Tagged mythic bastionland

Mythic Bastionland Second Session

For my second open-table session of Mythic Bastionland for ATLRPG I ran for four knights.

The Knights:

Session Recap

The Company began the session at Corvale, the Seat of Power, just in time for the Feast of the Sun. The Knights attend the early morning mass to catch the first rays of Spring. After listening to the monk intone a solemn blessing, a couple of the Knights shared some subtle digs targeted at Valamonte the ruler for his supposed part in the poisioning of Sir Croyle the ruler of Cragborough.

Next the Knights prepared themselves for thier part in the bloody games; a battle against some fantastical creatures. But first the Knights were spectators of Valamonte's fight against a fearsome bear. A couple of the Knights noticed something looked off between the lethargy of the bear, and Valamonte's showboating. They were able to overhear some beast tamers discussing the drugs used to slow the bear so the ruler could have his grand spectacle in relative safety.

Disgusted by this, but not above a little prepartion themselves the Hooded Knight made sure to learn what beasts they were to fight and prepare accordingly. They quickly dispatched a pair of giant tigers, maiming one, and driving the other back down its entrance tunnel. This show of mercy and restraint stood in great contrast to the theatrics of Valamonte's bout.

After the adulations of the crowd, the Knights attended the feast held by the ruler. There the Gazer Knight was able to win the good graces of Valamonte, but at the expense of earning a bitter enemy in the ruler's Marshall, Cradokke the Hive Knight. The Hooded Knight and the Pigeon Knight set about gathering information, and learned a little (but I forgot what lol). The Reliquary Knight decided to embrace the tradition of indulging during the Feast, but went too far and suffered hefty Vigor and Clarity loss.

The next day with the Reliquary Knight confined to his bed to recover his Vigor, the Hooded Knight and the Pigeon Knight visited the keep's great library in hopes of learning more about the Cudgel myth. Instead they discovered that the nearby forest was named after a mighty Boar who still roams the land. Eager for glory they later convinced the rest of the Company to seek out this mythical creature. Meanwhile the Gazer Knight decided to capitialize on his relationship with Valamonte and sought him out in hopes of securing aid for the lonely guard near Jouster's Field. He succeed, but perhaps by too much as Valamonte seized on the opportunity to send troops so close to Cragborough. Thus a warband lead by the Hive Knight was roused to be sent out to Jouster's Field.

After everyone shared their information, the Company decided to set out the next day, but the Reliquary Knight urged them to seek the closest Seer to gain any knowledge about the myth of the Boar, and to regain their senses after the great night of revelry. A path chosen, they once again used the Gazer Knight's lantern to lead the way to the Sunlit Seer.

The Sunlit Seer told the Company that they were not the only ones hunting the Boar, and that it would be wise to join forces. She then implored them to take part in the battles that were surely to come between Corvale and Cragborough. Heeding at least the first part of the Seer's messages the Company rode north into the forest. There they met a scheming piper whose help in luring the Boar they secured for a promise of finding him a position as a court musician. Then they met three inexperienced hunters also seeking the Boar, but for revenge not glory.

An accomodation was reached and the large force set up an ambush for the Boar and quickly slew it. A goal reached the Company claimed the Boar's tusks then set out on their separate paths with a plan to rejoin in Cragborough at the beginning of Harvest.

Thoughts

This was the first time the Knights would be in Corvale. Instead of lore dumping on them, I did a light description, then used a Paint the Scene question to spread the worldbuilding load around. My question was something along the lines of:
Valamonte the Thunder Knight seized control of the throne a short while after Sceptremass last year. He quickly went about acts of goodwill and largese to win the hearts and minds of his new subjects. However as you look around you can see there are still pockets of unrest and unhappiness. What do you see?

Not the best worded question, but it proved interesting as the players were able to add in details such as the squalor and noticable increase in guards. These details were fun to work into Valamonte's entourage during his fight against the bear, and showing the haves and havenots. I'm definitely going to incorporate more paint the scene questions when the Knights visit major locations.

The Feast of the Sun was my first feast. And I'll admit I was a bit nervous. How does one make a feast and spectale fun without being a boring set of minigames?

