[Eldariel]

First, few things. Lack of updates has been due to computer failure on our "remote player"'s part, and a variety of trips and such over the summer. The game should continue at a faster pace from now on.

Second, we're implementing some additional WP-related rules in near future, though they weren't in use over this session yet. Basically, we'll make ½ VP damage count you as fatigued, full VP damage count you as exhausted and each WP damage have a chance of causing limb injury; tables still on prototype level though.


Session 5

Another Journey:

Spoiler

Day 13
Our heroes have the task of figuring out the whatever artifact is located to the temple in the north. They have also told Decor they would go south to their hometown and put together money to acquire another of those amulets. As such, the party (complete with now healed-up Nightshade) sets off: they leave through the southern gate, travel south for a few miles and circles through the forest on foot with Peter doing what he can to confound and cover their tracks.


The trip passes uneventfully with the party reasonably sure they aren't being followed, they quickly reach the northern road. There are some other travelers en route to Nakmar so the road is surprisingly lively. No meaningful interaction takes place between any outsiders over the first day of travel though until the party's ears catch someone screaming for help. After an extremely swift conference, the party decides to investigate. Well, more precisely, Peter & Edmund decide to investigate and leave Nightshade with the horses since they want to approach stealthily and Nightshade's Fullplate isn't conductive to stealth.

The duo sneaks towards the source of the sound, pretty competently I might add, and manages to reach the scene undetected. Before them opens a view of a wagon with a woman and a child, and in front of them a man grasping a sword with shaking hands. Staring down the man? A Dire Boar. Knowing the man is completely outmatched, Peter and Edmund quickly decide on their course of actions: The bow and the crossbow sing in unison, forming a chorus of arrows that puts a close to the surprise round, and surprisingly enough the entire fight.

Edmund finds the creature's lung with his arrow (in other words, scores a critical) and the beast botches its save vs. being stunned, and is in shock, unable to act. Cue a pair of coup de graces (from Rapier and Greatsword, respectively) and a very dead Boar. Interestingly enough, the flustered man opens up the dialogue by asking "Who are you?" before realizing what just happened and thanking the two for saving his life, and that of his family. He's but a poor man though and has but a silver to offer for the group's trouble. The two graciously accept (while Nightshade has finally arrived at the scene, figuring that stealth would no longer be necessary). At this point, the following exchange takes place, outside the others' ears:
Edmund: "Let's kill them and loot the rest of their money!"
Peter: "But they hardly have anything! Hell, they probably just gave us half their total wealth!"
Edmund: "What, aren't we gonna be bandits?"
Peter: "I think there are better ways to make a living than leaving a trail of bodies behind us."
Edmund: "Then let's burn the Wagon!"
Peter: "..." Along with awkward gazes, chatter about the party's previous pyromancy exploits (see the cave, the bodies and...well, when anything needed to be disposed of) and what exactly "Chaotic Neutral" stands for.


Anyway, the party bids their farewells to the family (involving 0 stabbery/pyromancy/thievery-related moves) and the family hurries to get to the town's safety before nightfall. The party, on the other hand, still has a long way to go and sets off, continuing their journey towards Nakmar (the last real town in the north). No other relevant incidents happen over their trip, and the group sets up a camp by the roadside, with the already routinated tasks of Peter finding the location and setting up the camp for best defensibility, Edmund laying some easily settable traps in the surroundings and Nightshade...being there. Cue night, with the guard order being Peter/Edmund/Nightshade.

Of course, can't have uneventful nights! On Peter's guard about two hours into it, he hears footsteps near the camp. Curiously enough, they sound Human to him. He quickly awakens the other two, but it sounds like the steps turn away. Peter decides to investigate, taking Edmund with him and lighting a Torch due to the darkness of a clouded autumn night in a forest. Of course, this makes any sneak attempts on his part futile, but Edmund stays a bit further back just in case. Nightshade stays to guard the camp. Peter and Edmund never reach the source of the footsteps though as the sound just...vanishes.

