World-building flavour (SF)

So there’s this article on NPR (https://www.npr.org/2025/02/12/nx-s1-5293253/his-genes-forecast-alzheimers-his-brain-had-other-plans?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us but I’ll summarize it for you.

• Early-onset Alzheimers runs in his family; no one else has lived to be past 60 and they all had it by 50. The cause is a mutation in a specific gene.
• He is the only person to have lived to 75 with that mutation. (Two other people in Colombia have lived past 60, but their mutation is on a different chromosome.)
• They don’t know why. Certain mutated proteins accumulate throughout the brain in normal sufferers, but they’re concentrated in a tiny area in him.
• They suspect the fact that he has a lot of heat shock proteins in his brain might be causing it; heat shock proteins are caused by working in hot environments, like the engine room of a ship. (He was in the Navy for 20 years, and temperatures are routinely above 43 Celsius or 110 Fahrenheit.)

Wildly irresponsible world-building follows.

You have a hot planet—call it “Hades”—with a high frequency of this particular mutation. It doesn’t particularly express itself because of heat shock proteins...but when people leave the planet young, before 25, they don’t have sufficient levels of heat shock proteins.

(Insert reason for high frequency: possibly founder's effect, possibly that there’s no selective pressure against it.)

Now insert general prejudice about people from Hades, because “everybody knows” that they develop early onset Alzheimers if they are off the planet.

A story? No. But a detail you could throw into a story.

Curse of Strahd in Iron & Gold, so far

Iron & Gold

(Yeah, the tag says Iron Gauntlets and it probably will forever. But the game system I’m currently using is Iron & Gold, also from Precis Intermedia Games.)

Curse of Strahd is a big sort-of-sandbox campaign that has the players traveling all over, to try and get the items to deal with Strahd Von Zarovitch. It is a Dungeons & Dragons 5E campaign, possibly the most popular one, and it takes the characters from level 1 (with the optional “Death House” adventure) to ten.

I have been running it in Iron & Gold, a PIG game from their genreDiversion&tm; line, with some things changed to make it more like the PCs came from Amherst, the default setting for Iron & Gold.

However, this is what we’ve done:

• Death House
• Buried the burgomaster of Barovia but did not fight the vampire under the church
• Saved the young Vistani girl, killed five vampire spawn, retrieved bones of St. Andral
• Took Ireena to Krezk and lost her to the pool
• Fought druids and blights at winery
• Fought druids and berserkers at Yester Hill

They have not received the invitation from Strahd for dinner at Castle Ravenloft, because they have not been at their last known location, and are on the move to Berez.

They are at the point where they now have teleportation, but a fight with, say, a berserker can still be a threat.

Now, Iron & Gold has teleportation but does not provide distance guidelines; it does limit teleportation (Fabrica Ge, the game calls it) to locations the caster has been to, so the wizard still has to get to the place first. However, the PCs have already been about 27 miles by road or about 11 miles as the raven flies.

To avoid PCs skipping all over the map, I have instituted an arbitrary limit of 2 kilometres per Creativity, the stat that governs wizardry. Stats run from 1-5 in PCs, and I allow time-consuming ways to extend that so there can be teleport circles that go anywhere in Barovia. For Hrelgi, the PC in question, this gives her a range of 8 km, or 5 miles, straight line. That gets them very far but not everywhere.

Is it workable? I dunno; I’m making this up as I go along.

Edit, a couple of days later: Looking at some other items (the use of the magic skill that allows knowing about and controlling the ability of other wizards to do magic), perhaps I should have limited it by the caster’s skill rather than the caster’s raw power. Maybe; the important thing to me was to keep them from traveling to some part of the map and thenceforth bipping back and forth: “Hey, Hrelgi, go back to the first town we were in and tell her brother we messed up, okay?” Putting a limit of about 8 kilometers on teleportation means they still have to walk sometimes.

Edit: I notice a number of the discussions about the campaign in D&D suggest enlarging the scale so one hex on the map actually means three-quarters of a mile or even four miles. That certainly makes the land support more people.

Sample NPC converted from Dungeons & Dragons

Berserker

Fitness 4 Awareness 3 Creativity 2 Reasoning 2 Influence 2 Race Human
Skills Athletics 5, Composure 4, Dueling 4, Stealth 3, Subterfuge 3
Gimmick Fearless
Weapon War Axe 3 inj (does 4 inj because of Fitness) Armor Studded leather

The studded leather is mine; it’s not in Iron & Gold — just leather provides protection 1 against bruising damage (clubs and such) but “studded leather” provides protection 1 against both kinds of damage, bruising and piercing/slashing.

