The Nerd's RPG Variety Cast, er, Blog

Time for another installment of my solo game using Dungeon Crawl Classics to run through the adventure included in TSR’s AC3, Dragon Tiles. Spoilers for that adventure below.

This is a long one but I did not want to break the combat over two separate posts.

When we last left our group of peasants attempting to rescue their fair princess, and claim a sizable reward, they had opened the front door and were about to enter the hallway. The Potato Farmer had noticed that something was strange about the far wall. The Tax Collector, who along with the Guild Beggar had taken it upon himself to lead the group had declared that the Potato Farmer would accompany the two of them to investigate the far wall while the rest of the party checked the other rooms. 

I am going to roll randomly to see who is first to the nearest door which is on the left hand wall. Since there are 11 party members left, not counting those already mentioned, I will roll a d4 and a d8 then subtract one from the total to get a result between 1 and 11. Just as a reminder those other party members are the Ditch Digger, the Healer, the Beekeeper, the Ostler, the Herbalist, the Rice Farmer, the Halfling Glovemaker, the Shaman, the Butcher, the Gong Farmer, and the Cheese Maker (who is injured and down to one hit point).

2+7-1=8. That is our Shaman!  Let’s see if they are male or female. Odds, male. He tries the door but it is locked! “Give us some help here!” I will roll two d10 to see who answers the plea, 1 & 4, the Ditch Digger and the Ostler. The Ditch Digger gets there first and along with the Shaman is able to break down the door.

(I didn’t use the Dungeon Crawl Classics resolution system here because the module is clear on this, a combined Strength of 24 or higher is needed to break down the door. The Shaman’s Strength is 12 and the Ditch Digger’s is 14.)

As the door gives way with a loud crack we are presented with more box text!

“Bookshelves cover the entire north wall of this musty library. Many books, their leather covers ripped and rotting, have fallen to the floor. 

A fireplace filled with spider webs and dry kindling stands along the west wall. Two swords draped in cobwebs hang above the mantle. Candelabras stand on each side of the fireplace. None of the candles is burning. 

A sofa and two stuffed chairs face the fireplace, and a large, thick rug lies in front of the sofa. 

A wooden desk stands in the southwest corner of the room. Several bottles and crystal goblets litter the desktop. An inkwell, a feather quill, and a parchment scroll lie between the bottles. A wooden chair stands before the desk.” 

I do not want to leave the Ostler out of the fun so he (I rolled a one, also a male since I’m going odds for male and evens for female) enters the room and is greeted by the sight of a form rising from the sofa. A few seconds later three more rise from the chairs and sofa and all four get to their feet to welcome their guests. The four appear quite hideous, they are beast like and dressed in tattered clothes. Interestingly enough they make no noise whatsoever. The Shaman looking in gasps and then screams, “Ghouls! Help, there are ghouls in here!” (Some may balk at my not making a roll but I think it is fair that a a Shaman living in a high fantasy world would know what a ghoul looks like.)

Time for Initiative!

So I said I was going to run the PCs by DCC rules and the module by BECMI rules, I am going to compromise in this case and roll a d20 for the ghoul’s Initiative. I am only going to roll once for the party and initially only the Ostler, Ditch Digger, and Shaman will be able to act, next round the rest of the party will be able to take action. Since the Ostler is closest I will use his +1 to Initiative. A 16 for the ghouls and a 20 (19+1) for the party, a lucky break!

The Shaman yells another warning as the three PC’s close into battle, “They are said to be able to paralyze their prey, do not let them touch you! Come on, we can overwhelm them!” He rushes forward and swings his mace at one of the ghouls. He needs to roll a 13 and rolled a 9, swing and a miss! Next up is the Ostler who will attack with his staff, sadly due to his low Strength he suffers a -1 penalty to the roll. He also rolled a 9. Not looking good for our heroes! The Ditch Digger is last, with a 14 Strength that is a +1 to the roll. A 13, that is a hit! The Ditch Digger’s shovel is treated like a staff so it does 1-4 (+1 for Strength) and the roll is a 1, so two points of damage to one of the four attacking undead. The module gives Hit Points for all four so I will just roll randomly to see which one it hit. 

