WEISSMACH LETTER #5
Village of Krigsgrave, Duchy of Sandomir, The Weissmach
To His Lordship, the Viscount Wilfrick of Verbobonc,
Finally! After weeks of travelling through The Weissmach, the Order of Merit has found..... adventure!
Your Faithful Servant,
Elsderth Greyhawk
Sage of the The Order of Merit, Former Sellsword - Extraordinaire
Wielder of the Legendary Betrayer.
DM Notes: As I mentioned last week "Necropolis" out of Dungeon Magazine was one of the adventures my original high school group passed on in my early days of DMing. It is only right and just that my little sister's (1st) character at the time would come back and try to right the wrongs of a non-heroic group by using Elsderth's Order of Merit.
I'm almost tempted to chalk up this write-up as a solo D&D game. Most of the previous encounters I've used logic and DM fiat to figure out the fate of the Order and let the story progress. For the first time since I resolved the combat off-table since I figured out the chaos of the Saltmarsh tragedy in my Journey of Mutumbo Hackmaster game. Details didn't come out until a surviving player from that campaign moved over to the Burning Trogs Rule! follow-up.
I legitimately rolled for both sides (using a phone app), and it was ugly. Rolgrim was dead by round 2 and Celeste and Alwin were in single digits the following round. Luckily the viking and dwarf are the poster children for the modern usage of "tank," and Elsderth tried to engage in run-of-the-mill player shenanigans.
In the round Celeste finally laid the killing blow to Balfas, the main characters were:
Next: #25 The Totenlinden of Amberstoll
Village of Krigsgrave, Duchy of Sandomir, The Weissmach
To His Lordship, the Viscount Wilfrick of Verbobonc,
Finally! After weeks of travelling through The Weissmach, the Order of Merit has found..... adventure!
- Akana Priest, Alwin Warmark
- Wyrmnalian Battlemistress, Morya Silverbough
- Dwarf, Murag Mountainhammer
- Con-Man, Rolgrim Snakecloud
- Sword-Sage Elsderth Greyhawk
have joined forces with another acolyte of Akana, Celeste Sonnage de la Souer. It might sound more insane than our other encounter with rabbit-men, but Celeste convinced the others to pursue an undead ghost general, Balfas "The Betrayer," and his elite skeleton warrior guard, who have conscripted the entire village of Krisgrave for some deranged ancient purpose.
Of course, the revelation that Celeste had encountered the infernal Talanth Blackash and his crew, have made us a bit unsteady.
It took a full day's ride to find the first casualties of Balfas, a group of elderly villagers, close to succumbing to an apparent forced march out towards Galmar. They were not permitted to expire naturally, as someone ran them through with a rather large sword.
By the following mid-day, we could spot a group of a few dozen people, walking alongside the relentless steps of the undead. The villagers were armed with simple farming tools, while the skeleton warriors were fully armed and armored. Within their ranks stood Balfas, his inhuman husk in glistening golden armor.
None of us having any military experience of any quality, we haphazardly charged the undead. We were so noisy and obvious that the peaceful dead would be awoken, much less the martial undead, yet they simply stopped where they were and went into a defensive posture. We met the skeletons with a half-hearted attack, followed by their equally mediocre counter attack.
I saw Celeste smack General Balfas in the head with her mace, proving he was not invincible, but when he upended her horse, sending her flying, it confirmed what I already suspected: We had never had a run-in of creatures of this strength and power.
Rolgrim Snakecloud, our rogue and underworld diplomat, tried valiantly to keep the skeleton warriors at bay, only to have Balfas grab him off the back of his horse and ran him through with his sword.
In hindsight, I'm not ashamed to admit that after the initial shock of watching my friend die, my second concern was if Balfas had the power to bring him back from the dead. Thankfully, Balfas just retained his toughness and swordplay from his previous life, as well as his cadre of guards.
With the Balfas distracted by us, the guards futilely tried to rally their conscripted villagers, but the words of a seriously wounded Celeste seemed to rally some of the villagers from a cowering stance... to a defensive stance, to some of the stronger folk attempting (and landing) a few blows.
I noticed Balfas catch sight of this treachery by "his" troops and ignored our glancing blows to deal with Celeste. With Morya the Viking and Murag the Dwarf showing ability to destroy the skeleton warriors, I rode around the combat and foolishly dove onto the back of Balfas before he reached Celeste.
