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Author Topic: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure  (Read 2408 times)

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« on: April 18, 2018, 01:56:05 AM »
Once again Aekwaffer and his gang went on the rampage, to bring liberty peace to the wilderness (well, liberating the souls of creatures from their bodies and rest in peace).
Again he was joined by the wizard, and sometimes pin-up model, Gloria; Dire Brian, the famous archer; Thomas of Kerry; Nils Barri, Chrispin Davis and the brothers Stuart and Kenneth of the Green Hills (this foursome might call themselves loyal followers, Aelkwaffer calls them orc-fodder).

With a glint in the eye, Aelkwaffer begins the slaughter of the Orc Clan (a clan of Vikings who ate too many psychoactive funghi and now believe they are a mythical race of beings). 


Too soon did they disturb the Sisyphus the Saucy Sorcerer of Sicily who got his mystical powers from the equally mystical standing stones (one might say they are the six standing stones of Sisyphus the Saucy Sorcerer of Sicily).  Deactivating the magic runes on these stones will help weaken Sisyphus.
Below:  Sisyphus.  He life believes in getting a head, or two, or three or four....




Blood and slaughter continues with the heroes getting separated as they try to get to the standing stones before Sisyphus gets into spell range.  Gloria repeatedly fails activations and spell rolls leaving the men to have to do the hard work.

Where wolf?  There wolf.  Sisyphus' pet werewolf, Stephen, appears (NB his favourite movie is Young Frankenstein).



A mana flux occurs, Gloria's spell casting will only get worse...



Failed activations see Sisyphus get off a few magic missiles in revenge for the brutal slaying of Stephen.  He manages to bring down Stuart and Kenneth, but is severely slashed several times by Thomas and decides to suddenly, slyly slip away  Run away, run away.



Moral amongst the Orc Clan collapses with them running away, leaving a few wandering monsters to be destroyed, but not before Gloria is bashed to the ground by a trolls club.




This was a scenario of my own and made use of some modifications to the rules.
If Gloria wanted to cast more than one spell in her turn each spell after the first had a cumulative -1 to success.
Archery was also toned down, with a -2 to second and third shots fired in a turn.  Against large creatures archery still enjoyed a +2 to hit, but the damage could be saved on a roll of 5-6.  Previously Brian killed almost all the larger creatures himself, now he was still a significant character, but no more so than Aelkwaffer or Gloria.
I have used a simple morale system so creatures and characters don't fight to the death without thoughts of self preservation.
Orcs were beefed up to DL9 and I reduced their susceptability to magic.  Trolls no longer lumber around directionless and I added an extra Monster Frenzy and Monster activate card as I often found the more lethal monsters often stood around doing little.
Overall, this increases the lethality for the characters, so monster numbers are kept down a little.
Still, with this being a now experienced war band their victims were: one troll, one giant spider, a werewolf, 34 orcs.

Stuart and Kenneth died.  Gloria recovered from her wounds.  As Sisyphus escaped there are few XP from this game and Sysiphus will appear again.

Offline beefcake

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 7413
Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #1 on: April 18, 2018, 02:01:14 AM »
Cool. That last pic looks rather menacing with the troll looming over the unconscious people.
Love the names, very Monty Python.
Which rule system are you using?


Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #2 on: April 18, 2018, 02:07:49 AM »
Sisyphus says superior stories are from Sellswords and Spell Slingers.  Same as Argonor is using.
This is certainly the best solo game i have played.

Offline beefcake

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #3 on: April 18, 2018, 02:13:15 AM »
I may have to look into it then being a gaming group of myself and my kids.

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #4 on: April 29, 2018, 01:56:41 AM »
Just a few photographs and comments, no long story this time.

In this scenario the forces of evil are raiding a village and the inhabitants are besieged in a tower.
The adventurers must try to save village buildings from being burnt and stop the enemy breaking into the tower (scenario event cards either caused a building to burn or the siege to tighten).
A complication was the appearance of a necromancer with a force of skeletons  (Things couldn't get worse card).

The table set up.   Partially completed ruins (tower, walls and rubble from Urban Construct)





A damsel in the tower.




Slaughter at the (improvised) bridge.




Burn, baby; burnnnn...




