Gunderholfen – Meeting Bayard the Bold and his guild (session 14)

11 septembre 20254 décembre 2025 David Skelector Dragonbane, Dungeons and Dragons, Fantasy, Gunderholfen, jeux de rôles, megadungeon, OSR, Play reports, Roleplaying Game, RPG

Battered from their last expedition, the Battle Brothers are back in town to recuperate and do some training afterward – before going back to the dungeon. They bring their new member, another goblin named Grimoire, a friend of Torch that can do magic.

Gunderholfen by G. Hawkins: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/265629/gunderholfen

Player Characters (PCs) – The Battle Brothers:

Aracyne, Elf Hunter, fearless Guild Leader, (Isaac)
Jedri, Ratman Thief, he likes his rat-shape curse (Isaac)
Forka, Dogman Knight, fierce warrior (Edmond)
Torch, Goblin Knight, not expendable anymore (Edmond)
Grimoire, Goblin Mage, frail but smart (me)

Longfelt

Rumor

-There’s a monstrous rat disguised as a person going by night in the thieves’ quarter – hey (pointing at Jedri) wait a minute, y-y you’re a rat!

Hearing of this « disguised monstrous rat » they immediately think of their friend Tlali and they go see her at her house. There’s a nice reunion, she explains that she started the process to get back her human form but there’s powerful magic involved (Sethid’s, the Master of the Dungeon) and it will take a while.
They do some training and are living at the Hare & the Hound inn for the moment.
They buy some supplies, Forka buys a great helm and then, after 9 days in town, are ready to go dungeon-delving once more.

Gunderholfen

Travel through the Ganfal swamp is uneventful.
They enter the dungeon and when they approach Level 1C they start to see a trail of dead hobgoblins – all missing their ears. The corpses are fresh – recently killed for sure.
Forka pick up the scent of non-hobgoblins and tries to track where it goes – more dead hobgoblins on the other side of the (cut) rope bridge that leads to the exit of Level 1. They spend some time reparing the bridge and continue their tracking down in Level 2 and then it goes south and west in an area the PCs already explored (and had a bad time against both zombies and giant ants).
They’re near the giant ants’ nest, the insects are clearly agitated. The PCs quickly cross the area and further south, they hear some voices coming from the room with the aforementionned zombies.
The Battles Brothers decide to go back the room with broken crates and wait there for the other guild to come their way (there’s no other path). They soon hear the sounds of a battle between adventurers and giant ants though.
It seems like the other guild is retreating in order, with a rearguard fighting in the narrow tunnel. The Battle Brothers see an elf, with short sword and buckler in hand, emerging from the tunnel. The latter is surprised and maybe a bit alarmed but then he asks for their help against the giant ants – they’re coming in great numbers.

Aracyne hesitates an instant on what his best for his guild (even contemplating murder!) but then he decides to help the other adventurers IF they accept to give his guild some money… The two elves quickly negociate and settle for 80gp to be given after this fight. The other members of the rival guild come into the room one by one, two mages, a hunter and the last being Bayard the Bold, their leader, brandishing a glowing mace and his plate armor covered in insect juices – an impressive sight! His companion informs him that the Battle Brothers will help the Protectors and already the first giant ants enter the room.
The ensuing battle is intense, with the fighters type holding the line, at least at first, against both normal worker giant ants and bigger, meaner soldier giant ants. Another wave of monsters arrives though and some get past the frontline and one mage of the Protectors get nearly bitten in half by a soldier ant. The other mage hurries to keep him alive with healing magic. Forka makes good work of his two-hand hammer, delivering massive blows left and right. Aracyne and his hunter counterpart shoot arrow after arrow on the incoming ants. Grimoire, their new goblin mage, proves to be a good addition and incinerates ants with fireballs. Two dozens dead ants are littering the floor and the two guilds seize the opportunity to move away from there, going east and south, with the Battle Brothers knowing their way around, and soon getting behind a door where the ants horde won’t reach them.
Now in safety, the Elf from the Protectors (their treasurer named Bodil) counts 80 gold coins and gives them to Aracyne with Bayard frowning at the sight but not saying anything. The two guild leaders then exchange a few compliments, talk about their recent delves and then Aracyne has this idea, he offers to the Protectors to do a joint expedition into Level 4. Bayard, not one to decline a challenge less his reputation for bravery takes a hit, doesn’t think much and accepts.

