Sickle Swords of the Exiles

These weapons are cast of copper or bronze and usually heavily stained or tarnished by the ages. Often they have various runes or hieroglyphs inscribed on the blades. These slashing weapons have always been associated with a people known as “the exiles,” though who these exiles were, where they came from, or what happened to them is a mystery.

The sickle swords of the exiles function as +2 long swords and are 75% likely to also possess a minor power. This power is not always beneficial. Some possible powers include:

1. Double damage vs. poisonous creatures
2. Glow (as per light spell) 3 times/day
3. Walk on water for 1 turn 1 time/day
4. Know Direction 3 times/day
5. On to-hit roll of 20 damage caused (excluding +2 bonus) is healed in wielder
6. Wielder gains 60′ infravision when holding sickle sword
7. Cause fear to all within 10′ of the wielder when drawn
8. On to-hit roll of 1 cause 1d4 points of electrical damage to wielder
9. +2 reaction penalty when drawn
10. Requires save vs. magic to draw
11. Constantly emits low hum (-1 penalty to surprise rolls)
12. Specific monster gains +1 to-hit vs. wielder due to racial hatred of the sword

They decided to spend a day searching for hirelings as their previous trek into the jungle ended badly at the hands of goblin raiders. Being short of funds, they could only afford to hire two men at arms, an old worlder with leather, sword, and shield and a native tribesman* with scale mail, spear, and shield. I explained that the tribesman’s scale was in rough shape, and my daughter wondered if it might not be stolen. I did nothing to discourage the thought.

Rumors floating around town centered around a tower across the big river, off to the southeast. My son’s previous character, the ranger detailed here, had been to this tower but had told the boatmaster he had not been able to locate it. Despite the ranger’s story, the amount of loot he brought back out of the jungle had set the townsfolk a-talking. So the party decided to set out in search of this tower. They rented canoes and paddled across the river. The elf had trouble and was nearly washed out to sea, but after an hour of fierce effort they were all safely across and the canoes hidden.

After an afternoon of jungle trekking, they set camp for the night. Being as everyone was in good shape and the weather was good, they decided not to set a fire. All three PCs have infravision (simply good night vision in our game) and the three of them decided to take turns on watch. Shortly after the other bedded down, my daughter’s dwarf spotted a man and a mule loaded with packs and tools making their way southward. As the dwarf had surprise, he quietly watched as the man stopped and set up camp. Soon the man was snoring away. The dwarf let him sleep and waked the halfling druid for her watch.

The druid (played by my wife) cast a Speak With Animals and asked the mule what was going on. The mule complained about being awakened but informed her that they were headed toward the sea. Apparently the previous place had not worked out, though the halfling didn’t understand exactly what that meant. The halfling thanked the mule and let the strangers sleep. At the crack of dawn the man awoke, grumbled about his sore bones, and set off toward the south with his mule in tow.

The party continued on their way through the jungle, taking cover when a group of five elephants rumbled past. The old worlder man-at-arms, a newcomer to the new world, wanted to take one down for the ivory. Fortunately, both the elf and the halfling talked him out of trying. Soon they stumbled upon the tower they sought, but while they looked it over they were surprised by something in the trees.

An arrow flew into the tree next to the old-worlder’s head, and not waiting to see who was shooting at them, the party ran for the tower. A huge set of bronze double doors, one of them slightly ajar (from the ranger’s previous visit), was visible through the vines overgrowing the tower, and they fled inside. The native tribesman, slowed by his scale mail, lagged behind and was narrowly missed by another arrow. But soon they were all safe inside.

My son’s cleric/magic-user watched the door while the others checked out the inside of the tower. They spotted two sets of spiral stairs, one heading up and one heading down. They went up. The levels above showed signs of previous exploration, though when they spent a turn digging through a ruined laboratory the dwarf found a short sword in a drawer. He gave it to the native man-at-arms, who stuck it in his belt as a back-up weapon. Climbing another few levels, they encountered a clan of chattering monkeys. The druid once again made use of the Speak With Animals and brokered a truce with the monkeys. The party asked if the monkeys had ever been to the lower levels but were told they were afraid of “the scary bone monkeys” and never went down. (This refered to the undead monkey skeletons my son’s ranger ran into previously.) After some more exploration, they decided to head down the stairs that led below the surface.