Things I Like About Iron & Gold

• Essentially point-based character creation, but bonuses or penalties depending on character vocation and race
• Much looser magic system with different penalties
• Armor can absorb damage (have I mentioned that I dislike “armor class” as a thing that makes you harder to hit?)
• Much smaller range of health: everyone has the same health levels

Later I’ll reproduce this list and include things I dislike about Iron & Gold because there are some.

Curse of Strahd Redux and how D&D modules are written

Iron & Gold

There are going to be spoilers for Curse of Strahd. Just so you know.

Okay, so I started Curse of Strahd as a solo anyway. I’m running it with Iron & Gold from Precis Intermdia. Iron & Gold is a level-less point-based 2d6 system (yes, it says Iron Gauntlets in the label for this entry, but I’m actually using Iron & Gold); Curse of Strahd is chock-a-block with levels and classes. Conversion between them has some mechanical differences (2d6 roll under versus d20 roll over; Iron & Gold uses only 5 wound levels, so making things tougher is a bit more complicated than adding more hit points), but the story has been the biggest challenge.

Not just because I’m a wimp and don’t want my characters doing really awful things (there is an example of that, which I’ll get to) but because of the way that D&D adventures are structured, and have been since, oh, the village of Hommlet was first written.

See, I write technical documentation for a living. In my job, we are supposed to put all available information or pointers to possibly useful information together. “Here is how you do the thing, and if you need to do something related, here are places you can look.” As a group we are more or less successful at this (my lexicon and the Microsoft lexicon seem to be vastly different, so it is often more useful for me to Google something than use the help provided by Microsoft, fr example), but that is the goal.

Adventures and modules for D&D are different. They are largely location-based, and tell you what you can see at any given moment. Great if what you’re doing is fighting something. However, the land of Barovia in this fifth edition sandbox is set up as a powderkeg, with various political factions working against each other or for each other, or pretending to ignore each other. It is complicated, and there’s no summary or links to let you know.

You have to read the whole thing, preferably several times and preferably taking notes, so that you know that, oh, the Vistani aren’t the only ones who can penetrate the mists in some scenarios. (One of the intros has werewolves doing it occasionally.) Or maybe discovering that the wedding gown mentioned in Vallakia might have some use in dealing with the Abbot in Krezk, so a GM knows to mention the wedding gown if the PCs get to a place where then can see it.

It lets you plan, is what I’m saying.

There’s also an interesting thing that happens in Krezk, which my story needs to go to because of the (cool) random fortune thing.

There is in Krezk a sacred pool that they get their water from. It’s inside the town walls, so they are pretty self-sufficient. (The village of Barovia looks to be built on a floodplain, so wells should be easy there, and I’d expect them to be in the houses. The module doesn’t mention this, though there are hints that things don’ make sense because this is actually a pocket dimension made to torment Strahd.) If Ireena sees the pool:

1. A vision of Sergei appears in the pool.
2. Ireena gets the memories of being Tatyana back (and somewhere I saw a hint that she remembers things from all past incarnations).
3. Sergei tries to pull her into the pool; Ireena wants to go.

The PCs either:

• Let her go in, and she’s safe forever; or
• The PCs stop her from diving in (this is a woman who has been charmed repeatedly by a vampire), in which case she loses her chance to be with Sergei

In either case, Strahd is aware that she now remembers her previous life (and is possibly gone), breaks the enchantment on the pool, and is gunning for the PCs as punishment, and the pool is no longer safe to drink, which means that they’ve earned the enmity of the entirety of Krezk.

I am not sure I can work either of them, so I might get her out of Krezk and up to the abbey as quickly as possible.

Or not; part of this is up to dice — I’ve already stretched things by having the thief steal Richtoven’s raise dead scroll.

The epilogue, for DM’s only, states that (because this particular dimension is Strahd’s punishment) he revives in a few months to be punished some more even if the PCs kill him. No word on whether Tatyana’s soul is yanked back onto the reincarnation machine, but frankly, I suspect it’s an ersatz soul somehow; if the whole place is constructed to torment Strahd, why not have a few souls of people who also need punishment, put them in, and mark one less-bad soul as “Tatyana’s” soul. This is the interpretation that I’ll be using: if they manage to kill Strahd, anyone who wants to leave does so, but the Dark Powers will always get a bunch of souls who need to be tortured and they get on the Bavaria soul merry-go-round.

EDIT: I misread it first time; now it’s clear that no matter what, bringing Ireena to the pool causes the enchantment on the pool to be broken, whether they let Ireena dive in or not. (I've rewritten the above to be clear on that.)

Yay.

I don’t mind if the PCs make difficult choices, but there is no way that PCs can know this is a bad choice. And one of the NPCs (Donavich) suggests it.

The epilogue does not in any way suggest what happens to the pool when the dimension re-sets, but I suspect it also re-sets. Heck, maybe the Ireena of the next iteration will be back, too — there’s so much in the module that is simmering and about to boil that it seems likely that all of it re-sets.

