#Dungeon23

Sean McCoy came up with an idea, a dungeon room a day, for a year. At the end of the year, you've got a 12 level, 365 room megadungeon. He posted this on Twitter, and it took off. He then wrote up a blog post about it here.

And as I love a good megadungeon, and can use a good kick in the pants to get posting more regularly, I'm joining in! I've even got my notebook all set up. 

 

 And the plan is as follows:

• 1 Room per day (or small group of rooms)
  
• 1 Section per week - and one blog post about it 
• 1 Level per month

I'll be using the Tomb of Adventure Design and the Dungeon Alphabet for inspiration, and leaning toward Old School Essentials/Rules Cyclopedia as the rules set

Since it's going to be largely unplanned, I'm going to make a number of connection points early on that won't be identified until later. 

As for the maps, I'm considering a number of options, from dice drop maps to whatever I can doodle out to reusing some maps I've drawn but never did anything else with before. I'll probably end up doing a mix by year's end. 

The most exciting part about this is that it feels like that collaborative creative rush we used to have back on G+! I think I might start early, do a practice run before starting the project in the new year.

November ‘22 In Review

It is a time to be thankful, and there’s a lot to be thankful for. My family and friends are all healthy and safe. I have a good job that does good work. I have a house, space and some time for games and hobbies. I have a wife who encourages me to do these things that bring me joy. Hell, she even took care of our toddler for a weekend so I could head back to Maryland to go collect a bunch of my stuff that’s been in storage since I moved to NY! And now I have my whole RPG library back!

Gaming
Over Thanksgiving break one of my D&D players was in town, and we got to play 2 games of Stargrave together! Stonehell has also been rolling along, and you might have noticed I finally got back into writing session reports. More are on the way!  

Miniatures
You know those projects that you start on and then sit on for… a long time? Well, I finally wrapped one of those up. A 3D printed statue that I got years ago. The print lines on it were fairly bad, and it was demotivating. Well, I finally got back to it. After a liberal coat of glue and sand, the texture was transformed from 3D print to rough stone. Add in a couple of nail art gems and some paint, and it’s looking good!

I also worked on a few other fun things this month, including a chicken swarm, which may be the silliest mini in my collection.

Media
Star Wars Tales of the Jedi
Star Trek Prodigy
Andor
Bad Batch
Ghosts
Your Highness
Wednesday

Goals
1 session report written up per week. At least that way I won’t fall further behind.
Play the next solo Stargrave adventure
Finish all my current WIP minis

Stonehell: Mines out of Time

 Session 188 was played on 2/6


Morgana, Mage 8 (Rob)
Joho, Mystic, 7 (Chris)
Koltic, Cleric 6 (NPC)
Biffin, Fighter 7 (NPC)
Aroon, Fighter 4 (NPC)
Jameth, Fighter 4 (NPC)
Lor’Koth, Dwarf 5 (NPC)
Rada, Thief 3 (NPC)
Thunder, Dwarf 1 (NPC)
Barcox, Fighter 1 (NPC)


Koltic spends his time back in town getting drunk and brewing potions… among other things. Morgana researches gate rituals. Joho hires some likely recruits, Thunder the Dwarf and Barcox the Fighter.

Heading into the dungeon they pass through the main entrance, through the Quiet Halls where Kolic dusts some skeletons. From there they head down to the 5th level without further incident. Exploring an unmapped mineshaft, they pass by words of warning against entering the mines. They ignore the warnings and enter anyway…  promptly blacking out.

When they come to, they’re dressed in rags with only some old mining equipment to share among them, and a group of skeletons to fight. Tough mineral encrusted skeletons. They defeat them, Koltic managing to destroy 4/5, while Jojo smashes one apart. Not knowing which way to go, they head out in a random direction. And promptly black out.

When they come to, they’re dressed in rags with only some old mining equipment to share among them, and a group of skeletons to fight. Tough mineral encrusted skeletons. They defeat them, and then head off in a different direction.