They found themselves in a basement level with water pooled at one side of the room but otherwise empty. Afraid to enter the water, they searched the floor, walls, and staircase for secret door without luck. The dwarf even spent a turn trying to “disbelieve” the water without success. My son’s elf finally decided to walk into the water, which was only a few inches deep, and search the wall for secret doors. Lo and behold, he found one. A keystone trigger opened a sliding panel to reveal a 20′ corridor also flooded with a few inches of water. They went down the passage and, with some difficulty due to the swollen timbers, forced open the heavy wooden door at the far end.

They found a passageway heading left and right. Heading left, they entered a 20′ by 20′ room with a large glass mirror on the far wall and an arched doorway to the left leading out. A Detect Magic spell by the elf revealed two things: A) the mirror was not magical and B) the sword that the dwarf had found in the lab and lent to the native was. After making sure the native understood that the sword was just a loaner, they tried to check behind the mirror. They found nothing on the wall or on the back, but as one of them was a dwarf and another was a halfling, and the mirror was 6′ tall and 4′ wide, they were not able to do a very thorough job of it.

Heading through the passageway, they found themselves in another 20′ by 20′ room, this one occupied by a 5′ diameter stone pool of water. A 3′ pedestal in the middle of the pool was topped with a golden carved creepy-looking snake. The elf’s Detect Magic, just about to expire, showed that the snake and the water were both enchanted. He approached the water but when he got close found himself oddly terrified of the snake and could go no closer. He cast Protection From Evil and tried again. This time he was able to get to the edge of the pool. He tried to grab the snake but found that it was attached to the pedestal. So he took a drink of the water and apprehensively waited to see what would happen. Surprisingly, he found that he felt much stronger than he normally did and was told that he had experienced a +2 increase to his strength.

At this time I informed the players that our pre-determined time allotment was nearing its end and that any characters who had not returned to town by the end of the session would find themselves in terrible shape. Virtually no one survived out in the jungle on their own for very long. So the party decided to head back for town.

On the way, while camping after a day’s march, they were attacked by a group of pale-skinned vaguely human-looking humanoids. Four of the creatures were visible but others were heard in the trees. Unsure of what they were faced with, the druid cast an Entanglement spell and three were tangled tight. Five others were partially entangled and howled in rage, trying to fight their way through the branches and vines that kept them from their targets. The characters leaped into action, and soon all the attackers, hampered by the entanglement, were dispatched.

The rest of the trip to town was uneventful, though the river crossing once again found the dwarf’s canoe in trouble for a while. While they returned safely, they found no gold and are more destitute than before. They don’t know who was shooting at them outside the tower, and they don’t know what those nasty creatures who attacked them were. I’m also wondering if they’re going to be successful in keeping an eye on that native with the sword. We’ll see next time.

Line of the game: (After complaints about the great deal of time spent hiring men-at-arms, haggling over canoe rentals, and crossing the river) “Well, at least we’re still alive!” –by my daughter.

* I will have more information on our alternative experience/advancement system and the Jungle Minions up on the blog soon.

Snake-Men

No. Enc.: 1d8 (3d6)
Alignment: Chaotic
Movement: 90′ (30′)
Armor Class: 5 [14]
Hit Dice: 1
Attacks: 1
Damage: 1d6+1 or by weapon +1 (due to strength)
Save: F2
Morale: 9
Hoard Class: IV (XIX)

Snake-men are an ancient race of serpent people that inhabits the heavy, trackless jungle. Whether a cursed mix of human and snake or a part of the natural world, none can say. The more advanced groups of snake-men often inhabit ruins, and relics of what appears to be a lost snake-man civilization are to be found overgrown in the depths of the jungle. Snake-men appear as scaled humanoids, about five and a half feet tall with a tail. They have the heads of snakes, flicking tongues, and clawed hands.

