Dark Alchemy campaign - Game 2: Skeletal Run

[Malebolgia]

Here's report 2 of the Dark Alchemy campaign! You can find the report of the first game here.

"When both the Necromancer Dragos and the Elven mage had entered the alchemical factory they had tried to best the other to get to any treasures. This led to a massive explosion, rocking the entire structure and separating the warbands. The factory as now falling apart fast. Dragos struggled against the alchemical monstrosity and the scurvy rats, while his apprentice Gustav tried to navigate the catacombs on the other side of the building.
Gustav and the dreadful captain  Stanizlov wandered through the maze-like tunnels. They were fortunate to have the tunnel fighter with them. The bound spirit found its way relatively easily and had even found some useful secret tunnels. After the three of them exited another tunnel, they almost walked into the Elven mage. Gustav raised his staff in reflex, but the Elf Mage simply walked by. “Your master is somewhere behind us. He seems to be lost in the dark with his minions”. Gustav didn’t trust the Elf, but the thought of his master in trouble made him uneasy. The Elf shook his head. “Can’t go back for him, the passage collapsed behind us. He must find another way…if you are smart, you will come with us. Maybe you will have more luck than he”. Gustav wavered, but Stanizlov’s eyes burned in hatred. It hissed to the Elf “liesssss...you Elves alwayssss lie…”. The Elf shrugged and movd on together with his Captain and Treasure Hunter. “Whatever, foul thing. It’s your loss”. Gustav made a decision. He looked at Stanizlov. “We are going with him. Like you, I don’t trust him, but we cannot go back further into the factory. This whole place is coming down soon. We must leave the place and hope the master finds his way out”. Stanizlov gripped his glaive tightly and his boney hands crunched. “…assssss long asssssss I am being paid my price….mortal….”. Gustav swallowed in fear, nodded and then moved off. "


The alchemical factory was almost coming down. Plaster was falling down and cracks appeared in the walls as the Elves and undead forces moved into the large room. It seemed to be a throne room of sort and it was quiet. In the distance they saw several doors leading into darkened dungeons. The two groups quickly moved for the stairs and made their way into the room.


Gustav tried to lend some speed to the Captain, but he couldn’t work the magic properly. The effort hurt him tremendously. Behind them they heard some soft moans. The Elf Mage turned around and saw two shuffling zombies coming for them. He flung a Bone Dart at the nearest, but the missile had no effect on the dead creature. It simply went through, leaving a small hole.


Gustav sent the Tunnel Fighter for the stairs in the middle of the chamber and he saw Stanizlov go for the archway on the right. The Elf Captain and Treasure Hunter moved up, have confidence in their leader. But once again the Elf couldn’t destroy the zombies with his magic.
From the darkened dungeons, strange mysterious moving lights seemed to appear. The lights grew brighter and then suddenly a flaming skeleton rushed from the dungeon to assault Stanizlov. The captain swung his glaive in a furious attack and hacked the skeleton apart without effort. This might turn out to be a dangerous dungeon…


From the other side of the large door came the door of a shuffling creature. Expecting more trouble, Gustav carefully opened the door and sent the Tunnel Fighter in. The spirit went in and charged the burning skeleton on the other side. On the right, the Captain moved into the dungeons and prepared to attack the next skeleton. Meanwhile the Captain and Treasure Hunter raced back to support their leader.


The Elves hacked, swung and dodged and cut the zombies many times. The creatures kept on going. Although their dead flesh was splattered around they didn’t seem to mind.


Gustav had a plan. He quickly moved into the evil dungeon and with some of his life’s energy he summoned a zombie. It wasn’t that hard in the corpse covered dungeon. The zombie went for the burning skeleton, helping the Tunnel Fighter spirit. But the burning skeleton was faster than Gustav suspected and first decapitated the zombie and then with a backhand stroke took the Tunnel Fighter down. Gustav was facing the burning creature alone…
Stanizlov wasn’t having a lot of luck either. The burning skeleton managed to severely burn him and a second one crawled from the open coffin nearby.


The Elves on the other hand did well. They managed to destroy both zombies and then quickly raced up the stairs. The Elven Mage saw the Necromancer apprentice in trouble and with a lazy gesture he leapt the Apprentice away from danger. His soldiers would take care of the foul skeleton.
The two Elves rushed through the door and in a flurry of attacks they quickly destroyed the burning skeleton. The Undead Captain attacked left and right with his glaive and after several attacks he had destroyed the two burning skeletons. Both sides had a moment of respite! The Undead Captain quickly grabbed the nearest treasure and he and Gustav went through the lower part of the dungeon, while the Elves went over the bridge.


