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"Mr. Groatalus is a well-known 'character' hereabouts", explained Pan 'Psycho' Woodstock. "You often see him wandering around, smiling inanely and mumbling incomprehensible gibberish, but he's harmless enough if kept away from a pulpit. I thought I'd teach those bullies a lesson." The "lesson" left a trail of maimed and mutilated bodies scattered across several miles. "Unfortunately, they carried off most of their wounded," reports Mad Manish, "so perhaps we'll never know where they came from. But lest they come back, I should mention that I charge very good rates for guarding helpless, beautiful females, and have developed a guaranteed method for preventing despoilation of virgins." Page 42: Probe into criminal charges being brought against the heroes...
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Summary
The Genest Giants accepted a contract to write a book on local lore from The Magister, and wandered back Genestwards. On the way they discovered a previously unknown girlfriend of Marcus' (not unknown to Marcus though one hopes), and stumbled across an attack upon Father Groatalus by bandits. Our merry men saved Father G, and discovered a clue which hinted that the attackers may have been acting upon the orders of the Schwarzgelts.
Details
Game dates: Dark, 1621.
Dramatis Personae: Pan (Charlie); Agvan (Alan); Marcus (Lynne); Gelert (MarkB); Manish (MarkC). Viran was absent, presumed non compos mentis ( Rupert)
As described in the last issue , the Magister offered the PCs a contract of employment for a month, gathering material for a book of local legends for him. The PCs readily agreed to the terms and stayed an extra day at Arin House, resting before returning to Genest.
They seemed much more welcome than when they'd first arrived. One benefit was that the Magister assumed they would want to start by examining his own library, to get some experience in searching through libraries (should they gain access to one on the project) and see what stories he already had, to avoid duplication. Certain PCs can't actually read yet and were a bit bored by the library but the rest realised that several hundred scrolls and books is an important collection and scanned the shelves to see what kind of things are there. The library is actually in two sections. One is the Magister's study, which is guarded: the PCs were not allowed to examine books in there. The 'public' library simply has a servant or two present to keep an eye on visitors, as books are valuable and sometimes irreplaceable. (There are two other young men staying at Arin House, "Students" everyone calls them: about 20 years old, well spoken, dressed in predominantly red vestments; the library attendants keep an eye on them, too.) The public library has sections on philosophy, history, genealogy, botany, medicine, religion, geography, the Arts (language, famous speeches, essays on painting, etc). The Magister's son has added a number of books and scrolls which suit younger tastes, such as racy accounts of famous sybarists' exploits, poetry, some songbooks, juicy history books concerning famous decadent happenings and so on - much to the Magister's disapproval, it seems. Perusal of everything in the library would take a couple of years, but there are basic introductions to many subjects here. The students were friendly and explained that they were only here temporarily, normally studying at a college in Roodshire. They had come to study some specialist subjects under The Magister, whom they wryly describe as "eccentric". Marcus mentioned in passing that The Magister raises giant bats as a hobby.
The Village of Thraldum
This village lies on the edge of the Magister's immediate estate, and is populated mainly by serfs. It is a little larger than Genest and boasts a smith, shrine etc. The players noticed a commotion as they passed through, which turned out to be the local sport - cat fights. These are like dog fights, cockfights, etc. but the contestants are extremely large black cats which are incited to tear each other to shreds. All good clean fun, a nice day out for all the family.
Passing by a wood, the party noticed a curious green object on the path ahead: "Look out!" warned Marcus, as someone got Too Near. "Why, what is it?" they asked. "It's a frog," explained Marcus, "and right nearby there's probably a kid with a peashooter - yes, there he is, in that bush!" The PC's gave chase, but the 8 year old boy made his escape through dense undergrowth. Marcus explained how there's a fad amongst young lads to inflate frogs or toads using a hollow reed inserted into them, to unfeasible dimensions; then they lurk nearby and when a passerby stoops to examine the amphibian oddity, they shoot it with a peashooter. If its skin is ruptured, it explodes, showering the adult with blood and bits of frog. The frog was carefully deflated and released.
The Stones are a family apparently consisting entirely of wimmin, living on a farm 8 miles NE of Genest. They consider men fun, but are very independent-minded and farm their place themselves, with the aid of a couple of hired labourers who live in a seperate cottage. The wimmin all have red hair and green eyes. They are:
Great-Granma (80 years old, sits huddled by fire, quiet, but alert eyes); Gran (60, PA 5, admirer of male flesh, relatively spry); Ma (40, motherly, stout and strong, no-nonsense efficient air); Zenna (20, PA 16, romantically involved with Marcus (?), used to go out with Agvan's brother Smithy); Lapis (age 6, shy, hid from the noisy louts during the visit).
One of the reasons they are successful as farmers is that they are healers and midwives, which supplements their income. Often they charge a service, such as ploughing one of their fields, rather than money. Another is that their farm has an Earth spirit called Dorengarth, which appears to be in a huge rock near their pond, which (they claim) increases your farm's fertility if you worship it - like a Pelora shrine. They are the Priestesses of the Stone. The other striking feature of their farm is a huge Yew tree, obviously hundreds of years old. This has significance to Droods - Yews being their Favourite Tree - and is curious as most other trees this old in this area became charcoal in the Great Scorching of 1275.
