Metal Gods of Ur-Hadad: Adventures in the Undercity, part... I can't even remember anymore

Well, boys and girls, last night's DCC session was a barn-burner. We finally hit that sweet spot between (mostly) survivable and "brudl" (a.k.a. "BRUTAL"). For background on that, see this: Make it Brudl. Here's what went down.

As you may remember, Vane Barbute (2nd level--again--fighter) had been fitted by the Gray Man leader with some fine new bling (an exploding collar). The Gray Men promised to remove it if the PCs would kill the Toothman chief and his "ju-ju man." Vane's owner was not able to make it to our session last night, having been brought low by a killer klown (bad McD's is a bitch, yo). It was just as well, he might finally have died, had he made the session.

When we started, the PCs were standing on an elevated platform, above the flooded room where they'd entered. Last session had seen them take out about 8 Toothmen with bows, slaughtering them to the last (tooth)man. Now, they were faced with a door designed in the style of a modern naval bulkhead door, vault-style with a spinning when in the center. This group being what it is, they opened the door pretty quickly. Luckily, no traps were affixed to it.

Upon entering, they encountered 6 Toothman warriors with bows. I've been trying out missile weapons this adventure, because I got kind of sick of the guys cutting up my pretty monsters in melee. Unfortunately for them, they pretty much got slaughtered without inflicting significant damage. Bows just don't do that much harm, and these guys are tough--humanoids about 7 feet tall, broad across the chest, with heads like a cross between an alligator and a T-Rex with bigger teeth. Scary bastards. Their bites are vicious, though, as the PCs would soon discover. Also, Clave was wielding the Spear of the Lizard King, and managed to chain together about three or four consecutive strikes on these guys, helping to wear them down considerably, and then the rest of the party got in on the action. Result? Six dead bad guys.

Having dispensed with the Toothmen, they searched the bedding in the chamber and found a variety of uncut gems. Nice. These could probably fetch a pretty decent price, and maybe more if they're willing to find a jeweler to cut them. They also found another door, like the first, but smaller. This one also had an attached keypad. Careful inspection suggested that the Toothmen are not particularly adept at choosing secure keycodes. Only the "6" button seemed to have been used, as it was marked with claw scratches. A short while later, "6-6-6" was entered and the door emitted a "thunk" as the lock disengaged. They entered the room only to discover it was actually more like an airlock. There was another keypad on the other side of this door, and another door about 20 feet on. It also had a keypad. Again, 6-6-6 was the number of the code. I'd thought briefly about making it 6-6-8 (the neighbor of the beast), just because it was right next door to the first keypad, but it was getting late. It was time for brutality. And brutality there would be.

The PCs opened this door as well, and were confronted by the Toothmen's chief, a ju-ju man (shaman), and four warriors with bows. I called for initiative. They rolled well, and I rolled very poorly. This would prove to be fortuitous for them. I'm not sure they would have survived, otherwise.

Absalom the Elf cast Choking Cloud to good effect, centered on the ju-ju man. Formerly Ian the Wizard cast Sleep. Several of the enemy were put down, but others, including the ju-ju man and his chief remained standing. The others could be roused by normal means (i.e., a swift kick in the head). The ju-ju man cast Emirikol's Entropic Maelstrom. I rolled pretty high, but the effect was less impressive than I'd hoped. Should have cast Fireball instead, or Invisibility, or Monster Summoning... oh, well. The chief also charged in with his axe, dealing decent damage. At this point, things started to get pretty chaotic, and I don't remember the blow-by-blow, but here are some highlights.

The party's wizards had some pretty bad spell rolls. The misfires on Sleep were particularly bad, as (twice!) a misfired Sleep put down all but one member of the party. Luckily, they could be awakened, but this constituted a movement action, and there were five of them. Also twice, Morfans the Dwarf used his Mighty Deed in an interesting manner--for increased movement. He used it to wake all of his companions. Did he roll well? Yes, ridiculously so, and narrowly averted what seemed like a sure TPK for the group.

That's when things got really, really ugly. Another Sleep was cast. Same. Fucking. Result. This time, everyone but Formerly Ian the Wizard was whacked with the misfire. Then the ju-ju man cast Fireball, and rolled something like 27, resulting in a 6d6 blast that killed just about everyone.

