Dwarves in Eden – Putting Things in Motion

This session had a log of prep & ground-work getting laid for bigger things in the future. The next session should be pretty explosive (possibly literally).

Lighting the Forge

With the fire spirit taken care of by the human spirit-binders, the Dwarves have started moving back into the hold and cleaning up. They persevere.

The three spirit-binders, led by a human named Koru, have been given quarters in a room above ground in the ziggurat.

Kardin & Flint talk to them about what needs to be done to light the forge. Koru provides them with a list of materials they’ll need to bind a spirit of that power to the forge. Also, he requests access to the forge so that he can see the area and make a mental map of it. Flint & Kardin escort him down to the forge.

They find Fergus & Falur with their heads together near the forge. It’s obvious they’re trying to light the forge by conventional methods. Koru goes about his business examining the area while Flint & Kardin take Fergus aside.

“Listen. You know and I know that Falur will never get that forge lit using the usual methods. The only way to get any use out of this forge is going to bind a spirit to it like before and use this forge key.”

Dwarves in Eden – The Return of Urgo

This sessions starts off right where the last one left off.

Finding Wind and Confronting the Coward

Flint & Kardin head away from the human camp to track down Wind. They only have a very vague idea of where to go and it’s imperative they find Wind before Urgo does. Using the knowledge he’s been gaining about spiders Kardin says “Well, Wind is ancient and huge from all we’ve been told. Then surely his home will be in the biggest tree in the area.” (successful BL Great Spider-Wise).

Following Kardin’s advice, Flint climbs the nearest tree to get his bearings and spots the boughs of a huge tree in the distance. They start making their way there, occasionally climbing another tree to keep their heading (successful BL Orienteering). Climbing one last tree to get his bearings, Flint suddenly comes face to face with a huge great spider, currently in the process of wrapping up some… food. Looks similar to the wild cats they’ve previously encountered.

“Come back again?”

“… huh?”

“Going to try cutting me again?”

“Ohh. I think there’s a mistake. I’ve never seen you before. I’m looking for Wind and trying to intercept another dwarf. Can we, uh, continue this down below?”

Dwarves in Eden – Midnor’s Return

Jumping right in from where we left off last time…

Homecoming

Flint, Kardin, & Co get to the ziggurat to find chaos. Smoke is billowing up from the ruins, dwarves are rushing around and there look to be some triage stations set up. Flint manages to find a dwarf (failed Circles — the enmity clause will be invoked at some later point) and starts to get an idea of what happened. About three days ago something happened in the forge. This huge stone creature rose out of the ground and took the forge key, which released huge amounts of uncontrolled flame. Nothing could control the flames. Argus was scene, completely bald, talking to the stone creature, with Delana and two of Rutger’s now-orphans in tow. They walked off towards spider territory.

Dwarves in Eden – Deep in the Forest

After a week off we finally have Ilsa the matronly herder/healer in the game. Through e-mail we’d decided it would be cool if Ilsa was one of the 3 captured dwarves, so we start our story there!

Imprisoned

Ilsa is in a small, cramped room with two other dwarves — scouts/foragers she’d been out with when they were ambushed by a party of these not-Elves.

A tall, thin man enters the room all decked out in a forest motif. He’s accompanied by a dwarf, but none of the three prisoners recognize him. The tall man addresses the dwarf, “So, what do we do with them?” He speaks in a kind of archaic dwarven, but it’s understandable. The dwarf points to the two male dwarves then at Ilsa, “take them first.” The dwarf calls the man Tareek and they leave.

Dread: Actual Play

So, way back here, I’d just finished reading the Dread rpg. At the time I’d only played a single game of Dread and it was an Inception-based hack, which while pretty awesome was still a hack. I’ve been itching for a chance to play the actual game ever since.

Well, a few weeks back at The Walking Eye con I finally got a chance. Megan from The Jank Cast ran a session of Dread and I managed to get in on it.

Verdict: awesome. I’d love to go into some AP specifics, but it was a published scenario and Dread definitely benefits from not knowing things before going in. For those curious or those that have played, we did The Dead City scenario.

I’ll at least give the premise, but no more: the characters are all semi-strangers and wake up at the same time in a grocery store. Their last memory is of a blinding light and an otherworldly high-pitch wail. The game focuses on the characters exploring their environment and trying to find out what happened.

Monsterhearts

As mentioned previously I got to play Monsterhearts (a hack of Apocalypse World) at The Walking Eye Con a couple weekends ago. It was my last game of the con and it went out with a bang. I really got more than I was expecting out of this game. So, Monstehearts is about teenage monsters, citing things like Buffy or Twilight (ugh) as inspiration. Hey, I’m a big Buffy fan, so this should be fun. I was kind of ‘meh’ about the whole teenage angst/love thing, but I was willing to give it a shot and I’m really glad I did!

I’ll probably assume some familiarity with Apocalypse World, but I’ll try not to throw too much jargon around.

Dwarves in Eden – First Contact

Ouch. Six weeks since the last game! Work and sickness conspired against us.

Catch up

A season has passed now. Dwarves are settling into the ziggurat ruins. By now most dwarves are in the lower areas with just a few remaining back at the original camp. Regular scouting and hunting parties are ranging out.

Halel, Kardin’s love interest has healed and started to hold court (as it were) among the females of the clan.

Delana, Flint’s betrothed, has been taking care of Rutger’s children (Rutger being the dwarf that’s trying to blackmail Flint).

Falur (Flint’s father and Forge Master) has been spending a lot of time with Fergus around the great forge or in Fergus’ study.

The Walking Eye Con Breakdown

This past weekend was The Walking Eye Con in Des Moines, hosted by my friends over at The Walking Eye podcast. I had a great time — hung out with friends, met new people, and played games.

I got to play some new games, some games I’d never heard of, some games I’d been wanting to play and some games I always enjoy playing.

Now for the breakdown!

Tales of the Arabian Nights

The GM for my regular Burning Wheel game wasn’t able to make it the last couple weeks. Usually those of us that can still make it will play a board game or card game or sometimes a one-shot of some RPG. So, last week one of the guys in the group brought a board game I’d never seen or hard of: Tales of the Arabian Nights. The box was pretty and just seeing the artwork made me want to play it.

Check it out:

See? I had no idea what was in the box or what the game was about (storytelling boardgame? what’s that even mean?), but having that box in front of me, I absolutely wanted to crack it open and check it out.

Dwarves in Eden – Settling In

Just two PCs this week: Flint & Kardin, so jumping into things right after last session…

Investigating the Forge

The encounter with the strange creature that came out of the floor left the two Host dwarves and Fergus kind of shaken, so Bozkar went with them to escort them out of the ruins.

Meanwhile, Flint & Kardin are still curious about the forge. “There’s gotta be tools around here somewhere!” Kardin actually climbs into the forge sifting through ash and suet to find anything usable. As he’s crawling around he suddenly sees a small flame pop up from somewhere (failed Scavenging roll). Then it starts dancing around. Then it flares up right in front of him, singeing him pretty badly (a Superficial wound). Not to be discouraged he just keeps sifting through the layers of ash, now looking for some kind of nozzle or plumbing. “That flame must have come from somewhere!”. He finds nothing after a few minutes and eventually scrambles out in haste (failed Steel test after his third Supie).

“Only one other thing to try, right? We’ve got the key, let’s try and get this thing started.”

Flint starts getting ready to go in, “I’ve got the key and better armor, I’ll do this.”

“Use that shield, too. It might help protect you from the flame.”