ZEITGEIST [Zeitgeist] The daring adventures of Sec9

[texred]

I've been the GM for our group going on three years now, I think, perhaps four. We started up with Gamma World, which was fun, but a bit shallow. After that we moved into 4e and good times were had. I eventually got sick of building encounters and lost the thread of the campaign after the holiday break. We picked back up with Dragon Age, which didn't resonate with us, then a quick run through Low Life. After getting sick of the balance in Low Life I started looking for something to run and knew it would likely be 4e. That's when I stumbled upon Zeitgeist, and we switched over.

Our party is the Section 9 unit of the RHC. We did a little collaborative story telling before we started up to fill in the back story for the characters, which I may post at some point.

Anyhoo, here is the group. I'll start posting reports with my commentary later.

Erik - Dwarven Fighter

Erik came to Risur attempting to find a new home that wasn’t dominated by the Escatol philosophy of his nation. He fought in the Fourth Yearsol War, and his military experience has inspired the RHC team to look to him as the leader of the group.

Jak - Minotaur Barbarian

The hot-headed minotaur from Ber, Jak has gotten herself into a bit of trouble with the RHC. The first investigation the team was put together for ended with Jak running a foreign dignitary through with her greatsword, in defiance of Erik’s orders.

Lorenzo - Human Monk

Lorenzo, the silent monk with a deep sense of justice and a thirst for strong drink. Something deeply affected Lorenzo in the past, but the details may be lost in silence.

Quinn - Human Druid

Quinn is a human druid with an unflinching devotion to the crown. He trusts his fellow RHC officers, but is unsure of how much he can trust the hot-headed minotaur.

Remington - Genasi Warlord

Remington is an oddity. Lines of power glow on his shrouded face, which is a curiosity. He’s impulsive, and quick with a gun.

A couple of notes about the characters.

Lorenzo's race was Thri-Kreen, but we changed him to be a human as it seemed to fit better. We justified his goofy bug abilities to his intense training as a monk, which works pretty well.

Remington is a Genasi, though we had initially thought of reskinning him to be human as well. In the end my player wanted to just be Genasi, and I said that'd be fine. With the planes being cut off from this world, I figure I'd eventually have to come up with a reason for why he's here. I'm thinking he'll have been stuck between planes for an extended period of time, which he's forgotten about, and somehow slipped through. I'm reading through Digging for Lies now, and I think my idea may work.

Session Recaps

Jak's player does recaps from her point of view. I'll be quoting her, and interspersing my commentary throughout in this format.

Session notes

My comments.

 

[texred]

The Duchess and The Coaltongue

We meet up with the constables of the RHC doing crowd control at an event for King Aodhan. Their goal - to allow hundreds of townspeople to witness the king christen a ship, while keeping everyone involved safe. During their prep for this event, they'd come up with several profiles of people likely to cause a disturbance and they kept their eyes peeled for these individuals. Erik, a dwarven fighter, identified a docker acting suspiciously and pulled him aside. The man protested his innocence, but was soon outed as a troublemaker by a fellow docker who came on the scene - his boss, Thames. He told Jak he was aware of a group of other dockers planning something. Since many people had already passed by their location, Jak brought Thames towards the front of the area so he could see everyone. He ID'd three other dockers. Jak sent a cop to bring 'em in, but one of the guys knocked him out.

It was on.

We started off with this skill challenge, and it went fairly well. I've never really liked skill challenges, and have generally run them focused more on role playing with a few skill checks thrown in to see how well the plans work out. I figured I'd give the skill challenge a whirl again since this one was laid out really well. In the end it was fun, but I'll probably default back to my regular method of resolving large skill challenges in the future.

The group whirled and shifted and slashed and punched. Jak grabbed a bystander's umbrella and jabbed one of the dockers in his nethers. Lorenzo, a mute monk, grabbed another bystander's cane and swiped a docker with it. Thames, kind eye-patched fellow that he was, assisted the coworkers in their battle and identified the head hooligan as Colton.

When the battle was won, the group was torn between marching Thames to the police station with the other dockers and letting him pass the checkpoints to see the king. Thames made it easy on everyone by taking off.