Luck can go both ways.  Here three charactes are down, having only taken down three lowly minions.  Shields and armour make the chances of being seriously hurt quite low, but try telling my dice that.




Gloria approaches the scene of devastation left by her fireball last turn.  Magic can be powerful. I have pulled this back a bit by making multiple spell casts in one turn more difficult.  The necromancer can be seen with my newly painted skellies and a troll is busy trying to break into the tower.




The mission was mostly successful (tower and one building saved) but three minor adventurers were put out of action, as were Gloria and Dire Brian, the archer.  Unlike my last game, all were revived.  Replacing Stuart and Kenneth are now Young Calum (white cape) and Brunhilde.

Offline Argonor

  • Elder God
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  • Attic Attack: Mead and Dice!
    • Argonor's Wargames
Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #5 on: April 29, 2018, 02:08:44 AM »
Splendid looking games!

Have you made a document with your modifications?
Ask at the LAF, and answer shall thy be given!


Cultist #84

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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  • Posts: 1083
Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #6 on: April 29, 2018, 03:14:56 AM »
Argonor, I have a number of files for straight modifications and also for a more specific attempt at having rules to fit a Silmarillion setting.  I can certainly e-mail them to you if you want to pm me your e-mail address.
I have tried some rules that might suit your desire to have a rogue character and also ran a game with two suped-up Noldor elves.
For a Silmarillion setting I am still struggling with ideas of fate and grief (important in a campaign setting) and trying to get "magic" right (elves would argue there is no magic).

Offline beefcake

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 7413
Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #7 on: April 29, 2018, 03:45:34 AM »
Nice writeup. I'm hopefully getting some cash for some sculpts I sold recently so this is how I'll be spending some of that cash.
Ethelred, Do you just have the PDF or did you spring for the printed book? If so where did you get it from, Ganesha or DrivethruRPG?

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #8 on: April 29, 2018, 03:56:33 AM »
I think I got it from the Drive Thru RPG site.  I got it in digital as the main rules are basic and you seldom need the book.  Also, I am modifying a lot of the not so important rules which take up a lot of the book.  Many of the monsters I am either not using or modifying, so getting proper cards in print isn't important.  I just print them in black and white off the PDF and use a glue stick to paste them onto cards.

Offline beefcake

  • Galactic Brain
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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #9 on: April 29, 2018, 04:00:09 AM »
Do you even need them as cards? Could you just  roll a suitable die, d20, d100 excluding numbers that aren't needed and make up a reference chart?

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

  • Mastermind
  • Posts: 1083
Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #10 on: April 29, 2018, 07:42:31 AM »
Do you even need them as cards? Could you just  roll a suitable die, d20, d100 excluding numbers that aren't needed and make up a reference chart?

You do need the event cards, because some you can discard, some will cause you to reshuffle the deck.  You can also customise a deck by adding some cards and removing others - far easier than creating a new table. It would be hard to replicate this without cards.  As I said, cutting out the cards as printed off a home printer and stuck on to a cheap set of playing cards they work just as well as fancy custom made cards.
The monster, potion and spell cards aren't needed, but they certainly help to speed up play.  You simply take out what cards are needed for that particular game and put the rest aside.  I keep them spread out next to the gaming table where they can easily be seen without shuffling through them.

Offline Sunjester

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #11 on: April 29, 2018, 08:07:03 AM »
Some fantastic games there. I need to get some more games of Sellswords in.

I've also bought the pdf version of the rules so I can more easily customise the cards (once I've decided what changes I need).

I would also appreciate a copy of your amendments if you would not mind?

Offline Ethelred the Almost Ready

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #12 on: April 30, 2018, 06:58:47 AM »
Sunjester,
I have just sent a rather long e-mail with several attachments to Agonor.
If you want the modifications/ideas I have I can send them if you PM me your e-mail address, or if you already have Agonor's e-mail you could get them off him.


Agonor, e-mail sent.  I hope it is not too long/confusing. 


Offline Argonor

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    • Argonor's Wargames
Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #13 on: April 30, 2018, 05:40:07 PM »
Got it, thanks.

Haven't had time to look at it, yet, though, shall do so before the weekend (as mentioned, I have a co-op game planned then).

Offline Sunjester

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Re: Another Aelkwaffer Adventure
« Reply #14 on: April 30, 2018, 08:11:10 PM »
PM sent, thanks.