Charles Plemons' Blog

Game summary for December 22, 2015, Savage! campaign, for Phoenix Gaming Club. Session included: Blazing Sun (Kau Human Sage played by Kaliegh Belda), Night Watcher (Ogre Martial Artist played by Casey Scruggs), Singing Mammoth (Elf Soldier played by Taylor Averdick), Standing Bison (Giant Soldier played by Peyton Harmon), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache Human Priest played by Chris Harmon). Game Master for this session was Charles Plemons.

Beyond the doorway, the team faced off against Tocatlpilli and his Keeper warriors. Night Watcher got his macuahuitl stuck in the floor, and Singing Mammoth nearly shot him with an arrow. Tocatlpilli hurled numerous curses at the team, but they easily shrugged off the effects. It did not take long for the team to take out the warriors and square off against Tocatlpilli on a swinging bridge over a great abyss. Wolf Spirit’s wolf managed to trip the high priest, and Standing Bison hurled him off the bridge to his doom!

The group went into the next room where they were confronted with a riddle guarding two stone boxes. In one was the Dawn Seal fragment, in the other “death.” The team debated the riddle and eventually made their choice: they chose wisely! The group seized the fragment as the ceiling opened to reveal a massive gray widow spider! The group found their edged weapons of limited benefit against its chitinous exoskeleton, but Standing Bison and Night Watcher were able to do a lot of bashing damage to it. Eventually, they squashed the creature.

The group took the fragment and despite being led astray repeatedly by Standing Bison, they found their way out of Tocatlmayana. They learned their horses had been stolen, and they tracked down a group of gnolls with their mounts. After lots of posturing, and a bit of bribery, they secured their mounts and left. Along the route, they had to avoid the Nightmare Company raptor scouts, which they did masterfully.

Once home, they went through an initiation ritual in celebration to mark their full acceptance into the tribe. The grueling ritual left Wolf Spirit battered, but the team prevailed. After the celebration, they were tasked by Rides-the-Moon, elder and vidutana of the tribe, to travel to the Swamps of Woe and the Cueyatlahtli (cue-yacht-el-ah-tee) temple to retrieve the next fragment. They also learned Laughing Horse’s daughter had run off with several braves to try and get the fragment themselves and not returned. With nothing else to leverage, Laughing Horse offered his daughter in marriage if someone will return her safely. Rides-the-Moon agreed to perform a union ceremony but warned the fragment is far more important than the life of missing Runs-with-Deer.

Game summary for December 15, 2015, Savage! campaign, for Phoenix Gaming Club. Session included: Blazing Sun (Kau Human Sage played by Kaliegh Belda), Night Watcher (Ogre Martial Artist played by Casey Scruggs), Singing Mammoth (Elf Soldier played by Taylor Averdick), Standing Bison (Giant Soldier played by Peyton Harmon), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache Human Priest played by Chris Harmon). Game Master for this session was Charles Plemons.

The team followed the tattered map and advanced toward the first switch. Most of the team filed into the hallway with Singing Mammoth hanging back in the main room. Throwing the switch raised a platform into the room occupied by a great lasher spider! It sprayed webbing at Singing Mammoth who dodged it and then backed right into it. The team came running down the hallway, and Night Watcher got stuck unable to maneuver through the crowd. Standing Bison hit the creature, as did Wolf Spirit and his wolf. A few arrows sank in from Singing Mammoth, but it was the amazing blow by Blazing Sun that laid it low.

Next the team went down the middle hallway and threw the next lever. Doing so shocked Blazing Sun with a jolt of electricity. The ceiling in the main room rolled away, and a massive margoyle flew into the room to attack! The creature proved challenging to fight due to its ability to blend when motionless, but several of the team landed solid blows. Finally, Wolf Spirit’s wolf tripped it into the blazing coal pits where it died in flames.

The group advanced down the third hallway where Wolf Spirit and Blazing Sun plunged into a pit trap. They climbed out, and Standing Bison rushed in and fell in. The group threw the next switch and then went to the final switch. Once thrown, the barred doorway at the end of the hallway slid open!

Game summary for December 8, 2015, Savage! campaign, for Phoenix Gaming Club. Session included: Blazing Sun (Kau Human Sage played by Kaliegh Belda), Singing Mammoth (Elf Soldier played by Taylor Averdick), Spirit Walker (Naci Human Assassin played by Andrew Renfrow), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache Human Priest played by Chris Harmon). Game Master for this session was Charles Plemons.