Now it is the ghoul’s turn! The Ditch Digger has an AC of 10 which means our BECMI ghouls need a 9 to hit. The Ostler and the Shaman are AC 11 so the ghouls need 10 to hit them. Let’s see how they do, remember BECMI ghouls get three attacks a round, two claws for 1-3 plus a bite for 1-6 not to mention if hit the victim must make a save vs Paralysis! The one struck by the Ditch Digger will attack him. 6, 15, 6 so the second claw hits for 2 points of damage. Sadly the Ditch Digger only had two Hit Points and is killed as the ghoul’s sharp claws tear into the soft flesh of his throat. He falls to the ground and quickly bleeds out unable to even scream.

The second ghoul goes for the Ostler! 6, 12, 10 so one claw and the bite connect. The damage rolls are 2 and 2 for a total of four points which is enough to kill the poor man. The third ghoul attacks the Shaman, 6, 1, 4 all misses! The fourth ghoul will either also attack the Shaman or rush past toward the voices in the hallway, odds the Shaman and evens the hallway. I rolled a 4 so the ghoul moves into the hallway and attacks the closest character, let’s see who the unlucky soul is! It is the Herbalist. Connecting with one claw and the bite the foul creature barrels into Herbalist taking them to the ground and killing them on the spot. 

Time for Initiative again! I will roll twice, once for the Shaman and the three ghouls in the room and once for the rest of the party and the single ghoul in the hallway. The Shaman wins with a natural 20 against the ghoul’s 6 and in the hallway the ghoul wins with a natural 20 against the party’s 10. Since the Shaman gets a +1 to Initiative I will have him go first, then the ghoul in the hallway, then the party and finally the three ghouls in the room. 

The Shaman swings at the wounded ghoul whilst hollering, “In here, to me my friends!” He rolls a 10 which is not good enough to hit. He hopes his comrades come to his aid before the ghouls tear him to shreds. 

The ghoul in the hallway lunges for the Butcher. 4, 18, 6 the claw does three points of damage which is enough to kill the Butcher.  

I am going to have three other characters attack the ghoul in the hallway and the rest will go into the room. The three that attack the ghoul are the Rice Farmer, the Halfling Glovemaker, and the injured Cheese Maker. DCC does not have any dedicated mechanics for flanking or ganging up on opponents that I have found so I will just make use of the die chain and bump them each up to a d24 for this roll. In order their attacks are 17, 7, and 6. The Rice Farmer connects with their pitchfork which acts as a spear doing d8 damage. 8! The Rice Farmer sinks the pitchfork deeply into the creature’s face, the tines coming out the other side, ending it’s miserable existence. “They can be killed, have heart!” 

The Healer, Beekeeper, Tax Collector, Potato Farmer, Gong Farmer, and Guild Beggar rush into the room to see three ghouls starting to surround the Shaman. They break into groups The Healer and Beekeeper going after one, the Tax Collector and Potato Farmer another and finally the Gong Farmer and Guild Beggar after the last. 

The Healer fumbles with a 1 but the Beekeeper hits with a 17! The Beekeeper’s staff does 2 points of damage to the monster as the Healer’s incompetent blow makes them the laughingstock of the party but otherwise causes no damage. (I rolled a 1). 

The Tax Collector and the Potato Farmer are attacking the one by the Shaman so I will bump their die up one to a d24. The revenue man misses, 8, but the Potato Farmer connects, 19, with their pitchfork doing 1 point of damage. 

Finally the Gong Farmer and Guild Beggar both miss the last ghoul, 8 and 2.

The ghoul’s turn!

The first turns and attacks the Healer, 18, 3, 3. The claw that connects does 3 damage which leaves the healer with 1 Hit Point! Let’s see if the Healer makes their save, luckily ghouls are in DCC and require a DC 14 Will Save so no ruling is needed on my part. The Healer rolls an 11 and fails failing to the floor unable to move. 

The second ghoul strikes at the Potato Farmer, 1, 11, 13. Three points of damage total which is enough to kill the valiant Potato Farmer. 

The last ghoul will attack the Gong Farmer (I’m rolling randomly to see who is attacked) and connects with one claw (9, 6, 1). 1 point of damage and the Gong Farmer fails the save falling to the ground.  

Round three! 

I’m just going to roll once for the PCs and once for the ghouls this round. 5 and 18 so the undead will act first! 

The ghoul that just struck the Healer now attacks the Beekeeper, 11, 9, 14 doing a total of 7 points of damage which is plenty to ensure those bees will need a new keeper. 

The next ghoul turns it’s attention back to the Shaman, 3, 5, 15. The bite only does 1 point of damage but sadly that is enough to end the Shaman’s career. 

Our last ghoul attacks the Guild Beggar 16, 15, 15 for 10 total points of damage ending his aspirations of leadership forever. 

