| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
Caladan Brood
Senior Scribe
Norway
410 Posts |
 Posted - 18 Jun 2013 : 08:01:10
|
I'm a teacher and today we have a so-called "activity day" at school (I teach fifteen year old kids). Naturally, I volunteered to run a game ;) So today, seven kids from my classes are going to meet up in Arabel and travel east toward Eveningstar to explore the legendary Haunted Halls. I thought to share how I prepared this session (going to start in a few minutes, going on all day) and how it went down. I am going down to meet the kids now and set everything up - including a projector to display art, maps etc. and music and a bag full of stuff; dice, The Haunted Halls of Eveningstar, Cormyr, printed material from Volo's Guide to Cormyr PDF (I have a physical copy on order though), Running the Realms, Shadowdale (for the Arabel-map) etc.
I will update stuffety stuff when the session is over in six hours. Heh. I'll be dead tired I suspect.
|
Edited by - Caladan Brood on 18 Jun 2013 13:32:39
|
|
|
Jeremy Grenemyer
Great Reader
USA
2717 Posts |
Posted - 18 Jun 2013 : 08:17:17
|
Looking forward to your first update!
Thank you for sharing.  |
Look for me and my content at EN World (user name: sanishiver). |
 |
|
|
Ze
Learned Scribe
Italy
147 Posts |
Posted - 18 Jun 2013 : 13:00:52
|
Sounds great!
Let us know!
|
|
|
|
Caladan Brood
Senior Scribe
Norway
410 Posts |
Posted - 18 Jun 2013 : 13:55:44
|
All right, whew!
That was interesting, and kind of funny how the realms came alive even in the presence of seven - seven! - teenagers.
To start the game early, I had done some prep work last week. I had given each player a little info on the Realms, including a map of Faerűn and a map of Cormyr. They all received this and they had all looked at it to some degree. I didn't write much, know ye, but just enough so they knew what was going to happen (four of the kids had tried a little RPing with me earlier this semester but not much).
I gave each of them a separate piece of paper as well, detailing some aspects of each of their characters, including names, patron deity, age, appearance etc. so that they could visualize their character.
The characters were:
Colthorn Moonbow - a male moon elf cleric devoted to Sehanine Moonbow
(The kid playing him did a fairly good job, he's played a lot of computer RPGs so he knew the nuts and bolts)
Anírin Olrist - a male high elf wizard
I described in their sheets how the two had met each other on the road to Cormyr and had decided to travel together to follow the rumors of these "haunted halls" of Eveningstar.
Thum, son of Belrin, blood of Uldred - a male shield dwarf fighter
Dersan Meddirost - a male young fighter from Hill's Edge
I wrote in their sheets how they had teamed up when the dwarf had come to Hill's Edge, and decided to go east into Cormyr. The dwarf had heard rumors of these, ah, "haunted halls" supposedly built by dwarves so he wished to investigate this (and acquire unfathomable riches).
Iscyra Gant - a female half-elven fighter
Lhomin Rhenelar - a male fighter of Arabel
Illymin Sulim - a male thief of Arabel
In their sheets I wrote that Iscyra had traveled from her home in Featherdale west into Cormyr in search of adventure; in Arabel, she met up with Illymin, and together they decided to travel to Eveningstar to seek adventure in the haunted halls (the player of Lhomin was added after I had given the kids the prep paers, so I weaved him into play see next post).
It was, for me personally, interesting to have an actual girl at the table, something I've never really had before. She's a very creative and intelligent kid, and she really liked dungeoning and dragoning :) Also, she was a little bit quieter (because she didn't know the six boys around the table) which was nice in contrast to some of the more...boisterous boys around the table. Oh, oh..
...the point being that I had kind of given these characters in pairs some connection to each other, so that when play began I would have them meet up with the other pairs and form an adventuring company (but not without some hindrances, of course).