Confused, Peter locates the tracks and follows them to a point where the tracks too simply vanish. Even more confused, Peter and Edmund search high and low for any possible signs of where the person might have disappeared, but all they find, even with a dozen minutes burned on taking 20, is a silver coin in a stock. Interestingly enough, this silver coin is not the modern currency; neither P nor E can identify it (after thorough search to ensure that there is nothing more to the coin; all they notice is a small notch in it), followed by Peter deciding the person walking here must have turned into a coin and is thus now his prisoner (promptly putting the coin into his pocket).

After returning to the camp and letting Nightshade take a look at it, he concludes that it's a couple of hundred years old, from the era when the northern mountains were still mined and when the temple was built. Puzzled, the party goes to sleep with Peter still convinced he just captured the unwanted visitor. The rest of the night involves a deer appearing on Edmund's watch and promptly eating a Crossbow bolt in the face, causing it to run away in panic, and not much else. The DM makes an ominous note on how that deer was a test and how taking the shot will be relevant in the future.


Day 14
The second day of the travel involves no surprises as the party reaches a half-way inn named "Galloping Horse". There's also a Hunter's Hut in the same area, along with some woodcutters but there's nothing else making it more of a group of buildings than a hamlet. As soon as the party arrives, a strongly-built hunter approaches the party saying "the bear chases the deer", to which Nightshade immediately answers "the deer chases the bear" and just walks away on the party. Edmund yells "Where are you going?!" and earns a "None of your business." I can't believe they just ditched us like that! A quick conference reveals that the party figures Nightshade won't probably be terribly happy if they follow him, and he's probably more than adequately prepared to cover his back so the party chooses to instead head into the inn.
Peter: "Let's go to the inn and ask around. Maybe we could learn something about Nightshade too."
Edmund: "No. Not asking about Nightshade."
DM: Don't you remember? Good things happen whenever you ask after Nightshade!"
Peter: *flashback of the two guys we had to kill and dispose of in the city after asking after Nightshade* "...you've got a point."

Peter and Edmund settle for local gossip and whatever a beer or two can buy, learning about a tournament in two days in the town of Nakmar to the north. It just so happens that it's right en route to the northern mountains and it's about two days from the inn to Nakmar so the two decide to compete. It also turns out the beer here is excellent compared to what the two have been used to in Waterdawn and they quite thoroughly enjoy this and themselves. The inn itself is a round building, with stairs to the rooms, and door to the kitchen both to the immediate right from the main door and rest of the floor reserved for tables.

Around half an hour into the tavern session, Nightshade shows up from the kitchen door (WTF, right?) and walks over to the party. Edmund asks "Where were you?" and this time, Nightshade is a bit more open. He explains he was asking after news from the north.

Turns out an Ogre has banded together with a couple of Gnomes and is causing all sorts of havoc north of Nakmar; a problem the party will probably have to look into. Turns out Tara Forge is willing to pay gold for its head. Nightshade also tells a bit of his friend, apparently a man named Martin Greaves, and the air is cleared up a bit. The party decides to stay at the inn for the night and thus the whole lot drinks quite a bit. Into the evening, Peter feels like singing and with a mighty "10" out of "Perform: Drunken Singing", manages to even get some applause! Of course, after a singing session on top of a table, he manages to slip and fall down after his singing, but with some acrobatics, manages to avoid pain. Edmund decides to try something he's actually good at and does a tumbling show, rolling a "1" on the die for a total of 11, also getting some applause but ending up on his head after the show. Happy with their accomplishments for the day, the party heads for bed early to set out in the morning.


Day 15
Fresh off their night in an inn, the party heads off towards Nakmar and the tournament they're looking forward to. The ride starts off uneventfully, but couple of hours in, the group sees a slew of corpses. More accurately, there's one dead man, apparently a warrior of some kind judging from his Breastplate and Greatsword, and two dead Wolves. Peter tells the other two to stay back as he searches the ground for clues as to what exactly happened.

