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| Keep your stick on the ice. Unless you're gonna drive it thru a vampire's chest cavity. |
Vlad Draculastein – Lvl 4 Dampyr
Greed – Lvl 5 Homanculus
Rael – Lvl 6 Thief/Werewolf
Ritzy – Lvl 5 Homanculus
Richard Darkmagic – Lvl 5 Magic User
Arongoth of Hogendaus – Lvl 5 Cleric
Fritzy and Doug 2 zombified rat creature minions
The story so far: Bark Eatin’ Ted, the mad mountain man of Ghoulardia Pass has agreed to help you find some of the herbs on Rael’s werewolf cure shopping list in exchange for killing Lobovich, the vampire of Cardille keep.
Desiring to freshen up before tackling such a foe, the party repaired to Strangeldorf and found the town quite indifferent to their presence. They bought rooms at The Dead Cat (Strangledorf’s Inn/Biergarten) and placed an order at the Temple of All Saints for 10 healing potions (At a cost of 1500 gp) which will be ready in a week, and therefore are killing time around town while waiting for their potions.
And that’s where we introduce Carousing into the game. Huzzah!
Current Party Finances:
Items in red are items you need to sell or barter to get the monetary value out of.
First Session: 40 GP, Necklace: 50 gp, Greed’s Teapot: 10 gp
Session 1: 2 GP
Session 3: 100 GP, 1 Gold Earring (40gp)
Session 6: 2400 GP, Cache of Gems: Total Worth 2430 GP (930)*, Fine Sword with Skull Pommel & Engraved Rose & Thorns 300 GP
Session 8: 600 SP, 400 GP, 4 Bottles of Fine Brandy (80 gp total)
Session 10: 70 GP
Total: 3072 in liquid cash. 2910 in sellable assets (1410 available to sell in Strangeldorf)
*Strangeldorf is a moderate sized town, and can’t handle transactions of cash over 350 gp. Therefore, 3 of the gems you retrieved from Gore De Vol’s crypt, a large topaz, a large citrine, and a deep blue spinel are too rich for the town’s commerce, reducing the available cash by a total of 1500 gp. To sell these you’ll need to make it to a larger city.
In addition, you have found several magic items which you must divide between yourselves.
Basic Carousing Rules:
Spend d6 x 100gp to earn that many XP. The save versus Poison or roll on the Carousing Mishaps table below. If you roll more money than you have on hand you now owe the difference to some sort of criminal unless another PC can cover your expenses. (Note: Strangeldorf isn’t as big a town, so I’m gonna call that number 1d4X100 instead of 1d6)
Jeff Rients' Carousing Rules
Commentary:
With a list of herbs to gather in their grubby little paws our adventuring party set out into the fog shrouded pine forests covering the hillsides around Ghoulardia Pass. There they met and parlayed with the mad druid Bark Eatin' Ted and his giant, flesh ripping weasels. After some gravelly voiced negotiation Ted agreed to hook them up with the herbs if they'd take care of the area's little vampire problem.
Figuring they'd need to stock up and maybe sleep in a bed that hadn't had a deer carcass ripped open by a werewolf on it, they headed to the nearby town of Strangeldorf. The reason they were surprised at that sleepy alpine hamlet's indifference to their presence is the fact that they'd earlier been run out of town by a torch and pitchfork wielding mob.
This is my general lead in for the Ghoulardia Pass sandbox. Why they got run out of town is totally immaterial. The fact is they were and now the story begins in media res with the party walking down a road past a graveyard, a creepy keep, a lake, and a dilapidated hunting lodge on a cold, rainy night.
Since torch and pitchfork wielding mobs are kind of the local pastime, it really was no big whoop. Whatever they did to precipitate one, by now it was long forgotten. Especially if they were back with jingling piles of coins in hand.
So this was mostly one of those logistics centered sessions that pop up in an ongoing campaign from time to time. The party had been piling up loot and riling up monsters for several sessions, now it was time to cash in. I decided to toss Jeff Rients' legendary Carousing Rules into the mix, 'cos nothin' spices up a trip into town like a drunken rampage or two. To any DM's out there, if you aren't using Carousing in your game then you're not having as much fun as you could. It may take a little coaxing to get players to nut up and throw down, but it can lead to some rich, rich gameplay. Check 'em out!
Stay tuned for next week when our creepy crew samples Strangeldorf's night life.
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