Bones of the Naga

GMed by Jess, starting the 1st of May 2010.

This will be a high fantasy campaign starting in the formerly plague-ridden city of Serenton.  Characters will be starting with moderate point values, and I'm planning on growing them fairly rapidly through the use of character points awarded for excellent role playing and in-character or movie-worthy actions or words as well as through loot and possible advantages and disadvantage development, based on role-playing.  My goal is to simulate, in a fashion, the more rapid and powerful character progression of other games such as Dungeons and Dragons.  However, there will still be role-playing required and I do not intend this to be exclusively a hack'n'slash tactical combat session.

Characters:

From Fantasy book:

In low fantasy, and in fantasy based on folklore and fairy tales, point values below 100 often work well. An ordinary man thrown into adventure can be a 50-point character. In higher fantasy, characters built on 100-200 points work better; the added points can represent the Rank, Status, and Wealth of aristocrats, or the skills of veteran adventurers such as the heroes of sword and sorcery. In a dark fantasy setting, PCs may need the added points just for survival! Still higher point values are possible, but move the campaign to the level of epic, with heroes who can contend with the gods or challenge fate. This chapter assumes that the base for typical characters is 100 or 150 points, with up to 50 or 75 points in disadvantages.

Characters should have diverse but realistic skill sets. That is if you've been a baker's assistant your whole life, you're probably not an expert rider and swordsman, but you may have high manual dexterity, a good cooking skill, some herb lore, and perhaps be strong from lugging around bags of flour and making deliveries or such. In that example you may also be overweight for gorging on your own tasty sweet specialties.

I expect role-playing, not just hack'n slash dice rolling. I will be awarding extra character points for playing your character and for good role-playing.

Party will start in the now recovering Serenton. Serenton was plagued some two years back and many died. More left. The city was wholly evacuated and the Serentonian guard barricaded the outer walls, keeping the refugees who camped nearby from sneaking back in until the plague was dealt with.

You are likely all young adventurers or perhaps elder citizens who've never risen to heroics previously.   At 100 points you are not likely complete novices. It is possible you are Serentonian Guards, mage apprentices, devout religious followers, wandering tradespeople or mercenaries. I would like interesting back stories perhaps to use to enhance the campaign. It is also altogether possible you have spent the entirety of your life in Serenton or any other city for that matter coming into Serenton only recently. It's possible you are not an experienced adventurer, but then it would be unlikely that you have a 15 riding skill and a 18 broadsword skill, for example. Your points might be invested into trade skills or "book learning".

Regardless of your origin and past you have to have some reason to be involved in the campaign. That means you have some affiliation with Abacaneeser the alchemist in Serenton. Perhaps you are his niece or nephew or have ran errands (sometimes adventurous) for him in the past. I would like it if at least some members of the party were familiar with each other prior to this. In any case, Abacaneeser has summoned you together for an errand that he trusts your skills will be valuable to accomplishing.

As there are primarily only humans native around Serenton, if you desire to be another race, you can use the following templates:

Elf - -5 pt unusual background

Dwarf - -5 pt unusual background

Half-elf - no cost

Half-orc - -2 pt unusual background

Gnome - -5 pt unusual background

Other race - with DM consultation

Characters will have 100 points to start with and up to -50 points in disadvantages with an optional additional -10 points to be used specifically for Enemies, Reputation or Debt disadvantages, but these must be a tangible part of your back story and your character during role-play.

Characters will be illiterate by default.  Being semi-literate (B p24) in the Common tongue will cost 1 pt, literate 2 pts.

Equipment

• Characters will start with the TL3 starting wealth of $1000.00 which in Gurth recently has been one-thousand silver pieces. This can be modified by choosing the Wealth advantage or disadvantage accordingly. Clothing, weapons, armor and gear should be purchased at base cost in the Characters book from starting wealth. If you have $1000.00, you have nothing and are naked walking the streets of Gurth. A gold piece is ten silver pieces.

• Specialized adventure gear and magical items from Dungeon Fantasy - Adventurers are fine. Magic items must be purchased with character points, at a cost of 1 point per $1000 cost.
  * You may buy power stone(s) by spending 2 character points per power level, with a maximum of 12 power level total in all stones/items. Spending 20 points gets you a single 10 point powerstone, or two 5-point stones, etc.
  

The Party:

• Kemble Coyote, played by John
• Una Laing, played by Niki
• Ferona, played by Melissa
• Jinx, played by Traci

What Happened

Departure

Kemble and Ferona convened at Abacaneeser's request, and agreed to fetch certain goods from a tower in Troll Wood

I have called you both here to run an errand for me. There is an abandoned logging operation in the Trollwood. At the heart of this operation is an abandoned tower. Somewhere in that tower it is rumored there are the bones of a great serpent and I would very much like to have as many of those bones as possible. If you can procure me the head and teeth of that beast I will double your reward. Also, keep your eyes peeled for any other oddities. Amulets, baubles, flagons of strange brew. It could be a curious place, tred with caution and beware. The tower lies in the Trollwood, so Ferona's woodland knowledge should help you find it safely. It is said there were strange goblin-kin enslaved as the laborers of the operation and they may yet remain at the tower.

 He then gave each a potion and 5 gold coins to send them on their way.

Ferona gathered supplies and Kemble parlayed with a miserly stable-owner named Cleed for horse-transport.