Due to some pretty good rolls, he can find the tracks of five-six distinct wolves, and figures the man was alone and not mounted. A quick inspection of his equipment reveals that he had few silvers and the Breastplate is ordinary, but his sword is special. None of the group, not even Nightshade, can identify the metal it's made of and there were strange burn marks on the dead wolves. Edmund gives it a thorough search to find some oil injection or something to explain the marks, but none are forthcoming.

Peter tests it for a swing or two, finding it to be at least as well balanced as his sword and then tries to hit one of the dead wolves, noticing that sparks do indeed fly when the weapon hits, and whatever is being hit gets scorched. It doesn't take long for Peter to figure out that given the warrior no longer has a use for this, he's now got a new sword. Edmund decides he wants the Breastplate along, and thanks to the various interlocking pieces, manages to cram it into his saddlebags. Peter is a bit worried about the ferocity of the wolves (since he wasn't able to find anything abnormal about the tracks), given they attacked and slew a hardened warrior, but at least during the group's trip, the wolves leave them alone.

The rest of the day passes uneventfully and the party camps, cursing how they have to camp in the open. Watches are the same Peter/Edmund/Nightshade, but nothing happens over night so it's quite trivial. Everyone does what they've done thus far with Nightshade parking skin, Peter fletching arrows or brewing poisons and Edmund being Edmund.


Day 16
The last day of the travels passes without incidents. We fastforward to Nakmar to get to business; sufficient to say, the road has others heading towards the same tournament but not much that catches the eye. We stay overnight in Nakmar and prepare for the big day.

Nakmar and the Tournament; A Die God I Am:

Spoiler

Day 17
Edmund and Peter sign up for the tournament, to compete as a team in the combat scenarios and solo in the others. It's 5 coppers per head to enter, so "pathetically cheap" would be quite the understatement. After registrations, we quickly get to the first part of the tournament; man vs. beast.

First Event - Man versus Beast
There are three levels of monsters the warriors get to face. As Peter and Edmund entered as a team, it's 2v2; two monsters, one per man. The arena is much too small for any skirmishing tactics; it's a 30' rectangle with each contestant at an edge of the area. The wolves are pretty quick; Peter wins initiative, Rabid Wolf Strikes and the Wolf dies in spite of a "2" on the To Hit die. The second one attacks Edmund once, and hits for 2 damage but loses the Trip-check, gets clobbered by Edmund and then dies on Peter's turn.

The second round is Worgs. The fight was much the same; the Worgs won initiative and charged the two. They both missed, Peter KOd his with full PA Rabid Wolf Strike (rolling a 6 which was just sufficient) and moved to flank the other one and Edmund critted its brains out.

The last monster was scary: Dire Wolves. Luckily for him, Peter won the initiative and readied an action to Rabid Wolf Strike the wolf once it comes within reach. Edmund sniped his with Hand Crossbow and the Wolves came. They charged, Peter hit his hard with the full PA Rabid Wolf Strike and then the Wolf-attacks came. Peter defended with Wall of Blades; good decision as the Wolf would've hit easily otherwise which might've ended the fight right there. 17 on the die roll though meant, Peter's effective AC of 25 was too much for the Wolf to overcome. Edmund's Wolf missed him.

The second turn, Peter cursed how the Wolves were 10' apart (in spite of Peter & Edmund being right next to each other; they hit the corner squares on both sides) denying him Steel Wind, and he resolved to just do a normal full PA attack on his wolf, dropping it. He moved to flank Edmund's wolf. Edmund hit his for some damage, but it was still standing. The wolf hit Edmund right back, catching him bad dealing some 16 points of damage and tripping Edmund, putting him into a very precarious position.

Luckily, Peter was able to cut the twice Sneak Attacked wolf on his next turn and the fight was over; Wolves hit hard. I daresay, had it not been for the Wall of Blades, the Wolves would've probably won the fight; Peter would've been pretty FUBAR'd after getting tripped and the Wolves would've lunched on us.

