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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 8, part 1)
I got a bit behind on posting these due to the holidays, but here’s the after-action report for Session Seven of the Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign. The Knight Rangers have headed out in their converted Martian Excavating Machine, now known as The Armadillo, to the Montana city of Hellgate as part of their quest to find and defeat Professor Barkane Adrameliche, who has become the darkling Lord, the Venom King.
Along the way, they topped in on the family of the ogre ranch-hand and ally Bo Hoss, and discovered the Hoss clan was being forced to labor for a group of Vrock cultists.
This entry is adapted from the notes of my friend Carl, a player in the game, and told from his point of view. My wife, Lj, was unable to play this session. As a result her character, the fenrin operative bounty hunter, was caught up by a twister while flying ahead to scout using DaVinci Wings. Sawyer managed to assure the other Knight Rangers that she’s catch up with them after she landed (and since Lj wanted us to go ahead and play without her, we hand-waved any concern the characters might normally have had over losing a member for a few days).
You can find Session One here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Two here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Three here.
Session Four here.
Session Five here: Part One. Part Two.
Session Six here.
Session Seven here: Part One, Part Two, Part Three.
If you don’t recognize a reference, it may (or may not) be in a previous session, or at the updated campaign notes page.
May 7, 1891
Travel past Idaho Falls, turning west.
May 8, 1891
The Knight Rangers pass many signs, pointing back to Idaho Falls, which appears to have been called Eagle Rock until recently. Numerous families in wagons are headed East toward Idaho Falls, evacuating the area further west.
Reach Root Hog, Idaho (will someday become Arco). It shows signs of extensive new construction, Edison and Tesla-based engineering, and numerous Martian tech survey teams
The nearby “Craters of the Moon” was a major Martian landing location, and kind of an initial base for them. When Martians were getting sick at the end of the War of the Worlds, this was a place they fell back too. The town is “Martian wreckage boom town.”
Recently the Army Corps of Engineers has opened up Craters of the Moon battle site to public exploration. The Corp found a lot of stuff, but the mass of public can find more, and even a simple Martian “screw” is worth 2 credits.
As the Knight rangers arrive in the Armadillo, a bunch of people with newstypes (Newspapers printed locally having been received over the Babbage-Bel Grid) approach us and ask us for signatures.
Headline in the “Lake Hudson Dispatch” reads: Knight Rangers Threaten Town of Texburg. The coverage is all negative and wrong, along with a negative artists rendition
Headline in the “Gotham Times” reads: The Really Wild West: Martians, Mercenaries, and Magic!, and only mentions the KR in passing
Headline in the “Washington’s Bugle Weekly ” reads: The New Wild: Heroes Arise to Meet Unimagined Threats, and is accompanied by a fairly accurate artists rendition, although the female centaur paladin is depicted as being 12 feet tall. The article is written by “April Raynes,” and it mentions two other groups, the “Swordslingers” and the “Blud-Hexen Bunch”
After about hour, 12 men with rifles who have us artilleryman’s badges and red strip trousers show up. They are led by Sergeant Levy Cooper, a gruff man with a big bushy mustache and beard. He is currently in charge of Martian issues in Root Hog. Wants to see our Martian papers, and to have one of his people go over the Armadillo to make sure its not leaking or going to exploding. We agree.
Locals had more encounters with the “bug gum” and takes some affidavits from us about our experiences with it (the Jerusalem bugs and walking meat).
The engineer mentions “orange goo” from some Martian tech that makes bugs grow big. Sergeant mentions Tesla was here first, indicates the least constructed building, “they had a really nice headquarters.”
He gives us a whistle that has a specific frequency that his fenrin employees can hear, they use it for emergencies.
They leave a corporal to keep an eye on us. Sergeant cooper says ” people don’t do what is expected, they do what is inspected.”
The closest crossing the Armadillo can take is a bridge which currently has so much traffic, we have to make an “appointment” to cross the bridge with the bridge officer.
In town, the centaur paladin goes for a hot shower, can’t find a shower place big enough, but a place that normally does degreaser for salvaged Martian tech, allows her to wash there. She encounters a large, 6″ wasp and pops it with a towel. It explodes into a green goo that is the same color as the Venom King’s various poisons.
The roboticist mechanic does some gambling, and looses to a professional gambler, “Slyton Seeves” , his friends call him “Sly.” They chat. He seems polite and proper. He wants to buy her (custom built) spark pistol for a lead lined box with a glowing blue dodecahedron crystal, She recognizes it as technological, but doesn’t know what it is. She does identify it as a part of a Martian interplanetary communicator. She makes the trade (and later builds herself a new spark pistol).
The human soldier guards the Armadillo while others are in town. He sees a woman walking about unnoticed on other people’s camps. No one else seems to see her. She then kisses a guy who is wraked with coughs, and that guy dies.
She approaches the Armadillo, and the soldier makes it obvious he can see her. She approaches, and they talk. She is Macha Morriga, basically a psychopomp. They exchange information, she tells him darklings rewrite reality. About 1,000 one got loose in South America, and destroyed an entire empire. She leaves, peacefully.
The cartographamancer half-orc was contact by agent of Tex Tanner. Tanner wanted to hire the Cartographamancer away from the Knight Rangers on a long-term contract, but was turned down. Tex Tanner is clearly paying agents throughout the West to keep track of the Knight Rangers.
(End Part One)
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 7, part 3)
Wrapping up the after-action report for Session Seven of the Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign. The Knight rangers have headed out in their converted Martian Excavationg Machine, now known as The Armadillo, to the Montana city of Hellgate as part of their quest to find and defeat Professor Barkane Adrameliche, who has become the darkling Lord, the Venom King.
But first, they want to check in on the family of the ogre ranch-hand and ally Bo Hoss, who live near Rexburg and stopped communicating with him months ago, though they only ever sent him messages once a season.
Notes adapted from the notes of my wife Lj, a player in the game, and told from her point of view.
>>Later on May 6th day we come to Rexburg.
The Knight Rangers decide to visit Bo Hoss’s family before going in to Rexburg. The ogre clan live in a small valley between Rexburg and Hibbard, in the vents of a mostly-dormant shield volcano.
· There’s a Pony Express post at the edge of the valley, which looks abandoned. An investigation reveals an old smell of blood in the floor – a Kasatha was stabbed and bled to death right there – no blood drops leading out of the shack. It’s been at least 7-8 months since the pony has been here, and no foot prints nearby for months.