Luckily, Aram the cleric was on the job. If he hadn't been there to reverse the momentum of the fight by reviving his compatriots, the day surely would have ended poorly for one and all. Even so, the party almost got TPK'd twice in this combat. Alas, the brutality would not happen for me. My players were rollin' and my NPCs were hatin'. I don't think I've ever seen a DCC cleric this effective. He only blew a single roll, and the rest of his rolls basically saved everybody else.

Morfans the Dwarf also was magnificent. He kept using his Mighty Deed to knock the Toothman chief prone. On one such round, he hit with his blade and with his shield bash, busting the chief in the chops and cutting his legs out from underneath him.

Eventually, though there were many near deaths, the party survived the fight, took the heads of their enemies, and saved Vane Barbute's neck (literally).

The final tally ran about like this:

• Formerly Ian the Wizard got reduced to zero hit points THREE TIMES (!!!) and survived to tell the tale.
• Other party members got reduced to zero hit points and revived several times.
• Two Sleep spells misfired, sending a total of 10 PCs into Slumber Land.
• Two times, the party managed to rouse its sleeping members before The End could come.
• Aram the Cleric earned several rounds of drinks with his mad healing skillz. He literally saved the party from certain death.
• Aram was forced, in the end, to choose who would live and who would die. Wayne (the owner of Clave and Jerkal) gave the nod to Formerly Ian the Wizard, stating simply, "He's a better wizard than I ever was." Formerly Ian, despite three near-death experiences, will live to fight another day.
• Clave and Jerkal the Blazin' will not.

About Clave and Jerkal, in memorium.  

Clave was one of the characters from the inaugural Metal Gods of Ur-Hadad session. He won the Spear of the Lizard King. He killed many an ape man at the Battle of Fort Simian. He was a good dude, and now he's dead. Pour out a drank for him.

Jerkal the Blazin' started life as a gambler. He looked like Kenny Rogers. He cast Flaming Hands like a champion, except when it misfired. When that happened, he inevitably--by dice roll, each time it happened--shot fire from his cock (a.k.a. his "flaming glans"). He also saved the party (along with with Formerly Ian) during the great battle with a Serpent Man Lich and his minions, in the caverns under the Temple of the Serpent God. His work, there, helped to save the world. Literally. Without his contribution, the Serpent Men would have reemerged as a force to be reckoned with in the World of Ore. Now he is dead. Pour out another drank.

The players have discussed maybe bronzing Clave and Jerkal's skulls and beginning a Wall of Heroes, back at the chapter house, but no firm plans have been made.

All in all, a very tense, very satisfying session. It was just about everything DCC can be. Hell yeah!

MGoU-H: Adventures in the Undercity, Session I don't even know anymore

Our valiant(ish) heroes ended last session with chaotic fighter Vane Barbute equipped with an exploding collar about his neck, and a charge to keep: Kill the Toothmen! Both of these were foist upon them by the leader of the Gray Men, which is kinda funny... Vane already killed that guy, right? How'd he get here? Again? Yet another groovy mystery for the gang to solve, but it will have to wait until later. In the meantime, it's off to Toothman Central.

A group of the Gray Men escort the party, consisting of:

Aram (2nd lev. Cleric)
Absalom (1st lev. Elf)
Vane (2nd lev. Warrior)
Abel (1st lev. Wizard)
Formerly Ian (2nd lev. Wizard)
Rolf (1st lev. Thief)
(All levels are my best guesses, but everyone is either 1st or 2nd level at this point.)

On the way over to their desitination, they are told to beware the boss Toothman's "Juju Man," who apparently is bad news. After a short journey, the Gray Men left them at a crossroads in a wide passage. To the east was a set of stairs, ascending, now in the form of a waterfall due to the water draining down them. In fact, the whole passage is sort of a shallow river. The Gray Men said to go south, so they do, following the current.

Rolf took point, and was justifiably suspicious. He searched every nook and cranny for traps, especially the passage floor, but found none. Eventually, though, he found something very odd (and I quote):

A 12' tall statue of a man with small horns on his head, wearing a cap and an ancient schoolboy uniform, stands here gripping a stone guitar. If examined closely, the face can be seen to have a seam-with some effort, the face may be spun counterclockwise to unscrew it from the statue, leaving only a threaded hole.