The party opened the next door and encountered an enormous fearsome ettin! Spirit Walker moved in and got bloodied by the creature’s spiked war club. The team closed in, but the brute unleashed a twin-headed scream that shook the team to its core. Several fled in terror. Singing Mammoth unleashed a barrage of arrows, and the same Kompache scout that assisted them earlier arrived and attacked! Some of the team shook off their fear and returned while Spirit Walker tried to keep from bleeding to death. At last, Singing Mammoth’s arrow pieced one of the skulls and killed the creature.

The team found it guarded a room with a paneled wall. After some investigation, they discovered the panels moved like a puzzle or riddle. Blazing Sun had no trouble figuring out the combination and unlocked a hidden panel! Within was a worn, tattered old map which the group assumes leads to the Dawn Seal fragment.

Arriving at the map location, the group engaged a mob of Keepers of the Gate along with their enslaved octorok guardians. A quick scuffle ensued, but the team mopped up the enemies very quickly. Now, they stand before a trio of doors and have a map to consult.

Game summary for December 1, 2015, Savage! campaign, for Phoenix Gaming Club. Session included: Blazing Sun (Kau Human Sage played by Kaliegh Belda), Singing Mammoth (Elf Soldier played by Taylor Averdick), Standing Bison (Giant Soldier played by Peyton Harmon), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache Human Priest played by Chris Harmon). Game Master for this session was Charles Plemons.

The team proceeded down a hallway where Standing Bison sprung a spiked floor trap! He suffered minor injuries but pressed on. They went into another room and found four Keepers of the Gate who attacked with macuahuitls. It didn’t take long to cut down the foes and head down a flight of stairs.

At the bottom, they discovered a narrow hallway leading into a room guarded by numerous blue tektites! The leaping creatures slammed into Wolf Spirit and hurt him badly. In their wild frenzy, they accidentally killed one of their own! Soon the team was able to make headway as Singing Mammoth picked off some from the back and the team was able to advance on the rest.

Next the group found themselves trapped in a room with a mathematical riddle inscribed on the walls. Overhead a spiked ceiling loomed ominously promising a horrendous death if they chose the wrong answer and depressed the wrong stone. After some debate the party made a choice… and found the right pressure plate to open the doors!

From the other side of the door, a pack of hell hounds burst through and breathed fire all around. Fortunately, many of the team have armor providing some protection against fire. So outfitted, the group had little trouble dispatching most of the hounds. At the last moment, a wandering Kompache scout wandered in and killed the last hound before disappearing from whence he came. Just who was that guy?

Game summary for November 24, 2015, Savage! campaign, for Phoenix Gaming Club. Session included: Night Watcher (Ogre Martial Artist played by Casey Scruggs), Spirit Walker (Naci Human Assassin played by Andrew Renfrow), Standing Bison (Giant Soldier played by Peyton Harmon), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache Human Priest played by Chris Harmon). Game Master for this session was Charles Plemons.

The crept through Tocatlmayana avoiding patrols as best they could. They captured a Keeper and interrogated him. They learned of a tlamacazqui (lama-cause-kwee; a high priest) named Tocatlpilli who has offered a bounty of 10 slaves for the heads of the party! The team made their way through trapped corridors and avoiding falling boulders. Eventually, they rescued a slave boy named Hopping Dog and earned his trust. He informed them he has seen Tocatlpilli with a map depicting a sequence of levers to pull to open a secret chamber. However, the map is always guarded by a two-headed ogre! The group came to a ravine where they had to convince a pack of giant spider steeds to allow them to ride in precariously attached saddles to the other side!

On the far side, they entered a room and were soon attacked by a massive gray widow spider! Spirit Walker charged in and was nearly killed in a single blow! Wolf Spirit’s wolf companion dragged him to safety as the team fell in around the spider. Standing Bison landed a crushing blow, and Night Watcher reached in and ripped off its head!

Looking around the room, they found a lever, which Wolf Spirit flipped. It opened an overhead hatch that dropped a cobalt jelly onto the team! Its acidic touch burned, but it was quickly taken down. As the group proceeded through a doorway, a mob of ettercaps attacked! The team came back through and brought the fight to them. In short order, the spider men lay dead and twitching.

Game summary for November 17, 2015, Savage! campaign; PCs included Blazing Sun (Kau human sage), Singing Mammoth (elf soldier), Standing Bison (giant soldier), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache human priest).

