Knave Campaign Postmortem: Yonwell

I've been delaying and delaying closing the page on this chapter, but:

The Bell Ringers have made their last journey together. 

Adventures So Far:

Report 1(Not Really): Clowns, Handspiders, and Lions

Reports 2, 3: Ew, Gross

Report 4: Generic Wizard Tower

Report 5: Pepper Dies (Again)

Reports 6, 7, 8: Don't Go To The Library

Reports 9, 10, 11, 12, 13: What's the Worst that Could Happen?

A Recital

Since our last recap, there have been many sessions with new players and deadly adventures. The guild finally entered into Honorwatch, the dread keep ever on the horizon. The first foray brought them through the hidden tunnels uncovered by Corin the Smith. While they found great fortunes within their brief exploration of the dark tunnels, they very quickly were forced to flee from wights and knights that haunted the halls. A chance encounter with the bandits holed up along the south road to Yonwell breeds enmity as they suffer heavy "taxation" from the bandit king in exchange for free passage and sanctuary.

Rallying once again from Yonwell, they journey with a larger party to Honorwatch itself and seek a ground level entrance. On the way, they battle with the notorious drake, Kesselwyrm, before reaching the decrepit town on the outskirts of Honorwatch proper. There, Stratford Slee meets his demise under a cavalry charge of dead, and the party escapes into a hidden tunnel in a ruined chapel. 

From here there were lengthy trips into the fetid halls- treasures were won and nascent adventurers were slain. Retreating back to Yonwell the guild sought treasures in the east, across the Greenspine and in the court of the rumored Fairy Queen. They journeyed there and defeated devious traps, attended a strange party, and were cast out by attendants of the fae court. High up in the mountains they broke upon a golden tomb and robbed it of its worth before returning to Yonwell once more. 

Here, the core of the adventuring party began to move (literally) on- and I decided the time was nigh. These adventures ended not with a bang or TPK (as they'd always thought it would)- but as must always happen, the wheel of time turns, and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. 

Max Bedulenko

In the Beginning

I made the Yonwell campaign about two years ago with the intent to run it with a rotating cast of players and focus on exploration of the world and dungeon crawling. In many respects this was a success, and through ~11 players the group forged a guild, fought a war, brought rune magic into the world, and much much more. 

Knave was my system of choice here mostly for ease of pickup for newer players and simplicity- encouraging the more modern-system focused players to engage with the world over the system itself. I also experimented with many, many rule tweaks and procedures, system changes and add-ons. Some were dropped, like the death and dismemberment table, but others such as the simplified hexploration procedures stayed relatively unchanged. 

>>Messy and unedited house rules heavily borrowed from others here<<

In fact, contrary to my usual tendency to over-worldbuild, Yonwell started extremely light on work after prep of the initial 10x10 hex area immediately around the town. The world doesn't even have a name, still (only a single player asked about it, once), but thanks to really leaning in to only preparing things the players will interact with it felt like all of the prep that I did saw use. Dungeons were lifted wholesale from other products, including the Tomb of the Serpent Kings, many Trilemma adventures sites (handwolves were put into a random encounter list after finding them in the glossary, they grew to become a frequent comedy encounter), the previously discussed rune dungeons, the entire Freeport adventure, and more.

In memory of loyal party donkeys Ser Dunkelton (RIP) & Dunketello

 

Last Questions: Secrets Unveiled

And now, before closing the curtain on Yonwell, there were a few questions from my players to answer. 

 

Forrest White

Q: What was up with Honorwatch?

A: Honorwatch started as a big ruined fort on the hill, some skeletons on the random encounter tables for the surrounding plains, and the warning from the first npc out of town to not sleep within sight of it. After a few early sessions, it took a more developed role as the world got fleshed out wherever the players interacted with it. So, let's dump some lore.

There were Duke Conrad of Yonwell, and his brother Duke Konrad of Honorwatch. Naming conventions aside, years ago the Duke of Yonwell plotted against the Duke of Honorwatch- intending to kill him and seize Honorwatch. Honorwatch itself was a bastion of researchers, having a grand ruin underneath the castle proper, and the Duke of Honorwatch kept the peace honorably in his lands until his brother's betrayal. 

Essentially, the Duke of Yonwell made a secret alliance with the Witch Queen and gifted a cursed amulet to the Duchess of Honorwatch. The amulet corrupted the Duchess and eventually laid root and turned the lands into the Witch Queen's native swamplands, marshy and riddled with vampiric thorn bushes, allowing the Witch Queen's magics enough ground to teleport directly into the ruins beneath the castle. 

The ruins, as was discovered by the Duke of Honorwatch, were a great pristine seal- over some great power sealed away by the ancients. There were three swords that acted as keys to open the seal, and at the time the Duke of Honorwatch had located two of them: Eventide and Hierophant. The Witch Queen sought to harness this power herself, and tried to break the seal without the third blade. Her attempts backfired and she barely escaped the site alive- but the seal's magics brought the curse of undeath to the Duke of Yonwell and his lands- binding them to keep the seal intact.

This all draws into the further lore backgrounds of what was sealed and why- but essentially what we had was a snakeman empire overthrown by men who discovered how to wield Godbound-tier magic. They overthrew the snakemen and built a great utopian empire, with six of their number being the de facto pseudo-pantheon. Over time, they began to restrict who learned their magics, as in the hands of any lowly peasant it could destroy the works of kings. Eventually their empire grew more and more insular, elitist, and cruel. One of their number attempted rebellion, and trained legions of commoners in secret. A great war, sometimes known as the Runic War, scarred the land and broke the empire. The remaining five were not able to kill the unnamed sixth, but were able to erase their name and form and seal their seat of power- but in doing so had to seal away their greatest magics.

Time passed and they ancients sealed their greatest city and all its technology behind the mighty Shieldwall mountains, chaining another of their own who had become corrupted to guard it eternally (this being Azamax the Cursed). The rest scattered, with some being lost to time, others still live in the setting (The First Wyvern, the Lich King). Eventually, the much less magical civilizations of the world were formed and after many many years we have Yonwell- just 20 hexes from the sealed magical city and ten from the great seal underneath Honorwatch. 

All this was in no way in place at the design of the campaign, and it wasn't until they discovered the teleporter cairns some 15 sessions in that it was set in stone. At the beginning, all I had was Honorwatch being a cursed castle and there being big mountains to the way way north that hid something. 

Ben Zweifel

 Q: What was the deal with the teleporter cairns?

A: That was how to unseal the city behind the Shieldwall. Two hexes out of Yonwell and not discovered until 10-12 sessions in to the game, there was a monolith just in the Shellwood atop a cairn. The party fought a vampire-vine-beast inside and explored the remaining three rooms. One held dozens of stone statues of people in various stages of life, another held the tomb of one of the five Ancients as well as a pool of magical healing water, and the third held the teleporter. 

It's a simple system, there's a crystal that powers it and the players had to find it (stolen by the vampire thing) and activate the system. There were four reels filled with symbols that could be lined up into combinations of four and a lever. The way it worked was a simple dialling system, put in the right combo and teleport to the corresponding cairn. They had already worked out the address of the cairn they were in and were satisfied to leave- but one player wanted to try a few hunches. 

Fortunately for them, I had planned for that. The first success was all four Tree symbols- this led to the "Cathedral". It was a building set beyond the Shieldwall and filled with six statues, one smashed, each which when touched would give a vision of the corresponding cairn. Each statue looked like one of the six ancients, and if all six cairns were activated then the barrier in the cathedral blocking the exit would be broken. 

The second successful combo was the four dragons, which led to a floating castle above the bay of the lost continent Wyv. The sheer number of wyverns around the castle led to the players to quickly decide to leave and not come back- unfortunately for them. 

Q: Is magic everywhere now? How will it affect... things?

A: Rune magic is, at least. The players were already seeing some fall out from when their lantern boy taught all the other lantern boys how to make magical rune-powered light, and they also taught even more to a second henchman. Rune magic was one of the magics sealed in the Runic Wars, being the easiest for the common person to use and benefit from. 

It will take time for people around the world to see the old runes in ruins are working again and figure their inner workings out- but what happens once magic is readily available for even the lowliest peasant is anyone's guess.