Our first bit of combat, which makes my players extremely happy. We've got two martial scientists in the group and they improvised their feats pretty well, which I wasn't sure about. The rigorously structured rules of 4e make it easy for players to think there are no options open to them if they aren't written down on a card. The nice thing about that martial scientist power is it basically tells the player to make something up and I'll reward them for being creative.

We also started seeing the personalities of our characters/players showing up. After they subdued the dockers there was a bit of a debate between the group regarding Thames. Some of them wanted to haul him in with the other dockers, and the others wanted to let him go since he'd helped them out. Quinn, the druid, got in his face and left a sour taste in his mouth for this group of constables.

Assistant Chief Inspector Stover Delft, the constables' boss, congratulated them on their efforts, but requested a more subdued response to any further disruptions. He said Principal Minister Harkover Lee wished to speak with them. Lee requested the constables attend the event on the ship that evening to work as additional security - and to keep an eye on the king's sister, Duchess Ethelyn of Shale, and to make sure she made it to the king's speech.

Right on cue, the nobility began showing up. The duchess was not far behind. Quinn, with his keen druid eyes, noticed her handmaiden, Sokanna, was eladrin. The group discussed whether this made her in and of herself evil and Lorenzo appeared to have something to say on the matter, but since he didn't, they decided she could be a lovely person and did nothing.

The constables really dislike Eladrin, probably because they're from Danor, which they have been at war with for quite some time.

The group introduced themselves to the duchess and let her know they'd be watching her that evening - for her own safety, of course. The duchess complained of a headache and requested the constables find her a room for the journey. Erik said he'd see what he could do.

They spoke with Captain Rutger Smith, who recommended they find a petty officer. They did and Petty Officer Elian Aughtbrook found her a room on the second floor of the ship, also known as the gun deck. Quinn, in a disastrously disrespectful and nail-biting performance, tried to convince the duchess to allow one of the constables to stay in her room while she slept. The duchess did not respond kindly to his repeated attempts and finally called her brother - the king - over. Quinn reluctantly backed down and agreed to post someone - Jak - at her door. (During this time, Jak snuck off and disabled the lock on said door.)

This was a rather awkward exchange. Quinn, the druid, basically told the Duchess they were going to post someone in her room while she napped. She obviously thought this was ridiculous and told him that wouldn't be happening. I figured that would be enough, but he was rather persistent. I figured I'd be able to cow him by having the Duchess threaten him by having her call the King over. For some reason, even the King telling him the guard posted in the room wouldn't be necessary wasn't enough to dissuade him. I probably broke character here and told the player that wasn't going to work. In the end, they were able to have Jak posted at the door, which seemed perfectly reasonable in comparison to having someone watching her sleep. I still scratch my head at this exchange.

The ship sailed and the duchess went to her room. The group positioned themselves throughout the top two floors. When it was time for the king to speak, Jak knocked politely at the duchess' door and was told by the handmaiden that the duchess was asleep and she didn't want to wake her. Jak politely insisted and when she was about to open the door, she heard furniture moving about the room. Something large had been pushed in front of the door.

Jak and Erik tried breaking into the room and instead, broke the door in half. They could see the handmaiden with an amber rod, surrounded by ritual materials. What they didn't see was the duchess - but they heard a splash below the porthole. Determined to save the duchess from her handmaiden's dastardly plan, Jak leaped impressively over the dresser blocking their path and made it to the window. She saw the duchess, looking not at all distressed, ride off on a giant seahorse. For her efforts, Jak was attacked and immobilized by the handmaiden, who then teleported away.

This is a recurring theme, Jak jumps headfirst into trouble and gets bashed.

By this time, the other constables had made their way down to the gun deck and a fight was breaking out. Other enemies popped out of the woodwork to take on the stalwart defenders of justice, but they were defeated. The handmaiden made it down to the engine room of the ship and threw the amber rod in the furnace (causing it to overheat) and some crooked engineers bashed away at its control valves. The constables followed her, defeated her soundly, then worked to save the ship. Quinn bravely plunged his hands into the furnace and pulled out the amber rod, then went upstairs to warn the passengers and find someone with knowledge of the ship, since it was still overheating. Geoff Massarde, the ship's designer, came down to assist. In the meantime, the coppers bashed the valves open to let steam escape. Geoff and the dependable gunslinger Remington (who was resistant to fire) shoveled the hot fire gems out of the furnace and onto the ground, halting the ship's destruction.