Closing comments:

I had decided when I started this campaign that I would put some emphasis on adventuring guilds interactions. I have written some random tables, erased them, re-written some more, to help me get a sense of what NPCs guilds would likely achieve as competing explorers (the PCs still having a decent headstart, of course it’s still about them). I’m not quite satisfied with this tool yet but it did indeed lead to this, I think, interesting session.
Now, dealing with so many NPCs, adventurers with all their abilities to boot, is certainly cumbersome for me as a the DM. In fact, I’m pretty certain it’s the reason why in most campaigns rival adventurers don’t seem to accomplish anything ever and are reduced to discreet appearances here and there.
Isaac’s first instinct was to ambush the Protectors while they were fighting the giant ants. A sound plan strategically speaking. Also quite ruthless. I let him choose his course of action but I’m happy in the end he chose to help (with a price attached) instead of killing.

Gunderholfen – Between a harder place and a bigger rock (session 13)

3 septembre 20254 septembre 2025 David Skelector Dragonbane, Fantasy, Gunderholfen, jeux de rôles, OSR, Play reports, Roleplaying Game, RPG

The Screaming Devilkin that the PCs killed last session wasn’t that dangerous in itself but the ruckus he made sure attracted attention!

Gunderholfen by G. Hawkins: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/265629/gunderholfen

Player Characters (PCs) – The Battle Brothers:

Aracyne, Elf Hunter, Guild Leader, (Isaac)
Jedri, Ratman Thief (Isaac)
Forka, Dogman Knight (Edmond)
Torch, Goblin Torchbearer, not expendable anymore (Edmond)
Ghardeet, hired Hobgoblin Mage/Shaman (me)

Level 4A

The Battle Brothers go back at the entrance of Level 4 nearby and there they see someone coming from the south. It’s an orc, grievously wounded but still standing. They decide to capture him so they can interrogate him at their leisure and get more information about this level. They jump on him but right at this moment there’s much noises coming from the ogre lair just the other side of the eastern door.
The orc isn’t happy either at the idea of meeting with ogres and they all flee together southward and then east into natural passages – unexplored territory yet for the PCs.
There’s boiling sounds coming from the east and it’s also noticably warmer the more they advance. The orc says it’s not a good place, better follow him and get to his home he says. The PCs accept to follow him.
They backtrack a little and now they see several ogres (five of them) coming their way. They hurry and turn south and then east, fleeing away from the brutes. After more than an hundred feet they turn north and soon get at the entrance of a large cavern (dimly lit).

There’s a lower section in the middle of the cavern with an island in the middle. To the left and right are also elevated sections and five orc archers stand on each side, bow at the ready.
The wounded orc shouts: « don’t shoot, it’s Snagrat! » They shoot anyway, the orc get hit by a several arrows and dies. Torch the not-expendable-goblin-anymore blocks many arrows with his nice dwarven shield.
The PCs hear the ogres behind them and they decide to they’d be better taking on the orcs and they all try to jump on the eastern section (I’ve messed up with the difference in elevations, that shouldn’t have been possible, oops o_O).
They all succeed to jump, except Ghardeet who didn’t react quickly enough (slow iniative) and gets caught by a massive blow from an ogre’s club from behind and he’s down! Aracyne shouts to Ghardeet to get up already (rally) and get with them and the mage makes an ultimate effort, get on his feet and tries a levitate spell but fails, falls down all the way to the bottom of the cliff and dies…
The Battle Brothers have lost their hired mage and are now fighting against 5 orcs in melee. The 5 archers on the other side concentrate their fire on the ogres for the moment and kill the closer one, the one who clubbed Ghardeet, forcing the remaining ogres to turn tail. The archers then switch their focus on the adventurers and shoot at them but, in the confusing melee, they hit their comrades as often as not.
Aracyne isn’t in melee though, he stays behind his companions with his bow and he kills two orc archers and disable another over the course of the fight. He manages to evade several arrows aimed at him too (good evade skill and fast footwork).
Meanwhile, Forka, Jedri and Torch slowly gain the advantage despite being initially outnumbered. They eventually kill all 5 orcs on their side but they’re also all pretty banged up from this fight, with heavily-armored Forka being the least wounded.
But now they see a throng of orc warriors coming from the west and they don’t have much choice but fleeing the way they came, with the remaining orc archers shooting at them (but missing fortunately). Forka throws Torch moria-style across the chasm (as his acrobatic skill his poor and he suffers from a condition making it even more difficult) and then himself, Jedri and Aracyne jump back on the southern section.
They hurry down the passage to get away from the orc arrows. The ogres don’t seem to have lingered fortunately.
They want to go back at the level’s entrance and they go westward but then they see a giant lizard (pretty much like a komodo dragon in my mind, bacteriological-hazard bite included) coming at them from a side-passage (random encounter) and they now sprint to escape.
They’re in sight of the entrance, the stairs, with the giant lizard breathing down Aracyne’s neck (last on marching order) and they can see an ogre sort-of keeping watch nearby. They dash for the stairs. Aracyne dodges a bite attempt from the giant lizard and then also manages to get into the stairs. Now the ogre and giant lizard face each other and start fighting harryhausen-style and the adventurers climb up not looking down. Halfway, Aracyne throws up from exertion (sickly condition) and almost fall to his death but he wills himself and soldiers on.
From Level 3 they get to Level 2 pretty quickly with the ladder that leads to the secret room and then they’re down to Level 1 in no time.
There their hobgoblin allies complain that the blockade of Level 1 isn’t doing that great, the adventurers are inflicting heavy casualties on them. But they also trapped one party into the special room, they’re there right now but one adventurer mage have blocked access with a magic stone wall. By the time the hobgoblins manage to enter the room the adventurers are gone, the portcullis trapping them smashed open. There’s one dead adventurer left in the room, it seems like the Black Axes don’t care that much for each other.
Chief Nerulf is in a bad mood and he tells the Battle Brothers that since they lost his mage (Ghardeet) he’ll keep theirs (Hedralynn) as his warriors need a healer.
The Battle Brothers leave Gunderholfen to go back in Longfelt and, apart from a few stings from angry wasps, don’t have any troubles crossing Ganfal Swamp.

