Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/...uded_Valley/15

This was a short session, and the final session of the campaign. We're not going to stop playing, but we are going to restart with new characters in a better developed campaign world in a few weeks. The current characters have gotten too powerful and we're looking to get back to something reasonable.

There isn't a lot to say about this session. The monsters were down to 2 bosses, both badly wounded and in poor positions, against 2 nearly unwounded delvers and a raging minotaur berserker of doom! Clever movement on the delvers part preventing the monsters from doing much, and then the monsters died. The berserker chased one of his allies around for a while, but a determined Scout can avoid melee attacks for a few rounds, especially if he has Luck. Then the wizard cast Daze on the berserker.

We weren't quite sure if a Daze would stop a berserker, but nothing in the Berserk disadvantage implied that it wouldn't.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Good luck.

So, the characters have gotten too powerful in about 50 game sessions (although you didn't give CPs at the end of each game session but for each successful delve), starting more or less from 250 points character values.

In your campaign, do you find this result as due to the ("high") 250 cp starting point? Do you have in mind some way to prevent the characters from growing too powerful and reproducing thus the same current situation in about the same number of dungeon delves?

... maybe starting the characters from 150 points? (not really serious here in this last question, but interested in the subject)

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Congratulations to the players.

No, I'm not sarcastic.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

The biggest difficulty was the rise in skill levels, coupled with extremely high quality gear. At the end, Berkun had Bow-20 and was using a Balanced Composite Bow with with Weapon Bond and Accuracy +1 and Armor-Piercing (AD2) enchantments, plus cornucopia quivers of impaling, piercing, and cutting arrows. He had an effective skill of 21 when he did a Move and Attack, or 25 on a straight attack. Magic in general was a problem.

A lot of the fault was the GMs, for handing out all these magical items. I also structured some adventures poorly, so the PCs were fighting relatively weak opposition. They also didn't have enough non-combat challenges, so it was easy and safe to throw all their earned CP into a few combat skills.

The new campaign involves a lot more exploring, so hopefully secondary skills will be much more important. There will be fewer magic items, and magic items can't be purchased. Patches of low and no-mana areas will be more prevalent, limiting wizards and making it more difficult for non-wizards to get reliably buffed by wizards. I hope to use a lot more non-humanoid foes, though we're also changing some rules to make animal attackers more viable.

I think reducing the characters to 150 points - while it would certainly reduce the power creep - would also make the characters nearly unplayable. Playing a "knight" with ST13, DX12, HT12, Shield-14 and Broadsword-14 is not really all that much fun in my experience. You're not that much better than a ST11, DX10, HT10, Axe-12 Shield-12 goblin or orc.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Interesting answer, Mark. I agree diversifying challenges and handling powerful items more scarcely can work -for mentioning only a few of the before mentioned ideas.

Please, keep updating the Westmarch Saga Wiki.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New game session 0:
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_0-0

We've restarted the campaign with a lot more exploration and all new characters. This was just a short combat test session to give everyone a chance to see if there were any problems with their character builds.

No one had problems, though Harald noted that Marik is fairly weak on defense and needs to either be rebuilt or stay the heck away from his enemies.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

If PCs are loaded to the hilt with magic weapons they will attract thieves. These guys may pose as guides, traveling merchants, people at taverns and may also work in concert with brawlers who distract the PCs with violence while the thieves sneak up from behind, pilfering their magic item stash. Thieves can also shadow the PCs when they enter the dungeon as they are too cowardly to venture into the dungeon by themselves but will do so if the PCs are doing the hard part of dungeon clearing. The thieves could wait until the PCs are weakened and then strike from behind. Thieves could also join the party as men at arms or even fellow adventurers.

As far as non combat skills in DF, towns become more important. Also faeries are very useful. Maybe some faerie elves want to challenge their mortal elf counterparts to an archery contest or to a drinking contest. Or maybe they need help finding one of their faerie horses and if the PCs help track it down then they may have some information on some clue to the dungeon. Faeries are really perfect for these kinds of encounters because they like to give omens of the future or give hints at solving puzzles (or they may also like to confound the PCs too) Faerie hags and crones can give clues or prophesies too. Little folk can be nuissances or even side adventures.

Here is an idea, the PCs see a black wolf in a rocky ravine. The black wolf is trying to jump out but can't quite make it. If the PCs do nothing then the black wolf will eventually free itself then stare at the PCs and then run off into the forest. If the PCs prevent the black wolf from escaping they will need to kill it and once the black wolf is killed then it will vanish. This could be a faerie allegory where there is a demon or Elder Thing bound into the dungeon and if the black wolf gets free then maybe one of the bindings keeping the demon bound is broken, possibly by the magic fading or maybe another adventuring party has broken a binding. If the PCs defeat the black wolf then the demon keeps all of his bindings and has less power in the dungeon. So in this way the faeries can allow the PCs to alter their future by their actions.

Other ideas include dead animals found on the path to the dungeon. How they are killed can give insight into the nature of the dungeon. By using a religious ritual, or faerie lore or even a divination spell. Faeries are some of the best ways to have non combat skill use on the way to the dungeon becase they are not really a part of the mortal world but they have access to the secrets of it, especially the dungeons where they learn about what is inside of them. Faeries really don't care or interfere with what goes on in the dungeon either, they are just spectators who enjoy seeing what happens and if they like the party them they will give some help, if they don't they will not help and if they are malicious they will lie so as to harm the party.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I might have missed it, but I didn't see the quick character intros for the new characters: e.g.,

Firefly (Emily/Bruno): Pixie - Wizard
Marik (Harold): ? - Thief?
Belturne (Nate): ? - ?
Kopfen (?): ? - ?
Wolfgang(?): ? - Knight?
Suede(?): ? - ?

