Religion in D&D

A couple of years ago, I did a brief workup of faith and ritual in the Forgotten Realms' Shadowdale.  This was a small overview of some ideas I had to deepen and broaden how I could handle faith and religion in The Forgotten Realms campaign setting.  I should clearly note that I do not use nor am I interested in any of the changes to the setting brought about in 4th (or now 5th) edition.

A great 2nd edition resource is the Faiths & Avatars book, which gives a really good write-up on the gods and the beliefs of their followers but the truth is, The Forgotten Realms, as presented, is a somewhat unrealistic approach to ancient polytheistic belief systems.  So, drawing upon what I know from Eliade's The Sacred and the Profane, Burkert's Greek Religion, Yehezkel Kaufmann's History of the Religion of Israel, and a couple of other sources on pre-modern polytheistic belief structures.  I would love to have gotten my hands on M.A.R. Barker's article "Create a Religion in your Spare Time for Fun and Profit."  (I hear they have a copy at DriveThruRpg.)  This blog entry over at Game Over provides a nice review and summary of the article for those interested and it has helped me quite a bit.

To build on this, we honestly need to isolate a number of cultural/linguistic groups that inhabit the Realms and determine how tradition and ritual (which are very, very important parts of religion) interact with the societies. There is one, singular pantheon for all of Faerûn and that is something that really just pulls me right out of that precious suspension of disbelief because of how dramatically unrealistic it is.  After doing some thinking, I managed to pull together some ideas about how cultural interaction and communication led to a diffusion of deities throughout the Faerûnian ecumene.  This would be similar to how, during the Hellenistic and Roman periods of Mediterranean history you start seeing gods being identified with one another, mixed, and new gods form, like Serapis in Graeco-Roman Egypt, Zeus' syncretistic identification with other chief deities, and the introduction of entirely foreign cults, like Mithraism from Iran.

So, I started working backwards through Faerûnian history to break down the human deities into distinct and isolated pantheons of gods.  These are based on language groups that are also cultural groups of humans that dispersed through Faerûn--Talfiric, Calishite, Luskan, Damaran, Netherese, and Chondathan.  The Netherese gods are detailed in the 2nd edition boxed set entitled Netheril: Empire of Magic, although it is important to know that Chauntea (whom I identify as a Chondathan grain goddess) was synonymous with the Netherese goddess Jannath.

From there I started to do some work mixing and matching, looking at which gods were worshiped the most where through the sourcebooks and discovered, low and behold, that I could pull out a logical sense of consistency for a lot of these different pantheons.  It took some work but hey, back then I was a lazy college student who liked wasting time applying my new scholarship skills to frivolous stuff like D&D back in the day.

So, what are the values of these cultures?  Well, for starters, I'm going to take a look at the Chondathan culture before I start tackling other ones.  Chondathan culture is a very distinctly Western European plus good ol' corn-fed United States red-blooded American sturdiness.  The Chondathan diaspora has spread out from it's titular lands, through the Vilhon Reach, Cormyr, Sembia, the Dales, and out into the Western Heartlands where they mixed with and culturally replaced the Talfiric peoples.  Basically, the population of the Heartlands of Faerûn, from Waterdeep to the western Sea of Fallen Stars littoral, is almost entirely of Chondathan linguistic speakers.  Language and culture are intrinsically tied, so much so as to be difficult to separate one from the other, therefore, even if the genetic stock of a region isn't Chondathan, if they speak a Chondathan language, it is safe to assume they have overall Chondathan cultural traits.

Anyway, I'm digressing.  A lot.  So, let me circle away from this tangent and back to my main points.  Alright?  Okay.

Now, while reading the review of Barker's essay at Game Over, the blogger emphasizes one of Barker's key arguments about how to build these religions in his summary:

It's not just a matter of phoning it in by whipping up a few names and one-paragraph descriptors for your gods either; these are entities which are going to govern the lives and livelihoods of player characters, and so you're going to want to answer a lot of questions about the gods and the religions from the players. ...

That said, the single-paragraph description of the god is still there; Barker demonstrates just how much of a religions' nature can be derived from examining a detailed and well-written description of its god.  However, it's not actually Barker's recommended starting point. ...

...  I bring this up partly to illustrate that the essay has considerable value beyond the issue of building religions in fantasy games, and partly to demonstrate how Barker actually recommends building religions: from the ground up.  Worry about the social, the political, the economic situation on the ground, in the cultures where the player characters move - then get your arse up there and think about what kind of gods might appeal to those cultures, or might have formed those cultures through exerting influence on their situations.  Treat religion as the social process it is and you'll get something rich and deep for your trouble.

Start at the bottom then work your way up.  The problem with most DMs, setting designers, etc., is that they never, ever, ever consider the actual duties and functions of their deities within the actual structure of the society itself.  Oh, yeah, in the 2nd edition The Complete Priests' Handbook the writers and designers give all sorts of advice for creating gods, religions, clergies, etc.  It's only the tip of the iceberg.

Where can one start?

With studying actual polytheistic faith systems that really exist in the world.  No, I'm not talking about Wicca, Witchcraft, or Paganism in the modern world.  Sorry, they're honestly new inventions and while they seek to reclaim and restore much of the lost religions of the old gods of Europe, they are still very influenced by modern perceptions of those cults than the actual worship and practice of ancient religious belief.

But permit me to digress, once more, by citing an excerpt of the 3rd edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book.

Some Faerûnians zealously follow one deity.  Others make sacrifices to many deities, while upholding one as their personal patron.  Still others sacrifice to as many deities as possible, shifting allegiances as their circumstances and needs warrant.  It's a rare Faerûnian who hasn't occasionally hoped to avert the baleful influence of an evil deity with a propitious gift, or thanked a good power for an unexpected blessing.  The belief system of most Faerûnians generally centers on a particular deity whose interests and influences are most likely to affect them, but acknowledges other gods as significant and important, too.  --The Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, 3rd edition, pg. 93.

The first sentence in this paragraph describes henotheism.  The second sentence as well as the last sentence describe monolatry.  Everything in the middle describes standard polytheism or (at most) kathenotheism.  In function, however, especially through the cleric and paladin character class, what we mostly get in Faerûn is henotheism and monolatrism.  This smacks me as problematic, especially because the common needs of the populace will require frequent appeals to a variety of deities.

If you read pages 93 and 94 of the 3rd edition Campaign Setting, it paints a fairly believable and solid picture of religion in theory but in practice most DMs simply take the easy way out--monolatry and henotheism, all clergy are paladins, monks, and clerics, etc.  The Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting makes it clear that "most of a Temple's clergy are not clerics."  It goes on to say, "They're experts, aristocrats, even commoners who serve as advisors and counselors to the faithful and officiate at routine observances.  A cleric usually leads any particular temple, shrine, or order, judiciously using her spells to aid sick or injured followers and assist the local authorities in maintaining law and order in the community as it suits the deity in question."

Here, the authors actually undo some of what they were trying to build--true actual polytheism.  The key here is where they say, "the faithful" and "followers."  This can mislead players and DMs alike into the assumption that the clergy of a temple only administers to those who follow their deity and their deity alone.

When studying polytheistic belief systems, I tend to lean toward the Graeco-Roman traditions (specifically because I specialized in Graeco-Roman history, society, and culture in my undergrad and grad school days) and modern-day polytheistic traditions like Hinduism and Shinto.

I have a lot of exposure to Shinto through my stuc., and receive a good-luck charm that would bless their efforts in study with hopes that they would pass their university entrance examinations.  These students were not henotheists or monolatrists like the bulk of D&D non-player-characters and player-characters.  The temple provided a specific service to the students by taking offerings dedicated to Tenjin and interceding with the kami in order to grant his favor to the students.