· The post itself has a hobo mark on it – means this place is unfriendly and unsafe
· Strongly smells of vulture-like bird – either a large flock or a huge roc visits here every few days but is smart enough to clean up their sign (only their scent gives them away)
· Place is clean and packed like they left it on purpose
· The Soldier and Operative, both with DaVinci Wings, take to the air and scout the valley.
o The soldier determines that there is wildlife, but they are all acting like there are predators around. He finds and talks to a fisher (a weasellike mustelid) using speak with animals. It says there are “big, death birds” – they crow and dance and speak all the wrong words. They’re all feathered, but they talk to fleshy people
o The operative sees at the other end of the valley, beyond the volcano, there is a creepy looking lodge up in the side of the mountainside, in a wetland area. It’s old and rundown, but there’s a light on. Between 100-200 years old, or maybe just a really hard 40 years. Smells of at least two half-elves.
Drive the Armadillo in, but it can’t make it up the mountain to the vents where Bo Hoss’s family live. There are carved-in stairs the Knight Rangers take to get up.
· There are old stones here carved with South Pacific language, which no PC speaks
· Also some larger, new stones carved in a very different language
· We see someone inside the cave – a Bo Hoss-like ogre– carving on the wall.
· There is a vrock overseeing him. It sees us and screeches – it’s on
FIGHT!
· The operative shoots and misses, but startles the vrock.
· The centaur paladin charges and shouts “I name thee demon!” The Knight Rangers conclude it’s a demon.
· The vrock screams and causes fear, though no one in the area is affected
· It slams its beak into the paladin for a LOT of damage. It seems to be augmented.
· The cartograthurge technomancer moves up to see if the new stones are doing something that may effect the ogres
· The ogre, being now free to move as he will, turns to the stones at the entrance and starts to chisel away the runes yelling “NO!” with each blow
· The soldier PC spots another figure down the other tunnel
· The vrock dances and creates a cloud of spores, affecting everyone but the soldier, who is out of range. The centaur paladin grows pustules on her skin from it – blech – but just ignores the penalties and keeps fighting.
· The technomancer says the menhirs are summoning rocks – brings more demons here, and infuse the area with demonic energy. The ogre keeps trying to destroy it, but it’s taken months to make and is resistant to destruction.
· The roboticist engineer and her drone joins in to destroy the menhir with the ogre, using her engineering knowledge to help break up its structure. They speed up the destruction quite a bit
· The figure the PC soldier spotted down another tunnel is a half-elf male with a red, glowing pentagram over one eye who has a wavy-bladed dagger and a pistol. He waves his dagger in the air to cast a spell while he fires. A screaming bullet fires past the Soldier, the bullet crying out obscenities in Infernal.
· The ogre hits one of the runes on the menhir (natural 1 on a skill check to damage it), and it disintegrates his chisel and damages him mildly.
· The fenrin Operative bounty hunter moves into the tunnel near , sees another set of stones and alerts the cartograthurge technomancer. Operative shoots the vrock, but the attack bounces.
· The roboticist mechanic moves into the tunnel to deal with the second menhir. She spots three more ogres manacled and gagged deeper in the tunnel, and lets the other OCs know.
· Te half-eld cultist and PC Soldier exchange gunfire in a different tunnel. The half-elf staggers to behind a third menhir in that tunnel, and smears his blood on the menhir – his eyes roll up – he chants in Ancient Sumarian and keeps firing at the Soldier. His bullet missed, but the soldier felt the vileness of it as it passed
· The Operative bounty hunter moves over to the bound ogres, and identifies that their manacles happen to be compatible with her manacle keys. Ha! She unlocks one, tells it to free the others.
· The centaur paladin continues to solo the vrock but has to lay on hands for herself – she was running too ragged. It’s smite evil lance strikes against fiendishly-empowered beak bites.
· The technomancer successfully breaks the front menhir. Half the sense of fiendish energy infusion in the area goes away.
· The mechanic begins to dismantle the second menhir
· The soldier (able to ignore the half-elf’s cover), shoots him again – this time, killing him
· The first menhir broken, the ogre who was attacking it picks up a rock and assists the centaur paladin fight the vrock by flanking it with her. The ogre takes an attack of opportunity from the Vrock to get into position and is bloodied (runs out of stamina), but doesn’t seem to care.
· The centaur paladin bloodies the vrock – woohoo! Then it smashes her with its beak again, bloodying her.
· The technomancer unleashes his steampunk bee-bots (the spell “microboat assault) at the vrock, distracting it
· With Engineering and her drone’s strength, the mechanic roboticist destroys the second menhir, ending the “evil temple” feel entirely, inside this tunnel. The vrock is visible weakened.
· Soldier, Technomancer, and Mechanic PCs move on to break the third menhir in the other tunnel, byt the dead halg-eld cultist.
· The manacled ogres frees themselves and follow the fenrun Operative into battle. Second.
· Aided by the Operative and the orges, the centaur paladin finally does in the vrock. It diminishes into ropey cords of muscle, pus, and rot before it disappears.
· A second vrock is spotted flying this way. The Knight rangers and freed ogres destroy the remianing menhir, and wait for it to arrive. It is visibly weaker than the first vrock, and faulters when the last mehir is destroyed.
·During the wait, the freed orgres explain two half-elves arrived months ago and summoned a vrock on a stormy knight. Then the vrock captured the ogres and forced them to make the new, evil mehirs. When three were done, the vrock did a dance that turned on half-elf into a second vrock. Then they began being forced to make more menhirs, to turn the last half-elf into a vrock, so the three vrocks could then open a gate to the Abyss.
· Most Knight Rangers take cover to fight the vrock, but the centaur paladin and the ogres stand in open view to draw it in.
· The second vrock arrives at half health since there are no menhirs, and he’s trying to get to the third one.
· Paladin charges, Operative and Soldier shoot, Technomancer uses the beebots, Mechanic sics her drone on it, so the vrock is flanked by drone and paladin. Orgres pick up and throw rocks they have prepared for their home’s defense.
· Vrock is outmatched, though it does ignore magic missiles cast by the technomancer thanks to Spell Resistance, and on a critical hit inflicts a bleed effect on the drone. It dies, much less impressively than the first vrock.
AFTERMATH
· The ogres are Bo Ghun, Bo Ghran, Bo Deir, and Bo Fo. There are 20 total in the Bo clan (babies grow to full size within 2 years). They invite the Knight Rangers to eat and rest.
· PCs check out the shack at the end of the valley first — was an abandoned cult house. Find a demonic text telling them how to summon a vrock. The cultists were still 5 months from completing the rocks needed to summon the third vrock, but needed the ogre’s exert stone-carving skills to do it. They told the local townsfolk that the post had been destroyed and that the ogres would come into town to get their mail, townsfolk didn’t care enough to check on why the ogres never did that.
LOOT: Magical Sumerian wavy-bladed dagger; sixteen sets of size-large manacles; demonic text (which is put in a lead-lined safe n the Armadillo the mechanic deigned for radioactives, but will work great for magic too)
· The ogres give the Knight rangers us a return letter for Bo Hoss.
· When the Knight Rangers get into Rexburg to mail the letter to Bo Hoss, they tell local officials that because they ignored the inquiry about the Bo clan, demons nearly overran the world.