I cannot provide a detail of the rest of the battle, for within seconds I was wrestling this restless spirit on the ground. His sword knocked away from my flying attack, soon, his bony fingers were wrapped around my neck, choking the life out of me. I tried in vain to grab one his arms with one hand while hitting his mummified skull with a rock that I found within reach. I couldn't see anything beyond his empty eye sockets staring back at me.
The next thing I can recall is a glistening mace of goodness and light smashing open the back of Balfas' skull. Celeste stood above me, with a content smirk. She dropped the longsword that Balfas had been wielding, next to my head.
"A sword works better against these guys. Try this one next time. I've got dibs on the armor."
.... and that is how I've come to wield "The Betrayer."
I saw Celeste smack General Balfas in the head with her mace, proving he was not invincible, but when he upended her horse, sending her flying, it confirmed what I already suspected: We had never had a run-in of creatures of this strength and power.
Rolgrim Snakecloud, our rogue and underworld diplomat, tried valiantly to keep the skeleton warriors at bay, only to have Balfas grab him off the back of his horse and ran him through with his sword.
In hindsight, I'm not ashamed to admit that after the initial shock of watching my friend die, my second concern was if Balfas had the power to bring him back from the dead. Thankfully, Balfas just retained his toughness and swordplay from his previous life, as well as his cadre of guards.
With the Balfas distracted by us, the guards futilely tried to rally their conscripted villagers, but the words of a seriously wounded Celeste seemed to rally some of the villagers from a cowering stance... to a defensive stance, to some of the stronger folk attempting (and landing) a few blows.
I noticed Balfas catch sight of this treachery by "his" troops and ignored our glancing blows to deal with Celeste. With Morya the Viking and Murag the Dwarf showing ability to destroy the skeleton warriors, I rode around the combat and foolishly dove onto the back of Balfas before he reached Celeste.
I cannot provide a detail of the rest of the battle, for within seconds I was wrestling this restless spirit on the ground. His sword knocked away from my flying attack, soon, his bony fingers were wrapped around my neck, choking the life out of me. I tried in vain to grab one his arms with one hand while hitting his mummified skull with a rock that I found within reach. I couldn't see anything beyond his empty eye sockets staring back at me.
The next thing I can recall is a glistening mace of goodness and light smashing open the back of Balfas' skull. Celeste stood above me, with a content smirk. She dropped the longsword that Balfas had been wielding, next to my head.
"A sword works better against these guys. Try this one next time. I've got dibs on the armor."
.... and that is how I've come to wield "The Betrayer."
Elsderth Greyhawk
Sage of the The Order of Merit, Former Sellsword - Extraordinaire
Wielder of the Legendary Betrayer.
I'm almost tempted to chalk up this write-up as a solo D&D game. Most of the previous encounters I've used logic and DM fiat to figure out the fate of the Order and let the story progress. For the first time since I resolved the combat off-table since I figured out the chaos of the Saltmarsh tragedy in my Journey of Mutumbo Hackmaster game. Details didn't come out until a surviving player from that campaign moved over to the Burning Trogs Rule! follow-up.
I legitimately rolled for both sides (using a phone app), and it was ugly. Rolgrim was dead by round 2 and Celeste and Alwin were in single digits the following round. Luckily the viking and dwarf are the poster children for the modern usage of "tank," and Elsderth tried to engage in run-of-the-mill player shenanigans.
In the round Celeste finally laid the killing blow to Balfas, the main characters were:
- Balfas 3hp
- Alwin 2 hp
- Celeste 1hp
- Elsderth 2hp
- Morya 29 hp
- Murag 31 hp
Like I said, those two were tanks.
I had envisioned this to be a simple one post story, but with trying to figure out the logic (or illogic) of the encounter, it looks like we'll need a third to wrap this up and send The Order of Merit north, in casual pursuit of evil, immorality, and a very annoying elf and his friends.
There's still the spoils of valor to split, but "The Betrayer" is nothing more than a Longsword +1. The golden armor is nothing more than gold embossed plate, but in a magical one-size-fits-all world, that just made Celeste into Tank #3.
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| RIP: Rolgrim Snakecloud (1095 - 1021) |
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