So what do temples do?  They provide services to the populace but also to the state.  Their job is to be a basis for tradition so as to curry favor with the gods so that peace and prosperity is ensured, misfortune and catastrophe are prevented or warded off, and the cultural traditions continue.  The D&D campaign worlds are far too influenced by Christianity (whether players and DMs like it or not) in that each god has a sort of salvation or promised afterlife for their worshipers.  Relationship with the divine is a part of Judeo-Christian faith (more Christianity than modern Judaism, though).  Polytheists don't often seek to have a personal relationship with the divine unless they're rulers or dies of Japanese history and culture, as well as having visited a couple Shinto temples in Japan.  What I saw, for example, at the Tenman-gu shrine to Tenjin, the Shinto god of scholarship, made me realize that D&D (in particular) and role-playing games' designers (in general) have religion all wrong.

I arrived at Tenman-gu around the time when Exam Hell was just starting to ramp up.  Students would come to the temple and make offerings to Tenjin in money, incense, etoracles and even then it is rare because too much attention from the gods invites calamity as much as fortune.

So temples don't exist for the individual to develop a relationship with the god.  They're not where the populace go in order to commune with the deity.  They're where the populace go to offer sacrifice and store-houses or treasuries for various offerings.  They could also be a place where certain things are stored safely, like how the Temple of Saturn in ancient Republican Rome was the site of the Roman state's treasury and also where legal documents (like contracts, wills & testaments, etc.), archives, seals, and original measurement templates were kept.  They could be clinics, like the temples of Asclepius, the Graeco-Roman god of healing, or places where sacred prostitutes were sought, like the Temples of Ishtar or Ianna in ancient Mesopotamia.

Alright, what does the clergy do?  The clergy has knowledge.  This knowledge could take many forms.  It could simply be the knowledge of when and where to plow, when to sow and when to harvest.  It could be analysis of the calendar in order to decide what days are fasti and which are nefas.  It could be knowledge of medicine and healing, or how to examine entrails or flights of birds to divine the gods' will.  Some clergies may have knowledge of exorcism and warding against ghosts, evil spirits, or plain bad luck.  Still others will observe and maintain the markers of boundaries.  Even irrigation and water management has been known to fall under the auspices of temples in Bali.  Most importantly, however, the clergy of a temple has knowledge of how to carry out tradition, how to avoid ritual impurity, how to be cleansed of ritual impurity, when and how to store and display sacred relics and cult statues, when and how to perform ritual dances, how to offer sacrifice, what hymns to sing and their words, what songs or stories to tell and when, how to recreate and commemorate sacred events, and how to communicate to the gods both the fidelity of the populace and their needs, wishes and desires.

Notice that I say "the populace" and not "the people."  Polytheistic deities were often perceived as detached and distant.  This is especially apparent in Republican Rome where the primary gods were gods of the state.  The gods were more concerned with Rome as a whole than with each and every individual living in the city or countryside.

A major important concept to note is that religion is going to vary from region to region, especially in the form of traditions, cultic practices, sacrifices, festivals, and other details.  While in a wide Faerûnian ecumene it is likely that specific similarities in practices and traditions are going to be common, there is not much likelihood of there being any strict set of doctrines and dogmas.  Shinto doesn't have much in the way of guiding texts or dogmatic scriptures, for example.  Hinduism has numerous holy texts and different sects of Hinduism value the various texts differently.  Buddhism has a great many holy texts.  Greek, Roman, and Egyptian religion didn't have much in the way of holy texts that were monopolized by the temples and considered specifically holy and sacred.

Thus, a great starting point for actually building a believable religious tradition for your role-playing world will start at the ground and work its way up.  A phenomenal example of a compelling religious tradition can be found in the video game The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind.  The Tribunal Temple, the primary religion of the dark elves of the setting, is full of lore, hierarchies, functions, dogmas, traditions, rituals, and volume upon volume upon volume of in-game sacred texts, scriptures, and writings that the player can read and participate in.

Religion in D&D: Faith in the Forgotten Realm's Shadowdale

It's late and I'm musing on some of the things I did to deepen religion and illustrate faith-in-practice in the Dales.  I was heavily influenced by Walter Burkert's Religion in Ancient Greece and Mircea Eliade's The Sacred and the Profane.

Let me zero in on one specific area of the Dalelands--Shadowdale.  It has three temples, one to Tymora (goddess of luck), one to Lathander (the god of mornings and light), and one to Chauntea (the earth goddess).  Each one is a cultic center and each has its own rites, rituals, and means of currying favor with the gods.  In addition, there's a shrine to Mystra (goddess of magic) and Tyr (god of justice) in the village environs.

Let's start with Chauntea, the earth goddess.  This temple is vitally important to the village, as it's surrounded by farms and therefore very rural and agriculturally oriented.  The priests of Chauntea are keepers of agricultural lore and as such, they are called upon by the people to perform ritual cleansing ceremonies and blessings of the soil before it is tilled.  The details are simple in my head, but if the characters investigate, I can make them more complex.  Perhaps a procession around the boundaries of the field is conducted and holy water is sprinkled along the border to ward off evil or blight.  Songs and chants are sung during this procession and incense is burned.  Then, maybe, an offering of last year's harvest is given to Chauntea and burned at the center of the field.  The officiating priest plows the first furrow and sows the ashes into the ground.

Simple.  And yet it creates a deep and powerful meaning for the players.  The gods are real, their favor is curried.  They are called upon to aid the works of their devotees.  Although each NPC and player may have a patron deity, the inhabitants of the world will seek the benevolence of the gods.  Rituals in which sacred time is experienced and sacred events are reenacted may be crucial to the cults of each temple, bringing the celebrants and the god in closer communion.  For example, at the dawning of the sun during the winter solstice, the first rays shine upon a golden disc in the Temple of Lathander.  Before that, the priests may intone drearily that all is primordial darkness and chaos rules.  Once the sun breaches the horizon, the priests will praise Lathander with song, crying out that light is born and order is generated--the sacred reenactment of the first dawn in which the sun is reborn and begins its journey from the southern to the northern skies brings the priests and the people of Shadowdale into closer communion with Lathander.

Each town may have their own traditions and rituals.  In Shadowdale, during the midsummer festival, the children will make small paper or wooden boats, each with a wafer, berry, copper coin, or other minor offering, and set it into the River Ashaba as an offering to the water wizard who died there and gave the river its name centuries ago.  In Mistledale, they throw flowers into the river in the wizard's memory during the festival and ask the wizard to protect the village.  These offerings may, indeed, bear fruit for if Zhentil Keep sends forces to conquer the settlements, the river may remember these deeds and rise up against the Zhentarim and protect those who made the offerings.

Thus, the wizard Ashaba is a saint to the people of both Shadowdale and Mistledale.  Sylune, the Witch of Shadowdale, who fell defending the settlement from a dragon, may also be worshiped and honored as a saint, with offerings of flowers, coins, incense, food, or candles at her grave and shrine beneath the village citadel.  The remains of her hut where she died may be the site of an annual gathering of all the women in the village, who perform a ceremony that reenacts her brave death and commemorates her sacrifice.

When my players enter my worlds, I do endeavor to make those worlds real and breathing, even if I didn't create those worlds myself.  I still want the players to feel that these worlds are alive.  I want them to know that clerics and paladins aren't just character classes with duties demanded by role-playing mechanics.   They are a part of a religious continuum and have social and religious roles to play in the party and the world at large.

Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Twelve

A dozen sessions and running strong! This latest session was mostly roleplaying. However, the PCs managed to finish the dungeon beneath the Twisted Tower of Ashaba, freeing nearly 40 dwarven slaves from the drow and chasing the overmage off. Their raid on the drow fortress resulted in a humongous haul. They emerged from the tunnels, gave a full report to Thurbal, and were given 20% of all loot as per the agreement, amounting to nearly 3,000 gp all told. Lord Mourngrym and Thurbal (captain of the Shadowdale guard) were so impressed that their payment was tripled, to 300 gp per person.

