In which I finally discuss...at lengrh...the tournament module written for Cauldron 2025's prestigious (and now annual) Blackrazor Cup....
SATURDAY BLOCK I: Rivers of Blood, Death, and Glory
Getting to Germany from Seattle isn't the easiest thing in the world. Yeah, it's a long haul. Yeah, it's more money than I'd like to spend on a plane ticket. Yeah, it means being away from my family for a weekend and missing things like high school dances and playoff soccer games.
Is it worth the trouble and effort, just for a gaming convention? For me?
Yes. It is.
But I don't know if it's quite worth it...or if I'm quite willing...to make it an annual pilgrimage. Every other year sounds about right. At least until my kids are old enough to accompany me (always assuming I can afford the airfare). Cauldron I (in 2023) was fantastic...but I couldn't quite justify doing it again in 2024. And yet, I wanted to be part of Cauldron II all the same. Which is why I asked to convention organizers (well, really just Settembrini) if I could write a tournament module for the thing.
Hence was born Children of the Sea, which I haven't written much about, because I thought it was going to be part of the OSRIC kickstarter stretch goals. Yeah, no...THAT didn't happen. But don't worry; it'll get released in a different fashion....
Feedback from Children was immensely positive: the con-goers in 2024 really seemed to enjoy it...so much so that they wanted to make it an annual contest at the con. Great news! However, some folks felt that the module had been "too easy." What the F...?
[when I ran it for my home group it ended in a TPK...]
My adventures are supposed to be "challenging" not "easy;" certainly not "too easy!" Having my ego slighted, it is only natural that I would want to redeem myself with a stronger adventure for 2025. Not a terribly awful, "killer" dungeon, but something designed to be fiendish even while being appropriately stocked for players of the requisite level.
Thus was conceived the idea for Rivers of Blood, Death, and Glory. I think the title probably came first, even before the concept: an upriver trek into the frozen wilds of British Columbia.
Now, when searching for a premise/scenario, my first thought that to re-write/re-purpose yet another DragonLance module...specifically DL6: Dragons of Ice. I have a fascination with this adventure, for a number of reasons. For one thing, I rather love white dragons: they are dragons (duh) that even low-mid level parties can survive encounters with...great for a game with the word "dragons" in the title. Also, frost breath is awesome. Also, in B/X and OD&D they are NEUTRAL in alignment, making them one of three "non-evil" dragons (which opens all sorts of possibilities). Not that this adventure was ever planned to be anything other than AD&D....
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| My favorite DragonLance cover art... |
There are two other reasons that DL6 interests me: the first of these is that it represents the first adventure truly divorced from the novels. I read the original DL novels long before I ever read any of the modules, and the details of the protagonists' excursion to IceWall Castle (another great name) is mostly left out of the text, instead being relegated to (yet another) example of the Hickman poetry fetish. Which...for me...means that the unfolding events of the adventure are quite wide open for interpretation.
The last reason I find DL6 interesting is that the "dungeon" portion of the adventure is actually stocked "by the numbers," with the proper amount of monsters, traps/tricks, special, and empty encounters (for the number of encounter areas) AND (if memory serves) even the proper amount of treasure for the party. This is pretty amazing, and considering the size it would fit just fine within a four-hour tournament time slot (it is a rather small "dungeon").
However, it is BORING AS HELL and, for the most part, far too easy when it comes to the "big bad evil wizard," and while it is well-themed (and includes some great dragon encounters), I didn't particularly want minotaurs and walrus men. Oh...and the layout is pretty sad, too: a bunch of rooms around a courtyard; possibly the most dull map ever attached to a Hickman project.
[to be fair, it IS credited to Douglas Niles, an author I do not hold in very high esteem as a module cobbler]
Even so, it gave me a good base to start from. I removed the "evil wizard" guy completely (because evil wizards tend to get pwned when facing a party of eight adventurers, no matter how high their level...spell interruption, you know?) and instead made the guy dead and buried and part of the backstory. Minotaurs and thanoi got replaced with yetis, the polar bear for a brown bear (because it's British Columnia). All the dragons got to stay (yes, Chomi, DL6 uses the exact same number of dragons!), as did the winter wolves. Throw in a few undead here and there, a golem, some magical traps appropriate to a lich's stronghold and some more interesting treasure and voila! Tournament adventure written.
[I keep telling people I'm just a hack when it comes to this stuff, and I'm not lying. I may be a very good hack, but in terms of sheer creativity there are plenty of Very Fine Minds out there to whom I don't hold a candle]
Having run the adventure twice prior to Cauldron, I had a pretty good idea of how the thing played. The "upper works" (where the bulk of the adventure's half a million gold pieces in treasure may be found) is especially dastardly. UNIVERSALLY, I found players would get flustered/distracted by the firetrap on the lich's crystal ball and then miss searching for secret doors in the scrying room; this is only exacerbated by the multiple yeti encounters (where are we going to run into another pack of those guys) and the pressure of the tournament time limit.
