Goodman Games

*** WARNING: This thread contains Extreme Spoilers! ***

Ok, so after reading and thoroughly enjoying JediOre's 'C&C style' play-report posts, I'm going to attempt to share some posts of our DCC sessions as well.

I give advance warning that I'm not much of a writer and don't have all that much time to write in, so they will not be anywhere near the length or quality, but I will try to get as much of the feel of the moment across as I can.

So, here it is: The Sinister Secret of Whiterock, C&C style!

Our characters/players consist of:

Frawd the Dwarf Fighter
Mantol the Human Monk
Proxy the Human Wizard
Zarleth the Elf Rogue
Truku the Human Cleric

First of all, this was our first C&C session ever and we were all very excited to try out the system. It did not disappoint at all, though we had a few minor issues with it (which can be seen/discussed over that Troll Lord's forums here). DCC was a perfect fit for both C&C's system and our style of play.

Character creation took us about an hour and a half for the 5 characters, which felt like a lot but was mainly because none of us have any recent PnP experience and we took our time going about it; mostly it was a very straightfoward and simple business.

I kick everything off by explaining very quickly that the had arrived in town (didn't give the name), they had looked for some jobs, they had been told that the tavern master's son was missing, that there were rumors of a giant black monter that 'glowed green', and that Frawd had a quest to retrieve his family's heirlooms from a nearby 'ancient place'.

Then I described a huge stone menhir they had found 'somewhere near the town', and that when Frawd touched it, a big door opened, they went in, and that is where we were starting.

(Btw, as you can see our playstyle can pretty much be summed up as 'heavy on the dungeon, light on the roleplaying' )

Beneath the Menhir

Ok, so, first room, the party walks in, I describe the dust and stale air, as well a crate smashed by a ceiling beam in the corner, a dark passageway going south, and a dirty puddle next to the east wall (I added the puddle myself to draw attention to that wall).

Frawd the Fighter decides to try to look in the crate, I inform him that he can see a dwarven skull inside, but he can't reach it without going into the crate. Frawd promptly decides to attack the crate with his war axe . Skeletons fall and we have our first battle. Big laughs were had by everyone as the skeletons missed every single attack they made against Frawd, but hit and high-damaged every attack against Mantol the Monk. The dice were not kind to Mantol.

Zarleth the Rogue tries shooting the skeletons with his arrows to little effect, while Proxy the Wizard hits hard with his Magic Missiles. As the skeletons are worn down I describe which bones or appendages they're losing as a way for them to sort of guess at the hit points. The fight was won, and Truku performs his first ever CLW on Mantol. Frawd then continues his search of the crate and finds and pockets the skull's ruby.

After that the party starts to head down the south passageway, which I dreaded because it was going to complicate things a lot, and the party had not yet caught on to the need to constantly search for traps. However, just at the last second, Mantol exclaims, 'Hey! What about the puddle?? I bet you there's something weird going on with that puddle!' I breathe a sigh of relief.

Assorted members of the party take turns trying to drink the water and do spot checks against the wall, they find the 'secret' rune above the wall, and then one by one they all completely fail at trying to decipher what it means (and I mean fail like everyone rolled less than 5 on the descipher ), however, eventually Frawd decides to just shove the rune into the wall, and the wall falls open.

Watch Room

The party makes its way down the corridor. They stop just shy of entering into the Watch room, and observe the two sih'hel blindly going about their cooking (little does the party know that the sih'hel are perfectly aware of them, thanks to the fight with the skeletons, and are simply biding their time to attack!) The party stops in the passageway and whispers back and forth opun what to do - and what do they decide to do: They decide to head back and rest in the first room

Well, as soon as their backs are turned, the sih'hels let out a hissing war cry, one of them turns the cauldron over while the other throws a javelin at the passageway. It happens that only Frawd and mantol are in range of the spilling soup. Frawd makes his DEX save easily and jumps clear of the soup, while Mantol fails it and gets his feet cooked, prompting more laughing and joking at Mantol's player. Poor Mantol. The Javelin does hit Frawd though, which annoys him very much.

Surprise round over, one sih'hel wins initiative by a long shot and throws another Javelin which also hits Frawd and annoys him even more. The players run into the room and hit and kill the cauldron-pushing sih'hel, but are too slow to stop the javelin-throwing sih-hel from running the hell out of there through the south door and shuts it behind him.

Truku decides to use his CLW on Frawd this time, and the party has a long discussion about what to do with the escaped humanoid. They thoroughly search the south door for traps and even go as far as having Proxy cast Open on the door while standing from a safe distance, but nothing happens.

The party has another discussion and decides to make camp and rest behind the cauldron before going after the other sih'hel!!