Curse of Strahd

D&D 5E

I’ve just run myself through Death House using the Iron & Gold rules. Along with one of the conceits of the series (one character is a former tomb raider, so he approaches trapped buildings differently), it was relatively easy so I thought I’d tackle Curse of Strahd...except you have to read everything to get all the pieces to fit together or to discover that they don’t say anything about what you are interested in.

How does the economy work? Do the Kolyanovich’s have horses? Where would they keep them? How did Ireena get bitten the first two times? As near as I can tell, there are no answers, and I am not sure that I want to read the entire thing.

Thoughts on slasher fantasy

Fantasy RPGs

While I was listening to the Imaginary Worlds podcast an email ad arrived regarding a 5e slasher setting. It turned out to be Crystal Lake done using 5e rules, which wasn’t what I was expecting based on the email subject. 

My uneducated feeling….

• Slasher films are in the end about someone against an implacable enemy: even if the protagonists starts as a powerful character, they get knocked down very quickly (I’m not sure I’d call Aliens a slasher film, but the Marines are clearly outmatched at first by the aliens). It’s not an adventure if you walk in, mow down the monsters, and leave. (However, you might watch Dog Soldiers for competent professionals discovering they are out of their depth.)
• The protagonist is usually someone regarded as weak or vulnerable at the beginning: there’s a reason we say “final girl” or “enduring woman” rather than “protagonist.”
• The monster is fixated on our protagonists: getting out of Dodge isn’t an option (even if the protagonist thinks it is).
• It’s rare there’s recourse to “official” powers, or if there is, those fail. The deputy is not there at the finale of Scream, for instance.
• The adventure might officially be in a populated place, but the set-pieces occur somewhere it’s isolated or private: a sleep away camp, a house, a cabin in the woods. Again, part of cutting the protagonists from help.

So what would a cod-medieval fantasy slasher movie/adventure be?

Well, some of that is already common in the setting. Official help isn’t coming; there are excuses to have the monsters fixated on the protagonists.

As far as weak…imagine the main characters are left behind by the dungeon delvers because they’ve been injured. Just to avoid the whole near-a-dungeon thing, let’s say the protagonists are not especially effective fighters. By virtue of being player characters, they're better than the ground beef that surrounds them, but they can't go, “Oh, it’s a troll; boil some water for tea.”

No, our protagonists are injured or are the least effective fighters in the party. They are low level or low point value or have a condition that makes them less effective.

More to come.

Icons

A bit of world building.

Our city — maybe yours too — has had supers since at least the 1950s, and one of them was a possibly-grim definitely-human vigilante called “MidKnight.” (I’m sure the name looked clever in 1958.) Possibly because child endangerment laws were different then, he had a sidekick, “Squire.”

Actually, he eventually had a metric butt-load of Squires.

At least one went on to become a superhero in his own right, Wild Justice; some later retired (one founded a sporting goods chain and capitalized), and one probably died in the course of superhero-ing. Teenagers made their own costumes, became vigilantes, and sometimes MidKnight picked them and they became the real official-as-it-gets Squire.

MidKnight stopped being active in 1974, which made him positively ancient by urban vigilante standards. By then, being the Squire was like being in a garage band: many tried it, and a few went on to be actual superheroes. The trend mostly died out by the 1990s but it never vanished.

Superhero setting

Icons

Well, it's months later, but I've had one or two ideas.

An adventure set at a twelve-step program for supervillains who are trying to reform. I don't know what the adventure is, but there's something I like about the guy with the mechanical arms going, “Hello, my name is Otto, and I'm a supervillain.”

(I'm currently running Brindlewood Bay, thank you for asking, and I'll have comments at some point in the future.)

Huh.

Iron Gauntlets

I felt sure that I had posted here the first three Felewin and Ninefingers stories. But I didn't label them, and a search for "Felewin" isn't pulling them up.

Do I want to put them here?

Ironwood Gorge - the end!

Iron & Gold

That is all there is of the Ironwood Gorge adventure.

As is often the case, I left myself in a pickle...there's no easy "adventure in a ruined town" available that doesn't involve orcs or some kind of race that I don't want to deal with yet. I have a tickle of an idea, but I think it's too close to the second Felewin story for my tastes. There are plenty of possible adventures, but I'll have to skip to a new locale for those.

(Which I can do.)

If you read it, great; let me know if you spotted anything wrong or if you want a longer discussion of the Iron & Gold game. I'm planning to put one up, anyway, but guidance would be great.

For now, though, we have a new puppy, and he's taking up my free time.

Ironwood Gorge - 24 - Dead Ends

Iron & Gold

Credits

This is a solo play-through of the adventure “Ironwood Gorge” by Eric Jones, published by Ludibrium Games.

