Stonetop: Great Wood arc, Session 3 (1/2)
My home campaign has made it back to Stonetop.
We opened with our Marshal reading a letter, titled And the Apatosaurus you rolled in on... He learned that while he was away from session, he and his crew managed to hitch a ride on a few Tal Gerdwyr and ride courageously to where the rest of the party was waiting in a Manmarches hillfort called Rottleberode. Because he rolled a 12 on Catch Up, the party learned that they'd been enjoying a hero's treatment in Rottleberode while they waited for Cadfael.
Rottleberode is a typical hillfort, ringed with a decent palisade and headed by a bizarre Manmarcher chief called Ludig. I made Ludig using Stonetop's procedural Chief generation tables, and his traits were:
utter lack of scruples, a silver tongue and regal presence, and the courage to try new things frail from age/sickness/corruption, an utter lack of a warrior's skills
I used these lines alone to improvise what kind of Chief I thought Ludig was, and it went really well. He emerged as a demanding, if gregarious, figure who delighted in magic and mystery. This was helpful for pushing my Seeker, Ciara (pronounced Kira) to use her Azure Hand and maybe set fire to a village or two. Ludig asked to see a demonstration of the Hand's power before our party left the fort. She was amenable, and before she left she channeled the power of wind into a little jar and left it with the Chief. This was our first of two successful Azure Hand rolls of the session!
Many cute moments ensued involving braiding flowers into the mossy shag feathers of the Tal Gerdwyr. Our party left with a familiar horse in tow, supplies to last them the trip home, and instructions for building Drakeroarers, basically a Bullroarer but fashioned in such a way that it replicates Drake calls. This was the prized secret our Manmarchers, Ulrik and Mieke, offered to the party in exchange for walking them home. As a result of their efforts, we've added the Drakeroarers Steading Improvement to Stonetop, keeping Crinwin out for as long as there are folks to swing the roarers every so often on the edge of the village.
Ulrik and Mieke are gone. Part of the letter indicated that the party should ask how they know those two were slain. I partly wanted to get them out of the picture, but mainly wanted to portray the bloody society of Manmarchers. Nobody really had any objections to their death, but it did set the tone of a Manmarch hillfort being a place where fortunes could turn unexpectedly.
We followed Book I instructions for returning home by largely glossing over the journey and using some narrative devices to remind them of what they learned on the way here.
This wasn't the entire session, I'm just too tired to post something. Part 2 will be up soon. We had some dramatic reveals that I'm still reflecting on.