Closing Comments:

Very near tpk territory here. In fact if I hadn’t messed up with the elevation in the orc cavern I don’t think they could have survived.
I’m a bit disappointed by myself for that mistake really. Not that they haven’t been killed but I very much like verticality in dungeons, something that is often lacking, so to mess this up is annoying. Less skimming through the rooms’ description I guess.
The rally mechanics in Dragonbane allows for a fellow characters to « persuade » another to still act even getting down to 0 hp. I was on the fence about that but I think it makes sense narratively speaking and I’m all for it now. There’s also a « 3 failures- 3 successes » count (borrowed from D&D 5E no doubt) and that I don’t like that much and I’m replacing with the grittier Frail feature from Worlds without Number where one is kept at just another hitpoint from dying unless he receives magical healing.
Fleeing in unkown territory is very very risky. Their orc « guide » had his own motives for sure. The issue of whom to trust is maybe a bit too much to ask from my young players though. They have a nice childhood, why wouldn’t they be trustful? Well ttrpgs are good for a variety of reasons, one is to simulate non-favorable situations and learn from those perhaps (i.e not everyone has your best interest in mind).
I like the concept of the Screaming Devilkin monster. More of an alarm system than a real threat, it does only light damage but is hard to kill (27hps as per the book). The real threat of course is in having a good chance of provoking a random encounter and possibly alerting nearby denizens too. I’m thinking about making them somewhat more prevalent in the dungeon, that may be a bit evil…

Gunderholfen – Against the Kiigoths (session 11)

26 août 202515 septembre 2025 David Skelector Dragonbane, Dungeons and Dragons, Fantasy, Gunderholfen, jeux de rôles, megadungeon, OSR, Play reports, Roleplaying Game, RPG

There’s officialy 5 parties of adventurers (including the PCs) in our campaign that have been given permits to explore Gunderholfen. Being the first one in place gave the PCs a huge headstart, particularly with their alliance with the hobgoblins. But now comes a dilemna, do they help their allies against other adventurers and be complicit on such a dubious course of actions or do they let them fare for themselves onward to their incoming annihilation?

Gunderholfen by G. Hawkins: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/265629/gunderholfen

Player Characters (PCs):

Aracyne, Elf Hunter, Guild Leader, (Isaac)
Jedri, Ratman Thief (Isaac)
Forka, Dogman Knight (Edmond)
Torch, Goblin Torchbearer (Edmond)
Ghardeet, hired Hobgoblin Mage/Shaman (me)

Longfelt – Gunderholfen Level 3

Leaving Longfelt and all went well with getting across the Ganfal Swamp.
In Gunderholfen, they talk to Nerulf who informs them that the Hobgoblins are taking heavy casualties againts adventurers, most recently against a party with 3 magic-users. This party has installed itself in Level 1A for the past few days and is still there. With current rate of losses, Nerulf will remove patrols outside of 1C except the nearest exit in 1B.
Unmoved by the hobgoblins plight, the PCs hire Gardheet, the hobgoblin mage (30gp and 10% cut) and go to Level 3, taking the shortcuts they know.
Down the ladder in Level 3 they go west where they hear sounds of grunting and growling and open a set of double-doors and come face-to-face against 7 kiigoths.