Any plans to have such a writeup?
-Dan

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Delvers

Bruno has a pixie wizard, Kevin has a mountain elf scout, Ted has a gargoyle knight, Nathan has a dwarf cleric, Joel has a minotaur martial artist*, Hari should have a catfolk swashbuckler.

The GM has 25 monsters to write up in the next few days. Ick.

* A surprisingly effective build, with 4 points of DR (Tough Skin).

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New campaign session 1
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-1

The delvers head out for glory! adventure1 riches! ... and stop outside the Inn door to argue about the very important question of what to call themselves. Then they walk for a few hours, find a tavern, and half the band stops for a drink, while one of the others decides to supplement his rations by stealing a sheep. I'm not really sure what's up with that.

Overall, this session was an acceptable but somewhat rocky start, mostly due to the GM's inability to create balanced encounters. Both the "Ill Omens" and the "Rock Borer holes in the road" encounters were deemed slightly unfair. I was willing to modify them on the fly to make them more equitable, and most people seemed happy that their secondary and tertiary skills were going to useful. But the initial designs were a bit harsh.

Next week, I think I'm going to simply describe the situation, and ask the PCs for suggestions on appropriate skills. I ran an Action! game that way, and it worked much better.

The one combat encounter was pretty much a gimme, but I don't think anyone minded and it really was luck of the dice that it came out that way. Had there been more giant eagles... no one would have been in any real danger, but there might have been a bit more excitement.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

We got to establish early in the campaign and in a noncritical incident that two of the PCs are fuzzy bunny touchers with Sense of Duty: Nature (AKA "Druid wannabes" in the opinion of some of the other PCs). This can be just as important as killing stuff!

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

And even earlier that several members of the campaign are goody-two-shoes with some level of Honest.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New campaign session 2
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-2

Our band of intrepid delvers gets distracted from their plan to find Obsidian Lake by something shiny - I mean by a mysterious, concealed pathway in a cliff wall. So they go merrily traipsing into the wilderness.

They also found their first big mystery: a wagon, wrecked at the bottom of a cliff, even though the local mountains are completely impassable to wheeled vehicles. They figured some of it out, though.

This was entirely a non-combat session, but next session starts with a possible fight against a bunch of goblins, so that's something. The timing was convenient because having the encounter start to develop at the very end of the game gives me a week to prepare the map and everything.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New campaign session 3
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-3

The band of delvers got into an engagement with a bunch of goblins supported by a pair of Shock Lizards and two disease ridden Giant Eagles. The lizards can throw lightning bolts with impressive accuracy.

The delvers spread out, waiting for the goblins to arrive. Wolfgang flew into the air to scout (and also because Wolfgang's player was absent and I didn't feel like running him myself) and got attacked by semi-visible Elder Things.

The goblins opened their assault with crossbow and lightning bolts at Ghazeb, wearing him down. He finally retreated into the woods to break line of sight and avoid their massive aiming bonuses. The other delvers also fell back, except for Marik who shot the goblin leader and then began playing lethal tag with 3 others.

The giant eagles came in as reinforcements. One grabbed Thasos, and the two wrestled for several seconds before Thasos managed a takedown and thus broke free. The other grabbed Firefly (the pixie), but she managed to break free (rolling a 4 on her ST check versus a failed check from the eagle!). Beltarne ran around, trying to decide who to reinforce.

At the end of the session, two goblins were fighting Ghazeb and holding their own. Thasos was still dealing with the giant eagle and diseased himself. Two goblin crossbowmen were advancing on Marik, and the Shock Lizards were closing on Beltarne and Firefly and throwing long-range bolts at Marik. Marik had killed two goblins and was running around, trying to avoid being axed by the other two.

Overall, this was a pretty smooth session. The goblins had a good ambush, but the delvers were pulling through due to skill and luck. There were rule questions, but nothing we couldn't figure out immediately.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Things I Learned This Week:

Spell maintenance sucks.
Buy more Energy Reserve.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Bruno is right: spell-casters are much more limited when every spell has a fatigue cost. I'm pretty pleased with it. (We have a house rule: no reduction in energy cost for high skill, but many spells have a lower energy cost than they do in standard GURPS).

The wildly varying mana levels make up for it somewhat, but they hurt as much as they help.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New campaign session 3
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-4

The delvers continued their fight with the goblins to a painful victory.

Wolfgang the gargoyle returned, and quickly dispatched both crossbowmen. Thasos and Ghazeb spent a couple of seconds annihilating their enemies and then spent the rest of the combat running north. Firefly played tag with the shock lizards until Wolfgang reinforced her, while Beltarne ran north to support Marik. He took a lightning bolt in the back for his trouble but recovered.

The giant eagle that had been fighting Firefly flew off to help engage Marik. Marik killed another goblin but then took a ST17 axe to the chest and dropped. The giant eagle then started eating his face. Beltarne came up and distracted the goblin. In a moment of awesome, the goblin made a Committed (Determined) Rapid Strike, which Beltarne countered with a Commmad spell: "Drop it!". Instead of brutally carving the dwarf to pieces, the goblin swung his fist at Beltarne's nose twice. The giant eagle (actually an Divine Servitor of Disease) then released a disease cloud, doing 3 damage to Firefly (nearly killing her!) and just enough damage to drop the wounded goblin. Beltarne then carved up the eagle before it could flee.