Second Event - Archery
Next sport was archery, which was a solo event. I planned on using Destiny Shot to get some damn good hits in, but DM had figured I might and stated the competition would be performed through base die rolls. Of course, Peter proceeded to prove that maneuvers or not, he's Just That Damn Good™ and rolled the following series for his five hits:
16
11
14
20
20

Sufficient to say, he won.

Third Event - Balance
Next was another lighter event, balancing. The DM hadn't thought of much for this, so it was a simple slew of balance checks; kinda dull, but then again, kinda interesting and finally some use out of those obligatory 5 ranks I put into the skill. First was some plank, DC 10 Balance-check. Then a rope, another DC 10 and finally some third DC 10 I forget about. Both of us passed them with flying colors. Then came couple of DC 15s, and Edmund failed the first one. Peter? Well, he proceeded to roll the following:
11
14
Something (didn't remember to write the third up)
19
20
13
13

Sufficient to say, after completing the whole track including the two DC 20s in the end, he won this one too.

Last Event - Team Duel
This was the end; the best-performing teams now fought for the trophy. On one side was the dynamic duo, Peter & Edmund and standing against them was Jack the Slasher and some less memorable name, who will henceforth be called The Nameless Pharaoh (due to his way with luck, among others... Read on). The Nameless Pharaoh had with a Guisarme while Jack had some melee weapon; I never really figured out which one since I didn't understand to ask and he never really got to use it.

Fight starts, Peter wins initiative. Unlike in the previous fights, Peter chose Guisarme as his opening weapon here; there was talk that the fight would be fought dealing non-lethal damage so a tripping weapon seemed more beneficial. Of course, that quickly flew out of the window as nobody else was dealing non-lethal but there you go.

Peter moved next to Edmund to cover him and readied a non-lethal Rabid Wolf Strike for whoever approached first. Edmund took the round 0 Sneak Attack snipe on Jack, hitting him for a lot and removing any hopes of a non-lethal combat. The Nameless Pharaoh approached first, eating the readied attack from Peter that failed to connect due to the nonlethal penalty (and a 6 on the die).

Nameless Pharaoh tried to hit Peter back but likewise missed, and Jack was forced to approach provoking an AoO from Peter which he used to trip Jack successfully. On his next turn, Peter figured he's in perfect position and used Steel Wind, first attempting to trip the Nameless Pharaoh but botching his Trip-result and dropping his Guisarme to avoid countertrip, then taking 5' step and drawing his Greatsword to take the second attack on Jack...which was a hit. Edmund moved to flanking position behind the Nameless Pharaoh and manages a miss on him too.

At this point, the Nameless Pharaoh 5' steps next to Edmund enabling him to reach Peter again and attacks, but Peter manages a 20 on Wall of Blades blocking him; good thing too since the DM shows that the Nameless Pharaoh had rolled a 19 which is, by WP rules, in the crit range for Guisarme. Jack inefficiently fumbles around with his weapon in the ground, too afraid to raise with Peter next to him (in other words, the -4 causes him to miss. Shocker, right?). Peter 5' steps in and tries to again hit Nameless Pharaoh, inefficiently, followed by Edmund being equally inefficient. At this point, the Nameless Pharaoh manages a critical threat. And this time, Peter doesn't have a counter to save his ass. In fact, Nameless Pharaoh just rolled a 20 (DM reveals the result). And 17 on his Critical Confirmation.