Well first I read Chris McDowall's Mythic Feasts post to gather some more details. He breaksdown each holy day from the rulebook. Here is what he says about the Feast of the Sun:

Feast of the Sun (Sprouts, Early Spring)
Ceremony - A great toast is held at the first sight of the sun, offering thanks for the end to another winter. It’s customary not to mention those lost during the winter, lest spring feel ashamed for not coming sooner, but rulers will make a subtle tally of those absent.
Spectacle - A bloody tournament, in the belief that blood spilt on the ground will strengthen the land. This particularly attracts young knights hoping to make a name for themselves. Older, more established knights may know better than to risk their necks.
Revelry - The expectation is that this will be the biggest, most decadent feast of the year, but coming after a particularly difficult winter can leave the larders bare. Any lack of food is made up for in excessive drink, music, and dancing.

From this I decided I would hold a morning ceremony and asked each Knight where would they be during the ceremony:

  1. Up front with the monk and the ruler
  2. In the middle to avoid attention
  3. In the back with the other lollygaggers.

For the spectacle, I offered them another set of three choices:

  1. Fighting duels
  2. A fight against four other knights
  3. A fight against unknown beast(s)

For the revelery, I informed them they had several feasts they could attend, but Valamonte the ruler had invited them. At the feast I then offered them the three feast pursuits, Chris laid out in his blog post:

  1. Mirth
  2. Whispers
  3. Charm

For the ceremony, the players chose all three options. The Reliquary and Gazer Knights decided to be up front and chimed in with subtle and not so subtle digs at Valamonte when the Monk asked for anyone to offer words after the light. Oh, I also used this opportunity to incorporate the sun table from the Valley of Flowers to add more weirdness to the world.

The group quickly chose the fight against the beast, and prevailed in it quite handily while once again using it a subtle dig at the ruler. I think the ruler might start dispatching some mercaneries to teach these upstart knights a lesson or two.

As for the revelery, once again all three options were chosen. I liked the chance to zoom out here (as I wanted to get back to the myths), but still give the players a taste and potential rewards.

The rest of the session went mostly smooth. I got to introduce a new Seer, the Sunlit Seer. Her desire for her precious Knights to win some battles is going to be a joy to play.

The only rough patch was an inner debate with myself as the players planned their ambush of the Boar. They had only seen two omens. Yet they had a good plan and recruited aid through exchange of favors. Should I have the Boar attack and run away, or answer the ambush at all? Well the next Wilderness roll revealed the next omen for the Boar so I decided to embrace it and the primacy of action and say they planned it so they get it. Not sure if that is exactly how it was intended to be played, but it worked for the table.

Plus this gave me the perfect excuse to embrace Advancing Time. I seized the opportunity and declared we were advancing a season. I'm looking forward to the next feast: the Feast of the Stars. It is when the biggest tournaments are held. I think I'm going to riff on the Thorn Diares ideas in Running Tourneys and Jousting in Mythic Bastionland. I don't want to spend 2 hours of the 4 hours we have doing a tourney so I'll probably fast forward to the Elite Eight and see how things go.

Stats:

Mythic Bastionland First Session

Yesterday was my first open-table session of Mythic Bastionland for ATLRPG. For the first session I planned for only 4 players, but an extra one showed up so I let them join.

The Knights:

The Holdings:

Session Recap

The Company (which we still need to name) rode in from the east and made for the closest holding, Cragborough, to quickly get a pulse on the new realm they had entered. After a few days ride they arrived at the holding. During a few days exploring the holding, the Knights were able to learn:

The knights immediately began speculating that the ruler of the holding's illness was an omen for a myth. Deciding to act upon it they attended an open session of court. There they saw a group of farmers, led by Jon Juan Johan, petitioning the court of the recent damage to the crops from a drought. Seizing opportunity the knights offered to assist in determining the cause of the drought. Sir Croyle suggested they head south to the nearest Seer. During this conversation with Sir Croyle there were some awkward in-game moments (but hilarious to the table) about the Reliquary Knight's relic as it was two-headed swan who had been slain for causing a drought in a distant realm, and the Knight was parading the relic around describing its signifance while in a holding suffering from drought.

After another knight spent in Cragborough the Company journeyed south. After making camping in a glade, they awoke to the pleasant sounds of a washerman singing a tune while going about his business. This tune mentioned a "knight who had defeated death." Intrigued the Company questioned the man about his doings and the way to the Seer while making sure to remind him of his station.

Following the washerman's directions while making use of the Gazer Knight's lantern and the Pigeon Knight's homing ability they made their way towards the Sanctum of the Amber Brook. However their journey was interrupted when an ashen skinned knight atop a ghostly steed challenged each of them to solo combat. The Gazer Knight boldly took up this challenge, but was swiftly slain before realizing this was a vision of what would come to pass if stepped into the circle against this ghastly knight.

