Notes from a Savage Worlds fantasy campaign (updated with 05/28/08 session notes!)...

[Flynn]

Session Notes - 03/26/08

Good Morning, All:

Another week has gone by, and it's time for another update on my Savage Worlds fantasy campaign. Yesterday, we were down one player, as he had been involved in a car accident yesterday afternoon and couldn't make it. (He's okay, just on some pain killers and doing light duty at his job for the rest of the week. The company van was totalled, though.)

The Synopsis:

The party settled down for the night as they discussed plans on their next course of action: hit the Sundered still in Moonwell and hurt their position in the township. They had learned from Calyt's recon that the Sundered Emperor and about half his forces were gone elsewhere.

Before long, however, the more attentive of the band heard the distant drums of the Sundered revelling in the streets of Moonwell, and the Magus Chrysander detected the occasional high pitched feminine scream among the drums and chants. Thinking back to his lore regarding cabalists, he felt that this could be a sacrifice, either in the death of a virgin or perhaps the implantation of a "Dark Seed", which would allow a Half-Demon to enter into the world.

Calyt the Shade proposed a plan: if the party would cause a distraction, he could slip over the walls and into Moonwell again (for he did not have the Essence to transform once again into a bird's form), and find out what may be going on. Yngvar Stonewall readily agreed, and led the rest of the band to the western side of the village, where the walking tower had broken through the walls. Meanwhile, Calyt snuck across the open fields to the city wall, and fortunately was not noticed by the guards.

When Calyt was in position, he waved over to the rest of the party, who then began to move across the field. The Magus Chrysander began to herald to the guards at the breeched wall about the coming of the Thane of Thanes, and Yngvar added to the accolades with a challenge of his own. As four crossbowmen began to rain bolts upon the party, twelve Sundered warriors poured forth from the breech to face the party, led by Lord Orath, a commander of the Sundered forces. From behind them, an infernal cabalist began casting spells.

It was a fierce fight, for the Sundered, being dwarves, did not suffer from the poor lighting of the moonlit night, and so the crossbow bolts struck more often than not. Yngvar Stonewall, Anzjin the elven priest and the Magus Chrysander moved forward to meet the first wave of dwarven warriors, the Magus throwing sonic blasts into the midst of the warriors at the breech and taking out almost half of the second wave. The cabalist returned the effort with three massive bolts of hellfire that nearly felled the elven priest and wounded the human magus. As Anzjin began using magic to heal himself and his comrades, Chrysander used the Hand of Joven upon himself and moved to back Yngvar up, who stood as a stone wall drawing the attentions of Lord Orath and his Sundered warriors.

It was then that Yngvar drew forth the blade Tiwazbrandr, that legendary dwarven greatsword that marked him as the Thane of Thanes, the very sword that the Sundered Emperor sought. Several of the charging warriors immediately called out for the Thane's pardons, and surrounded Yngvar and Lord Orath as they engaged in a battle of strength and warskill, trading blows and insults. At that moment, the Lord Orath landed a well-placed blow upon Thane Yngvar, stunning him into silence. It was some time before the Thane became unshaken and called to his new supporters, and only his stalwart nature provided him protection from Lord Orath's continued onslaught. As he recovered, Yngvar accepted the aid and redemption of the Sundered warriors and dealt a vicious blow to Lord Orath. A well-placed strike from the Magus Chrysander's polearm against the enemy Lord was enough to fell the dwarf, and the Thane finished him off with a flourish.

Meanwhile, Calyt the Shade had been stealthily moving along the wall of the village towards the battle, for this confrontation had turned into much more than a distraction. Knowing that the remainder of the forces in town were rushing towards the breeched wall to fight off what was assumed to be a "massive invading force", Calyt felt the need to rush to his comrades' aid, using his accomplished skills with the bow to aid his friends when possible. Given the darkness, many of the Shade's bow shots missed, but the dwarves, once they knew of his presence, easily struck him with several bolts. Heavily wounded, Calyt dropped to the landing beneath him, feigning death.