A lot of character development took place. Vlad discussed his secret god with Lhaeo, who dug up some information from old tomes and identified Vlad's benefactor as Jergal, an ancient deity of death and endings once worshiped in Netheril thousands of years ago before Bane, Bhaal, and Myrkul won most of his portfolio from him (allowing Jergal to retire to the position of seneschal of Myrkul's Bone Castle). With the death of Bane, Bhaal, and Myrkul during the Time of Troubles, Cyric usurped all of their portfolios and now Jergal is a very frustrated deity due to Cyric's chaotic and vengeful nature.

Sven discussed the death of his Harper parents with Storm Silverhand, resident of Shadowdale, one of the legendary Seven Sisters, Harper, and former Knight of Myth Drannor. Later, as the party traveled south toward Mistledale through the elven forest, Sven's felt a calling in his elven blood. He keenly felt the loss the forest has experienced since the Retreat of the elves from Cormanthor. This has made him a bit moody and introspective. We'll see how he deals with the mixing of human and elven blood in his veins as the adventures continue.

The PCs paid many of their commissions, bought horses, a wagon, an alchemist's lab for Vlad, and a chest with an amazing lock for their communal treasure, then set out along the Mistle Trail beneath the eaves of Cormanthor along the River Ashaba. After many days journey, they arrived at the town of Elven Crossing, where they spent the night, then arrived the next day in the town of Ashabenford. When we next meet, perhaps their journey will continue toward Deepingdale, where the sage Rhauntides and the Leaves of Learning (the Temple of Oghma) may harbor knowledge that will lead them to the home of the wizard Finott or the location of the Sword of the Dales.

Sessions like this are why I love the Realms. Through the PCs' explorations, I get to see the Forgotten Realms come to life. Having Vlad interact with Lhaeo, Elminster's apprentice, and discover his benefactor is an ancient Netherese deity was really cool, but so was all of the development Sven has been experiencing as well. I never would have thought that I'd get to portray one of Ed Greenwood's original PCs, Storm Silverhand--legendary Harper and Knight of Myth Drannor. There are a variety of paths the PCs could take to reach Deepingdale. I'm excited to see where they go and what happens to them along the way! Let the dice fall where they may!

Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Eight, Nine, Ten, and Eleven

First, a quick recap of our characters (more details can be found here).

Baravis: Played by Luke. A tiefling from Sigil, currently a 3rd-level Favored Soul (of Marthammor Duin) and 2nd-level Warlock.

Sven Lackman: Played by Shaun. A half-elf Waterdhavian Urban Ranger 2/Rogue 3 who seeks vengeance against the Cult of the Dragon for the murder of his Harper parents.

Drog Fangblade: A Rashemar 5th-level barbarian on his dajemma.

Vlad: A Zhent 4th-level Dread Necromancer who is seeking for his hidden, secret god.

Our Story Thus Far: After solving the riddle of the Dream Fever in Dagger Falls, the PCs came to Shadowdale searching for answers to several more clues--Baravis for a way home, Vlad for the secret god he seeks, and everyone for the location of the Sword of the Dales. They commissioned several weapons and armors from the local businesses and took up a reconnaissance job with the Twisted Tower in hopes that it could help them solve the puzzle as to what sort of stampeding herds were trampling the farms north of the Old Skull hill. They were offered 100 gp each and 20% of all loot acquired beneath the Twisted Tower of Ashaba as payment for mapping the tunnels and clearing out all monsters. They descended beneath the tower, fought a few quaggoths, boogins (half-orc, half-quaggoth), and a half-orc.

Part Nine
After defeating a group of boogins, led by a half-orc, they discovered an emaciated dwarf who called himself Simon Stonebreaker. Simon had apparently escaped from a dark-elven slave pit deeper in the tunnels. He led the PCs to a large room with an exit. They gave him a weapon and sent him to the surface.

The pool of water in the room contained an aballin--aka a "living water," a magical ooze that tried to absorb and suffocate both Drog and Sven before Vlad, thinking quickly, threw an open vial of Drow poison into the creature. The diluted poison knocked Sven out, but also did the same to the aballin.

The PCs then began to crawl down a long, low, thin tunnel that extended for hundreds of feet. Baravis blasted a swarm of rats, but was forced to hide behind his shield when the cave badger that was chasing the rats attacked him. Sven managed to kill the badger and they continued.

Part Ten
They made their way to a huge cavern with many exits and determined to explore as much as they could after resting many hours. They were almost taken in by a huge illusory treasure hoard (Drog kept feeling uneasy and I let him make a second Will save to disbelieve, which he did). Excellent roleplaying ensued in which Drog convinced the other PCs to disbelieve the illusion as well. Continued scouting led the PCs into an ambush by Mongrelmen and a drow patrol, which they dispatched. They crossed a chasm, encountered a gelatinous cube, then fled back across and pelted the cube until it collapsed into a gooey mass. (This was quite funny, as only Luke knew what the cube was. When I revealed the cube to the PCs on MapTool, Luke freaked out, screaming "run!") But that wasn't all the running they did. They stumbled upon the lair of a drider, and spent several rounds fleeing that as well. Luke's spider walk enabled him to cross the chasm, but Sven and Drog managed to successfully jump across it like something from an action movie. They continued fleeing until they were certain the drider had given up pursuit. At the end of the session, they encountered Tirrendale Talltales, a dwarven cleric whose voicebox had been severely damaged by a drow slaver. He told the PCs that the dwarves had been sold to the drow by the Zhentarim and the drow overmage was turning them into a horde of gibberlings that he released into the tunnels. The gibberlings would then pour out of a cave in the northern face of the Old Skull, descend and rampage through the fields in dead of night to pour into the forests and hopefully begin to destabilize the area during planting season.

Part Eleven
Armed with new information, the PCs found the secret tunnel that led to the drow fortress. They fought their way past another guardpost of ambushing Mongrelmen and plundered their corpses. They equipped themselves with the most excellent drowcraft adamantine mesh armor, drowcraft enchanted short swords, drow poisons, and prepared to turn the drow's own weapons against them (this really upped the chances they'd survive the upcoming encounters--without doing this, I doubt they'd have been able to succeed so well). But first, they finished mapping the regular tunnels, slew a carrion crawler in a drow graveyard, dispatched four monstrous spiders in a vast lair, burned the webs, and amassed as much treasure as possible from the enormous room (which they knew wasn't everything, but time was pressing in).

They rested and returned to the secret passage. Baravis used his spider walk to cross the lake beyond the Mongrelmen outpost by sticking to the cavern walls. He commandeered a boat and soon the entire party was across. Baravis and Tirrendale (the dwarven cleric) found a set of secret doors, Sven discovered how to bypass the trap set there. Beyond lay a chasm full of lava and a raised stone drawbridge on the other side. Vlad blew the code they had found (on a scrap of paper in a Mongrelman's pocket) on the horn dangling on their side of the chasm. The drawbridge lowered and the PCs (with NPC Tirrendale) charged and overwhelmed the Mongrelmen beyond.

As they made their way into the drow fortress, they heard a female voice chanting eerily. (I played Kanno Yokko's "A Sai En" for the drow chanting.) Baravis lept to the ceiling and together with Drog, bellowed out a roaring challenge. Silence fell deeper in the fortress and the party charged around the corner (Baravis, with his satanic features was quite intimidating crawling on the ceiling and yelling curses in Infernal).

The following encounter could have killed the PCs. As it were, three things saved them. 1) The dice were on their side. They rolled well, their opponents failed most poison saves, while they passed almost all of theirs (save one). Only one critical hit struck them, nearly incapacitating Vlad. 2) They had Tirrendale to throw a couple of cure light wounds at them. 3) They had the drow adamantine armor and drow-poisoned weapons.