Q: If it had gone on for long enough, would we eventually have gotten involved in the southern wars, or is that an off-screen thing? 

A: There's a physical line drawn south of Yonwell that the players were told we don't go to. Conceptually, this is because the south lands are filled with mundane war and generally suck, so they left and came to these frontierlands by Yonwell. Mechanically, it encouraged players to explore north out of Yonwell- but no, there were no plans for the south lands- players were free to name the wretched and boring countries of origin for their characters at will (all I can remember were Florida and Ohio). 

William Stevens

Q: Was there a city in the far north past the dragons or am I mistaking?

A: "DRAGONS?" was written all over the player map at various points- but I believe this refers to the area north of Starmoore. North of that destroyed town was a narrow coastline hedged by brokenlands, which opened up into a grand plain spiked with plateaus atop which were the Dragon Baronies. These were to very feudal-themed cities which maintained knights that rode atop drakes as well as legions of footmen that were used to battle each other and the seasonal tide of orcs from the east. 

Q: What did we not get to that you are most disappointed about?

A: I could have directed or hinted better, but that floating island with wyverns? It was empty. There's no monsters or ghosts or ghouls or even wyverns inside it. The only things inside were treasure and the means to move the island at will. It was a giant flying castle filled with treasure that you could just move wherever you wanted it to- but as it turns out the wyverns outside were so scary the players just never left the parlor. 

Let's take a last quick tour of some of the mysteries and denizens around the world of Yonwell- and reveal just how poor my hook management was for this campaign.

Chaim Holtjer

A freshly excavated tunnel in a farmer's lands lead through the snake-emblazoned temple deep beneath the earth, scales slide against stone as the ancient necromancer prepares his next concoction- oblivious to the rediscovery of his laboratory.

In the deep cavern beneath the Ranger's Guild, a brass brazier burns fiercly outside the Unbroken Tomb, its contents awaiting the worthy.

Undolant the Purple hums a merry tune- conjoining the last set of arms to his new batch of handwolves.

Atop the Greenspine, the bumbling grobkins work in their stolen brewery, feeding the great hunger that commands them. 

Thunder rumbles from the mouth of the Castle Demon- squat among the glassy ruins of Starmoore. Furtive figures dart to and from its hidden passages, stoking the flames of its dreaming engine.

Deep in a snaking cave a not so ogreish scholar connects wires and cables and invokes the ancient oaths, trying to resurrect his dead god.

Vibrant greens choke out the twisting red vines creeping at the heart of the Shellwood, a silver pond undisturbed at its heart. 

Balanced on the fanged mountains in the sea north of Shellport, the ever-fought battle of ancient automata continue in blasted halls and spiralling stairs.

Down dark alleyways and behind closed doors of Gnarledshore, the remnants of the snakeman empire conspire and plot- dreaming of their empire's return.

The great pale ziggurats of the dead in the far east mill with tired corpses under the empty eyes of the Lich King.

Coins tumble from enormous piles of treasure heaped amongst the far mountain altar as Azamax the Cursed's flaking gold scaled-head considers the horizon.

The priestesses of Magda offer a freshly harvested crop of Man-Locusts to their False Mermaid gods, feeding the beast they build in their temple.

A new bandit king crowned, the roads from Shellport to Yonwell prove to be ever valuable- as long as they pay their taxes to the Duke.

Ribboned trees line the forest paths where half-elves tend to the ghosts of the dead play court with their Half-dead queen. 

Drake-mounted knights dive and cut at hordes of pallid-fleshed orcs in a pitched battle on the plains, banners unfurled and blood splattered.

Bristling black spines and fiercely cut chitin adorn the blood red Wyrm that emerges from the ruins of the blood altar- now fully recovered it sets its eyes to reclaiming its title.

Centaurs skirmish with the twisted minions of the Witch Queen in the snowy hills of the Beastwarren. From her fetid pit of Felltine, she howls and slinks; plotting anew to break the seal.

High amongst ancient pine trees, the feathered Serpent Lord glides in search of prey- and vengeance.   

In taverns throughout the bustling city of Yonwell, stories are told of adventurers mad and mighty- and the bells they rang and the tales they sang.

The high bell tolls at her shrine and Alia wishes safe journeys to a fresh faced band of adventurers and their dog, eager to make a name for themselves on the frontier.

Through a Nearby Mirror

Tim Hansz

All in all, I'd count this grand West Marches-ish a success. Knave was a good choice to be sure, but I don't think I'd choose it again for a longer campaign like Yonwell ended up being. It could have been my tooling around with the system constantly that made it into something I didn't quite like- but either way it'll be good to go back to something with a bit more structure and classes, even. 

Long ago I had found hexcrawls to be an intimidating prospect to set up- with there being dozens of guides and articles on how to do it properly, on how the procedures need to be, on how to build the world- but ultimately focusing on smaller 10x10 hexes to start with and keeping things flexible the first few sessions worked wonders. 

 

Above is the real- actual-, current and up to date map for Yonwell as well as the player made map for comparison. Each little yellow tag- for those not familiar- is where I made an entry for that hex- an encounter or something similar. Astute players of mine may notice there are many hexes that they explored which do not have an encounter shown on my map. To them, the answer is I Improvised A Lot. Sometimes they were encounters or locations I knew I wanted to use and just waited for a good time to adapt them- sometimes it was a roll on some roll-up tables to make the place on the spot- but something I really leaned on heavily throughout the game was improvisation and not sweating the prep- and to my mind this ended up being fairly smooth with only a few bumps.

Looking back at it all and reminiscing, there's plenty I would have done differently if I started again today- and that's just fine. I had a great time running this world with all my players, and now it's time for the next adventure.

Thanks for playing

Knave Report 9, 10, 11, 12, 13: Catching Up With the Knaves

More Knavery to catch up on! This will be brief and mostly focusing in on the highlights of the most recent adventuring shenanigans, loosely dubbed the Runic Arc.

Session 9

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of Eventide, Hierophant, and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Olga Derippe (level 4) Body builder, Hammer Enthusiast, Haunted by a Revenant, Death Defier, Hoardmaster, Aspiring Gym Owner

Stratford Slee (level 4) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

Piety Portendorfer (level 3) Gourmand, Survivor of a Death Curse, Notoriously not Pious, Aspiring Author

Hirelings: Penollyn the Archer, Lil' Ten Piece the Lantern Boy

The gang makes a loose appointment to speak with Cormac in the morning before finding where Piety ran off to (drunk, swallowing frogs in a competition with a muddy drunkard in the streets) and then crashed for the night with the rest of the town in the longhouse. 

In the morning, Piety discovers she has a flyer for the town's local Crab Shack Combinator (entirely forgotten shortly later) and the everyone else decides to split up and do some shopping before meeting with Cormac. Alma and Piety get some armor made for Yellow Beedums the horse and Belle, the Pegasus. Piety then spends the rest of the morning working with a local pegasus rider and getting the hang of riding Belle. 

Stratford, Olga, and Alma wander around in the meantime exploring the leatherworking industry and trying to find a boat to get back down the river to Yonwell. They find a merchant who offers them passage for a fee, and also offers a treasure map for a hefty 200 gold. The party, desperately strapped for cash as always begins bickering over who pays what percentages and whether or not Piety- being not present- should pay a fee. Ultimately, the three of them foot the bill and purchase the map, which points to the giant glowing moa head in the mountains far to the south, as well as outlines the solution to a puzzle to enter the head itself. 

Midjourney

 

Gathering back together once more, the party meets with Cormac to begin the lore dump that Alma has been desperately craving for the last year. To summarize: 

    - The Rangers Guild, of which Cormac was once grandmaster, supported Duke Konrad of  Honorwatch, and in their time Honorwatch was a just and noble domain that protected the lands to the south from the various monsters and beasts that roamed out from Starmoore and the surrounding mountains. 

    - Cormac doesn't know what caused the undead uprising, and on the day of the first battle for Honorwatch he and his rangers were caught between the tide of undeath and the oncoming forces of Duke Conrad of Yonwell.

    - Konrad and Conrad didn't get along at all, Cormac was helping Konrad and his spies had uncovered that the Duke of Yonwell was secretly meeting with the Witch Queen of Felltine, north of the Karst. 