So Peter eats a Guisarme to the gut and just barely makes the DC 17 Fortitude-save to not get stunned (12 damage + 5 base difficulty - he rolls 12 and has +5 to Fort-saves), with Nameless Pharaoh rolling Double 4 on his damage dice. Ouch. He's at 2 WP now. He's also at various penalties for having taken Wound Point damage. In the meanwhile, Jack again fumbles around rolling a 15 which isn't enough to hit 'cause he's still at -4 from being prone. Now Peter is pissed. And now it's Peter's turn. Full Power Attack hit on the Nameless Pharaoh. 19. That's a critical threat. 18 on confirmation. That's a confirmed critical. 6, 5, 4 (Fire) on the damage dice, plus 11 damage bonus from Str and PA (counting -2 Str from Fatigue). That's a dead man, gentlemen. No, he did not roll 20 on his Fort-save. Well, technically dying; of course we had no intention of killing anyone here. Then, Peter deals "non-lethal" to Jack, manages to accidentally roll a critical and the fight is over; Edmund took one more miss in the meanwhile.


So, Peter and Edmund win the tournament. The people come to cheer for them. Even Nightshade offers them a gruff "Well, I never thought you were quite that good warriors" from the mass. Peter wouldn't mind a chance to fix up his gut, but that's denied for him right now. Then the victorious duo is called before the tournament organizers, to receive their prize. It is, indeed, a very real Mithril Chain Shirt. A brief discussion of who wears it occurs; Peter figures he should receive it by rights of deeds. Edmund's player, OOC, wonders if he should shoot Peter in the head now that he's not prepared and is quite hurt. IC, Peter decides to let Edmund wear it for the time being, due to having just gotten his new sword himself to balance it out

Afterwards, Peter manages to get enough breathing room for himself to bandage his own "skin punctures" and the party gets to the celebration as the heroes of the day. Free room in the finest (only) inn in town, lots of free food, congratulating people and awesome time was to be had by all. In the evening, Peter withdraws to his room and summons a healer. Edmund and Nightshade hit their respective beds and the day is over.


Days 18-19
Nightshade and Edmund enjoy the festivities while Peter enjoys bedrest; with the healer and full bedrest, the wounds are healed in a couple of days. Edmund thinks if he should rob the city and misuse his status as a local hero.

Peter manages talks him out of it and points out how this is but a small town compared to Waterdawn, where robbery would be far more productive. Given that the party does have a schedule to stick to, they'd rather not waste any more time than they have to so Peter just chooses the quickest way to get fixed up.

Onwards to the Gnomes and the Mountains!:

Spoiler

Day 20
With the festivities somewhat subsiding and Peter completely functional again, the party decides to head off. They're greeted by a jolly autumn rain that is both, cold and wet. Things are made a bit better by the masses cheering for them as they ride north, braving the weather under their somewhat protective raincoats from their explorers' suits. There's some forest around again and if it weren't so bloody wet, the trip could be kind of interesting. The first day of travel is rather uneventful, probably thanks to the constant rain.

The party is very happy to set up a camp and get into tents as the tents are quite a bit drier than the outdoors. As a true woodsman, Peter manages to make a fire in spite of the horrible downpour and the night gets underway. Nothing much happens and the party is very thankful to awaken into hearing not a drop of water.


Day 21
Indeed, the rain rained itself out the day before and now all that remains is a heavy mist, effectively limiting vision to 30'. The trip starts off uneventfully, but a bit into the day, the party hears some very heavy footsteps, a loud voice saying "Boris wants medicine", some really highpitched voice answering "but it's not time for Boris's medicine yet" and overall, weird stuff.

Peter and Edmund decide Nightshade best do the talking and quickly flee into the woods on both sides, tying their horses a bit further to hide them in the mist, then staying 30' to both sides of the road just barely maintaining vision, waiting in ambush. Nightshade, in the meanwhile, stands in the middle of the road and as the huge shadow of a humanoid twice the size of a large human shows up, calls out: "Who goes there?"

At first, there's no response, so he calls out again, louder "Who goes there?!" The creature approaches a bit closer and indeed, Peter and his 32 in Knowledge: Nature identifies the creature as an Ogre. It's drawing a wagon with two creatures identified as Gnomes. The Gnomes quickly yell "Kill that man and Boris gets his medicine!" The Ogre's eyes light with wild fury and it charges with the wagon tied to it, causing the gnomes to fly around; cue initiative. Edmund and Nightshade act first followed by the monsters and then Peter.

