm glued on. These are lovely miniatures but do not scale in at all with the historical figures above; the LotR figures are a fair bit smaller and finer (more anatomically accurate), and the quality of the sculpting is much better. That said, sometimes quantity is a quality in itself, and that is where the historical figures come into their own - good value for money for decent enough figures - armies can be built much more cheaply.

Next up are the last of my son's figures from this batch and the first of mine. They are Noldur's D&D figures bought from our local comic and gaming store a few months ago. Here we have a griffin and an umberhulk...

The griffin will be glued to a base the same as the umberhulk to fit in with more of my son's fantasy miniatures (all of his Lord of the Rings figures are on GW style round bases of various sizes). These figures are really nicely made and not too pricey for their size. For some reason my umberhulk came without one of its antennae - it was not in the box, so I could not have glued it back on even if I had found it. I am not too fussed actually, as it gives it a bit of character.

Next up are my Rangers and RPG characters...

They are from a variety of manufacturers and I have stuck them all onto 30mm lipped round bases. I am going to begin to standardise my basing if I can from now on, so they all fit in with my Lord of the Rings figures - 20mm for hobbits and other small creatures, 25mm for standard humans, elves, orcs etc., 30mm for heroes and medium-sized creatures like wolves, 40mm for mounted figures and medium-large monsters, 50mm for large monsters, trolls and giants, and larger bases for dragons etc.

The back row consists of Hasslefree figures, the second-rear row are from Otherworld, and the two front rows are Northstar's official Rangers of Shadowdeep figures. I have yet to glue on some of their arms and weapons - hopefully at some point this week I can accomplish that?

Finally, here are the first of the Frostgrave wizards that I bought a long time ago. Again, they are glued onto 30mm lipped bases to match in with the Rangers and adventurers above. Each school of magic is represented by a pair of wizards...

From left to right, these are; a Chronomancer and apprentice, an Elementalist and apprentice, an Enchanter and apprentice, an Illusionist and apprentice, and a Necromancer and apprentice. I have yet to decide which is the master and which the apprentice - that decision will most likely come once they have been painted, or not. I still have five more pairs to prep and glue, but the light has run out for today. I am working overtime all day tomorrow (another Bank Holiday in the UK), so will not get any modelling done then - hopefully there will be some good days through the coming week that will allow me to complete these.

In addition to the figures above, I have an eleventh pair of wizards (not sure what school they belong to until I look them up again) and some treasure tokens/markers for Frostgrave. There is also a box set of 20 plastic Frostgrave Soldiers and a sprue of 5 Frostgrave Barbarians which need assembling. Hopefully the next post will see all of these glued up at least.

I am really hoping to get some tabletop gaming going again very soon; either solo or with my youngest son. I have my eye on a few new rulesets too - Sellswords and Spellslingers (for solo gaming) and the latest version of Runequest; a game I played extensively back in the day. I no longer own these rules (I have owned three different editions in the past) and the new rulebooks look lavish, so I am very tempted.

So, there is plenty for me to be getting on with for now. Once the above miniatures have been fully prepped, they will need undercoating and then painting. Also, once the long summer days roll in, I may take another look at my LotR miniatures - I have over 800 to complete, although many are almost there.

Battle Systems - Northern Homestead

Good morning everybody - long time no post. This is due to a number of reasons, mostly good, but primarily because I have been working. After another long time out of work I managed to secure back-to-back contracts. I am still in the second role and it seems to be going well - hopefully at the end of this contract I will be back to where I want to be financially, so I can begin spending a little more time, effort and money on my hobby.

So, what have I been up to hobby-wise over the last few months? Due to my new work roles and various other reasons, I have not been able to see my youngest son often enough to do any actual playing, but we did do lots of sorting out and chatting about gaming. He has managed to put some paint onto some of his Ebay bought miniatures (not finished yet, but when they are I will feature them in a separate post) and also bought some new figures from a local comic and games shop. I bought a few one-off figures from the same comic/game shop (four halflings which are a bit smaller than the GW LotR ones and an Owlbear - one of my fave monsters from D&D), some Ghost Archipelago rule and scenario books, and some card-stock buildings from Battle Systems.

The card buildings are the main-stay of this post. A month or so back, out of the blue, my son sent me a few pictures on my phone and a link to a company called Battle Systems. He suggested that they might be good for our tabletop battles as they were quite cheap (relative to resin and plastic buildings they certainly are). They looked really good in the photos (not promo shots by the company but in-use shots by a gamer), so I thought I would buy a few to see how they turned out for myself.

There was a sale on at the web store (result!), so I was able to afford to buy enough buildings from my gaming budget to hopefully kit-out one of the scenarios in the Rangers of Shadowdeep rulebook. I chose three of the Northern Homesteads as my mainstay, plus a couple of outbuildings, as they could double-up for use as Rohan, D&D, Pathfinder and so on buildings for a quasi-Dark Age/Medieval setting. There are also options to buy snow effect roofs (rooves?) to allow gaming in Frostgrave or other cold-set climates (Winterfell or beyond the wall for Game of Thrones perhaps?).

The order was delivered in double-quick time and sat on my workbench (well, pile in the corner of the room) until two weekends back when my son was over and we decided to build the first homestead. Out of the box you get three sheets of card-stock building pieces (two the same plus another different one) and a small bag of plastic connection pieces.

The pieces push out very easily, with no cutting required. The only thing you don't get is a set of assembly instructions. Now, I have made many kits over the years so thought I would be able to construct these easily, but I went about these in completely the wrong way. I tried to put the connectors at the bottom of the walls etc. thinking they would be least visible there. However, after my son looked up an online tutorial and we found out that they should be joined by slots in the middle of the walls, the building went together in seconds. We literally built it in under two minutes. Once constructed, they are very sturdy.

There are three choices for the doors, two singles and a double. We decided on a simple single door for this building. As these kits are multi-purpose; they will fit in with all the other kits for completely customisable building construction, so many of the pieces can be used on other buildings. We will look at the watch towers and mead hall next so the double-doors can be used there (Meduseld anyone?) - they do look impressive.

The entry way - the door is off to one side with a porch to cover the entrance for times of inclement weather. You may also notice some holes in the thatch and flooring. There are pushout pieces to give buildings a more run-down look if required. We decided to go full-out on this building. The good thing is, the little bits that get pushed out can be used for scatter terrain later on too!

The front view - with attendant horse-head posts. Perfect for a Rohan setting.

The rear of the building has a platform upon which your archers can stand to defend their homes from marauding uruk-hai.

The side opposite the entrance shows the horse-head posts in better detail.