The delvers found some general loot and a cryptic map:
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/File:GoblinMap.png
which they are trying to decipher.

All in all, this was a slightly longer fight than I would have liked, but a nicely tough one. Dropping 2 of the PCs into negatives demonstrated the potential lethality of the West March nicely. Both sides had pretty iffy tactics: the PCs were too spread out to reinforce each other properly, and too many of the goblins spent too much time making ineffectual ranged attacks against Firefly.

Huh. Looking over my notes, the shock lizards are supposed to a 1d lightning aura that might have affected Wolfgang. Not that big a deal in the grand scheme of things, though.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

No update this week? I need my fix!

(I've very much been enjoying reading the session logs)

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

This week's game was called on account of Canadian Thanksgiving.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Interesting game prop.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Apparently I like drawing confusing, ill-defined maps more than the group likes deciphering them.

This bodes poorly for the group's long term ability to uncover the mysteries of the West March.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

We're just trying to keep our priorities (and our stomachs) straight; we've got limited resources out here (even with the food we found), so we sort of want to feel as if we're sticking with the plan.

Even when we aren't.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

What plan? My aren't you the optimist. :-)

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New campaign session 5
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-5

Play resumes! The delvers walk back down the pass and find a mysterious cave with smoke coming out of chimneys behind it. They enter the cave, hear voices coming from a passageway, and almost avoid the tripwires on the trap. But Firefly blunders into the wires, and then bravely intercepts several of the tumbling glass vials with her body.

Apparently its bad for pixies to get hit with Oozing Doom and Demon's Brew poison at the same time.

The delvers them turned the corner and engaged with a half dozen goblins backed up by shock lizards. Wolfgang got zapped a bunch while killing goblins, supported by Thasos. Beltarne got attacked by a Divine Servitor in the form of an earth elemental, which he dispelled. Beltarne is getting off the best spell effects. The session ended with the delvers still fighting the goblins, pushing them back quite successfully.


We didn't have too many rules questions, except for "what happens when you dispel a Divine Servitor?" We ruled that it could be dispelled and summoned again later. Technically, I suppose he would have had to Banish it, but I was okay with treating it as summoned Earth elemental.


Overall, this wasn't too hard a session. The poison lichen encounter didn't cause any rules complaints, and while the trap was deadly, the delvers ALMOST managed to avoid it. Most of them weren't even too badly hurt by it.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

This weeks session is an excellent example of how 2 HP is a horrible painful death just waiting for you :D

Mark was very generous and let an emergency heal land to drag Firefly back from -6xHP and "stabilize" her at mortally wounded, which was really more than I expected...

So now she's K.O.'d and stuffed in a pocket :D

EDIT: Oh, and critical failures really can happen at the worst possible moment to the worst possible person :D

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Well, in all fairness, I think both Thasos and Firefly critically failed the Perception roll to notice the tripwire, and everyone was crowding around Marik. I probably would have been more generous about it if only Thasos or Firefly critically failed.

Good trap though, and it even has story significance that the survivors may figure out shortly/eventually.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

What immediately sprang to mind was "Where the heck did goblins get all the good alchemical stuff?"

Actually, what immediately sprang to mind was "OW MY SPLEEN" followed by "I'm being killed by the treasure! WOE!"

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Upon further analysis of divine servitors, I don't think dispelling should have worked, but Turning might have. Assuming the divine servitors are using the holy might PM, there's nothing in there about anti-powers or a source that you can be cut off from. It's just the pact stuff. Since it's not magic, Dispel Magic shouldn't have worked.

Is that right though? Neither the DF description nor the Divine description in powers mentions sanctity levels, which seems like the kind of thing that would need to be incorperated into the power modifier.

I'm really looking forward to seeing if we can continue the criitfail trend with Stop Bleeding next session. Not that I want to lose Firefly, but fountains of gore are fun for the whole family.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Wow, and Lol.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

That's really weird. I thought that Sanctity would be covered by the Power Modifier discount on the Ally, but it's just a Pact limitation as you pointed out.

Dispel Magic works on all sorts of magic. Divine Servitors are probably magic... but it may be one of those "direct (though minor) manifestations of godhood" things that Kromm likes. Hmmm.

Beltarne has Turning, so he could have just shoved the thing away at any time. Maybe we should just treat it as a really powerful turning effect, that dispersed the creature for a limited period of time but did not actually Dispel it?

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Well, I definitely don't think I should get abilities I haven't paid for. If you want to maintain that the creature is gone bye-bye, perhaps a critical success on the Will roll for turning disperses the target creature until the next sunset/sunrise? Or perhaps a critical failure on the part of the target, so that I'm less likely to catch a lucky break and tell Cthulhu to take a hike.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Critical failure on the target's Will roll disperses it/sends it fleeing until dawn seems like a reasonable concept to me.

Of course, since Beltarne failed his Theology roll to identify the critter, he doesn't quite know that it's something other than just an Earth elemental and he probably does think he dispersed it.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Alternately it may have been an enslaved earth elemental and the dispel clobbered the control spell. Then it just decided to leave and go do earth elemental things in an odd way :)

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I figure I can put together the sigils on the eagles, goblin, and walking pile of rock without a skill roll.