Before play started, I laid down a map of Faerűn (the big 90" one from the Campaign Setting box (we played AD&D). I told them in very broad strokes about the Forgotten Realms, pointing at a few interesting features (the Sword Coast, the Sea of Fallen Stars), then "zoomed in" by putting the 30" map on the table, telling them of the Heartlands; finally, I put the Cormyr map from the Cormyr accessory over the other two maps, telling them of this realm, that there was a King Azoun, said a few words about the Purple Dragons and the War Wizards, told them a little bit about Ed Greenwood and how he began this world and how it was acquired by TSR and is now the playground for a lot of people and how this connects to what the kids know best - computer games (even today's kids are aware of some of the Realms games out there, well at least kids that are inclined to want to play AD&D with their teacher  )
Finally I gave them their character sheets which I had prepared to increase play time (also, I hate it when people create character names that don't gel with the setting, and also, I didn't have to explain every single detail on the character sheet and instead we could get a-rollin' and they learned their THAC0s, ACs, Speeds, Types, Saving Throws as play went along). While they looked over them and talked among themselves (not Iscyra's player, she was content to just listen to the boys comparing their Strength scores and keep her own sheet secret), I hooked the computer up to the projector, displaying the map of Cormyr on the big screen and loading up a prepared folder of music.
(I basically went through the The Haunted Halls of Eveningstar booklet and wrote down a list of things that would need a "theme", then found music in my music library to match - then I copied those files over to a new folder and renamed the songs to make it easier on myself, so I had songs like "Eveningstar by Day", "Eveningstar by Night", "Look, a Tressym" (oh but those tressym were popular), "Into the Haunted Halls", "The Owlbear", "Starwater Gorge", "Tessaril Winter", "The Lonesome Tankard" etc.
I played a song I had named "Cormyr Border Post", and started the game by taking the two elves - Anírin and Moonbow - through the episode in Four from Cormyr, stating the laws of Cormyr through Sergeant Stoan, and having them visualize the Purple Dragons and their tabards (the other players in this way learned the same information - I told them they had been to similar border posts themselves, so LISTEN OR BE DESTROYED!!1 In hellfire).
Next up: The actual session, but first - going home to eat! And stuff. |
|
|
|
Caladan Brood
Senior Scribe
Norway
410 Posts |
Posted - 18 Jun 2013 : 19:57:27
|
All right, so with all that prepwork out of the way I am happy to report that it paid off - the kids did their best trying to portray their characters (some more than others) and with two exceptions managed to stay on track most of the time. A few juvenile jokes couldn't be avoided I guess, but that's something I can deal with.
I started out with the two Elves who had come from the Elven Court of Cormanthor down the road where they were hailed by Sergeant Stoan at the border post. When Stoan told them that it is forbidden to harm cats, they snickered, but didn't ask why or anything. They understood the peace bonding of their weapons well enough, though, but didn't ask enough questions to learn about the adventuring company charter.
Then I skipped to Iscyra and Illymin who were sneaking their way out of Arabel, trying to avoid the guard (Illymin was being sought by the watch for theft). On their way they met the lumbering Lhomin, who joined them.
Then I skipped to the dwarf, Thum, and his mostly-silent-for-all-five-hours-of-game-time Dersan, on their way down from the High Horns toward Eveningstar. They stopped a passing patrol of Purple Dragons, Thum asking them questions about dwarven ruins and hearing about the Haunted Halls.
Next, I had the two elves meet the three Arabel characters on the High Road, then, as they crossed the bridge over the Starwater River into Eveningstar, they met the dwarf and the silent warrior. From there, they decided to hit the Lonesome Tankard to make plans (when they found out they were all questing for the Haunted Halls). They talked a little bit to the proprietor, Dunman, I realized I didn't know much about this guy aside from a hidden +4 dagger up his sleeve, so I had to "build" him on the spot; I made him a jovial man with a kind face, short-haired and somewhat serious, tried to portray him as someone who thought it was madness that so many young adventurers tested their mettle in the Haunted Halls never to return.
From Durnan they learned about the whole charter business, they went over to Eveningstar Hall and talked to a clerk, learned the steep price for a charter, went back to the tavern to sleep (first session nobody got roaring drunk I think), then decided to head north into the gorge to "see if they could find money" heh. Not before watching a Tressym take off from a rooftop in pursuit of a crow, though. I had them meet another adventuring party in Eveningstar, to show them the world "lives", but now they were rather intent on finding gold so they disregarded them and went off.