As the Rice Farmer, Halfling Glovemaker, and Cheese Maker enter the room they see one ghoul standing over the Healer and Beekeeper, one facing off against the Tax Collector with the Shaman and Potato Farmer at its feet and the last standing over the immobile forms of the Guild Beggar and Gong Farmer. They run in and attack the last one but only the Cheese Maker hits with his cudgel doing 3 points of damage to the fiend. The unfortunate Halfling rolled a 1 to hit and then a 3 on the Fumble table which is turned into a 4 due to his -1 Luck which gives a result of, “Your weapon is damaged: a bowstring breaks, a sword hilt falls off, or a crossbow firing mechanism jams. The weapon can be repaired with 10 minutes of work but is useless for now.” He sees the swords over the mantle, a long sword to a human but the equivalent of a bastard sword for him. 

Speaking of long swords the Tax Collector swings his at the ghoul in front of him but just misses. 

Time for Initiative, this will decide the fate of our heroes. The party gets a 9 which beats the 5 the ghouls rolled, they get to attack again!

The Tax Collector makes another desperate swing and with a 13 hits! He rolls 6 damage and gets a +1 due to his birth sign for a total of 7 damage which is enough to cut the ghoul down! Only two more to go…

The Halfling decides against trying to climb up the fireplace to retrieve a sword and picks up the fallen Gong Farmer’s trowel and attacks alongside the Rice Farmer and Cheese Maker. Sadly they all miss. 

The ghoul goes after the Halfling hitting with one claw for 3 damage which kills the poor Glovemaker. The last ghoul goes for the Tax Collector also hitting with one claw but only doing 1 point of damage, that leaves the Tax Collector with 1 Hit Point but the poor man failed his saving throw and drops to the ground. Now we have two ghouls vs two adventurers. Things are not looking good.

The party loses Initiative and both are cut down. Let us draw the veil over this sad scene so the ghouls can feast in peace.

I’ll be back next week with thoughts on this misadventure and to discuss what is next for the blog. Be excellent to each other! 

Time for another installment of my solo game using Dungeon Crawl Classics to run through the adventure included in TSR’s AC3, Dragon Tiles. Spoilers for that adventure below.

As you might remember the Herbalist has secured a grappling hook on the tower and has successfully climbed the tower to a bricked up second story window. 

Here is where I need to make a decision on how faithfully I should follow the module. The description of the tower that the Herbalist includes the following text:

“If characters inspect the windows, they see that cracks run between the mortar around some of the bricks. Characters cannot pull any of the bricks loose, but they can look through the cracks. If they do, they see several of King Limakhan’s archers standing around the iron fence.” 

That is obviously from the inside not the outside but it seems clear that they do not want the PC’s to be able to open the window. I could follow this intent or I could give the Herbalist a chance to use the crowbar to pry a brick loose. If I was running this for a group I definitely would allow that. I think I am going to allow the Herbalist a skill check to do it. The Herbalist has a crowbar and there are cracks he can wedge it in. On the other hand he is not skilled at working from a height and wouldn’t be able to put his weight into it. I think this is probably not possible using the DCC rules. It would probably be a DC 15 skill check using Strength and the Herbalist has a 0 modifier. Even if I give a +2 bonus for the crowbar there is no way the Herbalist could roll high enough on a d10. I think in this case the Herbalist will not be able pry any of the bricks loose and will only be able to report darkness through the cracks in the bricked up window.  

This is frustrating but I feel I would be invoking the “rule of cool” and just disregarding the rules of both the module and DCC if I allowed this particular attempt to have a chance.

(On the other hand if we were using my home brewed skill system the Herbalist would still have a 1 in 6 chance of success)

The Herbalist climbs back down and reports the disappointing news to the Tax Collector. The group moves to rejoin the rest of our merry band.

 Our main party has successfully destroyed two stone gargoyle statues, see last week’s entry, with only two dead and one PC down to 1 hit point. An encouraging start! They now approach the front door. The Guild Beggar orders them to take axes to the door but Potato Farmer says, “Hold on a minute, maybe it is unlocked.” The Guild Beggar snorts, “Who would just leave it unlocked?” At which the Potato Farmer pushes the heavy doors which freely swing into the entryway exposing a hallway. An amused hush falls on the crowd as the Guild Beggar pushes his way next to the Potato Farmer and looks in.