XPs: 1300
20,270 current total, (23,000 to 7th)
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 7, part 2)
Continuing the after-action report for Session Seven of the Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign. The Knight rangers have headed out in their converted Martian Excavationg Machine, now known as The Armadillo, to the Montana city of Hellgate as part of their quest to find and defeat Professor Barkane Adrameliche, who has become the darkling Lord, the Venom King.
Notes adapted from the notes of my wife Lj, a player in the game, and told from her point of view.
>>Campaign Day 31
· About an hour after we set out, we see Waterlily (a ranch hand from the Circle Axe Ranch) riding up behind us
· We pull over and she hands us a large, fancy, international letter that arrived right after the Knight Rangers left the Circle Axe.
o Formal Eastern European letter
o Carries appreciation and amazement at our accomplishments from Princess Allegra Gullveig of Stythencia (a tiny Tiefling City-state in Eastern Europe in the Carpathian Mts. near Transylvania).
o She wrote and sent it, referring to the Knight Rangers by name, about six hours after we decided on our group name. Info doesn;t travel that fast without magic.
Camping first night, spot a glow-in-the-dark figure on a horse coming toward the camp. Skeletal man in law officer duds, with a badge that says he is “Deputy D. Nails.” His horse is bandaged like a mummy and has a necklace of severed heads. As the figure approaches it gets cold and snow begins to fall – not cloudy
· The heads – there are at least three – are from men who fled when the Knight rangers attacks the Venom King’s forces at Neblin Hill.
· He says he’s taking over after Deputy B. Hill was recalled. He’s hunting the grave jumper (Venom King).
· We trade information. The Knight Rangers learn the Prof. has split himself in to two – flesh and bone – but they’re right next to each other. He’ll be at full strength in 180 days from tonight if not stopped – he needs a specific conjunction to accomplish this so it cannot be rushed. His vulnerability is the metal from coffin nails, not silver or cold iron, that have been used to keep bodies in the ground.
· If the Venom King isn’t brought down soon, “the Marshall” will come down to earth personally and get him.
· Deputy Nails heads away toward Montana
Campaign Day 32
· Pass through Rollings, WY
· Get to Rock Springs, WY
o Stop here to camp and resupply
Day 33
· Eden, Farson, Boulder, and Pinedale, WY – all of which are wrecks – wiped out during the WotW
· Stop at a battlefield on our path – the centaur paladin stops to honor the dead
Day 34
· Come to a pass through the mountains – gorgeous
· Stop in Hoeback
Day 35 (fifth travel day – May 5th)
· Idaho Falls, far eastern Idaho – decent sized town
· Bear River too deep to cross in the Armadillo
· Use the cattle bridge and end up in the edge of town
· A crowd gathers, looking at the amazing converted Martian tech. Begin to cheer, because they think the Knight Rangers took it from the Martians
· Cartographothurge Technomancer gets off to resupply
· Centaur paladin gets on the train station platform and tells a tale of defeating the forces of the Venom King’s snakeperson allies, who are quickly dubbed “the Scorpion Gang.” Though she tells the tale accurately, the crowd is already making it bigger that she tells
· We head out five miles from town to camp
· A handful of horsemen come out to us – five
o Three young men, one older man, and a middle-aged woman
o Professor Virgil, and students from the Eastern Idaho Technical College
o They want to ask about the Armadillo
o They brought us potatoes au gratino They talk to the technomancer roboticist, talking to dawn and learning from her. Invite her to come lecture whenever she likes
Campaign Day 36, which is determiend to be May 6th
· Around noon, we spot a herd of brontosauruses.
· We slow down and drive by at a safe distance
· Soldier outlaw with DaVinci wings goes out and flies over them – sees the babies
· The technomancer sketches his heart out
Later that day, the Knight rangers reach Rexburg, and head to the nearby shield volcano to visit Bo Hoss’s family.<<
What do they find!? We’ll discover that tomorrow, in part 3!
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 7, part 1)
After nearly a month break, I finally ran by Starfinder-Really Wild West-Doomstone campaign again, and people have been asking about getting to see the after-action report. So here’s a write-up adapted from notes taken by my wife Lj (who is playing the fenrin operative bounty hunter named “Sawyer”), mostly in second person, as a report for Session Seven!
You can find Session One here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Two here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Three here.
Session Four here.
Session Five here: Part One. Part Two.
Session Six here.
If you don’t recognize a reference, it may (or may not) be in a previous session, or at the updated campaign notes page.
A lot happened in this one, so it’s been broken into multiple blog posts.
>>We’ve traded the digging bits of the Martian Embanking Machine we captured (that had already been partially-converted by Professor Adrameliche, who turns out to be the Venom King) to the Circle Axe Ranch in exchange for the parts, materials, tools, and assistance we need to convert it into our base of operations. Conversion takes two weeks, during which time we are guests of the Circle Axe. The group decides on a group name (the Knight Rangers), and name the soon-to-be-finished mobile base of operations “The Armadillo.”
The local Fonts and Bismarck Station Chief, Adler, comes to visit and receive a briefing on the Knight Ranger’s recent activities. Agrees to use official Fonts and Bismarck channels to make inquiries about whether Professor Adrameliche has been seen in Montana. Also helps discover that the Professor’s style of technological invention is very similar to that found in several train robberies (performed with the aid of a robotic derailing machine) performed a few years back that accrued a great deal of cash.
Since the Knight Rangers believe the Professor is in Montana, the fenrin operative bounty hunter looks up bounties in Montana.
· The situation is complicated, with the state new to the Union and in a very unstable place due to massive damage from Martian Walkers during the War of the Worlds. Various Copper Kings (like cattle barons, but for copper) are in near-open warfare and set bounties on each other, many with local (though not legal) support. State bounties are legal, but often lack local support and are likely to anger one or more factions. Mostly only official Federal bounties are seen to have the weight needed to be legal and not likely to bring reprisals.
· An exception is that the rare bounty placed by “Gotham Jo” – Josephine Fiery, are also respected throughout Montana.
o She is a madam and business owner of a hurdy gurdy house in Helena
o She’s married to a man who’s present, but not in charge. In fact she seems to have him under her thumb, with lcoals knowing not to allow him to drink or gamble.
o has a reputation for taking care of her employees, and only put out bounties on those who have wronged her people, never on an ex-employee
· There are currently no active bounties safe to take
Knight rangers made some inquiries about Beard-cutter Ben (who sold them “walking meat,” a chewing gum that turned out to attract the Monstrous Jerusalem Bugs that attacks the PCs back in Session Two.
· Upon hearing they are looking for him, he shows up at the ranch to apologize and offer us refunds and reparations. He got the material from the East Hudson Fur Trading Company. He will never do business with them again, and he’s spreading word that it’s bad, hired a lawyer to sue the EHBFTCo.
