Replay 1 - Session 2 - Why did the eagleserpent cross the road?

Philosophy on monsters

As a sort of preamble, now that we are going to be dealing with monsters. I'd like to give a sort of philosophy I have for monsters and creatures that are pseudo-intelligent. Mostly, that I think of monsters less like animals and more like folklore pieces; creatures of the forests and caves that go from mischievous to evil.

I don't think they act like animals, in the sense that I don't think they care that much about survival, they act in accordance with a certain philosophy which is their way of living. Goblins, for example, steal gold from people not because they will use it in their society as a form of trade, but simply because they like to keep shiny things — they will not use that treasure for anything, in fact, they would probably just bury it so no one else could have it. That's what I mean by acting on their philosophy rather than for survival, in that sense, monsters are entirely distinct from animals.

They can still have burrows and lairs, territory, domains, and all sort of things, some have this as part of their philosophy, but in most cases it's not a priority. The idea of some goblin hole where there are dozens of them is absurd to me.

Similarly, I take their pseudo-intelligence to mean that they can make some decisions, choose which fights to pick, when to run away, and when to try and communicate. Due to this individualistic nature, I imagine that monsters whose philosophies are not compatible with one another are not likely to work together. But if they are compatible, independent of their appearance or race, monsters can and should work in small groups — especially under the command of an intelligent or more powerful monster or wizard.

That's my idea for monsters, it is an in-between the more game-like idea of monsters as mindless obstacles that just want to murder, and the more realistic perspective that tries to make the actions of monsters part of their societies, biology, and part of a larger ecosystem. Both of those, I do not like, the former is not interesting at all, and the latter is simply too much; I don't care about orc society, I just want pig people walking around being bastards!

A story from the past

I have a tale from when I was a child, it is very valuable to me, perhaps more valuable than that thing—well, let's not be quick of judgement. Appraisal ain't my forte but I can tell that there was some value in there.

I would leave the orphanage to see it. I don't know how I got there, I just liked sneaking past walls. So first I sneaked out through the yard, and then through the plaza, even though there was no need to do so, and then past the north wall, through some hole, silently through the forest, and there it was.

By the time I'd get back to the orphanage, well into the night, I'd be covered in dirt. I didn't care, they didn't care either, at some point I stopped going back, but that's another story.

There was a dance of light and these figures that I thought to be fairies from the tales of adventures well past the walls of Molinos. Scared? No, I wasn't scared. I didn't care, I was too curious. I followed them as I followed the breeze, and saw them, slightly differently, resting on trees. And resting in a tree it was; the blade was golden and it had a shine more than gold.

It is there that I met my friend, who came there from the forest, for reasons not too different from mine. I believed him to be a child just like me... well, he was, but so many years have gone by and he still looks the same.

We would gather and talk — he would tell me about the forest, and the life there within, that those things in the breeze and the trees were not fairies but spirits of nature and wind. We talked about the magic sword, we told ourselves that we were going to free it from the tree, and once that was done, we would go on adventures — those adventures that I've read, that I would gladly share, from well past the walls of Molinos.

But we couldn't do it. It is not like we tried. How would we meet again once the sword was taken and the spirits were to leave? What use was the sword if I didn't have my friend? At some point we had to part ways.

When one rainy day I left like any other day, but mud replaced the dirt over my face, and I found myself unknowing where to go, no sword or spirits to guide me — I knew that perhaps that day was the day. But it was my gamble to not return, to expect something else. That was the story of when I stopped going back, and by pure chance I was able to exchange a magic sword for a good friendship. Now, appraisal ain't my forte, but I think there is value in that.

Replay

Well, well... what was that about? I will explain... soon, but not too soon. I am going at my own pace here, that's the neat thing about solo RPG; I can go at my own pace. In a sense this is a sort of blog, isn't it? It's just that my hobby is rolling dice by myself (lol). I wouldn't say it is too different from playing a computer RPG.

First let me set some backstory that I thought about in relation to the brothers, Ferem and Suilandos. Their family is still dead by unknown reasons, but I figure that they were attacked by something while traveling the road. At the same time, Gertosel and Demdem planned to rob them, but by the time they arrived, the family was already dead — except the two sons.

Demdem probably helped them recover, since he's a magic user — of course, they also took all of the things that were valuable. This happened a year ago, and they've been living off of hunting and the money from the family, and that's how the brothers joined the Crimson Strike Band, and how they haven't really done any type of robbing despite the fact that they are thieves.

As for the reason why they chose to become thieves rather than returning to Molinos... I don't know, I'll think about it. Maybe the only survivor of their family is their uncle and he's evil or something... I'll think about it. That's enough of backstory, except that little short story, but I'll talk about that later.