And finally an internal shot. With the kit you get internal flooring, beds, bed rolls, weapon racks and weapons; in fact all sorts of paraphernalia to sprinkle around the table top when gaming to add flavour. The weapons are a little over-sized, so I won't use them, but plenty of the other bits will be very useful as scatter.

Next time my son is over we will construct a few more of these buildings, most likely in different formats to make up a small hamlet. We can then fight over it with his Rohan (once re-painted) and orc miniatures before moving onto rangers of Shadowdeep once he has figures for his small warband for that game.

The system also features more medieval style buildings that would suit D&D and Pathfiner more, but they could also double-up as buildings from places like Bree or towns around Gondor and the fiefdoms in Lord of the Rings.

Overall, I am happy with my purchases. I will most likely try to find suitable basing material to put these on so they become even more sturdy and hard-wearing, and it will stop the flooring falling away from the buildings too when they are moved. The rest will hopefully be built in a few weeks' time, so I can photograph them all together to see how a hamlet or small village would look.

Elf Repaints III

I managed to get the brushes out again today and completed three more Lord of the Ring elves. I also put a bit more paint onto several others, but these are not quite finished yet (hopefully next week). This brings the total of completed elves to eight; four armed with bows and today's repaints that are armed with swords/glaives.

This bunch, again, includes one of the test pieces I did a few weeks back to see what they would look like. The one with the blue-handled glaive looks like he has a badly deformed hand, but this was done by the previous owner - obviously some kind of repair. It looks OK from a distance though, so should not detract from our playing enjoyment.

Like with the orcs, there were several broken figures - about six or seven of the glaive-armed warriors. I was able to find the appropriate pieces for one or two of them, but four, so far, have had to be bodged. One or two look good, but the other two not so. At least it gives them a little variety to stop them all looking identical.

As mentioned above, I am hoping to get the rest of these sorted sometime next week. My son will want to paint the last four (the two command, an archer, and the last glaive warrior that needs repairing), but not sure when we will get time for that. Maybe the next time he pops over?

I am still awaiting a delivery from Otherworld Miniatures for another couple of packs of skeletons to go with the ones I already have. If they come through soon, I will try to get them onto the paint station next week in readiness for another Frostgrave game. I haven't played any Frostgrave for several weeks now, and I want to get back to Balthazar's and Dave's adventures on their way to Felstad. I am hoping there will be three or four more encounters by the time they get there, and then I will play some of the scenarios in the rule book and supplement. As these will be played solo, I will need to see if any adjustments need to be made to the encounters. Perhaps I can find some ideas if I trawl the web? That said, I am also contemplating getting the Rangers of Shadow Deep rulebook for me and the lad to play. Maybe I will see how compatible the rules are and adjust some of them to fit into the Frostgrave universe and vice versa? I am really getting into the mood to play some RPG/dungeon style adventures on the tabletop.

Painted Skeletons

The blog has been a little quiet over the last couple of weeks. This is not because of a waning interest, but because nothing has been available to be published. A lot has been going on in the background, and there are a fair number of miniatures approaching the completed (or nearly completed) stage.

Today saw me finish the painting and most of the basing on the first six Otherworld Skeleton warriors. They still need to be varnished for protection. These have been painted to represent an ancient (Bronze Age equivalent) barrow or tomb that has been naively opened by a band of adventurers and the denizens set to guard the treasures contained within have risen from their slumbers...

And here they are all lined up...

These figures are some of the best skeleton warriors (in my opinion anyway) I have seen but they are a little fiddly to put together and are thus quite fragile, so extra care will need to be taken when in use on the tabletop. As mentioned previously, I am aiming to amass a force of around 30 skeletons (I will probably do something similar for an undead horde: zombies, ghouls, ghasts, wraiths and so on), which should be more than enough to play Frostgrave and any fantasy RPGs I will play in the future, and may also be enough for a small force under the command of a necromancer or a lich for tabletop battle games like Lord of the Rings (I will need to work out stats for them) or Dragon Rampant.

I am not sure how to finish the basing. The basing material has overlapped the edges of the bases a little in some places, so that has prompted me to paint the base edges. But, what colour? I don't want them too bright so that the bases then won't blend into the tabletop a little better, but not too dull so that the miniatures get toned down and become a little washed out as there is not a lot of colour on these skeletons to start with.

Over the weekend, I bit the bullet and ordered up two more packs of these skeletons. I do not have a lot of spare cash at the moment due to yet another bout of unemployment (two redundancies in the space of three years is rather demoralising), but I am hoping a £20 per month budget should cover most of what I require going forwards to make up not only this skeleton horde but also fill any other gaps in my collection to allow me to begin playing more games.

I have also had a very interesting email conversation with my long-time gaming buddy Colin. We had a bit of a chat about skeletons and undead in general, and how they are not represented properly on the tabletop in both RPGs and battle games. I may put together what we discussed into another one of my ideas style posts.

Skeletons

Today I was able to spend a little time prepping some very old (1985 according to the base tabs) Games Workshop mounted skeletons. This is a small force of five mounted skeleton warriors armed with an array of weapons on a varied set of undead horses.

Unfortunately, the ravages of time, and possibly some miscasting, had led to a few of the legs on the horses becoming damaged or to go missing. I glued and bent them into the best shapes possible and mounted them on 40mm round bases, one of which I managed to screw up, but I will fill the gap when it comes to basing the miniature. I will need to find the mounted skeletons some suitable shields too as the plastic ones that came with them are long lost; I will also need to remove a bit from the tabs on their arms that would have housed their original push-on shields. I will try to find some more of the same shields I used on the foot skeleton warriors.

I also dug out some old painted models that I had completed (iirc, the first two were originally painted by my friend Colin, but I have tidied them up a little to more match my own style) when I was on a roll back around the early 2010s. These will form a kind of command group for the skeleton warriors on foot, or maybe a variety of lich and/or undead lords/champions for Frostgrave or fantasy RPGs.

These will be added to the six Otherworld skeletons I have begun to paint over the last couple of days.

I am hoping to get a small undead force together from these and probably a small order from Otherworld to make up their numbers when I have some spare cash. Here's the undead band so far...

If I can get another half-a-dozen of the unarmoured variety of skeleton warrior and the six armoured versions of the same, that will give me a force of 3 command, 12 unarmoured, 6 armoured and 5 mounted skeletons. I can't imagine I will need more than a couple of dozen or so skeletons for the gaming I intend to run, but if I do, I will go down the plastic route, as it will work out a lot cheaper per miniature. There are several manufacturers out there from which I could build a significant force if I should want to put my mind to it.