The box text tells us:

“The sound of scurrying rats echoes from the north end of the hall. Cobwebs cover the ceiling and hang down into the hallway, which is musty and damp. 

Rotting black curtains hang along one section of the east wall. A long wooden table stands to the north of the curtains. 

Doors stand in the west and east walls of this hallway’s north end. A bricked-up window rests in the north wall, and a cracked mirror hangs from one of the window’s bricks. 

A jumble of footprints criss-crosses the dusty floor.” 

At this point the second story crew has rejoined them and the Tax Collector moves forward to survey the situation.  

Time for some Intelligence checks! I’m going to make these DC 15 skilled checks. Let’s just do the Potato Farmer and Guild Beggar initially, The Potato Farmer rolls a 19 (+2 for Intelligence) and the Guild Beggar a 13 (+1 for Intelligence) so the Potato Farmer passes easily with a 21 where the Guild Beggar’s 14 just misses. 

“Look there,” the Potato Farmer says, “why would you have a bricked up window in the middle of a house? That surely is not the back wall as the house is wider than the distance to that window. Plus I did not see any rats when we walked around outside, they must be inside on the other side of the wall.”

 “Indeed.” The Tax Collector says as he strives to take control back. “Here is what we will do. You , Potato Farmer, the Guild Beggar and I will check that northern wall, the rest of you check those other doors.” 

Another round of Intelligence Checks is needed here, these will be unskilled with a DC 10. The previous check was skilled because it was just picking up that the house was deeper than the bricked window made it appear. Since the PCs walked around the house it seemed they shouldn’t need any specialized knowledge to figure that out. This time we are seeing if anyone thinks to investigate the footprints. Only the Potato Farmer makes it!

The Potato Farmer puts his arms up in keeping the Tax Collector and Guild Beggar from walking through the threshold. “Hold on there, what about the footprints?” The Tax Collector in an obviously annoyed voice reply, “I was just getting to that. Let’s see if we can follow these footprints before we check the rooms and that window. Does anyone have any tracking experience?” He turns and looks to the group. “You, Ostler, you see a lot of tracks in the course of your work, do you think you could see what story these footprints tell?”

“Well sir that is not really what I do but I can give it a try.” I’ll be generous and give this an unskilled DC 10. With a 3 the Ostler comes forward and after looking states that while some do seem to be fresh they do not seem to lead anywhere specific. “Fine, fine.” The Tax Collector states, “We are wasting time, search the hallway as I directed!”

And we will pick back up next week. Thank you for reading this and don’t forget to be excellent to each other! 

Time for another installment of my solo game using Dungeon Crawl Classics to run through the adventure included in TSR’s AC3, Dragon Tiles. Spoilers for that adventure below.

The party has decided to split with four hardy souls who plan to scale the building under command of the Tax Collector and the rest led by the Guild Beggar who will go through the front door. After a quick huddle it was determined that the Tax Collector would supervise the Beekeper, the Halfling Glovemaker, and the Herbalist in trying to get to the roof. Canvasing the various equipment everyone had it was decided a crowbar and at least one iron spike would be useful so the Ditch Digger and Shaman were asked to give those items to the second story team. After a brief but tense negotiation the Tax Collector agreed to pay them market value for the items once the adventure was completed. The crowbar and iron spike were given to the Herbalist who gave his club to the Halfling Glovemaker. The Glovemaker’s grappling hook was tied to the end of the Beekeeper’s rope and the Herbalist was elected to attempt to secure it to the top of the tower on the right front of the house.

Here is what our second story crew looks like:

I will say securing the grappling hook to the top of the tower is a DC 10 check. I don’t think any of our intrepid adventurer’s occupations lend themselves to this task so it will be an unskilled Reflex check. In DCC skilled checks are rolled on a d20 and unskilled ones are rolled on a d10. The Herbalist gets a +2 to Reflex Checks. Rolling an 8 he just makes it! Now will he succeed in scaling the wall? I will give him a +2 for the rope in addition to his natural +2 but this is still an unskilled Reflex check, with a 9 he easily makes it and is able to scale the wall.

While this is going on the rest of our heroes, under the Guild Beggar’s leadership are going through the front door. You can see all their character sheets back in the Meet the party post. To decide who goes first I will roll a d12, and I got a 12! It looks like the Cheesemaker drew the short straw. As the Cheesemaker approaches the steps, he sees two gargoyle statues, one on either side of the entryway. Five-foot wide, iron-banded double doors stand in the porch’s north wall. With a gulp the Cheesemaker surveys the scene before advancing. I’m going to make a unskilled check against DC 10 to notice anything odd. Because the Cheesemaker has a +1 to intelligence and a 10 foot pole I’m going to give them +3 to the roll, 1 for the Intelligence modifier and 2 for the pole. Unskilled checks in DCC are done with a D10. I rolled a 2 so with a total of 5 the Cheesemaker fails and does not notice anything out of the ordinary.