Because I am not really an old-school guy, things have been converted to (originally) Iron Gauntlets by Precis Intermedia Games and after about chapter 6, Iron & Gold, also by Precis Intermedia Games. Where necessary, I use Mythic Game Master Emulator by Tana Pigeon, published by Word Mill Games.

This is the second Ludibrium Games module I’ve used for these characters, and I enjoy them. (The first was “The Sanctuary Ruin.”)

As usual, rules misunderstandings are mine and I try to present it as (bad) fiction, with game mechanics in footnotes. The italicized subtitles after the chapter title are prompts from Mythic Game Master Emulator; I try to work the intent into the scene. I am not always successful, but it keeps me a bit more honest.

“Ironwood Gorge” is meant to be the basis for a campaign, where the Bleak Tower is a home base for adventures. I have not yet decided whether I will do that; there could be additional Bleak Tower adventures, or they'll wander away until the third adventure in the trilogy is published.

---

24 — Dead Ends

Overthrow Evil (PC Positive)

“Felewin, Ninefingers, Emond, Hrelgi…you are not dwarves, and I had hoped to spare you this knowledge. That is the entrance to the Dwarf Roads, and we have killed the creatures keeping the orcs from finding it.”

“You said the Dwarf Roads were fiction,” said Ninefingers.

“Daerdun said that, not me.” He looked back. “We haven’t much time, but we need to close this tunnel and then try to escape.”

“Well, as long as escape is still on the menu,” said Felewin. “We haven’t got much to work with here.”

“We have Hrelgi.”

Felewin cocked an eyebrow.

“Here, Hrelgi. Where the passage widens up.”

“Not water this time,” she said. “In Westport there were walls to gather the water. Here it would flow all over us,” she said. “We don’t want to get our feet wet.”

Uthrilir shrugged. “You’re the expert.” He said to Felewin, “Give her the lantern.”

“What?” asked Felewin.

“She needs to be able to see her grimoire.”

“Fine.” He handed Hrelgi the lantern. She happily hung it around her neck.

“Did you say something?” Emond asked Felewin.

“No,” said Felewin, thinking, I hate wizards.

The group moved back into the previous cavern. They heard Hrelgi make the incantation.^[245] There was a tremendous thump as a lot of sand fell to the ground, blocking the tunnel entirely.^[246]

Hrelgi waved her hand to indicate she was relaxing the fabric of reality again, and headed to the rest of the group. “Done,” she said.

“Now we just have to make our way to the surface and escape,” said Ninefingers.

“I was hoping,” said Uthrilir, “that we’d try and find the dwarves already here.”

“I was hoping,” said Felewin, “that we’d work on surviving first.”

“You are getting pragmatic,” commented Ninefingers.

“They won‘t knight me if I’m dead. We go back the way we came, because we know a way out.”

“I have some knowledge of the caves from my own entrance,” said Emond.

“If we need it, we’ll use it. Hrelgi, you can keep the lantern while we’re down here, but you go in front of me in marching order; I block too much light if I’m in front of you. Emond, you’re second, behind Ninefingers.”

“A weapon? This is Hrelgi’s knife.”

“It’s got eltadyr eyeball on it. You can keep it until you wash it.”

“Let’s move!”

#

They were past the dead eltadyr when they heard a shuffling that didn’t sound like someone trying to be quiet but it didn’t sound like someone normal, either.

“Manikins, maybe? They found something Heardwhistle had left?” asked Ninefingers.

“We’ll know in a second—” Felewin said. “Ready?” He had an arrow sit in his bow.

Something was moving. Ninefingers, who could see the best, said, “Zombies. It’s zombies.”

Four reanimated orc corpses shuffled out from the tunnel that led to the workshop. Felewin looked at them curiously, trying to figure out if they had been reanimated where they fell or if there were some larger plan.

Hrelgi said some words^[247], and the armour of the foremost zombie turned into lava. The additional weight made the zombie stumble, but it kept coming.

Felewin fired and the arrow sank into the second zombie. The arrow sank into the thing’s neck and stayed there.

Ninefingers said, “I really don’t want to fight something dripping lava. I mean, they’re wearing stone.” He slashed at the lead zombie and took a chunk out of its arm^[248].

“They don’t smell much. Are they fresh?” asked Emond. He had not dashed forward.

Uthrilir began praying, but it seemed to have no effect.

The zombies kept moving. Felewin unstrung his bow and drew his sword.

Ninefingers managed to take the head off the first zombie, and it fell to the ground. “You could lava the one in the back.”

“Sure,” said Hrelgi.^[249] The lava faded back into scale armor.^[250] Hrelgi spoke again, and one at the back stumbled and glowed red.