Snake-man claws are formidable weapons, but more civilized tribes make use of weapons and favor curved scimitars and long bows. In melee, a to-hit roll of 20 indicates that the snake-man has also bitten his opponent for an extra 1d6 damage. Some snake-men are said to be poisonous.

Snake-men can be fighters, clerics, magic-users, and thieves. Snake-man women can also be druids and illusionists.

Snake-men are susceptible to all magic which affects normal snakes. Cold does double damage to them, but they get a +1 bonus to saves vs. fire or heat.

Half-Snakes: These appear to be some sort of snake-man/human crossbreed, and might more properly be called “quarter-snakes.” They appear to be more human than snake, and 10% of them can pass for human if they avoid close inspection. They can be assassins, fighters, and thieves.

Snake-Lords: The upper nobility of the snake-men consists of 20′ long snakes with a human-ish upper torso with arms. These fearsome creatures have 4-7 hit dice, venomous bites, and an innate ability to charm person if eye contact is made with a victim. They are 80% likely to be magic-users of 4th-9th level.

Snake people are a staple in so many genres of fiction that it’s tough to nail them down. They’ve been done to death many times over and yet never grow too stale. I wanted a simple archetype snake people for the Forbidden Jungle, and I think this will do the trick.

As our campaign develops, there will no doubt be some alterations to the details. I want something 1HD as we use the mook rules allowing fighters 1 attack per level against 1HD or lower creatures. But I also want a little extra bite (pardon the pun) to differentiate them from orcs. And the fact that classed snake-men will not be uncommon, serving as leaders, spies, and assassins, means that some of the villains will be tough foes, indeed. And there will always be exceptional examples of these beings, snake-men who do not fit any molds or conform to any standard rules.

Clerics use this power to perform magic by meditating and letting the energy flow through them, using metaphysical discipline to “plug in” to it and channel it for their purposes. Druids use similar methods, but rather than meditating and using mind over body to access the mystic force, they commune with nature and use their understanding of life and the natural world to draw upon it.

Magic-users and illusionists, on the other hand, use science, physics, and mathematical formulae to tap into this force, siphoning off a small amount and harnessing it so they can force it to perform magic for them. It is not a partnership with the force like clerics and druids employ, but rather a method of exploiting its power.

There are beings who call themselves gods and goddesses, and people worship these beings. But they are really no more than very powerful monsters. Clerics may be affiliated with a religion, but that religion is not the source of their power.

We’re more or less sticking with the three-alignment system, but we’re switching the terminology a little to fit in with our worldview:

Light Side: These beings are most often good and generally lawful. Though not necessarily kind or even law-abiding, they will stand together if the final battle comes. Light Side characters are opposed to the Dark Side but they usually do not fight it on a daily basis.

Dark Side: These are usually not terribly nice and often quite evil. Dark Side characters are not always opposed to the Light Side characters, but their views of the world and how it should be run are self-centered and generally chaotic.

Unaligned: These beings are not on either the Light Side or the Dark Side. This does not mean they are in the middle. They are simply not on anyone else’s side. If the final battle comes, most of them will hide until it’s over.

This system is very much in keeping with my view of clerics as mystic warriors, though we do not allow them to use edged weapons.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention that spell casters DO NOT need to pre-memorize spells. Time must be spent in study/meditation but any spell the caster knows can be cast at any time. The number of spells per day per level is unchanged, though a higher level slot can be used to cast a lower level spell if desired. To slightly offset the large advantage that this gives spell casters, casting the same spell more than once in a day requires a successful save vs. spells. Subsequent attempts are save at -2 for the third try, -4 for the fourth, and so on.

If the save fails, the spell does not work, but we haven’t decided if it uses up that slot for the day or not.

Also, clerics and druids have “known spells” just as magic-users and illusionists do, though they do not have spellbooks. Clerics simply have patterns in the Force that they recognize and meditate upon, while druids have rune-inscribed stones or pieces of wood that serve as their “spell book.” They usually carry these around on a leather loop.