(If I had used my preferred skill system, a d6 starting with 1 in 6 chance and adding 1 for each thing in the character’s favor the Cheesemaker would have had a 3 in 6 chance after factoring in Intelligence and the pole. That said I’m trying to mostly play RAW here.)

The Cheesemaker slowly advances forward but just after he passes the gargoyle statues the one on the left pivot’s and it’s clawed wings of stone swing out to hit the Cheesemaker!

The module says the character must roll a d20 and get their Dexterity score or lower to avoid the blow. This would be a Reflex save in DCC. Normally the Cheesemaker’s high Agility of 15 would give him a +1 to this roll but the Cheesemaker’s Birth Augur is Struck By Lightning and that means he has to apply his starting Luck modifier to his Reflex Saving Throw. The Cheesemaker’s starting Luck is 7 which gives a modifier of -1 which cancels out the +1 so it is just a straight roll. To make a Saving Throw in DCC you roll a d20, plus any modifiers, and compare it to the DC. I have two options here. I can use twenty minus the character’s Agility score as the DC, which follows the intent of the module, or I can assign a DC going by the examples in the Skills section of the DCC rules. In that case I would probably assign a DC 15 to this. The first way means the Cheesemaker has to roll 5 or higher on a d20 and the second means he has to roll 15 or higher on a d20. As much as I want to use the former I think the latter is more in line with my intent as stated in previous posts.

The roll is a 7 and the Cheesemaker is struck by the stone wings of the gargoyle! The module specifies this will do 1d6 damage and I rolled a 3. The Cheesemaker started with 4 Hit Points so he is still barely alive.

The Guild Beggar yells, “Get them!” and our band of heroes surge forth to do battle. They will split up and six will attack each gargoyle. Normally at this point we would do initiative but as you may have guessed these aren’t normal gargoyles, they are a trap, statues that spin based on pressure plates just past them on the stone porch at the top of the steps. Let’s see if the Cheesemaker realizes this, we’ll give a DC 10 check and he’ll get his +1 for Intelligence. I’ll even make it a skilled check since he did step on the plate. The roll was an 8, +1 makes it a 9 which is just shy so the Cheesemaker, still reeling from the blow, does not realize what happened and cannot warn his companions about the pressure plates. I will roll for two unlucky souls who will activate the plates and need to make a Saving Throw themselves. The Woodcutter, who has a -1 to their Reflex Save, and the Cooper who has a -2 to theirs! With a 3 and a 1 both are struck by these pesky statues as they swing around doing 6 points to the Woodcutter and 3 points to the Cooper. Both are killed.

The Statues are unable to fight back and can each take 6 points of damage until they are destroyed. I am going to roll because natural 1’s are Fumbles in DCC. No 1’s luckily enough but the Ostler did roll a Natural 20 which is a Critical Hit. Let’s see what that result is. Zero level characters get a d4 to roll on Crit Table I and the Oster rolled a 4! “Strike to foe’s kneecap. Inflict +1d4 damage with this strike and the foe suffers a -10’ penalty to speed until healed.” Nice!

Both statues are quickly demolished but the Guild Beggar’s group has lost two members before they even reached the front door!

That’s it for this week, next week we’ll check that front door out and find out what happens when the Herbalist scales the tower. Until then, be excellent to each other!

This post contains spoilers for AC3

“Be it known that yesterday, vile and treacherous fiends kidnapped Princess Arelina, King Limakhan’s youngest daughter.

Be it also known that royal guardsmen pursued the kidnappers to the gates of a house bounded by two dark towers. Archers and lancers have surrounded the evil place, and trapped the wretched kidnappers within.

Be it also known that the king has forbidden the archers and lancers to attack the house of towers so long as the princess remains inside. Therefore, the king seeks a few strong warriors to enter the house and rescue Princess Arelina.

Thus, King Limakhan offers a reward of 50,000 gold pieces to any person or party who rescues the princess by nightfall tomorrow. The king also offers one of his finest war horses to each rescuer.

Be warned! If the princess is harmed or is killed, or if the rescuers try to turn back, the king’s archers and lancers will be forced to kill the wrongdoers.”

