Pariah Session 4 - Play Report

Use the tags to find previous and for some more details. Hex fills used this session:

• River Rapids. 42, fishing village - salmon spawning.
• River very deep. Giant Bee Hive - 262.

The Pariahs awoke after their celebratory feast the night before. Shaking off hangovers as the tribe set about their daily tasks, the decided to ask Dismal Fortune, the chief of this group, about the local area. He revealed to them a warrior lodge beyond the north-eastern mountains, a Giant Bee hive with healing-honey to the west, drowning-spirits upon the coast and friendly bog-dwellers to the south-east with powerful shamans - required in their dangerous home. The band also asked after the source of the Desert Rue used to secure fires against spirits - to the best of the chief’s knowledge, the desert lay 2 weeks upriver. The band decided to investigate the hive, feeling the honey may be useful in future expeditions. Blue-Grove recalled that some honeys were psychoactive, and best gathered after exposing the hive to smoke. Armed with this knowledge, they set off.

Gathering these rumours was as simple as looking at the nearby hexes and seeing what this tribe might know. This was made much faster due to the super-slim format - to the point I think it might remove the need for a rumour table. The fills used in this case:

• River very deep. Giant Bee Hive - 262.
• Dog Eating Lodge - 18 members
• 13 Glaucon, coastal. Sun Eagle Spirit.
• Boat people, 38. Crocodile god, filled with spirits. 9 ghouls.

As the Band sought the hive by following the river, they stumbled across a huge tree hosting a colony of bats. Beyond this, they found the hive - terrier-sized bees coming and going from the base of a fallen tree, some carrying entire squirrels. The band bound two curved pieces of bark together, and filled this with a mix of pine-needles and wet grasses. Taking some time, they lit this mix from the bottom, creating a slow-burning fire outputting gouts of smoke. Purple Point called upon his spirit once more, bidding it to keep the fire close. Choking and spluttering but protected from immediate harm, the band sans Blue Fallen entered into the burrow - following the agitated bees deeper into the hive. On the surface, Blue Fallen watched the stragglers slowly begin to form a swarm. He was still safe as the wafts of smoke drifted up from the entrance to the hive. Meanwhile, beneath the earth, the Band hit it big - discovering the honey-cells of the bees. Realising they hadn’t brought any containers, they emptied sacks and used Purple Point’s colourful flaxen cloak to gather 5 doses of healing-honey. They began climbing back up as the wind-spirit lost cohesion and released the smoke, allowing it to generally drift upwards. Upon reaching the surface, the swarm began agitatedly moving towards the group. Blue-Grove bid their spirit possess a bee and attack the others, providing a distraction for the band to begin fleeing. Realising the bees were slow but determined, they made for a clearing, planning to create a much bigger fire to drive away the swarm. Whilst gathering leaves, Cunning Mountain kicked a snake and was bitten, falling to the ground with a rapidly swelling leg. Purple Point applied a makeshift to the tourniquet the wound before spending a dose of their precious healing-honey to cure the poison. They through their smoker onto their pile of dried leaves, which quickly caught - before spreading to consume the entire clearing. Thankfully for the band, the wind carried the flames and resultant smoke towards the swarm, driving them away although rapidly growing in size. Seeing that they couldn’t manage this fire, the band elected to return home.

I allowed the smoke to effectively pacify the bees after some quick research. The expenditure of the spirits energies was simply determined using the initial roll to evoke the effect. The snakebite was due to an encounter roll - as they fled, I rolled for an encounter and knowing their plan (gather tinder for a fire) it made the most sense for it to happen then. From there I randomly determine who it was sprung upon. The healing-honey cured the failed poison saving throw - I like to have failed saves kill over hours or days where possible, as it drives a lot of play in my experience. The wind direction, as ever, was determined with a d12 roll. As a result of the fire, I’m going to update a number of the fills to show the passage of the flames.

Upon returning to the village, Dismal Fortune questioned them as to the huge and spreading fire behind them. The party plead ignorance, which the chief did not buy for a second. The shaman of the settlement traded Desert Rue for healing-honey whilst Idle-Quiet One told a story of a stealthy exit, aided by Blue-Grove burning Sorcerer’s Sage to ensure a receptive audience. This mollified the ill-will of the tribe somewhat, although the fire and subsequent lying still leaves a bitter taste in their mouths. During the trip, Blue-Grove saw the form of their spirit - the mother-leopard that haunted his sister. Idle-Quiet One tattooed himself with a screaming baboon using the viscera gathered previously, and convinced Cunning Mountain to get the word FEAR across his chest, offsetting the DEATH on his face nicely.