What with the figures I have been painting for my son, and now these ones I am currently working on for myself, I will need to sort out some kind of storage. All of my old storage has been utilised by my Lord of the Rings figures, so I would need to buy another storage box or two for the latest figures I am painting. The Really Useful boxes that have been used to store the unpainted ones would not be conducive to keeping the paint jobs in tip-top condition, so foam lined boxes will be a necessity. I will look at these too when I am a little more flush.

Frostgrave: The Red King

A quick break from re-paints with a product review. Last night, and a part of this afternoon, I managed to read through a Frostgrave supplement I bought a few months back when it was first released.

This is the first supplement for the new Second Edition of Frostgrave. I bought the new rules when they were released and have actually done something with them this time (see the posts on the Adventures of Balthazar Blimp), rather than just reading them through, putting them on the shelf for later use, and then forgetting about them as either something new comes along or real life gets in the way.

With the release of The Red King rulebook supplement, there is a price rise to £20.00, but the page count has remained the same at 96 pages plus the card cover. I am currently between jobs (yet again!) and, as a consequence, the gaming budget is very limited, so I looked around for a cheaper way of buying it. Amazon was the retailer this time, and I got it for a few quid off. I don't usually like to buy wargames stuff from Amazon, preferring local gaming shops or independent online retailers, but this time I have had to due to my current circumstances.

In this supplement we see a new campaign game that could see the gaming world of Frostgrave brought to its knees with an incursion of demonic beings.

Introduction - The Introduction gives a brief overview of what can be found between the covers of this supplement

The Invasion - This chapter sets out some campaign specific rules and details of the cracks that occur in reality. There are also some extra rules on warbands that have to continue fighting with the loss of their home base

The Red King: Act One - Three scenarios are presented here to get the campaign off to a start. They are all presented in the usual format of; a brief introduction to the secnario, the set up, special rules, and finally the treasure and experience section

The Red King: Act Two - Three more scenarios set in the campaign

The Red King: Act Three - Six more scenarios to complete the campaign

The Red King: Epilogue - A summary of what would be the likely outcome if the warbands fail at stopping the Red King

Treasure- A couple of new tables featuring new treasures and artifacts found in Felstad during the time of the Red King

Bestiary - The final part of the book is a listing of all the new monsters encountered within the Red King campaign: Blood-Marked Berserkers, Burning Man, Foulhorn, Herald of the Red King, Hrut, Key-Master of the Red King, Mindshrike, and Nullman

Again we have a very full supplement. It is nice that the game is still getting lots of support in its second edition - this will hopefully encourage me, and others, to keep going with planning and building items for Frostgrave. I want to carry on gaming with my test warband to learn and get used to the rules, and then build a new warband using newly painted miniatures to run through the various supplements in order to build a kind of narrative for the heroes. I am also hoping to begin building some scenery for this game too, which can double-up for use in Middle-earth. Like the previous games, I will most likely play these solo, or maybe refereeing my youngest son if he fancies a turn.

Felt Battlemats

After the loss of so much of my scenery a few years back, I thought I would look at purchasing some stop-gap items to make the table look a little better for forthcoming games. After looking back at the last couple of battle reports, I thought that the first thing I needed to get was a battlemat.

With a battlemat as a purchase in mind I perused the websites of all the main suppliers of tailor-made solutions. There are some really lovely pieces out there, but they are well out of my price range as I am currently on a very limited budget.

So, I thought to look at haberdashery stores for my inspiration. For a mere £6.71 or so per item (plus £7.95 postage, which was actually very reasonable coming to the UK from Europe), I managed to find a German company online ( https://www.myfabrics.co.uk/felt.html ) that supplies 3mm thick felt that is 90mm wide but can be cut to size in 10mm measurements (minimum of 50mm). Thus, I was able to buy three 90mm x 90mm sheets of fairly sturdy felt that fit almost exactly onto my dining table (when not extended out). I decided to go for Dark Green, Grass Green and Slate Grey...

Forest and wildlands (Dark Green)...

This sheet will be used for battles in the wilderness; the dark forests of the Great Weald of Doggerland, the grasslands of Rohan and many others.

Cultivated and grasslands (Grass Green)...

This sheet will be used for battles in more cultivated areas; The Shire, parts of Gondor and more civilised areas on habitation.

Hills, mountains and cold wastelands (Slate Grey)...

This sheet will be used for battles in Frostgrave or hilly/mountainous regions.

All three are actually very nice colours in the flesh and work well for what I need them for.

I will hopefully be playing a game or two this coming weekend, so will let you know how well the different mats fare.

Skeletons and a Dragon

After the brief interlude of articles on dungeon aesthetics, I am slowly getting back to what I want to do with Frostgrave. I have begun digging through my unpainted backlog and came up with some fitting adversaries for Balthazar and his gang of ne'er-do-wells. As mentioned previously, I seem to have many more historical and human miniatures than I do monster stuff. I will see to remedying that by looking through the rulebooks to see what I have lying around that can be used and maybe look into purchasing some additional minis to bolster the numbers.

After the "mundane" (i.e. not supernatural) encounters on the way to Felstad have been overcome (more on Balthazar's adventures to come over the next few weeks), the first taste of the supernatural makes itself known as the frozen city gets closer. The overspill of magic from eons past causes more supernatural beings to spring into being and this will come as a shock to our intrepid party when they are first encountered.

I was able to dig out a couple of blisters of Otherworld Miniatures' Skeletons. I bought these many moons ago at a Salute show I went to and never got around to doing anything with them. I decided it was high time I got them out of the blisters, glued up and ready for some paint.

Here they are glued up as per the designs/images on the website. I may buy another few packs (they also do armoured skeletons) to make up the numbers (and provide more unique poses by swapping around the weapon and shield arms) as they are quite an easy adversary in Frostgrave (only 1 hit point each) and will come in handy for many other games.

I wasn't too enamoured by the shields that came with them, so they went into my bits box. The shields in themselves are OK, but the two different blisters contained different styles and I wanted them all to match as if they came from the same burial mound/crypt and/or era. So, I looked around in my bits box and found some alternatives from Conquest Games that fitted my vision better - plus I have more spares of the same, so if I do get more skeletons, then they can all be armed (shielded) in the same way.

I will try to get these undercoated in the next couple of days, but I will need to wait for a break in the weather if I want to use my usual spray can. I do have plenty of normal black paint, so I may just water that down a bit and brush it on.

 

This brings me onto the next bunch of miniatures that I sorted out; a few dragons and some trolls. The trolls are the three cave trolls and Burdhur, the hill troll chieftain that I have in my Lord of the Rings collection (I will do a separate post for these when I get around to painting them). I got out the greenstuff putty and filled the gaps around the joins between the arms and body, but I had some left over; what to do with it?

