Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Zounds! They killed The Hound!

So, I finally got a chance to run Harley Stroh's DCC module, "The Doom of the Savage Kings." To make a long story short, shit went off the damned rails. Here's how:

When last we encountered our intrepid adventurers, they were down a hole at the bottom of the Crypt of the Lizard King. This led to the Pod Caverns of the Sinister Shroom. They'd taken a beating from some Pod Men, but had recovered a lot of treasure, some of it magical.

Since Kevin had no actual characters, they left the Pod Caverns, and rested in The Crypt. Then (What luck!) they just happened to encounter a small group of trustworthy-looking zero-levels with a taste for adventure. Now stocked with additional zeroes, they made their way toward the village of Hirot (which now lies about ten miles east of The Crypt of the Lizard King, btw).

As they traveled, mist blew in from the coast, blanketing the terrain in dense fog. Eventually, they happened upon a group of grim-faced peasant leading a trussed and gagged woman, and trailed by a group of armored heavies on warhorses. Inquiries helped them learn that the girl was to be sacrifice to a creature called simply, The Hound. The Jarl (one of the mounted guys) was doing this to follow the advice of his court wizard, hoping to avert The Hound's predations. Chuck, John's warrior was all, "Nope, that ain't gonna happen," and various other things insulting to the jarl and his thegns.

The jarl was enraged at his insolence and draw weapon, charging at the burly (and surly!) warrior. Blows were exchanged. *Ahem* Strokes ... Hits? Oh, hell... Well, anyway, they tried to kill each other. The jarl got stabbed in the face, and he left the field, blinded by blood. The thegns, not knowing what else to do, fled.

The girl filled in the PCs about The Hound, and they made their way to the standing stones. The Mighty Chuck stood in as sacrifice. One of Kevin's zeroes was a Trapper by trade, and she thought it best to use some of the party's rope to set snares all over the fucking place, aided by a tracking roll that helped them figure out from where it had approached in days past. I asked her to roll to see how well she set up the kill zone, as well. Nothing but 19s and 20s for that girl. The ground was well prepared for some hounding of The Hound. About an hour later, it bounded into the kill zone. Some more nifty rolling saw it bound, by one leg and by the head, a chain looped around it, and Chuck and company raining down damage on its sorry chaotic ass. Then the Spear of the Lizard King was involved. The Hound was... vanquished. It took them one fucking encounter, and the damned thing was dead. *sigh*

They tracked The Hound back to its lair, and looted the sinkhole. Then they decided to go to the village to trumpet their awesomeness to all and sundry. Chuck began to talk shit about the jarl. The jarl emerged to contend with him, and it went about like this:

So, MC Chuck, what you got to tell the Jarl?

Personality was checked, the jarl's cred got wrecked, and the legend of Chuck was... umm... something that rhymes with wrecked.

The girl-sacrifice's father was, of course, ecstatic to see her again, and, buoyed by the presence of the PCs (and Chuck's mad oratorical stylings) accused the jarl of fixing the lottery. The villagers got angry. Pitchforks and torches ensued. The jarl and his pet wizard never had a chance. They became very dead, very quickly.

The thegns, seeing which way the wind was blowing, made a hasty retreat. They may be easily startled, but they will no doubt be back soon, and in greater numbers.

The village from this point forward will be known as "Chuck Town." Thus has decreed the Mighty Chuck. So say we all.

I mean this was pretty awesome, but it sure did make for a short adventure. What the hell, Harley Stroh? How did this happen? These guys broke that shit with some straight high rollin'. Oh, and there was Kevin's little idea with the binding and whatnot.

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