Four quaggoths and three drow fighters (2nd-level) charged them, while the drow priestess tried to hit Drog with hold person and the drow sorcerer slung Melf's acid arrow at them (missing every time). Drog muscled through the hold person. Sven's two-weapon fighting with drow-poisoned blades put many a quaggoth unconscious and swayed the battle in the party's favor decisively. Drog finally fell unconscious beneath a poisoned drow-blade but the tide had already turned. The unconscious quaggoths were dispatched, the drow fighters were slain, and the priestess cast meld into stone and the sorcerer simply vanished. The PCs and Tirrendale now stand in a vast cathedral-like cavern with an altar to Lolth on a dais. We'll find out what happens next on Friday.

Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Eight

A summary and cast of PCs can be found here, at the beginning of Session 6's AAR.

The PCs decided to take a reconnaissance job for the Twisted Tower. After negotiating the agreement with Thurbal, captain of the guard for the Tower of Ashaba, the PCs commissioned a few new sets of armor and weapons with some of their spoils from Daggerdale.

At midday, they arrived at the Twisted Tower the following day and were escorted through the tower dungeons (where they made offerings at the shrine for Sylune, the Lady of Shadowdale and fallen hero). They were escorted through a few doors and given a key and a parchment with the password to the next door.

They crossed an underground stream via a stone bridge. Baravis used his new spider walk invocation to guide PCs across the bridge. At the next door, they spoke the magic word to unbar the door and the parchment fizzled to ash. They opened the door, avoided a descending ceiling trap, and were attacked by two shaggy humanoid creatures with bastard swords. They dispatched them with ease, then plunged deeper into the dark tunnels.

They unraveled an illusory dead-end, found a secret door, and eventually made their way into a twisted series of water-carved tunnels when they heard the sound of voices approaching. When they heard in orcish "We'll find the dwarven wretch, then it's mealtime for everyone!" Baravis cried in dwarven "Over here you coward!"

Around a bend, a half-orc and five shaggy creatures (that looked like a cross between orcs and those things they had fought earlier) came round the bend and a tremendous fight ensued. The PCs made short work of three of the shaggy beasts when the rest retreated. A running fight ensued during which Sven was cut down, but Baravis healed him. (Sven always gets put below 0 hp in battle, the poor guy!) The session ended after the fight and will resume next time in the twisted tunnels.

Hungerover Heroes Guild, Part Six

CAST OF CHARACTERS
Baravis: Played by Luke. A tiefling warlock 1/favored soul 1 from Sigil, he knew something strange was up when a few guys bearing pendants with a black sun and white skull tried to kill or kidnap him. One day, walking through the streets of Sigil, he did something to annoy the Scratcher who basically portaled him to Faerûn. He wandered through the forests until he found Drog encamped by a path. Resigned to his fate, he seeks an answer to why the Cyricists (whose symbol he's identified as theirs) want him dead. He's become a follower of Marthammor Duin, the Dwarven god of wanderers, with whom he's made a pact.

Drog: Played by DJ. A Rashemar barbarian 2 who is on his dajemma--his coming-of-age journey into the lands outside of Rashemen. A stalwart warrior of honor who has a way with the ladies (who admire his rugged looks and massive muscles).

Sven Lackman: Played by Shaun. A half-elven rogue 1/urban ranger 1 from Waterdeep whose parents were Harpers murdered by the Cult of the Dragon. He has devoted himself to Hoar, god of vengeance and swift justice. Sven is being a bit retooled by Shaun (with DM consent). Sven is a bit reckless and impatient, but is developing into a powerful finesse fighter.

Vlad: Played by Alex. Vlad's parents were Zhents who died during the Banedeath, when the priests of Cyric murdered (or forcibly converted) all followers of Bane in Zhentil Keep. Left for dead, a nameless god approached Vlad and made an agreement with him--Vlad would become a dread necromancer (see Heroes of Horror) so long as he kept the Pact. Vlad seeks for the truth of this unknown deity while swearing vengeance against Cyric and all of his followers.

THE STORY THUS FAR
The PCs met in Shadowdale, where they heard rumors of a Dream Fever in Dagger Falls, chief town in Daggerdale. Forty or fifty years past, the Zhentarim (a.k.a. the Black Network) ousted the rightful rulers of Daggerdale and backed a usurper, Malyk. Then, twenty years past, Randal Morn and the Knights of Myth Drannor slew Malyk and retook the Dale. Zhentilar forces then invaded and captured all of the Dale north of the Dagger River. Randal Morn leads his Freedom Riders and only controls part of the Dale, while the Zhentarim controls Dagger Falls and the Zhentilar (the army of Zhentil Keep) extorts or raids villages between the Tesh and Dagger rivers.

They set off, encountering the Brightblade dwarven clan at Anathar's Dell and learning that two hundred years past, Colderan Morn, Lord of Daggerdale, exiled them from their home in Eagle's Eyrie, overlooking Dagger Falls. They encountered a patrol of Freedom Riders, who took them to Randal Morn. They were tried for being suspected Zhentarim (Vlad's accent gave him away as a Zhent), but Tunfer the Stout's zone of truth spell exonerated them. With Randal Morn's favor, they arrived at Dagger Falls and cleared out the Eagle's Eyrie.

They made contact with Loudon the Cooper, a supporter of Randal Morn, at the Red Rock tavern, but were captured later at the Teshford Arms inn resisting a summons by the Constable. Sven's attempted knifing of a mercenary in the Constable's employ and Vlad's spellslinging got them booted from town without their gear and Vlad slated for a caravan back to Zhentil Keep. But all was not lost--the Brightblade dwarves, on a pilgrimage to the Eyrie disguised as traveling tinkers, discovered the PCs had cleared it out and began to restore it in secret, giving the PCs a base of operations. They staged a daring rescue on Vlad's caravan, then snuck into town, headed for the ruined Temple of Lathander, having learned that all the troubles with the Dream Fever and the strange wood-woses (mysterious dwarf-sized night stalkers) had begun shortly after Eragyn the Dark, priestess of Cyric, had disappeared in the Temple crypts.

The PCs battled several wood-woses and a juvenile hook horror, befriended a nixie, and even met Colderan Morn himself--not 200-years dead as they had once suspected.

Session Six
The PCs made their way to Colderan's headquarters, centered around his crypt, and a great battle ensued. Colderan was ready for them--4 skeletons attacked as they entered the anteroom. Colderan created a wall of thorns and ordered his remaining wood-woses to gather his things and help him escape. The PCs managed to kill most of the wood-woses, but during the battle (which was fought in several rooms and corridors) Colderan escaped, trapping Sven in another wall of thorns and nearly killing him (negative hit points). Baravis stabilized him with a cure minor wounds orison, Drog hacked him out of the thorns, and the PCs discovered eight sleepers, several corpses, a strange net, a treasury, and Colderan's library and notes. After reading through his notes, the PCs destroyed the net of dreams (the cause of the fever) and the sleepers began to awake. Among them was Eragyn the Dark and a Zhent guardsman. Eragyn had been bound and gagged, but Baravis and Vlad disagreed on what to do with her. Vlad wanted to kill her outright--she was evil and served and evil god. Baravis wanted her to stand trial for her wickedness. They quarreled and Drog broke it up. Baravis tried to talk with her, but gave up all attempts at diplomacy when Vlad vocally advocated killing her outright. Eragyn saw the PCs as traitors, especially considering they were still wearing the Zhentilar tabards with the arms of the occupying forces.
They followed a passageway to a wall of masonry. A dwarf victim of the Dream Fever, Boront, found a secret door into a room full of confiscated contraband--including the confiscated masterwork studded leather Baravis had commissioned, Sven's masterwork dagger, and Drog's masterwork greatsword. Franter, the Zhent guard, exclaimed that the secret door led into one of the basements of the Constable's Tower! Baravis, hoping to make peace with the Constable (at least, for now) sent Franter up to the Constable. The plan backfired. Zhentilar troops opened the trapdoor with crossbows trained on the PCs. Eragyn was freed by the troops and the PCs fled through the secret door. They closed it, hoping the Zhentilar wouldn't locate the opening mechanisms. Just to be sure, Drog jammed a sword into the doorjam to block it.