They explore the mines further, battling more undead. Thundar drops in a tough fight and they have to abandon him and run away to regroup. They encounter a glitchy but friendly ghost who tells them of a primordial being locked in a stele within the mine, and a weapon that might destroy him. Following the ghost’s glitchy directions, they head in what they think is the right direction, and promptly pass out.

When they come to, they’re dressed in rags with only some old mining equipment to share among them, and a group of skeletons to fight. Tough mineral encrusted skeletons. They defeat them, noticing that their spells and wounds aren’t resetting while everything else (including all the undead) are. They follow the ghost’s directions again, avoiding the path that reset them, and find a shrine devoted to the dwarven god of mines. A large silver hammer on the wall serves as the holy symbol, and according to the ghost, the means of destroying the evil that has them trapped in the mines out of time.  

Gains: Magic Hammer
Kills: Ore Skeletons, Skeletons, Pitmen, Wraiths, Wights, Zombies
Losses: Thundar

Stargrave Quarantine 37: Hydroponics Bay Bugs!

Captain's Log: The bastard said the station was abandoned. He didn't say anything about the bugs.Or that he'd sold the same info to my former fellow marine...

The stations life support systems were limping along, helped in part by the extensive hydroponics bay. From what our initial scans showed, there was salvage worth making the trip. We worked our way deeper into the station, leaving the ship with the engine idling so we could make a quick escape if we needed to. Scanners showed movement, and we went to investigate. Once in the hydroponics bay, we heard from the far side the unmistakable sounds of people talking, but scanners showed more... And soon enough we spotted the bugs.

 

 While we faced a number of the acid spewing bugs, my competition and his crew ended up facing the nastier warrior bugs that tore into and through his troop. Having grabbed a single treasure token, what was left of his force made for the doors. 

On my side of the hydroponics bay, concentrated crossfire kept the acid spewers from causing too much pain, while the rest of the treasures were secured. 

And not wanting to overstay our welcome, we headed for the station transit line.

---

Just these few pics as I was too into playing with another person for the first time in years to worry about snapping pics every turn. Needless to say, I had a blast.And getting to pull out my old nids and the aquarium plants I'd picked up right before COVID hit was a big bonus. I used the same crew as in my solo game (but not counting any of the XP I'd earned there.

Stargrave: Hope Eternal Mission 1 Access Codes

 It has been literally years since I last played Frostgrave, and until just this week, had never gotten the chance to play Stargrave. Something about moving away from my gaming group, and then a pandemic, plus the addition of a baby to the household just made mini gaming take a back seat to everything else. Thankfully, with the pandemic in mind, Joseph McCullough decided to release a solo Stargrave supplement called Hope Eternal. (He'd previous released a solo game akin to Frostgrave called Rangers of Shadowdeep, which I have, but have yet to play...) On Halloween, I decided to treat myself and play the first mission. 

I set up the board as the mission suggests, complete with a large central building, except my central building wasn't big enough. So I took a square of cardboard and set it to the side to serve as the interior of the building. 

Then I pulled out my minis and assembled a crew!

As Captain, I picked Sgt. Stone, clearly a vet in heavy armor.
1st officer, Decker the Tecker
Saw the Case Cracker
Dino the Commando
Trooper the Trooper
Rocket the Code Breaker
Jyn the Runner
Mr. Fixit the Gobbo Chisler
Troll the Gunner
And Blob the Recruit

Their mission? To break into a secure facility and retrieve some access codes. The crew infiltrated the settlement, avoiding the goons patrolling the streets.

The captain and first mate each took one side of the main building while everyone else milled about as convincingly as possible. The captain brazenly walked up, dropped a bag of credits into the guard's hand, and said he had an appointment, and the guard took the loot and opened the door for him (Nat 20!) Decker fails to open the door on his side of the building, but it turns out to be less important as the Captain's side held the data center. Saw moves in and immediately tries to hack the system, but fails. The guards are now on alert, and more ruffians enter the board. 