I’m tracking the reputation with each group as a simple +/- to Reaction rolls. Often the roll isn’t needed so much as the integer showing general good/bad sentiment, but it might be useful to have it tied to an ‘objective’ mechanic at some point.

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Pariah Session 3 - Play Report

Use the tags to find previous and for some more details. Hex fills used this session:

• Learned shamanic baboon + 14 captives. Flint Mine.
• River Rapids. 42, fishing village - salmon spawning.

Having resolved to approach the situation diplomatically, Idle Quiet One and Golden Other approached the settlement, immediately challenged by the spear-fishers and surprised to be able to understand them. They raised an alarm as they demanded to know the purpose of these visitors. The delegation from the band explained they were traders, showing the bear claws and teeth they had harvested. During the panic in the camp, the chief of this group, Dismal Fortune, strode up to them, brow furrowed with worries. He asked if they were killers to so openly flash the viscera of a powerful animal like a bear. Golden Other replied that they killed when the situation required it. The chief asked what they wished to trade for, leading them to explain they had witnessed the fire-warding the night before and wished to learn it against the spirits of the night. For such tutelage, Dismal Fortune asked that they rescue members of their band from the “small red-faced mockery of a man who opened the head of a shaman and ate his brains” down-river. Running this message back to camp, the group agreed. They instructed the adults of their Band to maintain their camp, continuing to work the bear and yak hides they had accumulated. As the party left, the falcon that had been following the band landed nearby to watch over their camp. Golden Other fed it scraps of meat.

A bad reaction roll followed by a very good one led to the openness of the chief. Their problems made sense due to the proximity to the baboon shaman, even though not originally present in the hex-fills. The falcon getting closer was a random encounter result (Hawk) which I took as their semi-pet the Falcon.

Setting off downriver, moving somewhat stealthily, the band found their way back to the site where they had watched a figure tip out soil. Night was falling, limiting vision but highlighting the fire within the hill. The sounds of barking, laughter, and pained moans echoed up and out from the hollowed out hill, and several holes bored into the top of the hill vomited smoke. Half the band split off, moving around to the side to investigate. Behind the hill, they saw wooden cages set inside large pits. From a hidden entrance, a human figure emerged and passed something into one of the cages, revealing a humanoid captive. Watching through the entrance, Purple Point spied at least 6 humanoid figures moving around the central fire within the hill. He and Blue-Grove crept up the hill, planning to peer down the smoke-holes. Blue-Grove, having a bound elemental of the wind, asked his spirit to gently push the smoke down the holes, allowing them clearer visibility. With this clear sight-line, they saw waxen-fleshed humans dancing around a fire for the amusement of a baboon wearing a golden amulet and wearing a belt laden with pouches.

Some extremely fun use of a bound spirit - the stipulation of 5 word commands gives a lot of texture to how they can be used.

Golden Other painted the word “DEATH” across each face before the band stormed into the hill, using the element of surprise. The baboon was hacked to death after screeching for its captives to “destroy the intruders”. With the death of this creature, the humans stood still, faces blank and empty. The band issues commands to free the others before following them back to the people upon the river. Amongst the captives unbroken to the will of the baboon was Eager Grave, who gave them some details of how they were made to mine flint for the baboon. From the near-unrecognisable corpse of the baboon the Band took the golden medallion, a jaw, a paw and miscellaneous viscera (for Idle Quiet One’s tattoos, naturally).

Some extremely good rolls and a failure by Gorefingers Manbrain to hear them approaching. If they’d not rushed at night, this fight would’ve been interesting - trying to avoid killing 14 minions whilst Gorefingers tried to use mind-control magic.

Leading this group back home, the party encountered a large hollow log washed downriver since they left. Apart from this, nothing of note occurred. Upon returning, Dismal Fortune welcomed them gladly, many families overjoyed to see their loved ones returned - although the DEATH markings on their faces gave him some consternation. As promised, the shaman begrudgingly taught the Band to ward their fires, explaining that a tea of Desert Rue must be drunk. He noticed that Golden Other was writing this down - although she wiped it off her arm, he was still displeased. The settlement threw a feast for the return of the captives, inviting the Band to join. They played their instruments and told tales, indulging in the fermented fish-drink of these river people. Cunning Mountain succumbed to this, allowing Idle Quiet One to convince him that getting the word DEATH tattooed across his face was a great idea. Finally, as the party wound down, Purple Point, Golden Other and Blue-Grove slept with members of the settlement.