Needless to say as soon as they fell asleep the sih'hell shows up once again, and Truku gets a rude awakening to find the creature standing on top of the overturned cauldron and slicing its hooksword down into him. The creature uses the rest of its move to turn tail and run, shutting the door behind it once again

After a few curses and laughs the party decides they're gonna have to hunt down the little rascal before resting. They step into the south corridor, and by being very paranoid and very careful they discover the tripwire, and Zarleth manages to disarm it, not without tripping it one time first, but being able to easily dodge out of the swinging block's way.

Gear Room

Zarleth the Rogue sneaks into the gear room, and with some very high DEX and WIS rolls manages to stealth around and spot the sih'hel without it spotting him. Zarleth sneaks up behind the sih'hel and tries a Back Attack, only to blow the roll and miss, alerting the sih'hell to his presence.

Initiative is rolled and Proxy the Wizard wins it. Sadly, Proxy is all out of missiles, and being outside the gear room (everybody is outside save for Zarleth) elects to fire his sling instead. He misses and hits the gear right behind the sih'hel, causing the entire gear room to spin into chaotic action and Zarleth to have to DEX roll to avoid being hit by the turning metal, which he succeeds.

Truku decides to brave the gears in the room for the sake of doing the evil creature in once and for all. As soon as he walks into the room he fails his throw and takes full damage from the gears. He fails his attack against the sih'hel and next round takes full damage from the gears as well, whittling him down to 3 hit points.

Everybody shouts for him to get the hell outta there, and Frawd goes 'screw this!' and runs into the room, also fails his DEX roll and takes gear damage, but manages to cleave the sih'hell in half with a single greataxe attack! Truku asks if he should stay and search for treasure and gets promtply shouted down with requests that he evacuate the room, which he does. The party then heads back to the cauldron room and rests, this time successfully.

Beneath the Menhir again

After resting, the party decides to go back and explore the first dark passageway again. This time though, they have developed a very healthy paranoia, and it saves them from the horrible trap in this room which I dreaded having to deal with. First, thanks to a Stonecraft roll Frawd manages to detect that something is wrong with both the door at the end of the passage way and the tiles right in front of it.

Zarleth tries to detect any traps and fails horribly. The party decides to try an old trick, and this time it serves them well: Proxy the Wizard casts Open at the painted door, and his spell fizzles. The party decides the door is fake and throws a torch at it, which bounces off the door, falls into the pit trap, and fizzles out when it hits the water.

Truku and Mantol go forward and inspect the trapdoor, and debate whether they should climb down and investigate. They decide not to, and instead go all the way east, past the cauldron room and into the chain room.

Chain Room

The chain room proves not much of a stumper for our party, since with Truku's high WIS rolls and Zarleth's inhuman DEX rolls, after a little bumping around they have found and figured out the lever mechanisms.

Mantol grabs hold of the chain with a hooksword they looted off of the first sih'hel, and the scene ends with Zarleth perched up on the wall managing the levers while Frawd hangs by his belt from the bottom of the chain like a big dwarven worm on a giant fishing pole and is lowered into the darkness.

Here we took a little break for snacks, and continued the game soon after, which I will do in the next post

Sounds fun.

You are so right that DCCs and C&C are a great match.

I'm glad to have inspired you to write your game a bit. I can almost see the game playing out when I read 'em.

JediOre wrote:Sounds fun.

You are so right that DCCs and C&C are a great match.

I'm glad to have inspired you to write your game a bit. I can almost see the game playing out when I read 'em.

Thanks Jedi, it's actually almost as much fun to write these as it is to play the game itself

Anyways, here goes.. Part 2 of our adventure.

We rejoin our band of adventurers as they finish figuring out the chain and lower themselves one by one onto the western platform of the second level of the dungeon.

I had a second of nervousness here since Zarleth the Rogue didn't have anyone to operate the chain for him to descend, so a botched DEX roll could mean I'd be forced to have him fall and kill him off. But I should have known better, for C&C's SIEGE bonuses made it so he not only slid down the chain like a champ, he also backflipped off the chain and onto the platform and got a smattering of applause for his display. Anyway..

The Forbidden Fane

As soon as I described this room, with green swampy light, musty vapors, sickly green vines all over the place etc., Mantol's player starts going 'OMG guys this is gonna be a boss fight here, I know it! A BOSS fight! Which I thought was funny.

I point out the big mushrooms growing out of the ground-soil, the golden doors with the vines around them, the staircase going upwards, and a corpse of a rogue who had had half her body half-crushed by something (put in by myself - I like all secrets to have clear and fair hints pointing at them, and the door to 7-A was just too randomly hidden for my taste).

First thing the party does is send Zarleth the Rogue up to sneak into the room and check out what is there. I describe the huge, hulking, feathered black bear-form in the darkness just shuffling around, and he decides to take a shot at it He misses and the owlbear starts roaring in all directions, but because Zarleth again makes his DEX stealth check with flying colors, the owlbear does not pursue down the stairs.

The party then focuses on the corpse, search it and find a ten-foot pole, and lockpicks set and a spike trap set which Zarleth takes. Mantol tries to prod the puzzle-lock's mouth with the 10 foot pole, which promptly gets its end crushed under the steel jaws.

