Half a Worm and a Bitten Apple

One Shot Open Table Play Report Mythic Bastionland The Fanged Knight The Amber Knight Myths No omens occurred in this session, but the following myths were used for content: The Sprite The River The Dead Prologue The previous session ended with the Company retrieving the Keystone, wherein a ruler was trapped (think Han Solo in carbonite). This session was going to see the knights freeing Lady Bellamonte, the unlucky victim inside. For prep I worked out 2 options: Freeing her by water, this would require a climb up a mountain and navigating a site. The other required a visit to the Dwarf who had recently come to the realm after the Colossus was slain. I accidentally left my iPad at home, I generally use it for showing players the map, so I made an executive decision and that the Dwarf would remain undisturbed, at least for today. The players liked the idea of the Lady's love interest playing a role. And they really latched on to the idea of her having fallen for someone of lower bu...

One Shot Open Table Play Report Mythic Bastionland The Fanged Knight The Amber Knight The Bone Knight The Leaf Knight Myths The Legion Prologue I started by asking the players what they wanted to do this session and the players soon decided that there was a moving castle so ugly that it's existence was unwarranted. Sweat pouring down my brow I scoured the Myths to find something that would fit for I couldn't see the castle plot point filling more than 30 minutes in a 3-hour-session. The players suggested more narrative elements and were, to my dismay, trending towards Disney-esque. Which is something that I don't enjoy as much as Arthurian/mythological. But I landed on the Legion as a good jumping off point for the session. The Company had recently freed one of the four missing rulers from supernatural imprisonment, and we decided that should happen again today. The recently freed ruler had, in his supernatural cell, learned the way to locate the Moving Castle. This info w...

Maximising Omens and Myths Advice for running Mythic Bastionland An ongoing attempt to maximise narrative potential. I would like to think that over time I have developed a specific style of running the  award-winning  game Mythic Bastionland. This is the first post out of 3 or so where I’ll summarise some things I do that I think might be of use to others. Chris McDowall has an almost obscene love for doing things in 3's and as an ode this blogpost will present things in 3's as much as possible. The Wyvern will be used as an example throughout. The first omen from the Demon and from the Wight are also included. So spoilers obviously follow. I. Expanding Omens The book does a pretty good job of presenting omens in an evocative way. Nonetheless, having a procedure to assist improvisation can help. This section shows how to do that by asking three W-Questions , by thinking about Chronology and finally by Cross-Pollinating Myths !  The Three W-Questions The following q...

One Shot Open Table Play Report Mythic Bastionland The Fanged Knight Squire Suzy Myths The Catacomb The Cave The Demon Prologue Two returning players! One player had previously been the Salt Knight. But the Salt Knight died horrifically and the player had continued with Suzy, who was to take on the role of squire today. It seemed fitting to all at the table that this session should see her take a more prominent role in helping the realm, followed by her being knighted. Her backstory was that her hamlet (002.003) had been ravaged when she was but a child and that today's session would play into that somehow. This is cool backstory but didn't answer the question of how today's session would start. So I gave some suggestions and we decided the party would begin at the Fetid Sanctum (004.001) and would see the Company escort an acolyte to Windswept Spire (004.006). There was something buried there and the acolyte would help find it and help convince the locals that this diggin...

A suggestion of a game mechanism. In Horst's game his Company encountered a Bridge Knight, someone of Fey origin. He would not let the Company cross the bridge unless they won in a duel. One of the Knights suggested the Game of Three Truths. You can listen to the episode here where Horst gives a full explanation and some clarifying details. It starts around 1h22. My explanation needed some further clarification, so I made the following handy step-by-step guide: Further explanation: Example 1 Here is a further example with more thoughts. Let's say the first player says " I will make a statement about whether you prefer lime or melon ice-cream ". The second player probably doesn't care about his knight preferring one flavour over the other and says " it doesn't really matter, so let's make the odds 50-50 ". The first player now chooses lime flavour. It's a 3-in-6 roll, so the die will determine lime on a 1,2 or 3 and melon on a 4,5 or 6. Final...

Man's Best Fiend One Shot Open Table Play Report Mythic Bastionland The Fanged Knight The Amber Knight Myths The Demon The Hound Prologue Confronted with the question of what the session would entail the Fanged Knight player (a familiar face) suggested an old fashioned take down of an epic beast. I threw my prepared myths out the window and rolled  The Judge The River The Hound. The Amber Knight had given up her weapon to the Leaf-Clad Guards and wished to see it back in her possession (see Bull 3 ). After a brief discussion we decided that today's session was going to start with the Guards saying "You have proven yourself, here is your weapon back, now we do have something to ask of you..." One of the Leaf-Clad Guards had joined the party before, and I thought it fitting that they join the Company for this session too. Edynn Yonder - 007.004 The Company was informed that the fauna were acting erratic, something was stirring in the east. The Hound 1 - 009.004 The C...

One Shot Open Table Play Report Mythic Bastionland The Saddle Knight The Dust Knight Myths The Colossus Prologue The Saddle Knight had previously worked with an elderly hunter who claimed a curse had rapidly aged him. Today's quest was to find a way to reverse this curse. The table thought it best to start at the Pale Keep, where the Dust Knight had recently arrived from another realm. The Pale Keep - 007.009 Since the Company knew little of how to solve this curse they asked someone in a position of authority, the Marshall. He thought a visit to the Seer on the NW island (a Seer the Company had previously been directed towards) was not necessary since the Seer on this island had recently returned! 008.008 The Company left the Pale Keep and travelled East, around midday they came upon a man washing clothing in a brook under the Goat Tree. My intentions were to have a local that knew more about the land, but the Company was really, really fascinated by a tree that had soft goat fur...