Now victorious against the Lord Orath, Yngvar Stonewall brandished the sword overhead and called for the surrender of the crossbowmen. (Somewhere during the assault, the cabalist slipped away into the night, for he was as out of Essence as Calyt had been). Two of them turned on their fellows for the chance to gain redemption at the hand of the new dwarven emperor, and the fight was shortly over. Even as the group slowly reunited, the newly pardoned Sundered at their side, more reinforcements emerged at the breech to face these would-be attackers.

And that's where we ended the session...

The Commentary:

Due to the late arrival of one of the players, we started a little late this time around, and so we only got in about two and a half hours of gaming. Still, it was a lot of fun. I had other plans set up for the evening, but a simple background detail (the sounds of drumming and possible torture or sacrifice of a female villager) spurred the party into an action I was not quite expecting.

With that, there was no further hemming and hawing, and they quickly moved into action. The confrontation became much more direct, with four Wild Cards facing off essentially against two Wild Cards and sixteen extras. To top it off, Calyt had only one Power Point available, so he was effectively without spells for the duration of the combat.

Aside from the fun flavor of having a few of the warriors turn to Yngvar for pardons, this was a fine combat that accentuated the impact of lighting penalties on the good guys (both Chrysander and Calyt are human and thus suffered a -2 on all attacks due to the poor lighting), as well as the effectiveness of ranged attacks (most of the damage dealt to the player-characters came from the crossbow bolts and the hellfire bolts). Ranged combat attacks against a TN of 4, instead of the higher Parry values that melee combatants must face. It's basically easier to hit with ranged, so as a Savage Worlds GM, I know that mixing in some ranged attackers with my mixed encounters is a good thing, if I want to present a good challenge. (That, and it gives Calyt an area to shine, as he's becoming a ranged specialist. Better die rolls on his part would be helpful, too.)

This combat also brought home the point that a Toughness of 9 or higher makes it very hard to do damage. Both Yngvar and the Lord Orath had a Toughness of 9, and even though both hit with a certain regularity, usually they would simply render one another Shaken. It was only after Yngvar's bennies were gone that the Shaken started converting Shaken hits to Wounds. That, and a few lucky damage rolls that aced (on both sides) were what took down the big guys and what pulled at the party's healing resources.

With twenty-two active combatants, the combat lasted between one-and-a-half hours and two hours, with somewhere in the neighborhood of ten or twelve rounds of combat. While the combat still took about as long as a mid-level D20 combat, we got more actions and there were many, many more combatants on the field than I would have seen otherwise in a D20 campaign. I loved the flavor of this particular combat, too, because we saw a variety of opponents and attacks taken, the battlefield was bigger than normal, and it had some great moments in it. Still, no one tried any Tricks or Tests of Will last night. Just imagine what it would have been like had they done so.

On the down side, I am also seeing that the group is capable of wading through Extras pretty easily, when they set their minds to do so. This is in fitting with the direction they've built their characters, but I am looking forward to seeing how Savage Worlds deals with this phenomenon as the game progresses.

Next week, we hope that the Warlord Andrus can return to the group, and apply some of his Leadership Edges to the new recruits in a more massive battle against the rest of the Sundered that are rushing to fight off the invading party. Oh, the legends that will be written of this night in the dwarven courts in years to come...

Enjoy,
Flynn

 

[Flynn]

Session Notes - 04/02/08

Good Morning, All:

Last night, we had a full table once again. Despite a late start and a somewhat early end, we managed to pack a lot of fun into a 2.5 hour session. The quote that people have made of "4 hours of gaming, 20 minutes of fun" isn't too far off with a relaxed gaming group. For us, it's more the socializing aspect that overshadows gameplay, rather than complicated rules issues. Still, it was a fun night.