The bridge of the guitar also has a seam-and pulling up on it will reveal a folded piece of paper, upon which is written the tablature for the song Back in Black.

I did a little free-stylin' at this point, and said that the guitar's body and neck were inset with colorful stones. The players hadn't discovered the tablature yet, but they soon would, after some good rolls by Rolf the Thief. [GM Note: These guys rolled extremely well, all session long. It was ridiculous]

After discovering the tablature, someone asked if it could be performed on the guitar, using the colored stones (like Guitar Hero, I guess). I hadn't even imagined such a thing at that point. The stones on the guitar were just a little descriptive flourish I'd included. But you know... why the fuck not? So... "Yes," I said, "I think that could work. You'll have to coordinate. It's a big guitar."

So three of them did it. One read the tab, one played the neck, and one played the body. They discovered that touching the stones made them light up. So, I quick-fixed a game mechanic. Everybody had to roll a d20, modified by their Agility and Intelligence. Eventually, they were successful, and heard a loud click. A compartment had opened in the back of the pedestal, revealing... I not a fucking clue. At this point I was just making shit up. I didn't want it to suck, though, so I delayed. It was, I told them, a small box made out of black stone. It was clearly meant to be opened, as it had hinges, but there were no corresponding seams, no lock, and no apparent means for manipulating it in such a way as to open it. This was me, scrambling to move on to the next thing, and not have to figure out what the hell was in the box. Hell, I still don't know, but I'm sure I'll figure something out... something... appropriate to the Metal Gods.

Oh, and by the way, thanks, Patrick Wetmore, for including (even if unknowingly) appropriate content for the Metal Gods of Ur-Hadad campaign. Oh, and for those of you playing at home, the statue is of the Metal God known as Yangu. He is the Metal God of... hmm... youth and rebellion, let's say. Maybe that will give me something fun to put in the box.

So, then the party turned to the east again, and descended another waterfall/staircase. There were a few missteps, but no damage, and no one got swept away. Eventually, after working way down a long corridor, the emerged in a room with four huge columns running in a row down the center. The water here was a bit deeper (and slower) and emptied through a grate under a raised platform on the room's west side. And, atop this fifteen foot platform... Toothmen! With bows! Roll initiatives!

The fight was on. Once again, these guys were KILLING ME with the high rolls. The spell rolls, in particular, were ridiculous. A veritable storm of magic missiles struck the opposition, turning one of into a rapidly expanding cloud of meat and vapor. Then, a whole bunch of them got Slept. During all of this, the Toothmen were raining arrows down on the party, and a few of them got lucky as well, striking party members, despite their use of cover (some of them) and the presence of a Choking Cloud which provide a 2 point penalty to all Toothman actions. But, like I said, the party was rolling like winners tonight. There was much healing, and they pushed on.

Eventually, Vane (who else?) charged toward the ladder on the east side of the platform and began climbing. He as hit (again) but eventually made it to the top. He fought the remaining Toothmen, alone, before one of them got a successful d10 bite on him. Vane died (again, again). Luckily, the wizards were able to Sleep most of the rest of them. And Aram the cleric healed Vane with a roll of something like 26 or 28 (Seriously, the rolls were ridiculous this session).

However, the stamina cost of death is starting to take a toll on Vane. After a bit of discussion, we decided to create a new house rule. Clerics, by tapping into their own essences, can heal attribute damage. The way it worked this time was to treat it like a laying on of hands roll. The cleric names the attribute (Strength or Stamina, only), and how many points he's going to give up to the other character. Then the roll is compared to the chart. For every die of healing the person would have gotten on the laying on hands chart, one point of attribute damage is healed permanently. Aram rolled ridiculously high (again), giving Vane 3 points (if I remember correctly).

Now, we're going to have to examine this house rule a bit more. It seems like an insanely powerful effect, and the risks are somewhat limited (temporary attribute damage). It may well be that we need to make that attribute damage permanent on a botched roll. I think that, then, the risk/reward ratio is a bit more balanced. I'll take it up with the fellas, later on.