Finding a new rune stone is how druids acquire new spells, or they can try to create their own rune stone for a spell they want to learn. Clerics learn new spells by finding them written down or are taught them by other clerics. I haven’t quite worked that out yet.

Then the Advanced Edition Companion came. By taking what I liked most about the 1st edition of AD&D and porting it over to the Labyrinth Lord engine, it was truly just about the Perfect Fantasy Game. A couple minor house rules, and we’d be set forever.

But a couple of my ideas for the White Box game have kept gnawing at me, particularly an alternative experience/advancement system, the possible use of ascending armor class, and the greatly simplified way that monsters are handled.

So I began work on my custom advancement system and decided that we’d give it a try in our Forbidden Jungle game. To simplify things for others, I decided to put together class charts listing advancements, and I tacked on an attack bonus to use with AAC. As most of the hard work was done, I decided to add in the rest of the class information into my level tables, as well, to replace the default pages in the Labyrinth Lord book. This way we could work in some of our house rules, such as d6 hit dice for thieves and magic-users getting bonus spells for high intelligence the same way that clerics do for high wisdom. We also tinkered a little with weapon damage values, so those would have to be updated as well.

It was somewhere in there that the trouble started. Because I was re-doing the tables, I began to tweak a few more things. Just here and there as needed. Thief skills needed a little kicker, and the read languages was just not quite right. Fighters needed a slight advantage in attack progression over rangers and paladins, and all three fighter classes needed to begin with better to-hit numbers than the other classes. We’re going to use retainers/henchmen heavily, and I decided to up the maximum number a couple for each point of charisma. And so on.

With my son’s help, we’ve pretty worked our way through the player’s section (except spells) and re-worked everything into our own customized Labyrinth Lord. I have a few reservations about this, as it means we’ll be playing a different game than everyone else who plays LL. But we’re trying to be careful as we go, making sure that none of our tweaks and re-interpretations are drastic.

I think we’ve succeeded so far, and a fourth-level fighter in our game will be analogous to a fourth-level fighter in anyone else’s game. We want our game to be considered “compatible” with other LL or old-school games. Just because our clerics are a bit different in the details than standard clerics won’t really matter. Just because our characters advance using a different system won’t invalidate what it means to be X level. There will be little fiddly bits that are at odds, but there already are in nearly everyone’s game that uses any house rules and I’m not concerned with a conflict over what a seventh-level thief’s pick pockets percentage is.

Now I’m doing monsters, building what is essentially a customized Labyrinth Lord version of the combined monster table from OD&D. I’m tweaking things as I go, with a significant change being the elimination of multiple attack routines and replacing them with a single attack. Many monsters are also undergoing a slight “de-powering” during this process, something which is related to our efforts to make the game slightly more survivable. But if a dungeon we build has “three bugbears” in it, it will be perfectly usable in standard campaigns by simply putting three standard bugbears in it.

This is all sort of a grand experiment. The fun has been upped by my son’s participation and the final product will certainly be the better for it. Will we finish it? Who knows? My ultimate end state would be a printed and coil-bound full version of our game for use in play. That’s a long ways off, as today we’ve got a bunch of tables with simple notes listed in between. But we’re moving ahead a little bit every day, and we’re playing as we go.

The Heart of Darkness
One Page Dungeon

As a side note, I’ve made several significant changes to this one-pager as we’ve begun playing. The most immediately noticeable is the scale of 15 miles per hex. My plan had been to map things out using 1-league (3 mile) sub-hexes, with 1-mile detail hexes only when/where necessary. However, I decided to go with an “everything conforms to hex sides” plan but was stuck with river hexes three miles wide. So I decided to go back to the good old “5 miles per large scale hex” scale, making the area covered by the one-page map only a third as big. I think, as it’s all heavy jungle, that it will still provide far more than enough territory for the low- and mid-level adventuring this eastern section of the Forbidden Jungle is intended for.

Regions Sizes in a setting
Great summary of guidelines about sizing various realms on a fantasy map.

