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Wouter Dhondt
Belgium
Anzegem
My armor is contempt. My shield is disgust. My sword is hatred. In the Emperor's name, let none survive.
When I now saw this Coppelius, the frightful and terrific thought took possession of my soul, that indeed no one but he could be the Sandman.
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Of Chickens and Vampires
This is the second chapter from the Thousand Thrones campaign (An Unquiet Peace). We're not doing the campaign though, it just looked like a fun adventure before starting with something big.
Players:
Snorri, a Dwarven apprentice runesmith
Ronny, a Human initiate of Morr
Hugo, a halfling rogue
An Elven apprentice wizard (name as of yet unknown)
The elf and the halfling players didn't join this session, but we played anyway. We already postponed the session once. One still wasn't able to make it and the other one forgot...
After their previous adventure the party has some time off in Mittleresdorf. The Dwarven runesmith apprentice prepares to create a rune on his axe and the others do some shopping. After a week they start to notice wanted posters all over town. It looks like a party similar to theirs is wanted for crimes (though it doesn't mention which). They prepare to skip town but just as they are leaving they are halted by a group of 24 armed man. One of them steps forward and introduces himself as Arnolt Schade, member of the Blauesblut. The Blauesblut is a group of young nobles who are against the current inheritance system. Only the oldest son or daughter of the noble inherits the family fortune leaving the others with little more than a peasant's wage.
Arnolt : "It seems you lot are wanted for crimes against the empire. Would you be so kind and follow me to Pfeifeldorf. Our Stewart will check your credentials to see if you are indeed the persons we are looking for. I will let my right-hand man Wendell take you in."
Wendell Ott, clearly depressed joins Arnolt reluctantly.
Wendell : "Please follow me. No need to surrender your arms if you come willingly".
Snorri : "I was just leaving anyway"
Wendell : "That's what my wife told me, and she did indeed leave me. I'm not good at anything".
Ronny : "Cheer up, there's good things in life" (yes, Ronny is an initiate of Morr, God of Death)
And with that they are on their way. They are guarded by the men and don't even try anything silly. They arrive in Pfeifeldorf after a days traveling. (Note for Warhammer fans: I substituted Pfeildorf in Wissenland for Pfeifeldorf. The trip had to be short and the name was similar enough).
Pfeifeldorf is a town ruled by the von Speier family. The father Lorentz is dying and soon his oldest son Lennhardt will take over. He has a second son Lucas, who is leader of the Blauesblut and would rather be in charge of the town when his father dies.
They are brought before the town Stewart, Zecharius Lauer. He informs them that he'll need to check their credentials.
"I will send a pigeon to Talabheim right away, shouldn't take more than a few days. In the mean time you can stay in our holding cells. Unless, maybe you are willing to do a little job for me?"
"What kind of job?"
"Something easy really. I'll need you to investigate a theft."
"What if we don't want to do your chores?"
"Well, pigeon hunting season has just begun. And it would be a shame should the pigeon carrying my message get shot by accident on it's way. Who knows, you might be in our cell for months before this mess is cleared up. The choice is yours."
Conveniently Snorri and Ronny agree and the two absent players don't. The latter are locked up in a cell. Zecharius asks his scribe Dwali Runeborn to accompany the willing players to frau Gertrudt who reported the theft. He also informs them that the borders are protected by the Blauesblut and if they try to escape Pfeifeldorf they will surely regret it.
They arrive at the home of frau Gertrudt. In the distance they see a lot of townsfolk near a certain house but they ignore them for now. They knock on the door and a women, two meters high and almost as wide opens the door.
"What do you want? I don't need no strangers on my doorstep."
"We are sent by the Stewart. We're here to investigate a theft?"
"He sends some strangers to do his work for him? He's scared of me isn't he? Doesn't matter. I'm glad someone finally showed up. They stole Gretta you see."
"And who is this Gretta?"
"One of my prize chickens of course. Here, check the chicken coop!"
Somewhat surprised by the stolen item they reluctantly look around in the coop. They notice a blood patch and a trail leading of, but are unable to follow it.
"Who would be interested in stealing one of your chickens".
"The whole town is envious of my beasts. But if I where you I'd check with my neighbor: Old Man Eysen. Always hungry that fellow. Or maybe Herr Neytz our Bailiff".
Next stop is Old Man Eysen. Ronny starts talking with the old man while Snorri checks his house. Nothing special about his house so Snorri joins the conversation. Old Man Eysen doesn't understand most of the conversation. Almost deaf and nearly blind. They're thinking of leaving the man alone when suddenly Ronny sees a piece of cloth in the pockets of the old man. It has a family crest: a gold-trimmed shield with a purple background encasing a gold lion. Eysen informs them he found it on the fence between Gertrudt's and his land. They want the cloth for their investigation but Eysen refuses. He wants to trade it for a Swamp Pigeon Pie (frog being the key ingredient). They have to ask a Bretonnian woman named Francine Arouer about it.
They find Francine in "The Wet Whistle", the only tavern in Pfeifeldorf.
Ronny : "Hello, sorry to bother you. You wouldn't be selling any pigeon pie would you."
Francine : "Vel, I 'ave zie pie, but iet iz not for zale. But I'd be 'appy to 'elp out if you'd do a favor for me".
-- Players sigh ---
Francine : "I'm lookingk for a book from Johannes Gephardt's library, but 'e won't let me borrow iet anymore. I only need to copy a small passage. If you get me the book, I will give you ze pie".