The Synopsis:

As the adventurers quickly organized their converted troops, the Warlord Andrus Phaetren rushed in to join his fellow adventurers. Looking through the breached walls they could see a large force of more than thirty dwarves and a handful of humans by their side running towards them. The Magus Chrysander prayed fervently to Joven, the God of Healing and Knowledge, and was filled with a sense of peace, calming his nerves. Thane Yngvar stepped before his troops and called out to pardon those that would fight by his side. His offer was met at first with crossbow bolts, followed by hellfire bolts from the hands of diabolic cabalists among the ranks of the forces starting to pour through the choke point of the breached wall. As the Warlord Andrus and Anzjin, the wounded elven priest, moved forward behind Yngvar's slight wall of troops, the stonecutter-turned-king shouted his promises of pardons, although his cries fell mostly on deaf ears.

Soon the battle was joined, and the forces were locked within the breach. The Magus Chrysander spent the last of his Essence to create a sonic burst, rendering many of the enemy stunned and even slaying one. It looked like the heroes were grossly out-numbered, and the only convert that the party had seen was a single dwarven lord. Between the empassioned cries of Yngvar, the dwarven lord Ioleth and the persuasive calls of the Warlord Andrus, the battle slowed and stopped in order to hold an Allthing, a public hearing used to settle disputes in the dwarven culture. Though the dwarves were exiled, many saw the chance to be pardoned of their crimes and return to their homes, while the few that followed the diabolists of the Black Court did not wish to see that happen. When the bulk of the warriors craved an Allthing to settle the dispute in true dwarven fashion, the cabalists had no other choice but to acquiesce.

For those unfamiliar with a dwarven Allthing, its formal presentations and robust arguments make for a long and drawn out political affair. It is especially draining on those that participate, and it has happened that Allthings have ended with one side conceding simply because the participants fell asleep from utter exhaustion. Into this political arena strode Thane Yngvar, the Warlord Andrus and the Magus Chrysander, joined by their new ally, Ioleth. Speaking for the cabalists were two cultists of the demon prince Rundigaard and the dwarven Warlord Pater. It was a long debate, well over an hour, filled mostly with intimidation on the part of the demon worshippers and countered by emotional arguments and historical debates on the part of our heroes. In the end, it became obvious that the former Sundered of Moonwell had accepted Yngvar as the new Thane of the Dwarves, for he bore the Sword of Dwarven Kings, Tiwazbrandr. (The party later learned that Yngvar's acceptance as a Thane had been heavily influenced by the Sundered Emperor's indoctrination of his troops about the importance of the blade in preparations of his finding it and leading his people in a march of conquest against the dwarven Triumverate.)

The party celebrated with their newfound supporters, freed the captive villagers and got some well earned rest. Over the next few days, the band rested up, although Yngvar did direct his troops to move outside the city walls (to ease tensions with the locals) and ordered them to help construct a new gate where the tower had breached the wall. As the Duargate, as it began to be called, was nearing completion, the party learned that the Sundered Emperor had left almost a week ago in pursuit of rumors that he thought would take him to the sword. A local had told the Emperor about a barrow that might have been a tomb constructed by the Archmagus Agarean, the same magus that had taken the Sword of Dwarven Kings at the request of the first Thane of Thanes and hidden it away. Given that the Sundered Emperor had yet to return, the party felt that either he met with defeat at the barrows or that he had succeeded and was marching on towards the Black Hills and the dwarven clanholds of the Triumverate.

Yngvar remembered the words of the prophetess Amandrea, that he would face the Sundered Emperor only after many battles and slaying the White Hand, and felt that the Sundered Emperor was perhaps still to be found in the barrow, for he knew a confrontation with the bandit king was destined and still had not unfolded. The rest of the party, motivated by curiosity and the thoughts of treasure, decided to join Yngvar on his quest to seek out the Sundered Emperor in the ancient barrows built by Agarean.

And that's where the session ended...