Luckily I had a couple of very old Ral Partha dragons (a blue dragon and some kind of Chinese style dragon - again, a later post will detail these) and a large plastic model from a magazine I bought the first issue of many years ago.

Now, I cannot remember what the magazine was called as I no longer have a copy of it, but I do recall that all the models that came with it were of differing scales, and that the dragon above was the only one worth collecting. I had peviously base coated it and stuck it onto a CD as a base, but where the undercoat spray missed, there was still a lot of the original colouring of the model showing through. I touched this up with watered down paint and used the remainder of the greenstuff to attach the wings more securely. This also allowed me to blend the wings to the body a little more (there were fairly large gaps).

I actually really like this miniature, so I will try to give it a good paint job whenever I get around to it. As to colour scheme, I am not entirely sure which way to go. The original colour was red, but I find that too cliched. Maybe I will go for some kind of green/brown mix, so it looks like it could be some long-lost antediluvian fire-breathing lizard with wings. Who knows? I will also take a fair bit of care and give the base a bit more attention than my usual sand, flock and tufts. Maybe I will have it guarding some treasure as well as its egg?

Hopefully next post I will have some of these at least partially painted.

TToBB II - Camp Kobold

Two days after the encounter with the rabid dogs in the small hamlet of Canisby, Ben and Bill 2 returned breathlessly from a scouting mission. "Balthazar," huffed Ben, "There is a small set of ruins in a glade up ahead that appears to be an encampment of some kind. It is well placed in that it blocks our way, and to go around would add maybe two days to our journey to Felstad."

"It looks like there are guards set, not human guards," interjected Bill 2, "But small imp-like beings, heavily armed and alert."

Balthazar glanced across at his apprentice, Dave, and raised an eyebrow. "What do you think?" the wizard asked.

"Well, we can't really afford the time to go around, especially with the condition that Dom is in. I say we attack the camp with the element of surprise."

"Aye," muttered a few of the others, looking to their leader.

"OK, let's prepare to push our way through." said Balthazar with an air of doom in his voice. "Let's quickly scout the area and work out the best form of taking them by surprise."

A quick recce, taken from the vantage point of a couple of large trees in the forest, the warband surveyed the small encampment, complete with several hide tents and a small campfire that gave out only a little smoke to give away its position. Three small, well-armed creatures patrolled between the tents and the ruins. They would have to time their advance carefully to gain maximum advantage.

Leaving Dom with the supplies and packs in a safe place, the rest of the band moved forward in three small groups, hoping to gain as much ground as they could without being seen.

Balthazar advanced towards the camp and was just on the point of giving the call for a general advance when he was spotted by one of the sentries. With a "Yip, yip", the small creatures hoisted their shields and weapons, and ran to meet their foes in battle.

Balthazar called upon his elemental powers and launched a ball of fire at the closest imp. Unfortunately, the power of the elements was not on hand for him to call upon at that particular moment and the fireball fizzled to the floor just in front of him. Dave noticed that his master's spell had failed and with great trepidation tried to call forth his own. Again, the stars were not properly aligned and his ball of fire was also about to fizzle out. But, like against the wild dogs, he summoned the courage and doubled-down on his concentration just enough to launch the spell successfully. It hurt him dearly but it was worth the pain to see one of the imps burn to a charred mess. Unfortunately, the commotion had led to another imp leaving its tent, fully armed, to see what was occurring.

The rest of Balthazar's warband advanced to try to protect their masters and to search out for any treasures that might be available. A minor melee erupted and, taken by surprise by the ferocity of the little critter facing him, Ben suffered a hefty cut.

The noise of the conflict was now building up as weapons clashed with other weapons and the screams of the injured and dying filled the air. With a loud "Yip," a much larger creature emerged from what looked like the leader's tent and made towards Dave and his small squad of soldiers.

Luckily, this was now the time that the elements began to flow again. Balthazar summoned another Elemental Ball and blasted another of the imps from the face of the world. Dave, spotting Balthazar on his own against an imp, and not wanting to tackle the leader-type critter, made his way towards his master and attempted to cast another of his spells. Unfortunately, the movements must have made him lose concentration, so the spell fizzled out.

The leader of the pack of creatures charged into Dick and Ted, but the two soldiers were ready for the fight, and dispatched it with more ease than they thought possible (critical hit).

Meanwhile, unseen and unmolested, the three soldiers on the right flank had found a treasure in an upper part of the ruins and were rapidly scooting around the edge of the camp in order to avoid any more of the small creatures from spotting them.

With almost all of the creatures disposed of, Balthazar sounded the call for a rapid exit. This caught Dave by surprise as he was being sorely pressed by an imp. With the support of two of the soldiers he was able to kill his adversary bare-handed and make good his move to escape.

One or two more stragglers were left, but they managed to evade the last few imps that left their tents.

With the defeat of their leader and the deaths of many of their pack, the remainder of the small creatures fled from their camp and got away from the vicinity. This gave Balthazar's warband the chance to double-back in order to collect Dom and their belongings.

After everyone had been collected together and wounds checked over, Balthazar examined the two treasures that had been found in the village. The ledge in the ruins proved to be the resting place of a very nice sword; why the imps had not found this was anybody's guess - perhaps they had not been there that long or maybe they were just no good at climbing? The small sack which one of the imps was looking in at the entrance of his tent when teh party arrived contained a Grimoire, 20 Gold Crowns and a few trinkets. The trinkets and small coins were rapidly dealt out to the soldiers and the two wizards set about finding out what else they had found.

It took a short while before Balthazar and Dave worked out that they were now the proud owners of 20 GC, a magical sword (+3 Will), and a Grimoire that contained details of the spell Elemental Shield.

Experience:-

Wizard participation = 40 XP 

2 spells successfully cast = 20 XP

2 spells unsuccessfully cast = 10 XP

2 Treasure Tokens secured = 80 XP

9 kobolds killed = 45 XP

Total = 195 XP 

 

With this game, I wanted to try out a few new things rules-wise. Mostly, the opportunity for what I wanted to try did not arise, but I was able to check out the climbing rules and spawning a new enemy every turn. I found that rolling for extra adversaries last game meant that they came in small bands or none at all. However, I thought that one-at-a-time every turn would prove to be quite a challenge. Fortunately, or unfortunately, this time round this posed little challenge to the warband, even though they were down a man.