Working their way along the side the Apprentice found another treasure…and another burning skeleton. Seeing the peril, the Apprentice quickly raised another zombie to lend support. The zombie grappled the burning skeleton and managed to rip him apart. Meanwhile on the bridge, the Elves moved up in formation. The Captain and Treasure Hunter managed to destroy all skeletons coming for them and it gave the Mage the time to collect some treasures.


With the skeleton destroyed, Gustav saw his chance. He and the zombie raced towards the large door leading out of this place. The Undead Captain moved through a hidden passage and exited next to another treasure. While the Treasure Hunter was almost overwhelmed by the skeletons, the Elves managed to take them down. This cost them so much time, the sneaky Gustav managed to race out of the dungeon with four precious treasures. The Apprentice escaped through the tunnels and hoped to find his master soon. His master would want these treasures!

Post Game Thoughts
“Gustav stopped to catch his breath. They had been running for a long time now and it seemed to him they were going in circles. They had to get out fast, before they would be buried beneath tons of bricks. The Captain stared his deathly gaze at him. “Gusssssstav…are you ready to go again? We mussssst hurry…”. Gustav leaned on his staff and nodded. “Yes, yes…lead on. I just wish the Tunnel Fighter was still with us, he would know where to go”.  A few moments later the spirit arrived through a false wall and stood in front of Gustav. “You called, master”. Gustav jumped up in surprise. “Oh yes, ehm..lead the way then!”
The three moved through the rubble and the Tunnel Fighter seemed to know the way out. After several minutes they heard voices in the distance. Gustav hid behind a fallen statue, but Stanizlov moved on fearlessly. The wight turned around and faced the Apprentice. “Hiding from your master…Gussssstav….?” He laughed his dreadful laugh and moved on. Gustav peered over the statue and smiled. It was indeed his master Dragos! He was alive! He jumped up…and crashed his head into the low ceiling. He slumped down again, unconscious…”

This was the second game of the Dark Alchemy campaign, the “Skeleton Run” and like the first game it was really cool. The game started easily with us travelling through the large chamber. My mate had some trouble with the zombies but when he sent in his two combat monsters I knew he would take them out. So I focused on the dungeon…but it went sour fast! My plan of using a zombie to support the Tunnel Fighter sounded nice, but I whiffed both Fight rolls and my mate rolled very high for the Skeleton. As a result he one-shotted both of my models…eek! On the other hand, the Captain did very well. He managed to hack his way through 5 of the burning skeletons.
My mate went over the bridge but unfortunately for him a lot of burning skeletons went his way. So he had to hack his way through several of them. This gave me time to move through the dungeon and collect a total of 4 treasures before quickly escaping.
It turned out my Tunnel Fighter was fine, so no harm done. And I found a good amount of money, a Poison Potion, a Potion of Fire Breath and a Bone Dart Grimoire. Excellent! The Bone Dart Grimoire isn’t really useful for me, but I can sell it after the third game for 250gc. That is nice!

Next up will be the third and last game in the Dark Alchemy campaign…The Spreading Flames!

NB! The zombies are my old Heroquest zombies, painted when I was 15!

Here's the link to the PDF:
http://paintoholic.nl/batreps/frostgrave_game2.pdf

[jp1885]

Another great report - bravo!

[Brummie Thug]

Another fab report

[Raz]

Another great writeup mate! I especially like the ease with which the elf mage cast leap on your apprentice, really fits his character

As with the first we really enjoyed this scenario. Having the zombies chasing you at the start is a great way to get a move on and with a skeleton spawning every turn you want to keep moving towards the exit. The treasure hunter and captain teaming up worked really well, with both of them benefitting from the +2 for multiple combat. They struck down most skeletons with ease and cleared the way for my mage, who wasn't as lucky with his casting rolls as in the previous game. Although him casting leap to get the apprentice out of harms way was a great moment from a storytelling perspective.

My mage collected a nice amount of experience this game, gaining another three levels; he used these to gain +1 health, +1 on casting fleet feet and +1 on casting bone dart. The treasures revealed to be some more gold and an elixer of chameleon. Now to get out of this collapsing building