Kafranbel Has Spoken

Merry Christmas

HackMaster Fortunes

My wife Carolyn likes to do some interesting HackMaster projects and I like to help out where able.  One thing she came up with was adding a little twist to the fortunes we get from the fortune cookies at the Chinese restaurant where we hold our Toastmaster meetings.  She posts them on her blog.

She cannot always attend because of work and on these occasions I try to take notes for her.  Several weeks ago I also made some HackMaster fortunes and totally forgot to give them to her.  I found them in my phone yesterday and thought I'd glom on to her awesome idea and share them with you.  Don't get too excited as this won't be a regular thing for me.

In case you have trouble reading my writing, the HackMaster fortune reads, "You shall soon make a long, overdue personal decision.  15 BP for a +3 specialization or skills."

In case you have trouble reading my writing, the HackMaster fortune reads, "You will travel to many exotic places, meet exotic creatures.....and kill them"

Linian Check-In

It's been a while since I've posted about the online game.  My group has made some sort of circular progress.

We've headed out of the city to go hunting for Kobolds.  The little blighters have been raiding farmsteads on the edge of the frontier for some time now and there is a bounty on their heads for anyone brave or foolish enough to go after them.

Out first encounter with the Kobolds comes when we reach a farmstead that is under attack.  We manage to kill or route the Kobolds and save the farmers.  These people are pretty much pacifists who prefer to flee rather than stand up for themselves.  We stay for a couple of days and try to teach those willing and able some rudimentary skills so they could at least defend themselves should they choose to.  They'll still flee when attacked, but at least they are willing to keep the Kobolds from pursuing them as they do so.  The Fighter types work hard with the men in the family and Linian spends as much time with the women and children.  He's much more comfortable indoors and the kids remind him of his own siblings.

The group continues on, circling the other farmsteads until we come to the last one, which is basically the very edge of the frontier.  The farmer is a cantankerous old man who has his place fenced up and tries to keep everyone at bay.  We make our presence known and end up camping barely in sight of his property.  The next day we head on into the wooded hills.

Our Ranger scouts up ahead and discovers what appears to be an area of Kobold activity.  Most of the party charges in and succumbs to a combination of pit traps, guard weasels, and Kobold crossbow bolts.  The Kobold have fortified guard posts that are basically dug into rocky outcroppings.  I managed to get in close to one and they have 3 or 4 in there with crossbows and the tunnel leading in seems to have more Kobolds reloading and handing off crossbows so they can fire at a much faster rate.

You know things are getting bad when I take part in the battle.  I do my best to cover the retreat of the badly wounded fighters.

We leave the area of the Kobold warren and find a small defensible cave to hole up in.  The cave is an old bear den that I correctly identify as a winter den.  After cleaning it out and making some defensive foxholes around the edge we have a place we think we can rest up for a while.  On the way to the cave we came across an Kobold patrol that we were easily able to overcome.  Personally I think we should just ambush patrols out in the open where we have the advantage instead of attacking their den where they have an overwhelming advantage.  What do I know?

Awesome Paint Job!

Our first night in the cave we come are attacked by another Kobold patrol.  We overtake them with some difficulty since they were spread out so much, but we manage to take them all out before they can make it to the safety of the den.  We had some outside help from a wandering Fighter/Mage who was hunting after the Kobolds himself.  Evidently they (possibly this very patrol) had just killed some of his family and he was out for revenge.  The Fighter/Mage was more than willing to join up with us.

In the morning we set out to find some more Kobolds to slaughter.  Our Ranger thought he knew where one of the patrols was encamped away from the warren.  We headed back to what looked like familiar territory to me.  Some Kobolds were spotted and everyone took off to engage them.  Soon another small group of Kobolds were seen and the fight was on in earnest.  The Fighter/Mage took a nasty blow and was knocked down while the ranger went out by himself to engage the new group of Kobolds.  The fight was going badly as I slowly entered the fray.

As I tried to cautiously move closer should the group need my help I was assaulted by more crossbow bolts from an unseen location.  We were back at the Kobold warren!  We had just approached it from the far side this time.  I rushed in to try and drag the Fighter/Mage out of the battle.  The Cleric took over for me, saying he could revive him to fighting spirit.  Further in the Ranger had been knocked down, possibly killed.