They kill a few quickly but as much as 15 others rush from the 2 adjacent rooms!
The PCs take a few steps back to get into the corridor behind them in order not to get immediately surrounded.
A long and violent brawl ensues. Kiigoths often keep fighting even when mortally wounded and get more ferocious while doing so. Jedri gets wounded by a club attack but Ghardeet casts stoneskin on him at maximum power and the protected thief is able to stay in the fight and, with one knife in each hand, stab foes left and right. Forka’s chainmail deflects most attacks from the crude weapons but is still getting bruised after getting hit by numerous blows. Aracyne shoots arrows from behind and Torch even manage to burn a couple of kiigoths here and there. With several of his own now dead the bigger, meaner kiigoth leader gets into melee against Forka and has one good hit with his deadly-looking, not-crude-at-all battle-axe but is smashed to pulp by the knight’s 2-h hammer in return. The death of their leader isn’t changing the savage kiigoth’s will to fight unfortunately and the adventurers eventually have to kill them to the last, not without being severely hurt themselves in the process.
The fight over, the PCs go to Jedri’s place nearby and Ghardeet heal all their wounds. They then get back to to the big pile of dead kiigoths, but there’s not much else other than the very nice battle-axe (nobody is very proficient with axes though).
They then go at the big room south and find big non-locked chests that contain coins, a nice chainmail (taken and wore by Forka) and a big, sturdy dwarven shield (given to the less and less expendable Torch, who’s overjoyed by the gift).
Going to the west now, they find a lot of broken, useless stuff and also an intact clay jug of wine. A bit further they also find an okay helmet (to Jedri).
They get into a very long and narrow passage going south, there’s also a side-passage going west with a brirge going over fast water. There’s a really bad smell coming from that way though and they decide to go further south instead.
They open a door into a room with a statue of a dwarven warrior. They spot a depression on his extended hande but can’t do much with anything and right then, an ooze drops from the ceiling on Forka’s head! Torch burns the ooze a few times with his torch and saves his boss from asphixy. Forka looks at the ceiling fearfully for a while.,
Nearby, they see a Sun Face carved into a wall and messing with it, manage to obtain a ruby from its opened mouth. It’s exactly the rigth size for the depression on the statue’s hand and they put it in place. An aura of virile dwarven energy surrounds them and they all feel a bit more competent. Except the elf, virile dwarven energy isn’t for elves obviously.
Next room, looking for it, they spot an ooze suspended on the ceiling and they send Torch with his shield up to bait it to drop down, which it does but it somehow slides on the shiels and target Torch’s head and it’s the turn of Forka in coming to the help of his sidekick.
The PCs now have found their way to the Level 2 stairs coming from the other way around and connecting their map in the process. They decide to go to the lair of ogres in the central corridor but the door is stuck and that’s enough to dissuade them for the moment.
They get back into the long passage west and Jedri, who’s walking a few steps ahead, sees an ogre coming the other way. He’s dragging a kiigoth corpse along.
Aracyne tries to cast Augment Weapon on his bow but only gets a nosebleed for his effort. He shoots nonetheless and hurts the ogre. The latter try to bum-rush the elf archer but Forka valiantly gets in front (guardian) and takes the hit instead. He gets slammed hard against the wall but still manages to take a big swing of his hammer at his foe. Jedri then plunges his dagger in the ogre’s chest and gets the kill.
Leaving the dead ogre behind but picking up the dead kiigoth, the party goes back to the ogre lair and boldly shouts at the inhabitants that they want to make a deal. Or more of a fait-accompli, since they killed the kiigoths, the enemies of the ogres, they ask that they show them the way to Level 4. The ogres (there seem to be 3 of them) are surprisingly amiable (excellent persuade and reaction roll) to this non-deal and Glorm, their leader escort them to the stairs to Level 4. He also tells the adventurers that there’s an ogre colony in Level 4 (not in good terms with himself) and also an orc colony.

Closing Comments:

The players chose to explore and let the hobgoblins fight alone, that’s probably the thing to do. I’ve built an okayish random table to see how goes the protracted fight between the hobgoblins and adventurers and let the dice decide, mostly.
Big fight against the kiigoths, close one too. Forgot one major thing on my side though, the squares on the map are 10′ wide, so that was a 20′ wide corridor not a 10′ one like I had in mind. Fighting there wouldn’t do much to prevent encirclement in fact. Bad DM, bad!
The ogres of Level 3 were amiable at that moment but will find their dead kin before long. With an arrow protruding from his chest, even an ogre will make the link…
They found the entrance to Level 4! The last of the Upper Levels and more complex than what they’ve seen so far, no doubt about that.