    - The two swords of Honorwatch are familiar to Cormac, and he and Konrad had been searching for the third to unlock the vault beneath the castle but had not come upon any leads.    

    -  After barely escaping the first battle of Honorwatch, the Rangers were broken and Cormac fled to the Beastwarren, wandering aimlessly for some time before encountering the Fairy Queen. She offered him her boon and he swore fealty to her, taking on his centaur form and becoming bound to protecting the Beastwarren- unable to leave it.

    - The Fairy Queen's demesne is known as the Fairy Woods, sometimes the Mirrorwood. It lies south across the split in the Greenspine. She makes the ever-distant white pillar her home.

    - The elves in the Beastwarren are descendants of the Ancients, loyal to the Fairy Queen, and possess extreme magical powers. Their enclaves are hidden and they keep to themselves and maintain their homes, especially abhorring anything they determine to be distasteful or ugly. Their human servants all wear masks to hide their imperfections. 

     - Hunters in the Hunter's Pact who attain rank are given the chance to accept the boon of the Fairy Queen as well, and become centaurs like Cormac. 

    - The Bellringers are welcome to taking over the remains of the Ranger's Guild, as Cormac cannot make his way there. 

    - The northern edge of the Beastwarren runs up against the Shield Wall, the sky-scraping mountain range encircles the last city of the Ancients, protecting it since their fall. Along the southern edge of the ring, the dragon Azamax the Cursed lairs in his shrine, bound to forever prevent any incursions into the lands inside the Shield Wall. Reports of late indicate Azamax has been more and more active in recent months.

Having only more questions, the party bids Cormac farewell and retires to an inn for the night. 

In the morning, the group holds a lengthy debate about whether or not to brave the day-long journey south into the Beastwarren to make for the giant stone head and plumb its depths for treasure, or to save that for a later day and return to Yonwell. Ultimately, their lack of tangible funds from this expedition drives them to the call of adventure and they ready the party and head south. 

 

Midjourney

 

Through the enormous old-growth of the Beastwarren, the party makes camp just a short journey from the ominously glowing stone head up in the Greenspine. During the night, Stratford Slee catches sight of a towering silver Elk- and his Hunter's Pact compulsion to hunt any creature he's never seen before sends him off after it, with only a shout behind to rouse his companions. 

What follows is a desperate night-cloaked chase through the snowy undergrowth. Stratford catches the elk by surprise, but to his dismay its call rouses the nearby trees to its defense- and its teeth are sharp and vampiric, taking a savage chunk out of Stratford. Piety rides Belle in, furious at Stratford going off on his own, helps strike the killing blow after Stratford's attempt at casting body swap on the elk fails. A new hide and some fresh meat now in their posession, the party sleeps the night away.

Session 10

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of Eventide, Hierophant, and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Olga Derippe (level 4) Body builder, Hammer Enthusiast, Haunted by a Revenant, Death Defier, Hoardmaster, Aspiring Gym Owner

Stratford Slee (level 4) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

Piety Portendorfer (level 3) Gourmand, Survivor of a Death Curse, Notoriously not Pious, Aspiring Author

Hirelings: Penollyn the Archer, Lil' Ten Piece the Lantern Boy

The gang heads up the mountains in the morning and into the giant stone head's secret entrance, revealed by solving the puzzle (hand waved as it's on the treasure map). They descend down a long staircase and into the deeps beneath the stone head. Into... The Rune Dungeon (modified).

An aside: I read the Rune Dungeon posts years ago and have always wanted to throw them into a game. Knave as a system being pretty magic light, when I first mapped out the Dellen Plains around Yonwell I added this dungeon into the Greenspine. I'm pretty sure the party first caught a glance of the stone head somewhere back in the Unrecorded Sessions, so it has been on the map for awhile.

Midjourney

 

 

The first few rune puzzles lead to the players figuring out how to make lights, and they begin to get a general idea of the rune abilities. They have a nasty time fighting the wave elementals in room 10, as they entirely avoid fighting normally and instead try to force themselves down the adventurers throats and drown them. 

Moving in further, the party is ecstatic at finding the kitchen and the heating and cooling runes, with Piety scooping all that she can carry up and declaring she'll make the best bar in the world back in Yonwell. 

The gang makes a brief excursion across the chasm in 13 and has an anxiety riddled time retrieving a great ruby from 14 as well as exploring the pits in 15. 

We end up cutting the session after explaining the set up for room 16, as much of the time for this session was taken up with experimenting with runes and their effects.

Session 11

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of Eventide, Hierophant, and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Stratford Slee (level 4) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

Piety Portendorfer (level 3) Gourmand, Survivor of a Death Curse, Notoriously not Pious, Aspiring Author

Hirelings: Penollyn the Archer, Lil' Ten Piece the Lantern Boy 

Room 16 is defeated with some dramatic encounters with the skeletons. Lil' Ten Piece is put on Belle and flown around the room to keep the obelisks alight while Olga scrambles to slap a light rune in the middle of the room. Lil' Ten Piece is nearly killed when the skeletons launch each other into the air after the lantern boy, but the obelisks are covered in light in just enough time to prevent his death. 

Creeping forward again, the party gets a brief look into 18, seeing the dozen or more clay men in worship of a great Clay Statue God and decide to book it back out of the room after a brief encounter leaves them heavily wounded. After making their way back across the chasm (again, only thanks to Belle), they rest and heal their wounds in the kitchen. They make a quick journey to explore the dorms back in 11 and learn to use mass runes to float over the deadly yellow mold and retrieve a very expensive looking crystalline statuette.

The next day is spent exploring the east half of the dungeon. Fighting the half-lich and its skeletons in 6 nearly wipes the party out with some cones of cold, but they scrape out a victory and head outside to try and retrieve Olga's hammer (once again crit failed and hurled out of reach, into the murky waters). A lightning arrow from Alma convinces the Watcher in the Lake to return the hammer and the group loots the room to find some shimmering silk, various coins, and a magical warhammer that causes gusts of cutting wind- which Olga takes handily. The half-lich and its companions are noted as having symbols bearing the Skull-Over-Ziggurat of the Lich King of the East. 

Midjourney

Murals are examined all along the journey- of Wizards triumphing over terrible Rune Wizards that were abusing poor peasantry, but little explanation is found. Scattered around though, the party finds more clues at how to work the runes, usually in the form of silver tablets with associations of effects hidden in caches.

After solving the weight puzzle in 25, the party finds the magical fountain of 26 to be similar to a previous one they encountered in the teleporting cairn. It bears the marks of the now-familiar long haired woman wreathed in oak leaves, and the water bears magical healing properties- at risk. Alma is mutated into more of a bird, now nearly covered in feathers and with talon-like claws. Olga also rolls up a bird mutation and sprouts white feathers, and Piety feels her guts expand with heat- becoming a living bomb (on death deal HD*d10 damage to everything in HD*10 feet). Some of the magic water is bottled for later. 

Crossing to the other side of the bridge-chasm in 24, the party begins using runes to just absolutely wreck the clay men of the dungeon, clearing the pillar room with ease but deciding not to press into 18 in fear of the greater numbers of the clay men. They instead enter into 28 where Lil' Ten Piece and Belle (and the rest of the party) are nearly instantly obliterated by the rune-amplified fireball spell. The combat is near, but the party overcomes thanks to their earth-taking amplified rune weapons and they ascend up to the hub in 29. 

The three layers of shielded lights protect the floating platform in the middle, with a azure blue statue of a wizard with hands outstretched. They peek into each of the puzzle rooms and discover they need to solve each puzzle to reduce the light shields and get down below- where clearly something terrible or valuable waits, as they can see a massive crystalline sphere through thick glass beneath their feet. 

Solving the water room puzzle, the party gains the full-metal amethysts which are letting them now draw three runes in a glyph instantly and power it on the same turn as well, a massive boon for combat. They open the door to 34 and find inside a small library (not running the mirror puzzle room, didn't feel like it'd be fun to run or play with a theater of mind game) with several books on how runes work as well as the history of the runic wars clearly visible. To their dismay though, just in the middle of the room is a large golden statue of Gorebold the Devourer, waiting patiently for them.