The king gave his speech and made a shocking announcement - he would be attending a peace summit with Danor in Flint in one year. And as a show of his commitment to this peace, he was going to marry a Danoran.

And in the end they were able to pull out enough firegems thanks to all that fire resistance.

The Coaltongue encounter was pretty massive, and the players had a good time running through it. I felt I'd kind of dropped the ball on the ceremony in the King's Square when there are all those major characters to introduce. Then again, the players fixated on the Duchess and basically ignored everything else. Lorenzo did managed to shake Stanfield's hand, he's rather interested in the Deva which will be cool when he shows up again later on.

The party dynamic was interesting. The group gets rather concerned whenever Quinn speaks to someone of importance, and they always think back to when he tried to tell the King what to do. Erik didn't get pushed to make any decisions for the party this night, but with everyone looking to him for direction I figured it would be coming at some point.

 

[RangerWickett]

As always, it's a treat to hear from GMs about their group's experiences with ZEITGEIST. I think yours is the first to disrespect the king, though.

About eladrins, did you change something, or is your group just wary of those eladrin who happen to have come from Danor. Because the intention is that generally eladrin don't like Danor. They originate from Elfaivar, and the eladrin in Danor are basically high-status slaves.

 

[texred]

As always, it's a treat to hear from GMs about their group's experiences with ZEITGEIST. I think yours is the first to disrespect the king, though.

It was a bit odd, and I let it slide since it was our first session.

About eladrins, did you change something, or is your group just wary of those eladrin who happen to have come from Danor. Because the intention is that generally eladrin don't like Danor. They originate from Elfaivar, and the eladrin in Danor are basically high-status slaves.

Nope, didn't change them at all. When they first encountered an Eladrin they were convinced she was evil and I totally forgot to look that up and figure out why. They're going to be meeting with Gale in, hmm, not the next session, but perhaps the one after that. We'll see what comes of that (I have a feeling that meeting may not go as planned).

 

[mumford]

Landing on Axis Island

Well, now that we're back, here's the notes and commentary from the second session.

A week after the ship sabotage, Assistant Chief Inspector Stover Delft came into Section 9's office to bring them to his. The group found a tiefling bedecked in a formal red and purple coat and a rapier on her hip. Lya Jierre, the Minister of Outsiders from Danor, had a job for the group. But first, she wanted to test their mental mettle with a physical puzzle. Erik took that pitch and knocked it out of the park.

I had actually put this puzzle together using key rings, Legos (that’s right, Legos), and yarn. After a couple of attempts to build this up with other materials I was able to make it pretty quickly with those items. I dropped it on the table and after about 30 seconds Erik suggested they just hold some of the pieces up rather than just keeping them all on the table. They solved the puzzle pretty quickly after that. I was expecting at least some tinkering before they realized they couldn’t solve it without doing something quirky.

Take that, DM.

Her job? To seize Axis Island back from Duchess Ethelyn of Shale, the king's sister. She (along with several hundred soldiers) had taken over the island after abandoning the sabotaged ship a week previous. She must have had an inside source, Lya reasoned, since she didn't have to fight to take it over - she just walked in (or sailed in on her giant and not-at-all-ridiculous seahorse) and took it. Since the island was Danor's territory, it could be seen as a move by Risur, so it was imperative control be wrested away from the Duchess right quick. In fact, Lya was giving the group three days before Danor was going to take it back forcibly. She also gave the group a second mission - to look for her cousin, Nathan Jierre. He was doing astrological research with miners on Axis Island.

This little detail would come up again later. I’m not sure why it was recorded that Nathan was working with the workers. I’m guessing I mentioned Nathan doing work on the island, as well as mining operations that were occurring there and it was mashed together in the notes. This time it wasn’t that big a deal, but it comes up again in the second adventure where it becomes much more important that their information is consistent.

The plan to take back the island was this: Section 9, accompanied by a navy infiltration team, lands at the sea caves, goes through the mines, opens the sea gate, and lets the Risur navy in to take control from the Duchess.

The group assured Lya they'd complete the mission and she departed. Delft remarked that he thought she wasn't telling them everything and instructed the group to keep their eyes peeled for hinky dealings from Danor.