The Commentary:

Again, we got caught up in talk and socializing, especially with Andrus's player, who had been in a car accident last Wednesday and so had missed that session. Despite the reduced game time, this proved to be an interesting evening. The numbers for the battle looking overwhelming, and the first few rounds quickly inspired much commentary on the possibility of a TPK (Total Party Kill). Finally, the Warlord Andrus made a persuasion roll with a raise, and I allowed their joint efforts to sway enough of the "common dwarves" among the Sundered to call for an Allthing. Without support, the leaders were forced to comply. That was nice, and helped demonstrate that sometimes talking can be better than fighting.

For the Allthing, I used an idea found in the Savage Worlds fanzine, Shark Bytes, Vol. 1, Issue #2, in an article starting on page 56, about alternate uses for the Mass Battles rules. I used Knowledge (Politics) as the base skill for the "generals" of each side, knowing that one of the players had it and so would give him a chance to be in the spotlight. For each side, I gave them tokens equal to their die type. Each player that participated chose a skill to use, explaining how it applied, for their rolls. (Yngvar and the Warlord Andrus used Persuasion, while Magus Chrysander used Knowledge (History) to relate Yngvar's deeds back to famous dwarven legends.) When the Mass Battle results called for damage, I changed that to be a Vigor roll (with scaling penalties) to avoid fatigue levels. The length of the rounds was set at about half an hour per round. These all combined to produce a flavorful effect of making Allthings arduous and establishing the flavor of their form of governance. The enemies ran out of tokens pretty quickly, and by the rules of the Allthing, they and their supporters were allowed to leave unharmed.

The guys liked it, because 1) it wasn't a TPK and 2) it added a lot of flavor to the game world. Also, using the Mass Battle rules for the Allthing helped demonstrate to them how versatile the SW rules can be. 'll probably keep the same rules for dwarven Allthings, but I'll probably reduce the Vigor roll penalties I used for human political debates and the like. I used 4d6 = -4, 3d6 = -2, and 2d6 = +0 this time around. In hindsight, I probably should have gone -2/+0/+2 instead. I'll use those for human debates and let it go at that. (Nobody argues politics like a dwarf. )

The rest was bookkeeping, some minor treasure and stuff, some healing rolls and the beginnings of their next adventure.

Next week, they should learn what could hold a bandit king and his men within some ruins for over a week. I'm sure it'll be a lot of fun.

Wish Them Luck,
Flynn

 

[ragboy]

I always feel like I'm lurking around your SW posts feeling jealous.

My kids and I played SW fantasy for a bit (we converted from a 1st edition campaign almost seamlessly), but I think I was still stuck in the D&D mindset at the time.

How do you handle the tendency for the players (and the DM, in my case) to load on ever more powerful magical junk on the characters and enemies?

I guess what I'm asking is, how do you handle treasure? In modern, sci-fi and pulp SW games, we rarely run into this problem -- we've kinda used a handwave d20 modern "wealth" approach without problems, but fantasy just begs for mounds of sweet loot that everyone wants to record, catalog, distribute and roll around in.

 

[Rel]

What a wicked useful thread!

I'm a recent fan of SW and I may well be using it to run my next campaign. This thread is choc full of great advice and insights. Thanks! I'll be reading with interest.

 

[Neil Bishop]

Your use of the mass battles rules for the Allthing was absolutely brilliant. As I read your report, I was imagining how it would play out and was really impressed. Very creative!

 

[Flynn]

I always feel like I'm lurking around your SW posts feeling jealous.

My kids and I played SW fantasy for a bit (we converted from a 1st edition campaign almost seamlessly), but I think I was still stuck in the D&D mindset at the time.

How do you handle the tendency for the players (and the DM, in my case) to load on ever more powerful magical junk on the characters and enemies?

I guess what I'm asking is, how do you handle treasure? In modern, sci-fi and pulp SW games, we rarely run into this problem -- we've kinda used a handwave d20 modern "wealth" approach without problems, but fantasy just begs for mounds of sweet loot that everyone wants to record, catalog, distribute and roll around in.