So they get to Johannes' house and ask for the book. They receive it after convincing Johannes that they are interested in "A Right & Honourable Accounting of the Empire's History: Provincial Perspectives from the Common Man". They also need to leave a deposit. They get the book to Francine who copies the text she needs. She gives them the pie. Ronny goes back to Johannes to return the book and Snorri goes to Old Man Eysen for the cloth. After some more miscommunications they trade the pie for the cloth. Then it's back to Johannes Gephardt for heraldry information. Unfortunately he doesn't know the shield but they are welcome to search his books. He notes that the search would go a lot faster if they have a family name with it, but they decide to search anyway. And after 7 hours searching they find what they need. The crest belongs to the Hollenbach family who have connections with the Electoral Count of Nordland. They where accused of Vampirism and Sorcery. Witch hunters descended on their lands on Hexentag in 2066 and burned the entire family en masse. Nordland's Elector Count was assured that the entire family had been put to flame, but peasants continued to vanish. 30 years later the noble family's corpses where exhumed by order of the new Count and each Hollenbach skeleton still had a stake embedded in its chest. After learning all this they decide to call it a day and go to sleep.
Next morning they decide to go to the house where they saw a lot of villagers the first day. The house is that of frau Schmidt. She's mourning over the loss of her husband Casper who apparently hanged himself in the house two days ago. They tell her the Stewart send them for an investigation and she lets them in the house. They immediately notice a scuff mark on the crossbeams. Ronny notices that the splinters on the crossbeam are pointing up instead of down, which would indicate that the rope was pulled over with a heavy weight secured to it. This means Casper was murdered and it isn't a suicide. They ask frau Schmidt who was the last person to see her husband and apparently he had a visit from Lucas von Speier, the youngest of the von Speier family, while she was away from home.
Obviously the next person to talk to is Lucas von Speier. They have some problems gaining access to the estate but they reach Lucas eventually. He's clearly troubled and when they ask about Casper Schmidt he confesses everything.
"I can't stand it anymore. Yes, I killed Casper. We had a deal together to compromise my older brother and accuse him of being in a blood cult so I could inherit the reign. Casper wanted out after a while and I couldn't hold myself."
"But it gets worse cause I had a terrible backup plan. Even as we speak my brother is sedated in the family mausoleum where I have trapped the vampire Wilhelm Hollenbach. I honestly have no idea what to do now. Do we let Lennhardt live to rule Pfeifeldorf with an iron fist? Or do we let him die a painless death knowing the lives of others will benefit? I can't tell good from bad anymore, so please you tell me what to do.".
They group decides to attack the vampire. Lucas will join them in their fight together with some other villagers. They also get the elf and the halfling out of their cells to help in the fight. They reach the Garden of Morr where the mausoleum is located. After discussing who goes first town Bailiff Neytz takes point. First they see a hallway with open tombs on each side. Lucas informs them these are the former von Speier patriarchs. Continuing on they reach a big room which is the cadaver preparation room. The room has a table on the other end but it's to dark to see anything else. When they go further in they suddenly see the vampire Wilhelm Hollenbach standing at the end of the room, close to the table with Lennhardt lying dead on it.
The vampire uses his necromancy powers to animate the dead von Speier family. They are trapped inside between a vampire and 8 undead corpses. Lucas and the PCs go after Wilhelm right away while Netz, Wendell Ott and 2 guard NPCs attack the skeletons. The elf is casting magic dart. This works in the first few rounds but after a while he has some casting failures (never a good sign in Warhammer). The friendly NPCs and skeletons where doing both ok. 2 NPCs left vs 4 skeletons. Meanwhile the party and Lucas are hitting on the vampire, but vampires are worthy foes indeed. He stuns the dwarf and crushes Lucas' leg. It doesn't look good for the heroes until finally the initiate of Morr kills Wilhelm with his final blow.
Aftermath?
We had lots of fun but had to stop right after combat cause a player had to leave. We'll have to do the aftermath next session. It was the first time I used a map and minis for combat and the players seemed to love it. I guess they got a little bored investigating and where happy with the action.
Note for me: my players probably don't like investigative games but love to crack some skulls. I'll make sure my future adventures are more combat heavy. It's only our second session and we need to learn each others preferences.
First session: A merry bunch visits the old world: character creation and their first adventure.
All images are (c) Black Industries
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Bossko B.
England
Brierley Hill
The Black Country
BAZINGA!
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Sounded like a fun adventure.
Quote: Note for me: my players probably don't like investigative games but love to crack some skulls. I'll make sure my future adventures are more combat heavy. It's only our second session and we need to learn each others preferences.
Maybe, but the balance felt about right to me. Too much combat in WFRP leads to lots of dead PCs from my experience.
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Jim Patching
United Kingdom
Cardiff
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Terror in Talaheim is great, probably my favourite of the 2nd ed adventures. Thousand Thrones has a lot of good chapters in it but you're probably doing the right thing in running them as individual adventures as they don't hang together as a campaign all that well!
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Rich P
United Kingdom
Sheffield
United Kingdom
I didn't know what to do with my UberBadge, so I left it as a GeekBadge.
Back home after a world tour. How quickly a year goes...
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Sounds fun. Our group got a bit frustrated with this part of the campaign. The quest to find a missing chicken seemed ridiculous when we had bigger fish to fry elsewhere. We completely missed any clues to vampiric activity in the area and as a result were very surprised with the ending of this chapter. I can see how the adventure might work better if taken out of Thousand Thrones, removing the problem of PCs not wanting to join in because they would rather be off looking for Karl and his followers.
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