This mostly consisted of music checks to impress the settlement followed by some Drinking checks to stay in control of their drink. I gave Cunning Mountain an X for getting such a great tattoo. Allowing the group to form some social bonds with settlement has been great and will hopefully give them some context for future wanderings. Most pertinently for them (and something they’ve not considered) - someone was trading with the baboon for that flint. I think I’m going to have to start giving more X’s in play as only 3 are required to improve something. One to consider on my end.

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Pariah Session 2 - Play Report

Use the tags to find previous and for some more details. Hex fills used this session:

• Entrance to Cave Network. 4 Bears give way to Earth.
• Learned shamanic baboon + 14 captives. Flint Mine.
• River Rapids. 42, fishing village - salmon spawning.

After their feast of yak flesh, the band settled down, posting watch as normal. During the watch of Golden Other, once more four huge-headed figures loped over the hills, silhouetted against the sky. Their camp was upon the coast, leaving a large open space which the creatures did not dare cross, instead taunting the band with their hoots and gibbers. As the sun dawned, they seemingly snuck away - or disappeared entirely.

An encounter roll, boosted by the feasting, resulted in the vampiric spirits paying another visit to the party. Being intelligent, they didn’t risk the open crossing against greater numbers, opting instead to keep them up with noise.

The band moved back into the hills, away from the coast. From this vantage, they saw mountains to the distant north-west, more hills to the north and a river running through forest to the west. In a bend in the river, they saw a trail of smoke rising upwards. Having slept poorly the night before, they made the decision to make camp before setting out. They sought out a camp which would keep them shielded from the (presumed) settlement in the forest below. They camped quietly, wary of alerting anything in this new area.

During the first watch of the night, Purple Point Clever Crayfish spotted a bear snuffling towards the encampment. Sneaking back and rousing his fellows, the band decided to ambush the bear. They laid out food as bait before hiding themselves amongst the grasses and undergrowth. After an initial flurry of misses, they managed to strike the bear decisively. It decided to flee, swiping at one of the group before being cut down as it fled - despite the risk of hitting their fellows in the black of the night. Half the band stayed up skinning and smoking the bear meat whilst the rest went back to sleep.

As we’re playing over VTT, I reveal parts of the hexmap during play - in person, I’d ask them to make their own map. As they move around, they reveal adjacent hexes depending on the terrain - with mountains being seen from further way, especially from the hills overlooking the forested hexes between. The smoke was due to the settlement present in that hex. Whilst moving through the current hex, I gave them a 50% chance of ‘stumbling’ upon the main fill as well as rolling for encounters. In this case they didn’t, but camped close enough (a 3 being rolled) for the Bear to be on the encounter table that night. It was Surprised as part of the encounter roll, hence the ability to set up an ambush. The morale failure cost the bear any revenge kills, but followed through with animal behaviour.

Rather than directly approaching, the elected to follow the river to the North before travelling up it, potentially allowing for a stealthy approach. They spied a raggedy man dumping a basket of earth outside an entrance-arch dug into a hill, which they decided to come back to later. Travelling up river, the encountered a section of rapids with a rocky cliff-face near where they expected an encampment. They also found tree-stumps, evidence of sightlines being cleared. They debated whether to attack the camp or try and enter peacefully, eventually deciding to send Purple Point and Blue Fallen to observe.

They saw many people with vests of unknown material, using tridents and spears of flint to fish. Others emptied fish-traps, gutting and smoking the contents. They counted around 40 members of the encampment, 20 of fighting age. Their tents were set up for longer stays, but clearly were not permanent constructions. As the sun dipped low, one dressed in a ceremonial mask and suit studded with pairs of shells. They danced around a fire and sang, joined by the sentries before retiring, clearly heavily drained. The watchers remained until the first changing of the watch, returning to the camp.

Another cold and quiet camp to avoid detection, the only disturbance during the night was a single lost Giant Bee, clumsily slamming into trees and shrubs. During his watch, Idle Quiet One began work on his tattoo of the clay-headed spirits. In the morning, the band agreed to approach peacefully, Idle Quiet One leading negotiations by telling the story of their fight against he clay-head spirits.