They saw Old Meg's Hut, went to investigate, tried to lift the soot-stained flagstones off the floor without success. Throughout the session, I tried to continually give hints (be very lenient/forgiving) as to what options they had (at first they were unsure about the whole speaking in character-thing, how they updated their sheets, all the basics really). At this point, I said if you've got something that you could use to wedge between two tiles, but they had lost interest and moved on.
Eventually they found themselves outside the first of the two caves illustrated in the map of The Haunted Halls of Eveningstar. "Look," said Iscyra's player, "I have two torches" (pointing at her character sheet), "Can I take them out of my bag?" "Of course you can, you do whatever you feel like, that's the kewl thing about RPGs". So they lit two torches, smartly decided on a formation before entering the cave, with the biggest guy in front (Lhomin) and the weakest in the back (the two elves). Using some creepy music I tried to build the scene and the kids got really into it at that moment, so I let them wonder for a while, then had them roll and they were all like, "Why? Why? What do we roll for?"
Only Lhomin rolled good enough so I told him he smelled a beast or some such, and the kids got all excited, and the peace bonds were shattered before I could say much more, and then I indulged them by jumping up, waving my arms about and shriek like a, well, I hope it sounded like an owlbear, because a big mother owlbear came charging down the cave tunnel toward them. Good fun.
Learning Initiative and Weapon Speed took a little longer than expected, but soon enough they were swinging around, wondering what they could do, I told them how time was now measured in rounds, kind of weird to be explaining all this stuff. I had some pretty bad rolls (so did they) so the fight took a good while. Eventually the owl bear managed to hug Dersan, and when I told them how they heard his ribs snap under pressure, they visibly flinched 
Colthorn had memorized a cure light wounds however, so Dersan survived the encounter; the others were only damaged when Anírin fired off a Burning Hands spell, singing those between him and the owlbear in the process. Iscyra fired her arrows, Illymin stabbed with his spear, Thum hacked with his axe, Dersan with his long sword, Lhomin hammered with a mace he had purchased back in town, and finally the beast succumbed as it was decapitated in a spray of gory glory.
And all the boys just jumped out of their chairs and began cheering and clapping  The girl smiled but was content being entertained by the others' obvious pleasure at "winning" against the beast. As a treat I gave them all full xp for the monster, to more cheering.
"Flay it!" someone shouted, Iscyra stepped forward with her butchering skills, but then they abandoned the plan (they wanted to skin it and sell the skin for their charter) and investigated the rest of the cave. They found two owlbear eggs, which they took, a dagger, and a burlap sack of coin.
Lhomin and Thum dragged the corpse of the owlbear outside as they had resumed their plan of flaying the owlbear, when Thum noticed a second cave opening further north. They went there and found the oaken doors leading into the Haunted Halls.
After a little deliberation, they went inside, explored the first few rooms (the pile of weapons and shield, the defunct crossbow trap), Thum discovered a sliding door leading to a chamber with old wooden bunks and chests, but then Colthorn Moonbow suggested they retreat to Eveningstar for the night, what with Dersan gravely wounded (30% hp left) and him and Anírin out of spells.
There was some discussion, Illymin wanted to explore further, but in the end they decided to go back - which led to another discussion, what to do about the broken peace bonds (I had mentioned that they would probably be given a stern warning, but I don't think they caught that tidbit).
"I want to see more flying cats," one of them said, and the party of very young, but entertained, characters went back.
And that's when I had to call it a day, as the hours had passed quickly for all involved, and they all began talking about "next time" as if I had planned a next time
In retrospect, I realize I probably "dulled" the game down too much for the audience; realmslore is probably more interesting for a 38 year old than a 15 year old. The fight with the owlbear was the obvious highlight, dice rolling and shouts and intensity, but the careful buildup of Eveningstar and some of its inhabitants did make it easier for them as we went along to consider their options.
All in all, a success and boy do I wish I had a regular gaming group now that I'm obsessing over the Realms and all that.
Thank you for your time, peace out and I don't mind if you visit my blog (if you're interested in "A Song of Ice and Fire") at slynt.blogspot.com
|
|
|
|
Ze
Learned Scribe
Italy
147 Posts |
Posted - 18 Jun 2013 : 21:20:09
|
Great job with spreading the game, Caladan.