Touch of Pain
Another Bat creation. Nice alternative to shocking grasp. I’d make it 1st-level, personally.

Random Ruins
“No proper ocher wasteland or purple fungus forest would be complete without a smattering of bizarre monuments, relics, and ruins.” Developed for sword & planet but very usable just about anywhere.

OD&D+ Damage & Theory
I love the d6 and simplified monster attack/damage in the original. I will be adapting my LL game to something similar if I can work out a system that I like.

Fudge You
Either roll the dice or don’t roll the dice. But don’t pretend to roll the dice.

Fiend Folio
The FF seems to attract a lot of hate and I can’t really understand why. Plus, I had totally forgotten about a couple of those totally awesome full-page art pieces.

What Killed the Dinosaurs
No, it wasn’t Chuck Norris.

UPDATE: Hmm. I seem to have lost more content on this site than on some other sites that I run which are hosted on the same server at my hosting provider. I’m not sure if it will be able to be restored from my own back-ups or not.

ANOTHER UPDATE: I think I’ve got everything here more or less restored except for the post I accidentally published with some notes about the Forbidden Jungle. That wasn’t supposed to see the light of day (at least in that format) and was only the beginning of a new idea dump for my own use.

His ranger was dismayed to discover that the trolls are keeping a closer eye on their hoard now that he’s stolen some of it while they were away from their lair, but was excited to check out a little more of the tower he’s been exploring and managed to get back to town with another ivory tusk. Another NPC bit the dust, this time a thief who fell victim to the undead monkeys within the tower when the characters failed to take sufficient precautions.

That evening my wife and daughter rolled up PCs and we had our third-ever whole-family game. The two new PCs joined my son’s ranger and yet another NPC and headed into the wild. After some tense moments when they became disoriented in the trackless jungle, they managed to find their way back toward town and drove off some jungle goblin raiders near town. Unfortunately, the next morning they ran into more goblins and were wiped out.

The first time we all played together, the party was captured out by goblins. The second session we all played together was a successful rescue mission with new PCs. And now the third time was a TPK. Though I want the threat of danger to be very real and want 1st-level characters to be justifiably frail, the death rate is discouraging. My son, in particular, was pretty upset about losing the ranger that had done so well in the first two sessions.

He and I have discussed this extensively and we are going to be making a few tweaks to improve the survivability of PCs. I’m going to up the binding of wounds from 1d4-1 hit points per battle to 1d6, and the overnight healing is going to be upped to 1d6 hit points as well. I think this is in keeping with the sword & sorcery vibe I’m going for. Battles are savage and death is not uncommon, but soon the characters are back into the thick of it. So we’re going to give it a try.

I’ve got another change, much more significant, in mind as well, but I want to think on it a bit. The goal is to increase survivability at the first couple levels without altering game balance or making mid-level characters TOO powerful. I also want the risk of PC death to remain significant, and even a threat to well-played characters. It’s a fine line and one that I think a lot of people have trouble with.

The hope had been to have a few of my 15-year-old son’s friends over for a night of gaming, but short notice and busy schedules meant that no one else could make it for a Friday night game. Rather than hold off, I went ahead and launched things with a one-on-one session with my son’s latest PC, a half-elf ranger rolled up using Labyrinth Lord’s Advanced Edition Companion. We hadn’t played for months, and I was worried that launching a major campaign with only one player was going to be a let-down. Instead, it was probably the best single session I’ve ever played with my son and one of the more memorable in my whole gaming career. For four hours at our table, not only did the Forbidden Jungle at last come to life, but my son braved the treacherous place with a character class he had never played or seen played before. And he rocked.

I don’t know how everyone feels about lengthy session write-ups. I know that I don’t always read all of them on other sites all the time, but I’m going to go into a bit of detail on this one. If the campaign takes off and we get a number of regular players, I’ll be getting a wiki going (something I’ve never done before) and this sort of stuff, hopefully written by players, will go there. But I really enjoyed this and want to give it the royal treatment. So read on if you dare.