I think we're trying to establish what happens with divine servitors, not keep continuity.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I'm pretty sure that when Beltarne has a minute to think about it, he'll put it all together and say "hey, that was a Divine Servitor! Spooky!" At the moment he was in - worried about Firefly, unsuccessfully dodging the binding attack, and trying to keep his spell going - he may have just thought "it's an earth elemental, I'll dispel it" and only later realized that he really needed to Banish it.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

It all depends on whether the divine servitor was summoned using the clerical version of Planar Summons (making it a spell that uses ambient holy energies rather than a direct act of the gods, and therefore subject to counterspells and sanctity levels) or was the Ally of someone with divine power (making it a "borrowed cosmic ability" that isn't subject to counterspells or sanctity levels, provided that you remain on good terms with the deity doing the lending). The former would be subject to Dispel Magic . . . well, to Banish, but Dispel Magic seems fine for a minor critter, and both are PI 4 spells. The latter would not be. Note that Spell vs. Spell and Spell vs. Power (DF 1, p. 20) are pretty clear on this difference.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

This particular element was meant to be an Allied Divine Servitor. Allied Divine Servitors are generally either "Servitors of Good" and therefore explicitly subject to Banish (DF5 p12) or else take the Unholy Lens and become Demons and therefore explicitly subject to Banish (DF2 p21). On the off chance it were just an Elemental, it'd still be subject to Banish (DF2 p21 again).

So no matter what it is, it'd be subject to Banish as an extraplanar critter that isn't an Elder Thing.

However, since it's a "borrowed cosmic ability" it isn't subject to counterspells (other than Banish), so the Dispel shouldn't have worked on it. Bad call on my part.

On the other hand, Beltarne certainly could have just Turned the silly thing, especially the way it blew the Will roll to resist, and he had plenty of time to try. So we can treat it as Turned for the next 1d seconds, unless Beltarne Concentrates longer to keep holding it off. Since he totally blew his Theology roll to understand the implications of what the heck was going on - and since Firefly can't make a Thaumatology roll to advise him - I'm ruling that Beltarne thinks he dispersed it. The neat description of it blowing apart was just a special effect of the Turning.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 6
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-6

Bruno and I have been revising the bard spell list to give them their own colleges (Comedy, Drama, History, and Tragedy) with their own prerequisites. Since her character was mortally wounded in the last session, she worked up a gnome bard who'd been caught the goblins and was trying to escape while they were distracted.

This session was a large, dynamic fight. It was divided into three parts: the gnome bard against a pair of goblins, the primary fighters against a goblin Knight, and Marik and Beltarne against the returned earth elemental. The goblin knight used careful Retreats, blocks, and parries to hold against 3 foes for quite some time while slowly getting his HP whittled down. The PCs were quite frustrated.

The bard finally stunned both her foes and stabbed them in the back at about the same time that the fighters overran the goblin knight. Thasos and Beltarne then briefly pinned the elemental with a Turning effect and the kusari, but Thasos fell unconscious from previous wounds. The elemental then permeated the floor and fled.

The PCs were never in a whole lot of danger, but it seemed like a tense session from the GM perspective. No weird rules queries this time.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 7
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-7

This session was spent dealing with the aftermath of the combat in the last two sessions. The delvers did some desultory searching, successfully interrogated a surviving goblin, and were stymied by a mysterious door. They have some theories about that.

At the end of the session, the delvers decided to explore the rest of the cave complex. At the very end of the session, they were attacked by whatever was lurking in the caves.

I had to work late tonight, so this was a fairly short session without a lot of combat. Everyone seemed a bit distracted, so that was probably for the best.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Things I learned today:
Forgetfulness is your key to getting a second chance when interrogating a goblin.
I'm having quite a bit of fun playing a bard. I'm sort of meh at everything!

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 7
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-8

The delvers encounter an elder thing at the bottom of the cave! This was a tense but not actually difficult fight. The biggest problem was when Thasos got hit with a faceful of poison, screamed in pain, and went Berserk. Normally, he can control his temper, but with Severe Pain giving a -4 to his self-control rolls, there was a real chance he was going to rampage through the other delvers after the fight. Fortunately, with both Minnizig and Beltarne having access to the Command spell, they were able to mystically force him to control his temper until he managed to regain his temper.

That night, Wolfgang misidentified a roaming cave bear as a demon that was immune to metal weapons. He proceeded to drive it off by hitting it with his shield while Marik watched but didn't intervene (Marik's player now hates Sense of Duty: Nature).

The next morning the delvers decided to head south to deal with whatever weirdo was organizing these goblins against them. On the march, they encountered even more of the goblins!


This session went smoothly. The delvers were lucky in that their foes had some bad rolls, but there were plenty of critical failures on monster identification rolls with hilarious and strange results. Everyone seemed to have a good time.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 9
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-9

The goblins crouched behind their shields and started to try to parley, but Marik immediately opening fire, killing one. Minnizig and Beltarne headed for cover, while Thasos moved west to flank the goblins. The survivng goblins headed forward while their shocker lizards zapped lightning at Marik. He dodged and shot goblin archers, then eventually launched arrows at the lizards. Ghazeb and Wolfgang killed several goblins, but one brute managed to close with Beltarne who met him at the run. The goblin overran Beltarne and cut him down with two quick axe blows. Wolfgang and Marik moved to reinforce, eventually dropping the goblin with a pair of arrows to the heart.

The delvers quickly killed the surviving but wounded goblins, looted the bodies, healed Beltarne, and continued on their way.

That night, while Thasos was on watch, the earth elemental from the cave appeared in the camp with an offer of parley from the Master.


