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Rolemaster Moments for June 2002 - page 3
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I have been a GM and a player for more than 10 years, so many things have happened to me in my roleplaying.
One of the most shocking was when a magician was victim of a vacuum spell from a dragon. He was travelling with some fellows when suddenly a canyon dragon came over them. The dragon (of my invention) cast a vacuum spell over these people. The magician was the most affected by the spell, with the results that he suffered a mental shock which damaged him alot.
The player, when he saw that, hid under the table and waited for the GM (me) to roll the shock critic. Once rolled, it resulted in big brain damage. The player was still under the table and the GM told him to roll one 10-sided die in order to, randomly, lower one of his 10 characteristics (co, ag, etc.). The player, still under the table, rised his hand, tapped over the table looking for his dice, and without looking (as he was still under the table) he rolled the dice. Then someone said "oh my god". The lowered characteristic was empathy, his main characteristic, from where he takes his magic power.
He passed from having 3pp/lvl to 1pp/lvl (and as a pure miracle he didnt lose it all, and didn't remain with 0pp). The joke is that the player was level 15, and he was a very good and powerful magician.
I have two Rolemaster moments, both as DM from a campaign that is currently running. They sort of follow on from each other.
The party:
Quinn Nightblade - Human Thief (with an eye for the ladies and a blackpowder
pistol in each pocket)
Garrant the Hunter - Human Ranger (great shot with bow)
Aspira - Human Sorceress (a bit strange)
All second level.
Double Cross
The party have just killed a Corleone, a notorious highwayman and his band in an ambush. They traveled to the Durant manor in order to collect the bounty. As Lord Durant is out on a hunting trip they met Lady Arabella Durant. She handed the bounty over and told them that she had another job for them if they were interested. Always on the look out for a quick gold piece they agree and turned up early the next morning for instructions.
It was a simple job, to deliver a locked box to the druid which lived in the woods about 7 miles out of the town. The left, under a cloak of secrecy, and went to the place which was marked on the map. When they arrived, there was no sign of the druid, or his grove, but they found an abandoned bandit camp. Starting to smell a rat, the party opened the box to find it full of jewelry.
Lady Durant was secretly Corleones lover before his death. When the party had proof that they had killed him she decided on a fitting revenge. She sent them to his old camp with her jewelry box and then told the local militia that they had robbed her but dropped a map during the robbery. The militia would then hunt them down and kill them. The party got away but not without a few skirmishes and a few comments along the lines of never trust a DM.
Naked Party
A short while after this they hear that Lady Arabella keeps all of her letters in a bureau in her room. Convinced that this is the way to clear their names the party decide to break into the house during the wake for Lord Durant who has just died under suspicious circumstances.
Garrant decides that he can make people invisible, but not their clothing or equipment. Quinn and Garrant will therefore go in naked and invisible. Aspira will infiltrate the party as a serving girl. They hide all of their equipment half a mile from the castle and set about the mission.
Aspira goes about her duties in the kitchen and the other two climb up the walls and into Arabella's room. The first thing that our intrepid due find is that the bureau is magically locked and defies all attempts at getting it open. They remember that Arabella wore pendant in the shape of a key around her neck and decide to get this off her.
It's decided that Quinn is the man for the job so he set's off for the party. Garrant stays in the room. Just after Quinn has left, one of Lady Durant's personal bodyguard, a rather scary amazon, enters the room. Before Garrant's horrified eyes she changes into a seven foot demon (type I but looks more scary) and starts to sniff around the room. Luckily one of Garants background options was neutral smell so he is not found. The demon then goes invisible and leaves the room, heading towards the party.
Quinn has reached the party. He decides that with so many people down below his best bet is to attack from above. He sits astride one of the rough wooden beams which run across the top of the banquet hall and starts to edge across, still naked. The invisible demon can smell him and begins to follow him. Once they reach the middle of the beam a small scuffle ensues.
The result is that both of them fall into the party below. The astonished guests are then treated to a naked wrestling match between a seven foot demon and a naked (and shorter) Quin Nightblade. The only help they could have was Aspira's 50th Level Staff of Demon Mastery which they had left buried half a mile from the Castle!
The demon was finally killed by Carlson, a new PC who had joined that night. Lady Arabella escaped to become the party's nemesis.
Everywhere that the party goes now the bards sing of "Carlson the Demon Slayer" and "Quinn the Naked".
The End.
Please note that I do not normally give 2nd level parties a 50th level Staff of Demon Mastery. I wanted to see if they would ever have the bottle to use it!
Our party was returning from their adventure in the Uj desert (on Shadow World) and were glad to see the City of Kaitaine across the bay...well, all but one of the group was.
The party members involved here consisted of Codi the Sorceress, Arn the Druid and Denroth the Rhiani Bounty Hunter.