Throwing caution to the wind I rushed in to cover his body with my own.  Under the cover of my shield I was able to determine he was alive, but barely.  As I stared to drag him out of combat I saw the Fighter/Mage rush past me to assault the Kobolds still engaged in combat.  In a moment he too was down.  The Cleric took the Ranger from me and I moved forward to get the Fighter/Mage.  The attacks were relentless there and I didn't wait to see if he was alive or dead.  I dragged the body back as fast as I could while maintaining cover from my shield.

(OOC: We ended the session there.  We all will have to wait to see what happens...)

Man Down! Man Down!

We are still playing in the HackMaster adventure Dusk of the Dead, because it takes a long time to clear out the undead.  We managed to go through every room in the waystation and get the comatose cleric into a nice warm bed near a fire.  The room we left her in seemed relatively defensible.  It was clear a losing battle was fought here, with zombies coming in through both windows as the door was well barricaded.  The floor was littered with bit of gore and chopped off zombie hands and fingers.

Out of Character (OOC) we new the cleric would come to in a couple days, In Character (IC) we new she was badly injured and may very well die.  She was the only one who new any first aid.  My fighter, having been badly injured and bandaged many times in the past, did what he could for "his" cleric.  OOC next level I'm not spending any build points on combat specialization and instead I'm going to pick up some First Aid and maybe another skill.  IC, leaving the Caregiver Cleric so we can flee is NOT an option.  To the best of our knowledge we've cleared the place, but then we find a trapdoor to some sort of cellar.  Our normal method of clearing rooms was to walk up to the room and rap on the door/window, call out something to the effect of "here zombie, zombie" and wait for a response.  When we did that in the cellar we got a very strong response.

Instead of opening up the interior door down there, we set up around the trap door and sent Cazon, our Human Rogue, down to open the door a crack and run back up.  He got the detail since he is the fastest of the group.  Once the zombies started shambling towards us, we just whacked on them at the natural choke-point which was the trapdoor.  It took a lot of time, but it worked.

Once we were sure we had checked every single room in the place we ventured outside.  The first thing we noticed was there was another outbuilding that Cazon had failed to mention when he scouted around outside the day before.  It was only a small chicken coop, but it had to be checked anyway....and then those poor chickens needed to be fed, and then the animals holed up in the barn as well.  Some poor stablehand is going to have one helluva mess to contend with when they clean that place out.

We start a fire and call out to the woods, "Fresh unwashed Dwarf here for you culinary pleasure!"  we figured there would be a few stragglers in the woods somewhere, and we were right...to an extent.  A few more zombies came shambling out than we expected.  The initial plan was to retreat back to the waystation should there be too many, but they got the drop on us and I was the only one able to move before they surrounded us.  I couldn't leave my party for the relative safety of the waystation, so I moved in between the fire and Salt, the other Dwarf.  I called for Cazon to form up close to my back, but he was too slow.  A couple of zombies got a hold of him before he could do much anything.  Salt and I are fighting off zombies and after I down one I finally hear Cazon call out that he is in trouble.  A quick side-step towards him leave me more exposed, but I'm able to help him by knocking back and killing one of his attackers.  Another zed grabs him and pretty soon he has four of the foul undead chomping on him.  It was grisly and he succumbs to his wounds.

Salt and I decide to fall-back to the waystation, and while the zombies feast on Cazon she has an opportunity to disengage.  I'm surrounded and after I knock back one zombie I think I have a chance to make a break for it.  I'm grabbed by two zombies and they each take a small bite out of me.  I am very fortunate in that I'm able to knock back one zombie that ends up landing in the fire.  With only a second to spare I just start jogging away from the zombies, dragging one away with me.  It continues to bite at me as I make my way to the side door of the waystation, but I just have to take it.  Salt unbars the door just in tie and helps me kill the one that latched onto me.

We make a very quick plan.  We make our way to the front door of the waystation and open it up.  We will attack one zombie at a time (hopefully) and if we need to we will fall back to the door to the inner courtyard and reset.  If we have to we will then fallback to the room we left the Cleric in and fight to our deaths defending her as long as we can.

As bad as the combat at the fire had gone for us, it was far worse for the zombies at the door.  We were practically knocking them back through the door more forcefully than they could claw their way in.  We were able to whittle the zombies down at a really fast pace.

Now we need to rest and to properly bury Cazon.  I'm hoping that Tecane will come to soon, but if I have to I'll carry her out of here.