Marik's player wanted to know how many he times he had to be attacked by shocker lizards, obviously in the service of the goblins, before he got over his Sense of Duty to Nature and could attack them preemptively. My feeling was that he would never make that leap but I said I was open to arguments from the forums.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

My argument is largely this: Once an animal has been domesticated and trained to kill things for people on command, it's stopped being 'nature' and started being 'the work of foul civilized folk'. This applies equally to human guard dogs, orcish dire wolf mounts, or goblin shocker lizards, but wouldn't apply to any of the above found on their own. There are a couple of other good reasons that Marik should grow a clue, but that's the really big one for me.

Ultimately it's not that big a deal, but I'm likely going to buy off the damned SoD anyway.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

We know it's truly a Disadvantage when the player wants to buy it off :D

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I'm going to side with Harald on this one. Having a domesticated beast that is trained to attack its masters enemies in not "natural" and therefore I'd rule that Marik can ignore SOD Nature in the case of the shock lizards, unless he has hard evidence that this lizard in question is not under control of the golbins. This case is clearly different than the infamious flesh-eating apes incident in the old westmarch campaign where they were clearly doing what nature reared them to do.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Things I learned this session:

The combat buffer can totally take partial credit for the awesome things your buffee does once buffed. But make sure to buff someone who manages to make it to the fight before everything ends, or you won't get ANY credit :D

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Heh. I sometimes think that part of the reason that Wolfgang and Marik are so comparatively effective is because they just go over and do stuff: hiding behind trees and running back and forth between two targets doesn't result in dead foes and treasure.


As far as Marik goes, the way I see it, it's not that he needs to "get wise" to the threat. He suspects the shock lizards are going to turn on him and attack, but he cares about them anyway. He feels obliged to try to talk them down/ignore them, much like a cop would try to talk down an ornery drunk even if the cop suspects that a taser is going to have to be used in the end.

I'd think that for someone with SoD: Nature, trained guard dogs are somewhat akin to how Western militaries view child soldiers: potential threats that are in themselves victims. You'll attack to defend yourself, but you don't want start anything if there's another way.

I suppose I could institute some kind of self-control roll, starting at 3- to engage in pre-emptive violence against critters and going up by 3 if the critter is a dire animal or trained.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I can agree with this completely, actually... and it's pretty clear that Marik cares more about animals (SoD: Nature) than he does about his companions (Loner, no SoD, WHY DIDN'T YOU BRING FOOD?)

So, objections withdrawn.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 10
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-10

We had to end last week's session after an hour or so of play, so I'm combining it with tonight's session.

At the end of the 9th session, the earth elemental had just entered the delvers' camp, proposing a parley. After some difficulty, both sides reached agreeable terms for the discussion: shouting at each other from 30 yards away. Which honestly would the way I'd handle negotiating with heavily armed, homicidal maniacs.

The elemental's master turned out to have a severe hatred of some harpies that lived nearby, and he sorta convinced the delvers to go hunt the harpies. So their tentative plans to track down the elemental's master turned into the great harpy hunt, and then headed around the lake to get to the harpies. This is about the fourth change of direction and one of the ones I least anticipated.

Fortunately, I was prepared enough to know what they might encounter in the woods, and it was the work of but a few minutes to prepare an encounter against giant spiders. The spiders are strong, but it doesn't look like they are strong enough to handle the delvers on 1:1 odds.

Next week, the delvers are most likely going to get an unpleasant surprise. And meet some harpies, too.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 11
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-11

I did prep work for this game on Sunday night - rolling encounters on the delver's expected path, making sure I had monster stats, and stuff like that - and immediately sent out a message apologizing to the players.

The delvers finished off the last of the spiders, ransacked the bodies for raw giant spider silk, and camped over night. They had an uneventful night and started walking down the peninsula toward the harpies... when they were suddenly transported 5 miles due west by the random and erratic faerie gates that are endemic to the West March.

The delvers quickly surveyed their situation, and realized they were just above the druidic circle that they believed was Kalless' base. Not really feeling up to walking all the way around the lake again, they headed down to scout. They saw a mysterious glowing white dome and fortified lodgings for 30-50 goblins. There was an extended discussion about the virtues of curiosity, discretion, and valor, and then everyone turned due east and started walking around the lake again. Apparently tangling with goblins at 7:1 odds against was not part of the game plan!

On their way back around the lake, they spotted several snakes floating just above a swamp. Given that they were already avoiding that swamp, they just avoided in harder. They continued around the lake, made camp, and got attacked by floating snakes. It turns out these are some kind of weird faerie snakes, and they can make people levitate.

We only played the first 3 rounds of the battle, but things are not going well for the delvers. Everyone but Minnizig and Thasos has been hit by levitation spells. Wolfgang is mostly ignoring it, being a native flyer, but it's affecting his aim. Minnizig is desperately trying to keep Ghazeb on the ground, and Thasos has wrapped his chain around Beltarne in hopes of pulling everyone back to earth. He's also broken his vow of silence to shout a warning and a plan, with potentially dire consequences. Marik is now high enough that killing the snake levitating him would be painful, even with the weak and friendly DF falling damage table.


One question that came up and that I didn't have the time to look up the answer to is what happens to creatures that need to Concentrate to move something with a spell but not maintain it if they are attacked? How does the turn sequence work with that? If one of the snakes takes a Concentrate maneuver on its Turn 2, and is damaged before the start of Turn 3, does that mean it can't take a Concentrate maneuver on its Turn 3 without making the Will-3 roll?

