Adventure Log: Shen Month 4 Epic Quest Part 1

 

Rules Used

A quick note: Not that I need to explain things in a solo game (other than to myself?), I've decided to keep the Send Lawyers, Guns, and Money model for Involuntary encounters. Why? There is a 1-3 chance of a something bad happening, 1 chance at a job, and 2 chances of nothing happening. As written in Caravanserai, your chance of something bad happening at the beginning of the month is 100%. Now, in a post-apocalyptic setting I can see that being the case. It is, indeed, a harsh environment where every day you are fighting for your life.

In a fantasy world, however, I really don't see someone being attacked every month while going about their humdrum lives in between encounters. Sometimes, sure, you're going to be raided by goblins but not always. So with that said, I'm going with the SLGM involuntary encounter table. As I said before, the great thing about Two Hour Wargames is, you can pick and choose from other rule sets. Besides, Talomir Tales Distant Shores doesn't even have involuntary encounters so it's a nice in between.

On with the adventures!

As always, our heroes:

Rep 5 AC 2 Thief Star (Smooth, Clumsy)

Rep 4 AC 2 Soldier Grunt (Hard as Nails)

Involuntary encounter: Job offer. Hmm, nice! The job is to "Go on a quest for a caster." Geeze, need to read up on quests, I guess. He's a rep 4 ac 2 caster. So basically, you keep going on wandering encounters until the dice turns up equal or less than the number of wandering encounters you have been on. Then, you go into a dungeon and that item is in the treasure room. After that, you have to go back as many wandering encounters as you had to get there. On top of that, you have to have a carousing encounter and he's the last PEF you resolve. Sounds simple, right? I will probably be clobbered by the goon squad right off!

"Bring me the statue of the Eternal Father!"

 

Well, let's get started! I've never had a quest nor a dungeon encounter so two birds with one stone, as they say. The item I have to retrieve was drawn randomly from the GM's Apprentice, Identify, Eternal, Father. Sounded like a statue to me.

Wandering Encounter 1: PEFs will be resolved as follows Capalan League (1-3), Dwarfs (4-5), and Trolls (6). As I get further away, they will increase in danger. Number of PEFs to be resolved is 4.

PEF 1: Two Capalan League people. A rep 4 ac 6 mounted knight slow mover and a rep 4 ac 2 soldier. I choose to interact with them but nothing comes of it as we both passed 2d6.

My play surface.

 PEF 2: One rep 4 ac 4 Red Sun Dwarf healer (double 2s) with the attribute agile. I interact and pass more d6! 1 IRD (increasing rep d6) plus, I can recruit lower reps to my band. I further interact to see if he's interested in joining and he is. Always nice to have a healer around! May I introduce to you, (randomly draws a GM's Apprentice card), Ragnar the Dwarven Healer.

Ragnar Rep 4 AC 4 Healer Grunt (Agile)

 

PEF 3: Resolves as two trolls! Probably going to need Ragnar for this one. One is a rep 6 ac 4 troll and the other is a rep 4 ac 2 troll. I can either go to the battle board or try and intimidate them. Let's give peace a chance, we'll intimidate them! So much for diplomacy, passed the same d6 and the trolls attack!

Action table: I have the advantage and drats, I passed 1d6 less so I utilize my extraordinary effort and pass the same. Whew! I choose to send Phineas at the little troll and Shen and Ragnar at the big troll. Despite a long battle, Phineas goes OOF (out of the fight) (0 rep). Then, after a battle filled with drama and me sweating, Ragnar ended up OOF. Reduced to 1 rep each, the fight between Shen and the troll was decided by a -1 roll on the melee damage chart. Since we didn't tie, I rolled under the troll's ac and he would be -1 rep, which would have been 0.

PEF 4: Shen faces this one alone as his two companions have went OOF. Dragging the two poor sods behind him, the last PEF is resolved as 1 Capalan League man. A rep 3 ac 2 shooter with stealthy. Aha! Watch me interact the socks off this lad. Well, I guess I was too cocky. We passed the same d6 and he just ignored me.

Special Instructions: When the last PEF is resolved, roll a dice. If it is equal to the number of wandering encounters you have completed, you have found the object. WHAT!? I had to cross reference this with the Caravanserai since I was using the older Distant Shores book and it turned out to be an errata. It's supposed to be "if it is equal to or less than the number of wandering encounters."

After the encounter:

OOF Recovery: Ok, this was a rough one. First let's bring out the OOF starting with Phineas. He passed 2d6 and recovers. Next Ragnar who also passes 2d6 and recovers!

Here are the totals so far for the month:

Shen 2 IRD, 6 DRD

Phineas 0 IRD, 1 DRD

Ragnar 0 IRD, 1 DRD 

IRD Pool: 3 (This will be spit equally among the group with excess points going to a random band member.

(Note: If you read this earlier, I forgot that IRD/DRD rolls happen at the end of the month. It's going to be a long month for these guys!)

Tune in next time for the second wandering encounter....