Session 12

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of Eventide, Hierophant, and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Stratford Slee (level 4) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

Piety Portendorfer (level 3) Gourmand, Survivor of a Death Curse, Notoriously not Pious, Aspiring Author

Hirelings: Penollyn the Archer, Lil' Ten Piece the Lantern Boy

Resting up first, the party easily (except for the crystal golems which only fail to murder all of them due to sheer luck, leaving heavy, heavy wounds) solves the rest of the puzzles around the hub and debate entering the library or not. Finally, they decide they desperately want to know how runes work and enter, finding the rooms surrounded with white chalk drawn in intricate diagrams. 

Midjourney

Piety enters first and feels her intelligence draining rapidly as she gets closer to the statue, and leaves quickly. Some quick math is done and the party determines they cannot reach the books in front of the statue and survive, so Piety pops a potion sold to her by Parsley back in Yonwell which would allow her to name a deity and ask a question. She opts for a deity she had learned about from Alia before setting out, and asks Athena how to cross the barrier. A spiritual encounter with a divine entity and a geas to build a (1500gp) shrine to Athena later, Piety crosses the barrier under divine protection and retrieves the books. 

Spending their morning doing some reading, Piety uncovers the secrets of runes (I gave them the blog articles) and Alma reads about the history of the Rune Wars. It turns out that the Ancients had learned runes from the Orbital Gods and used them in conjunction with more advanced magics to run their empire, until one of their own (the name squirms and will not be read) taught the lower castes how to use the free and easy powers of rune magic, leading to a bloody war that brought down the empire and resulted in rune magic being sealed away under the protection of a guardian. Now knowing what probably awaits them below, the party is unsure of whether or not they should release rune magic back into the world (or if they can even defeat the guardian). 

Opting to explore the rest of the dungeon, they find some charred phoenix strips (instant full heal) and more gold and trinkets, as well as a great guilded scroll bearing ornate calligraphy of the name Azamax. Twisting some curious draconic tapestry reveals a hidden vault and a hint leading them to another hidden room earlier in the dungeon. This one being clearly of different make and added later to the dungeon contains a clear glass box filled with warped purple sloshing liquid. A small note explains that this is a magical bomb (9d10 damage) and explains how to use it, bearing a signature that clearly points to this having been left by someone in the employ of Azamax. Bomb in hand, they decide to take on the guardian. 

Midjourney

Descending the floating platform back in the hub, the azure statue issues a dire warning (ignored) and the party finds themselves atop a giant glassy black platform beneath the crystal dome, a giant crystalline chandelier filled with writhing liquid hangs in the center. The liquid pours from the chandelier and forms into a 15 foot tall writhing ball of flesh and limbs- which Piety flies by on Belle and uses the magical bomb for a third of its health and a horrific violet implosion in its wake. 

The battle with the guardian is dire, and its summoned clay minions keep Alma and Stratford on the run and eventually bring down Piety and Belle who come crashing to the ground- 3 HP between the two of them. Brought near the brink of a total party kill, Stratford reveals that he had spent the previous reading/lore dump time preparing his summoning ritual, and takes the gamble to see if it can summon into the room Azamax the Cursed. 

Reality tears (along with most of Stratford's intelligence stat) and the head and front claws of the cursed dragon roars into the room, spouting golden flames in fury that nearly finished the party off. Then, spying the guardian, Azamax roars triumphantly and rips its open before filling it with golden flames- destroying it as Azamax pulls back into the tear in reality leaving laughter and flicks of golden light in its wake. 

The crystalline chandelier shatters and the room vibrates before quieting. The party picks themselves up and heads back to the hub to sleep off the consequences of what they just did. 

In the morning, they clear the Clay God room and find the books for making clay men, making three to carry their overburdened loot and help (with rune magic) to clear the stairs and escape the dungeon and exit into the light and make their way back to Taubey. 

Just outside of Taubey, however, the party's camp is attacked. Late in the night, something is heard gliding amongst the tree tops, and a colossal feathered serpent swallows Stratford whole. 

Midjourney

The party rouses in terror at the titanic snake coiled amongst the trees and begins a desperate combat. Stratford tries (and fails) a body swap and resorts to blind slashing in a desperate attempt to survive as the party tries whatever they can think of to get him out. Ultimately (lucky dice) the serpent vomits Stratford up into the air- where he is barely saved from certain death by Piety and Belle who catch him and set him down safely with Penolly and Ten Piece. As a last attack, the serpent strikes at the gathered pack animals and swallows up Yellow Beedums before fleeing amongst the trees at frightening pace. 

Terrified and glad it left, Piety returns to the ground and checks on Alma and Stratford, wherein Alma reveals they must go after the snake- as it now carries the dark sword Hierophant that was being carried amongst her horse's pack. 

Another desperate night flight with Alma casting bird person to keep up, she and Piety find a poisonous fog in a nearby valley and use their rune magic to clear the air- revealing the snake that struck once more. A quick combat ensues and the snake (failing badly again) vomits up most of Yellow Beedums and decides this not to be worth the trouble and leaves the party behind. 

Sword recovered and now horseless (and losing a collection of valuable silks and cloths recovered from the dungeon), Alma rides with Piety and Belle back to the camp and sulk for the night. In the morning, they return to Taubey and get a proper meal and night's sleep.

Session 13

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of Eventide, Hierophant, and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Piety Portendorfer (level 3) Gourmand, Survivor of a Death Curse, Notoriously not Pious, Aspiring Author

Hirelings: Penollyn the Archer, Lil' Ten Piece the Lantern Boy, Salamander the Man at Arms

Short on players, the remaining gang decides to make for Yonwell and finally get their experience (xp only gets added in Yonwell). They hire along Salamander, a man at arms, and make the trek through the beastwarren and out to Magda. 

Following the river out of Taubey, the party finds the riverboat presumably belonging to the merchant they'd bought their treasure map from is aflame in the icy river, a large treant battering the flames out and sending wood and embers flying. 

Piety flies in on Belle and runes away the flames, causing the treant to trudge away back up river. The boat itself sinks shortly later, no survivors remained to be found- but it was notably covered with arrows from the north end of the river. 

Getting creative with make air runes and make heat runes, Piety comfortably plumbs the icy river and recovers a healthy haul of coins from the ship before returning to the waiting party to make camp. Throughout the night, Alma watches vague figures across the river, until the sun rises and the distant figures melt back into the treeline. 

The journey to Magda is relatively uneventful, and the party sets out in the morning eager to avoid the gaze of Honorwatch and make their way back to Yonwell. Another night spent camped out on the road, the party makes it to just two hexes out of Yonwell when they spy a (very, very unlucky) encounter up ahead near the blood-clay pond. A group of eight riders, clad in black, making their way in a line slowly along the north-road.

Midjourney

 Piety mounts Belle and takes to the air as the rest of the party prepares to engage or flee. Getting closer, Piety can make out very little detail amongst the snowy glare of a clear winter's day, and gets close enough to hail the lead rider. A word of magic is spoken and Belle falls asleep- crashing to the ground with Piety as the riders charge forward into a throng around her. The stench of death is now clear, as is the blackened emblem of Honorwatch. Piety tries to surrender- and susprisingly (a mistake that I'm keeping) the dark knights accept, taking her and Belle into custody as the rest of the party flees into the nearby Shellwood. 

In the Shellwood, Alma and the hirelings make for the teleporter cairn and have a brief moment to be distraught at the recent events, before the line of riders charge in from the treeline into the clearing surrounding the obelisk above the yawning opening of the cairn. The riders charge the beleaguered party with lancers at the front as a greater glaiver carrying knight circles around for a pincer attack- leaving the magic caster and the one that had captured Piety (in tow with Belle) at the treeline. The three lancers make a devastating attack against Alma who nearly falls as Ten Piece and Penollyn take Dunketello the pack donkey and his cart below into the cairn. Salamander charges the glaive-knight and prevents his charge. Alma flees below as well while Salamander, in the best performance from any hireling and with the most astounding rolls, keeps the remaining lancers and glaive-knight at bay for three rounds of combat. 