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I'd think their concentrate would work just like it does for a mage for a one second spell or for spells that can stay on but need a concentrate maneuver to change. They can only be interrupted by a wait since it's a one second concentrate and that would also be the only time they'd have to make will roll to successfully concentrate. They have to use their whole turn to move people, can't move much themselves but it doesn't hurt their defenses.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaigns Session 12, 13
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-12
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-13

The Christmas holidays ate the game for a while, but we came roaring back last night.

Over two sessions, the delvers defeated the floating snakes, fed a bear, and finally made it to their current destination: the island of the harpies. They briefly negotiated with the harpies, before the hungry monsters ineffectually tried to betray them. Basically, about half of the harpies went after Marik, hoping to eat him while he was away from the others, but Wolfgang spotted them and intervened. Marik + Wolfgang seem to be capable of taking 5 harpies in a more or less fair fight, while the other four harpies are not quite a match for the remaining four delvers. Though it was certainly touch and go for a while and the harpies did a good job of delaying the fighting to get their Affliction spells off.

The delvers potentially picked up some useful information in these sessions, though as usual its cloaked in lies and confusion. Both sessions played out really well, without any head-scratchers as far as the rules went.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Lessons learned:

-Never use a knife when a bow will do.
-Never turn your back on an archer.
-Stop relying on 14s to succeed.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Singing and other such frivolities inevitably lead to battle?

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Never! Singing and other such frivoloties win the day!

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Maybe the lesson learned should have been "just because someone says they're Sidhe and can't lie is no reason to believe they're telling the truth."

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

And the other players wondered why I kept trying Detect Lies... I'm not very GOOD at it yet, so never rolled particularly well, but it's the principle of the thing.

No idea if they ARE Sidhe or not, but presuming they are, that actually REDUCES the likely hood that they're telling the truth about ANYTHING, IMO :D

Or perhaps I've been playing Changeling for too long.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

If only someone other than Firefly had Faerie Lore and could answer questions like "are harpies Sidhe" and "can the Sidhe lie".

I'm really amazed at how useful a category Faerie is, given that there aren't any examples of Faeries in DF2.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Session 14
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-14

The delvers finished off the harpies in good order. I almost managed to get Minnizig dropped from a great height (and almost as a bombing attack on Beltarne immediately after he'd taken an all-out action), but she managed to mind control the harpy into not dropping her. Too bad, it would have been funny as heck and actually might have been enough for the harpy to pull a Pyrrhic draw out of the situation. The harpies have musical influence skills, and while Wolfgang, Marik, Beltarne, and Minnizig generally combine to prevent those skills from coming into play by countersinging/spelling or chasing down singing harpies and beating them up, Ghazeb and Thasos have terrible ranged combat and bad mobility. Of course, Marik and Wolfgang would have shown up eventually and that would have been it for the last harpy.

The delvers also got their first taste of really good loot. No one made the Hidden Lore rolls necessary to know that harpy skins can be sold as Ornate Fine leather armor for $$$, but they did get the jewelry stash and a nice pair of holy dwarven traveling boots.

Later, they also came across a mysterious trail in the wood that they haven't identified. I expect there will be a lot of questions in town about what could make that, possibly people spending money to buy some useful books. This style of game is deliberately intended to make the hidden lore rolls more useful. It's ironic that Firefly got taken out so early, as she would have been quite helpful on some of this stuff.

We had another rules argument about whether Bloodlust allows a PC to partially disable an enemy and then move on to someone else. I'm being a mean dictatorial GM and saying that it requires lethal blows until the opponent falls over, and then bloody murder unless another threat is visibly more pressing. The PCs would prefer to be able to use better tactics, but then I'm not quite sure why its a Disadvantage in DF.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Damn it!

I think your reasoning is correct for DF, I just don't think it's broadly applicable to other genres. And I think most of the protests are due to greater familiarity with those other genres than GURPS DF.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I can't help but compare the point value with that for Berserk. It's just as bad a disadvantage, at least by value.

I think part of the confusion last night was some players misinterpreting the harpy as "down" as in "lying down limply and clearly out of the fight" as opposed to the actual case, being "not in the air and stunned", which is a very very different sort of "down".

Regarding Minnizig's brief career as a kinetic kill weapon, I was already pulling out my Emergency Backup Minotaur :D

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

So what's the final decision? Bloodlust is a "lock on target" disad that also requires you to use an extra turn stabbing/chopping/smashing your target after it's down? Under what circumstances can you switch to a new target without killing your initial one? If you're fighting a goblin and an ogre joins the fray, can you switch to the ogre as a greater threat since they're both trying to kill you? Or does that require a self-control roll?

I want an axe enchanted with Throw Spell. -1 per yard sucks.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

It's a judgment call, but I'm inclined to something like this:

a) If possible, you will strike killing blows. If killing blows are suboptimal because of armor issues, you can go for crippling blows against limbs.
b) If possible, you will finish off wounded/crippled foes before moving to deal with fresh ones.
c) If possible, you will finish off unconscious foes before moving a substantial difference to deal with fresh ones. If that means spending a couple of seconds murdering people instead of helping an ally... its a disadvantage.
d) If you're targeted by multiple foes, you can deal with active foes before insuring unconscious ones are dead.
e) If you're targeted by multiple foes, you can engage them in any order you like and can switch between them freely. You still need to resist to not follow-up on a substantially wounded foe.