Heart of Darkness: The Forbidden Jungle
Session 1, Starting on Jan 6, Year 783 of Gann

The PC, a half-elven ranger named Brundo (S11 I12 W13 D10 C17 Ch8) and an NPC half-orc cleric called Gushgar (S13 I9 W11 D10 C11 Ch9) arrived by ship in the fortified town of Shadella on the mouth of a huge river snaking up into a dark and mysterious continent. The town is held by a count and serves hunters, explorers, and prospectors who have come to this new world in the hope of finding a new life out of reach in the decadent society of the old world. They learn that ivory is main treasure to be found and that ship loads of it return regularly to the king of Gann. They gather rumors, learning that:

1. A hunter led a large expedition up a narrow side river into an inland swamp some miles north and never returned. A week later a porter, apparently the lone survivor, staggered into town before expiring.
2. Legend tells of a tower across the river to the southeast that has a huge labyrinth below. No one knows anyone who has actually seen this tower.
3. In the hills to the northwest, there is a hill called Wolf Rock that apparently has ruins filled with treasure.

Brundo decided that the tower to the southeast sounded the best and looked into renting a canoe to cross the river. He had only a few silvers to his name, though, so Gushgar had to pay the 1gp/day rental. They crossed the river and hid the canoe on the far bank.

Even with a ranger leading, they had trouble staying on track through the jungle. Though they didn’t know it, they spent several days headed slightly off-course and ended up a long ways from anything. Attempting to spot the tower, Brundo climbed a tree just in time to see a herd of elephants approaching. He considered attacking one, but decided (wisely) that his arrows would be of little use.

Trying to track their own path back, Brundo lost the way and they ended up running into more elephants the next day. Again hesitating to attack, they continued to try to find their way back while keeping an eye out for the tower. They surprised a lone prospector with a mule loaded down with gear, so Brundo told the half-orc to stay hidden while he approached. Unfortunately, the ranger’s low charisma put the prospector on his guard and he didn’t give much information other than the general direction back toward town. An hour later, though, Brundo climbed another tree and somehow spotted the tower a mile off. They hurried toward it and found it 50′ in diameter, close to 90′ tall, and over grown by thick vines. Huge bronze doors depicting elephants were locked tight and it was getting late, so they set up camp nearby.

The next morning they climbed the vines on the tower, but had troubles making it to the top safely. Several falls were mitigated by the fact that they were belaying each other, and after much effort they reached the flat roof to discover a rusty flag pole and an iron spiral stair leading down.

Heading down, they reached a floor filled with jungle debris and small snakes and animals. Another spiral stair led further down, so they took it. It led to another level, this one occupied by a number of monkeys. The ranger shot at one with his bow and missed, but his attack enraged the monkeys and they swarmed to the attack. At first chuckling about it, the two adventurers soon found themselves overwhelmed and the cleric badly injured. Only a light spell saved them, as the monkeys failed a morale check and ran screeching for cover from its sudden brilliance. The two limped down another spiral stair to the next floor below.

The stairs leading down were rusty and gave way, spilling the cleric and knocking him out cold. After binding his wounds, Brundo helped him back to the roof and went down into the jungle to hunt. Their food was getting low, but he managed to bring down some game and return with fresh meat. They camped on the roof of the tower after a satisfying meal.

Taking a torch to keep the monkeys at bay, the two re-entered the tower the next morning and proceeded carefully down the rusted staircase, using a rope the ranger rigged to keep from falling again. That floor was empty except for another staircase, so they continued down.

The next level was filled with tables and workbenches covered with all sorts of laboratory equipment, most of it wrecked and ruined. After twenty fruitless minutes searching for something valuable, they took yet another spiral stair downward. The next level contained a locked iron box against one wall, and the ranger investigated. As he did, a cobra rose up from behind the box and spit poison at him. Only his ranger ability to avoid surprise saved him, and he dodged the venom. Drawing his bow, he and the snake began exchanging fire while the cleric reluctantly edged closer to finish it off with his morningstar. Unable to open the box, they proceeded down the next spiral staircase.