During their adventure, the party's Sorcereress had claimed a ring as her portion of the booty. It had some value to it, but it also was cursed. Codi is now deathly afraid of water. Anything more than a waterskin-full and she starts getting the shakes. Being out in the desert, the curse had laid dormant. Now, with the bay stretched out in front of her, the hydrophobia kicked in high gear.
Now to complete the scene, please note that there is a LARGE tent-city full of Kaitaine refugees on the continental side of the bay due to martial law being declared (my storyline). Hundreds of people are milling about and that means there are guardsmen milling about with them, trying to keep the peace. The following action takes place in front of some of these guards:
"Guys, I don't think I want to go home, just yet." Codi said.
Seeing the Sorceress is being hesitant, possibly ensorcelled, Arn the Druid attempts to knock her unconscious with his staff. With a successful Perception roll, Codi sees the blow coming and takes it on the shoulder instead of the skull. On pure instinct, Codi pulls out her Wand of Lightning and proceeds to blast a fist-sized hole through the Druid. This same Druid was the only Channeler of the group!
Without missing a beat, Codi walks right up to the guards and asks, "Excuse me? Do you have a Healer? I just shot ours.
It all started in the countryside. My group (my ranger, a couple of thieves, an eager young bard and a grumpy old dwarf, plus a pack mule we bought to carry our gear) set up camp for the night, and posted sentries, as usual. Those sentries, however failed to spot a group of 6 approaching bandits, who promptly surrounded us. We decided to fight, but again the dice were unkind and soon both thieves were dead, the bard and the dwarf down and my ranger barely hanging on, while the bandits had only lost 2 of their own. Two others were trying to avenge their deaths by killing me, and the two remaining were already looting our kit.
It is my turn to attack, and I... fumble! My sword flies away and I am defenseless. One of my foes misses. The other attacks and...fumbles too! He gets off lightly, though, by rolling an 11. Apparently nothing has changed and we are still doomed. But wait! The GM rules that he misses me and his pike scratches the mule. The mule strikes back, and promptly rolls a 200+ attack, and 98 crit. It kicks the bandits brain out from his skull. The second bandit turns surprised, and tries to attack the mule, while I forfeit my round in shock. He rolls really badly and misses. The mule strikes again, rolls brilliantly, and promptly kills him too! The two others charge the mule. I regain my wits and wrestle one of them to the ground, while the other attacks, inflicts some minor damage, and is immediately killed by our sweet beast of burden, now on a killing spree; its third victim in so many kicks!
In the end, the last bandit surrendered (´just get it away from me!!´), and eventually became a PC. The mule (whose combat stats where lower than anyone's) was immortalized in song, and eventually became the heraldic symbol of my ranger´s family. It lived quiet and content to the rest of its days and never again joined in battle.
Our GM posted the Dwarf #6 story a while back but it was out of context and missing a few important points - especially the battle just before it.
The system we use is a Merp/Rolemaster hybrid. In this adventure the party has joined the Lords of Order to help reset the balance between Order and Chaos. The name spellings may be a little off but the party consists of:
Alanna - changling (and group paramedic) who runs around bear all the time Ronan - ridiculously strong fighter who usually ends up taking as much damage as he gives Dameon - bad tempered alchemist who usually is more of a threat than the enemy Beowyn THE Horse Lord - overconfident glory hound combat monster on horseback who will be really annoyed that his name wasn't first on this list Avin - Bard with metaphysical bow skill. Also is the Public Relations Manager and Official Historical Exaggerator for THE Horse Lord Odeber - Mage and general air strike force Loki - secretive thief who is more evil than he looks Shinohl - uncontrollable sword of Order currently equipped with a ranger accessory named Korko
Ijaj the Sleeping Lord of Light and Order - Mentalist and group pack mule. Breakdown of the title:
Sleeping - 12 hour coma twice because of ESF with simple spells Lord - ring of Lordship = PR+1 (important for Mentalists) Light - The Brilliance list is his favorite and Light Eruption is his only area effect attack Order - He is a Child of Raku (a Lord of Order). Originally was a Dorwinrim worshiping Donu but had to switch in order to get arm fixed after Dwarf #6 (read on)
I run Ijaj and Avin (yet another gaming orphan). The party is a fairly high stat group that has more abilities and equipment than it knows what to do with but everyone is under 10th level. Of course, in most battles all of this is not nearly enough. Every member of the party has at least one ability that is nearly godlike (way over 100) except Ijaj - PR 102 with the Lordship ring is his best. Ijaj tries to support fighters with stunning attacks, occasionally gets a few good backbow attacks in, but often gets nearly killed by spectacular coincidences of fate.
