The Bandit Map

The Bandit Map is here: the first supplement for Rachel Kronick's Blade & Crown RPG. The adventure begins with the discovery of a scrap of an old map, and leads to a bandit-hunting adventure in lands shunned by peasants and burghers alike.

Our gaming group playtested the scenario in the Spring/Winter of 2014. We had a blast with it, and together created one of the best adventuring parties with whom I've had the pleasure of gaming. Each member of the party - including my youthful and violent fire mage (based on the Fullmetal Alchemist) - was part of the entourage of a noble (also a PC) who had fallen on hard times. We were bound to each other by oaths of fealty, as well as a desire for gold.

Now, as a game inspired by Swordbearer, Blade & Crown lends itself to gritty, A Game of Thronesy/Abercrombsie-style adventure, There's magic, but most of it is subtle. But in this adventure my fire mage encountered something that quite literally blew his mind.

The Bandit Map is available in print in both full color and in B&W editions, as well as in PDF, All the details, and a free preview can be found right here.

While the scenario could readily be adapted for almost any fantasy RPG with little difficulty, the time is right to check out Blade & Crown if you're not familiar with the game or are sitting in the fence at the moment. It's 25% off right now (regardless of format) until September 30! Find print here and PDF here.

The Mountain Monastery Murder Mystery

Christine de Pisan

My bet is that any gamemaster who has read Umberto Eco's Name of the Rose has considered running a scenario featuring a murder mystery in a monastery. Rachel Kronick, the author of the gritty medieval RPG, Blade & Crown, did just that this weekend at Con of the North. Her session was the high point of the con for me, so I thought I'd blog about her game before I proceed with accounts of the scenarios I ran (which will post to FATE SF starting on Wednesday).

Rachel chose to set the game in an all-female monastery: one dedicated to the Earth goddess on the island of Morensia (a land about the same size as Wisconsin) set in her world of Calteir. One interesting aspect of the Sisters of Faenwitha is that all the women in the order had been assigned a male gender at birth. Each member of the order seeks in her own way to complete a Great Work in service of the order and the Earth goddess, a Great Work which will result in the goddess conferring on them the gift of a complete physical transition to having a female body.

It's worth noting that Calteir is very low-magic world in which you cannot just ask the local sorcerer, witch, or mage to affect a permanent change in your gender. In that sense, life for trans folk has similarities to our world - a transition entails a process of discernment, as well as self-commitment and significant resources.

Now you don't ordinarily expect to see murders happening in a monastery dedicated to a peaceful Earth goddess, but by the session's end, there were two. It was the PCs job to investigate them. We were all members of the order (that is, we were all playing female trans characters ranging from a lowly cellarer to an archbishop), a delegation that had arrived after significant time on the road to be part of a convocation to determine the future political direction of the order.

The convention book had called-out this event as involving LGBT themes, so the players all knew to expect this to come up in the game. Except for Rachel, the GM, all the players were males. The players really immersed themselves in their roles and characters they were playing. (This was easy to do as Rachel had created brief but memorable bios for each of the characters.) I have no idea if any of the other guys at the table identifies as LGBT, but I can say as the gamer who for years was the only queer person at the gaming table that the GM and players worked together to create a space where everyone took the story seriously and had fun together.

The only disconcerting thing about the game was the very LOUD GM running a B5 game at the next table. Trying to solve a medieval murder mystery while hearing Londo imitations at a million decibels was a bit disconcerting, to say the least!

"The Mountain Monastery Mystery" was a VERY satisfying event, and once again showed off Rachel's eye for detail and preparation.

Trash in Roleplaying

http://aia.archaeological.org/gala/2012/auction/
alluring-amphor/index.html

In last night's session of Rachel Kronick's Blade & Crown RPG, we went in search of bandits. Our party had an old map (probably from a bandit hunter of yore), which provided some suggestions about where in the wilderness to find the bandits who had plagued the region for more than a decade.

Our goal was to kill them and make some money.

We found one of their advance outposts by a combination of following the map, and following their trash. This trash was mostly in the form of clay wine jars that had been discarded in the river along our trail.

That was a new experience: I can't ever recall a time when we found our quarry in an RPG scenario by following their trash trail. I thought that was pretty cool clue placement by the GM.

I'll be thinking more about trash in roleplaying in the future.

Blade & Crown Is At The Source

Rachel Kronick's new roleplaying game, Blade & Crown, is on the new rack now at The Source Comics and Games in Roseville, Minnesota!

The Source is a well-managed, extremely friendly game store. It is also one of the largest (if not the largest in the USA). The Source has been a consistent supporter of tabletop indie RPG authors, developers, and gamers.

They stock the games we want. They make demo and game space available for anybody that wants it. And most importantly, they take risks on new authors, giving their customers a chance to see new things. For example, they also stocked another truly outstanding indie/small press RPG that I have really fallen in love with this Fall: Broken Rooms.

So, if you live in the Twin Cities, and are considering a purchase of Blade & Crown, please consider picking it up at The Source. Nothing wrong with ordering from DTRPG if you just want the PDF, or from Lulu, if you don't live in the Twin Cities.

But if you are here in town, why not support an FLGS that does such great job supporting indie authors and gamers?

Blade & Crown Turns To Piracy!

http://www.cindyvallar.com/medieval.html

Our Blade & Crown campaign resumed this week, thanks to the perspicacity of GM Eric Gilbertson! Serene the Priest and Stabber the Assassin finally got off the Island of Too Many Stupid Rules thanks to much sneakery and the help of a friendly  trapper. This trapper was a fellow Morensian, one of the failed crusaders who came to this Island of Ill Fortune many years ago. He got us out of harm's way, saving us from the soldiers of the Three Suns heretics. The good man also turned us on to a way off the island: join the pirates who come ashore periodically.

The catch? You only get to join them if you can beat one of the pirates in hand-to-hand combat. If you lose you become a slave. So naturally we asked to try out as pirates immediately, and were rowed away from Heretic Island out to the pirate ship.

Stabber, as played by Eric Stoltz

Our good friend the handsome Stabber aka "Red", faced off with his new magic greatsword against a wiry swordsman pirate opponent. Both were wounded, but Stabber prevailed in the end.

It was a close call.

The priest Serene had a better time of it. She used her weapon of choice, a warhammer, facing off against a worthy and well-muscled she-pirate. Serene also prevailed, using the pointy end of her warhammer to mete out a benediction to her defeated and prone opponent.

Then "our" two children cleaned the decks with two pirate children.

So we are pirates now, and off the Island Cursed By Three Suns! A great session with stirring combat that was uncertain until the very end!