During this combat, Piety manages to escape with the help of some clever glyph making, and, in a truly impressive display, succeeds in slaying her captor and the lancer that came to assist. She frees Belle and the two rescue Salamander, barely escaping the glaive-knight and company. 

Piety and Salamander make the panicked flight to Alia the Bell Priestess's shrine outside of Yonwell and beg sanctuary as well as help rescuing their comrades. Alia agrees but asks to wait until morning and let the two rest while she gathers help. Unhappily, Piety assents and the party gathers again at dawn to break out for the cairn and rescue Alma and company with the help of four mounted Bell Priests as well as Alia. 

Inside the cairn, Dunketello and his cart are abandoned in the entry way as Alma, Ten Piece, and Penollyn race for the teleportation platform and punch in their only know working codes, finding sanctuary at the corresponding teleporter inside the floating island above the bay of Wyv. They rest and find no one chasing them, then Alma makes the calculated choice to try and return back to the cairn the earliest she would think Piety could return with help. Alma and hirelings carefully head up and to the cairn's opening- only to be ambushed by four heavily armored dark knights of Honorwatch- as the sounds of battle crash in from outside. 

In the meantime, Piety and the Bell Priests reach the Cairn and find the area untouched, no bodies or blood to be seen. She presses forward and finds this all to have been an illusion hiding twelve of Honorwatch's knights, including the magic-casting noble and the glaive-knight. The priests use their turn undead abilities to cause half the number to flee before the trap is sprung, and a horrendous melee ensues. Salamander is slain in the mess and Piety charges into the Cairn to find Alma and the rest. In this time Alma had used her stunning shield to blind the attackers and slay two of them, and with Piety's help they corral the rest as the sounds of battle suddenly fade above. 

Returning above ground they find the bell priests slain and Alia to be the only remaining one- trapped in a self-casted bubble of Time Slow along with the magic-casting dark knight, the glaive-knight, and a lancer. The party prepares for the spell to end and manage to avert Alia's imminent death and drive off the remaining Honorwatch forces. With haste, the remaining group find the cart back in the Cairn smashed to pieces- but Dunketello to still be alive (luck roll). They gather what they can and quick march back to Alia's Shrine, depositing her to the care of her people as the party finally returns back to Yonwell.

Knave Report 6, 7, 8

We're back, with three sessions combined into one post! 

Session 6

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of the Unknown Blade and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Olga Derippe (level 3) Body builder, Hammer Enthusiast, Haunted by a Revenant, Death Defier, Hoardmaster

Stratford Slee (level 3) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

My notes for session 6 got considerably jumbled and lost, so this is all mostly from memory. 

After leaving the black iron door behind, the party wanders into rows of shelves that are occasionally interrupted by brains floating in jars. They wake some of them up but find most don't respond or speak in tongues they cannot understand. One jar does prove fruitful, however, and it turns out to be the brain of Torovax the Yellow. 

Torovax was a wizard of the Ranger's Guild, according to the records that the party had found on their last expedition, and the party eagerly asks after what Torovax knows of the curse on Honorwatch and what caused its fall. The news of the undead curse on the keep shocks Torovax, who entered the Stygian Library shortly before the fall to try and locate a spellbook lost in Starmoore. He has no ideas about who could have caused it, but he does offer to help the party in exchange for them removing him from the library. They agree and Torovax tells them of some hidden books that would help them deeper in the library. 

The next room is a simple tea room and contains the hidden books, a considerably large spellbook and a book that causes Olga to level up instantly. Time works strangely in the room and after fruitlessly trying to sleep the party slowly realizes time only moves forward when they move. Taking the knowledge they have in hand they realize the Greatest Joke in the world is nearby and decide to forego resting and press onwards. 

They find their quarry in another mess of pipes and clockwork, a computation engine greater than the last. A singular librarian is present when they enter and on seeing the party they scurry out of the room. Quickly, the party decides the librarian is going to call for help and finally they'll be attacked for all the damage they've done to the library so far. Fearing their souls being captured and catalogued by the white robed librarians, they quickly use the computation engine and print out the Greatest Joke. Stratford grabs it and carefully avoids reading the book, noting the way the letters swim on the cover and fearing it will sap his intelligence. 

Just then, the librarians enter the room in force and unleash a flurry of magic missiles at the party, who turn tail and run. They keep ahead of their pursuers and even manage to grab Torovax as they flee. Stratford downs his potion of Giant Size and tries to create some obstacles while the party crawls single-file through the tunnel out of the room with a black iron door- now also chased by a hungry and cackling neurovore they encounter in the tea room. 

Back upstairs, the chase continues until they reach the room with the cone that contains vials of what now are clearly recognized as souls. Alma starts grabbing the vials and smashing them, unleashing a vortex of agonized dead that swarm both the party and the librarians in pursuit, but causes enough of a distraction to allow the party to escape. The Scooby Doo chase continues all the way until the party escapes the library and returns to the sand dunes, where their running to the exit mirror attracts an enormous sand shark- which they barely avoid before closing the mirror portal and returning to the wizard's tower once more. 

Back in the wizard's tower, the party makes their way to the tavern at the base level and promptly fall asleep after checking to ensure their horse and donkey were well cared for by their man-at-arms. The next day they make the trek down the mountains and back to Yonwell, avoiding the attention of a drake that loitered in the skies. In Yonwell, they finally meet with the possessed Destrian once more and deliver him the Greatest Joke. Destrian Rumboldt reads the book, chuckles, and then promptly explodes with a wet pop as the entire dream-like apparatus around him collapses and the party finds themselves suddenly in the attic of the house across from the guild hall, Scrying Orb and cursed black sword in hand. This adventure ends as they confirm the town has returned to normal and people don't seem to recall anything amiss, but they ensure to safely lock up their questionably cursed objects and deliver the Scrying Orb into the hands of the Bell Priests (as well as pay a bribe to some town guards who were questioning why the guildhall was covered in bloody hand prints). 

Session 7

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of the Unknown Blade and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Olga Derippe (level 3) Body builder, Hammer Enthusiast, Haunted by a Revenant, Death Defier, Hoardmaster

Stratford Slee (level 3) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

The events of the Destrian Arc now settled, the party takes stock of their priorities and status. Stratford and Alma want to visit Taubey in the Beastwarren- partly to meet with Cormac the Green and inquire about his story with the Ranger's Guild and Honorwatch and partly to allow Stratford to deliver his various trophies to the Hunter's Pact. Stratford, now, finds himself free of his curse of undeath but is still afflicted by a mysterious golden statue that he cannot seem to get rid of and that grows larger every day. Olga brings up the rumors of a dwarven smith set up in the hills near Honorwatch and Alma mentions that she'd like to visit them and get her two swords examined. 

Ultimately, the group decides to first go to find the dwarf, then return to Yonwell and make for Taubey, hoping to catch a ferry in Magda. Winter is encroaching and the party prepares accordingly in the market, taking the time to hire a new lantern boy and discover a new alchemy shop has opened up (run by a previous random encounter, a young witch named Parsley) and readily empties the party's coffers by selling healing potions as well as identifying their many mysterious potions. 

The journey north to the hills goes well enough for the first day, but on the second day the party stops to rest just south of the black-smeared walls of Honorwatch. Everyone recalls the many times they have been warned since their first adventuring days in these lands: "Do not sleep within sight of Honorwatch." Upon finishing their recollection the party notices a lone rider further along the road to the north, cloaked in black and unmoving. Weighing their options, everyone does what fortifying of their small camp that they can on these open plains and settle in for the night. 

Not long after darkness shrouds the lands, a red glare blooms out of the tallest tower of Honorwatch. Stratford Slee, on watch, wakes the others as he sees the gates of Honorwatch open, a stream of shadow pouring out and only dimly visible under the glare. Everyone wakes and prepares as the shadow streams down the road and meets the rider, still waiting. Once the shadow meets the rider, four other riders are revealed amongst the roiling mass and the cavalry charge sets forward to the party. 

Darkness shrouds the party and extinguishes their flames as the riders mercilessly charge again and again to devastating effect. Potions are chugged, "We should have listened"'s are said, but finally Stratford's wolfhead lantern is able to dispel a circle of the darkness and provides just enough room to allow the party to take out a handful of riders before the shadow dissipates. They rest for the night and quickly pack in the morning, heading off the road and into the misty plains to the northwest. 

