In-store game demo - Dragon's Table Sep 18th

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    • In-store game demo - Dragon's Table Sep 18th

      Hey folks,

      As my first official act as a Shard Emissary I'm pleased to announce my first Shard in-store demo this Saturday September 18th at the Dragon's Table here in beautiful Champaign Illinois.

      Demo Name: A Matter of Honor
      Game System/Genre: Shard/Arabian-Indian Anthropomorphic Fantasy
      Day & Time: Saturday September 18th 1:00 PM – 5:00 PM
      Location: Dragons Table, Champaign Illinois
      Experience Level: Novices welcome
      Gamemaster: Joseph C. Wolf

      A daring band of freebooter zoics new to the big city find themselves
      embroiled in the intrigures of the local slavers guild, unscrupulous
      airship captains, sky pirates, and most dangerous of all - familial
      entanglements. Rules taught as we play. All materials and pregenerated
      characters provided.

      I realize this is short notice but my original plans fell through forcing me to seek an alternate venue. In the future I'd expect 3-4 weeks notice.

      This year I may also attend Flat-Con in Bloomington and Winter War here in Champaign as a Shard Emissary.

      Warmest Regards,

      >>ReaperWolf
    • Hey! That's great news!

      Sounds like an excellent adventure to run, and we'd love to hear how it goes. Good luck with it!

      Additionally, if you have the chance, post the adventure itself here on the forums when you're through, along with the pre-generated characters. It'd be a great thing to share with everyone here!

      Thanks again!

      Scottie ^^
    • I had two players one of whom heard about the demo the night before because I told him. Apparently the owner of the store failed to advertise the event even though he had two weeks to do so. I'm taking a break from running demos at this store till after the 1st of the year and see if anything changes. This has happened before but it's still frustrating.

      Anyways I had two adventurous souls. We had a great time playing around two and a half hours. Jake, the younger of the two fellows had played D&D 4e with his friend DMing but he didn't really enjoy himself. Apparently the DM was also new to gamemastering so it was sort of like the blind leading the blind. Jake was in the store expecting to participate in a Warhammer 40K tournament for newbies but the players/organizers failed to show up. One possibility is the shop owner got the date wrong, he thought my Shard demo was running LAST Saturday. Nothing new there...

      Anyways Jake and Tom had a great time. Tomm an old-school gamer dude and a real joy to play with, mentioned the setting reminded him of Skyrealms of Jorune; I agreed.

      To save time we used the pregens from the Shard Welcome Manual, Tom playing the elephant and Jake the wolf. I cooked up a roguish basilisk named Hatush't who was more or less the humble servant of the wolf.

      They scenario was intended to be short and simple. After weeks of exploring the crumbling ruins of an ancient pre Twilight War Sarpah ruin in search of an unplundered treasury the zoics chanced upon an ancient public bath under a dome. Using the drain they gained access to the sewers and spent the next several days wandering around the labyrinth of passages and cisterns. After a cave-in, they found a set of long-abandoned dry passageways guarded by traps. Several near-misses later they found their way into a tall gallery overlooking a murky pool. A thin haze hung in the air emanating from the pool below, a weak but effective debilitative poison effective against birds and mammals. While exploring the chamber a massive water elemental arose combining elements of an armored sea serpent. While the elephant wrestled and swung his huge hammer of green jade, the wolf fumbled what could have been an outstandingly cool acrobatic action and ended up losing his suthra punch dagger to the pool.

      He dove into the slightly caustic (3 Stamina per 2 rounds) to retrieve his pet while the elephant swung his hammer and the basilisk let fly his blue-crystal chakram. They managed to down the elemental with minimal injuries.