· We ask him to tell us when he finds out more information
· As part of reparations, ask him to give discounted shaves for law enforcement. He also gives some cash.
Station Chief Adler reports Professor Adremeliche has been spotted in three places in Montana in the last 60 days.
· Helena, the capitol (It is 680 miles from here – if Knight Rangers go there, can visit Bute-Silverbow on the way. Economy fueled by lead, silver, and gold mining. Capitol buildings under construction. Most millionaires per capita in the US. Many movers and shakers – includes Gotham Jo. The Copper Kings who are so influential elsewhere in the state have very little control here. Population 13,000. No real bad part of town. Almost no unemployment. The rich people compete in charitable giving.)
· Butte-Silverbow (Closest to the Knight Ranger’s current location – 450 miles. Population of 15,000 – biggest city in Montana. Center of War of the Worlds refugees in the state. Major EHBFTCo. base of operations–no Fonts and Bismarck office there. Center of where the Copper Kings are waging war against each other. Center of the Asteroid Mining Co. – mine adamantine and other star metals. Growing copper industry. Center of Martian tech research in the state. Two scummy red light districts. Grimy and smoke-filled. Gangs based on foreign national or ethnic origins divided up the town, most with ties to one or another Copper King.)
· Hellgate (800 miles from here – due to limitations on moving the Armadillo through mountains and damaged infrastructure from the War of the Worlds, have to go around a forest to get there. Third largest city in Montana – pop. 3,400. In Hellgate Valley [Sections of which were choked with bones due to French fir traders fighting with natives, which is how it got its name. Fur trade has moved out.] Now largely trades in lumber. Home of Hellgate University [oldest in the state and includes the only accredited and licensed school of necromancy not in Eastern Europe]. Next to the Rattlesnake Mts. One of only two places in the world with a Badlands City embassy.
Most information comes from Station Chief Allison Flynn of Helena, Montana.
· Her information was gathered under the radar. She is convinced Professor Adrameliche is connected with one of the power structures in the state. Found a picture of him for us – he wears black with accents of the same green as the Venom King. He is, of course, the Venom King. Mechanical arm. Cane with human bones and a green skull pommel – [Likely the Venom King’s actual bones.] Eyes = black with tiny, green dots
The Knight Rangers decide they are going to visit the university in Hellgate first, to see if they can find a way to put down the dead spirit that is the Venom King, and who now seems to inhabit Professor Adrameliche.
· We can make 40-50 miles per day in the Armadillo. Get to the university in 16 days using an alternate route. Our route will take us through Yellowstone, Idaho Falls, Salmon, Hamilton, Lolo, then Hellgate
Around Day 10 into the 14 days it takes to put together the Armadillo. Dwargus invites us up to the big house for supper and new. Circle Axe has been granted 75% of the disputed lands they were arguing with the vicious Hippogriff Ranch – including Neblin Ridge.
· Dwargus gives us a Federal salvage deed for the Armadillo from the Sixth Federal Circuit Court in Ohio. It might be overturned, but it should at least take a court case to do so.
· Mention that Texas Helium Magnate Tex Tanner has sent word he’s sending a representative to make an offer to buy the Armadillo… but the rep won’t arrive until two days after the Knight Rangers have left. We decide not to wait for him.
Around Day 12 into the 14 days elven ranch hand Waterlily wants to talk to us. She mentions the Ogre ranch hand Bo Hoss has a problem he doesn’t want to bother us with. His family lives in a shield volcano near Rexberg, Idaho. Communication with them has ceased. Dwargus sent an inquiry – got no information. They’re all ogres – only a few speak English – mostly immigrants of Pacific Islander descent.
A Shirren lady comes to measure Liam for some clothes. As a sensate, she asks if she can lick the Armadillo. The Knight rangers are okay with it, and she experiences 15 new flavors she’s never tasted before. In thanks, she gives us all spider silk umbrellas (+2 KAC/EAC against liquid-based attacks if held, but only 1 HP and takes damage if attack it is used against does any damage).
On Campaign Day 31 – it’s time to head out to Hellgate
· The roboticist mechanic and operative bounty hunter are the best drivers, with the cartogramancer technomancer a close third.
· The centaur paladin can drive, but her armor gives her penalties
· The others we set up on rotation to learn
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Technomancers of the Really Wild West 1: Cartogramancers
The technomancer character in my Really Wild West campaign “Doomstone,” is a cartogramancer–someone who uses magic to enhance maps and mapmaking tools, and can use those tools to divine some kinds of information.
I noted on Facebook and Twitter recently that in the Really Wild West, the most common kinds of technomancers are Cartogramancers, Edisonades, Lovelacers, Telethurges, Teslics, and the Prophets of John Moses Browning.
I thought it might be fun to examine those ideas, starting with the one I had used the most, cartogramancer.
Cartogramancers
Cartogramancers focus on cartography, exploration, and the map as a scrying device. It has multiple origins, having developed in different forms separately in Babylon, China, and India. These were all known to and evolved by Greek and Roman mappers, but the major advancements in cartogramancy occurred in the Muslim community during the Golden Age of Islam. The 12th century cartographer Muhammad al-Idrisi is considered the Founder of Modern Cartogramancy, and it was his time spent in Sicily at the court of King Roger II that brought this modern version of the art to Europe, from whence it spread to every place the Europeans eventually colonized.
Cartogramancers are among the most in-demand forms of technomancers among major companies, governments, and military groups. Though this ascendency had begun in the past generation to wane as less and less of the world was uncharted, the Martian Invasion changed so much topography, and stirred up so many Hollow Worlds, that demand has spiked again in the past two years.
Technomancer Alternate Class Feature: Cartogramancy
At 1st level, you gain access to cartogramancy. This replaces you spell cache. (You gain a spell cache at 6th level in place of a cache capacitor, and gain cache capacitor ( at 12th and cache capacitor II at 18th level).
You can make a Mysticism check to perform the Orienteering task normally associated with Survival. You double any equipment bonus that would normally apply to an Orienteering task check (such as from a cartographer’s kit). You also gain an insight bonus to checks made for Orienteering equal to 1/3 your technomancer level (round up).
Additionally, if you are in an environment you have taken at least 10 minutes to survey with a cartography kit from a vantage point that grants you a broad view (such as the top of a hill, rather than down in an alleyway), you gain a +2 circumstance bonus to initiative checks, Perception checks, Stealth checks, and Survival checks within the area you were able to see from your survey point.
Once per day, you can divine information about a region using a cartography kit. This takes 10 minutes, and can be combined with surveying an area, as described above. You generally gain information about one biome you can see out to one day’s travel from you. You can learn one piece of information, plus one piece per 4 technomancer levels.
You can learn the direction or distance to the nearest potable water source, what the natural weather will be over the next 24 hours, the CR of most dangerous creature native to the region, what the most dangerous natural hazard is and what its CR is.
