DCC Beta Campaign test: Portland, OR
Posted: Fri Jul 08, 2011 2:08 am
Firstly, I'd like to give thanks once again to Nick... who saved me from sitting at a table all by my self in a room full of gamers...
I was talking to the shop owner and she said that gamers are always a little sparse this time of year. Then I thought... she's right, In this part of the country when the sun finally does come out, even gamers tend to crawl out of our gaming dens and spend time in the great outdoors.
Campaign story arc runs through these modules: DCC 0-level beta -> DCC #1 -> DCC#27; then on to a larger storyline with DCC#14 as a backbone and a fair bit of world traveling to accomplish all that is necessary.
Here is my reworked intro to the "Portal under the stars." In order to understand some of this you'll need to know the following:
1. I have adapted the materials of DCC#35 into a "Living Greyhawk" style with the history spaced out over aprox. 100,000 years of prehistory leading up to the 3rd (and prophesied to be the last) appearance of the Star of the Black Sun at the end of the year 3199.
1a. in the year -1199 (with the fall of the Isle of Lirea as year 0) the Shadow Star fell to Aereth. From that point onwards: anything with an INT score that dies will re-animate within 1d6 hours. Most societies eventually learned to cope with this, as there was usually enough time to get a cleric to consecrate the body before re-animation. With the appearance of the Star of the Black Sun... this window has now dropped to 1d6 rounds.
2. my version of Aereth uses a standardized calender that is 13 months of 28 days... nice and neat, because Valdreth "the Lord of Time" likes it that way... and because he hates the concept of a "leap year." The exactitude with which the turning of the year is accomplished is why everyone is so FREAKED OUT! While shooting stars occasionally happen, new stars appearing out of no where is... the end of everything as they know it...
3. the first of every month is always a New Moon and the Full Moon is always on the 14th; and the Spectral Moon is only seen by Northerners every 13 years due to a very eccentric orbit.
I don't want to over load the posting limits so I'll post the rest of the game report after I finish writing it all down.
It is the 27th of Winterheart, in the year 3199; the day before the Winter Solstice, and the last day of the year. You are residents or visitors who arrived with the last caravan into town 6 weeks ago, to the smallish town of Grenvec; on the northeastern most edge of the Imperial province of Trella (a.k.a. Silver Reaches) , which encompasses most of the Fang Mountains. The town sits in the scrubby hills at the north edge of the vast grassy ocean of central Crieste. Life is hard here.
The Fangs, an implacable wall to the west, are so named because their jagged peaks are too steep for snow to form upon their crowns even though their height is sufficient to allow for it all 13 months of the year. The summer growing season is short and the weather is violent in the shadows of the mountains, for when the cold wet air from its heights mixes with the hot dry air of the plains it makes for frequent and lethal lightning storms. In winter it always seems as though the lower elevations get all the snow that the peaks refuse to carry, as if Winter’s fury were looking to avenge this grievous affront. The spirit of this Winter seems bent on shaming its predecessors. The chalk white and twisted limestone peaks of the Fang Mountains are also riddled with caves and underground river networks which provide plenty of hiding places for the Monsters that call these mountains home. If it has fangs or feathers… it lives in these mountains.
The harvests are always meager and barely keep you through the winter most years. You sweat and toil for half the year or more only to freeze and starve by late winter. In Grenvec there are mostly just farmers and such as would support them, but the town is fortunate enough to be located on the old Veltoni trade road halfway between Vaqueria and Silverton. It is the steady flow of Merchants and their trains full of metal ingots and finery from the mountains traded for goods in Vaqueria, the Gear-City, that keeps the town alive. But this year has been worse than all the rest, and it was that damn wizard who caused all the trouble!
It was a little less than two months ago. Just after the Passing New Moon in December & and not quite a week from the festival of Death Pass when that no good wizard returned home to visit his dieing brother; Old Man Roberts, the aging mayor of Grenvec. “Tending to the family legacy,” says the Roberts family and, “He is taking a rest from the rigors of the wizardly life.” Everyone knows its troll poop, because it was right after the festival that the strange lights started appearing in the skies, and then the winter started with the most savage blizzard in living memory. It wasn’t until after the wizard arrived that the cows all got sick and the granary burned down. Then last night a new constellation of stars burned brightly in the night at the same time that many other stars began to fall from the sky, streaking through the heavens in all the colors of the rainbow…
(28th of Winterheart; the Winter Solstice) it was the screaming and sounds of panic that roused you from your beds. When you rush outside there are people in various states of dressed running past you, all heading towards the west side of town. No one stops to answer your questions, some point wildly towards the east, north, or south… that is when you see the purple-green glow. You grab what you can and run along with the others; slogging as best as you can through the slushy snow in the muddy churned streets. Long before you get to the west end of town the ground begins to climb steeply towards the apex of a large rounded hill, whose lowest flanks are covered in scraggly orchards. As you run, slipping and sliding through the town you see the glow is caused by a wall of giant purple and green flames consuming everything in its path: even the snow; leaving naught but a silvery powder in its wake. The flames march quickly from all directions save the west, and are consuming the outermost houses of the town as you sprint, fear lending strength to your legs as you make your way up the hill.
No trees had ever grown at the top of this smallish mound, nor had snow ever fallen within the circle of stones with which it was crowned. Long before you reach the top you see that those stones are now eerie black silhouettes like giant rotted bones protruding from the ground; and you know in your heart that you are surrounded buy fire.
You and a few others reach the outer stone ring with the flames nipping at your heels and see that the stone arch in the center of the ring is wreathed in golden orange lightning and where you could normally see the mountains through the arch, there is now a long dark hallway… You have no idea what awaits you on the other side of the portal, but you do know that you don’t want to burn. Damn wizards!