I'd prep up for that "next time", if I were you.
|
|
|
|
George Krashos
Master of Realmslore
Australia
6680 Posts |
Posted - 19 Jun 2013 : 01:36:44
|
I'm loving this. More please. Some of us haven't gamed in decades ... *sigh*
-- George Krashos
|
"Because only we, contrary to the barbarians, never count the enemy in battle." -- Aeschylus |
|
|
|
The Hooded One
Lady Herald of Realmslore
5056 Posts |
Posted - 19 Jun 2013 : 03:39:09
|
This sounds great - - and you got Dunman EXACTLY right, Caladan!
Beeg hugs!
love,
THO |
|
|
|
xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
Posted - 19 Jun 2013 : 04:05:28
|
This is good stuff. I wholeheartedly support introducing kids to the game, and teens are neck-deep in the phase of life where they start really needing some of the skills that RPGs help to build -- critical thinking, looking past the obvious face of things, humility, appreciating the talents that everyone else brings to the table, and the ability to walk for miles in others' shoes which leads inexorably to the demise of narrow-mindedness.
Don't stress too much reviewing your own performance. One perk of being the only/most experienced person in the group is that they are not in a position to critique you, so now even more than other times you are your own worst critic. They're having fun, and you're giving them that.
High-fives, and hopefully they'll tell their friends about the fun they're having. Flying cats, man... flying cats! The Realms is cool. |
|
|
|
Kris the Grey
Senior Scribe
USA
422 Posts |
Posted - 19 Jun 2013 : 16:40:53
|
Sounds like loads of fun, I love the wonder new players bring to the game.
Keep them on their toes and enjoy the fun! |
Kris the Grey - Member in Good Standing of the Watchful Order of Magists and Protectors, the Arcane Guild of Silverymoon, and the Connecticut Bar Association |
|
|
|
Plaguescarred
Learned Scribe
Canada
190 Posts |
Posted - 20 Jun 2013 : 14:27:50
|
| Great tale Caladan Brood! That was a very entertaining read too! Let us know if you run again... |
Yan
Playtester |
|
|
|
Caladan Brood
Senior Scribe
Norway
410 Posts |
Posted - 21 Jun 2013 : 07:51:37
|
| Thanks for the nice comments, people :) I've been asked by the kids to continue today, but alas! It is the last day before summer holiday, and there is no time. Not that I mind starting the holiday today :-) |
|
|
|
Marco Volo
Learned Scribe
France
204 Posts |
Posted - 28 Jun 2013 : 08:12:08
|
I had a great time reading you !
Thanks for sharing this session.
Big up ! |
|
|
|
Ozreth
Learned Scribe
206 Posts |
Posted - 29 Jun 2013 : 05:39:25
|
| I WANT TO KNOW WHY THERE ARE NO PHOTOS! |
|
|
|
Caladan Brood
Senior Scribe
Norway
410 Posts |
Posted - 26 Sep 2013 : 21:36:11
|
When rumors began to circulate of a new activity day at school, seven certain youngsters immediately asked for AD&D, so tomorrow they will continue their exploration of the Haunted Halls. Good thing I've kept their character sheets these four months :) This time I'm bringing in some dungeon tiles and miniatures as well. They are pretty excited about it and there will be an eighth (!) kid but he's a laidback and funny and very clever fellow so that should work just fine. Will try to tell them how RPGs can be played with as few as two. One of them is saving money for his own rulebooks. I told him about D&D Next.
As for photos, I can't and won't legally publish photos of my students :)
|
|
|
|
George Krashos
Master of Realmslore
Australia
6680 Posts |
Posted - 27 Sep 2013 : 00:45:29
|
Looking foward to more updates. These were great to read.
-- George Krashos
|
"Because only we, contrary to the barbarians, never count the enemy in battle." -- Aeschylus |
|
|
|
Lord Bane
Senior Scribe
Germany
479 Posts |
Posted - 27 Sep 2013 : 12:31:56
|
Make sure you give them the full experience of the traps. Have them outsmart and crawl their way through the dungeon! Oh and i expect the Zhent wizard to be a challange aswell!  |
The driving force in the multiverse is evil, for it forces good to act. |
|
|
|
Caladan Brood
Senior Scribe
Norway
410 Posts |
Posted - 27 Sep 2013 : 21:27:02
|
All right, wow, playing AD&D with the young ones is a very different, and somewhat tiring experience. I knew that before going in, of course, since we played before the summer, but still. I met the kids, we gathered around the table and I dug up some miniatures to represent their characters. This led to a lot of focus on the figures and moving them about, but at the same time they had a lot of fun with it. I also brought up some dungeon tiles and so I laid down new rooms and corridors as they explored.