The party is crossing a desert on the way to a far distant woods. Ijaj is on one of two artifact horses, Loki is on a gigantic war cat, and the rest either fly, ride, or follow on foot (and some are very fast runners). Beowyn was missing because his player was elsewhere. Ijaj had just killed an evil assassin duplicate of Loki by casting an amazing Light Eruption with unexpected spell extension assistance from Dameon. This made up for the previous battle with a Lord of Chaos where Korko nearly killed Ijaj with a Triad of Ice fumble cast using Shinohl (blew out his spine, X rounds till death, etc.) We don't have a healer and are a little low on herbs - shattered bone repair in particular. Alanna has a healing staff that can fix one major organ/bone per day but we save it for emergencies.
Ahead in the distance is a tower of rock (like Devil's Tower but smaller). Suddenly it explodes and half of it is blown away revealing an inky area of darkness. Odeber with his ridiculously fast cloak of flight cautiously files up to it and finds that it is a force field of some sort made up of darkness and flying chunks of black ice. He tries to touch one and KAPOW! instant electrical crit. He falls to the ground and takes a few more hits. We arrive and patch him up. On examination, it is obvious the field is protecting some sort of monument and dimly a tunnel is seen through the field leading into it. Analysis reveals that walking through the field on the ground without any metal objects on would probably be safe. Ijaj decides to try it with Avin and the medical team standing by. He drops all of his equipment including his expensive metal Circlet of Mentalism (his 2X PP multiplier and the only helmet a Mentalist can wear) and steps in. Only an annoying static charge is felt. In the darkness he blindly walks towards the even blacker tunnel and enters it. It is absolutely black - a darkness spell of some sort. He feels his way in and suddenly steps into a lighted room. Several black statues surround a sand-filled pit facing in. Suspended animation? Being an unassuming guy he tries Mind Speech on one of them. No sentience detected but there is an overwhelming sense of evil and chaos. Suddenly a shimmering light begins to form over the pit and it seems to be emanating from the statues. Then the sand begins to seep into an unseen void revealing a large black figure within. Obviously a good time for sprinting practice.
He races out of the tunnel and through the field screaming to the rest of the party that something nasty may be coming out. He leaps to where he left his equipment but it's not there. This is when Loki informs him that he thought Ijaj would need his equipment so he tossed it into the field in the direction of the tunnel. There's no time to go back for them so Ijaj only has his spells to rely on and half of his PPs. Obviously a light spell is in order but now he has to decide between targeting the creature or the damn thief.
Unfortunately he doesn't get time. Avin is standing next to him aiming for the tunnel. Now everyone hears it approaching and can tell by the sound that it is heavy - a golem of some sort. Suddenly the force field solidifies and then explodes. The GM had predetermined that ten chunks of electrically charged ice (cold and electrical crits) had the potential of randomly hitting members of the party. Someone dodged one, someone else got nicked by another but four headed for Ijaj and Avin each. Each dodged two but took bad hits from the others. We both end up laying on the ground. Avin is unconscious and Ijaj is crippled and unarmed. Directly in the path of the creature. Now identified as a LEVEL 35 Black Reaver made of Eog and trapped souls and wielding a huge battle axe. Our mounts take the initiative and run like mad with the rest of the party following. Suddenly Odeber makes a panic attempt of stopping or stunning the Reaver in order to save Avin and Ijaj. He dumps all of his PPs into a Shock Bolt and rolls 00. The Reaver is vaporized instantly and all that is left is little chunks of evil and his axe spinning up into the distance. Whew, that was close. While the herbs and magic staff are being dug out Ijaj asks the GM where the axe lands. You see, Ijaj has Mana Sensing and has a chance of determining the properties of any magical item just by touching it. After a few more die rolls, the GM announces that axe conveniently embeds itself in his chest (E slash). Unfortunately it was tainted by Chaos and wasn't even really powerful. After healing, we discover that we are completely out of shatter repair herbs and low on several others.
In a panic, Ijaj looks for his stuff but can't find it. So we check out the room and find a trap door to a room below it. His stuff is there and so are some other items the odd teleport trap had collected over the eons. A really evil necromancy related skull is destroyed. Ijaj finds gauntlets of quickness that give him an extra attack per round. But we are curious as to why the whole building has started to sway slowly like a giant bell in a bell tower. Suddenly, Beowyn drops in. He tells us that he was sent by the ghost of a Lady of Order and that we are in extreme danger and have to leave the place immediately. We barely make it out when the whole building collapses into a deep pit. By smell and visual inspection we can see that the chasm has a large lake of naphtha in the bottom and that there is going to be a very large boom. We run like hell and take shelter a mile away as a large section of the desert is turned into a very large crater. One of the artifact horses is the only casualty. We determine that the whole place was an elaborate trap probably from some long forgotten war between Order and Chaos.