While visiting the inn at the village near their hideout, Gertosel heard of a rumor — a rumor that a thief would ignore, no doubt he should have, it was none of his concerns... and yet he found himself drawn to it due to a memory.

Merchant: "Yes, down the road to Molinos, there are so many spirits, they are visible even in plain daylight..."

Having heard this Gertosel had an idea, and decided to inquire with his friend Demdem.

Gertosel: "Hear me out, remember how we met?"
Demdem: "I do, it is one of my biggest regrets; a recurring nightmare of sorts."
Gertosel: "Save your tears, old friend. That sword — a magical sword was stuck in a tree, and the spirits were gathering around it, so many spirits that they were visible even during daytime."
Demdem: "It is a shame that we were so young. By the time we'd got the resolve, both the sword and the spirits had drifted away."
Gertosel: "Magical items are so expensive... we could have made good gold out of it... And I think destiny has given us another chance."
Demdem: "What is it that you mean?"
Gertosel: "I've heard word in the village that the path to Molinos has an abnormal amount of spirits — could it be that the sword is back?"
Demdem: "Did the sword drop its purse? Don't be foolish! A ton of spirits could mean many things, all sorts of magics attract spirits."
Gertosel: "Let's take a look and see what we find, if it is easy gold then that's our treasure!"

And so, Gertosel and Demdem walked to the forest close to the road. With the help of Demdem and his ability to speak with spirits, finding the source was no trouble.

In my setting all races except humans have an unique ability - the ability of grassrunners is being able to communicate with spirits of nature, earth, wind, water, death and divinity. Elves can cast spells without using a staff. And beastmen can see in the dark. There are other small benefits, like elves not needing a bedroll because they meditate instead of sleeping, and beastmen being able to eat food raw without getting sick.

What they found was not a blade but an entrance to a structure underground. That place was the source, and Gertosel thought, where the treasure resides.

Gertosel: "We should prepare an expedition to this place."
Demdem: "Have you finally lost your mind?! We are thieves, not adventurers or tomb robbers!"
Gertosel: "We are running out of funds, the gold from the kids can't keep us going forever, and with their help we may be able to get some quick treasure and leave."

Although Demdem was skeptical he found himself agreeing; his pupil, Suilandos Knightveil, was more than capable in the realms of magic, and his brother Ferem was more reliable than Gertosel has ever been — he thought they may have a chance.

And here we have it. That was it. That was the reason for the backstory, I needed a reason why these thieves would go dungeon crawling — now I get to talk about the game.

First, I would have liked having the characters search for the dungeon, but I decided that it was too much trouble this time. In the future I plan to make it like that.

Ferem and Suilandos stand in a shop, they were tasked with buying things for the exploration of the dungeon.

Suilandos: "And with that... we are all out of money!"
Ferem: "Do we really need all of this stuff?"
Suilandos: "Fufu~ Big brother doesn't know! I've read about adventuring before; lantern, torches, rations, camping kits and ten foot poles."
Ferem: "We didn't get any poles."
Suilandos: "They fell out of fashion."
Ferem: "Is it fashion or is it survival?!"
Suilandos: "It is survival when resources are abound, and fashion when the purse is filled with dust."
Ferem: Σ(°ロ°)

Overconfidence killed the adventurer. This ain't 5e, I am keeping track of light, dungeon turns, wandering monsters, food and sleep. Perhaps the poles are a bit too much, so I decided to omit them. Still, one of the things I like the most is not really combat or rolling dice, but resource management. It is the fun of the crawl. Also, this is not pointless roleplay, I spent every single piece of their gold for this — if they don't get treasure then they are in for a bad time.

All right, all preparations done... let's go! Adventure awaits, huzzah! Wait... where are we going? Where are we even? Let me just pull up the map.

Let me comment a bit on this thing before I talk about traveling.

I am not the type of person that cares too much about world-building in my RPGs — I don't mind building the world but I like it as much as I get to use whatever I've built. So basically, I am making everything up as I go. Most of my inspiration is video-games, and as a result, I don't really care about the realism of town placement and stuff like that. Even though in the future I'd like to make distinct cities and towns, for now these serve the same purpose as "the castle" in Wizardry; places to rest and buy things. I have rules about what is sold depending on the size of the settlement, but for now, that's about it. Don't think about the towns, villages and cities, too much! Damn it, I didn't even name the village near the hideout!

Finally, this map is prone to change, adapting to newer ideas of "what could be there." All right, that's all about the map, let's talk exploration.

You move through those hexes. Moving through a hex takes a turn, a turn is like four hours (on foot). You need to rest at least two turns every 6 turns. In other words, at least 8 hours every 24 hours. If you don't do it... exhaustion. Both traveling and resting has dangers of random encounters, each turn must end with a check for those dangers — some areas are more dangerous than others. The last thing you should know is that to benefit from resting one must have rations, at least one per character.