The group boarded the R.N.S. Impossible and once again encountered Captain Rutger Smith, who recognized them from their previous encounter aboard the Coaltongue and asked if they'd like to join him for brunch the next day. They, of course, agreed.

At brunch the next day, the captain relayed the tale of Section 9, the Duchess, and the Coaltongue to his tablemates, who were almost certainly very impressed and possibly a little awestruck. The captain changed topic to the mission and Section 9 clammed up - national security and all. He understood. He then moved on to discussing whether the Duchess was in the right, trying to fight to protect the old ways. Perhaps if he had broached this subject with them in a more private location they would've felt free to entertain such a notion, but certainly within a crowded cafeteria, they - part of the royal investigative body - weren't interested in questioning the king's wishes.

We did a bit of chatting back and forth here. I posed them questions to try and get them to look at things from the Duchess’ point of view. What was she trying to do? What was she opposed to? Her methods may be deplorable, but doesn’t her goal justify her actions? I was concerned they were going to gut Smith after a few of the questions. I think the party was still getting used to the idea of having to question motivation in an RPG rather than having things being more black and white.

Soon it was time to go below decks to hear more about the plan and meet their new comrades, four constables from Slate. They were Tanya, a half-elf shaman with a spirit hound, Burton, a goblin who smelled wonderful, Letmas, a small human with daggers, and 7-Foot Dan, a tall human with a bulging sack (perv) and the largest mace the group had ever seen.
They settled in to discuss the plan. Soon Jak and Lorenzo noticed Letmas wasn't there anymore - not in corporeal form, anyway. Just an illusion. Erik mentioned the island had strange issues - things like rock slides when there shouldn't be and trees where there shouldn't be.

The plan had been discussed. Time for some R&R. Dan asked Jak whether she liked to break stuff. Did she? You bet she did! They went up top and smashed away. Lorenzo found some pals with whom he could drown his sorrows. The others milled about.

They arrived at the island. Tanya checked over her people and their equipment, then they jumped into the water with a 500-foot rope. A couple of minutes later, the rope began to vibrate. Then it started jerking. Time to go check on them.

Section 9 boldly jumped in the water and followed the rope into a cave, where they found Burton with a leg trapped under a boulder. He was still conscious and was able to tell them that they'd made it out of the water, then suddenly they were back in the water again. Everything turned yellow, he said, and there was a blue sun. Dun dun dun...

Section 9 picked up the boulder. Burton pulled himself and his now-flattened leg out, then passed out. The group moved the boulder to the side and discovered the crushed remains of the rest of the infiltration crew. (Big Tom! We barely knew ye!) Sec9 grabbed Burton and the others and returned them to the navy ship from which they'd disembarked.

One of my players will sometimes anticipate where the story is going to go, and I felt this would be one of those points where he’d call out that the infiltration team was going to get killed pretty quickly. Why would you introduce a squad of agents who are better than the characters and have them lead the way? So I came up with a plan to surprise them with the cave in.

We meet every other week, so as I was preparing for this session I reskinned a handful of monsters so I’d have stats for these NPCs. I started dropping hints to a couple of my players that they’d be getting some NPCs they could us in encounters. I shot some of the powers I’d put together over to one of the guys I work with and really talked it up.

When they met the group I handed out sheets with their stats and powers to each of the players, asked them to pick the one they wanted and told them they’d use the NPC as an ally in combat. Everyone was super excited with these powerful NPCs, and sheets were traded until everyone had the character they wanted.

Then the moment of truth came. The infiltration team was going to go in the cave first. Nobody said anything, everything was cool. The water rippled, the rope was yanked several times. My players figured they’d just have to head in there and catch up to help them fight off an ambush, no problem.

Nope, the rope was stuck under a huge boulder and Burton’s leg was pinned as well. They easily lifted the boulder only to find the infiltration team crushed underneath. At that point I asked for the sheets back, then crumpled them up and tossed them on the floor. Right at that moment my dog showed up and ripped the crumpled paper into shreds.

Didn’t see it coming. Lorenzo’s player, who I was expecting would have called it, just started laughing. He got it.