      With the departure of the elemental, the zoics found a few magical stones (beginning with 's', can't remember) used to bind the elemental guardian to the chamber, adding the loot to their gear they searched about for an exit. After some discussion and some knowledge (history) rolls, they pieced together a few added details. The treasury was also the home of a reclusive Sarpah who dabbled in summoning. Towards the end of his life, just before the War of Twilight broke out, his paranoia took hold and he withdrew to his home protected by guardians and traps. He eventually died and his mouldering bones were buried when the city was sacked and razed but a few subterranean chambers remained along with his fabled treasure vault. A little searching and some elbow grease from the elephant and a secret door led to a dusty maze with no apparent solution. After hours of wandering aimlessly, the wolf realized he had direction sense and the elephant had eidetic memory and between the two they managed to find an overlooked passageway but in so doing they found a gruesome discovery: a bird, probably a cardinal, mummified by time. His cork sandals were worn down and torch snuffed. Apparently he perished from exhaustion and dehydration after wandering the maze blindly for days after being separated from his companions who had no choice but to move on without him...

      Undeterred the zoics pressed on eventually finding a spiral stone staircase.
      While descending they overlooked a cunning trap, the stairs collapsed into a chute plunging the characters head-long and into the treasury. The elephant blew the Acrobatics roll to keep his feet and ended up head-butting a statue of blue-black crystal as he was tossed into the chamber flailing. While he recovered from his headache, the other characters wandered the cave of wonders filling canvas sacks till they brimmed. They also found precious weapons of unusual crystal make. The elephant found a massive maul with an pyrite-veined onyx handle and a head of singing crystal. When the wielder sings, the Perform (singing) skill compliments the attack roll as the weapon delivers a sonic attack.

      They also discovered the mummified remains of four other adventurers all of whom apparently died in agony. As the players explored I had them make Observation rolls while the nasty demon skulked, watched, and waited for the trespassers attempted to leave. It sprang from the shadows like some ghastly centauroid spider and proceeded to tear them limb from limb. The elephant only took a few scratches (thanks to his heavy armor) as the player rolled good initiative and even better combat actions just about every turn. The wolf performed well but he ended up being reduced to 2 remaining Stamina before the elephant remembered about the endowed nature of his new hammer. Once he remembered his character was trumpeting up a storm (unskilled Perform, naturally) and laying waste to the demon. The canny basilisk was also doing his all acrobatically dodging in and out of harms way chucking his chakrum like hoola-hoops of doom.

      The wolf managed to use his suthra living whip to grapple on of the demon's spider-like limbs wrapped the living whip around a nearby pillar but the following round he forgot the weapon was alive and the demon tore the suthra in half before slurping it down like spaghetti. Oh! Before I forget, the demon was a soul-drinker. The previous treasure seekers could be seen as ghostly cadavers pushing against the inside of the bloated demon's translucent abdomen moaning and clawing to escape as their essence and anguish sustained the demon.

      Eventually the players managed to bring the demon down. Afterwards the freed souls thanked them for release before boiling away bound for the Edge of Heaven. The zoics hefted their bulging bags full of ancient Sarpah coins, treasure, and precious resins and used a secret passage back to the surface where their mounts awaited them.

      In retrospect I'd have the demon reanimate the mummified cadavers to attack the heroes and wouldn't have it appear until after the mummies were smashed to dust.

      This wasn't the scenario I intended because I only had two players who arrived late so I just winged it but everybody, including your humble servant, had a great time.

      The shop owner was ungrateful, grumpy and magnanimous especially after Jake, who's a regular at the shop and a friend of the shop-owner's family, asked about purchasing the Shard Compendium. The owner doesn't think much of anthropomorphic fantasy so Jake might be waiting a while before his book shows up, if ever.

      That's about it for now, another demo will occur in a few weeks at Armored Gopher. More details to follow...

      >>ReaperWolf

      The post was edited 1 time, last by ReaperWolf ().

    • First let me begin by once again expressing our gratitude that you're running these demos, ReaperWolf. You rule. :)

      I'm sorry the demo at this store didn't quite go as planned. Nothing is worse than an apathetic or inattentive game store owner to ruin things like this. We're glad you and your two players had a good time nonetheless. We hope things go better at your next demo.

      And, btw, please direct that player to our website if he wishes to order the books and not wait for the store owner to order them. Studio 2 is a great distributor and would be happy to fulfill any orders for Shard products he'd care to make from their site (our site will also take him there).

      Once again, thank you so much. You are an awesome Shard Emissary!

      -Aaron