The party was at their hideout, so to reach the dungeon, they should move through 3 hexes. That's 3 turns or a 12 hour walk. Let's take those turns, but first, I will use a table to check the weather.

TURN 1: The party sets off as soon as the sun rises, it is cloudy but it isn't windy. There are no random encounters.

TURN 2: After reaching the village they move to the road safely.

TURN 3: I rolled a 1 which means there is a random encounter. As this occurs at the end of the turn, it means it either happens in the dungeon, or in the forest surrounding it.

I don't really have a table for random encounters, I guess I could search for one, but I'd rather make something up - I want to set up the types of creatures that live in this forest myself, so I'll ask the oracle instead.

Q: Is the encounter an animal? (½)
A: Yes. (5)
Q: Is the animal common? (⅔)
A: No. (1)

So it has to be some kind of fantastical creature, it is not a bear or wolves, which is what I thought it was going to be. I am going to inquire more about the creature.

Q: Is it alone? (½)
A: No. (2)

There are many of them! Let me roll for their size, and after that I'll ask if they are aggressive. For monsters, I'd assume they are, but these are animals so I'll go 50%.

Q: Are they aggressive? (½)
A: No. (3)

Medium sized fantastic creatures that are not aggressive. Perhaps we could sneak past them. Well, I don't really know what they are. Hmm... let's make some shit up, I don't want to get stuck, so I'll just make a creature that fits the description and make it part of the world. I find that the best way to make a fantasy animal is just mixing already existing animals together.

This is a pack of... eagleserpents... They have the body of wolves but with bird feathers instead of fur, and the head of white snakes. Saying that they are not actively aggressive could be interpreted as meaning they will not give chase. I'd say their behavior is roaming during the day, hunting for small animals, and taking care of their eggs during the night. I am not sure how their biology works, or their mating habits, but this is the limit of how much realism I want to apply to this fucked up creature.

I rolled the dice and there are 2 of them, that's not much of a pack. Let's make the party try and sneak past them, if they get seen perhaps the eagleserpents will think they are after their children and attack them.

I will explain how checks work because it is the first time you are seeing one. Each attribute has a modifier. When you check that attribute you roll 2D, then you add your bonus, and then you subtract the difficulty. Difficulty against monsters and creatures is equal to their level. Since they are a new creature, I rolled a dice to determine the level of the eagleserpents: they are level 1. To succeed you must meet or pass 8.

FEREM has +3 to DEX:
4 (3 and 1) + 3 (Bonus) - 1 (Difficulty) = 6. This is a failure.

In the future I will just say if they failed or not, with the resulting number, I'll save you the math.

The party traveled through the forest, the sun was starting to set... they heard a hissing sound in the distance. Ferem is the first to notice.

Ferem: Shush, there are eagleserpents nearby. Watch your step...

Before anyone could make another move there was a cracking sound. Looking in front of his own foot, Ferem found what remained of the large egg he just kicked.

Ferem: Σ(°ロ°)

Of course, I can't imagine the eagleserpents being very pleased with that, so let's go into combat and skip their reaction. Combat is somewhat complicated to explain, so I am not going to go into the details.

The party wins initiative (11) and the turn order is: ally, ally, ally, enemy, ally, enemy.

Gertosel tries to strike one of the eagleserpents with his hand-ax (8), he barely hits, dealing 3 damage.

Ferem attacks with his first dagger, rolling a critical (pair for simple weapons) strike (15), dealing 10 damage. The dagger pierces through the head of the eagleserpent as it launches its attack.

The eagleserpent, which was attacked by Gertosel, tries to retaliate with its bite (1) but it only manages to slam its head against a shield. Gertosel attacks (9) cutting through the neck of the eagleserpent and killing it.

Both creatures were defeated, huh... that was easy. Two level one animals are no match. There is no loot or experience, so nothing was gained from it. But I'll keep it in mind for next encounters. It is a shame, I had plans for their bite attacks to have a chance for a really bad venom. If there are a ton of them, I bet it'd be trouble — maybe for another time.

After that unexpected encounter the party arrives at the dungeon entrance. As the moon starts to rise, four pillars of stone stand; their shadows disappearing into the darkness of night. At the center of a platform of stone, a set of stairs goes down towards a large wooden door, slightly ajar.

And that is all for today's session. Sorry, I guess it took longer than I was expecting. I'll leave the dungeon for next session, hope you are enjoying reading this adventure. I'm expecting it to get a lot harder inside the actual dungeon. "Eagleserpent" huh? What a stupid name, I am not good with names. I'll think of a name for that village as well... lol.