The party followed Paqpopoca’s directions and found Tocatlmayana. Within they became trapped in a large mural-lined chamber filling with poison gas! They had to discover the correct combination of powders to pour into an altar to stop the trap. Fortunately, Blazing Sun speaks (but does not read) Tlacatecollehi and was able to puzzle through a word or two on the walls to help figure out the puzzle. The team struggled a bit and activated a fireball trap and sprung a pit trap in their efforts, but soon they were able to get free of the chamber.

The group found themselves in a large room with two additional exits. Going through one, the team fought against a vicious ettercap! The spider creature tried to poison Blazing Sun but ended up being skewered by Wolf Spirit. They found a wooden lever on the far side of a coal pit behind iron bars. They tried to use a rope to pull the lever and ended up singeing the rope instead. They went back through the other doorway and were attacked by a swarm of spiders. A quick but bloody battle ensued and no one was poisoned by the spiders.

The room contained a second lever, and pulling it raised the iron bars back in the previous room. The team went back used water from a fountain to quench the burning coals! They then pulled that lever and opened a secret passage guarded by a macuahaitl-wielding ogre! The creature bloodied Standing Bison but could not withstand the team’s onslaught of attacks. Beyond the slain ogre stood a door deeper into the complex.

Game summary for November 10, 2015, Savage! campaign; PCs included Blazing Sun (Kau human sage), Night Watcher (ogre martial artist), Singing Mammoth (elf soldier), Standing Bison (giant soldier), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache human priest).

The team made plans to ambush Paqpopoca and set a snare trap. They hid among the coverage and awaiting the approach. A Keeper warrior sprung the trap, but the knot failed! The party did have a surprise round though, and they tore into the warriors. Standing Bison clubbed soldiers viciously while Wolf Spirit scared off the enemy mounts. Blazing Sun rushed in to engage alongside Night Watcher as Singing Mammoth peppered the battlefield with arrows. The masked Keeper the party assumed to be Paqpopoca tried to flee, and Singing Mammoth fired and arrow at him. It lodged in the throat causing a quick, bloody, thrashing death. Night Watcher and a Keeper wounded each other grievously with macuahuitls, but the man was no match for the party’s combined might.

In the aftermath, the group discovered the masked figure was not Paqpopoca but a young lass! They found a Keeper who was mortally injured but capable of speech. The group learned they had killed Tepecot, Paqpopoca’s daughter! Realizing they could not get the information they needed here, the team traveled to the dreaded City of Bones!

Under the cover of darkness, the group crept in and found the home of the merchant. They interrogated him and found the location of Tocatlmayana. To make sure no one followed, they put an end to the miserable Paqpopoca and slipped back over the city walls to head toward the fearsome dungeon!

Game summary for October 20, 2015, Savage! campaign; PCs included Blazing Sun (Kau human sage), Night Watcher (ogre martial artist), Singing Mammoth (elf soldier), Standing Bison (giant soldier), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache human priest).

The group spent 8 hours trying to forage for food and ended up being spotted by a scout for the Nightmare Company. They fled into the night and came across a pack of wolves, led by a fearsome vargr, that had recently killed a bison. They engaged the wolves with quickly, with Wolf Spirit getting several on him quickly as Singing Mammoth’s arrows whistled through the air. Standing Bison and Blazing Sun moved against the vargr while Night Watcher came up the middle. The smaller pack wolves were brought down quickly, but the tough vargr shook off some devastating blows to remain in the fight a bit longer.

The team continued their journey until they reached the Speaking Lion Ravine. A great rope bridge spread out over the shallow ravine, and as the team moved through, a pack of slavering gnolls emerged! The beasts whirled bolas and swing great stone-bladed axes. Their shaman chanted ghula-tainted words of power and summoned magic of fiery destruction. The team split up to fight the gnolls on two sides and make great progress. Disaster struck the gnoll shaman as he ignited himself on fire with a miscast spell. The team quickly took down the other gnolls while Night Watcher and Standing Bison squared off against the burning shaman. With a vicious stroke, Night Watcher cut down the shaman in a shower of blood. The team searched the bodies and began discussing how to prepare for Paqpopoca’s caravan.

Game summary for October 13, 2015, Savage! campaign; PCs included Blazing Sun (Kau human sage), Singing Mammoth (elf soldier), Spirit Walker (Naci human assassin), Standing Bison (giant soldier), and Wolf Spirit (Kompache human priest).