Uthrilir prayed again, with more fervor^[251], and this time the zombies stopped and shuffled back into the darkness of the tunnel behind them.

Felewin was tempted to go after them — leaving an enemy behind you was a bad plan — and then realized that they had to move quickly.

“Good work,” he told Uthrilir.

“Thank the Lady,” said Uthrilir.

Felewin pushed as much as they could and soon they were near the top of the tunnel down. Ninefingers made a quiet gesture, and Hrelgi shut the lantern, leaving them in darkness while the goblin moved forward to check.

Uthrilir was confident in the Lady’s protection, so he did not look back to check for zombies, and none came.

Ninefingers returned after some agonizingly long time. “Fast; it’s clear for now. No lights until we get into the latrine tunnel.”

They moved as quickly as they could, and they were helped by the light from the orcs’ Great Hall, when suddenly there was a cry from ahead.^[252]

Ninefingers broke off to the right and the others, still holding on to each other, had to follow him.

They reached the Great Hall, and Ninefingers quietly said an obscenity.

They could all see in the room: it was warmed by fires in three corners and a half-dozen braziers. Six orcs sat there with mugs or asleep and four more stood at the barrel filling mugs.^[253]

The standing orcs noticed them come in. Ninefingers started running for the nearest exit from the Great Hall. He would have rather gone for the biggest exit, which he reasoned was the tunnel they had been in, but not against ten orcs in an indefensible position.

Felewin had done the same calculation he had and sprinted for the same tunnel. He was slower than everyone else, so he was last in; he turned to face the oncoming orcs.

It was the four of them; the six at the table were apparently in a drunk stupor.

Beside him, he could sense Uthrilir. He heard a cry from behind them, in orc: the tunnel they had chosen was not empty. It was, however, narrow: when Felewin and Uthrilir stood side by side they blocked the way. The orcs could only stand two abreast.

The air from inside wafted over them. It smelled terrible, like burning hair.

The first orc swung^[254] and avoided Felewin’s shield, but his sword banged against Felewin’s chain. Felewin struck^[255] well and hurt the orc in the armpit. The other orc struck at Uthrilir and missed.^[256] Uthrilir^[257] hit the orc but its armor took most of it.

Meanwhile, Ninefingers found himself facing three orc shamans. The flicker of one’s gaze showed him that their spears and swords were resting at the far part of the chamber. Ninefingers dashed forward to the farthest one, the one closest to the spears, and stabbed^[258] the orc shaman through the throat.

Hrelgi said one of the spells she had memorized.^[259]

Emond expected something to happen but when nothing did, he assumed it was a misfire. Wizards had them, and frankly, Hrelgi had not grown up in a good environment for learning magic.

She was probably only here because she had become attached to the dwarf.

He ducked forward and stabbed^[260] the nearest shaman. With luck, Ninefingers would take on the third.

Ninefingers did, in fact, swivel to the third one, standing between him and the weapons.^[261] He struck solidly and the orc shaman screamed in pain.

Emond muttered, “Showoff,” but his orc shaman had snatched up a cone of incense and threw it wildly toward Emond, who took another slash^[262] that opened the shaaman’s arm.

Meanwhile, Felewin barely hit the orc facing him^[263] and thought he had hurt him, but wasn’t sure. The orc riposted^[264] but missed. Uthrilir hit^[265] and saw the orc weaken, but there was still an orc waiting behind him. That orc^[266] suddenly had his armor turn to lava, and he screamed loudly enough that one of the orcs at the table blearily lifted its head. “A fire. Good. Too cold in here,” it muttered to itself and closed its eyes again.

“Thanks, Hrelgi,” said Uthrilir.

Ninefingers thought, Uh, could use a little help, too, but^[267] slashed at the orc shaman and brought it close to death. “What is this place? What are you doing here?” he asked in goblin, which was close enough to the orc tongue.

“We are the Split Tongue Tribe, and we will rule!^[268]” He began a prayer, but it had no effect.

“This one might know more,” said Emond.^[269] He slashed again but his blade skittered along the metal rivets in the orc’s hauberk. That orc scrambled for a nearby vial; he managed to get it and drink it.

That’s probably bad, thought Ninefingers.

He stabbed at the orc’s thigh, near where an artery should be, and severed it. The orc died messily. Emond stabbed the orc shaman again, hurting it again.^[270]

The orc said, “You fool! The blood unguent restores health to those who are strong enough!” He grimaced in pain and then fell over, dead.

Ninefingers said “I guess he wasn’t strong enough. Something called ‘blood unguent.’”

Felewin was whittling down his opponent^[271] and finally killed him. He drew his sword out quickly and adopted a defensive posture…^[272]but the orc’s armor turned into lava, and the orc fell screaming to the ground. Both orcs were dead in a moment.