[I am cognizant of the elven party members' ability to automatically check for secret doors just by passing by the space, but if they did not mention anything about exploring the room or even going deep into it, I did not allow the chance. Were I to rewrite the adventure, I would simply note that the secret door can ONLY be found by "active searching," and see which groups keep their wits about them]
Likewise, the cliffside entrance to the dragon caves is supposed to be difficult to spot...if anything, that entrance is meant to be a "reward" of sorts for groups that encounter (and survive!) a random encounter with the dragon while exploring the village. I will relate that ONE particular group at Cauldron (who shall not be named) asked me for a "hint" about the adventure and I said, "Keep your heads up." They deciphered my message and found their way into the caves...only to be all-but-TPK'd by the dragon and her young. Instant karma, perhaps?
With regard to my own Cauldron session, the group did a fine job: certainly the best of any of the three groups I've run. Now, given, they DID have eight heads in the game, but the adventure ran pretty much the same, and they were quite clever with how they approached the various encounters, not taking anything in the way of casualties (by actual DEATH), losing fingers to frostbite, melting their own weapons in the black forge, blowing up spell-casters with the firetrap, or trying on the necklace of strangulation. In fact, they were the FIRST group I've run to not lose a single party member...well, except for one player who left the table (perhaps in disgust, after being energy drained half his levels).
[sorry, man...]
ACTUALLY, the disgust was more likely due to the way I could not contain my maniacal cackling laughter towards the end of the adventure. I have no excuse for this and I apologize unconditionally for the offense I caused...the pained look on Prince of Nothing's face and the desperation in his voice as time was running out just did something to tickle my funny bone. It was highly reminiscent of playing with my brother (back in the good ol' days before he went crazy off-the-rails with his mental issues and alcoholism...), and Prince (and the others) should take it as a compliment. It is rare that I laugh that hard or so long with anyone, except friends I feel comfortable with (and my own kids).
[and, to be clear, it was not Prince who abandoned the table]
But...look here: they sussed out that the pit of wights was FULL OF WIGHTS even before they left the throne room. They MAPPED THE DUNGEON METICULOUSLY (up until the mines below) and knew EXACTLY WHERE THE WIGHTS WERE. And then they STILL went there (and got their asses beat). And THEN...with time running out and the desperation to find more treasure positively reeking off them...they WANTED TO GO BACK FOR MORE PUNISHMENT.
How could I not chuckle?
This I chalk up to metagaming of the WRONG type. I encourage metagaming: if players know that fire kills trolls, they should not pretend otherwise when they encounter a band of regenerators. The players KNEW that the skeleton with the yellow-orange mold on it was a dangerous mold of SOME variety, and wisely avoided it. They should have probably taken the same tack with the wights, especially since they knew there were 16 of them, far more than they could probably turn.
And, yet, they assumed that I (the DM) had put the wights there for a reason. That there must be some "great frigging treasure" in that pit. As if a lich lord wouldn't just have a pit of wights to throw people into for his own amusement. My adventures are designed to have a certain type of logic to them...they are not "funhouses." Why are the yetis there? Because the place has been abandoned and they've taken up residence (in the places they could reach). Why is there a forge of black flame? To craft the lich's weapons of war. Etc., etc. See, there is metagaming and then there is "over-thinking” (which might be defined as “trying to out-think/guess the DM”). I suppose that works sometimes but…well, I can’t say I recommend the practice.
But, again, the adventure is designed this way. The time pressure functioned great...the methodical, cautious approach started escaping their grasp as time wound down. As happens. A blizzard is a-coming folks...got to get the treasure out and get back to the boats!
Anyway...
Other teams (except the one that blundered into the dragons' den) escaped with far more loot...several in excess of 200K and the winning team with more than 300K. Then again, I wasn't running the adventure for all of them...would they have fared as well with me in the captain's chair? Hard to say. Prince & Co. took home some 88K which exceeded my home group by the value of one potion of heroism and a handful of silver...but they did it without losing a single PC to death and that is something.
Last thing I want to say about the tournament adventure (which most everyone I spoke with at Cauldron seemed to enjoy): every single monster in the adventure came direct from the 1E Monster Manual. Every single treasure in the adventure can be found in the pages of the 1E DMG. Every single spell-type trap (firetrap, glyph, etc.) is in the 1E Players Handbook. No UA tricks, no Dragon Magazine articles, not even a Fiend Folio critter to be found...I wanted to make sure all the DMs could run the thing using nothing but the core books.
Because the core books have PLENTY of "good stuff" in 'em.
; )
All right. That's all I want to say on the tournament adventure. Thanks to everyone who gave it a go, and thanks especially to all the DMs that ran it...you folks were excellent!
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