Castle Whiterock: The Quest Continues!

I'm worried about my players. I am.

My current group has been playing around - and in - Castle Whiterock and its environs for a year or two now. They've become cursorily familiar with the area, the nearby town of Cillimar, and various and sundry NPCs important to the plot of the supermodule. They've also introduced some variances to the setting. 

For instance, after wiping out a group of gnolls who had moved into the spot previously occupied by the Slavers of the Iron Manacle, they ran into a group of stone giants (random encounter), and directed them (unintentionally) to the ruins of the castle. Upon their next return, a clan of 20 or so of the giants had moved in and started remodeling the upper keep. The giants are friendly, for now... 

They've met Lorus Swiftquill and arranged a quid pro quo deal with him; information for information. 

They've located and restored the Hidden Fane of Justicia on level 7 and cleaned out both the chapel of Bobugbubilz and the Wight Lady!

They've made friends with the folk of Stone Pig's Crossing, in a tiny hamlet half way between Cillimar and the Castle. 

They've forged a business relationship with Chauntessa, and guessed more about her nature than I'm comfortable with as a DM. 

The one thing they haven't done, though, is the first job that Chauntessa gave them: find the "other group"... 

You see I had another group once. This group of adventurers swept through the upper levels of CW, murder-hoboing their merry way down to level 7, when the group sort of fell apart all at once. A few players moved away, another one got a job that didn't allow for much downtime, and that was all she wrote. 

Fast forward a year or two and I have a new group with no connections to the old! Their game started out in the same world but relatively remote from Castle Whiterock, but I introduced one plot thread that lead to Whiterock, and that was the one they chose to follow.

I decided to keep some continuity going; this group would follow on where the other group ended; Chauntessa would offer them the same deal as to the other group with a caveat; they should also try to determine what happened to the party that came before. 

At the point where the old group broke up, their party had a nasty scrap with the skum and, impaired with lowered resources and damaged boats, came to the derro slaver's outpost and (I deemed) were finally overwhelmed, captured, and taken down below. 

All Roads Lead To Narborg

Now it was up to the PCs. This was not their first rodeo and not even the first time they had to deal with duergar, even within Whiterock. They did a bit of sleuthing as they explored the now semi-repopulated dungeon. They have pieced together that the previous party was (mostly) captured by the slavers and shipped down to the Bleak Theater. In the interim several other things have happened.

1. Having wiped out most of the derro on level 7 and interrupted the flow of slaves, the party has faced increased resistance from the duergar and their lackeys upon each return to the Castle. The pattern has been established: an ambush involving troublesome cannon-fodder monsters supported by the duergar, who flee as soon as the battle turns against them. 
2. The party has pieced together the fate of the previous party and passed that on to Chauntessa. Chauntessa was gravely concerned about the party's ability to infiltrate the Bleak Theater and warned them against doing so - noteworthy because this is the first time she's ever advised caution. (And she has now thrown THREE parties into the maw of Whiterock!)
3. And most recently, they learned that the stone giants had been visited by the envoy of Thane Vejik and offered them payment in return for slaves. 

The giants are ambivalent, neither trusting the duergar to honor their agreement nor leave the clan alone, but not wanting to deal with the hassle of having an angry clan of duergar under their feet. They have handed the problem off to the PCs, as they have helped the clan out before. But if they do accept, the town of Stone Pig's Crossing could be wiped out by the giants virtually at one blow, and quite easily.

Thus here we are; the characters stand at the brink of level 9, the Immense Cavern, facing a determined enemy that is growing hungry and desperate to restore its economy.

(to be continued)

This should be fun

Totally stealing this from Zak over at D&D With Pornstars, who stole it from Meandering Banter!

The party has chosen to work their way up from level 7 of Castle Whiterock, looking for traces of the previous player group, who were TPK'd in the dungeon. The previous group, however, did such a great job of depopulating the dungeon levels above them that I now have to fill in the blanks.

Need to buff up the slaver party; the PC have wiped out the small derro camp at the foot of the elevator. Thane Vejik is tired of all these nuisances; the flow of slaves must never cease! More surprises await above...

The party finally wiped out the last of the toad god cult and the undead troglodytes, but random encounters in this area will keep them from getting lazy.

This area was wiped out by the previous party but is now quiet, filled only with scavengers and a few escapees from the original purge. The bugbear lost a bet and has to scavenge for food for the others above.

More nuisance monsters. Where do these stirges keep coming from??? The White Roc orcs have fully retreated to the inside of the fallen tower, insufficient in numbers to secure the entire level and insufficient in power to negotiate with the stone giants up above.

This level is mostly empty except for the duergar envoy party, who are engaging the giants in negotiations.

At this point the party simply has to gain access to the surface. Since they are already on fairly friendly (ish) terms with the stone giants, that shouldn't be too hard unless they antagonize the sentry. 

And perhaps more important; what are they doing?

 

Altruism - with a helping of Self-Interest

My guess

Is that no one is reading this blog anymore. I can't blame them, I've let it go the long slow heat-death road into oblivion. BUT. Right now, there's a chance that this might reach someone. Someone who has forgotten to take this blog off their watch list!

Over at RPGNOW, there's a charity drive going on for victims of hurricane Harvey (and hopefully for the forthcoming victims of Irma). For the pittance of $25, it gives you access to a host of useful game supplements, as well as entire games.

Among those are Deep Carbon Observatory - which pdf I've bought and paid for several times now as  a part of other packages without regret.

So head on over to the link above and get yourself some goodness. There's something for everyone in it, from OSR D&D to OSR space gaming to Zombie Apocalypse gaming to just good weird old shit, man. Hurry!

Campaign Development: North and South

Now that I have the rough outline of where all the larger regions are, it's time to develop some more boundaries to the north and south of the campaign area.

Campaign Development: From Tarabi to Kohan

While taking a break from running games (I'm in a group that trades off DM duties and we're currently in mid-stride of the other DM's campaign), I'm taking pot shots at building up my own campaign.

What I'm doing differently from my regular homebrewed method, which consists of custom content interspersed with published material, is leaving space for megadungeons.

Boxed settings never interested me, but I have a fondness for modules. In this case I'm creating a customized background, while planning for large empty spaces in which I can fit things like Castle Whiterock, Rappan Athuk, Slumbering Tsar and the Greyhawk Ruins. No one lives long enough to complete all of these, but I like to leave it open. Just in case...

"The One Thing", Down Time, Restarting and More...

So in the months since closing out the old campaign I ran, I have not been idle. Mostly I've been working, brewing beer and engaging in other hobbies. But last night I started up a new campaign with a new group. Still kicking the weeds but it's promising!

The End of the Line

Today we 'finished' my ongoing campaign, started in 2003 when my wife and I had just started dating (cue: AWWWWW).