I had also beefed up the monsters in this scenario; in the first game, the wild dogs didn't pose too much of a problem individually but in numbers they did. I also wanted more on the board at the start (3 instead of 1). However, how could I represent the kobold miniatures, which I wanted to use for this scenario, when there aren't really that many humanoid stat lines available? I harked back to my AD&D game from several years ago and found that the description of imps in the Frostgrave rulebook matched almost exactly with how kobolds (and other beings) are summoned in my Doggerland universe - summoned from one of the planes by a magic user. The only differences between Frostgrave imps and my kobolds was that the kobolds I wanted to represent are not magical creatures (not that that would make any difference in this sceanrio). I also boosted the stats for the leader (and a second in command that was not rolled for) but an unexpected critical hit took care of him in one round. Again, I used a simple random encounter table; 1 = Leader, 2 = Second, 3-4 = two-handed weapon, 5-6 = hand weapon and shield. They each had allotted spawn points and if the leader and second were both rolled for then the table would just go fifty-fifty with the other troop types.

I tried to limit the game to 6 turns and it almost worked. It did actually reach a point where I could have stopped but, like last time, I decided to play the game through (it wound up being 8 turns in the end).

Next time I will need to figure out more of a challenge for the party. I have several XP advances to add to Balthazar's stats and he needs to work out what to do with the magic items that have been found. I also want to try out more of the rules, so will think further about board set up to enable to me to use more.

I have enjoyed the two games so far, but really wish that I had more scenery and adversary miniatures for the warband to fight against. I think I will sort through my lead and plastic piles next week, and perhaps a few orders to miniatures companies will be in order too.

First Frostgrave Game - Aftermath

After playing my first game of Frostrgave 2nd Edition on Sunday, I thought I would do a quick write-up on some of my findings and conclusions.

In the write-up, I did not include a blow-by-blow account of all that happened as that would have been quite an undertaking, so I summarised quite a few turns into one or two lines of text. In doing so, I missed out on reporting on a few little issues and nuances of the game...

When the wizards cast their Elemental Balls at the wild dogs early on in the game, I didn't mention that Dave's spell actually failed on the initial roll. I used some of his health to boost it so that it worked. This turned out to be a great little mechanism, but his poor damage roll meant that he didn't have the spectacular effect Balthazar did with his casting.

I found that a lot of combats did not roll high enough for the attacker to cause any damage on quite a few occasions, but there were around 3 or 4 critical hits that went through and changed the pace of the game - there were a lot of dogs on the board at one time and the adventuring band were being sorely pressed but two critical hits in one round for the humans sorted that dilemma. The use of a d20 means that the game can be a little "swingy" due to the large range given by the dice rolls, but it does make for a great narrative.

Movement distances are very important in this game as it can mean the difference between getting to an objective safely and getting bogged down in a fight. When unhindered by enemies, figures can move quite a long way, even if burdened with carrying their "dead" comrades (I decided in this game to make any downed soldier not automatically get away from the scenario but to have to be moved off the board - half move for anyone carrying them). This seemed to work OK, but I will decide on the spot in my next games as it may not be practicable.

I did initailly set the game length as 6 turns in which to find the treasure and possibly get it off the board. The treasures were found quickly enough but getting them off the board was difficult due to the distances involved on a 3' by 3' table, and the numbers of dogs spawned each turn: for the first 8 turns dog spawning was according to the house rules mentioned in the write-up and then it was automatically one dog per turn to spur the adventurers into action in trying to get off the board rather than being bogged down in a very long fight. This worked well, and I decided that if the soldiers cleared all the dogs off the board in any particular turn then no more would come - this is exactly what happened around turn 9 after 11 dogs had spawned.

A few lessons learned...

It seems that I took my wizards off the board far too quickly and that they should have stayed around a bit longer to magically snipe from a distance to aid their comrades. There was a treasure token on its way off that the soldier could have taken himself and thus leave Balthazar and Dave to blast the dogs. It would also have given me an opportunity to cast more spells to see how well they work.

Ganging up really works. It might only be +2 per extra man in the fight, but that can really make a difference in combat outcomes.

Splitting the warband is the best way of achieving objectives in time. Bunching everyone together would have meant less casualties, but more safety. In this sceario I didn't award XP for completing the tasks in a certain time - perhaps that would be more incentive to split a warband in future games if the secanrio looks too daunting?

Rolling for treasure...

I randomly rolled up the treasure after the game (see last report for full details of what was found) and got some lovely items that I now need to work out when best to use. The Gold Crowns found pose a conundrum. In normal game terms I can just spend the money and get new items etc. However, I am trying to play this as "realistically" as possible, so I will need to wait until the warband encounter a travelling merchant or population centre to be able to spend their gains. I have a very simple encounter table that I am using: each in-game day I will roll for an encounter on a d6. If a 6 is rolled then there is an encounter. I then roll a further d6; on a 1-2 the encounter will be positive (just make up something from the top of my head) and the party can benefit without loss, e.g. they encounter a merchant train in order to purchase supplies, new weapons, armour or a new member of the band if someone has died, and on a 3-6 it will be a scenario (again I will look at my figure availability and see where the muse takes me).

I also rolled, as per my after-game chances of finding some gear for all the soldiers to see if they can "improve". So far none of the soldiers rolled the 10% requirement to gain something (cold weather clothing, a better weapon etc.), so after the next scenario they will roll at 20% to see if they find anything useful. These improvements, as mentioned previously, provide no actual in-game advantages but builds the characters' stories - it will also allow me to choose new miniatures from my collection for the soldiers and, perhaps, point the way towards where they are heading as new troop-types (i.e. what will Balthazar pay for them to upgrade to? Some may become thieves, others men-at-arms).

I still have lots of thoughts rolling around my head on this but I will call a halt here. I am hoping to get another game in this coming weekend, and I have a few ideas of how I want this journey to Felstad campaign to go - I am hoping to tell an ongoing story with recurring villains that will harass the party along the way.

The Tale of Balthazar Blimp : Part I

Part 1 : Dog Day Sunday

The village of Standof is situated in a wide, luxurious valley to the south of the country. Safe from border incursions, a benign local baron, its fertile fields and plentiful wild game mean that it is a place that most people would want to live. However, it can be very boring; not a lot happens in Standof. So, when Balthazar breezed into The Star Inn and offered the choice of eternal boredom, conviction for a variety of petty crimes and misdemeanours, or a life of adventure on the open road, many took him up on the life of adventure (as well as the beers he had on offer).

The weather was warm and a brisk, but leisurely pace meant good ground was covered each day. The journey to Felstad, 500 miles to the north, would take maybe 5 or 6 weeks if the weather held and not too much happened to slow the party's progress.