The situation looked hopeless. The Zhentilar would be waiting at the temple entrance for the PCs. So, they decided to escape via the underground river.

Led by Boront (to whom Drog had given a longsword), the townsfolk fled through the tunnels and out of the temple, while Drog, Vlad, Baravis, and Sven (whom Baravis had healed with cure light wounds to demonstrate the power of a benevolent deity to Eragyn) managed to escape the tunnels via the stream. When I revealed (using Maptool) that the stream had spilled them out at the waterfall, the players cheered in triumph. Yet another seemingly hopeless situation turned into a victory by the PCs.

Colderan had escaped. Eragyn was attempting to seize control of Dagger Falls from Constable Tren Noemfor. However, the Dream Fever had been ended and the townspeople were safe from the depredations of the wood-woses. Colderan's plans to take over the town were foiled, as were any hopes of him allying with (or being backed by) the Zhentarim. The PCs had made some enemies, but as they rested the rest of the day in the Eagle's Eyrie, they knew that they had succeeded at something worthwhile. Now, they had to contact Loudon the Cooper for their reward, try to find Randal Morn to warn him of Colderan, his thrice-great grandfather, and return the holy relics of Lathander that they had discovered to the Temple of Lathander in Shadowdale. Baravis leveled up (now a 3rd-level character). However, Sven may have contracted filth fever from the swarm Colderan had summoned beneath him. The path ahead is murky yet filled with possibilities.

Arms of the Zhentilar
Army of Zhentil Keep

Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Five

Well, the current adventure (in case you're wondering, I'm running, or trying to run, the Doom of Daggerdale adventure, which you can peruse in order to see just how far the PCs have deviated from the adventure) is drawing to a close. Our heroes have finally made it into the catacombs beneath the Temple of Lathander, seeking out the Priestess of Cyric, Eragyn, hoping to put an end to her and with her, the Dream Fever that's been plaguing the folk of the Dale.

We had to split this session into two short ones because of Alex's (Vlad's player) work schedule.

Session One
Having successfully rescued Vlad, the PCs and their dwarven allies flee into the forest as an Zhentilar patrol heads toward the scene of the combat. They'd seen the ambush from the parapets atop the River Gate in Dagger Falls and sent reinforcements to see if they could save the caravan. They arrived moments too late.

The PCs and their allies fled into the forest, but Baravis managed to sneak back to spy. He managed to hear that the patrol misidentified the tracks (their scout rolled a 1) and thought that goblins had attacked the caravan. Once they realized the caravan wagons had managed to escape, they returned to Dagger Falls. Sighing with relief, the PCs and dwarves walked two more miles downstream and fashioned a raft to cross the River Tesh. They returned to the Eagle's Eyrie by nightfall.

That evening, Baravis received a vision from Marthammor Duin, the dwarven god of wandering, living aboveground, and friendship with non-dwarves. Baravis pledged to aid and protect dwarves wherever they may be and to serve Marthammor Duin faithfully. He awoke with a level of Favored Soul (see Complete Divine) and immediately cast cure light wounds on any dwarves injured during the caravan fight. He then tended to his party members.

The dwarves were impressed by this. Kuldar, the chief of the dwarves, gave Baravis a copy of their holy texts to guide and shape his newfound faith. It was like roleplaying the birth of an apostle or saint of some sort. The Brightblade dwarves finished the chitin armor for Drog (DJ's Rashemar 2nd-level barbarian) as a gift for the PC's clearing of the Eyrie and returning it to the Brightblade clan. However, they feared for the safety and secrecy of their new outpost so they wished for no further risks, what with the Zhentarim so near in Dagger Falls.

After a few days of spying on Dagger Falls from the Eyrie, the PCs planned to infiltrate the town and sneak into the Temple at night. As they approached the Teshford Arms, they saw two off-duty Zhentilar ambushed and killed by the strange, short night creatures. When the creatures began to drag the bodies toward the woods, the PCs ambushed and killed them. They discovered that the creatures bled sap, and that sap was also coating the copper spearheads the creatures wielded. Baravis realized that it was a poison. Drog took two of the spears for future use. Vlad and Baravis donned the tabards and chain mail of the fallen Zhentilar and hid the bodies in the woods. Then, everyone snuck across the river. Drog and Sven took a long, circuitous route through outlying fields to avoid any Zhentilar in the town beyond the walls; they witnessed two more of those creatures sneaking into a house. Sven advised inaction: "We can't save them, we have to stick to the plan." They watched from the distance as the two creatures exited through the window of the cottage with a shimmering net or web. They then vanished into the night. Drog and Sven met up with Vlad and Baravis near the Forest Gate of the town. Using their disguises and Vlad's native Zhent accent, they convinced the two gate guards that they were their relief. Happy to go and drink, the Zhentilar left, allowing Baravis to open the portcullis enough for Drog and Sven to crawl under.

They snuck through the town, sticking close to the town wall, then saw the two night creatures climb into the ruins of the Temple of Lathander ahead of them. The PCs followed, sneaking past the guards stationed at the temple and going down into the darkness.

Session Two
They descended the stairs in the ruin, avoided fighting two osquips (territorial rodent-creatures) in the wine cellar and crept through the catacombs beneath the temple. There they discovered a secret door leading to a room containing the holy items of Lathander's temple--silver censers, golden candlesticks, and a holy symbol. They agreed to return these to the temple and prayed to Lathander before they took the objects.

They found a hole in one crypt that led to tunnels. They followed the twisting path until they encountered a young (medium-sized and not-so-powerful) hook horror. Despite its size, it still gave the PCs a good pounding, but luckily Baravis could heal. However, the noise of the fight drew some of the night-creature scouts. Soon, a battle ensued, and the PCs had slain five of the creatures, with Drog and Sven managing to avoid the effects of their poison blades. Baravis took the head of one as evidence in case they encountered the Constable on their way out.

They eventually found a small pool in a cavern. Baravis threw the head into the pool, wanting to make certain there wasn't an evil creature there. The head flew out and Baravis was harshly reprimanded by the fairy spirit of the pool, a nixie named Mara. Casting purify food and drink on the pool as a penance, Baravis gained her good graces. Drog, familiar with the worship of nature spirits and things fairy, charmed the nixie with conversation. Indeed, DJ admitted his character wanted to sleep with Mara, but I told him he's lucky because she could have charmed him and he could have ended up living with her for a hundred years or until she got bored of him.

Anyway, Mara told them about the night-creatures (she called them wood-woses) and said they were the most unseelie of things. Ever since the evil priestess came down into the catacombs, things have been going bad, but the wood-woses avoid Mara's pool.

Judging that it was safe, the PCs decided to rest here. Around the end of the eighth hour, though, a wall of thorns blocked off both exits from Mara's cave. A booming voice demanded, "Who are you and why are you here?"

The PCs identified themselves and their quest. "I am Colderan Morn, Colderan the Razor, Mage-Lord of Daggerdale, Conjuror of the Dark Wood. You have entered my house and slain my servitors!"

"We only seek to help. Your people are suffering because of the Dream Fever and your servitors."

"It is unfortunate, but necessary. I will tell you this once, leave or perish." The PCs protested. The voice repeated, "You will leave my house or you will die here!"

Then... across the table from me, Shaun said it. And everybody just stared at him with dropped jaws. "F--- off!"

Whomever it was wasted no time, immediately casting summon swarm. A boiling surge of rats erupted beneath Sven's feet. Baravis pleaded (successfully) for the caster to stop (which he did, although the spell's duration is concentration +2 rounds). The swarm dispersed eventually, leaving Sven with 0 hp and possibly filth fever. When Baravis mentioned the Brightblade dwarves, the caster's voice grew accusatory.