Streets & Spores – update

26 août 202526 août 2025 David Skelector Fantasy, musings, Roleplaying Game, RPG update

Okay my friends, it’s like my first blog update ever on Streets & Spores I think. Been writing this blog for 9 years (that’s crazy) and well, I’m not much of a dedicated blogger really. Always thought of this as my ttrpg personal journal first and foremost but y’know, some people read this and I’m happy about that.

So here we go, vacation near a end, which means I’ll get back to write more frequently. Perfectly logical I tell you. I also have a bit of a backlog to get through, with several sessions of Gunderholfen to write about. Campaign is progessing well & fast. It’s really fun too but I’m still experimenting with how I want to proceed, not the exploring part mind you that’s up to the players but the surrounding gameplay part if that make sense, and I have the sinking feeling that everything will click in my head only when we’ll be near the end of it. I’ll have to do some post-mortem for sure but we have a long way to go still.

Nothing for Frosthaven for the moment for those interested on that front, but we’ll get back to play soon enough I think. We’re more than halfway through and we intend to finish the game.

Also, as long as I’m updating, I’ve decided recently that my Gunderholfen campaign will be exclusively for my kids. My sister and nephew missed too many sessions by now. The last time they played, a few weeks ago, was for a 5E session that they kept pestering me to have until I gave in and did a truly abysmal, halfassed effort that still somehow seemed to make them happy, sigh. I mean, I had good hopes for my nephew to convert him to a more hmm, humble playstyle, after all he truly loved our Castle Xyntillan campaign, that much was obvious. But no, still wanted to play 5E and have an entire session seeking to fish a crit with a maxed-Ki Air Punch or some such so he could do the most damage for his monk character on a single attack… Man, I love him, and he’s only 16 yo, but thats’a bit heartbreaking.

But moving on, another thing that should happen in the coming months hopefully is a new campaign with my older son and some of his teenager friends (and his younger brother too, as always) with me as the DM. Another published osr megadungeon, can’t get enough of those, this time it’ll be The Forgotten Caverns of Archaia by Greg Gillepsie. For once with the intended system, Dragonslayer, That should be interesting.

What else? I’m slowly working on my own megadungeon, I’ll try to pick up a better pace if I can.

My younger son is still improving and is immensely creative with his dungeon-craft and I’ll try to write about this too.

I also have several non-play reports drafts to complete, probaly will get to it this autumn.

Lastly, prompted by 52 Monsters and its excellent author Brian Garthwaite, I’m thinking of being a bit more active on sharing some other blogs content. Could add a blogroll too, I read a lot of interesting stuff from other people after all. We’ll see.

Heh, that’s it for this update, oher post coming soon!

Dragonbane – rulebook walkthrough pt 1: character creation and magic

30 juillet 202525 septembre 2025 David Skelector Dragonbane, Fantasy, jeux de rôles, Play reports, review, Roleplaying Game, RPG

I’ve been using the Dragonbane ttrpg system (DB) for several sessions now- testing the limits of it in fact, with a megadungeon campaign, but I think for the moment I’d do something between a walkthrough and a true review. Suffice to say I like Dragonbane a lot but like every other systems, it also has some flaws.

First thing first, I’ve seen it often called an « OSR » game but I don’t think that’s quite accurate. It’s a fairly light system (the rulebook is slim at 112 pages) and there’s also many random tables (i.e magic mishaps, injuries, etc.), but here the comparison ends as I think the implied style of play is a bit different than OSR (i.e all the different actions you can do in combat).

Character creation:

You have the classical humans, elves, dwarves, halfings and then you’ve also got those guys, the duck-persons *mallards* and also *wolfkin*.

Choosing your Kin, you get an ability from it, a small power that you can activate spending willpower points (your wp pool is equal to your willpower score), for example the mallards get « ill-tempered » giving them a boon (advantage, roll twice take best) on attacks at the cost of getting angry (a condition, more on that later).

Choosing a Profession (the complete list: artisan, bard, fighter, hunter, knight, mage, mariner, merchant, scholar and thief), you get an Heroic Ability, another thing you can activate spending willpower points (the fighter for instance gets Veteran, something that lets him play with his initiative order a bit).

If you choose the Mage profession, you don’t get a Heroic Ability but instead get access to three Rank 1 spells and two Magic Tricks from one magic School. Others can also learn magic but not at the beginning.

Next step is rolling your attributes (the same 6, or thereabouts, willpower instead of wisdom, 4d6 take three, assign to one attribute at a time.

Lastly, based on your attributes numbers, you’ll have scores on skills, which are either free or trained (chosen from your profession’s list and a few you can choose as you wish), the minimum is 3, maximum is 14. thus if you have a 17 or 18 score in an attribute on a trained skill, you have 14 for that skill that will be used with a d20 roll under or equal. So, it’s a Roll Under system.