I was talking to the shop owner and she said that gamers are always a little sparse this time of year. Then I thought... she's right, In this part of the country when the sun finally does come out, even gamers tend to crawl out of our gaming dens and spend time in the great outdoors.
Campaign story arc runs through these modules: DCC 0-level beta -> DCC #1 -> DCC#27; then on to a larger storyline with DCC#14 as a backbone and a fair bit of world traveling to accomplish all that is necessary.
Here is my reworked intro to the "Portal under the stars." In order to understand some of this you'll need to know the following:
1. I have adapted the materials of DCC#35 into a "Living Greyhawk" style with the history spaced out over aprox. 100,000 years of prehistory leading up to the 3rd (and prophesied to be the last) appearance of the Star of the Black Sun at the end of the year 3199.
1a. in the year -1199 (with the fall of the Isle of Lirea as year 0) the Shadow Star fell to Aereth. From that point onwards: anything with an INT score that dies will re-animate within 1d6 hours. Most societies eventually learned to cope with this, as there was usually enough time to get a cleric to consecrate the body before re-animation. With the appearance of the Star of the Black Sun... this window has now dropped to 1d6 rounds.
2. my version of Aereth uses a standardized calender that is 13 months of 28 days... nice and neat, because Valdreth "the Lord of Time" likes it that way... and because he hates the concept of a "leap year." The exactitude with which the turning of the year is accomplished is why everyone is so FREAKED OUT! While shooting stars occasionally happen, new stars appearing out of no where is... the end of everything as they know it...
3. the first of every month is always a New Moon and the Full Moon is always on the 14th; and the Spectral Moon is only seen by Northerners every 13 years due to a very eccentric orbit.
I don't want to over load the posting limits so I'll post the rest of the game report after I finish writing it all down.
It is the 27th of Winterheart, in the year 3199; the day before the Winter Solstice, and the last day of the year. You are residents or visitors who arrived with the last caravan into town 6 weeks ago, to the smallish town of Grenvec; on the northeastern most edge of the Imperial province of Trella (a.k.a. Silver Reaches) , which encompasses most of the Fang Mountains. The town sits in the scrubby hills at the north edge of the vast grassy ocean of central Crieste. Life is hard here.
The Fangs, an implacable wall to the west, are so named because their jagged peaks are too steep for snow to form upon their crowns even though their height is sufficient to allow for it all 13 months of the year. The summer growing season is short and the weather is violent in the shadows of the mountains, for when the cold wet air from its heights mixes with the hot dry air of the plains it makes for frequent and lethal lightning storms. In winter it always seems as though the lower elevations get all the snow that the peaks refuse to carry, as if Winter’s fury were looking to avenge this grievous affront. The spirit of this Winter seems bent on shaming its predecessors. The chalk white and twisted limestone peaks of the Fang Mountains are also riddled with caves and underground river networks which provide plenty of hiding places for the Monsters that call these mountains home. If it has fangs or feathers… it lives in these mountains.
The harvests are always meager and barely keep you through the winter most years. You sweat and toil for half the year or more only to freeze and starve by late winter. In Grenvec there are mostly just farmers and such as would support them, but the town is fortunate enough to be located on the old Veltoni trade road halfway between Vaqueria and Silverton. It is the steady flow of Merchants and their trains full of metal ingots and finery from the mountains traded for goods in Vaqueria, the Gear-City, that keeps the town alive. But this year has been worse than all the rest, and it was that damn wizard who caused all the trouble!
It was a little less than two months ago. Just after the Passing New Moon in December & and not quite a week from the festival of Death Pass when that no good wizard returned home to visit his dieing brother; Old Man Roberts, the aging mayor of Grenvec. “Tending to the family legacy,” says the Roberts family and, “He is taking a rest from the rigors of the wizardly life.” Everyone knows its troll poop, because it was right after the festival that the strange lights started appearing in the skies, and then the winter started with the most savage blizzard in living memory. It wasn’t until after the wizard arrived that the cows all got sick and the granary burned down. Then last night a new constellation of stars burned brightly in the night at the same time that many other stars began to fall from the sky, streaking through the heavens in all the colors of the rainbow…
(28th of Winterheart; the Winter Solstice) it was the screaming and sounds of panic that roused you from your beds. When you rush outside there are people in various states of dressed running past you, all heading towards the west side of town. No one stops to answer your questions, some point wildly towards the east, north, or south… that is when you see the purple-green glow. You grab what you can and run along with the others; slogging as best as you can through the slushy snow in the muddy churned streets. Long before you get to the west end of town the ground begins to climb steeply towards the apex of a large rounded hill, whose lowest flanks are covered in scraggly orchards. As you run, slipping and sliding through the town you see the glow is caused by a wall of giant purple and green flames consuming everything in its path: even the snow; leaving naught but a silvery powder in its wake. The flames march quickly from all directions save the west, and are consuming the outermost houses of the town as you sprint, fear lending strength to your legs as you make your way up the hill.
No trees had ever grown at the top of this smallish mound, nor had snow ever fallen within the circle of stones with which it was crowned. Long before you reach the top you see that those stones are now eerie black silhouettes like giant rotted bones protruding from the ground; and you know in your heart that you are surrounded buy fire.
You and a few others reach the outer stone ring with the flames nipping at your heels and see that the stone arch in the center of the ring is wreathed in golden orange lightning and where you could normally see the mountains through the arch, there is now a long dark hallway… You have no idea what awaits you on the other side of the portal, but you do know that you don’t want to burn. Damn wizards!