Nightshade takes a few steps behind an readies an action to hit whoever comes within his reach. Edmund readies an action to shoot whoever he sees first. Ogre charges Nightshade, eats up SA from Edmund's Heavy Crossbow (he has both, a Heavy Crossbow for sniping and a Hand Crossbow for combined Rapier/Hand Crossbow combat) and Nightshade's Guisarme, then hits Nightshade for Massive Damage (seriously, it rolled 8 and 7 for its 2d8! This after Snake Eyes on Nightshade's damage dice).

The Gnomes yell some gibberish nonsense ("AIEEEE!"-type stuff) going wild by the ogre getting beat up so bad and throw some really scary explosive bottles but thanks to Edmund's evasion, he avoids the one thrown at him and the one thrown at Nightshade was aimed really, really poorly. Peter's turn, he Rapid Shots the Ogre 18 points and then it eats up some more hits from Nightshade and Edmund (who snuck into the fog and returned at a different position for a new sneak attack), finally going down to Edmund's sneak attack. The gnomes go absolutely crazy at the Ogre going down, and pick up some other potions and throw them both at Edmund, missing horribly and we hear some actually groundshaking explosions and the sound of a tree falling, being very thankful the Gnomes have a poor aim.

A Rapid Shot from Peter followed by Nightshade's Guisarme and Edmund's new Sneak Attack drop one Gnome, and the second one is looking in a bad way when he drinks a potion, and drops down apparently dead. Peter cuts his head off execution-style to be sure, and indeed, the party proceeds to generate three trophies (and wraps them in one of the Arabian Carpets they got from the bandit cave so long ago, having nothing else to wrap them in); the Ogre's head to collect their reward from Tara and the Gnome-heads for status symbols (and to probably sell to nobility).

An interesting exchange occurs when discussing what to do with the gnome potions. Edmund says he'll just cram them into his saddlebags, to which Peter objects by saying Edmund is free to blow himself up if he so desires, but as long as he rides with Peter, those potions stay right where they are. The next considered option is burning the wagon, until the party finally decides they'll just take the whole damn Wagon along with the Arabian Carpet to dampen any possible explosions. And Edmund's horse is in the middle. The party decides that now that they have a wagon, they hang the trophies from the sides. So now the wagon is decorated by an ogre head and two gnome heads. And the trip continues.


As the party fools around with the wagons, the mist is dissipating and as they set off, the visibility is actually quite good. The trip starts of peacefully until they arrive at a curve, behind which they hear some really weird kind of "explosive" sounds, whistling and all sorts of odd noises. The party decides to utilize the forest and sneak up to the source. Well, more precisely, Edmund and Peter will sneak; Nightshade is too loud for that (at this point, we tell the DM to get Nightshade some ranks in Hide & Move Silently).

We sneak through the short patch of forest with Nightshade staying behind with the horses and the wagon, and spy a weird bearded, short man with some really weird metal concoction making noises and releasing smoke. Peter tells Edmund to go ahead and talk while he stands at a ready with bow just in case. After a quick exchange, we figure that Edmund is the better speaker so yes, he does go. And lo and behold, the man is actually quite amiable (if a bit absent-minded; it takes quite a few yells to get his attention). I wonder whether he'd be a non-Human, but the discussion takes so many turns that I quickly forget about that minor detail.

He quickly explains that he's working on a machine that channels steam to move and believes it might actually be stronger than horses. Then he explains us the basis of his "Steam Locomotive" and the problems he's dealing with, most precisely how to regulate the amounts of steam released. At this point, Edmund's player says "Ever heard of a vent?", I say "OOC knowledge much?" and then we ponder on it a while, until it turns out he's actually got a rank in Knowledge: Architecture & Engineering.

