So basically the last two weeks have sucked. I have had zero prep time, end-of-semester crunch ate all my free time to do so, last night I had to bake and cook for the group coming over, and I sat down at the table with zero idea of what to do for another AD&D Christmas-themed game.
In previous games, I had the party find a "Christmas Room" off the main dungeon of Castle Delve complete with hearth-with-fire, Stockings hung up, a tree, presents for them, the works. Last year's game involved them stumbling on The Old Phoenix (if you've read Poul Anderson's work you'll know where that comes from) and having a few brief adventures in assisting a small town with Christmas woes (fighting gingerbread cookie golems in a baker's gingerbread model of the town, etc.)
So last night I was just absolutely stuck for ideas.
Then, call it divine inspiration, I googled the name of the three Magi who visited Christ in Bethlehem when he was born and off we went.
Essentially the party found themselves in the desert in the middle of a fierce sandstorm and literally bumped into the Magi who had lost their guides. The Magi, not being unused to the concept of otherworldly beings (historically, they were described alternately as magicians, sorcerers, astrologers, etc.) so after a few moments of culture shock they embraced the providence of the moment and moved forward, telling the party of their quest. Deciding to ride out the sandstorm in the lee of a rock prominence, they encamped for the night. The party (being adventurers) set up watch and during the maelstrom a terrible Efreet materialized and attacked the party watch, demanding the lives of the Magi, stating it wanted nothing from the adventurers.
Being as the balance of the party is -good aligned, they decided quickly to put paid to the Efreet's threats.
Now I'd intended this to be a bit of a challenge so I gave him maximum hits (80hp) and initially when he struck the watch, he did 22 points of damage - very nearly maximum! I planned in the following rounds to have him employ pyrotechnics, affect normal fires and of course wall of flame.
Never happened.
A cloud of magic missiles rained down on him, along with a shitload of sword blows. He lost initiative in the next round, got hit by a lightning bolt and three maxed-out two-handed sword hits. Even saving v. spells didn't help.
The sandstorm abated once the Efreet was slain. The adventurers, following the duly impressed magi, continued their walk into the west, and over the course of many days drew close to a small, nondescript city. Their guidance was an incredibly bright star that seemed to hover low in the west, indicating their way...
Perhaps ten miles from the city, the Magi found their guides again and bade the rest of the party farewell, and continued. Knowing something of great portent was afoot the group made to follow them but suddenly, after walking down through a foggy dell to try and skirt the many other pilgrims on the road to the city, they found themselves many, many leagues away, further progress barred by a shining white form bearing a flaming sword who spoke in a voice that reverberated through every iota of their beings and said THIS IS NOT YOUR PLACE, THIS IS NOT YOUR TIME
...and they then found themselves back along the path they'd been hiking in the Lortmil Mountains of Greyhawk.
Gifts were given: the Paladin was raised to 9th level (she'd been languishing at 8th for I can't even remember how long; this was highly utilitarian to me because her Character sheet is a mess of jotted down marginal notes about XP and when she's away it's impossible to determine how many XP she has). The fighter/magic-user/thief was given a magic, one-way portal back to the town the party started adventuring from: she has a small home there and two war-dogs. The player is semi-retiring from the game and wanted to bow out without having her character die, so I gave her that out. The dwarven fighter/cleric got an ale Everflask. Dispenses one pint, at a time, of any beer-type drink he desires. Rex the Fighter got a +3 vorpal sword. The fighter/magic-user was given a bastard sword +2. Previously in the Lost Caverns of Tsjoconth the acid breath of the Dracolisk cost the Cleric of Hieroneous his boots of levitation, so Santa DM had those magically reappear. Likewise, the illusionist/thief in the party lost an Ioun Stone that allowed him to not have to breathe, that was restored.
Highlights of the game:
The guy who plays Rex the Fighter is actually a human from Earth who found himself slingshotted through space and time to Greyhawk (the rest of the players don't know this origin story!) and being of the adventurous mindset already just decided to roll with it. During the sandstorm to try and gain orientation, he used a ring of flying to zoom up and I passed him a note describing the constellation he saw and simply wrote underneath it "...you realize that you're home."
My nephew is in the grar me evil badass phase of his role playing, so he tried to negotiate with the Efreet (he actually has "Efreet" as a chosen language). Fortunately he wasn't the party's spokesman and they'd already decided to oppose the creature.
Anyway, everyone seemed to have fun, and the highlight of the evening was when the retiring player commented that it was obvious how much care and planning I put into the Christmas games that they weren't improvised much...! :D
So Merry Christmas everyone! And to all a good fight!
*bump* Nobody? :)
Not much of a tradition around these parts, but then with the local economy being what it is, people aren't really jumping over each other with holiday cheer.
Still, I have a copy of a DCC Christmas adventure module (The Old God's Return) sitting on my shelf, and I do want to take this baby out for a ride some day.
I thought that was cool.
Merry Christmas!!
I've done plenty of holiday-themed sessions (Christmas and otherwise) but I've never woven in stuff from the Nativity. My instincts always take me to gingerbread golems and "rescue Santa" and stuff first, I guess. I see a number of people running holiday-themed sessions but they're always Santa, snowmen, toy workshop, or maybe Krampus kind of affairs rather than Biblical.
Maybe the "Rankin-Bass with swords" angle is easier to generate, especially for a gonzo type one-shot, but there's a lot to be mined in a less-gonzo Christmas session. I think you could do some pretty cool peripheral stuff (as you did, or even 'Rosencrantz style') around the well-known plot points of the Nativity.
Unholy Land (http://www.rpgnow.com/product/141291/Unholy-Land)is a hexcrawl set just before the birth of Jesus, it's pretty interesting (and PWYW). I wonder how hard a sell it would be for most groups, though.
Your session sounded cool:).
I'm torn between a session in Hong Kong 2015, a session in Tekumel, or a one-shot of Zenobia. I guess I'll know when I get to it, and improvise the rest;).
I've never done anything quite that elaborate for Christmas. However, every year during the last game session before Christmas (last Sunday, this year), Santa Claus visits the PCs, bringing them each a gift (a magic item, a treasure map, etc.) Santa is a more a deus ex machina than a character so nothing can prevent or interfere with his visits. The timing of his visits seems random in the game universe as he shows up once per real year regardless of whether days, months, years, decades, whatever have passed in the game world. The are a few sages that have made studying Santa their lifework. Oh, and Santa has been known to visit important non-evil NPCs as well.
Psh. I did Christmas themed games and blogged about it years ago.
That's a cool idea - I think I'll institute it for 2016. I often call off games in the month of December, as schedules fill up, but this might be a better option.
Quote from: Coffee Zombie;870516That's a cool idea - I think I'll institute it for 2016. I often call off games in the month of December, as schedules fill up, but this might be a better option.
The first one was just a "christmas room" in the big dungeon and it's (no pun intended) snowballed since then, and has been a big hit with the players. We use it as an excuse to have a Christmas party with gaming happening in the midst. Give it a go, report back with your success! :)