The single figure was the presence of the hex-fill, determined to be on their path with the aforementioned 50%. As they were keeping a wide berth and being careful, no Stealth rolls were made for their watching. In hindsight, I could have made some Awareness rolls for the sentries. The Shamanic activity was driven by the spirit-banishing ritual unknown to the party - this ritual stopping beings like the clay-headed spirits from approaching the fire. I entirely forgot to progress the spirit-sickness with Idle Quiet One - and his forwardness with the tattoo rendered it not needed.

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Pariah Session 1 - Play Report

I’m going to try and write play reports more often. I think they’re an important part of the space which we don’t see enough of anymore. Rather than just narrativising play, I’m aiming to also talk about any techniques or decisions I made in play.

Prior to this session, I generated a hexmap which I’m filling up “ahead” of the players. I’m experimenting with extremely terse one-line hexfills in the style of Carcosa. I’m finding it fun to wildly diverge from my approach in Wolves - the entire session happened within a single hex with the fill “Spirits which appear as mudmen with bloody mouths. Blood controls them - banished by seawater.” That’s probably the longest fill I’ve written so far, most are more like “Stinging sulphourous water. 3 Giant Toads.”

The Band of Pariahs awoke on the beach, cast out from their homes for various crimes and misunderstandings. Set upon small, flimsy vessels and given to the sea. A hound of unusual intelligence dragged the disparate forms together - this taken as a sign of a multiplicity of ancestors dwelling within the dog, the group bound together.

Immediately they set to work - Idle-Quiet One White-Gazelle led much of the band in fishing in the sea, Blue Fallen Disgusting Honeybird and Cunning Mountain Disgusting Dreamingtime assisting with fish-traps. The Hairy Auroch twins moved up into the nearby hills to find firewood and shelter. Blue-Grove spied a herd of 8 yak cropping distantly whilst Golden-Other found low, tortured trees which could form a rudimentary basis for a simple camp.

The named Pariahs are the player characters here, obviously. The twins are such because they happened to roll the same “second names” - and both rolled a leopard skull helmet. Starting with skills and a pressing need - you have no food - set the band immediately in action. Their first encounter rolls led to no result, the Yak-spotting being a deliberate bit of tracking.

Those in the hills began constructing a camp of lean-to structures whilst the fisherman dragged their significant haul of fish up to the camp, beginning the process of smoking the fish they didn’t eat that night. All contributed to their joint song. Blue-Grove took a single dose of the Shaman Shroom before whispering to their bound spell-spirit to go and find more. The noise and the fire highlighted the presence of the band to any in the hills. Idle-Quiet One decided to practice using the tattoo-kit that had survived the journey, tattooing a mystic symbol on Blue Fallen.

As the songs ceased, Golden-Other took up watch. After some time, they spotted loping humanoids with large lumpy heads loping over the hills, silhouetted against the sky and heading towards the camp. They roused the band, who stood guard and awaiting the creatures. Having camped on one slope of a hill (avoiding the strong coastal breeze), they heard a strange “koo-koo-ko” noise from the other side of the hill. A brief conversation with the creatures indicated they wanted “a drink and a fire, that we might be like your little four-legged one.” Asked to show themselves, they emerged atop the hill - large heads of wet clay, empty eye-sockets gouged with thumbs and open mouth-holes scraped out of the material. From these ‘mouths’ dripped a liquid indiscernible in the night. One of the four commented that the “fire had no ward” - something which excited the group, and left the Band nervous. Blue-Grove commanded his spell-spirit, a mother leopard, to attack the group. The sudden sounds of a she-leopard sent the group fleeing downhill, pursued and slain by the band.

An encounter roll, boosted by the fire and song, led to the inhabitants of this hex being summoned. Pariah specifies a ritual for banishing spirits from a campfire - the lack of this being an invitation to such entities. A failed morale roll after the spirit-attack led to them fleeing, giving the Band a decisive upper-hand. For fighting whilst charging downhill, any failed attack caused a Save - failure resulting in that character tumbling down hill too.

Where these beings were struck, they did not bleed but emitted only black dust. From their wet-clay mouths, blood dripped. Set within the mouths was a chaos of human teeth, rammed in without thought or reason. Idle-Quiet One gathered this dust and some of the blood, forming a paste with it. He then proceeded to burn the bodies, which emitted translucent fumes. Blue-Grove led a chant over this, even if he kept a distance from the flames. This done, all retired back to camp to resume resting. The rest of the night was uneventful. On his watch, Idle-Quiet One began planning a tattoo using the materials gathered from the corpses.