So if Wolfgang is fighting a bunch of goblins, he needs to cut at each one's head if possible. If he stuns one, he'll strike at it again instead of dealing with another. If he drops one to the ground, he can ignore it as long as others are attacking him. If an ogre shows up while all this is happening, he can switch to fight the ogre. If the ogre is heavily armored, he can cut out its legs or whatever - but he'll want to finish it off immediately instead of dealing with the goblins if he manages to take out a leg. If he beats back all the goblins and the ogre, he'll launch a flurry of Rapid Strikes to cut off their heads before running over to help the other PCs who are struggling against other goblins.

It's an easy resistance roll, so I don't think this is a horrible interpretation.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

We have different interpretations of the disadvantage. The one-line summary is "You want to see your foes dead.", not "You want to see your foes dead to the exclusion of all else." As long as the character didn't stop fighting before satisfying his Bloodlust, I'd call it good. But it's not my game.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

These seem fine.

These two seem mutually contradictory, especially the last sentence on e. If I am allowed to deal with active foes before making sure of the unconscious ones, and can switch between them freely, why do you have to roll not to follow up on a substantially wounded foe? Do you mean you have to roll to not kill them once everyone is dealt with, or you have to roll to not kill them immediately when someone is still trying to stab you in the back?

Why the head? Is whacking them with an axe in the torso not considered a "killing blow"?

Again, how is this being able to switch targets freely?

It seems that you want Bloodlust to be a "must exploit any weakness" disad. Is that an accurate summary? So long as everyone is an equal threat to you, you can do whatever you want. But as soon as one enemy is disadvantaged, you have to press that disadvantage in an attempt to kill them even if there are other enemies that present a more immediate threat.

This seems fine.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Well, the point is that in a DF game murdering your enemies is less of a disadvantage than in a normal game. If Bloodlust and Beserk are to be the same point cost, the disadvantage for Bloodlust has to be upped.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

worth bearing in mind, that for helpless or unconscious foes the rules for instant death applies. No rolls needed, you just kill them.

So once they are down, you basically 'only' pay another round to make sure they stay down. That is, if your attention is not demanded by someone else engaging with you.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Not being able to sneak past a sentry or take prisoners seems like a decent disadvantage.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

If someone is still standing, they're still a threat. The guy who is stunned and standing is just as dangerous as the one who is swinging at you.

Torso is fine, but simply cutting off arms is not going to do it.


No, I think of it more as "wounded doesn't diminish threat" attitude. Just because you stun someone, doesn't mean that they won't stab you in a back in the second after they recover. They're just as much of an offensive threat as ever - they're just more vulnerable and so should be targeted first.

I'm not penalizing people for resisting disadvantages, so I don't think that starting with the extreme position and letting people roll the dice for control is too much.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

surely either disadvantage allows for sneaking past a sentry. You're not in combat and you're not fighting a foe (that you want to see dead).

I'd say the bloodlusty character would be inclined to see killing the sentry as the obvious tactical option, but in a situation where it is a tactical decision and not a heat of the moment thing, I don't see it coming in to play.

Now if that character also is impulsive....

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

If you're going that route, I would think you'd need to reprice all the advantages (mainly social ones) that are not as advantageous in a DF game as in a usual one as well.

Or else allow the character with fashion sense to mentally stun goblins at first glance with his dashing appearance.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

You'll notice many of the advantages and skills that don't see a whole lot of use in the genre explicitly gain utility in the DF PDFs, and some advantages and disadvantages are disallowed entirely if they don't have enough utility.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

Then why do you state that you can switch targets freely earlier if you have to roll to do so once you've whacked someone?

Just making sure Bloodlust isn't a "automatic hit location penalty" disad.

Sure, but if you have a choice between turning your back on the stunned guy or the unstunned guy, why would you have to roll to not turn your back on the guy that is the immediate threat just because you whacked the stunned guy last round with that reasoning?

That's fair, I just think that the Bloodthirsty person should have some understandable internal logic that drives their behavior. Having a tier of Threat(conscious)>Minor Threat(unconscious)>Not a Threat(Dead) makes sense, but not being able to switch from the stunned guy to the guy who is maneuvering to tickle your kidneys with his shortsword without a roll doesn't jive with that belief system.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I didn't pull it out of thin air...:)

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

It's a judgment call thing, again. The thought is that you if you're facing multiple equal opponents and wound one of them and then decide to switch to another, that's fine. They're all still equally a threat and all equally difficult to take down. But if you stun one of them, you'll want to finish him off while his defenses are weak.

I wouldn't require you to turn your back on an unstunned foe to finish off a stunned foe. But if you can keep two foes in front of you and still hit the stunned guy, you're going to want to finish him off.

My intent is to discourage the tactic of "I disable a bunch of guys and then finish them off later." I don't think that's what Bloodlust is. Bloodlust is "I immediately kill the guy in front of me if I can." Not to the point of tactical insanity, but to a potentially unhealthy degree.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I stand corrected. :)

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

I was taking it to mean you wanted to kill your foes when possible, so no strikes to subdue and the rest of the party has to work hard to keep you from finishing all the downed foes at the end of the combat. Note, this has already come up when we wanted to interrogate the goblins and later let them go as a reward for talking, granted with some overlap with my intolerance for gobbos. Bloodlust is the same cost as Berserk but the dumb behavior is offset by making you much harder to stop. Bloodlust doesn't get any positive benefits so the action penalties should be a lot less too. I'm not real thrilled with the restrictions on switching targets but I can see where it comes from. My evaluation of the downed harpy was it was no longer an immediate threat since it had fallen down, couldn't fly and had no ranged weapons. I was pretty sure it was also in the 'finish off at my leisure' and 'can't get away' categories too. It seemed prudent to head towards Marik so we could cover each other better and be ready in case the grounded one tried to go for him.