As we played there were a lot of questions about the game rules, which I explained and once they got back into the story after I recapped the first session, it flowed smoothly from a game technical point of view. It was a lot harder for them to grasp the concept of playing "in character". They were referring to each other by their real names and seldom spoke in character so I tried to nudge them into it by introducing an on-the-fly NPC which turned out to be a dwarf who had come to claim the Haunted Halls as his very own kingdom, trying to subdue the party into becoming his "servants of the realm". I have a knack for playing gruff dwarves with no sense of irony so I portrayed him with gravelly voice, wildly flailing arms etc. then explained how I tried to "be" this megalomaniac dwarf. After that they began earnestly to learn their character names, and some spoke in character but they just do not have the ability to talk one at a time so more often than not a potentially good roleplaying scene was demolished by sudden jokes, spontaneous out-of-game discussions, rules questions etc. Each time they found something (the chest in the bone-littered cellar for example) the game halted as they began discussing who was going to get what. I suggested divying up loot and they agreed.
Once in that cellar by the way, they all failed their saving throw when trying to open the chest so the entire party fell asleep. On a whim I told them, as they woke up, that something was coming down the stairs...the look on their faces was priceless. Everybody was getting ready for carnage and then a tiny goblin appeared and said, "Mmm Gulg going to eat..." and then when the goblin spotted the seven-person-strong party he turned around and ran, shouting "Mommy!" Which was a big success with much laughter around the table.
(The dwarf, Thum, wondered if there indeed was a big bad mommy around).
There was much arguing for each chamber they explored, back and forth the arguments went. When they set off the lightning trap (in the chamber with the statues and the doors depicted on the cover of the module), the wizard elf Anírin went down, and the dwarf pulled him away, face against the floor - this is an example of how they didn't really grasp the "being there" aspect. Which is to be expected, of course, so I often had to remind them, but then, wasn't I the same when I first learned the tropes? I remember my first character built a wheelchair out of a random table in a dungeon for a fellow party member who had broken a leg. Creative, perhaps, but not really what I now consider very deep, heh.
All in all, the party of seven (the eighth new member didn't show up) ended up not exploring all that much of the Haunted Halls because they spent so much time discussing what to do, how to do it, and talking over each other. To up the tension, I added a Giant Spider to room #10, which became the finale fight with lots of misses, a few hits, well-rolled saving throws avoiding death and finally victory. I gave them enough XP so that everyone could level so they knew how that worked as well.
They had fun, and I admit that though it is a very different experience from my usual games with other adults, I had fun too :)There wasn't much immersion really, because we skipped the "going back to town to recuperate" bits so they could have some fun dungeon delving, but I believe they had a good time. Half the kids would probably enjoy a "deeper" game, the other, louder half thought it was just fine.
They did try out several aspects of the game; there was combat, some "social" interaction with the dwarf (the goblin was hacked down from behind), several alignment shifts could have occured, there were traps and treasure (I rolled randomly for the Giant Spider's treasure ending up with an Elven Chain Mail which by party decision went to Iscyra Gant, the girl player's character - though she was the only one not taking part in *that* twenty-minute discussion :D)
Unfortunately I am a tad drunk now so I may have forgotten some of the funny things that went on down in the Haunted Halls but boy I wish I had a DM and a few players to let me explore it! :)
As a bonus, I *did* take a picture today. Here's the table, with the party having decided on a formation:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y13/Slynt/20130927_111903_zpsb4788d99.jpg
And yes, they do hope for a third session... |
Edited by - Caladan Brood on 27 Sep 2013 21:32:19 |
|
|
|
Lord Bane
Senior Scribe
Germany
479 Posts |
Posted - 28 Sep 2013 : 12:01:08
|
| Hacking down the goblin? What a waste of trap clearing abilities. Enslave it and have it march first to trigger traps for the group! |
The driving force in the multiverse is evil, for it forces good to act. |
|
|
| |
Topic |
|
|
|
Today in Eveningstar