While retrieving the fleeing mounts, Beowyn notices an amazing horse in the distance and captures it - sort of. It is an intelligent carnivorous horse and after some negotiations it becomes his new mount. As we proceed towards the distant forest again, the ghost of the Lady of Order appears and tells us that we need more training before meeting the remaining forces of Chaos in battle. We are then gated to a small town in a place unknown and are told the help the townspeople.
After talking to the elders of the town we start off towards a distant mining town whose weekly shipment is overdue. After a few hours, we stop and camp in the woods for the night. After midnight, a party of chaotic dwarfs find us and we vanquish them without any major problems. Their short ponies are determined to be chaotic and have to be killed. Ijaj attacks one of the helpless ponies with his vibrating sword (secondary crush crit with any crit) and makes several critical hits but rolls ridiculously low on the crits. After several rounds of what effectively became torture, other members of the party finish them off out of mercy.
The next morning on the trail we run into a party of ten chaotic dwarfs. Odeber is invisible and sees them first but the leader has an axe that detects his presence so they are ready for us. Bowmen hidden in nearby trees start shooting at Odeber when he drops his invisibility to cast a fireball. Beowyn charges into the woods with a spectacular maneuver on his new horse and begins to circle around to attack from the rear. As usual we kept track of the opponents by number. Someone charges into the middle of the group and gets hit bad so Ijaj races to the rescue. With his 5 shot backbow and new gauntlets he gives a few good hits the first round and a shock bolt the next from an item. Beowyn emerges from the woods and takes on the crossbow men and leader at the back of the group. The war cat makes an amazing roll and splatters a bowman hidden up a tree. Avin and Korko follow in.
This is where things started to go wrong. Korko gets the snot beat out of him and is stunned for several rounds. The enemy leader teleports away. Several of our important attacks miss. Most of the dwarfs' don't. Suddenly, one of the dwarfs near Beowyn bezerks and screams "NOW YOU DIE!". The effect is a fear attack. Everyone resists excepts Avin who critically fails. He panics and runs (as randomly determined by a GM die roll) through the battle past Beowyn and the bezerk dwarf. At this time the bezerk dwarf(?) puffs up and explodes with the effect of an acid bomb. Conveniently, Avin is right next to him when this happens. Beowyn quickly rinses himself and his horse off with water from his canteen while Avin is sizzling on the ground unconscious. He has to take care of Avin too so he is tied up for a few rounds.
Now this battle took several hours to play out and with so many players, characters, and opponents it did get confusing. It was getting very late and we were tired. After dispatching some of the dwarfs in the middle of the group and reviewing which ones were left someone asked "what happened to dwarf #6?" The GM looked over his sketch of the battle and the casualty list he determined that #6 was alive and uninjured and was between Korko (who was still stunned) and Ijaj (who was busy being shot). So the GM rolled randomly to see what #6 was going to do. Attack was the result. Another roll to see if he would attack the stunned ranger with the nasty sword of order who would obviously come after him next or the beat-up mentalist on horseback. The Mentalist of course. So he swings and rolls a nasty critical and shatters the elbow of Ijaj's weapon arm. Ijaj drops the backbow and pulls out his vibrating sword with his off-hand. The next round the GM rolls and the dwarf decides to hit Ijaj again and rolls THE EXACT SAME CRITICAL on the SAME ARM. Well the GM figured in blowthrough and made some rolls and then stated that because the arm was already flopping uselessly that it swings up and breaks Ijaj's nose. By this time the whole room was laughing hysterically since everyone was aware that we were out of shattering herbs and the day hadn't even begun yet. This is when I calculated up the damage and found out Ijaj was at 0 HP and fell unconscious. After informing the GM I rolled to see if Ijaj was able to control how he fell off of his horse. It was a bad roll and Ijaj ended up SHATTERING HIS KNEE!
Quite a while later after we were able to stop laughing the rest of the party mopped up and the staff was used to heal the knee. Later on we were visited by Raku, a major Lord of Order who offered to fix the arm if Ijaj chose him to be his new deity. Ijaj agreed after conferring with Donu and became a Child of Raku. He lost his Dorwinrim racial bonuses but gained several horse related ones from Raku. Beowyn also switched to Raku but didn't change his race. Many other characters changed to related Lords of Order who had more power in this realm.
After this episode Ijaj usually targets opponent #6 regardless of threat assessment. After the next battle where Odeber single-handedly barbecued an entire party of dwarfs, Ijaj and Ronan were almost killed by an undead dragon. Avin later got splattered by a Kraken but survived. Korko was dragged into multiple battles against ridiculous odds by his damn sword. And so it goes. Here's some tips: you can never have enough herbs AND DON'T LOSE TRACK OF OPPONENTS!
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