The mist becomes thick quickly, the ground turns to a sludge of mud and unnaturally tall flax, the air carries a smell of rust and blood. Navigation becomes quickly impossible, but Stratford notices the wolfshead lantern's eyes moving. Deciding to follow the direction, the party discovers a low, muddy hill ringed by twelve stone pillars jutting from the mud. As they approach, a wretched howling begins and the party sees the muddied and bloodied wolf-men chained in agony to the center of the pillars. Their howls rise to a crescendo and an enormous hand wolf, seven feet tall and cruel, emerges from a divet in the muddy hill. 

Mud-zombies burst from the marsh and and trip the party up, trying to drag them into the marsh. Stratford beelines for the giant hand wolf and in short turn discovers himself alone and well over his head, nearly dying in two rounds. Olga and Alma are trapped below, slowly destroying the zombies and trying to keep the lantern boy alive, so Stratford spies the hole the wolf came from and jumps, sliding down a dark muddy hole and launching into the air atop an almost identical hill in a strange willowy swamp. Deciding to return, he slides back down into the mound and emerges from the other side, using the mud to slide down the hill and help Alma gut the giant hand wolf. Zombies and hand wolf slain, the party executes each of the chained monstrosities, causing the mound to rapidly inhale the surrounding mist and collapse into itself. Confused, beaten, muddy, the party makes their way north and manages to find the camp of Corin the Smith. 

Corin has hired a group of laborers and hunters, her goal to dig into the legendary forge beneath Honorwatch and set up shop. The party agrees to help clear out Honorwatch's surface in exchange for some smithing work. The smith examines the two blades Alma brought and relates what she knows of them. 

Eventide, the shortsword recovered from a cursed pond, said to have been wielded by Sir Dorcas, a knight of Honorwatch. 

Hierophant, the cruel longsword that formerly held a shade of Honorwatch and was wielded by Duke Konrad of Honorwatch's son. 

A legend goes of a sealed gate beneath Honorwatch, older than the hills and the rivers around it, and that three blades were tied to unlocking it- but as for the third blade Corin didn't know anything. 

Goal met, curiosities satisfied, and with many new questions the party returns to Yonwell uneventfully and prepares for their journey to Taubey.

Session 8

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of Eventide, Hierophant, and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Olga Derippe (level 4) Body builder, Hammer Enthusiast, Haunted by a Revenant, Death Defier, Hoardmaster, Aspiring Gym Owner

Stratford Slee (level 3) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

Piety Portendorfer (level 3) Gourmand, Survivor of a Death Curse, Notoriously not Pious, Aspiring Author

An old adventurer returns and joins the group once more. Piety had spent the last few months in Gnarledshore, looking for any records the Circle of Fire kept that could identify the strange crystal shards recovered from the mysterious cathedral the party had lucked into when investigating a cairn near Yonwell which functioned as a teleporter of sorts. Each of the statues in the cathedral gave a vision of a location and a similar cairn awaiting activation- and hinted that all of them activated at the same time would open the Cathedral's gates to the magnificent yet empty city visible from its warded windows. 

Piety discovered records of a monk at an old monastery in the Karst, north of Magda, who had come across similar crystals and had made a device that could, allegedly, locate these cairns. Knowledge in hand, she returned to the guild and joined with the rest of the party for their trip to Taubey, this time purchasing a cart for the donkey, Dunketello, as well as hiring an archer and their usual lantern boy.  

Winter has begun and snow has recently fallen, but the day looks clear as the party sets out. They stop in and chat with Alia at her shrine before they proceed north, once more examining the bloody clay pond where the old blood altar had been. This time, they spot tracks in the bloody clay, as of several large, clawed creatures emerging from it. Not wishing to make the same mistakes as previous guild members, the party studiously avoids interacting with the pond whatsoever and continue on. 

The second day finds the party traveling further north and again underneath the gaze of Honorwatch as night falls. They lighten their packs and force march through much of the night until reaching a copse of oaks outside the glare of Honorwatch. Approaching the trees and looking to shelter for the night, the party finds a dozen corpses swinging from ropes, freshly dead and bearing no marks of resistance. They spot a pit nearby and consider toughing it out despite the decorations, but despair once more when they discover the pit is deeper and darker than they had hoped. Lightening their loads and taking more exhaustion, they proceed north one more hex to shelter in the ruins of some old buildings along the road to Magda. 

Late in the night, four shuffling corpses follow along the road and attack the party. They recognize the corpses as ones that had hung from the trees earlier, nooses dragging in the snow behind them. Alma and the archer plug the first with arrows and watch it fall as an ominous buzzing emits from the corpses, and Stratford, Piety, and Olga charge forward with Piety protecting the others as Olga and Stratford pour and light lantern oil over the first corpse. Meanwhile, the other three corpses stop shambling and the buzzing gets louder and they open their mouths wide- the heads of giant locusts visible as they burst out and attack the party. Having fought locusts like these long before, the party makes quick work and cuts them all down and finally get some rest- just after Piety roasts one of the locusts and notes its strange pork flavor. Before settling in for the night Olga digs through the pockets of the now empty and dead shamblers, finding a heavy gold coin with a symbol of a man's gaping mouth on it. To her dismay, she finds that it bears the same properties as Stratford's statue and not only eats her gold but also finds that she cannot part with it.

Exhausted from the previous night's flight along the north road, the group finally reaches Magda in the early morning and get an inn and a hot bath while restocking their supplies. The town of Magda is not terribly large and notably surrounds a large hill near a river delta. The top of the hill has a chalk surrounding wall, the only access to the summit being a winding staircase from the central temple downhill. Mermaid motifs are engraved all over the town, and the party is on high alert after their initial investigations into the mermaid cult many months ago resulted in them being run out of town. With a mostly new cast, however, they once more decide to meet with the temple and see if they can learn anything new. Piety spends her time not shopping but instead fishing, and fishes a strange bass with several sets of eyes and small nodule legs. A nearby farmer warns her not to eat it as a beast in a cave upriver has been poisoning the rivers here and causing the strange mutations. After some brief discussions, the farmer gives Piety a small hand mirror and suggests she gifts it to the temple's priestesses. Excited, Piety goes and joins the rest of the group as they head into the temple. 

The priestesses outside don't speak but do bow and usher the party through the doors. In the main hall, lush pillows and a lavish table of exotic foods draw attention, but immediately on entering a thick and sweet incense begins to dull some of the party's wits. The priestesses add more of the incense to the large braziers flanking an extravagant oak throne at the end of the hall- each handful causing a small puff of green flame. An older priestess in heavy robes sits on the throne and gestures to the party to approach. 

Introducing herself as Sanesta and the leader of the Mermaid Cult, she invites the adventurers to share any tales they have and offers her own in exchange, specifically expressing an interest in any live creatures or samples that she could offer to the mermaids that dwell atop the hill in the Holy Pond. Stratford bargains as the rest of the party watches on, deciding to trade the fang he wrested from a giant snake beneath the Ranger's Guild in exchange for knowledge on how to remove the cursed statue and the cursed coin. He and Olga ascend the stairs to the pond and observe its strange milky waters and the chalk dome in the center as Sanesta calls forth a mermaid. Mist rolls into the pond and the top of an almost albino woman's face emerges from the water, reaching an arm out and examining the coin and statue before returning them and disappearing under the waters.   

Returning to the hall, Sanesta tells Stratford that the coin and statue were created by an artificer in Starmoore, specifically to sell to others who wished to curse their enemies and then ransom his curse breaking skills in exchange. Unfortunately, the means to break the curses exist only in his shop in the ruins of Starmoore- which is inaccessible still due to the Castle Demon that lairs within. Trading yet more knowledge of the region, Sanesta tells the party that they can likely find a way to avoid the Castle Demon's ire by consulting with the dogmen that roam the dunes around Starmoore and finding their secret that allows them to walk freely within. 

Piety rouses from devouring a lavish cheese board and gets her wits back, asking Sanesta if she knew anything about the strange teleporter cairn. Sanesta offers that she knows of three of them and Piety determines to return here and trade something for the knowledge of their locations later. Sanesta offers a variety of healing and even resurrection services as well in exchange for wealth or knowledge, hinting that if the party brings her whatever is tainting the river she'll gladly offer up more knowledge. The party notes down the location of the cave where the taint is said to be originating and then rests for the night and clears their exhaustion. 

