Session 9: Ogre Island Finale and Prep Review
No big thoughts this time except I was right with my last few posts, the session went great, and they've wrapped up.
I'm starting to get a much better sense of how long a session will go, so much so that I knew exactly where it was going to stop this time around and paced it exactly like I wanted.
On paper, this whole thing was very simple. My prep for it was mostly this:
There is a mountain next to the village. One day, the Ogre Galvino came up from deep within its recesses, which some say connect to Hell, and proclaimed himself as king of this island. Some of the more spiritually impure men turned into ogres themselves, some people managed to run away to Tolosa to request help, and some stayed behind, tilling the soil in the name of Sir Galvino.
Ball knowers will recognise this is roughly the premise of the story of Momotaro, from Japan.
Then I made four locations: two villages, the ogre mountain, and the "old fort ruins". I made a little map of the island (traced over a real island), put everything in there, and proceeded to detail it a little more. I added the main NPCs (Una, the two main ogres, one of whom is her dad), and then thought of what rewards I could put in there.
Main Village - Where the regular folks live, mostly a corridor with a bunch of houses and fields to their back. Nearby is the statue of Lady Carbel Avanix, the knightess who was known as a great warrior in Artù’s time, having conquered the island from a dragon and settled it.
The Carbel Order is a knighthood order for women, though the only free member is Una Tumanti, the daughter of the local knight, Zento Tumanti, who’s turned into an ogre too. Despite this, Una still loves her dad and doesn’t want to kill him.
They have a special technique where [REDACTED for the benefit of my players, I might rework this].
Una: Phlegmatic and melancholic, VERY introspective. Calm and content, but prone to depression.
Then I used a Hârn manor generator to get a population list, even though it doesn't quite work because the island was much bigger. Still, it gave me a rough idea of how many people would be there - about 200 able-bodied people under 6 ogres, so I reasoned that was because the Yeomen had become the ogres.
Ogre Mountain - At the top of which is Ogre Castle, where Galvino rules with his 6 retainers and a host of servants drafted from the rest of the island. The castle was originally down at the foot of the mountain, but Galvino coerced a spirit to transport it all the way up it.
The Ogres - They are all very tall but still in the human realm. Their bodies are thick and strong, very powerful.
Galvino - As tall as a mobile armour, huge, and extremely lusty for women, food, and drink. Very proud and easily fooled. [My players didn't find out the rest of this paragraph, so I advise skipping it] Did not actually come up from actual hell, as he is material rather than spiritual. He’s a shrewd bandit from Turoneto who fled to the island in the dark night and finally went to the bottom of the barrel, cannibalising someone who was out there, and thus being transformed into the ogre.
Sir Zento Tumanti - Sharp as a knife. Also mecha sized. Still wears the medallion that summons his mobile suit even though he doesn’t fit inside of it. The suit carries a magical sword with +1 to hit.
Leonante, Former Yeoman - Had a wife, 2 kids, and 2 elders
Baldo, Former Yeoman - Had a wife and 2 kids
Siricio, Former Yeoman - Had a wife and an elder
Biccosta, Pearl Diver - Had a husband and 1 kid, and 1 elder
Unoro, Fisherman, former Fish Warden - Had a wife and 3 kids
Rossandro, Fisherman - Lived alone
The Castle - At all times it is guarded by the 3 fishermen retainers, one at sight of the other, 2 in 6 chances that they’re distracted.
“Steward’s Room” has been converted into an improvised treasure where they keep their shit. In the middle of it they have 3 potions of invisibility which Galvino brought up from hell. They’re in bottles of liquor but look clear like no liquor ever seen.
3x Potion of Invisibility - Drinking this potion, the character becomes invisible. The standard potion duration applies. A potion of invisibility may be consumed in 6 smaller doses, each with a reduced duration.
For a map, I just overlayed a grid on the floorplans for Herstmonceux Castle, in Sussex. It didn't quite work perfectly because, as it turns out, real architecture has many more "indistinct doors" than one might expect - it ended up being less welcoming than if it had been a dungeon made for delving. However, we didn't linger too much on mapping, I mostly referred to the map for facilitation purposes. I also didn't bother with random encounters, I knew where the ogres were and adjudicated as needed.
Most of it ended up being unnecessary since the players waited for them to fall asleep and then skulked to slash at them in the dark, which is surprisingly close to how Momotaro did it too.
The secondary village and the old fort ruins I made as "bonus locations". They could have marched right up to the gate of the castle, but they didn't. I had rolled up "potion of diminution" and "potion of invisibility" as treasures, so I put one within the castle and one without, requiring an extra thing to get access to it - compromising on values.
Secondary Village - The old woman lives here with a few malcontents. She hates Biccosta and will grant two magic grains of rice she has which turns you the size of a rat, so long as one promises to bring her Biccosta’s head.
Diminution Rice - The character shrinks to 6” (15 cm) high. While shrunk, the character is unable to harm creatures larger than 1’ (30 cm) tall. If remaining motionless, the character only has a 1-in-10 chances of being spotted.
I also used HârnManor for more detail. I knew none of it was going to come up, at all, but I like having these numbers just to help imagining. At some point I would like to think of more modern occupations and make my own, but I have the impression it won't matter.
26 houses here, half of which are refugees from the main village. Pretty much everyone is a minor farmer or fisherman, the only craftspeople here are the salter from the main village, the salter from this village, and the timberwright.
The wise woman is the salter’s mother. They live in 6: the salter Cesare (29), his non-pregnant wife Silvestra (33), her mother Galassa (50), both his parents Galvano and Sofonia (dad 58 and mom 57), and the salter’s daughter of 2, Little Galassa.
Old Fort Ruins - Across the bay from the village is where the Fortuna Castle used to be. The outbuildings are still there, as are the horses and such. A secret tunnel here leads to the top of the mountain - Zento had it built for nefarious purposes.
And that was it. I got 3 sessions from this, mostly because I tried to adjudicate very closely what they were doing - they were about 6 inches tall for most of the adventure so a lot of it required thinking. A lot more was also improvised, or I didn't write it down because I already knew the answer. For instance, I did think more on details for the reason the old woman hated Biccosta, but I only solidified on that when the players specifically asked her about it.
The thing I tried to get right the most was the sense of the tragedy of the place, and I think it worked. Being an RPG and me having a terrible poker face, as well as a propensity to start smiling and giggling whenever I notice the players are into the game, there was a bit of an upper limit on how tragic it could go, but I think we had quite a few poignant scenes; particularly around Una, the daughter of one of the ogres, who was the same age as the characters.
For next session, it appears they will finally bite the hook of the treasure of ArtĂą and go into the Jungle, so that's very exciting! And the summer solstice is coming up, another monster will be coming to challenge Cora for the hand of the Bride.