I want to thank these players for making an immensely satisfying game of Dungeon World tonight, which I will describe below. Bear in mind that there was a lot of cool stuff that happened but I wanted to highlight the VERY best. It is probably a bit scattered but I wanted to share the experience.
Flute the Human Dashing Hero, Samson the Ranger, and Grignar the elven Barbarian were brought to the bridge that led across a cliff to an entrance to a mountain that was known as home to the dwarves of the Stone Tyrant clan. As Vadoo, a dwarven mage, ran across the bridge and made his way to the entry to the mountain with the kidnapped daughter of Samson, the group dealt with a particularly dragon-winged puma that was eyeing them from above their current position. Deciding to engage the puma [though unwillingly including Samson], they quickly realized that this was a mother protecting her cubs once the Flute swung Samson up, though backwards, on to the puma’s back. A few moments of wrangling and struggling eventually led to the three being chased across the bridge by the winged puma. Vadoo had already descended into the darkness of the mountain entrance while his magical staff caused the rocks of this mountain-side alcove to begin falling, causing a large chunk to fall and cover the entrance. Grignar just barely slid in time to beat the falling rock and found himself in the dark cavern without good sight of his situation.
The other two managed to climb into a neighboring hole that was some ways up and escape the falling rocks as Grignar was faced with an immense matis-bodied, buffalo-headed creature [the Mantallo, inside joke..]
ANYWAYS… just then, the group saw some dark robed individuals down at the end of the hall and gave chase, only to end up at one end of a hallway blocked by a man with two swords at his waist. The man was known as Jimmy, the duelist that defeated Flute in a dueling competition some time ago. Flute was fuming and demanded a duel from his former rival. To agree, the duelist demanded that there be no interference from others and to make sure it stayed that way, he presented the daughter of Samson down at the other end of the hall behind him at a goblin’s knifepoint.
The duel ensued and it was a spectacular competition watched by Grignar as his love of bloodsport entertained him. In the meantime of this battle, Samson was summoned away by a whisper sound in the distance. It turned out to be his wife, who had secretly been a part of a witch’s coven and was responsible for access to kidnap the daughter in the first place. As she sorrowfully explained that she was forced to do this and tried to give Samson a way around to get behind the goblin, he realized that she was being controlled from within by a dark spirit. He took to the secret entrance anyways and waited beneath a grate that the goblin was standing on for his moment to act.
The duel ended with a deal to aid the hero in place of his servant, who was forced to stay behind, in return for a powerful amulet that Flute acquired earlier from an earlier battle.
The group pressed forward as Samson took care of the goblin holding his daughter, though she ran ahead, scared, as there still remained some room between her and the party. Some battle stuff happened here. I’m going to skip ahead.
My favorite part of the game: As the witches gathered at the top of a scaling rock formation that led high up to a sacrificial stone, Grignar battled his way through some creatures to reach the stone, where he found Samson’s wife lying motionless among the ring of witches, the daughter hovering over her mother in a magical sphere. He swiftly beheaded Samson’s wife as there was some magical connection brewing between her and the dwarven mage. This ultimately saved her from becoming some grotesque monster. Skipping ahead some more while Flute was again fighting a revived, possessed Jimmy, Grignar was blasted away as Samson made his way up in an attempt to save his daughter, but Vadoo, who the party had also been fighting here, reached deep into Samson’s soul to see his true desire, which turned out to be that he wanted nothing more than to save his daughter. Vadoo smirked and began to drain the life from her in front of his eyes. Rather than fight, Samson offered his life for hers, which Vadoo accepted. Just as Samson’s life was draining to its last drop the rest of the party managed to break the spell and render Vadoo injured but conscious. Samsan gained the final death blow to Vadoo and the glow from Grignar’s axe, which was glowing brightly form the presence of dwarves, slowly faded as Vadoo spoke his last breath, “I will return for what is mine…”
As the players walked off to leave the chamber, the final cutscene was Samson’s daughter cutting her foot as she stepped on some of the shattered amulet lying by a defeated Jimmy. Her foot healed almost immediately with pieces of the amulet still embedded inside of her.
Thank you players. Thank you for my best game ever.
Kaillan Reukers Brian C. Miller William Carson
I would like to also add what my players came up with for a sequel to this game:
Samson:
“If we were to do a continuation, which I hope we do someday – I would love to pick up eleven years later and play as Annabelle, who is coming to grips with the dark magic that’s dwelling inside of her, despite her father’s attempts to squash and hide her own abilities from her.
Not to mention the growing threat of being consumed by whatever that amulet shard is up to.”
Flute:
“I wasn’t a huge fan of the Dashing Hero. He didn’t fit the tone of the story. So to change it up, I’d like to say Flute had terrible luck after Samson left the party to go care for his daughter. After these terrible incidents, destitute, name in tatters, abandoned by Clive, Flute turns to a life of crime. I’d like to see him eleven years on, and how he reacts when an old friend calls him on an old favor.”
So much awesome.
This was definitely a crazy fun session. One of the best I’ve been involved in in a long time.
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