This floor contained a number of small skeletons. At first thinking they were goblins, they soon realized that they were the bones of monkeys. When they approached them, the skeletons rose up and moved to attack. The cleric, though, successfully turned all of them. Three headed down some more stairs to the level below while the three others went up the stairs to the levels above. Shortly, the sounds of screaming an yelling monkeys could be heard drifting down from above. The two continued down.

Another monkey skeleton lay on the floor of the level below, and as the ranger approached cautiously he noticed something out of the corner of his eye. Dodging at the last moment, he just missed being bitten by a giant crab spider that had been lurking on the ceiling above. In the fight, however, the ranger was bitten twice and failed his saving throw. Dispatching the creature, the ranger could feel the venom in his veins and began binding his wounds. When that failed to stem the poison, he remembered that he had some spiderwort herb and, lacking any alternative, ate some. With only minutes to live, his condition stabilized (he made a new save with a -2 modifier) but was left with scores of only 3 in strength, dexterity, and constitution.

The cleric helped him to the roof. On the way they found the monkeys licking their wounds after fighting the three undead monkey skeletons. The cleric set him up a place to rest, then went down to scavenge for food. He headed north but did not return by nightfall. Too weak to do much, the ranger worried after his comrade and awaited his return. By dawn, the Brundo was sure that something terrible had happened.

All that day, his strength barely improving, the ranger waited but Gushgar did not return. The next morning, he climbed down and tried to track Gushgar but lost the trail less than a mile from the tower. Attempting to hunt while searching brought no meat, but he spotted some natives either hunting or patrolling. One of the tribesmen rode on the back of an elephant. Not recognizing their tribe or their language, Brundo stayed hidden and let them pass. Low on food and wondering what had happened to his friend, he headed back toward the tower.

On the way he surprised four trolls. Smartly staying hidden, he tried to creep away but snapped a twig. Not waiting to see if the trolls heard, he fled. Though it was getting close to dark, Brundo worried that the trolls had captured Gushgar so he returned to where he had observed them, picked up their trail, and began tracking them. He came upon an elephant carcass obviously slaughtered and eaten by the trolls, then tracked them back to their lair between some huge rocks. He returned to the elephant carcass, took one of the tusks, and went back to the tower.

The next morning he headed out to hunt but ran into a group of tribal hunters. Though he couldn’t speak their language and they didn’t speak common, they recognized each other as fellow hunters and parted with smiles. That afternoon he scored a kill and returned with several days’ worth of meat. But still no sign of the half-orc cleric. A monkey, however, had come up to the roof and was rummaging through his stuff. Scared off, it jumped into a nearby tree and chattered at him all night long. The next morning he took a shot at it and missed, but at least shut it up for a while.

He returned to the troll lair and, finding them not at home, went in. Digging around with a spade he had, he found a huge collection of coins, gems, and jewelry. Taking some of the choice items first, he made three trips lugging gold back to the tower.

The next day he went hunting again and ran into more elephants. Giving them a pass, came back empty-handed. Still no Gushgar.

After another night, he went out for another hunt and ran into four brigands. Seeing that he was alone, they spread out and prepared to move in on him. As he prepared to flee, he noticed that one of the men was using Gushgar’s shield. Figuring his friend was dead, he ran and easily managed to evade the brigands. Taking one elephant tusk and all the gold he could carry, he set out for the river.

After two more days of struggling through the jungle with his load, he happened on the river not far from where they had hidden the canoe. Loading his loot in, he paddled across and pulled into town. The boat master was shocked to see him alive, thinking that he was out a boat due to another adventurer who went off into the jungle to be killed. Seeing the amount of loot in the canoe, the man started to ask questions. Brundo paid him a small bribe to shut up about it and claimed that he had not been able to find the tower. He said that Gushgar had been slain battling a troll, but that he had managed to kill it himself. The boat master was impressed. Taking the tusk to the count’s men, he got 90gp for the 100gp tusk and count got his 10%.

End of session.