Ninefingers smashed another vial. “Emond, break the vials. I’ll check to see where this leads.” He slipped down the tunnel.

He was back in a moment. “It goes nowhere. I guess it’s where they make the unguent. They had some drying or something; I threw it to the ground.”

Felewin was looking out at the Great Hall. “Anything?” he asked. He handed Emond a shortsword and a shield from the dead orcs.

“No,” said Ninefinger. “Dead end.”

“Across the Great Hall, then. If it’s any benefit, those orcs won’t stop us.” One of the orcs had roused itself enough to get up and then it fell down and stayed there. “We haven’t exactly been quiet.”

“There’s a big idol over there,” said Emond. “We could get that gem that makes its eye and come out with a little profit.”

“If you want to, go ahead,” said Felewin. “But it ends our association. We’re trying to get out with our lives.”

Emond thought for a fraction of a moment and then said, “I’ll stick with you.”

“Good plan.”

They had never been in the Great Hall before. They knew what tunnel they were in, they know what tunnel they had come in by, but there were four other possible exits.

“Not that one; that looks like where they keep the dogs, and just be glad the dogs are out looking for us,” said Ninefingers.

“Pick one,” said Felewin.

They ran across to the next one, and into it. Soon it branched. “Left or right?”

Emond peeked down the tunnels and said, “Right looks like where they marched me to drop me down the chute. I’d pick left.”

Ninefingers led again. The air grew foul with the smell of decay and rot, but the walls were still clean. Finally they burst into a room with three goblins working, and two fury dogs.

Felewin swore this time, but the fury dogs were already on Ninefingers.^[273]

The first missed; the second grabbed him but its paws hit armor. Hrelgi started flipping through her grimoire; she hadn’t expected anything like this.

Emond hit one of the fury dogs with his new sword and connected, but the ferocity of the dog showed where its name came from; Felewin hit the same dog, but not cleanly.^[274] Uthrilir moved forward to find clear space and hit the top dog as if he were a golfer^[275]; the dog flew to the far side of the room and lay there, dead.

The goblins grabbed up stones to defend themselves.

Ninefingers still had a dog on top of him, but he couldn’t get his sword free. Instead he fumbled for his knife and tried to sink its blade into the animal. He managed, but the fury dog kept going. Its sharp teeth just missed his head, and the other head snarled and snapped at Felewin^[276] but its teeth closed on mail.

Felewin took the opportunity to slice at the thing’s neck^[277]. Uthrilir brought his mace down^[278] and killed the animal.

“You okay? I don’t feel proud…it was three-to-one,” said Felewin as he helped up the goblin.

“I feel proud. Those things are nasty,” said Ninefingers.

Hrelgi, who had the light, said, “Um, guys?” She flashed the light up to one of the entrances.

Zombies were entering.

Not just one or two zombies; there were zombies as far back as they could see, though admittedly that wasn’t terribly far. All had weapons and armour, though only some had shields.

“Uthrilir? Pray now,” said Felewin. The group moved to the right and put their backs against the wall, forming a loose cordon around Hrelgi and Uthrilir.

The zombies were not on another mission; they were intent on the group.^[279]

One was near enough to swing, and Felewin struck it before it could move^[280] — he hacked off an arm, but that wasn’t enough to stop the monster. It swung its remaining hand at Felewin and Felewin batted it away with his shield.^[281] Felewin heard Uthrilir praying behind him.

Uthrilir finished, and the zombies wandered away. Any in the chamber moved out into the tunnels; any waiting to come into the chamber backed up.

Slowly the group moved forward. (“I have no idea where this is,” Emond said in a low voice.) Zombies backed up to make room but the tunnel was too narrow to allow the zombies to get away from the group.

Hrelgi in the meantime was flipping pages in her grimoire. “If I can find the magic controlling the zombies…”

They moved slowly, clustered around Uthrilir, heading deeper into the chamber, and giving the zombies time to back up. The zombies who had left returned, staying away from Uthrilir but ordered to find them. Felewin guessed that there were maybe two dozen of them, and he didn’t know if they could succeed against that many.

The tunnel narrows ahead; maybe use that as a choke point, he thought. That relies on them being on one side, though, not both.

The next chamber was hazy and smoky. The zombies were shuffling back; there was another chamber where they were going. There were four exits, actually, but the zombies seemed to be concentrating on one. In the crowd, they became aware of an orc in vestments: Ninefingers recognized them as similar to the ones the shamans had worn, but more elaborate. The—call it a high priest—carried an intricately carved bone staff.

“He’s probably controlling the zombies,” said Ninefingers. “Kill him, and the zombies just wander around.”

“Then we still have two dozen zombies to worry about,” said Emond.