The whole character creation is pretty easy and fast as apart for Kin and Profession most of the choices are already made for you. A few more customizations, rolled randomly (i.e starting gear, a memento), and you’re ready to go. Nothing to complain there, all good.

Magic:

Spells are ranked from 1 to 5, with most within the 1-3 range, with each rank from 2 and above having a lower-ranked spell as a prerequisite.

There’s four magic schools: General, Animism, Elementalism and Mentalism. Everyone that has the Magic Talent heroic ability (from being a mage most probably) can access General magic and also choose one of the three other schools.

You can remember a finite number of spells depending on your Int score but can have more into your Grimoire. The magic system is somewhat Vancian (memorizing spells, spending them and getting to choose anew after resting) but with the addition that you can cast any spells that you have in your Grimoire if you double the casting time (2 rounds instead of 1 for most spells). That’s a nice touch, a bit more flexibility is good.

Spells also take magic points to cast (from you wp pool, as determined by your willpower score) and cost 2, 4 or 6 points depending on how strong you want the effet to be.

So both memorized spells and spell points, a bit cumbersome in my opinion.

But something pretty big is effectively missing from the whole thing: how do you acquire new spells? As it stands, it’e pretty much up to the DM to decide, that’s weird.

I would add that the spells list to choose from is a bit limited, some offensive spells are just stronger versions of lower-ranked ones, making the latter completely obsolete (which also feels wrong). There’s seventeen Rank 1 spells to choose from initially, with not too bad a variety of effects but it could also be better.

There’s also a nice (optional) Magical Mishaps table in case a character roll a 20 (remember, it’s a roll under system) whereas they could vomit a frog the moment they tell a lie for some time or some such.

Addendum:

There was a KS going on recently for financing two more Dragonbane books, one being the Book of Magic… They clearly recognized the need, that’s great, because as it stands the magic part of the game is the weakest.

Part 2 – character development and conditions

Gunderholfen – Back in Longfelt (session 10)

24 juillet 202525 juillet 2025 David Skelector Dragonbane, Fantasy, Gunderholfen, jeux de rôles, megadungeon, OSR, Play reports, Roleplaying Game, RPG

Short session without any combats but in which the PCs managed to get out of the dungeon efficiently (after 3 sessions inside) with the help of their new friends.

1,5 hours

Gunderholfen by G. Hawkins: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/265629/gunderholfen

Player Characters (PCs):

Aracyne (Isaac), Elf Hunter, Guild Leader
Forka (Edmond), Dogman Knight
Torch, Goblin Torchbearer (Edmond)
Ghardeet (me) Hobgoblin Mage/Shaman
Tiali, Ratwoman Thief (me)
Jedri, Ratman Thief (me)

Level 3

We start in Level 3 in a set of rooms occupied by Tiali and Jedri, cursed adventurers turned into rat persons. They shared a nice broth together and had time to rest and talk.
Among the things Tiali and Jedri shared is a shortcut to get to the entrance of Level 2. It’s near, to the north, next to the kiigoths’ den.
The PCs set for a plan of action, they would get out of the dungeon ao that Tiali could ask in town for a cure to her affliction. Jedri for his part, doesn’t mind being a rat person as it gives some good advantages as a thief and he never was a good-looking fellow anyway.
Getting out of the room, wary of the Gelatinous Cube in the vicinity, the PCs go north at the pair of double doors.
They get inside a large room that has a dead ogre and 3 dead kiigoths, casualties from the conflict going on between these two sides.
There’s a locked room at the left but the two thieves warn that there’s something dangerous inside.
Door to the right, there’s a small closet with a lone skull in a corner. Forka smashes it with his 2h hammer and kills a green centipede at the same time.
Going north they get into another large room with another dead ogre (no kiigoths this time) and a ladder next to the northern wall.
Forka goes first up the ladder followed by Torch (they named the goblin follower by what he does) and everybody else and up they go for a 100 feet until they reach a secret room right next the great hall, the entrance of Level 2!
From there they get among their hobgoblin allies and separate from Ghardeet and Torch until their next delve, maybe.
They get out under the sun, which they haven’t seen for several days, and start the trek through Ganfal Swamp. Aracyne the hunter manages to lead them well through the treacherous swamp and they reach the town of Longfelt before the end of the day. They leave Tiali to her own device but promise Jedri to invite him for the next delve.
Forka and Aracyne both takes training course in their respective guilds, pay 100 gold each and learn new tricks.
They’re then ready to leave for their next delve, out in the farmlands they encounter a patrol of horsemen and talk with them a little. They learn that the adventuring party « The Protectors » led by Bayard came back from Gundeholfen a few days ago with 9 pairs of hobgoblin ears that will earn them money by one Reginald in town, a Halfling inn-owner who pays for any dead hobgoblins.
The PCs are unsure if they can do something about that at first but then decide to turn back and talk to Reginald at his inn. They learn thar Reginald’s village had suffered heavily from hobgoblin raids in his youth and now he spends his money to avenge himself.
TBC…

