The party enter the main settlement of the area, Hazelhedge, and I rolled to see if there were any sorts of ongoing situations in town based on the tables within the book Sandbox Generator by Altier Clandestin. I got nothing of note so the party began their quest into the unknown.
Day 1 of Raven:
Weather: Rainy, cold, high of 34°f.
The party travel southeast to a mound of eerie remains they’d heard about in a nearby forest. The mound was reputed to have ashes and crystallized tools buried below but unfortunately for them they spotted a Hill Giant guarding the mound. The Hill Giant also spotted them, and thus they began to run since the reaction clearly messed up, not wanting to die over some cinders and old junk. Since the giant had greater speed than the party, the evasion became a pursuit as per OSE rules. The party thought quickly about this and Offlan the Druid sacrificed valuable dried meat from his cooking kit to distract the pursuing Hill Giant. The distraction worked and the party escaped, deciding to travel further east.
The party found themselves among more grasslands, and the storm had still not let up. Before the night had officially fallen and the party could set up their tent, they were ambushed by a pair of roving thouls. The thouls were unnoticed and closed the distance to the party easily. In a particularly mortifying and long combat (10 rounds altogether) the thouls had managed to nearly paralyze the entire party with their cruel claw attacks. As per their monster entry, they would rather paralyze all combatants then kill them rather than focus on killing any particular foe outright. Lucky for the party it would seem. After the first thoul was killed, I rolled for morale and the remaining thoul stuck with it to finish what they’d started. Though outnumbered, the thouls had managed to nearly kill the party off, after paralyzing 4 of the 6 party members, leaving only Hukdar and the mage Topolo standing. From the cold dead hands of the thouls the two found gems worth 710gp in total which is certainly a handsome sum.
Thoul (pg. 115, Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy Rules Tome)
The party then rest in their tent, consuming the gathered food Offlan had foraged along their way, leaving most of the party terribly wounded.
Thoughts
Talk about an introduction to the project. I almost lost the party TWICE. Hill giant who pursues the party? Thouls paralyzing these level 1s? I can only imagine what would have happened had I rolled 3-6 thouls instead of the two. I did find it hard to tell when the party might roll for morale considering there’s no party available to make such choices. I do however feel like I ran the encounter properly. The knight and barbarian wouldn’t back down when the rest of the party were paralyzed, which feels proper for the code of conduct, alignment, etc. whereas the evil mage in the party immediately ran about 80’ away after casting his magic missile, ironically being the one to end the brutal combat.
Overall, I do think that this process will hopefully be quicker in the future, but I figure a 10 round combat is an anomaly. I think combats like this are what make us in the OSR space come to love these relatively simple characters with such limited backgrounds and stories; they fight tooth and nail, and everything hinges on a single die roll at times. So, with that being said, I hope the scrappy gray team can make it home in one piece.
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