Five days in, and just under one hundred miles had been covered. The party were feeling good, and this particular day started well, but it would soon take a turn for the worse. The adventuring band was due to stop for a meal at the next village marked on their map - Canisby.

Balthazar called a halt as the village hove into view. Where were the usual noises a small-holding produced? There were no signs of human life, no sounds emanating from any of the animal pens and barns, and no smoke rose from the chimneys of the hovels. The only sign of life was a small cur snuffling at a small bundle in the middle of the path.

 

With horror, Balthazar realised that the bundle was the remains of a small child, in a poor state of decay, being worried by a mangy cur. Upon hearing the approach of the party the small cur snarled and yelped a couple of times. With a series of growls and snarls, two wild dogs bounded over the wooden fence, hunger written all over their mangy, emaciated bodies and saliva slathering from their gaping maws, straight at the wizard and his party.

This spurred Balthazar and his henchmen into action. The wizard advanced upon the two larger dogs, blasting them with an Elemental Ball of flame. The one at the centre of the blast immediately turned to a charred mass but the other kept charging. Dave, following his master's example, launched his own fireball, injuring the second dog. The rest of the soldiers ran to either engage the remaining dogs or to search the buildings for survivors or any left behind trinkets. Bill 2 and Dom were caught by surprise at the ferocity of the wild dogs and were savaged for their carelessness. Dom was severely injured, Bill 2 less so.

 

 

Balthazar, upon seeing that his companions seemed to have everything under control, advanced to the hovel to the left of the path with Ben. They peered inside but found no survivors and nothing of value. The rest of the soldiers carried on attacking the dogs but they proved a bit more troublesome than anticipated. Ted and Bill 2 struck down their adversary, but the fire-injured cur fighting Bill and Dom managed to finish off the already badly injured Dom with a savage snap of its jaws. At the other side of the hamlet Dec, Ant and Dick checked out the barn but were unable to find signs of any survivors. However, they did manage to find a small sack that might contain something of value.

The two wizards thought that the fight was totally under control, so decided to leave the village as soon as possible to check the treasure that was found on the child's body. Unfortunately, behind them the old kennels spawned more ill-favoured canines. A real fight was now on the cards.

As the wizards left the village, the rest of the warband fought for their lives against an ever growing number of wild dogs. Bill tried to carry the limp form of Dom after his masters so that his body would not be ravaged by the incensed hounds.

 

The melee swirled, sometimes the men had the upper hand and at other times the dogs, but eventually steel (a couple of well-timed critical hits) played out tougher than jaws and the final dog was put to death, but not before Dick fell to the savage beasts.

The remaining adventurers picked up the limp forms of their two downed comrades and left the doomed village behind. They finally caught up with their masters in a glade half-a-mile further along the road. A fire had been lit, water gathered from a small stream was boiling in a pot, and sleeping pallets were put down for those in need of rest.

Balthazar and Dave attended to their comrades; Dick, although quite severely savaged, his blood loss made his injuries look a lot worse than they actually were, would feel much better after a hot meal and a good night's rest (rolled Full Recovery). Dom, on the other hand picked up a few more injuries that needed some basic field work. He would need to take things easy for a short while (rolled Badly Injured, so will miss the next scenario), but the problem was it would slow the party's progress.

After everyone had been checked over and placed at ease, Balthazar examined the two treasures that had been found in the village. On the body of the child was a small satchel which contained a Grimoire, 80 Gold Crowns and a few trinkets. The sack found in the barn contained two potions, 40 GCs and a handful of silver and copper coins. The trinkets and small change were rapidly dealt out to the adventurers with hearty thanks and the two wizards set about working out what else they had found.

It took several hours, but eventually Balthazar and Dave found that they were now the proud owners of 120 GC, a Potion of Invisibility, a Greater Potion of Shrinking and a Grimoire that contained details of architecture and methods of construction, and how to prematurely age buildings and stonework by using the arcane sigils of the Chronomancer spell Crumble that was written in archaic script within the hefty tome.

Experience:-

Wizard participation = 40 XP 

2 spells successfully cast = 20 XP

2 Treasure Tokens secured = 80 XP

11 dogs killed = 50 XP (maximum allowed is 50 XP no matter how many killed)

Total = 190 XP 

 

This was my first game of Frostgrave. You can see how I built the warband in previous posts but I thought I would also summarise how I came up with the scenario idea and how it panned out. I do not have much in the way of scenery or critters to fight against in my collection, so I went with what I already own - I will add to these as time goes on.

As a result of the lack of resources, the scenario was fought in a non-snowy environment - the warband are on their way to Felstad - so I could use the few items of scenery I have. The opponents needed to be something quite simple to control but also something I have in my painted miniatures collection; cue the wild dogs. As this was a test scenario, I thought I should reduce the number of treasures to two, the central one that was to be found on the body in the centre of the board and another one that would be found as a result of a dice roll (there were four areas to search; the first area would contain a treasure on the roll of a 6 on a d6, the second area would contain a treasure on the roll of a 5 or 6, the third on a 4,5 or 6 and the fourth and final area would contain it automatically if not already found).

For the adversaries, I started the scenario off with just the one cur in the middle of the board, basically guarding the main treasure. Each turn, in the Creature Phase, I rolled a d6 and consulted the following list - 1-3 = no dogs, 4-5 = 1 dog, 6 = 2 dogs. If a 6 is rolled, on a further roll of a 5 or 6 then an additional dog arrives; i.e. if a 6 is rolled, followed by a further 5 or 6 means 3 dogs arrive. Each subsequent 5 or 6 also adds an additonal dog, so the number arriving can be quite high if the dice rolls go against you - I rolled up on one occasion during this game and on a couple of occasions rolled for no dogs arriving.

As the journey progresses, Balthazar and his band will encounter more adversaries. To facilitate this, I just roll a d6 per campaign day to see if there is an encounter. On a 6, then there is a scenario to come. This will require some thought each time a 6 is rolled - what miniatures do I have, how can I proxy if I have certain minatures but those particular critters do not appear in the Bestiary?

I am going to make the journey 500 miles (as stated in the preamble blurb above). If the going is good, then Balthazar's band will cover 20 miles per day. If any Bad Injuries are in action, then this will slow the pace by 2 miles per day per person. So, the results of this encounter reduce the mileage by 2 miles for each day until the next encounter is out of the way (by that time, Dom is deeemed healed). Even though the warband lost half a day's travel due to the encounter, it is assumed that each subsequent day will be taking that into account.

Anyway, enough for one day's gaming. I will sort out how to spend the experience points and divvy up the treasures over the next day or two and update the spreadsheet. Hopefully I can get a few more games played over the next few weeks in order to familiarise myself with the rules more and to use my dusty miniatures collection.