Closing comments:

No big eventful things happening but a very useful session nonetheless for the players as they progress in their knowledge of Gunderholfen.
Jedri will be a nice addition to the team.
I finally chose how to deal with the Ganfal swamp in my game: I make Aracyne the hunter makes a bushcraft check, that’s a skill in DB, if he succeeds there’s still a 1 on 6 chance of encounters, if he fails there’s a roll on the Dragonbane journeys’ mishaps table and also a 1 on 6 chance of encounters. At the moment, there’s still a bit more than 50% chance that something inconvenient/bad happening which seems fair to me.
Forka learned the heroic ability Massive Blow with his weeklong training and Aracyne learned Fast Footwork with his.

Alive and Well

17 juillet 2025 David Skelector Fantasy, Nature, Travel Cape Breton, Nova Scotia

I’m back from a trip to Nova Scotia with the wife and kids. It was great. We travelled along Northumberland shore with many great stops with view on the Atlantic ocean (the gulf of St-Lawrence to be more precise).

We survived going near Malignant Cove (awesome name, will steal it for an elfgame along with Folly Lake). We then went to the eastern part of the province in Cape Breton, where the locals were a bit confused with our french pronunciation of it (unwanted history lesson: Breton stands for France’s Bretagne), I’m not complaining really, the Nova Scotians are great folks, polite and welcoming Canadians through and through (a lot more than over here in Quebec I must say).

And we did the rightly famous Cabot Trail. My wife says that the Skyline trail is a bit overrated though, and in truth we all preferred our visit to the wetlands where we could see thousands of carnivorous pitcher plants among other things.

An artist view of me saving her from an excess of curiosity.

Beautiful and Gnarly. 100 yo and + trees.

I ate as much seafood as I could (and took a few pounds for it I think) but we also ate the best fire-grilled steak ever at Mother Webb’s in Antigonish. Thank god there’s no Mother Webb’s in Quebec City as my wife would be there 5 times a week I think!

We also nearly got all killed when we got stuck on the highway between a large, slow-moving farming machine and a non-slowing (down a slope) truck full of huge tree trunks, followed by another truck, but thankfully the truck’s driver reacted properly and got pass us full-speed in the gravel roadside. That was pretty frikkin close.

But hey, we’re still alive and unless you begin to think that I’m doing a travel blog, and as someone afflicted with GMS (Game Master Syndrome), whatever I do, wherever I go, I must find gameable content instead of, y’know, enjoying myself in the moment.

And so, I think Cape Breton would make for a great island, or small continent if upscaled maybe. The Bras d’or Lake is not really a lake in fact as it’s salt water and linked to the surrounding ocean in three places. A wonderful and impressive inner Sea with several strategic locations.

The name itself, Bras d’Or, Arm of Gold, is a bit incongruous but I think it has a feel of Lady in the Lake going on for it or something.

Well, come to think of it, that’s about all I have to say rpg-wise. I suppose I did enjoy myself!

Frosthaven – Apotheosis (76)

2 juillet 2025 David Skelector Boardgame, Fantasy, Frosthaven, Play reports

Final scenario of the Threat from the Deep (Personal Quest), a Boss Fight obviously. We do the Enemy to the Fish King version, as we’re not fools.

Characters

Schlurkt the Deepwraith (David) lvl 6, a crab that goes stab stab stab
Pantherius Octadine the Pain Conduit (Mathieu) lvl 8, loves the pain, shares the pain
Pearce DeWalt the Metal Mosaic (Guillaume) lvl 7, the pressure is rising!

The Fish King is rapidly gaining power and the disruptive Chaos energy that surrounds him means that he’s not entirely of this world anymore. This mean in effect that each time he loses one quarter of his HPs be becomes invulnerable and we have to move into some kind of pocket dimension, kill demons and come back to hurt him again.

Some weird thing is going on with the Fish King…

Gaining access to tentacles is a sure sign of success in life for some people.

One Piranah Pig each for Pearce and Schlurkt but Pantherius is hurting the Fish King bad!

Ice Demons now, their retaliate is worrisome.

Final blow from Pantherius and the Fish King has officially botched his apotheosis…

Closing comments:

The Fish King had heavy-hitting attacks but only one per turn so not too worrisome.
Dealing with the demons, and killing them fast, was more challenging.
Both the Metal Mosaic and the Pain Conduit are retiring so two new characters for next time and a whole new team dynamics for us.