Targeting is kind of a tricky one, I shouldn't be able to try and go for crippling blows to capture someone but I think ones to knock down their combat effectiveness so I can get in a killing blow should be, or to keep them from getting away. In this case the wings were just too juicy of a target to pass up as they had both less armor and crippled their mobility. Sort of why my wings get targeted whenever I'm flying! It really depends on the opponent; standard goblins get torso shots (or head/vitals/neck if I wanna be fancy) since it's usually the best way to make them dead and I'd rather take a -2 for a DA instead of a limb shot. Spiders with long easy to reach legs get those taken off, fliers with wings can expect those to be targeted so forth and so on.

What it boils down to for me is you should be going for the kill but you should also be able to do it in a tactically smart manner.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

New Campaign Sessions 15 and 16
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-15
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/WM/Treks/Log_1-16

The delvers head into a ruined town that they believe is White Pines, looking for a lost dwarven key that is worth a lot of money to the dwarf elders of Polisberg. The town is overrun with eerie, humanoid figures made of mud. Everyone decides to try to avoid them since they don't know what they are. Unfortunately, the delvers fail to avoid them and get attacked from multiple directions by dozens and dozens of shambling things.

Fortunately for the delvers, each individual shambler is easy to outrun and easy to kill. Unfortunately for the delvers, there's so many that some of them intercept the delvers and start to overwhelm them. Wolfgang and Ghazeb carve up a bunch, but Thasos is providing cover for Minnizig and gets knocked over and surrounded by six of them. They start grabbing at him.

At this point, Beltarne uses his True Faith (with Turning) under the hope the monsters are demons or undead - which they are. A lucky roll gives him a turn radius that entirely encompasses the spread out delving band. The two demons of Thasos try to pick him up and carry him away, but he resists well enough that they have to drop him.

Being practical, the delvers surround a stoically chanting Beltarne (who is in turn surrounded by nearly a hundred demons forty or more feet out) and start searching the town. I ruled that holding up True Faith for extended periods is tiring, and Beltarne had to make Will rolls at -2 for every hour he attempted it or have it burn out for a while. The delvers searched the town for a few hours and then retreated to the north to rest and camp. I got to make some use of Treasure Tables, though I had written the encounter before it came out and couldn't use it as much as I'd like.


In the next session, the delvers are taking an afternoon off, planning to return to the town the next morning and finish looting it. Marik goes and does some hunting, attracting the attention of horde of giant wasps that proceed to strafe the camp. Everyone hides but Thasos, who gets divebombed by 6 wasps and stabbed. The wasps have a horribly virulent poison, and the mighty minotaur goes down. Everyone else breaks hiding to rescue him. Beltarne is briefly grabbed by some wasps, but is too heavy to be lifted before his fellow delvers cut them off him. A second flight of wasps comes in from the flank, skewering Ghazeb and Thasos again, driving both of them well into death check territory. They're driven off, but not before the two skirmishers are nearly killed.

Marik, who is about 50 yards away from the rest of the group, isn't so lucky as Beltarne and gets picked up by a pair of wasps (out of 5 that originally attacked him). Over several rounds of desperate shooting, he manages to kill both wasps and survive an eight yard fall (yay Acrobatics!). He then starts collecting wasp bodies, or as he calls them, "Dinner".


These were an interesting pair of sessions, demonstrating the dangers of minions. The mud zombies were easy to kill individually, but I was rolling 1d-3 and squaring the result to see how many reinforcements they got each round, coming from a random direction. The delvers were going to get overwhelmed eventually unless they cheated by using Turning or the like. There probably needs to be some kind of rule for using Turning against large number of foes, but I can't really think how to approach it and the strain method worked well for limiting PC actions.

The wasps were much nastier than the zombies - fast flying speed and a very deadly attack. The delvers big problem against them was that the delvers were spread out and couldn't reinforce each other very well. Against the second wave, the delvers were closer together and had less problems, but were still hampered by some unlucky rolls. And of course, the entire crew was nearly stranded when Marik was almost abducted.

Everyone was very happy with the session except perhaps Minnizig's player, who was hampered by being in a twisted magic region and not having a ranged weapon. I expect Minnizig will see some redesign when the delvers get back to Polisberg.

Re: Review of Play: The Saga of the Westmarch DF Game
 

"use" = 'spending CP to modify a die roll resulper two t.

CP cost for a success:1 + 1 uses of it in a game session.Round down.

1 CP (1+0) for uses 1 and 2, 2 CP (1+1) for uses three and four and 3 (1+2) for 5 & 6 and so on.

CP cost for a critical hit: 2+ 1 per use of it in a game session.

3 CP (2+1) for a first use spensing, 4,5,6... for subsequent uses.

CP cost to tur a crit fail into a regular failure: 3 + 2 per use. Reasoning: Crit failures are supposed to scare players, and [i]act as equalizers against otherwise virtually invincible warriors. A cost progression of 5, 7, 9, 11... will encourage players to take their crits like a man, and make them reluctant to spend points on other modifications to keep the CF insurance premium down.

Edit: Why yes, that does make the minimum cost of turning a crit failure into a critical success ELEVEN CP (3+2) + (1+0) + (2+3).