"You are allied with the dwarves! Treacherous thieves and murderers! They slew my beloved Bellessaria! I will have no truck with their allies!" With that, the voice was gone.

The PCs used one of the vials of alchemist's fire to destroy one of the walls of thorns. They came to an abandoned circle of poisonous mushrooms (destroying 13 of which looked like wood-woses in fetal form), found a passage that descended toward a river, and eventually came to another wall of thorns that blocked further passage. The PCs hacked their way through the wall and came to a locked door with a guardian watchdog. Sven (who had been healed back up to half his hp) befriended the dog with wild empathy (he's now a 1st-level rogue, 1st-level urban ranger). Without thieves tools (they'd been confiscated in Part Four), they couldn't pick the lock, so Drog spent four rounds noisily chopping the door down. They entered a small antechamber with arrowslits and another door. Upon opening the second door, Baravis (who had gone ahead) found himself met with four skeletons.

And that's where we stopped. Play resumes tomorrow night where we will use Maptool on our laptops at the table instead of miniatures. Most play will use pen-and-paper, though. Maptool is simply to help us navigate through the logistics and movement aspects of gaming more quickly than miniatures, but I must admit, it takes a lot longer to set up and prepare adventures and campaigns (at least, at the level of detail I prefer). It has the potential to speed up games quite a bit, and allows for online gaming, but unfortunately, it takes a LOT of prep time.

The Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Four

The Flag of Zhentil Keep

Sometimes, a DM has to be a jerk in order to make the world believable and more importantly to adjudicate fairly. This is difficult, especially when the DM likes the characters and the players and doesn't want to ruin the fun.

Case in point, Session Four of my Forgotten Realms game.

In Session Three, the PCs cleared out the Eagle's Eyrie, an old Dwarven outpost that had been built into a rocky crag just south of Dagger Falls across the River Tesh. It once overlooked the trade routes east to the Moonsea and south through the Dales from the ancient Dwarf realm of Tethyamar. During the session, they'd fought two goblins, managed to scare off a brown bear by banging metal items together, gotten scratched by eagles, bitten by a swarm of bats, and assaulted by fire beetles. Baravis (Luke's character), the tiefling warlock, said a few prayers to Marthammor Duin, the dwarven god of wanderers and exiles, asking him that the Brightblade Clan could have their home back.

Baravis seems to have developed a real liking for the dwarven people.

Well, as the new session picked up they were drinking at the Teshford Arms across the ford from Dagger Falls when two mercenaries and an orcish messenger entered and demanded the PCs come with them to see the Constable, Tren Noemfor. Now, remember, Dagger Falls is fully under the control of the Black Network and is crawling with Zhentilar soldiers. Well, Baravis is already drunk (and hence only capable of healing 1 hp per day since he's not resting--dealing with alcohol inhibits healing because it is strenuous on your liver and other organs) and it's only 10 or 11 in the morning (his penalties due to Lathander's annoyance still apply each morning).

Well, Vlad tries to outwit the orc with questions like, "Are we the adventurers you're looking for? What are their names?" The orc only knows that he's to summon PCs matching their description into the Constable's Tower. The mercs try intimidation checks, but Baravis isn't impressed (although the others are). Baravis tries to intimidate the mercs, and is mildly successful on one. "I just wanna finish my drink."

The one merc picks up Sven's wine glass and dumps it on the floor. So, Baravis eldritch blasts the wine bottle.

Roll initiative.

POW, the one merc decks Baravis, who only has a few hp. The subdual damage is enough to knock him out. Vlad cast's cause fear on the orc, who flees, calling for the nearest Zhentilar patrol walking their beat.

In the intervening rounds, Sven's managed to stab the one mercenary, Vlad cast ray of enfeeblement, and Drog got in a fistfight with the other. Finally, the Zhentilar burst in with clubs. The owner of the inn is screaming in fury at the mess everyone is making of her bar. One-by-one, the PCs are beaten into unconsciousness by the seven Zhentilar soldiers (who, by-the-way, have the coat of arms to the left emblazoned on their surcoats and tabards). The Zhentilar kick the comatose bodies for additional subdual damage before dragging the PCs to the Constable's Tower.

They wake up in the dungeons. They're left there. Baravis tries to eldritch blast his manacles but he can't do enough damage to get around their Hardness. And besides, the racket is met with a threat to cut his hands off. They're left to dangle in chains for three days with no food or water.

Then, Baravis does the one thing that creates a glimmer of hope. He prays to Marthammor Duin.

They suffer from exhaustion and are down to 1 hp when Tren Noemfor comes to a decision. Baravis, Sven, and Drog are stripped of everything, escorted across the ford and told they're not to come back to town or they're dead men.

Now, let's recap. They're down to 1 hp, they have NO weapons, armor, gold... nothing but the clothes on their backs. Anything of worth is gone, including Sven's masterwork dagger from his family and Drog's masterwork greatsword from his grandfather. Gone. They are an inch away from a total-party-kill.

Back in the Constable's Tower, Tren Noemfor grills Vlad on why he left Zhentil Keep, what he was doing with a party of misfits like that, and what he knows about the Dream Fever and the disappearance of the priestess of Cyric beneath the ruined Temple of Lathander. This is conducted in the tower's torture chamber but Vlad satisfies Tren's curiosity so he doesn't need to be tortured. Tren says that Vlad's friends have been executed (he wanted to see Vlad's reaction) and returned Vlad's passport and belongings and put him under house arrest in the Teshford Arms inn until he is to be "escorted" home to Zhentil Keep by the next caravan. Red Morgan, the caravan chief, is given papers authorizing a formal "inquiry" of Vlad once he's reached Zhentil Keep--i.e. he's going to be tortured and if found guilty, tossed in prison or sent to work in the mines.

Well, things are looking grim. I'm actually worried. One bad encounter roll and they're toast. A goblin or kobold could kill them.

Sven and Baravis aid Drog in his Survival check (even with penalties, they find enough food and water to keep alive) and they hole up in the ruins of the lookout tower at Eagle's Eyrie (they wanted to go inside, but the bear had returned to the cavern entrance). Meanwhile, Vlad tried to go to Dulwar Leatherworker's shop but was prevented. So, he told the innkeeper to pass along a message that he needed permission to visit the leatherworker's shop and get some things he'd ordered. Bad idea.

Sven snuck to the Leatherworker's that night and discovered that the Zhentilar had gotten the message and decided to rough Dulwar up and take the masterwork studded leather armor Baravis had commissioned and paid for as well as Baravis' regular leather suit that was being repaired. Told Fulgath was just as likely to give him back his crossbow as turn him in, Sven asked Dulwar to pass a message along to Loudon the Cooper that they were holed up at Eagle's Eyrie.

Making his way back to the Eyrie, Sven dodged the brown bear by climbing a tree and discovered why it had fled it's lair--DWARVES! Marthammor Duin had heard Baravis' prayer. The message he'd asked Loudon to send to them last session paid off when the dwarves arrived to reoccupy the Eyrie. Loudon smuggled some weak weapons and a set of padded armor to the PCs, who were being bed-rest healed by a dwarven physician, and told them that Vlad was leaving in 2 days with a caravan bound for Zhentil Keep. The dwarves rewarded the PCs by taking the carapaces of the four fire beetles and fashioning a chitin breastplate worth a whole heck of a lot of gp! Baravis was named a Friend of Dwarves (he gains the honorary title "Dwarf-friend" that he can tack onto the end of his name) for his growing faith in Marthammor Duin and his services to the Brightblade Clan.

Together, they planned to raid the caravan and rescue Vlad. In the dead of night, sneaking across the river to set up an ambush, Baravis spied two short figures trying to sneak into a Dagger Falls cottage window. He eldritch blasted one, killing it. The other fled into the gloom. Baravis and the dwarves examined it, but it wasn't a dwarf. It's body was short and muscular like a dwarf, but it had brown skin, thick thatchlike hair and beard, tangled with vines, and a supple yet strong, reedlike form. All-in-all kind of treelike. When they threw the corpse into the river, it floated downstream.