Frosthaven – Infiltrating the Lair (75)

2 juillet 2025 David Skelector Boardgame, Fantasy, Frosthaven, Play reports

Penultimate scenario of the Threat from the Deep‘s Personal Quest.

Characters

Schlurkt the Deepwraith (David) lvl 6, a crab that goes stab stab stab
Pantherius Octadine the Pain Conduit (Mathieu) lvl 8, loves the pain, shares the pain
Pearce DeWalt the Metal Mosaic (Guillaume) lvl 7, the pressure is rising!

We’re infiltrating the lair of the Fish King. Water tiles are harmful (if we end our tun on one) cause they’re brimming with chaotic energy or something. Furthermore we have two explosive charges to use on tunnels inside, to effectively stop enemy reinforcement.

We have a narrow path to navigate and we have to stop the Abael Herder in the back quickly.

But these electric eels are fast and bity.

Pearce jumps ahead and get the fight to the piranah herder.

He’s dead, we move on! Schlurkt, stop messing around and kill your eel already.

Inside, a large room with two more entrances, and more enemies.

Pantherius opens the door: « Schlurkt, go set the charge, quick! »

Meanwhile, Pearce has gone to the other area and does the same, no more enemies this way.

But chaotic energy coalesce into two Chaos Demons.

Pantherius get into the last area where there’s three chests to be found! And Ice Demons…

Schlurkt does his best to go help his endangered companion.

Whilst Pantherius is busy on his own and then kill the last enemy. It’s Victory!

Closing comments:

Hard scenario with many possibilities to get derailed.
I was stuck fighting the eels way for one more turn when I picked the Miss card and was left behind by my ever-rushing friends.
Fortunately, we managed well the biggest hurdle of collapsing the tunnels quickly. I had a convenient Teleport 5 at my disposal at the right time.
The Metal Mosaic was put in a bad spot as he was suddenly the closest to the appearing Chaos Demons and couldn’t anticipate this turn of event. I got there to help in 2 turns as the Deepwraith has good mobility.

Frosthaven – Gaps in the Road (74)

2 juin 20259 juin 2025 David Skelector Boardgame, Fantasy, Frosthaven, Play reports

Third part (out of 5) of the Threat from the Deep personal quest that we’re doing for the Metal Mosaic character.

Characters

Schlurkt the Deepwraith (David) lvl 5, a crab that goes stab stab stab
Pantherius Octadine the Pain Conduit (Mathieu) lvl 7, loves the pain, shares the pain
Pearce DeWalt the Metal Mosaic (Guillaume) lvl 7, the pressure is rising!

We have a clue for an artifact we’ve been seeking for a while but the path going there is narrow and flooded.

In this scenario water tiles aren’t just difficult terrain as usual but full-on obstacles. We have the option of « killing » trees, felling them in order to get over the water.

Algox archers are shooting at us from the other side.

Pearce brings the fight to them while Schlurkt prefers looting.

It’s hard to manoeuvre into such a narrow place.

Schlurkt gets into the next area, quickly kills another archer but gets peppered by the remaining three and is badly wounded.

Fortunately his metallic companion takes the lead.

Schlurkt teleports to the other side, soon followed by Pantherius and Pearce, after the latter made a proper path to walk on (destroyed an obstacle). Pantherius does what he does and kills the enemies after they’d hurt him.

Still more Algox trying to stop us, assisted by Faery Imps.

Pearce is now heavily damaged but is killing foes left and right.

Pantherius clears the northern side of the room.

The last remaining archer is hidden behind traps and a tree.

Nothing that would stop an annoyed *Metal Mosaic*.

He then takes on a swarm of Piranha Pigs almost all by himself (with some minor help from Schlurkt). We’ve vanquished our foes but the objective was already taken away by the insolent Fish King…

Closing Comments:

As I understand it, the scenario changed (slightly) to adapt to a previous choice we made, whether we’d accepted the deal offered by the Fish King or not.
With all the options of getting invisible I have with the Deepwraith, I still managed to open a room and get plain visible in the middle of it and then lost a card to not die. Bad play this one.
Guillaume and his Metal Mosaic really pushed the pace and was, once more I felt , really reckless. He explained to me afterward that he hasn’t much choice with this character, with its pressure mechanics, it must be played accordingly. He did a lot to win the scenario mind you but one tiny bit of bad luck and he’d would lost his character (permadeath on) it seemed to me.
I’ve looted everything I could in this one, both because of a battle goal but also because we’re short on resources to further build in town. It felt underwhelming, less impactful than killing enemies let’s say, but it is a part of the game.