“But they’re not being directed to kill us,” said Felewin, fitting an arrow to his bow. “Better chance. Uthrilir, don’t get too close to him; we need you. Hrelgi, keep the light on him, do what you can, and protect Uthrilir.”

Felewin let the arrow fly.^[282] It scraped along the orc’s head.

Ninefingers slashed at the orc but the orc parried with the staff.^[283]

Emond didn’t get close enough, so his strike missed. The orc snapped out some vile sounding words^[284] and Emond shook his head, then scratched the back of his hand.^[285]

Hrelgi said her incantation^[286] and the bone staff flew into her hand.

“Let’s see if you can control zombies without it,” she said.

Uthrilir kept praying.^[287]

Ninefingers slashed again,^[288] Emond was still clutching at the back of his hand, while Felewin fitted another arrow to his bow. The priest said another brief prayer^[289] but Ninefingers resisted the urge to scratch the boils that were developing on his hands and face.

Felewin said, “Can you help them, Uthrilir?”

“I can help them or keep the zombies at bay.”

Felewin grunted. That was no choice at all.

Hrelgi tossed the staff behind her; she needed both hands to use the grimoire and point the lantern.

Felewin let go of the arrow.^[290] Like the last one, it avoided his clothes and hit the orc in the scalp. Ninefingers wailed in frustration as the itching was so bad, but he managed to hit the orc’s leg, revealing mail under the high priest’s robes.

The high priest dove for the talisman.^[291] He fell on the ground, whimpering, before Felewin, before scrambling back.

Ninefingers hacked again, this time at the orc’s head, and hit, beheading the high priest.^[292] The orc’s head rolled backward, where a zombie picked it up and began biting at it.

“We’ve still got two dozen zombies here,” said Felewin. “What if we back away into … that corridor, and let them pass?”

In response, Uthrilir began to shuffle back. Hrelgi kicked the bone staff in the direction they were heading; it was probably evil and she didn’t want the orcs to get it.

“Emond. Emond!” said Felewin. “This way.”

Emond whispered something that Felewin couldn’t make out.

Hrelgi said, “Zombies first, then we’ll get you fixed. Big baby.”

They had to retreat quite far into the tunnel before the zombies would pass them. With the high priest’s death, they no longer seemed fixated on the adventurers but still lethal.

Hrelgi impelled hard egg-like rocks from the table to move the last stragglers, and then it was safe for them to re-enter the high priest’s chamber.

Ninefingers quickly checked out each of the exits from the chamber and came back (looking slightly nauseated). “You don’t want to go there, and I have bad news. We’re stuck. We came in the only exit.”

---

Game Mechanics

[245] And she rolls a 2: automatic success.

[246] And she rolls a 6 on the Reasoning+Composure roll at difficulty -2, so she needed an 8≥.

[247] She rolls a 5 so the spell works. She rolls a 2 for the Reasoning+Composure, so that works too.

[248] He rolls an 8, margin of -1, but the zombie has a margin of -4, so it works.

[249] 8 to cast, 3 to avoid brain-burn.

[250] She rolls an 8 on her 9≥, and the one at the back takes 4 health levels out of 10.

[251] Difficulty is 3 (4-1 for holy object) He has 9≥ so he needs 6≥, and he rolls a 6. Yay.

[252] I’m in story mode, so I’m going to force a sighting here. If they’re sighted anyplace but at an intersection, they have no choice but to fight. At an intersection, they can choose to run.

[253] The adventure suggests that they are easily surprised, but I figure an alert has gone out and the only ones left are either in a stupor (the ones at the tables) or are refueling (the ones at the barrel).

[254] Margin 2, but the orc rolls 7 and has a margin of 3. The shield does not stop the 3 Inj but the chain does (1,3,2).

[255] Felewin rolls 10, a triumph, for double damage: 6 Inj.that does 3 health levels (1,5,6,2,3,4).

[256] Margin 4 for defense, margin 2 for success: he misses.

[257] Uthrilir’s margin of 3 (rolls 6) versus Margin 1. Hits. Armor is 4,3,1, so one gets through.

[258] The orc rolls a 9, which does not make it for a dodge. Ninefingers rolls a 3, which is a triumph. 2,3,3,5,5,4: that’s 5 health levels; that orc is dead.

[259] Her spell works (she rolls a 6) and she adds 6 to Uthrilir’s protection. She rolls a 5 on the Reasoning+Composure roll.

[260] The orc shaman tries a spell but it doesn’t work Rolls 6 but it’s difficulty 2, and he only has 6≥); Emond manages to hit him (with a 7) and it gets through.

[261] Ninefingers has margin 4, orc has margin -3, he hits (4,6,1)

[262] Emond rolls a 5 (margin 4) to hit versus a 6 margin -2; his knife does one health level, but it does it.