Truku becomes dead-set on searching every square inch around the corpse and soon the party has found the rotting bodies that feed the mushrooms of the room as well as the secret door to the altar room. After a bunch of tries and different ideas involving prying it, breaking it, picking it and casting Open at it, the party succeeds in opening the secret door.

Lost Treasures of the Underfolk

Zarleth searches for traps and for the first time in the entire game succeeds on the INT roll to find the trap, and finds the portcullis set to fall across the doorway. He totally botches the disarm roll though.

The party has a good discussion about what to do about the unarmed trap, which isn't helped when Truku decides to cast Light and peer into the room from outside, and his WIS roll lets him see that the dark color of the room's walls and floor is from sheets of dried blood.

Finally they come up with a course of action: they grab the corpse of the dead rogue and throw it in I rule in my head that being only half a corpse (more or less) this is enough weight to trigger the portcullis crashing down, but not enough to trigger the wall itself. The party watches as the portcullis crashes down, then after some 5 minutes comes back up. Frawd the Fighter decides to just step into the room and open one of the chests. Everyone else follows

Portcullis crashes down over the entrance, with all 5 members of the party inside the altar. As soon as they look into the chest, the wall starts closing. I start counting down the seconds to their death (30 seconds) and the party is frantic.

They start hitting the portcullis trying to break it to no effect. Some of them try to climb into the little alcove; noone except for Frawd (dwarf) would fit, and and the chests are in there anyways. When the wall is halfway gone Frawd finally thinks of lifting the portcullis by himself with a STR roll and letting everyone out, which he succeeds in doing. Mantol grabs the chests, gets encumbered but makes it along with everyone else.

By now the walls are almost closed, and Frawd can't get under the portcullis and lift it at the same time. He tries to wedge his mining pick under it to hold it while he passes through; I tell him the walls are so closed that he has only ONE chance to roll an INT roll to place it properly or be crushed. Frawd has almost no INT bonus (+1) and he would have to roll a natural 17 to make it. He goes for it. He rolls a natural 17. Definitely one of the high points of the night right there.

The party breathes a sigh of relief as they watch the rest of the body of the dead rogue be crushed into a fine paste, and loot the stuff from the chests. Strangely none of them think to detect magic on any of the stuff

Champion of the Sih'Hel

Next, the group decides to take on the Owlbear (aka 'the big eagle thing upstairs'). Zarleth the Rogue sets his trap at the top of the stairs, and sneaks into the room the same way as before. He tries to take a shot at the thing again, misses it again, but this time the owlbear chases him down! It falls into the spike trap, taking some damage, but now has the high ground against everyone else.

The owlbear is pounding on Zarleth's back and quickly brings him down to 3 hit points before he can jump behind Mantol the Monk and run. Proxy the Wizard is slinging all the Magic Missiles he can but he's rolling low and the owl has huge hitpoints anyway. I describe how every hit makes the bear's feather's glow green and the party decides that this is the feared monter that they were warned about, but it doesn't look good.

Mantol decides he wants to try a Stunning Blow against the owlbear. With his bonuses he needs a natural 16 to land it and he's been rolling low all night long. He rolls it. Natural 16. The bear gets stunned for 1d4 rounds; Mantol rolls it; natural 4. Crowd goes wild. Owlbear is soon dispatched.

The party cuts the creature's head off and sticks it in a backpack in order to prove they killed it. They explore the owlbear's lair, and find the cistern and the dire rat's nest, which they promptly take care of without getting bit even once The take the 'bony stick' which they find in the nest without bothering to detect magic once again

Climbing back down the stairs, Zarleth plainly refuses to stick his hands in the puzzle lock. Nobody can come to an agreement on the lock (aside from casting Open on it, which fails of course). The decision is made to make camp and rest on the platform outside the fane, and that is where we left the game for the night.

***

So, as you can see we had TONS of fun with this. It was really cool and well-made and allowed me to add in bits and pieces that I though were cool without breaking down. We'll finish it in the days to come and then I'll give the guys the option to go into Whiterock or use the Game Finder in the back to find another which they like, and for closing impressions, we are all unanimously very happy to continue playing both C&C and DCCs

Tropico,

It is so much fun reading this. You're doing a bomb-proof job of running the adventure, and the little details you're adding are all ideas I wish I had thought of. Great work.

Can't wait to read the next episode.

//H

Tropico wrote:Zarleth tries to detect any traps and fails horribly. The party decides to try an old trick, and this time it serves them well: Proxy the Wizard casts Open at the painted door, and his spell fizzles. The party decides the door is fake and throws a torch at it, which bounces off the door, falls into the pit trap, and fizzles out when it hits the water.

Ad this is just awesome. I love it when players break out of simply rolling skill checks and start to manipulate the dungeon. Very cool.

//H