 

The Captain moves into the building and unlocks the computer (did someone give him the passcodes?) Saw and the guards trade gunfire. Decker again fails to open the other door, but the ruffians in the street are now aware of whats up, and firefights break out all over the neighborhood. Trooper and Blob are both hit, Blob is wounded. Troll takes out one ruffian with his big gun. Amazingly no additional forces enter the board.

Cap and Saw take pot shots at the guards in the building as they run for the street. Decker takes out an injured ruffian, while Saw takes shots from multiple directions and goes down. Gobbo and Blob run off, while Trooper kills another ruffian. 2 more ruffians enter the board.

Cap tries to launch a grenade on a clustered group of ruffians, but misses. Decker and Dino give up on the door and run for it. Trooper gets shot up, but makes it off the board. Jyn kills a ruffian and she and Troll run off the board. 4 more ruffians enter the board. 

Cap sends another grenade off wildly, and books it off the board with the access codes. 

Saw manages to survive, but is badly injured. The crew earned 300 credits, and the captain 170xp. 

Next Mission: The Great Cardboard Maglev Robbery

October‘22 In Review

Started the month with Hurricane Ian hitting us. Well, it wasn’t a hurricane when it finally got up here, but it was still 4+ days of rain and gusty winds which revealed a leaky spot in the roof, and caused some minor flooding in the basement. Gonna need to rethink my plans for floor to ceiling bookshelves. There’s also a small roof leak that needed tending too. Both of these sucked up far too much of my time. Getting ready for Halloween took up the rest of it.

I picked up a 5’ skeleton to start things off, then decided to make some tombstones for the front yard. Nothing too complex, or expensive, this year. Just some simple shipping boxes with monster mud and paint. Due to not having any tools, not even a simple chip brush, this still required several trips to the hardware store, but I’ll detail that in another post. In the end I finished 8 tombstones. Next year I think I’m going to add another skeleton, and maybe a scarecrow. Thinking about going fancy and having the head light up… but I’ve got 364 days to figure it out.  

Gaming
My Stonehell game continues along. Almost had a TPK on a little demon infested side dungeon. The big news though is that I got to play Stargrave! Hope Eternal, the newest supplement was just released, and it’s an entire solo campaign. I only played the first scenario, but it was so much fun to get minis on the table. 

Miniatures
Solid progress this month. Painted a bunch of spooky minis, and have a bunch more picked out to work on for November.

Media
Star Trek Voyager (season 4)
Lower Decks
She Hulk
Andor
Hocus Pocus 2
Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
Rocky Horror Picture Show
Mr. Boogedy
Little Shop of Horrors
Young Frankenstein
Ghosts (eps 1-6)

Goals
Play more Stargrave, and get some session reports written up.

September ‘22 In Review

Time flies. As much as I love and look forward to October, I’m not actually ready for it to BE October. Yet, here we are. Last month was a busy one at work, plus taking care of home improvement projects, as well as the usual just day to day week to week things that need doing. I didn't have time for a game of Stargrave, but I did paint a bunch of terrain for it (or Frostgrave) and the table is set up and ready to go.


Gaming

My players have just about cleared the 5th level of Stonehell, having wiped out the mountain trolls. Now just to face the dragon. The question is, will they, or will they go back up to level 2 and deal with the unseelie fey on levels 1 & 2

Miniatures

Semi-productive month. Wrapped up a number of projects that had been lingering, including the squad of Blackstar Corsairs, the froghemoth, and some big terrain pieces. And of course the obligatory kobold.

Media

Star Trek Voyager (season 3)
What We Do In The Shadows (season 3 & 4)
Star Trek Lower Decks
She Hulk
Andor
Hocus Pocus 2

Goals

Play a single game of Stargrave, get at least 1 session report written a week, paint some fun halloween themed minis.