In the morning, a light snowfall greets the party as they decide to set out for Taubey. Originally they had planned to wait for a river boat, but with the river icing over there won't be one for some time. Instead, they decide to follow the river east on foot and use it to guide them through the Beastwarren until they reach Taubey. Their first day of travel sees them entering the Beastwarren for the first time- its enormous trees stirring as much dread as the strange sky-scraping peaks with a hazy light behind them just visible to the far northeast. As night falls on the first day, the party sets to cooking their meal and immediately draw the attention of a colossal 40 foot tall walking tree, two hippogriffs roosting on its head. The tree stomps into the clearing and ruins their cookware and extinguishes to fire as the party scrambles to hide. With a great settling, the tree unroots again and crashes out of the camp, hippogriffs eyeing the party as they exit. Chastised, the party settles in for the night with cold rations. 

Late in the night, a shattering crack like a gunshot is heard to the north, followed by a bone chilling rattle. The sentry wakes the rest of the party just as a similar crack and rattle is heard to the south, followed by a third in response to the west. In the dark of the woods as snow falls, the party whirls to try and ready for whatever may come. After a quick argument of who will light a torch, Stratford hides himself and Olga lights a torch while the cracks continue to get closer. The light reveals the source of the sound to the north as it crosses the river to reach the party. A seven foot tall fiendish creature in the shape of a man wrapped in bone white carapace studded with spurs and spikes with a mishapen head that cocks to the side with a crack and settles with a rattle. Combat begins and Alma and Olga are immediately brought to 1HP by two of the creatures as their first of two attacks appears to horribly impair when struck. The battle continues poorly but the party manages to avoid any fatalities. Stratford leaps from the shadows and casts Body Swap on one of the creatures, prompting Piety to restrain his body for the rest of the combat. The hirelings fail their morale checks and panic, hiding in the tent for most of the fight before the archer steels her nerves and manages a lucky shot on one of the needle men. Alma's sword Eventide glows brightly and she skewers two of the needle men, leaving Stratford- in the body of the third needle man- to climb a tree and jump from a height before swapping back as the needle man cracks open on a large rock. From a previous encounter with smaller versions of these beasts, the party knows the value of the needles contained in their heads. When properly prepared, they can be sold for a high price, or used and inserted into a creature to charm them. The ethics of permanently force-charming people are briefly discussed as they set about removing the beasts heads and adding them to their packs before everyone settles to sleep again. 

In the morning, snow continues to fall and the party opts to leave the cart behind as it is nearly unusable in the wild and rough terrain of the Beastwarren. They continue following the river east and come upon a large leaning stone tower near midday. A white flash at the top of the tower draws their interest and the party decides to investigate. They climb to the entrance and find the inside to be gutted and open to the elements, a frozen layer of water at the bottom and a singular trap door at the top. Olga spots something beneath the ice and sets to cracking it open while Stratford and Piety cast spider climb and pop open the trap door. Piety enters carefully and finds the room to be covered in branches and large white feathers, smelling of horse. An opening to the outside reveals a small landing at the top of the tower but its previous occupant is nowhere to be found. Piety finds a chest hidden beneath the branches and hauls it down the tower where Olga and Stratford are still breaking the ice. 

Inside the chest, Piety finds an ornate flute with pegasi symbols. Making the obvious choice, she plays the flute and a pegasus lands outside the tower. After some careful approach, she mounts the pegasus and quickly realizes she doesn't know how to ride a pegasus and it has no saddle. The pegasus rockets into the air and by grace of Piety's spider climb spell being still active she keeps on its back long enough to get it to land again before it sets off once more. 

Beneath the ice, Olga finds a pristine shimmering silk cloak, untouched by the environment, wrapped around a fine mace with striata of a pearlescent metal running through it. After some experimentation, the party finds the silk cloak can change its color if you concentrate and Olga dons it eagerly. The mace remains a mystery but is determined to at least be a +1 weapon. 

Setting forth again the party quickly reaches their goal: Taubey. Near the river is a stadium sized two-tiered marble structure, the top sporting an enormous tree and pristine marble homes with griffons and wooden masked elves (the party has previously encountered them in the Greenspine) while the bottom looks to have been open air but is now fortified with heavy palisades. Devon, the Hunter's Pact member who first recruited Stratford, comes out with a scouting party and greets the group, ushering them inside and showing them around town. 

Taubey's central feature is an enormous longhouse where a feast is actively underway. It also sports a robust leatherworking, tanning, and smithing industry- but as most of the town appears to be feasting the party opts to join them. Inside the longhouse, the walls are covered in trophies of exotic beasts, many of which the party fails to identify. Hanging from the rafters is a forty foot long winged giant snake skeleton, shining with gold. The many tables are laden with drink and food and the party sets to feasting and mingling. 

Stratford begins his proper initiation to the Hunter's Pact by offering his trophies and telling tales of his exploits. A giant hand he carved from the giant handwolf wins a spot on the wall as well as one of the large needle man heads. The tales of the party are well received and not long into the night a ship captain picks up on a tale the party had been telling of when they had used the cairn to teleport to a strange floating stone island above a great bayside city plagued with wyverns. The ship captain shares that his crew were well familiar with it, being the western continent of Wyv, said to be filled with riches but extremely difficult to enter thanks to the winged terrors. He offers his ship's services if the party wishes to sail there and the party sets to discussing what possible treasures may resided within the floating island, now known to be rumored as the throne room of the last king of Wyv. 

The feast continues late into the night until the door bursts open and Cormac the Green and several hunter companions enter dramatically, hauling inside a freshly slain drake. To the surprise of the party, Cormac looks to be the same as his statue in the ranger's guild- from the top up. He and his companions, however, have the equine lower halves of what was thought to be mythological centaurs. Cormac cheers and the longhouse echoes as the feast continues with a fervor and the session closes out.

Knave Report 5: Pepper Dies (Again)

 In which, the party delves into Emmy Allen's Stygian Library in search for the Greatest Joke.

Dramatis Personae:

Alma Tumbler (level 5) Aspirant Ranger, purple feather mutation, Wielder of the Unknown Blade and the Lightning Bow, Chronicler and Sole Survivor of the first session

Olga Derippe (level 3) Body builder, Hammer Enthusiast, Haunted by a Revenant, Death Defier, Hoardmaster

Pepper Slorah (level 3) Expert Archer, Herbalist, Bell Priestess, Blindshot Expert, expedition leader and freshly returned from work with the Bell Priests (now retired to the status of Henchman as the player is no longer in town)

Stratford Slee (level 3) Member of the Hunter's Pact, Arguably Australian, no longer stuck at 6 HP, ex-pirate

Godwin Le Marque (level 2) Sword swinger with a Napoleon complex

Minerva Hardwick (level 2) Abandoned coward

Oswald Needle (level 2) Exotic mercenary, replaces Minerva after her untimely demise.

Into the Library

Pawel Kot

We were joined by two new players who took on Godwin and Minerva (and then Oswald), joining the party in media res at the shack in the violet soaked dunes. The party made their acquaintance and then carefully crossed the shifting grey dunes, hearing the sounds of slithering on sand and seeing vague shapes roaming the dunes. Luckily, they reached the citadel unscathed.

The citadel itself was worn grey stone, half flooded with grey sand and sinking into the dunes themselves. Climbing the entrance, they descended down a long, steep staircase until they reached an archway of black obsidian. Everything that passed through the archway slowed down, and they had to fight to cross its threshold, but ultimately they all passed and entered a small dark foyer. A sign on a desk read "ring for service" and pointed to a silver bell, the otherwise unremarkable room had only a single simple exit. Here, the grey stone floors gave way to dry wood boards with the occasional carpet while the walls were a simple cream colored plaster. 

Here, Pepper Slorah decided to quaff the potion of doom treading and forsee her potential deaths. She rolled and got three portents: 

Opening a book chained to a lectern and disappearing. 

Walking along an endless bookshelf strewn corridor when the floor opens up and she has only a glimpse of a terrible spider. 