They returned to the cave and pressed on into a cavern with a guy yelling crazy-talk about how the group had killed his friends. And then he shot Erik. Never ones to shrink from battle, Sec9 girded their loins and gave the crazy bastard what-for. There was water and platforms and elementals and ladders and Remington blowing up barrels and knocking Crazy Ol' Coot unconscious. All the elements of a dashing, memorable fight. (There's something about those water levels...) Once the battle ended, the group grabbed some golden icons from the area. Coot asked for them back and they all gave him a withering look, then began the questioning.

Turns out Coot (real name Nicholas Dupier) was the mine foreman. He thought Sec9 was part of the Duchess-led army that had been killing people on the island left and right. Since they weren't, he agreed to take them through the mines. The group urged him to fight for his land, but he couldn't be swayed. His place was the mines.

The mines opened out onto a forested area. They noticed a recently-dug pit to the left and found a mass grave of miners. One can hope that while Captain Smith may be open to the Duchess' ideas, he would oppose her execution of them. Wow, no pun intended.

This is one of the things I really like about this Adventure Path, there are characters put in here that are pushing the players to ask questions and try to see things from another point of view. It’s not something I see in D&D that much, and it’s a huge change of pace from just killing all bad guys because they’re bad.

Sec9 had two choices for reaching their next destination: through the forest or by taking the road. The forest was unsettling, so they chose the road, which was only a couple of miles to the fortress.

After fifteen minutes, they heard metallic grinding from the forest. Then came the thump of heavy footsteps. Sec9 booked, and saw a headless iron golem burst from the forest behind them. It crossed the road to the other side of the forest and headed on its merry way.

Giant golem! I figured the players were going to kill it, because that’s what you do in D&D, right? Fortunately, I was able to convey the might of the creature well enough that they took off in the other direction. They did go back and investigate after it was gone and Quinn, who happens to be a spirit medium, got a good look at witchoil. That’ll be coming up again pretty soon.

They could see the fortress two miles away! But they could also see torches burning a half-mile away and getting closer. They tried hiding in the forest, but Clumsy McClodfoot stepped on a stick, alerting them to their presence.

This was a pretty great session. There was a good mix of role playing and combat so everyone was happy. As the DM, I was extremely pleased to see all of the foreshadowing going on with things they ran into here. There will be some small pay offs coming up pretty soon in the campaign, and I’m wondering if they’ll recall where they first ran into it.

 

[RangerWickett]

I really like the bait and switch with the NPC stats. Brilliant idea.

 

[mumford]

Sec9, though hidden amongst the trees, let the 14 approaching Risuri know they were there when several of their members failed to be properly stealthy. A couple fellas from the Risuri pack began checking the bushes for these clumsy oafs. Remington decided the best defense was a good offense and stepped out. He played it like they were a fellow squad lost on their way back from dealing with a situation in the mines. It was a valiant effort, but they just weren't buying it. So, battle!

Bungled Bluff check here.

The leaders of said pack were evil mage-like characters who made Erik and Jak attack their fellow comrades! Not cool! Fighting fighting fighting, when suddenly - reality shifted! Trees shimmer and things didn't feel quite real! Fighting fighting fighting, then reality took a big left turn and the group found themselves in a swampy place with yellow frogs and a blue sun! Oh no! Was death by a boulder far behind? Fortunately, this reality hung out until they finished the battle. And then they were back in regular reality. Real reality?

The group shrugged off the planar shift pretty quickly. It was disappointing that nobody was dumped into a pit when they shifted, lucky day I suppose.

'Bout a half-mile up, they noticed an overturned wagon in the middle of the road. Erik, his elemental, and Jak approached cautiously. Weapons were scattered all around the ground, but they were scattered in a way that looked almost too-random, so they left well-enough alone and headed on. Bigger fish to fry and all.

They were so close to poking the weapons I could taste it.

They continued on to the fortress. Because the passwall was on a southern wall and they were on course to run into the western wall, they left the path and headed into the foothills.

They reached the southern wall and found a guard walking the wall above them. They considered reading a scroll of silence, but decided there was no time advantage to it, so Remington just read the scroll of passwall. The wall spread before them like a cheap hooker. Or something more solemn and impressive.

They sent their little drunken sneak Lorenzo through the wall. He popped out on the other side, came back, and was somehow able to communicate to the group what he had seen - lots of broken windows and burnt buildings. (One must assume he - and the group - knew sign language. Although if he did, wasn't he not really mute?) He also saw more guards on the inner wall.