This is the opening box text to the mini adventure included in TSR’s AC3 3-D Dragon Tiles featuring The Kidnapping of Princess Arelina. It is specifically designed to show off the paper terrain and minis included in the module. It is also interesting as it is an adventure that is labeled for D&D (at the time the BEMCI line of products) or AD&D 1E.

As discussed in previous blog entries I will be using Goodman Games’ Dungeon Crawl Classics as my primary ruleset and will use this adventure, designed for a group of 4 to 8 characters between the second and fifth levels of experience, as a funnel for 16 zero level DCC characters. I will be doing minimum conversions aside from tracking both the ascending and descending armor class for each character and monster. I plan to use the D&D rules to adjudicate the monster’s attacks and will convert things like traps and saving throws on the fly.

I am not, nor do I aspire to be, an author so I will be approaching this more like a miniatures skirmish game and will be emphasizing the “G” or games aspect of Roleplaying Games over the “R” or roleplaying aspect. To stay fair I will let the dice make decisions for the characters if my knowledge as the Dungeon Master would unbalance the decision.

With that preliminary explanation out of the way let’s get started!

Sadly for King Limakhan all the heroes are elsewhere and none answered his call. Luckily Princess Arelina is well loved by her subjects and 16 foolhardy subjects have stepped forward to attempt to rescue her and claim the rich prize offered. I detailed those 16 brave souls in the previous blog post. Our motley crew approach the house that is surrounded by the King’s men.

“Cool breezes blow through the wet grass as the sun lights the sky to the east. To the north, a dark, one story stone building rises from the dawn mist. Bricked-up windows mark two 20-foot-high towers that rise from the northwest and southeast corners of the building.

A rickety iron fence runs around the house. Along the fence, dozens of soldiers stand guard. Steps run upward from the weed-covered lawn inside the fence. The steps lead to a porch in the south wall.”

The peasants confer with each other on their plan of action. The Tax Collector and Guild Beggar emerge as the two natural leaders (based on their high Personality and Intelligence scores) and set the others to scouting the exterior of the house to see if there is any other way into the structure. The house appears to be made entirely of stone and all the windows are bricked up. As far as they can tell the only way in is the front porch. As they were walking around the structure a few of our heroes got a little close to the circle of soldiers and were warned that they better get to it, any attempt to escape would result in them being run through!

Now as a player I would realize that the party has rope, grappling hooks, crowbars, small hammers and iron spikes. The idea of scaling one of the towers to look for an entrance from the roof or to break through one of the bricked over windows seems pretty obvious. It isn’t like the kidnappers don’t already know they are surrounded and that a rescue attempt will be made. But will the party realize this? I think it is a fairly obvious choice but let’s leave it to the dice. I’ll give each character a base 2 in 6 chance to think of it modified by their intelligence and giving them a +1 if they have a grappling hook or crowbar.

Oh my. Out of the 16 only the Rice Farmer, Halfling Glovemaker, and Cooper consider the idea. As the leaders, the Tax Collector and Guild Beggar start pressing the crowd toward the porch the Halfling Glovemaker speaks up.

“Excuse me, perhaps we could scale the walls? There may be an opening on the roof.” squeaks the Glovemaker.

The Tax Collector looks at him doubtfully, “Eh, what’s that?” He thinks to himself that he can’t be outshown by a mere tradesman, “Of course we thought of that while you lot were scouting around. The problem is not everyone can get up there and we would have to split the party. Isn’t that right Guild Beggar?”

The Guild Beggar, happy to be in a position of power for a change, backs the Tax Collector up. “Indeed that is correct. Strength in numbers you know. Still if a small number want to scale the building I don’t think there is much harm in, do you Tax Collector?”

Not being a fool and knowing that the safest place is either outside or behind the group the Tax Collector answers, “No, of course not. Let’s assign four to attempt to scale the tower, I’ll stay back to oversee the operation, and you can lead the rest through the front. We’ll either catch up to you inside one way or another. Best of luck Guild Beggar.”

And so the first major decision the party makes is to split the party!

That’s all for this week, thank you for reading along. I’ll be back next week with another post and until then be excellent to each other!

(By the way you might be asking why I didn’t use the standard DCC skill system and just assign a difficulty for the idea roll to scale the building. The honest truth is I didn’t think of it at the time and after I did it I didn’t want to retcon what happened. I will use the DCC skill system going forward for actual skill checks.)