Asleep in a tent in a grand library, a man with tentacles drooping from his face enters the tent- and all else she hears is the slurp of something being extracted and then nothing. 

Thoroughly perplexed by this, the party opens the door and gets their first glimpse at the library. Dark, with the occasional light in the far distance, maybe forty or fifty feet to the nearest ceiling. In all directions out and at haphazard placement and angles there were only bookshelves, crammed with books. The shelves all had a strange numbering system and the books contained mostly jumbled letters in endless variations. 

Godwin rings the bell at the urging of Olga, and the party takes up defensive positions as a diminutive figure in a black cloak appears from the dark shelves and sits at the desk in the foyer. After some prompting, the librarian explains the various orders of librarians and their purposes in the library, and then explains how the party should go about finding the Greatest Joke in this endless library. 

For those unfamiliar with the Stygian Library, it contains everything recorded, and endless variations on everything. I treated it as a Library of Babel-esque Escherian labyrinth. Depending on the rarity of the knowledge being looked for, the party sets a progress goal. In this case, their goal was 40- the highest recommended. To get progress, they need to get hints from creatures in the library, descend deeper, etc. Additionally, each time they descend there's a series of rolls made to randomly generate the next rooms and encounters- then link them all together. Each room descended into increases a depth score by one, and the party needs to reach their target progress and a depth of progress-20 to find their book. 

After this explanation the librarian leaves and the party decides to descend to the next room. En route, they realize that some of their weapons have gone missing- which causes a panic as several magical weapons have disappeared. Suddenly, even weapons they're carrying disappear, and Olga catches glimpse of a great, distended hand appearing from above and stealing her beloved warhammer.

Sandra Ristau

With this, the party sees a great, distended heron-headed beast with long human arms, one clutching a collection of stolen weapons and the other reaching for more. Minerva runs to the beast before it can steal more of their gear and casts Body Swap, temporarily becoming the Bandersnatch while the Bandersnatch takes control of her body. She releases the weapons and the party rearms, but her old body grabs a weapon and sprints into the dark. Minerva grabs the fleeing body swappee and then suddenly swaps back into her own body- now clutched by the beast. 

The party gets to work fighting the beast and do some damage, causing it to flee into the night- taking Olga's hammer with it. In the process, it also slowly, horribly, squeezes Minerva to death and drops the bloody pulp to the ground (causing the new player to begin rolling up the replacement character). Miraculously, the group manages to catch up to the bandersnatch and finish it off- and then are shortly later joined by Oswald Needle. They continue their journey and end up in a room filled with pipes, gears, and four grey librarians maintaining the machinery- which all supported a computer terminal. 

After some trial and error, the party finds out that the terminal is part of a great calculation machine, and they ask the machine questions about where to find the Greatest Joke- increasing their progress significantly. Speaking with the librarians proves equally helpful, and they show the party a shortcut to a lower depth. 

The party takes the shortcut and end up in a grand map room, descending through a hidden ladder in the ceiling. Checking out the room reveals a mysterious bronze globe whose clockwork machinations reveal their vague location in the library and gives some ideas on how to get to their goal. The maps on the walls are of strange and mythical lands, including central Europe in 1914 and the Ohio State Representative District number 9. 

As the searching of the room goes on, a cluster of desks stacked with paper turns violent, as the paper shapes and expands into two large Origami golems. Battle commences and the party finds their effects with nonmagical weapons to be largely ineffective, the most successful attacks being using torches to burn the golems or, in the case of Godwin, shoving one of the golems into the fireplace. Spreading fire is shortly a concern and the party scrambles into action and manages to get it under control. The desks themselves prove to contain a strange glass violin that, when played, causes a sphere of silence centered on it. There's a short discussion here about the rules of the library as they were read to them, notably don't steal from or damage the library, and the party decides that it doesn't count as stealing unless you remove it from the library and then carry on their merry journey. 

A great cone of metal and glass vials filled with varicolored mists dominates the next central room, and the party makes the connections that this must be a device for harvesting and cataloguing souls and used by the white librarians. While investigating the room, there is a scuffle where Oswald and Olga are nearly devoured by giant bookworms, but they prevail and the party acquires a spellbook from the worms' hovel which contains six spells in one item slot (but has the same casting restrictions). 

Into the next room, the party finds a hallway of statues with a staircase at the end. The statues are all lifelike and some are reclining or resting. Pepper plays the violin as the group moves through slowly, but when Alma discovers the plaques on all the statues are biographies that end with "Deceased in the hall of statues" she prompts the group to run and they make it to the staircase. 

Descending the stairs for some time, they eventually end up in front of a great stone door. Opening it reveals a room of bookshelves that contain no books, but instead large objects wrapped in white cloth that smelled of vinegar. Additionally, the room contains two chained books on lecterns which Pepper recalled for everyone as being something she foresaw killing her. They move hastily through the room and pause only long enough to see the titles on the chained books, A Way Out and Soulfire. 

In a clearing in the shelves, the group finds some old furniture and scattered floorboards. Examining the ceiling carefully for spiders, Stratford misses the opening of the trapdoor directly in front of him as a giant trapdoor spider pulls him into its hovel, paralyzing him. Luckily, he had the forethought to scream before being paralyzed and the party sets to searching for him immediately. Godwin finds the trapdoor and Pepper opens it, suddenly recalling her doom portent again just in time to be grabbed by the spider as well and pulled into its nest. 

Now, Godwin opens the trapdoor and provides room for everyone else to attack the spider crammed into the hole, but they make note of strange glass tubes filled with a pink mist that run through the nest. A terribly unlucky strike from the spider breaches one of these tubes and four horrid phantoms pour out from the tubes, causing a litany of distresses to the groups and, most tragically, one runs through Pepper, killing her on the spot. 

Two misfortunes hit at the same time. The first, Pepper falls backwards- shattering all her potions in the fall. But just as the light in her eyes fades away, her eyes turn inky black and she lets out a horrid death rattle, standing back up as flesh and muscle expands and her bones poke outwards, spiky and black. At the same time, the seven unidentified potions she was carrying mix and mingle- soaking into her wounds. Terrible octarine light pours out from her as Pepper's body warps and mutates, becoming enormous and horribly insectoid- and then disappears. But this is quickly revealed to only be an invisibility, as Not-Pepper begins attacking all around her indiscriminately. 

Alma kills the spider and the phantoms with a terrific shot from her lighting bow, but then the second misfortune hits. With a guttural and horrid laugh, a dark, hulking figure sprints at the group from beyond the light of the lanterns and grabs Olga, running into the darkness as it tries to strangle her. The revenant, returned once more, was the same one that had been slain by Olga's death ray way back in Gnarledshore and now chooses to strike again. The party flees Not-Pepper and run after the revenant whose strength proves too great for Olga to break free from. Just before the party arrives to rescue Olga, the revenant drains 600 experience from her and throws her to the ground before fleeing into the dark of the library once more, cackling the whole way. 

Lamenting the loss of Pepper, the party comes to the conclusion that they must return to the trapdoor area if they want to keep their progress, as they are very close to finding the Greatest Joke. Binding what wounds they could, the gang creeps back to the trapdoor and discover a stinking, rotting mass that was once Pepper. It does not appear to move anymore, and closer inspection reveals the mass to be dead- but also the skull is missing, a fact which is accompanied by a nefarious cackle in the distance. 

The trapdoor nest reveals a shortcut through a horrible small tunnel as well as a bounty of jeweled rings from some of the desiccated dead. Choosing to take the shortcut, the party crawls out into a large, warped wooden room with several normal exits but dominated by a horrid, gnarled black door with a lock on it and crowded with glowing red symbols. 

Something on the other side of the door knocks. 

It offers them the book they desire, or any wish, in exchange for one of their souls. 

The party refuses and heads off through one of the other exits to find the book on their own. Behind them, they hear the grinding of metal as of a door swinging open, and then closed again.

Some Notes

I should have run this using this generator, it would have been much easier. The random nature of the library was originally something I was concerned about running, but it was pretty smooth once I got generating the rooms. I'm also pretty liberally giving the party additional progress and letting them find shortcuts to cut deeper into the library than would be normally allowed.