The campaign began in the tent of tribe vidutana, Rides-the-Moon:

The sweet smell of tioye lingers in the whirling smoke filling the tent. The long feathered pipe has been passed about and all have drawn deep from the invigorating leaves burning in the bowl. A crackling fire lends its heat to the night as its smoke mingles with that of the pipe and drifts through the opening above. More fires burn outside, and the shadows of many harii, champions of the People, waiver on the stretched skins of the tent wall.

Your mentor and war leader, Laughing Horse, sits cross-legged on the ground, his eyes sharp. The pelt of a great jaguar is draped over his shoulders, and he slowly twirls his coup stick, its many trophies dangling, around in his hand. Next to him sits a man whose long hair has turned silvery gray, and deep lines etch his face. Rides-the-Moon, respected elder and vidutana, finishes a hymn of thanks to the Great Ancestors and to Sun and Earth. The flickering light dances along the resplendent feathers adorning his headdress.

He regards each of you through the smoky night air. The faint crackling fire somehow seems deafening within the tent. Each crack and pop makes you start with pent up energy and nervousness. The elder at last speaks. “So young, and we have lost so many. Your training ends early. The Tribes call you to take up the mantle of the harii. Three days ago, our scouts watched as the Dawning Eagles were ridden down by Nemtlac and his Nightmare Company. The Eagles’ horses were swift but no match for the crimson raptors of Nemtlac’s riders. They were captured or killed with none escaping. The Nightmare Company made camp and they… they ate the captives one by one. The Dawning Eagles were the last band we can spare in this region. The Tribes must move once more, but our work, your work, is not done.”

The Mecatl elder pauses to let the fate of the Dawning Eagles sink in. These men were mighty warriors, some even friends. Such a dishonorable death at the hands of one of the Taken fills you with sadness and smoldering rage. Rides-the-Moon continues, “Children, you know the power of the Keepers of the Gate and their masters the ghula. Our People are hunted and dying before their onslaught. But there is hope. Long ago, our Father Sun and the Great Ancestors created a barrier called the Dawn Seal. Through trickery, Uncle Moon found and shattered the seal and fathered the ghula. They are not of this world and have no claim to it. If the Dawn Seal could be reassembled, the power of Father Sun may yet drive the ghula and their dark medicine from our Mother Earth.”

Again, Rides-the-Moon pauses. A strange sensation washes over you. After a moment you realize it is an emotion you have never felt. Hope. If what the vidutana speaks is truth, there could be a way to break the power of the Keepers of the Gate and banish the ghula! The elder puffs the tioye once more before continuing, “The lands of Tuwa can be cleansed, but it is no small thing to assemble the fragments of the Dawn Seal. It is said the Keepers of the Gate have scattered its pieces and set fearsome guardians over them. It is also said one of the fragments may be hidden near here. Long ago, the Tocatl Order, a group of spider-loving Keepers, was entrusted with one such fragment. They took it to a place they called Tocatlmayana, a labyrinth beneath the earth filled with spiders and other horrors.”

“Finding Tocatlmayana may be the most important task before the Free Tribes, and I would task it to the Dawning Eagles. My Children, I have no choice but to hand this task to you. You are capable but untested, and I pray that Wakanachi the Peacemaker watch over you. There is one of the Taken, a man named Paqpopoca, who was once a member of the Tocatl. He now grows fat and rich in the City of Bones and has recently purchased one of the Keeper mines. Our spies tell us even now he travels toward his new purchase and is thus exposed. His trek will take him through the Speaking Lion Ravine which is a day’s travel from here. He will arrive within two days. Children, you must capture Paqpopoca and learn from him the location of Tocatlmayana. Then, you must get word of the location to our scouts while making haste to infiltrate the complex to find the Dawn Seal. The fate of all Tuwa and the Free People rests solely in your hands. Laughing Horse has trained you the best he can, and you have the greatest equipment we have. You must strike this blow against the children of Moon and bring hope back to us all.”

“Now go, ride swift under the cover of night, and be watchful for Nemtlac and the Nightmare Company. If he catches you, there will be no mercy.”

The team headed toward the ravine and discovered some brown tioye they harvested for their supplies. They likewise discovered the tracks of a raptor, likely one bearing a rider. While stopping to water their steeds, they were attacked by a mob of stone-spitting octoroks! A few stones hit various party members, but the most serious injury was done to Standing Bison. An octorok ripped a plug of flesh out of him and hurt him very badly. The team was able to muster and win the day, however. They harvested some parts and moved on, progressing further toward the ravine.