Good Morning, Ragboy:

Truth be told, and my players will tell you, I've always been a little behind the curve on treasure. I just don't tend to give it out. With Savage Worlds, being a new system to me, I have erred on the side of even slower treasure rewards. I use a silver standard and tend to give handfuls of silver coin with each humanoid encounter. For magic, as you can see, I either tend to give potions or the occasional story-based magic item. Here's what I've given them in regards to permanent magic items, as a recap:

* The Blood of Meritus/Blood of Demon Lord: This relic was the mechanism which I used to give them an extra advance in Vigor in the second session as part of the world's story line. They know it's a component in the Rite of the Orichalcum Key, but haven't researched any other properties of it.

* The Onyx Skull: This item teaches two rituals (I use rituals as a separate magic system for those effects that don't make for good powers, such as Raise the Dead and that kind of thing.) In addition, it serves as a Talisman for creating hellfire Bolts, provided that the bearer has the Dark Arts skill.

* Hand/Guantlet of Joven: This item allows the bearer to Heal (one wound, disease or similar use) and Succor (one level of fatigue, remove Shaken condition, or restore an Incapacitated person to wakefulness) once every 24 hours.

* Tiwazbrandr: The Sword of Dwarven Kings is only a +1 greatsword in the hands of a non-dwarf, but in the hands of a dwarf, it's a +2 weapon with the Giant Killer and Demon Slayer edges (i.e. grants a +1d6 damage when fighting giants or demons).

The players have requested a "loot run" and so the next adventure will be a response to that. I intend to include a few magic items for them. I'll post details on those items after the adventure, in case my players are reading these posts.

Really, I'm just taking it slow, exploring the core system, and since Mages and Priests are rare in the game world, I don't have the "magic shop" or "christmas tree" magic item issues in the current game. I figure if I give them an item every rank or so, starting at Seasoned, then it's all good.

Does that answer your questions?

With Regards,
Flynn

 

[Flynn]

Rel and Neil:

Thank you both for posting. I greatly appreciate the feedback, and I'm glad you are enjoying the posts. I hope they help you guys with your games, and I'm always open to discussing the details here.

With Warm Regards,
Flynn

 

[SavageRobby]

I'm a recent fan of SW and I may well be using it to run my next campaign. This thread is choc full of great advice and insights. Thanks! I'll be reading with interest.

I agree. I'm a fairly seasoned Savage DM, and still love to read Flynn's threads about the game.

The Allthing was a stroke of genius. We used the mass battle rules to finish off our Evernight game, but it was somewhat anti-climatic (and I won't do it again that way). But that application of the rules was really cool. I'm going to have to find a way to do that in Pathfinder.

 

[Flynn]

I agree. I'm a fairly seasoned Savage DM, and still love to read Flynn's threads about the game.

The Allthing was a stroke of genius. We used the mass battle rules to finish off our Evernight game, but it was somewhat anti-climatic (and I won't do it again that way). But that application of the rules was really cool. I'm going to have to find a way to do that in Pathfinder.

The Mass Battle rules are great for resolving the big battles that stand in the way of moving your story forward. I agree, I wouldn't use them to end a campaign, but perhaps to get through the big battle to the point where the players can play out that final confrontation, if I needed to. I imagine it would be pretty easy and fun to convert the Burning Skies adventure path using the SW rules, since there are reportedly a few major battles that the Mass Battles rules from SW would cover pretty well.

Also, there's a "Whispers From The Pit" article on the Pinnacle website for enhancing the Mass Battle experience overall:
http://www.peginc.com/Games/Savage Worlds/Downloads/WftP8.pdf

Hope This Helps,
Flynn

 

[Flynn]

Session Notes - 04/09/08

Good Morning, All:

It's Thursday, which means that I was fortunate enough to run another session in my weekly Savage Worlds Fantasy campaign last night. Everyone was in attendance, and we generally stayed on topic, so we were able to get some good gaming in. Oh, and I got to introduce the party to some new undead... "Undead, this is the party. Party, this is undead."