The Rescue of Father Groatalus
Night was falling as the group approached Genest. They could see a lone figure trudging up the road towards them: Father Groatalus' waddle was easily recognisable from this distance. Strange that he should be coming this way, it was off his normal rounds.
But hold, what were those shapes lurking behind the hedge?
Six men leapt out and confronted Father G as the PC' watched from a half-mile or so's distance. Suddenly, here was a red flash. The men laid about Father G, who defended himself with his staff, but there seemed some confusion in their ranks.
As the PCs ran to help, a glowing red haze appeared and engulfed one of the attackers. And by the time the PCs got there, another man was trying to avoid a swirling pulsation in the earth. Attacking a priest, even an old, out-of-shape hedge-priest, is not something you do lightly!
But despite the shimmer of magics around him, and the fact that one of the curmudgeons was foaming at the mouth and attacking another, Father G was losing ground when the PCs arrived. (Hmm, I seem to recall corporal Pan being somewhat reluctant to wade in & help his priest)
There followed a complex fight: six attackers, six PCs, Father G and his Allied all mixing it. Spells flew, fighters fumbled, people suddenly changed their minds as they became Befuddled or Demoralised, then the spells were dispelled or simply expired... the bloke who'd been attacking another NPC suddenly turned on the PCs; Father G had to do lots of Healing; at one point, an enemy glued his leg back on with one spell ! Viran lost 6 SAN, i.e. in game terms Something suddenly put a permanent nagging niggle of fear at the back of his brain - a spell? And Gelert's bronze mace-head melted.
The fight appeared to be almost ended when the PCs chased a couple of blokes across a field. One escaped, Befuddling several PCs - Marcus thought he was in a race and was very pleased when he won, though he thought it curious that the other fellow veered off in another direction.
But back at the scene, Father G and Manish were Healing themselves when they saw movement in the shadows. With a mind-wrenching alieness ( d8 SAN for a successful SAN roll ), they realised that some large spiders had crept out from under leaves, and were growing larger. And larger. And larger. About six of them, to approximately man-size, in fact. Agvan was also unfortunate enough to witness this.
All three (N)PCs left the vicinity as quietly and quickly as possible, but when they moved rapidly, the spiders seemed to sense the noise and moved towards it... By now it was almost completely dark. As Agvan, Manish and Father G hid behind hedges, Pan returned and, seeing 6 giant spiders, bethought it a suitable time for archery practice from cover. This simply enraged the spiders without apparently inconveniencing them in the slightest.
Those at the scene perforce remained hidden for several minutes as the arthropods stalked the area. Finally, however, the arachnids shrunk back to normal size whereupon they were stomped to oblivion by the brave Genest Home Guard.
Two blokes had escaped, but the PCs examined the remaining bodies closely for Clues (see: Loot). One thing they did notice, was that the attackers must have had horses nearby. One escapee had made off with the horses, but a scrap of cloth had been left torn on a thorn bush. The material was black, with gold edging - like the livery of the Schwarzgelt family.
Summary of facts known so far about the attack: - Father G was lured along this track by a lad aged perhaps 9, who found him in Genest and asked him to come after services to give the Last Rites to one of the daughters of the Oriole family. However, the Oriole family are all healthy. The boy has disappeared. - A farmer's son saw 6 riders travelling with a boy in this vicinity earlier today; descriptions match. - The attackers' weaponry and armour varied from partial chain and scimitar, to light leather and shortsword. - the fellow who made off with the horses took them to Allisbrook and used that to break their trail, though he was spotted heading north. A piece of black and gold cloth was found on a nearby thorn bush.
Loot ... er, Articles charitably donated by various NPC's From: 4 bodies of attackers who waylaid Father G; Between: Marcus, Pan, Viran, Gelert, Manish, Agvan - and Father G !
Size 15 half helm, chain hauberk and sleeves, leather / cuiboille legs; Size 17 Leather / cuiboille set of armour (5 points), half helm Size 12 2-point armour Size 17 set of leather / cuiboille (5 points) Maul Knife 4 daggers Shortsword Throwing dagger 1 Handed battle axe Large shield Great Hammer A 1" live spider in a small wooden box A set of strange tools (on the fellow with 2 point leather) A packet of blue powder A pair of silver earrings A one-inch crystal cube with a U rune carved in it. 8 Lunars, 12 clacks
If you wish to work out how much cash you can get for the above, assume weapons & metal armour fetches half price, whilst leather goods fetch one-quarter price.
All: New skill: Library Use Because the PC's are beginning to access libraries (All: the Magister's; Viran: possibility of Irippi Ontor ones), it is appropriate that you record your Library Use skill for when you need to do a bit of research. This is a Knowledge skill with a base of 25%.Obviously, it is inapplicable if you can't read yet, but comes into effect as soon as you can read Lunar.
Last game:
This game:
What next? 1. There is bound to be a bit of a rumpus over the attack on Father G, which should help distract Mr Revarnos from asking too many questions about people entering quarantined areas; 2. The PC's need to return to Arin House for their 3 weeks' Reading an' Riting tuition; 3. There's a one-month research contract to fulfil. People were thinking about visiting the Droods and checking out their oral histories, using Manish as a decoy for the old Wimmin.
Appendix A: Tales of Alys and Tales of Northmarch
Appendix B: Tales of Kalikos (Pan, Agvan only)
This page last updated 22-8-96 by LCH