Lorenzo doesn’t speak, but we never really thought about this until now. We’re all used to his player being vocal about everything, so we never thought it was odd that he was able to convey this information to us. After this point we all started to urge Lorenzo to not talk, I’m not sure it’s been super effective yet, though there have been a few occasions that it would have helped if he could have spoken. I expect this will be much more interesting soon.

The group decided to bypass the inner fortress in favor of heading straight for the lighthouse. On the way, they encountered a building with about ten guards watching it. Erik and Lorenzo wanted to be on their way, but Remington and Jak wanted to check it out. Quinn broke the tie in favor of curiosity. They snuck around back and overtook the guards. Jak entered and found a teleportation circle with many swords around it pointing in. She started quietly pulling them off, attempting to prevent the guards out front from noticing. The rest of the group made its way in and they all joined Jak in clearing the circle. One of the guards wandered to the back of the house and discovered the overcome guards' bodies. Time to fight!

Erik blocked the back door with a wall, so the guards were forced to come in through the front. Choke point! Remington decided being quiet (and therefore, keeping the knowledge of their infiltration a secret) was for pussies and fired his gun. Ah well. It turned out it didn't matter a hell of a lot anyway, since the remainder of the guards soon ran away, presumably to tattle on them. Sec9 let them go to finish clearing the device of swords. Making as much damned noise as they pleased.

Erik has been reluctant to take charge of the group and let the majority decide to infiltrate the building. They took out the guards at the back, but they’re not stealthy so the guards in the front made their Perception check and investigated the noise. I was trying to figure out what I should do about this and figured I’ve give them a couple of turns before things started going crazy in the fort. They were able to take out most of the guards, but a couple of them ran off. With guards escaping, they took off running and I bumped the alert level of the base up to max so they’d have no breathing room at the light house.

I’ve got plans to push Erik a bit more so he steps up into the leadership role. I’m working on building a short adventure that’ll take place between The Dying Skyseer and Digging for Lies that will give the players an opportunity to focus on their characters a bit more. I’m trying to come up with some reason for the group to be in charge of another unit, or some scenario where they will have to lead another group of people. I want that situation to reward quick decisive leadership, rather than the slow plodding committee run decision making they’re going with right now.

They headed towards the lighthouse and entered the towers that allowed them to get up onto the wall. They ran about two-hundred feet towards the lighthouse, then encountered resistance in the form of about a dozen enemies.

All sorts of fighting ensued as the brave members of Sec9 tried to push their way up the stairs towards the lighthouse. A bell began to ring from within the tower. A bolt of lightning hit Erik, but he with his sturdy exterior laughed it off. Fighting continued, then another bolt of lightning crashed into Erik and knocked him into the water. Quinn used his elemental's power to make a huge, daring leap, landing amongst four enemies! Remington tried to shoot the mage hitting the group with lightning, but instead, was knocked into the water with a bolt himself.

Eventually, Lorenzo got into the lighthouse. He found and pulled the lever and the sea gate began to retract. Jak fired the flare to let the navy know the gate was open. The wizard, apparently unable to tell when he was beat, tried to send a bolt at Quinn's bear, but missed. The group ended his evil ways once and for all.

The sea gate lumbered open while Sec9 surveyed the carnage at the lighthouse. Over the groaning of the gate they heard the distant rumble of incoming rebel soldiers. The Duchess’ forces had rallied to repel the intruders that had infiltrated the fortress, re-enabled the linked portal, and opened up the gate. The Risur navy was on its way, but would Sec9 be able to hold out long enough to keep the gate open?

The fight to take the lighthouse was pretty cool. Erik is a Battlerager Fighter, so he’s generally able to withstand tons of damage without trouble. Having the wizard blast him off and into the water was a good reminder that enemies can do more than just damage. He was out of the fight for several turns while he swam back and climbed back up to the light house. It did seem like some of the enemies were a bit weak, and they were dispatched fairly easily.

It was a pretty exciting adventure and the players kept me on my toes. Coming up with an encounter on the fly was fairly easy, and nobody suspected that I was just making things up. Up next would be the lighthouse defense challenge which would be an interesting change of pace.