Henchmen and Hirelings

This is the third, and possibly the last (for now) post on adventuring parties and their impacts on the local environment. This time I am going to discuss henchmen and hirelings. You will have to forgive me if I mis-remember the rules on henchmen etc. as I no longer have my 1st Edition AD&D manuals and it all comes from memory of playing as a kid.

In the previous posts, I mentioned that I used to hire men-at-arms and so on prior to mega-dungeon expeditions; mostly as treasure/supply bearers but also as additional cannon fodder. However, thinking back on what I wrote yesterday I seem to recall that there were four types of NPC character aides available to an AD&D character, namely Henchmen, Hirelings, Followers and Retainers. So, who and what are these types of underling?

Henchmen, followers and retainers, to my mind, are loyal to the character due to their force of character or esteem (usually based on the Charisma stat), but hirelings are only there for the money, and so may butt out when the going gets tough or the money runs out.

Henchmen - If I recall correctly, a character can hire a henchman X amount of levels lower than themselves at any time after the characters themselves attain a certain level depending upon the Charisma stat. They will be loyal and fight for the character even when the going gets tough. That said, they will not tolerate being abused too often, so a decent share of the treasure will always be welcomed. So, it is generally down to the player as to when the charcater should take one on, bearing in mind that there is also a limit to the numbers that can be hired. Where would these NPCs be found though? I cannot recall the exact rules, but I guess they would be encountered in cities etc. and will have tracked down the characters owing to their fame and good fortunes and ask to join the band in their service. Alternatively, this is my modern mind kicking in as I cannot remember if I did this or not, if an NPC is rescued or encountered on an adventure then there was a possibility she may join the list of those retained by that character.

Retainers and Followers - Upon reaching a certain level, fighters got castles, wizards got towers and other classes got whatever they aspired to according to their class; and it was filled with attendant NPCs. Again, these would be loyal followers at mostly '0' level but I recall that some could be higher level and act as sub-leaders (retainers?). Back in the day I always made sure my characters built their stronghold from their accrued treasure and, as a result, would spend hours poring over the DMG costing out all the relevant parts that made up the abode. I would then fill it with the correctly rolled amount of followers and organise them into patrols, units and so on. I saw these edifices as the place into which the retired character would return after their final adventure and begin to get involved in local politics. They would become future NPCs that hired new bands of heroes to do their bidding. But, where do their retainers come from? A dozen or so may be easy to pick up from the surrounding villages and towns but if a fighter needs 100+ men-at-arms then that would put a strain on any locale. In the past I just rolled the number and they were there. Nowadays, I would have to say that they arive in dribs and drabs until the final number is achieved in order to reduce the impact on the local populace.

Hirelings - These are the NPCs that are hired to carry out certain tasks on a short term basis: men-at-arms to fight alongside the PCs in dungeons, guard caravans or baggage trains whilst the PCs tackle the dungeon itself, or an apothecary to brew a potion, or a diviner to tell ones future and so on. When to hire these NPCs was determined by the skill sets that the party did not have, how much coin they had available and whether any were actually available for hire in that particular locale. Like with all people that can be hired, they are more fickle than the more loyal followers and henchmen; when the payments stop, so do they.

To hire a, ahem, hireling the cost is usually just a fee for their work or time; usually calculated by consulting the tables in the DMG and working it from there. The more loyal followers and henchmen will need to be looked after by the characters they are associated with otherwise dissention will breed (albeit no-where as quickly as with hirelings). This will be a more long-term cost as their upkeep will need to be met on a weekly, monthly or annual basis. Henchmen, as they take a share of the treasure, are easier to accommodate; no treasure equals no pay, but if there is a large hoard, then they will get their fair share. These, to me, are your typical hearthguard-type warriors as opposed to those called up for military service by a lord due to land ties - local fyrd-type warriors and thanes would come into this class as followers and retainers.

Adventurer retirement, as mentioned above, would be a time for the characters to rest on their laurels (unless the threat is huge) and become patrons for the new generation of heroes. If a new threat is exposed, they will no longer ride out to meet it themselves but will provide aid in the form of supplies and manpower (at a cost). This brings me to the final point of this post - what effect does this have on the local population and economy?

If a party breeze into a village, hire on all the local manpower and then proceed to lose them all in their latest dungeon escapade, the widows, orphans and old folk left behind will not be able to keep the village functioning when it comes to harvest or sowing time. The villagers would either starve, abandon their homes to go live with relatives, or start new lives anywhere their local lord would, or could, accommodate them. The lord would be furious as he would then be seriously out of pocket. Likewise, when a character gets to that certain level and acquires her retainers and followers, where do they come from? As mentioned above, the local city would be better as there are more numbers and a more diverse bunch of trades available. However, kitting out a castle with 100+ men-at-arms, or filling a cloister with dozens of clerics might draw suspicious looks from other local land holders or religious orders. Rivalries could build and spill over into violence and raiding.

 

So, where does this leave me with today's gaming? In the Frostgrave campaign I am currently prepping for, what are the people who follow Balthazar classed as? Dave, the apprentice, must be classed as a henchman; he is loyal and will be rewarded richly by the transfer of knowledge and some major treasure items. The initial band of soldiers that follow Balthazar will be classed as followers or retainers; they are paid out of the imaginary extraneous loot, but follow out of friendship (or coersion, but that is another story) and will die for their leader. However, if any of the said adventurers do die and have to be replaced, then their replacements must be hirelings, as they are brought into the fold with a one-off stipend. That said, and this is not covered in the rules from what I could see on my initial trawl through, what happens if they are not treated well? Could this be the place to write that loyalty table that is rolled upon after every adventure?

Dungeon Ecology

Hard on the heels of the Dungeon Parties post, comes this one about Dungeon Ecologies. This one was not intended to be as long as the previous one, as a lot of what was to be said in this one has been said in that one, but as with all things gaming I tend to ramble on forever and find new things to add as I am writing.

The previous article was more along the lines of what is an adventuring party. This one is more about the effects an adventuring party has on the local environs and the actual dungeon itself. To represent this post, I have trawled the net to find one of my favourite pictures from the original AD&D 1st edition Monster Manual (?) - an ankheg bursting from the ground to startle a farmer. This is kind of apt, as this colourised version of the artwork has the farmer looking very similarly dressed as one of the farmers from my Frostgrave party - I may use this as a Frostgrave scenario idea...

Like with all the images on my blog that are not my own copyright, please tell me to take it down if you are the owner and object to me using it without permission.