Una, Abacaneezer's nosy and untrusting servant, haphazardly gathered some supplies and followed behind the pair secretly. She drank old wine in order to stay hydrated while trying to keep up with the horses as they left Serenton on Joseph's Road, heading southeast.

A night was spent in a kindly old farm woman's farmhouse. Una was discovered and embraced as a compatriot. Kemble swayed his way into sharing a bed with Ferona while the heavily fatigued Una passed out on the floor.

Along the way, they met an old hunter who gave them a warning about Troll Wood.

"What news from Serenton?" "Going to visit a friend of mine who's keeping an eye on Serenton." "That's Trollwood you know? You'd best be cautious there. If'n you run into trolls, be sure to burn them. Otherwise, you'll run into 'em again." (regarding tower)"The old logging operation? A mess that was. Killed the druid in these parts they did. Had a hydra for pulling down trees as I recollect. Ah, gone now, mostly." "Ah to be young and full a piss'n vinegar again. Reckon I'd best be on my way." "Oh, them spitting gobs are round there. Mind yer eyes if you cross paths with them. They're fierce as hell, but old Dohbbart seems to have them mostly rangled."

The party entered Troll Wood with trepidation and gathered deadfall for a fire for dinner.

A troll snuck up in the night awakening Una who roused the others. Kemble was nearly eviscerated by the monster and narrowly escaped with his life. After Una threw a flurry of hasty hexes and Ferona tried to coax the forest into binding the beast, they eventually chased the beast off with burning sticks.

Then as they approached where they'd seen the bloodied Kemble fall, they were bound and drug rapidly through the darkness in nets. The local population of Sligs had captured the entire party and dragged them off to a fate yet unknown. The women awoke to look upon a clothed yellow goblinoid holding a small sword. With a spark of keen intelligence in his eye he peered at them wondering while other such creatures clad only in crude furs lurked about the early morning shadows of the deep TrollWood.

Reaching the Tower

As Ferona and Una tried to talk to Dohbart, one of the goblins, at dawn. Kemble awoke to see a toothy hard-skinned goblinoid packing mud into his shredded abdomen and fainted. Jinx crept up in the dawn shadows after looting Kemble's pack the night before.

The human girls sent Dohbart off to check on Kemble while they untied themselves just in time for Dohbart to return. They then were taken to the small tree root, branch and mud huts of the sligs where they tried to help Kemble. Una by using her voodoo to summon forth benevolent spirits and Ferona by dressing one of his troll bites. While this occurred in the cramped quarters of the smokey hut with Dohbart asking "Where...you go?" Jinx introduced herself by squirming around the Slig and rummaging through the contents of the wooden bowls of the hut. When asked who she was, she replied simply "I'm nobody, but my name is Jinx."

After getting Kemble back on his feet, the women were led by one of Dohbart's sligs back to their camp site where they gathered the parties gear. After the gnome bounced around the trees some, she and Kemble mock sword fought with Jinx barrowing Kemble's dagger.

When all were again reunited in the Slig village, Kemble demanded that Dohbart send one of his men to take them to the tower. After some discussion because Dohbart views his people as free, a Slig swordsman, Kuu'lok was sent along.

Travelling through the dense Trollwood, Kuu'lok seemed neither interested or understanding of Kemble's patronizing remarks. Along the way, Una fished, Ferona grew and harvested plants and Jinx looked through saddle-bags, tried to learn swordplay from the half-elf and tried to show off her circus tricks.

One night of the travel was torn asunder by a screaming Kuu'lok, running into the campsite from an apparent troll attack. The beast was dispatched handily by Kemble severing it's remaining arm as Kuu'lok slashed at it's mossy green body while Una chanted and shook her bones summoning spirits to carry their camp fire to the beast. As the remainder of the troll bubbled like over-roasted marshmellows smelling of a singed dish sponge, Ferona saw to Kuu'lok's wounds and Jinx jumped down from the tree branches to deal the final blow with Kemble's dagger to the smoldering troll-mass.

The following day, the party came to a clearing in the dense Trollwood. The tower with it's broad square base tapering to rise into a cylindrical spire looms darkly in the expanse of burnt stumps and young saplings pushing their way up between glass-like clumps of melted stone and soil. The tower does not fit, like some misplaced erection of a far-off society forcing its foreign filth and poison into primal forest about it. However, the newly sprung trees give proof to the fact the forest is a resilient force.

After staring in awe at the spectacle before them for a moment, Kemble threw rocks into the clearing suspecting some explosive trap that scorched this tower and surrounding clear-cut. Having deemed there being no danger, Ferona and Jinx moved ahead as Kemble and Una led up the horses.

The large 10-foot tall double doors seemed locked or barred from within with no keyhole, knocker or handles visible. The daring gnome attempted to scale the 45 degree charred stone face to jump to a window on the cylinder. After she'd slid down like a child a few times, leaving beige streaks where her coat and trousers removed suit from the fleshy colored stone, Una and Ferona decided to walk the perimeter of the tower.

As the two women approached an opening at the back, Jinx finally got Kembles hook and rope secured in the open window, and before noticing the wispy obstructions beyond, she leapt in, sticking in mid-air a few inches from the ground. After squirming free of her beloved coat, she urged Kemble to come up and help, yanking on her coat stuck in the "sticky stuff", as Una and Ferona light their lantern and begin descending into an apparent tunnel beneath the back-side of the tower.

Character Points#Bones of the Naga: 8 May, 2010

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