[263] Felewin rolls a 6, orc rolls a 7, so it’s margin 4 to 3. 2 Inj get through the shield, one of those gets through the armor.

[264] Orc rolls a 3, but he’s injured and at -3, so that’s Margin 4; Felewin isn’t injured and rolls a 5, margin 5.

[265] Uthrilir’s marin 4 versus margin 1; all 3 get through the shield, and 2 get through the armour.

[266] Hrelgi rolls 6 for the spells, so it works, and and 2 for the Reasoning+Composure roll.

[267] Ninefingers swing is 10, which just makes it (margin 0) but the orc shaman’s dodge is a 6, which is a margin of -2. So he hits. Two get through (1,3,4) and the shaman is down by 4.

[268] The orc tries a prayer but rolls an 11, so there is no intercession by the gods from him.

[269] His slash is a roll of 7 (margin 2) versus an unskilled athletics dodge of 5 (margin -1), so he hits, but the studded leadher stops it.

[270] Ninefingers rolled a 6 to hit versus a 10, so that’s margin 6 versus -8; it does 3 damage (1,4,5) and the orc dies.
Emond rolls a 6 versus a 9 (margin 3 versus margin -6) and does one health level (6). The orc then rolls a 12 on its Fitness+Composre roll and dies instantly.

[271] He rolls a 7 (margin 3) versus 6 (margin 2 after ijuries); his sword gets past the shield and 1 level gets through…which is enough.

[272] Hrelgi rolls a 5 on her spell, and a 3 on the composure test.

[273] Fury dog attacks, 8 margin 2 versus 2 margin 8. Fury dog misses. Second fury dog is 8 margin 2 and it succeeds because Ninefingers used his block. That one misses, too. Ninefingers

[274] Emond: rolls a 9 but both levels go through; Felewin rolls a 5 but only two get through (1,5,4).

[275] Roll 8, all 3 get through (5,3,4).

[276] Margin 5 versus Margin 2, so it hits him. Nothing gets through (1,1)

[277] Felewin rolls 5 to hit (margin 5 vs Margin 0) and does 2 levels of damage (3,4,1).

[278] Rolls a 2! Damage is 3, 3, 1 or two levels

[279] Given the number of zombies, Uthrilir is going to try a prostrated task to change the difficulty of the prayer from 2 to 0. In exchange for a grade of Fatigue, he prays hard and manages, barely: He rolls an 8, which makes it. The group is now protected against most of the zombies in the horde for a range of 16 meters. (4 meters times Uthrilir’s INF of 4.)

[280] Hey, when you roll a 2, good things happen. And it’s a triumph, so the action gets rid of 6 of the zombie’s 10 levels.

[281] Zombie rolls a 9, which is margin -3 (it’s 6≥ on brawling); Felewin has margin 0 with his weapon.

[282] It’s a called shot, difficulty 0+2; Felewin rolls a 10, which is margin 3, which beats 2. The arrow sinks into the orc’s head. The orc rolls a 2 for composure, so he’s fine.

[283] Ninefingers rolls 9 (margin 1) but the orc high priest parries with a 5 (margin 3)

[284] Emond rolls an 11 and the orc rolls a 5, so margin -2 versus 3. The orc prays and rolls a 7, which makes his Curse roll (he’s got a holy symbol and is in a holy place, so difficulty 0).

[285] Nope, Emond doesn’t have composure, so a 9 fails the Fitness+Composure roll.

[286] Hrelgi rolls a 7, which makes her Fabrica Motus roll by 2. Does the orc make his non-existent Athletics roll? With a 5, he does not. She rolls a 7, which makes her R+C roll at difficulty -1.

[287] Mechanically, Uthrilir doesn’t need to but it makes sense in the context of the world.

[288] Ninefingers rolls an 8 (margin 2) for a called shot that avoids clothes (difficulty 2). The orc high priest attempts to dodge but has no athletics skill, so it’s 4 or less: He rolls a 3, and makes it (margin 1) Ninefingers doesn’t beat that combined difficulty.

[289] Priest rolls a 5, which makes the difficulty 2 roll by 3, and the Cursed plague hits Ninefingers. Ninefingers doesn’t have composure either but he does roll a 4, which makes his F+C roll. He does not drop everything to scratch at the sudden boils.

[290] Rolled 8, distance is point blank, so he makes it by 2. The point of damage gets through.
Ninefingers rolls a 8, which just makes it against the orc’s failed dodge. Armor gets most of it, though.
Emond fails his Fit+Composure roll by 2.

[291] It’s behind them and he’s going to have trouble getting closer to Uthrilir: call it difficulty 4 because of Uthrilir’s influence. Awareness+composure: He rolls an 11, and failes

[292] Ninefingers made a called shot, rolled a 7 for a difficulty 2 shot, made it. No armour applied, 3 health levels, done.