If you ask the same question more than once, each answer moves down to the next relevant answer–for example of you discover CR 7 quicksand is the most dangerous hazard in a region and you asked that question twice, you might also learn than CR 5 rockslides are the second-most-dangerous hazard.
Cartographer’s Kit
Bulk: 1 Cost: 20 credits
A cartographer’s kit includes a compass, sundial, triangles, pens with various nib thicknesses, collapsible tripod, levels, spyglass with level, sextant, and plumb lines. It grants a +2 equipment bonus to skill checks for the Orienteering task or to craft a map. Additionally, if you are trained in a skill that can be used to perform the Orienteering task, and can see the stars or sun, you can take 10 minutes to make a DC 20 check with that skill to attempt to determine your longitude and latitude on the globe… if you know what world you are on.
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 6)
It looks like there is enough interest in session notes from my Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign for those to become a regular feature. So here’s a write-up adapted from notes taken by my wife Lj (who is playing the fenrin operative bounty hunter named “Sawyer”) as a quick report for Session Six!
You can find Session One here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Two here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Three here.
Session Four here.
Session Five here: Part One. Part Two.
If you don’t recognize a reference, it may (or may not) be in a previous session, or at the updated campaign notes page.
Session Six
I decided to playtest my idea for Spotlight Tokens in this session. I got some useful feedback, I may or may not keep using them in this campaign.
These notes are from the point of view of the PCs (specifically my wife Lj, and I adapted them from her notes for her character, the fenrin operative bounty hunter Sawyer).
The Svirfneblin host us and feed us. Dinner includes large roasted pill bugs that taste like lobster. Mushrooms, snails (escargot-style), slugs, beer.
· The svirfneblin give us papers and a copy of The Pact to give to Dwargus Hardfist, with whom they hope to open formal trade.
· The svirfneblin give us “the Door,” a complex set of nested crystal spheres. It will seek a spot within the serpent people Hollow World near its center, and then can be activated (with a combination of three successful Engineering and/or Mysciticm checks in a row) to close the serpent people Hollow World for a century or so. Once activated, it must be guarded for 1-2 minutes (1d10+10 rounds), after which it will open a portal. It then cannot be stopped, but anyone who doesn’t go through the portal will be trapped in the Serpent People dark Hollow World for a century.
· The Svirfneblin can have their Hollow World (the Vault) overlap the serpent people’s Hollow World (Aakath), and deposit us near where we will need to set up “the Door.” As soon as we open the door, the powerful Venom Champion known to the serpent people only as “Her” will know, and is sure to arrive.
· Once Aakath is cut off, the serpentfolk who are currently out in our world, will be stuck. They will still be able to teleport, but will have weaker arcane powers and less eldritch strength.
· The Svirfneblin the PCs found and buried have returned their essences and minds to the Svirfneblin communities. Their “soul sparks” have become soul gems, which those who have fallen offer to the PCs (one each) as thanks for putting them to rest.
o “Who they are” has gone back to the community
o These are the fuel that drove their essence, minds, and bodies.
Soul Gem
· all are +1 Resolve Point (only to stabilize)
· Then there are cuts, each with a different power set.
o Trillions +1 to all saves
o Navette +2 against all afflictions
o Cabochon +4 to all saves against poisons
Into the breach — The Svirfneblin perform the ceremony to place us in Aakath.
· We all take anti toxins
· Things dwell there that are worse than serpent folks
· Be prepared for darkness that defies simple concepts such as evil
Aakath — the Endless Cavern
· Darkness so gray, it might as well be black, but we know it isn’t
· Settlement with inhuman architecture in distance, outbuildings nearby
· Thin glowing green sickly line in the far distance
· Vapor clings to the ground
· Crunching noise beneath our feet
· An alien howl of alarm goes off
· The Door draws us toward a nearby fountain, but there are things between us and it.
FIGHT!
· “The unclean thing” – (GM describes it ‘the bezor that the otyugh spit up’). It is a shapeshifting mass of waste, raw, pulsing organs, and foul ichors.
o It spews digestive juices and waste as an attack out of a sphincter it forms for the purpose
· The alarm turns into chanting
· The green glow flashes and two figures teleport in
o One is a Four-armed Huge snake-legged serpentfolk, with glowing venomous pistols, a green gem in her head, and wicked dagger – this is clearly “Her”
o Also with HER is a Size-large serpent with ridges on its back
o Damage to HER appears on the serpent, until the serpent is slain.
· The serpent charges for the bounty hunter operative fenrin.
· A Size-large four-headed serpent appears
· The centaur mercenary paladin protects the human robotocist mechanic and half-orc cartographer tecnomancer as they get the mechanism activated.
· Another unclean thing shows up – a minor version
· We finally get everyone down
· The portal opens as we see siege weapons and giant coils rolling this way
· We flee
AFTERMATH
· We all make it through. End up in the same cavern as the Martian embanking machine, beneath Neblin Ridge.
· Heal up
LOOT from Her: Pocket hollow world (clear gem) – teleport (self only, 440-foot range) CL10 as a move or swift action once per day – (goes the the centaur paladin); warmaster’s gloves (swap out weapon you are wielding with those stored on your person without taking an action) – goes to human soldier; Martian capacitor (1ce/day supercharge a weapon as part of the attack) – goes to human mechanic.
The Tess drives the Martian Embanking Machine out of the mine. We all take a turn driving it. Go back to the Circle Axe Ranch.
· They give us burgers
· Bring Dwargus up to speed. Learn Felspark has been “Recalled East,” by the east Hudson Fur Trading Company.
· He makes us Trustees of the Circle Axe Ranch
· We can take out the tunneling stuff from the Embanking machine and turn the engine into a mobile Base of Operations. Decide to do so before hunting down the infamous Professor Barkane Adrameliche, who we believe has beocme the Venom King, and we think is in Montana.
Divide up the $4000 worth of bounties between us. $800 each.
XPs: 1920
18,970 (23,000 to 7th)
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 5, Pt. 2)
Here’s part Two of the Session Five notes for my Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign, adapted from notes taken by my wife Lj (who is playing the fenrin operative bounty hunter named “Sawyer”).
You can find Session One here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Two here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Three here.
Session Four here.
Session Five here: Part One.
If you don’t recognize a reference, it may (or may not) be in a previous session, or at the updated campaign notes page.
Session Five (Part Two)
Still Day 13
The characters see that the heaviest traffic out of the Big Cavern is through the left-hand tunnel, which was clearly made by the Embanking Machine. This also shows signs of the svirfneblin-drawn sled they saw bring green ore out of the mine when observing the camp outside. This is the route the take.
- There is a breach in the tunnel that clips some underground complex that was already there. (The players later learn this is the Svirfneblin Vault)
- The end of that tunnel opens up beyond the breach
- The centaur paladin, in the lead (with her darkvision) is attacked by monsters disguised as rocks at the entrance. They’re grick!