Disappointed with the lack of willing challengers the ashen knight rode on, and the Company continued to the Weeping Seer's sanctum. Here they came to understand that Sir Croyle was under the effects of a curse, and the curse had intertwined the land's fate and that of its ruler. They were then enlisted to accompany the Seer to Cragborough, but that night while sleeping a substantial section of heather caught fire near the Seer's hut. Geiss the Hooded Knight leapt up and led the Company in putting out the fire. Then the group headed back north to Cragborough.

Along the way they came upon a strange tunnel which the Seer seemed to imply a way of quickly reaching a destination of their choice, but knowing danger lies ahead. They rode through and arrived within sight of Cragborough in a third of the time taken a normal journey. But danger did lurk, but they swiftly slew a group of hound-shaped creatures formed from coils of worms.

With the Weeping Seer accompanying them, they returned to the ruler. There they discovered that the curse's origin was coming from Corvale, possibly from the ruler of that city himself. Determine to discover the truth they set out for Corvale. Along the way they stopped at Jouster's Field, a small set of dwellings in between the two holdings.

Before the field they came upon a curiously located tower. There they spoke to its lone guard who kept asking after the Cudgel, and declaring his need for it to protect the lady sleeping in the tower. But the knights would not relieve the man of his post. Instead they rode on to Jouster's Field and met Osric, a collector of knightly artifacts. The man begrudgingly doled on information on the tower and the Cudgel. He was quite upset that the Knights refused to part with any of their knightly possessions in exchange for his inforamtion.

Then the Company split in two to search for a vantage point and see if the Cudgel was nearby. They found little from the former, but in search for the latter they came across the ghastly knight from earlier, who rode away when he realized they found him.

The party rejoined then we ended it for the session. Nearly two weeks of travel, a duel that would have slain a knight averted, multiple omens encountered, and a quick destruction of a pack of strange beasts. When next we rejoin a few weeks will pass and the Knights will be partaking in the Feast of the Sun at Corvale, the Seat of Power.

Thoughts

I had read several suggestions of starting the knights out with a simple task to ensure they had something to do. I had one planned, and I even put it in the session pitch, but I forgot about it when we set down to play. Instead, I had them randomly determined the Company's starting location along the edge of the map by rolling a d4 for the map edge and a d12 for a hex. Luckily, I was saved by a player who had run the game previously as they insisted on the group heading to the nearby holding to gain information. For future GMs I would definitely recommend a simple task like find a named seer or present yourself to the ruler of the Seat of Power to start off with to avoid the flashes of hestitation in the players' eyes that I briefly encountered.

When they arrived at Cragborough I was able to do a mini time-skip as detailed in this post. I, however, chickened out at the end of the session on advancing to the next Season. I felt like I would be potentially robbing the players' of their momentum in seeking a resolution to the Cudgel or the conflict between Corvale and Cragborough. I called for a dice roll to determine the advancement of time, and settled for advancing time to the Feast of Sun in two weeks.

As for the mini time-skip at Cragborough, I felt I used it effectively to give them an overview of the holding. It also gave me a chance to offer them chances to gain information without playing multiple days. The first of those bits of information was the foreshadowing of a holding thread, while the other three came from pre-rolled conflicts sparks as discussed here and here. Those two pieces of prep really have made the world come alive and have sparked numerous conversations amongst the players about what they should do.

It is also helpful as it allowed me to push on two parts of their oath: "Honour the Seers" and "Protect the Realm." Who better to get to the bottom of a mysterious ailment than a Seer? How better to make the Knights question what is protecting the realm than to pit two holding against each other over devious actions?

One thing I would advise is to grab the tables from Chris McDowall's Into the Land post. It offers another set of spark tables for each terrain type. I'd also advise writing out more descriptions yourself. After revealing one of the Snail's omens I had to repeatedly detail an outcropping of rocks and I quickly ran out of ways of describing it.

As for the myths they were all a blast to describe and watch as the players interacted with them. Some of the early omens were shrugged off, while others were intermingled in their eyes. I would be curious to know how many omens and myths they think they've encountered so far. My only complaint is when I get a 2 or 3 and trying to figure out which Myth is closest. I'm very tempted to create a table so I can quit counting hexes. Okay, and I was a little disappointed that none of the Knights besides the Gazer Knight took up the challenge of the Wight. Yes, they would have likely died, but it would have been intriguing to see the outcome. Would the Knights have honored the duel? Would they have intervened?