Later that day, the ambush went off. The three wagons got away, but the dwarves and PCs managed to rescue Vlad and kill a powerful Zhentilar officer-woman who wielded a battleaxe and nearly killed Drog. Loot was gained, but not much. All but Vlad earned a new level (with Sven multiclassing into Urban Ranger, Drog into Ranger, and Baravis considering Cleric of Marthammor Duin and pledging himself to the dwarven god).

Lots of experience was handed out. Yes, the PCs got into a lot of trouble and lost a lot of their loot. Precious items were diced away to Zhentilar soldiers throughout the town and they may never see their heirlooms again. But they still turned what appeared as a hopeless situation into something much more positive by being smart, having faith and being in the right place at the right time. They didn't just give up. On top of that, even though it wasn't smart to do, when Baravis was knocked out by the merc, they didn't just sit back and take it, they fought together. Yeah, it was kind of dumb for Sven to draw his dagger and for Vlad to cast spells--if they hadn't resisted they'd have been taken quietly, and if they'd just brawled, they'd probably have been handed back their gear and frog-marched into the dungeon beneath Lathander's temple or kicked out of town temporarily. That wasn't too bright on their part to draw daggers and sling spells when their lives weren't in immediate danger.

But like I said, they didn't give up. It would have been easy to do so. Nope, they immediately started coming up with plans to get their stuff back and save Vlad. Triumph in the face of adversity. They earned a lot of XP for their role-playing, for not giving up despite their dire situation, for faith, for turning a hopeless situation into a victory, and for showing party solidarity in standing up for Baravis (despite his drunken foolishness in blasting the bottle and starting a fight) and saving Vlad. Great session.

The Flag of Daggerdale

The Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Three

Did I mention how much I love the Forgotten Realms? Yeah, I have. So far the Hungover Heroes (as we've dubbed them) and I are having a great time exploring this vivid, living, breathing setting as it was in the Year of the Banner, 1368 Dale Reckoning.

Alex couldn't make it tonight, so we had Vlad just hold the horses reins or sleep at the inn whenever anything was happening.

We picked up where we'd left off, a few miles north on the Tethyamar Trail from where Drog had critical-hit the ogre to death. The party continued on the next morning until they saw a curl of smoke off a side-trail in the distance. They took a short detour to investigate and discovered a burned village surrounding an equally burned motte-and-bailey fort. This was all that remained of the village of Black Switch. In the bailey, a large pile of corpses (men, women, and children) had been burned, heads had been mounted on pikes all along the stockade and a sign tacked to the gate proclaimed that all who harbored or supported Randal Morn would face a similar fate. Drog discovered a gold wedding ring in the ashes and kept it, but felt uncomfortable holding an item whose previous owner had suffered such a terrible fate (yet he hadn't wanted it to just sit in the ashes).

Early that afternoon, the party arrived at the village of Tethyamarside, fully occupied by Zhents. Seeking to pawn some of their loot, Baravis, Drog, and Sven visited the local peddler and curio shop. The elderly Daggerdalesman behind the counter was typical of his folk--he didn't trust strangers and asked Baravis to remove his hood. Baravis did so.

Now, understand, Baravis is a tiefling so he has grayish skin and devilish horns. I had to roll a Will save to see if the old man would be scared or merely shocked by Baravis' appearance.

I rolled a 1. Critical failure.

Horrified, the man fled through the back room and raced out of the building's rear entrance, screaming for his wife, "Marta, it's Bane! Bane, I tell you!" Baravis quickly grabbed the nearest valuable (he's Chaotic Good--it seemed like a good idea) hid a gold plate and golden earrings under his cloak and walked calmly out of the store before anyone else arrived. The three made their way back to the inn, but not before Sven noticed something--they were being tailed by someone.

Back at the inn, they intimidated the innkeeper (when bribing wouldn't work) into telling anyone who asked that they had never left the inn (they left the bribe--the unfortunate wedding ring). When the snitch went and told the guard, a small cadre of Zhentilar braced the innkeeper, who successfully bluffed them into thinking the PCs had never left the inn. After greasing the Zhentilars' palms with some silver (well worth it considering the ring), the innkeeper was left alone. Much laughter was had about Old Man McGraw (as we dubbed him) and how the town would be saying that Old Man McGraw was crazy for years. "He says he was robbed by Bane hisself, he does! An evil, dead god! Stole a gold plate, he swears!" The guards who had braced the innkeeper could barely believe it themselves. "Have you seen... Have... Oh, for Cyric's sake, have you seen Bane? Yes, Bane. Old Man McGraw is raving that Bane robbed his store. We're looking for someone who looks like the dead god of strife and tyranny. ... Man, I need a drink. I joined the army for this?" Much laughter was had.

The next morning, the party decided it would be wise to simply leave, so they got on their horses and got out of this small village as soon as they were able. Within an hour they were within sight of Dagger Falls, but decided to follow a small path that led up to a rocky crag to the southwest to see if they could get a good view of Dagger Falls. After making their way up the steep rock face via a crumbling trail, they were attacked by two goblins who had tamed some eagles as pets. After dispatching them, they investigated a cave, managed to drive off the bear that had taken over its entrance with a dented helm and a hammer (banging them together) they disabled some traps and found a secret entrance deep within the cave. This led them into a large vaulted chamber where they were assaulted by a swarm of bats (annoyed by being disturbed) and four fire beetles. By the end of all this combat, Sven, Drog, and Baravis were looking the worse for wear but decided to press on, discovering a forge, altars to Moradin, the bones of dwarves, and a message in Dwarven left by Colderan, the Mage-Lord, seeking vengeance and cursing the dwarves for the murder of his wife Belissaria. Colderan Morn, as they recalled, had been the Lord of Daggerdale two-hundred years before and was Randal Morn's ancestor. He had cast the Brightblade dwarves out, the same dwarves they had met in Anathar's Dell. So this must be Eagles Eyrie!

Leaving for Dagger Falls, they met up with Louden the Cooper, their contact. When shown the secret coins that Randal used to identify his supporters, Louden asked them many questions to ensure they weren't spies for the Zhentarim. Satisfied, he explained a little bit about the Dream Fever and the short, dark figures stalking the town at night. "It's been going on since that Priestess of Cyric went beneath the Temple of Lathander's ruins."

Baravis commissioned a pricy masterwork suit of studded leather armor, all blacked out to help with Hide checks. When Dulwar the tanner was asked about Colderan the Mage-Lord, the tanner simply said that Colderan's tomb is unknown.

The party entered the town of Dagger Falls, settled at the Teshford Arms (after selling loot to the pricegouging Fulgarth, the only caravan supply store and trader in town) and decided to rest up and heal before going down beneath the Temple ruins. And there we stopped.

The Hungover Heroes Guild, Part Two

Because we're probably not going to play next week, the Hungover Heroes Guild met tonight for a second time this week. This was, by far, one of the BEST roleplaying sessions I've had in years.

Play began with us picking up the PCs as they were entering Anathar's Dell, a small community in Daggerdale, Forgotten Realms. Piqued by rumors of dwarves (or dwarf-like creatures) prowling in the night in Daggerdale villages, the PCs began to ask questions of the populace at Anathar's Hall, the local watering-hole and open-air pavilion-cum-tavern with nearby one-room cottages for rent for visitors.

They picked up some local lore, discovering several new things. The town was built by the wizard Anathar who was slain by a dragon many years ago. The farmers made common cause with the dwarves of the area and built a community here. The dwarves are of the Brightblade clan and swear by their ancestors that they would never dishonor their blood by stalking the streets of the dale villages to the north. They met a Cormyrean knight-errant sworn to join Randal Morn and fight against the Zhentarim (the Black Network of Zhentil Keep) and free Daggerdale from their control. They also encountered a Sembian merchant speaking to two huntsman who may have been members of the Harpers (they wore the black badges with the silver harp).