FIGHT!!!
- The grick don’t seem to take electrical damage, fire damage either
- The human soldier criminal grabs the Warhammer the Chimera Kid was using and uses that on the grick – bounces off. The magic fusion that was on the warhammer has already been moved to the mechanic robotisit’s drone’s bite attack (her drone looks like a mechanical dog).
- The grick don’t do a lot of damage, but anyone near them has to make a Reflex save or take some damage from their flailing tentacles, on top of their bites or acid spit. And the grick are reducing every attack that hits them by 10 points of damage, so seem nearly invulnerable.
- There are two Sverfneblin here. They speak some kind of old German. It takes Culture checks for people who know German to understand them.
- The centaur paladin and fenrin operative work to asks the Svirfneblin to call off the beasts – the svirfneblin explain they do not control the gricks
- The human soldier criminal called out the name Drungeldan Smyreonot – the name of one of the ‘neblins we talked to after death
- Bullets don’t work against the gricks either
- The half-orc technomancer cartographer makes a Mysticism check, and says it takes magic damage to hurt the grick. He then casts overcharge weapon on the paladin centaur’s lance.
- The lance kills one. The human soldier has an automatic pistol with a magic rune on it, and he easily kills the other one.
AFTERMATH:
- The centaur paladin casts a spell that allows her to speak to the Svirfneblin
- They need to get to their Headman
- He is being held hostage in the back
- We will have to bypass the serpentfolk and some pact guardians
- The Pact Guardians are varied – some mechanical, some monsters. They protect the svirfneblin, but also obey the pact, and thus don’t currently attack the serpent people who took over the pact by stealing blood of pact scion – Dwargus. Thus as long as Dwargus does not elave the area, the serpent people can come and go in the Svirfneblin Vault. (PCs realize this is why the manticore kept killing off Dwargus’s cattle–so he couln’t retire and leave).
- Only the authority of the pact scion can get us to bypass the pact guardians
- The PCs try the writ given to them by Dwargus allowing them to investigate the area on the door in this room, which is a Pact Guardian itself.
- It works!
- There are serpentfolk on the other side of the door!!
FIGHT!
- There is a gorgeous small green snake, a serpentfolk with a gun and serrated jawbone of an ass sword, and a human carpetbagger with a staff and wearing a beautiful green operacloak
- The two ‘neblin cast spells to aid the PCs
- When the pretty cobra dies, it turns into a pool and evaporates
- The soulstaff dissolves
LOOT: Sharpened jawbone of an ass that is bane vs humanoids (5,000- 10,000-year-old artifact); Who’s Who in Montana 1890; guardian greatcloak (Goes to the technomancer cartographer, and changes from venomous green to midnight blue with silver nautical symbols, route lines, and compass roses when he puts it on).)
Guardian Greatcloak (magic item, level 5): If you take an action that provokes an attack of opportunity, you may expend a Resolve Point without taking an action and not provoke the attack of opportunity
LOOT: One shotgun
PCs move through the rest of the Vault to get to the headman, using the Writ from Dwargus to bypass traps and guardians of the Pact. Final room. Locked and trapped door. The mechanic roboticist bypasses it, and recognizes the handiwork/design skills of Professor Barkane Adrameliche, whose handiwork was also found in the Martian Embanking machine.
- The Svirfneblin Headman is inside
- He asks if he can close the vault, using their authority with the Writ from Dwargus – PCs all say yes
- The Headman explains Professor Barkane Adrameliche IS the Venom King (“Toxin Krieger”to the Sverneblin)
- The Professor found the idea of a “Venom King” while studying Martian Black Gas, and began to hear whispers. As he experimented with and perfected ways to use the Black gas, the whispers grew louder and louder, and eventually the Professor became the Venom King as much as he is Barkane Adrameliche.
- The Professor/Venom King is a Darkling — a human who has embraced the darkness so totally he is a native outsider, and on his way to becoming a demigod. He is one of six “Dread Fates,” six unspeakable ways to die.
- The Professor had six Lts.
- Dathaca (who was the Chimera Kid)
- Gaotma – (the only one with a Doomstone)
- Athath-ka
- Venomancer (the spellcasters the PCs *just* killed)
- Female serpentfolk in the other tunnel. Called “Her” in fearful tones by other serpent people.
- One Unknown
- The Professor and his six lts are the only ones who will ascend, becoming demigods
- None of the other six Dread Fates currently has a physical body. The Professor is trying to bring about one of them, his closest ally, the Dread Fate of Torture (who has a drop of blood as his icon, like the blood cultists encountered earlier on Neblin Ridge).
- The Professor is currently in Montana.
- Sverfhaim is a Hollow World– a place that is as much a concept and planar pocket as it is a material place. So is the Serpent People home. Also, the serpentfolk seek another “Hollow World“
- Headman offers PC hospitality for the night
- Sends his folk to watch the upper caverns
- PCs need to get into the serpentfolk city, set up a mystical “door” (a device the Neblin headman can create), go through it, close the door
- Then the serpent city will cease to have access to our world and we would be on Neblin Ridge
End of session. XPs: 2650
LEVEL UP to 6th!!
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 5, Pt. 1)
It looks like there is enough interest in session notes from my Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign for those to become a regular feature. So here’s a write-up adapted from notes taken by my wife Lj (who is playing the fenrin operative bounty hunter named “Sawyer”) as a quick report for Session Five!
You can find Session One here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Two here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Three here.
Session Four here.
If you don’t recognize a reference, it may (or may not) be in a previous session, or at the updated campaign notes page.
Session Five
Day 13
The fenrin operative bounty hunter takes the mask of inconsequence once used by the Chimera Kid. This magic item allows you to make Stealth checks, opposed by observer’s Perception or Sense Motive (whichever is greater) to appear to be no different form the majority of people around you. It only works when you are not in combat, and does not work against anyone directly interacting with you or who is in combat.
So equipped, she heads into the mine to do Stealth recon. She overhears a conversation between two guards – they know there was a ight outside, and if anyone comes up they don’t recognize the guards will will shoot first, ask questions later. They are awaiting the return of “the Professor,” who the guards obviously fear. The Professor specifically warned them not to use the “embanking machine,” which is taken by the group to be a Martian embanking machine from the War of the Worlds.
The players decide to make a blitz attack, since these guards and part of an operation that has used slave svirfneblin labor, and mercilessly killed and hid the bodies of a dozen or more of those.
- The centaur paladin charges in to begin the fracas, impaling an enemy operative (one of two) with a critical hit on a lance change before he has a chance to do anything. (“Yep, that’s a crit. What IS the crit effect on your lance?” “He dies?”)
- There is a spell-casting serpentfolk in here. It casts a defensive spell, then alternates between supercharge weapon and firing snakes as arrows from a 3-limbed bow.