When I started to play AD&D again at my local club several years back, I wanted my campaign world to be believable (in as far as a fantasy setting can be). I still put most of the emphasis on playability but world coherency was also a significant part of my thought process. As mentioned in yesterday's post, "I built a little consistency and randomness into it too, to show that life was carrying on at that place even if the adventurers weren't around to see it happening".

When building the campaign world of Doggerland, I had to work out a back story for the region - accomplished by playing a few play-by-email games to build a solid timeline, then adding in a few historical characters and creating a point in time to then work from. I then added to the timeline and the current power-plays of the local area; who were the main pro/antagonists and what was likely to still be around in the environs even after the area had settled down after the last PBeM game completed. So I asked myself a few questions and worked out a few stats before putting pen to paper and making the scenarios fit the world...

Who built the dungeon and why? - Each scenario, whether hand-written or taken and adapted from a published magazine article or offical supplement, had to fit with what was going on in the main narrative. For example, at the start of the camapign, the weather in the Loidis region was in turmoil; hazardous weather limited travel, destroyed crops and basically hindered any progress for anything but the second coming of the demoness. I had a table written up linked to the phases of the moon and a random factor that stated what the weather would be like each day. Once the adventurers had solved the riddle and got the authorities in to destroy the power orb that controlled the weather, then normal patterns began to emerge again. This was a long-winded way to say that the broch in which the Cthonic druid resided had a history - it was an ancient, vitrified tower from the age of the first PBeM game and was tied to the history of the land. When the demoness was first encountered in Doggerland (I based this on details from the Temple of Elemental Evil history set out in that supplement) she was defeated, but her legacy lived on through her worshippers who still inhabited the abandoned places in the landscape awaiting her return.

Wandering Monsters had to fit in with what is in the dungeon - I made up small randomly rollable tables for encounters in and around the dungeon settings (based on the random encounter tables given in the supplements, or made up to only include monsters from the adventures I made up to keep them coherent. In other words, if a dungeon was full of, say, orcs, goblins and the like, then only those creatures plus a few standard trope wandering monsters (gelatinous cubes and the like) would be encountered there - no chance of a red dragon, for instance, as that would change the entire feel and objectives of the scenario. I also tried to fit the wandering monsters into the narrative of what was actually happening in the area around the dungeon. So, if a patrol of bandits was encountered and wiped out by the party then they had to have come from somewhere. If the scenario stated that some of the bandits at encounter location X put out patrols, then if I rolled bandits, they would be from that location and the results of the random encounter would mean that location explanation would be amended. A prime example of this was when the party had half-cleared the moathouse dungeon in the boglands near Staneford - the resident bad guy decided the heat was too much and he high-tailed it out of there with most of his followers before the party got to him.

Treasure and why monsters hoard it rather than spend it - Where do they get it from? Where do they spend it? These are questions that have always puzzled me, and to be honest I do not really have any hard and fast answers. In my campaign, the humans encountered would have earned it in some way. That said, most encounters with humans (unless boss types) resulted in poor treasure hauls; a small pouch with a few coins or the occasional magic item. Monsters, on the other hand, would be the ones that held onto magical trinkets and caskets of precious metals and gems. This doesn't really make sense to me, but as players want their characters to grow and become rich to enable them to do more in the imagined world they inhabit, I guess this strange treasure placement becomes part of the reward structure (along with gaining levels due to experience). I kind of explained this away by making it that these treasures were tribute from their lackeys, or items purloined from other adventurers who had tried to defeat them in the not so distant past. As to where the monsters could spend it, I have no idea, except maybe to pay their henchmen or bribe other bands of adventurers to let them go if they are on the point of defeat?

Re-populating a dungeon after a party has plundered it - This ruling really put my players off their stroke. After half-clearing an encounter location they would often return to civilisation to divvy-up treasure, re-equip themselves and heal in safety. Upon returning to the previous location they found that some of the rooms that they had cleared were now re-inhabited by new denizens - they were so used to playing in games where they literally just carried on from where they left off. I saw this re-population as the natural way in which societies and the natural world would re-align itself to a new situation; nature, as it is said, abhors a vacuum. If there is an ecological niche that becomes empty, then something will come along and fill it. Again, these rooms and caverns would be filled from either the nearest inhabitants expanding their demesne (possibly with new recruits) or by a wandering monster using the newly vacated area as a new home (and a new source of food in some cases).

Effects on the local human population when adventurers hit the town (or village) - This is also another item that is very rarely covered in the rulebooks. A band of adventurers rock up in a small village after plundering a dungeon, loaded down with coinage, gems, looted weaponry, and boastful stories. Where can they spend their ill-gotten gains? A small village would hardly be able to provide what the adventurers require - there is no Ye Olde Shoppe of Magicke like in the main cities (not that I use those in my camapigns anyway). So, they may be able to spend some treasure on finer lodgings, gambling and getting outrageously drunk on alcohol and satiated on fine food. However, villages can really only offer a brief respite from the harsh realities of the adventuring world and a means of re-stocking basic requirements; weapon and armour repairs, bows and arrows, lower class armours, food supplies, beasts of burden, maybe a riding horse or cart and local hirelings, as well as the usual R&R services.

Towns would only be a marginal step up but there would still not be enough on which the adventurers could spend their coins. So, what to do? There was one occasion during my last campaign that a fighter set up a fortification within the remains of the moat house in the fens. This cost a lot to do, so was a good way of spending his money, but it was a rare event albeit in keeping with 9th level fighters establishing a fortress according to the rulebooks.

Next step up are the cities; these allowed for at leaset one extra thing to be accomplished - training. Provided there was an NPC of the same class and a couple of levels higher than what the PC required, gold could be spent on a one-for-one swap for XP.

So, in reality, there is not a lot a band of adventurers can spend their gains on except a re-stock of arms and armour, rest and recuperation, maybe a bit of training, and having fun, with the local denizens trying to find ways of relieving the party of their cash and trinkets where they can.

But, the effect on the local economy can be catastrophic after the adventurers leave. All that excess gold and silver in the economy would artificially hike prices so that the local populace can no longer afford basic supplies and amenities. All the items that the party purchase would leave the town or village short of certain goods that may not be replaceable, and if there are any deaths due to hirelings being killed whilst away on an adventure, or in bar-room brawls then there will be a lot of widows and orphans. Who will look after them?

Again, this tended towards a longer than expected post, but, like all of my posts, they are written off the cuff and tend to ramble to wherever my thoughts take me. There is a kind of an idea in my head of what I want to cover but it never comes out how I envision it. I hope it makes sense and is coherent enough for you to get something from it.