The next morning, the PCs set off for Dagger Falls, but were slowed by torrential rain. As they camped that evening, they were approached by a patrol of Freedom Riders, followers of Randal Morn (the true and rightful lord of Daggerdale, who seeks to free his Dale from Zhentarim oppression). When Vladimir spoke, the patrol, led by Captain Reiner Trall, took the four companions' weapons and arrested them for being suspected spies. As Captain Trall explained to Vladimir, "We folk of Daggerdale have never known anyone from Zhentil Keep who was not a Zhentilar soldier or a Zhentarim agent." (Note: Zhentilar = the army, Zhentarim = the Black Network, the secret society that rules Zhentil Keep and seeks to control all of the trade in Faerûn.)

They were force-marched across the Serpentsbridge over the rapids of the River Ashaba, where Vladimir was a bit nervous that they were simply going to hang him. But they continued on into the Dagger Hills and came upon the ruins of Castle Daggerdale, where they spent the night.

The next morning, Randal Morn arrived. Together with Tunfer the Stout, priest of Tyr, officiating, Randal Morn heard the trial of Vladimir. He pronounced Vladimir not guilty for want of proof, but since there was no proof Vladimir was innocent, he insisted that Vlad remain at Castle Daggerdale as a guest until riders returned from Anathar's Dell with evidence (if no evidence was to come, he was going to have Vladimir escorted to the borders of the Dale). It seemed the party's ambition to solve the mystery of the Dream Fever in Dagger Falls was going to fall apart, for they refused to leave their companion's side (which earned them the respect of Lord Morn). However, Tunfer offered to cast zone of truth on Vladimir, who repeated his tale and gave his testimony. After a brief cross-examination, Lord Morn pronounced Vladimir innocent.

When the PCs told him they wanted to solve the puzzle of the Dream Fever, Morn outfitted them with light horses and feed (the horses had belonged to riders who had been killed during raids on Zhentilar patrols and Zhentarim caravans). They set out for Dagger Falls the next morning, the day after the Spring Equinox, to warming weather on new mounts and headed north.

They quickly learned how skittish horses can be if they aren't trained for war and battle. The horses would not even walk past the black bear they encountered that was rooting through brambles for wild berries. Vladimir summoned a skeleton warrior that chased the young bear away, allowing them to continue.

Near dusk, though, they saw an ogre trudge up from behind a hill. The horses shied away and the ogre charged. Volleys of eldritch blast from Baravis' hands weakened the creatures as it closed on the party. It charged for Drog, who had dismounted and prepared for battle. The horses bolted, carrying Vladimir, Sven, Baravis' and Drog's horse away from the ogre, but they still attempted to strike it from a distance (with range penalties and -4 penalties for shooting from horseback).

The ogre charged Drog, swung his greatclub, and missed--the hit could have easily killed Drog had it connected, but as it was, it splashed into the mud of the road and left a deep indentation. Drog raged and smote the ogre so strongly that the monster was clobbered (can only take one standard action per turn). It staggered backward, withdrawing from battle. Drog stepped forward and swung again--20, critical threat! DJ rolled again--ANOTHER 20! Kill threat! DJ rolled a third time... and hit! His sword flashed in an arc slicing through the arteries in the ogres' neck and it toppled to the ground.

Drog's horse was recovered, the body was looted for what few useful goods it had (mostly haunches of venison, large rocks, and a wagon wheel were on the ogre) and camp was made an hour's ride north of the battle site. There, the party settled down to eat the venison and XP was divvied up.

Only one combat this session, but it was exhilarating and a nice way to end a session of great in-character roleplaying.

The Hungover Heroes Guild, Part One

So I scrapped by World of Darkness campaign. I had some good ideas for it, but I really do not like the changes that White Wolf made with their new edition of the games about six or seven years ago. Setting material is fine for the most part--what I dislike is the mechanics of the game. After playing Old World of Darkness, the New World of Darkness rules set is actually counter-intuitive. They sacked Perception, for example--this became pretty confusing for me whenever I asked someone to make a Perception + something roll and I had to figure out what other ability would fit for such a roll.

Instead, I went back to an old standby and a favorite system of mine--D&D 3.5 in the world of the Forgotten Realms.

Of course, the party is completely insane:

Luke is playing a tiefling Warlock (see Complete Arcane, I think) from Sigil in the Planes (Fated faction) who is trying to get back home so he can "pick up his friend."
DJ is playing a Rashemar barbarian on his dajemma. No, he doesn't have a miniature giant mutant space hamster but he is about three shots from being an alcoholic.
Alex is a Dread Necromancer (see Heroes of Horror) from Zhentil Keep who sold his soul to a forgotten god in order to see the Zhentarim destroyed and a just government put in its place.
Finally, Shaun is playing a half-elven Waterdhavian rogue with a glib tongue.

We played for about four, four-and-a-half hours last night. Baravis was banished from Sigil by the Scratcher and appeared in a circle of menhirs (like Stonehenge) in the middle of the forest of Cormanthor during the late winter. Arriving at a road, he encountered Drog (DJ's character) and after sharing a drink and some roasted rabbits, the two proceeded to Shadowdale where they encountered Sven (the half-elf) and Vladimir (the Zhent).

Thanks to Alex's acting chops, all Moonsea people now have a Russian accent.

Anyway, most of the session was devoted to in-character carousing and insane antics.

I took a page from old school D&D and some of Justin Alexander's ideas and decided that I'd award 1 XP for each gp spent carousing. This means spending gold frivolously on gambling, girls, food, expensive lodging, and booze specifically, NOT on magic weapons, traveling gear, spell components, or anything like that.

After breaking up some of Jhaele Silvermane's crockery (thanks to Luke's eldritch blast) and almost getting thrown out of the Old Skull Inn by Lord Mourngrym's guards, they calmed down and found their ways to their beds for the evening.

The next morning, nursing hangovers, the party ate a hearty breakfast and haggled with the renowned Lewellyn the Loquacious over rumors. Once both parties were satisfied and Lewellyn had played a nice dirge to soothe Baravis' frustrations at not being able to return to Sigil, they decided to set out for Dagger Falls, Daggerdale, and investigate rumors of dwarves stalking the town at night and a horrible plague called Dream Fever. They also heard tell of forgotten things stirring in crypts beneath the ruins of the Temple of Lathander in Dagger Falls. All this pointed to adventure and, for Baravis, perhaps a way home. So they equipped themselves (Vlad bought a donkey as a pack animal) at Weregund the Trader's and made ready to set off.

They inquired of a junior priest of Lathander at his Temple in Shadowdale of anything they might need to know about the temple ruins in Dagger Falls. As they left, Baravis let slip a farewell in his native tongue (Infernal) that Lathander found offensive, so now during the hours of daylit morning Luke's character has a -1 to EVERYTHING. Should he find any relics of interest at the Temple of Lathander's ruins or in its crypts and bring them to the Temple in Shadowdale, perhaps Lathander will smile upon him and remove his harsh judgment.

Baravis' eldritch blast nearly snagged the party quail as they walked and swigged wine. After passing (and frustrating) a patrol of Shadowdale men-at-arms ("What is with adventurers?"), they spent the night at a Shrine to Torm at the crossroads of the Northride and the Tethyamar Trail. The next day was spent with the party following the dirt track north and as night fell, they sought refuge in Anathar's Dell, a small hamlet surrounded by a stockade and home to a clan of dwarves as well as Daggerdalesmen. With the discovery that 2 gp covered food, services (such as stabling for Vlad's mule), room and linens, and most importantly, booze, the party happily piled into the inn for more drunken carousing and antics.

And that's all that happened. 100% in-character roleplaying. No combat. An old-schooler's nightmare if I ever ran one. They spent most of their time blowing through silver buying bottles of alcohol. I've got to dig up some rules on alcoholism and drunkenness in game.