The Synopsis:

After a week of helping Moonwell recover from the siege and subsequent assault of the Sundered, Thane Yngvar decided it was time to pursue the Sundered Emperor north to the barrow rumored to be the final resting place of a compatriot of the Archmagus Agerean. With twenty reprieved mercenaries, five forgiven crossbowmen, a human guide and the dwarven Defender Ioleth, the party headed out. As much of the local area had been scoured for food during the seige, the large company of warriors had to slow their pace in order to scrounge for sustenance. A two day journey turned into a three day trip, and the men marched hungry at least one day, but everyone held out until prey became more plentiful further away from Moonwell.

It was on the last night of the march that the skeletons came silently in the night. A group of fifteen skeletons, led by a four-armed skeletal lord, attacked the band of thirty-two men. The shouts of the guards awoke the entire encampment, and Chrysander was among the first to act, casting a concussive burst into the midst of the skeletal forces. It was their good fortune that he did so, for that blast removed about a third of the attacking force. In retaliation, the skeletal lord launched a fireball of his own from the crystalline crown upon his head, which dealt its own damage to the Magus Chrysander and the men surrounding him. Despite their fearful presence, Yngvar's forces formed a front line, many of them responding to the natural leadership of the Warlord Andrus. The Defender Ioleth threw himself into battle, charging the skeletal lord. Calyt the Shade, having suffered severely for sleeping on the side of the camp where the skeletons first attacked, used his magic to burrow through the earth and flee the attacking skeletons that had surrounded him. It was a massive scene of turmoil and carnage.

The skeletal lord dealt one more fireball from his Crown of the Deathflame and then engaged the Defender Ioleth, as well as some of the other dwarves on the front line. Slowly, the tide began to turn, and one by one, the skeletons fell. After the elven priest Anzjin felled the skeletal lord, the morale of the dwarven forces improved, and they renewed their assault on the remaining skeletons with a fervor. With their leader and his influence over them gone, the remaining skeletons dropped more quickly. Five of the dwarves had fallen, and two of those later died of complications related to their injuries. However, the rest of the party's small army came through the battle.

Sifting through the bones, Chrysander recovered the crystalline crown and properly identified it as the Crown of the Deathflame. It gave any that wore it power over both fire and death. Legend has it that the crown is cursed, however, and that should one die while wearing it, they would become one with the death that they control. Chrysander also remembered that the Warlord Esteros was of a four-armed race from the ancient lands of Achea, and surmised that this skeleton was the last remains of Esteros, animated by the Crown of the Deathflame. Filled with thoughts of possible undead rising up from the fallen, the dwarves burying their dead, and the Magus Chrysander used his extensive knowledge of rituals to consecrate the site.

The next day, their guide, Gatticus, requested to return to Moonwell. Being a kind man, Yngvar gave his permission, and the Thane's forces turned north again. Without a guide, it took longer than expected to find the barrow, and so it was in the late afternoon that the party finally came upon the small rectangular hill that housed the ancient tomb. It was obvious that a doorway had been uncovered on the eastern side of the tomb and had been opened. From the bodies strewn about in various states of decay, it was equally obvious that opening the door had unleashed something from within the tomb. Calyt and Anzjin moved forward silently to investigate, and Calyt noted the exposes bones of the bodies had been severely gnawed upon by sharp teeth, the bones broken open in some cases to expose the marror within.

Grimly, the dwarven forces turned their attention to burying these dead, and the Magus Chrysander once again performed the ritual of consecration to bless their burial. By this point, it was dark, and so the forces retreated another location in order to set up camp.

Yngvar and Calyt, as well as some guards on watch, noticed that a small band of pale-skinned figures crept forth from the tomb a few hours after sunset. Not finding the bodies before the tomb, they scampered off in the direction of the burial site, obviously following the scent of the dead bodies, or perhaps that of the living men that drug them away.

Yngvar decided to take the party alone to the burial site, in order to investigate this possible threat to his people and his mission. The small band of adventurers arrived at the burial site as the pale creatures had finished looking for the dead bodies and had found the scent of the living men leading back to camp. Just as the adventurers began to move forward on the undead, the wights noticed them and surged towards them, outnumbering them eight to five.

