Plunderers! of Thracia: #1
As one campaign ends, another begins: my second round of playtesting is a campaign of the legendary Caverns of Thracia (by the legendary, and sorely missed, Jennell Jaquays). I’ll be typing up play reports of what happens in the game, with the in-game events set aside from my out-of-game commentary.
Our heroes, Carlfel the Elf Mage (and former Astrologer) and Albilee the Halfling Expert (and former Baker), arrive in the city of Chiopolis seeking fame and fortune and news of the Lost City of Thracia.
Stats-wise, Carlfel has -1 to STR and DEX and +1 to WIL, while Albilee has +0 to WIL and +1 to STR and DEX.
Carlfel and Albilee manage to ingratiate themselves to a wealthy benefactor, who gives them 200 gp to outfit an expedition to the Caverns of Thracia, and promises more on the return of items from the Caverns.
These players are coming from a primarily 5e (D&D) background, so I wanted to give them a slightly stronger hook to go to the Caverns, as well as a source of some extra XP. The 200 gp will also be a kind of victory/loss condition: if they manage to use it all up without getting any treasure back from the Caverns to replace it, that will be a kind of loss over and above just losing a PC.
Carlfel and Albilee hear a bunch of rumors about the Caverns:
- The once famed rope bridges beneath the city are not rotted and unsafe
- The only way to cleanse the “yellow death” is with fire
- The beast men are enslaving humans
- Local tribes still perform human sacrifice
- Beware the god of death
- Lizardmen are a superstitious group prone to outbursts of zealotry.
This is one thing I don’t quite understand about the Caverns, where it seems like there must have been previous expeditions to the Caverns for there to be all these rumors, but there are few traces of such in the Caves themselves (at least in Jaquays' original version). To be fair, a lot of things about the Caverns don’t make sense and that’s kind of part of the charm.
Carlfel and Albilee also hear some rumors about other parts of the Island of Thracia:
- A ghost town called Grisenter is not abandoned -- its citizens are subsisting on what they can steal from passing caravans and occasionally kidnapping travelers
- The Vault of Doom on the Isle of Dead is to be avoided at all costs
- Mordeki, a wizard on the east side of the island, is planning to capture an owlbear for his farm.
Eagle-eyed readers may suspect this stuff isn’t part of the original module. I’m using the DCC version of the Caverns of Thracia, which also fleshes out some areas outside the Caverns (I should mention Goodman Games, DCC’s publisher, attracted controversy for working with Bob Bledsaw II despite a history of racist and antisemitic comments online; I acquired these books before this controversy and this series is not intended as an endorsement of this product nor Goodman Games as a company). I also placed some other classic old-school adventures elsewhere on the island in case the players want a change of scenery, so the Vault of Doom for instance is a modified version of the Tomb of Horrors.
They recruit 2 retainers, Billosh the Human Laborer and Veirne the Halfling Smuggler; hire 2 porters, Dibb and Darsh; and 2 mercenaries, Stranglix and Nurgan.
I'm quite pleased Carlfel and Albilee are using the hireling/retainer rules, in part cause I expect the dungeon to be seriously lethal. I’ll be curious to see how many of them survive the first expedition.
The party heads south through the wilderness of Thracia in search of the ruins.
The Island of Thracia is quite small and Carlfel and Albilee have (wisely?) avoided encumbrance so they can practically blast through.
On their way, they come to a settlement called Construction, an artificial village full of still, doll-like people. After searching the area for a time, they fail to find anything interesting.
This felt like the first "culture shock" moment for these more trad players: this area is just a fun little detail in the setting book, but the players spent a bit of time trying to figure out if there was anything they were supposed to do here. There wasn’t, and they proceeded on their journey.
Turning back toward their first goal, they continue south-southwest, passing through mountain ranges and across rivers, eventually finding the tracks of some kind of bipedal cat person leading into a smaller mountain range.
Though I could have spent more time really setting the scene in the forests and mountains, I do think I accomplished my other goal of tutorializing the basic search mechanics (now incorporated into the wilderness procedures as of Plunderer! version 0.5), and I hope that this will help when the players get into the dungeon proper.
Finally, the party arrives at the Ruins of Thracia, looking down on them from the northeast.
That’s the end of the session! This game is pretty casual, so sessions will generally be shorter and less frequent, but hopefully over a longer period of time, so stay tuned.