- The surviving operative sniper trick attacks the centaur, and gets his own critical hit on her before she rides him down.
- The human soldier criminal PC exhcages fire with numerous gunslingers, and two axe-lords (people with magic rune brands in their hands allowing them to make special throw-and-return and multiple-target ace attacks, an old Nordic tradition). He gets shot with a snake arrow, but doesn’t go down
- One crook, “Mr. Green Jacket” gets away out the front of the mine and since he agreed to flee “into the desert” and not come back, and the PCs took a lot of damage, they opt not to chase him down.
AFTERMATH
- There is a Martian Embanking Machine here, which has been used to dig dozens of tunnels. It looks like a 20-ft. wide mechanical centipede, and has been converted to be steered by human controls. The human mechanic roboticist disables it by taking out aprt of thsoe adapted controls and in doing so finds a gear with a patent he reognizes–it was created by the infamous Professor Barkane Adrameliche, a citizen of the Ottoman Empire who helped create the first automatons. It is suspected he might have known Gaotma, the Manticore.
- This room also has a series of Martian atomic batteries, which have been salvaged from other Embanking machines. These are not as powerful as a Tripod Generator (like the one serpentfolk tried to steal in Session One), but these three have been hooked to a capacitor designed to concentrate their power, though it takes several days to power up to a generator’s power level.
- The capacitor is hooked to an array that clearly once had a spherical device hooked up inside it. This is right next to an empty storage area which the fenrin can tell 9with Scent) used to have Martian Black gas cannisters. Also, the iron box with the Doomstone taken from the manticore gets hot near the area.
- The PCs conclude the Venom King is using the Martian Batteries to infuse Green Iron (taken from this mine) with the toxic properties of the Black Gas, the most virulent poison now known on Earth. This creates the “Doomstones,” such as the one they recovered, but can only make one every week or two. If the Venom King had a Tripod Generator, he could make a Doomstone every few hours.
LOOT from thsi fight: High-quality handaxes x4; Allin needle guns x2 (one for Liam); Ajax revolvers (x5); three-limbed serpent person bow (no arrows), bag with 8 snake eggs; golden bullet (magical) – put it in any projectile weapon and it has a one-shot built-in supercharge weapon (given to the fenrin operative bounty hunter); gallon of butane
Cast grave words on the bodies the Serpentfolk just hisses words at the PCs. The All of the rest of them talk about weird smells and weird dreams
There are two paths deeper into the mine. The PCs go left.
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Really Wild West “Doomstone” Campaign — After-Action Report (Game Session 4)
Since people still seem to be enjoying after-action reports of my Really Wild West: Doomstone campaign, here’s a write-up adapted from notes taken by my wife Lj (who is playing the fenrin operative bounty hunter named “Sawyer”) as a quick report for Session Four!
You can find Session One here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Two here: Part One, Part Two.
Session Three here.
If you don’t recognize a reference, it may (or may not) be in a previous session, or at the updated campaign notes page.
Day 12
- Heroes spy on the enemy encampments on Neblin’s Ridge. There is a camp at a mine entrance at the base of the mesa, and on top an outpost with a tower and a wind sock, and a couple of miles away a telegraph hut with a wire trailing off to the East. There are multiple species present among the gang running the camps, including seprent-folk.
- Using ask the wind their name, PCs determine the following:
- A Large serpentfolk (with a snake lower body) wearing onyx armor is Aakath-ka (naga form). He is a Monstrous humanoid, venomous, spell caster
- The human who seems to be a foreman is – Boston Bob (bowler hat)
- No special powers, has a price on his head ($200)
- Busted during the war for smuggling refugees out of cities on military trains for money
- The PCs form the following plan
- The human mechanic makes a timed cutter box to go off an hour before dawn, to be placed on the telegraph wires
- Human soldier watches the camp for the day
- Fenrin operative flies around to check the telegraph (using DaVinci wings), plants the cutter, looks for a way up, and checks the outpost
- Centaur paladin keeps our camp safe, secure, and secret
- When the cutter goes off, we immediately attack the outpost up on the mesa
- Then, we attack the camp at the mineshaft at the base of the mesa within the hour
- Recon
- The fenrin operative finds a switchback good when it’s dry – will take 3 hours to get from there to the outpost
- Set the cutter on a particularly difficult place to repair on the wire
- Spot 3-4 criminals in the outpost watching the Western skies (the direction of the Circle Axe) – packing pistols
- There is a manticore nest next to the house and a platformed tower with a crane and a windsock. Think this may be Gaotma‘s base of operations, and his minions don’t know he’s dead yet–just late.
- The human soldier spends a day observing and notes
- Sverfeblin come out of the mine, escourted by some humans and a snakefolk, and pulling a sledge. One of the sverfneblin appears to be in charge of them – has questions for Boston Bob, isn;t happy with the answers
- Some kind of strange questioning going on – sverfneblin taken to a blackout tend and peered at from outside (are the gang member checking the deep gnomes for some radiation glow?)
- There is an underground storage, with a trap door in the camp, and boxes from the sled (which seem to be very heavy) are lowered into it.
- The rowdies who came out of the mine undergo some kind of procedure in a tent that takes 30 minutes
- They come out rubbing their faces and somewhat cleaner
- Different rowdies escort the sverfneblin back into the mine.
Day 13
The attack on the Outpost on top of the mesa takes too long and is too noisy, because half the player’s skill and attack rolls were 1 or 2. Even so, manage to defeat all the rowdies, including one dressed in red who apparently could cast spells, but only when accessing his own blood.
LOOT: Sawed off shotgun; 3 bowie knives; cultist wavy dagger; emblem (of a twisted barbed wire, held by pliers, blood drops coming off the barbs, similar in style to the poison emblems fund earlier); $50; piece of paper from a writing desk
Soldier/mystic talks to the dead. One says: “Dark days are coming, mortals will not survive, ascension is the only option”
The letter was as folows:
I understand your doubts and concerns, but I assure you this venture is worth the risk. Allow me to address your concerns individually.
The Daemon Darklings are mortals best route to gain the powers needed to protect ourselves against the outer powers. Of the Six Dread Fates that have proven able to empower a Darkling, Venom seems most within my reach now that I have accessed the alchemical process of the Aresian War Clouds. That will not be enough, of course. I’ll need a Genus Foci, a Concept of Thought, to draw the lingering spirit of the Comte de Adalgiso back to the Material Plane.
The cost of such an operation will not be insignificant. But with the promise of unlocking the ability of Ascension, and the Theosophic formula to prove it possible? I believe I will be able to procure the needed patrons.
What I lack is the martial backing to ensure our patrons remain our allies rather than our masters. With backers from the Material world, I could perhaps just hire the needed defenders. But against the Scale of Aakath, I have no doubt more… experienced warriors will be needed to protect our interests. My belief is that your contacts, especially Gaotema and his band, will allow us to deal on equal footing.