A concussive blast removed a few of the attacking wights almost immediately, but after that, the wights were upon them, and the adventurers were fighting for their very lives. One struck the elven priest Anzjin with such force that it was able to feed upon the warm life within the priest, leaving Anzjin filled with a numbing coldness that would not leave him. It was the elven priest that first determined that the undead were immune to non-magical attacks, and so the party took to different tactics instead. Using a combination of unusual tactics and vicious non-magical blows, the party kept their attackers on the defensive while Yngvar used the magic sword Tiwazbrandr against the wights one by one to fell them. Chrysander attempted one more concussive burst, but his aim was off, and with the wights so close to the party, they ended up outside the area of effect when the burst drifted. Still, the band emerged victorious, though some were worse the wear for the experience.

Among the dessicated bodies of the wights, the party found a necklace bearing a noble sigil, likely related to the House of Warlord Esteros. They knew, then, that whatever else had happened, the Archmagus Agerean had dabble in the necromantic arts in order to protect this particular tomb.

And that's where we ended our session...

The Commentary:

This three-hour session managed two combats, one with almost fifty participants and one with thirteen. In regards to the large first encounter, per the rules, I let the players control their allied forces, leaving me to worry only about the wild card NPC Ioleth, the fifteen skeletons and the skeletal lord (Esteros, for those keeping score). The combat lasted just over an hour, and we took no shortcuts. I really liked that. Certainly, the good guys outnumbered the bad guys by two to one, or thereabouts, but the undead immunities and such helped balance that out. It was a pretty nice fight. Both the Warlord Andrus and I (through the skeletal lord Esteros) got the chance to experiment with the leadership Edges. It's interesting to me just how much of a difference a simple +1 Toughness can make. The skeletons within Esteros's range were only slightly harder to make Shaken, but where that +1 really seemed to hit was in getting that raise to destroy the undead, because it meant the difference between getting an average damage of 12 instead of 11. With the undead's natural +2 to recover from Shaken, skeletons rarely stayed Shaken long enough to allow the typical two-hit takedown that you see with most Extras.

When that battle was done, the players seemed surprised that we still had about half the session left. There was some lively discussion about the historical data I'd given them on Esteros, and Chrysander's player made a number of personal realizations about the campaign setting background that gave me that "GM Did Good" feeling of creating an internally consistent background and then letting them discover it on their own. I like those "Ah-Ha!" moments for the players, and while this one wasn't a big megaplot element, it's still cool to give them that kind of thing.

The second battle of the night was against wights. I pretty much used the wight from Savage Beasts, and since I had bennies, I made sure that I showed off the special attack power for the wight over the course of the encounter. By doing so, I felt I was able to create a better distinction for wights from other undead, and create a more memorable encounter. The players learned a bit about immunities with the encounter, and so used a variety of techniques (from Tricks to holding their actions) to keep most of the wights Shaken so that they couldn't attack, while the guy with the magic sword delivered the final blow. They are also hopeful that they will find magic weapons in the loot run they are embarking upon, and I assured them that there will be a few. Still, I was pleasantly surprised how well Savage Worlds allowed them options against their foes, even when they were incapable of delivering the final blow.

All in all, I felt that I had three resounding successes with the Savage Worlds system this week: 1) I began to integrate the use of the Leadership Edges into my combats and could see the impact of them on the combat; 2) I got to run a combat with 48 combatants and it took only about an hour to do so from start to finish; and 3) I got to see the players use the system to remain effective when the direct "beat 'em down" approach was denied to them. Add in the "GM Did Good" moment, and last night went pretty darn well.

Now, a minor dungeon crawl lies ahead, and that should be fun for everyone involved. At the end of it, the party hopes to have slain the Sundered Emperor and gotten some great loot in the process. If all goes well, and the PCs do not die, of course, they should be able to accomplish their goals. We'll see how it all goes, though.

Wish Them Luck,
Flynn