This was also the first instance of the Gazer Knight's ability to undo one of their or another Knight of the Company's decisions each day. I thought it was a good use of the skill, but I must admit I am worried about it. I don't want to join the anti or limited Wish spell crowd, but I'm also not going to replay a substantianal part of the session. As for the other Knight's abilities they seem interesting, though I think the Pigeon Knight is going to drive me bonkers asking after the names of everyone's homes and if the current location is considered someone's home. I am debating adding a once per day limit on the ability just to limit the question.

I only got to reveal one Seer so far, and for me it felt like a dud. I'm not really sure how to play the Weeping Seer in person without being a complete time waste. The Seers were one part of the creation I did not curate, and I realize I should have. Well now I know at least which Seer will be the victim of the Mist if they ever encounter it.

In the end this was an incredibly easy first session to run. I'm looking forward to the next, but what in the world am I going to do for the Feast of the Sun.

Prepping for Mythic Bastionland

Choices, Choices

For over the past year, I've been running games as part of an in-person ttrpg community called ATLRPG. The group runs three events each week, two of which I regularly attend, either to play or run games. I've mostly run one shots along with two short lived campaigns: one of Mausritter and the other MÖRK BORG. The former ending because of player schedules, the latter because I was done with the game after five sessions. Yet the desire to run a longer campaign still burns inside so I took a look at my shelves and tried to pick something that could make a fun open table campaign.

My choices came down to a potentially short megadungeon campaign running The Sun King's Palace, Mothership, or Mythic Bastionland. As you can guess by the title of this blog I chose the last one.

My reasoning against running the Sun King's Palace being:

  1. I could not decide what system I would want to run the dungeon with. I am leaning toward's Jason Tocci's Grave to embrace the Soulslike lore that I am getting from the text.
  2. To fix some glaring holes such as only two of the five geese required for an important fetch quest are detailed in the text.
  3. To add more interactions and desires between the factions. Right now most of the NPCs seem to very static.
  4. Add more pathways hidden and not between the major sections of the dungeon. The dungeon is quite flavorful and looks like a blast to run, but needs some work before I would be willing to bring it to the table.

Mothership is at this point a good friend whose layers I am still learning even after years of companionship. However my experience has been completely with one shots and I could not decide if I wanted to run a campaign of Gradient Descent or figure out a way to stich together a campaign from the multitude of modules that I own. Weeks later I stumbled upon this blog which would help me see how I could run the latter.

As for Mythic Bastionland, I've long been a fan of Arthurian legend, the Odd-like games, and the mythic qualities of video games like Elden Ring. Months ago, I had enjoyed my one foray as a player in an open table campaign. I wish I could have played more, but the three hour round trip drive was too much each week. Decision made, I dove into the game to get the campaign ready.

First, I voraciously reread the book, then I went about creating the realm. To save some effort I eagerly pilfered the predrawn realm from the Realm Sheets. I did make some alterations on the gm version of the sheet move landmarks and barriers around as well as reorient the sheet for portrait printing. I followed the procedure in the book along with the wonderful blog post by Among Cats and Books. I can't recommend the post enough as I am the type that needs to see how someone has written things down to better orient my own writings.

Myths

One thing I would strongly suggest is to curate your myths. While you can randomly roll them, I suggest having at least one of the following:

I think I went through 3 or 4 iterations before I finally settled on my initial set of six myths for the realm: The Boar, The Mist, The Cudgel, The Inferno, The Wight, and the Snail.As you can see the Mist will be doing double duty as I had to have a dragon, and the thought of the Wight challening the Knights to duels was too juicy to pass up.

Additional Prep

In addition to the prep outlined in the book and in the Among Cats and Books's post, I also gave each holding a thread in line with Chris McDowall's blog post. I also made generous use of the Referee Companion to generate:

I also snagged the Mythic Bastionland Calendar which builds upon Chris McDowall's post. I added the definitions of the days of the week to my copy of the sheet.

I also recommend reading this amazing reddit post on Why to Advance Time in Mythic Bastionland, and How to do it!. I was initially worried about advancing time in the game as it felt like potentially robbing the players of agency over their knight's story. When talking with the guy who ran the Mythic Bastionland open table I played in, he said he wanted to advance the seasons and ages, but he left it up to his players who never decided to advance time as they always wanted to deal with the current issue. So after that conversation and reading the post above I resolutely decided I was going to advance time during the game!