And yes, old friend, there will be money in it well before we make our fel godlings. I have already received interest from numerous individuals of means, and am sure
This letter was handed to players as a prop, crumpled and stained. Also a few letters had a tiny drop of gold ink in them. The players noticed, and wrote out the gold-flecked letters to discover the spelled )-B-E-Y. With this information, they release the letter had a secret magic message OBEY that compelled the addressee.
Then, the PCs attacked the camp in front of the mine shaft at the base of the mesa.
And discover the Chimera Kid is there, even though they never noticed him in their recon.
- The human solider opens by tossing sticks of dynamite into the tent area, taking out number ruffians.
- Akatha-ka casts spells
- Another red-clad cultists that uses blood magic, but has a neat wire on his wrist he can pull to just shed 1 drop of blood for each spell.
- The Chimera Kid engages the Centaur Paladin, with ram’s head hammer, poison pistol, and fire pistol. He severely damages her, and she him, but then he flies away to engage other targets with his own DaVinci wings, and he drops.
- Akatha-ka targets the fenrin operative with a psychic thrust attack – hate
- The operative fenrin focuses on Akatha-ka with her awareness – she is able to see through his blur
- The human mechanic and her dron Pinion use two sticks of dynomite to take out ruffians in a rifle position, then hold a spot in the middle of the camp for the rest of the conflict. She is poisoned by the Chimera Kid’s pistol as he flies by, though the centaur paladin’s lay on hands later fixes that.
- The centaur paladin turns out Akatha-ka with her smite… and he is of the dragon type. He has significant DR, but the smite ignores it, and the centaur paladin takes him out, then takes out Boston Bob.
- The human solider, rifle in hand, manages to take out the flying Chimera Kid
Aftermath:
- There is an irradiated mutant plant behind a bulwark
- It was growing out of Sverfeblin skull
- Dug it up from a grave
- PCs wonder why did the gang kept it? But decide to destroy it and the skull) with fire.
- The soldier/mystic uses Grave Words on many of the bodies. The Chimera Kid’s corpse says – “You can’t confuse other worlds with other planes or you’re gonna have a bad time”
- Within the storage under the trap door are twelve ammo boxes – all hooked together like it’s gonna be lifted all at once
- They are all locked – no keys on any of these bodies
- The human mechanic picks one open
- Inside are lumps of unrefined green iron ore – it glows. And gets on her skin through her gloves. She has to clean her hands thoroughly to stop having glowing specks.
LOOT: Six miner hats (butane lights on them)
The PCs choose to pause here, recuperate, then go into the mine itself.
XPs: 2400
Bringing the PCs to 14,400 (15,000 to 6th)
Thanks to Our Sponsor!
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Lands of Theia 5e, Pathfinder 1e, Pathfinder 2e
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The “Damn” Manticore of Really Wild West (in Starfinder)
In yesterday’s session notes for my third Really Wild West Game, I mentioned the main villain was a modified manticore. I took the base stats from Legendary game’s excellent Alien Bestiary (name mentioned here with special permission from LG), and made some changes.
Some of those changes are stylistic. I wanted a scorpion-tailed manticore, rather than a spike-flinging tail. But some of the changes (higher will saves, flexible tail, flyby attack, advanced weaponry) are specifically designed to make it a more dangerous foe.
Essentially, I wanted a CR 7 threat to be an epic encounter for the five 5th level heroes, but I didn’t want to use a CR 7 monster. In Starfinder, the math is so tight, fighting something that is 2 CRs above you can be extremely frustraintg, ebcause it never misses, and you rarely hit. Using two CR 5 monsters as a CR 7 encounter works great, but here I experimented with boosting the combat effectiveness of a foe without boosting their HP, AC, attack values, and so on. I list this as CR 6 +1; it’s CR 7 for all purposes except it’s array.
Then at the end I list my GM notes on two of the bits of treasure Gaotema had. They helped tell this specific monster’s story — an Ottoman Turk manticore who has been around since the 1700s, and fought for the Confederates in the US Civil War, then turned mercenary and gang leader after the South lost.
GAOTEMA, The “Damn” MANTICORE
Manticore CR 6+1
Init +2; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision; Perception +13
DEFENSE HP 95
EAC 18; KAC 20
Fort +10, Ref +10, Will +10
OFFENSE
Speed 40 ft., fly 60 ft. (Ex, average)
Melee claw +16 (1d8+11 S) or stinger +16 (1d8+11 P, Fort DC 17)
Ranged grenade launcher +14 (“Puckle Gin,” See below)
Space 10 ft.; Reach 5 ft. (10 ft. with stinger)
Offensive Abilities Flexible Tail (Threaten foes in reach even if they have cover)
STATISTICS
Str +5, Dex +2, Con +3, Int –1, Wis +0, Cha +0
Skills Survival +18 (+22 when tracking)
Feats Flyby Attack (as PF1), Mobility, Spring Attack
Languages Common, Ottoman Turkish
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Doomstone-Enhanced Poison – Uses track of target’s highest ability score. End State is Venom-Wight. DC 17 (7 points of damage)
Each state takes twice as long as the one before it
Immediate/1 round – Save or Weakened
2 rounds – Save or Impaired
4 rounds – Save or Staggered
8 Rounds – Save or Immobile
16 rounds – Save or Venom-Wight
Puckle Gun
2280 cr. 60 ft. 8 grenades 5 bulk Analog, Expiramental
Grenades
Grey Smoke – Fortitude saving throw each round (DC = 13 + 1 per previous check) or spend that round choking and coughing; he can do nothing else. A character who chokes for 2 consecutive rounds takes 1d6 nonlethal damage. Concealment.
Silver Smoke – DC 14, or forget details of what you saw without confirmation afterward.
Black Smoke – As smoke + tail venom, above
Red Shell – 5d6 fire, half damage to targets within 20 feet (Ref negates)
Experimental — If damaged, roll d20 on the mishap chart, below.
1-5: Backfire, user takes 1d6 fire damage each time it fires.
6-10: Takes a full round action to attack.
11-15: Can’t load a new round without a DC 17 Engineering check
16-20: Inaccurate. Roll scatter for every attack.
Artilleryman’s Hat – Constant – Reduce effect of miss change from smoke/fog/vapor-base concealment by half, and it is never total concealment.
Standard Action – Grant 1 hour of immunity to inhaled smoke/fog/vapor effects. 1/day.
“A battered hat with many cuts and scrapes, there is a Confederate artillery pin stuck on top of a faded Union artillery patch.”
Compression Gear Harness
Standard to activate, 1/day, for 1 hour +4 to bulk carrying capacity, +2 damage with melee attacks
2 bulk, 5k credits, item level 5, must be custom fit with Engineering check
PATREON
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Owen K.C. Stephens 