The Abandoned Tower - Part 1 - Labyrinth Lord Solo Adventure

This week's post is a solo session recap, once again with my Labyrinth Lord character, Darien the Elf. It is the same adventure I used in my first attempt at solo OSR, where I used Basic Fantasy RPG as the system, and it's contained in Chris Gonnerman's The Role-playing Game Primer and Old School Playbook, and uses Black Streams: Solo Heroes to play ann adventure as a single, stronger character to keep it easier but balanced.
This is the recap of the first session of this adventure, because completing it took me six sessions, the first being on February 28th and the last just a few days ago, on May 28th - being an adult with multiple hobbies and a wedding and honeymoon to arrange apparently doesn't go well with setting time aside for solo gaming. Anyway, enjoy!

 


THE ABANDONED TOWER

 Part 1  

Some time after rescuing Fei-lan, Darien hears while on his journey about an abandoned tower which is rumored to hold treasure in the dungeons beneath. A Dwarf priest recently went to explore it, but never returned. Darien decides to investigate it.
After leaving some of his non-essential equipment with the hireling he recently hired, a Human named Miles, he reaches the tower, which is little more than a shell, but it doesn't take long for him to find a staircase descending into darkness. He draws his sword and starts to descend it, while holding a torch in his right hand (he's a lefty). [1-2 on 1d20 to notice the tripwire: 11, no, 1-4 on 1d6 to trigger it: 1, yes]. He doesn't notice triggering a very thin tripwire on his way down, but the creatures who set it up do.
Darien reaches the bottom of the stairs, where he finds a closed door. It looks recently repaired, that's suspicious. He plants the torch in the ground for a moment and tries to open it: it's not locked, and as soon as he opens it he finds himself in front of six monstrous little manlike creatures with pointed ears and sharp pointed noses, who are pointing even sharper pointed spears at him. [Surprise: 1, not good] Darien's instinct tells him to close the door and prepare to fight, but the little creatures - which he recognizes as goblins - are faster; luckily the doorframe is quite narrow, so despite the bigger one in the back barking what sounds like orders, only one of them can attack him [needs a 15: 15! 1d6 for damage: 5 = 1 damage] and manages to wound him. [Initiative: PC: 4+1 / Goblins: 1]
With a scream Darien tries to return the favor to that goblin [needs a 13: 13, really? 1d8 for damage: 5 = 1 HD of damage, fray die: 2 = 1 HD of damage] and immediately lunges his sword in its chest, then immediately grabs its spear and throws it at a second one, impaling it on the spot. [Morale check: 7, exactly their value, so they keep fighting]. The bigger one keeps barking orders, and two of the remaining goblins seem ready to avenge their fallen companions [Init.: PC: 5+1 / Goblins: 6, draw], and they charge just as Darien does the same [PC attack: 17, damage: 1 = no damage, fray die: 1 = no damage / Goblins: 12 & 5, both miss]: he's able to dodge both spears, but his sword bounces on their armor [Init.: PC: 6+1 / Goblins: 3], not injuring them but leaving them open to Darien's next attack [5, miss, fray: 4 = 1 damage], which is a bit too high, but he's able to slash one of them on the backswing. [Half remaining, morale check = 9, success]. The other goblin tries to pierce through Darien's defenses with his spear [17, hit, damage 5 = 1] and manages to stab him near the hip. [Init. PC: 2+1 / Goblin: 5]
The other remaining smaller goblin closes the gap between him and Darien, and both attack him at the same time [9 & 4], but in their excitement they clash their spears, blocking each other's attack. [PC att: 20!, damage: 5 = 1, fray: 4 = 1] Darien uses his free hand to push both spears down, then focuses his strength on his left arm, decapitating both goblins in a single swing! The goblin leader gnarls at him [Morale check: 9, success], ready to fight until his last breath. [Init.: PC: 6+1 / Goblin: 2] 
The Elf now wants to end this battle and swings his longsword [9, miss, no fray die on a 2 HD enemy], but his opponent parries it and swings back at him [needs a 14: 14!, damage 1d6+1: 3 = 1 damage], hitting his arm. [Init.: PC: 4+1 / Goblin: 1]
The injuries pile up, but Darien grits his teeth and [PC attack: 16, damage: 5 =1] returns the favor, hitting the goblin's arm. [Init.: PC: 5+1 / Goblin: 1][PC attack: 16, damage: 7 = 2] Muttering a curse in Elvish, Darien plunges his sword in his enemy's stomach and sees the life escaping its eyes.
All is silent now. Darien goes back to get his torch and takes a moment to catch his breath and bind his wounds [recovering 2 of the 3 HP just lost]; while doing so, he notices in a corner the half-eaten remains of what looks like a Dwarf. A priest, judging by the holy symbol laying on the ground next to it. He whispers a few words, asking this poor soul's deity to bring him peace, then prepares to continue.

Darien's attempt has already outlasted Gorg's. In the future I'll post more of his adventures.

This is all for this week, see you next Sunday for my next post!

May your dice never betray you,
Kirhon

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Fellow Manifesto

Image
A while ago I was watching  this video  about Sword World, the TTRPG that was created in Japan when TSR refused to let them publish Replays (basically their version of Session Reports) with their official names - specifically for the campaign that then became known as Record of Lodoss War, a fascinating story - but one thing that stood out to me of the system was the concept of Fellows, which is what this post is about. But what are Fellows? To learn more about them I found the unofficial English translation of the game (easily found on Reddit,  here ). I'll use that as a reference, but I'll modify it a bit to make it work with OSR games. In short, to quote the Rulebook: Fellows are characters who assist the PCs in their adventures. Fellows are available on social media and in fan magazines. Players select those they wish to take with them on their adventures and have them travel along. So they are basically NPC versions of PCs that people make available online, so t...
Read more

Languages in a recently dead Empire

This week's post is directly inspired by  this post  from Prismatic Wasteland, one of the best TTRPG blogs I know. Go give it a read, it's worth it. In short, that post wonders why D&D (and most TTRPGs derived from it) have a "Common tongue" that everyone seems to know - even though in 1974's OD&D non-human NPCs only had a 20% chance of knowing Common, but let's not nitpick - and most non-human species have their own language, shared between all members, no matter how far in the world (or multiverse, in some cases) they are spread, when that was not usually the case in the real world's Middle Age, which D&D is obviously inspired by. It then gives 3 possible solutions for this discrepancy: Ignoring it altogether, to avoid adding complications to the game, but they don't like this solution and neither do I;  Gamifying it, making it so that PCs don't start with a list of known languages, but every time they encounter a new one an...
Read more

Let's create a monster in Cairn 2e!

Image
This week I'll go back to Cairn 2e after creating a PC for it a few weeks ago . This time I'll follow the procedure presented in Cairn 2e's Warden's Guide  to create a monster in just a few simple steps, strating by (you guessed it) rolling on some random tables, in the best OSR tradition.   Let's start with the Monster Appearance  table, which asks us to roll a d20 twice, once for  Physique  and once for  Feature : Physique : 5, Eyeless ; Feature : 20,  Wings. So it's some form of bat.   Next, we have the  Monster Traits  table, for  Quirk  and  Weakness : Quirk : 6, Draws symbols ;  Weakness : 12,  Music . Ok, I'm getting ideas. Maybe it's some kind of familiar, drawing symbols on preys for its master, but music distracts it, preventing it from following orders? Not sure yet. The third table we roll on is  Monster Attacks , for  Type  and  Critical Damage . Type : 8, Shoots ; Critical Damage...
Read more