In the morning, it was discovered the grass around this fire was not burnt but dead - and nothing remained but teeth. Idle-Quiet One smeared some of their ancestor-dog’s slobber on it for good measure. The Band decided to head North, seeking better long-term shelter. En-route, they discovered the trail of the Yak herd they saw yesterday - Golden-Other determining that one of the herd has a split hoof, easy prey for endurance hunters like Blue Fallen. The Band used numbers to spook the herd, separating the injured Yak and driving it to the coast where the sand and waves exhausted it quickly. The Band realised that the yak could feed all of them, and declared a feast - they would be unable to carry all of the meat if smoked and treated for journeying. Some set about trying to tan the hide of the yak to create tents, whilst Blue-Grove went to the hills to find entheogenic plants. He discovered six leafy plants, the flowers reminding him of bones.

Handling these spirit-corpses triggered a “secret” poison Save, which Idle-Quiet One failed. This was to cause a spirit-sickness resulting in a condition from the (very useful) spiritual bane tables provided in Pariah. The player explained that they were going to make a kill-tattoo - this seemed exactly the sort of action likely to give protection to a warrior killing spirits and handling their remains. As such, they already have the cure in hand even if the condition has yet to manifest. For a glorious waste of resources in a Feast, I gave the party an ‘X’ - analogous to XP for carousing in other games.

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Limited Monsters

At the outset of Wolves, I made the decision to limit myself to only using recurring monsters from Volume 2: Monsters &. Whilst there are the occasional unique creatures, the vast majority of monsters are taken from it.

For those not familiar, V2M& is a rewrite of a select few monsters from OD&D Volume 2: Monsters & Magic - a selection of which can be read using the MMM tag on this blog.

This restriction has added to to the cohesive feeling of Wolves - rather than being able to simply invent creatures, or select a novel one from a larger collection, the use and re-use required me to think deeply about each type of creature. The differences in each instance stem from the situation they are in - these situations being an outcropping of both the setting and the implied history and nature of each creature specifically. Furthermore, the placement of such beings across the world adds to their context, something visible as the writer, as the GM and as the player over recurring encounters. Whilst this method requires more thought in placement and presentation, I think limiting your palette of monsters can have a very positive effect. It’s too easy to have a fantasy game feel like a (more) fucked-up safari when each encounter is with a new creature entirely - and requiring less thought and care than having the unique situation be the interesting element in any given encounter. The world feels richer, each denizen worth investigating and understanding when they are not one in another chain of ‘one-offs’ - and those rarer, unique creatures stand out all the more for bucking the trend.

This deepening effect helps combat the presentation of the inhuman as ‘fair game’ - an empty Other, valid targets for all viciousness to be visited upon. The root of many monsters in V2M& being humans transformed by their own actions also helps with this - and this effect extends to those creatures which are not human in root, whether that be to underline that they have their own existence and motivations or to make their total inhumanity even more startling and uncomfortable.

In future, when developing a campaign setting, consider doing so ‘Monster First’ - and being very deliberate about using something from outside your initial list.

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Mentorship Applications Open

APPLICATIONS NOW CLOSED

I am now open to submissions for round 4 of the mentorship scheme I’ve been running. This is done free of charge to give back to the wider TTRPG scene.

As outlined here, the mentorship consists of regular calls to discuss techniques as well as taking a critical look at other works in the TTRPG space.

The mentorship prioritises marginalised people, although everyone is welcome to apply.

Those who have applied for previous rounds, I ask you apply again due to the slightly different format.

Scope

I am working with writers to develop adventures and sourcebooks for use with games. I am focused on helping you take a set of ideas and developing that out into a first draft - both in terms of generating quality ideas, but also techniques to help with the writing process. Manuscripts in the early stages of writing are also considered, although projects which have already had a round of crowd-funding are not eligible.

I also help with finding resources for self-publishing, or for finding a publisher. Engagements last for a variable amount of time, although there will be regular check-ins to ensure we’re making good progress and that the mentorship is still right for all parties.

If wanted, all communications can be held with a third party present - just indicate this during the application process.

Applying

To apply, please send an email to lukegearing.games@gmail.com.

In the subject line, please put your “[Your Name] - Mentorship Application”

In the body, please introduce yourself with any links to prior work (not required, just useful to have). If you consider yourself marginalised, please mention this here (no details are required).

Then provide a pitch of your project as well as a summary of where you are with it.

Finally, if you have any thoughts around self-publishing or being published, that would be useful to know.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and for considering applying.