A roll of 15 later, he's explaining vents to the weird bearded dude IC and suddenly the two of them are working out how to make it function while Peter is rolling 4 and 2 on his aid another, so mostly being extremely disruptive and not one bit useful for the conversation, even though he is quite bright (I chalk this up to him being more of a woodsman). Nightshade also shows up and...well, keeps Peter company. Both of them are pretty WTF while Edmund and Ye Olde Bearded Dude discuss the machine.

At this point Mr. Wårf, as his name turns out, invites us (especially Edmund) to his workshop so they can work out the changes in practice and Edmund, knowing good business when he sees one, is quick to accept. The rest of us have not much against it (besides the lost time) and we follow.

They work out how exactly to make the machine work over the rest of the evening and we stay overnight at the workshop.


Day 22
This day is practically entirely spent with me making failed Aid Another-checks (eventually going outside to sulk at my own inadequacy), Edmund and Wårf dealing with the machine and Nightshade pointing out to me that "Did you notice he's not a human?" We conclude that he's a dwarf or a half-dwarf; he tells they're somewhat common around here and often into crazy machines like that. Also quite harmless if a bit...crazy.

Peter starts to wonder if Edmund is one too, seeing how well they get along and how crazy Edmund is. Either way, over the day the changes to the machine reach a finish and it seems workable. A test of pitting 5 horses vs. the machine ends up with the machine trouncing the horses in raw power and Wårf is ecstatic; it's far more powerful than he could have ever imagined!

Edmund truly knows a good business when he sees one and asks if Wårf could make another one for him; Edmund is smart but isn't very good of his hands so making one himself would be near-impossible for him. Wårf gives us about a week for it and we agree; we'll probably take at least a week in the mountains anyways, and we can afford to wait here if we somehow make it back faster. We also agree to pay any raw material costs and such associated; he agrees that the work is payment for Edmund's help with the machine.


Day 23
We set off for the mountains and reach the hamlet of Bandara at the roots of the mountain. It is a remnant of one of the mining villages here, last one that's really inhabited. It mostly functions as a base for people searching for minerals and doing other expeditions at the mountains, which gives some people there just enough income to make a living.


At this point, we call it a day; it's getting late and this feels like a good place to stop at, especially since the DM says he hasn't really planned much further. We got much further than he expected; he expected for us to barely get to Nakmar and maybe do the tournament, but that we actually got beyond? Yeah, that was a surprise to us all. We also leveled up; I'll have to see what I'm picking up for my level 3 maneuver!

Observations:

Spoiler

- Well, the combats in this session really showcased how awesome stealth can be. We basically eliminated a CR appropriate encounter in the boar without a fight thanks to the surprise.
- The combats also showcased just how big luck is in the game. Had Peter not rolled obscenely well for the Wall of Blades, and over 11 for that Fort-save, we would probably have at the very least lost in the tournament. Twice. Also, the horrible rolls made it last much longer than the Man vs. Beast fights. That and the Human AC being much higher.
- We really got to use a lot of "rare" skills. I was rolling Search, Balance, Survival & co. a lot while Edmund actually got use out of his Knowledge: Architecture & Engineering! We also had Perform: Drunken Singing and what-not. It was awesome!
- Skill competitions are really bland as written; just rolling a bunch of dice is not interesting. There have to be better ways to implement them.
- Peter really rocked the luck-based events. 81/100 for 5 die rolls, I mean WTF!
- The WP system is awesome. I'm loving the versatility it provides for describing combat and the variance and the danger of it.
- Edmund is the only WP virgin in the party now; Nightshade and Peter have both tasted the bittersweet taste of critical, though none of us has been hit to 0 VP yet.
- Can't wait to put the new variations on the rules into practice!
- Edmund was acting much more coherently this time; we definitely were more neutral than evil this time around! Success!
- Finally a session! Woohoo!
- I must say, the "Ogre + Gnomes"-encounter vividly made me think of Goblin Alchemist of Warcraft-fame. Partly due to this (and due to other similarities), we now keep mixing the words "Gnome" and "Goblin".

That'll be all for now. Hopefully the next session won't take quite as long.