All in all, a good session.

Metal Gods of Ur-Hadad: Adventures in the Undercity (combined synopses)

It's been some time since I posted a play recap for the Metal Gods campaign. Honestly, it's mostly because of all the work-related writing I've been doing lately. I'm reading, editing/revising, and formatting a variety of policies and accreditation documents for most of the day, so writing on the blog has been a bit less frequent than I would like. Also, I find that writing recaps is harder for me when the adventure was not one of my own writing. Modules are great, sure, but they don't get my creative juices flowing in the same way as the stuff I put together myself. In any case, let's talk about what's been happening in the Undercity of Ur-Hadad.

We've transitioned, as I may have mentioned, from The Pod Caverns of the Sinister Shroom to Anomalous Subsurface Environment, Level 3. It's been a pretty refreshing change of pace. The Pod Caverns are a decent module, I suppose, but nobody in the party found them particularly compelling. We've gotten used to a certain level of gonzo in our campaign, and that setting just seemed way too tame for this group of scaliwags. So, here's how it went down the last few sessions.

The PCs came ASE's 3rd level via deus ex machina. "Where," one of the players asked, "is the door we came through?" There was none, as I'd simply ported them into a large, relatively safe cavern. We decided it was in the ceiling. Problem solved. I've already told you of the death of Klaus the Thief (a promising lad, now dead, eaten by giant frog-thing). He represented the first character death in the entire campaign, outside of some zero-level guys. Frog-things attacked from ambush and critted him with a natural 20. He took immense damage and was swallowed. By the time anyone could free him from the belly of the creature, he was toast. After that death, the characters became a lot more cautious, though that caution led to tragic consequences for Vane Barbute, chaotic warrior, as you shall see.

The characters worked their ways through the chain of natural caverns in which they found themselves, managing to avoid several fights by not mucking about with things that seemed sketchy, eventually finding a cache of supplies. After resting there, they pressed on to find the Tomb of the Bone Lord. They entered the tomb, ready for battle, but all they found initially was a large, well-lit room, furnished like a bordello. "The room is furnished... with red velvet divans, oriental rugs, tapestries depicting elegantly dressed monsters... attending parties, and exquisitely carved mahogany coffee tables" (ASE 2&3, p. 86). The room also contained a plain stone sarcophagus and a large dining table, set for a party of 12. Several skeletons dressed in tuxedos stood ready to serve, and gestured that they should sit and partake.

As I mentioned, Vane Barbute was having none of it. Knowing as he should that this soon would become yet another way to try to kill him, he refused to sit at the table. Instead, he stood ready at the sarcophagus, aiming to cause harm to whatever inhabited it. This proved to be a poor choice, as it placed him right next to a wight (the Bone Lord), and he soon learned what "level drain" means. Also, is a sad bit of irony, Vane was the first of our DCC crew to make it to 3rd level. He literally hadn't even had a chance to roll his brand new deed die (now a d5) before a successful hit by the Bone Lord reduced him to 2nd level. I don't think that Vane's player had ever dealt with level drain before, and was a bit taken aback by it. Since I'd not yet had a chance to stat up a DCC version of the wight, we worked out the following house rule. When level drained, you make a Fort Save. If you don't save, you lose half your experience points. If you do save, you lose a quarter of your experience points and one point of Strength (permanently). It was pretty brutal. In the end, though, the party was victorious. Aram the Cleric killed the Bone Lord with the Frosthammer of Graki Deathstalker.

The rest of the creatures were dispatched, and they looted the place completely, transferring their newfound wealth to the surface, and using the proceeds to finally build their Barbie Dream House in Ur-Hadad. They built a nice one, kept the Bone Lord's furnishings (to make it classy, don't you know), and turned the main floor into a tavern. The tavern has helped to fulfill the dreams of Crag Beerbeard, James' character, whose name should tell you what those dreams were. They also added an armory/forge, a stable, and some other basic, but useful, additions. All in all, they spent a lot of their loot, but ended up with a decent pad to live in. Also, they got to move out from beneath the bridge where they had been living previously. After a brief respite, they returned to the dungeon. This time, though, it was one character per player. We've decided that this is going to be the standard from now on, in recognition of our renewed commitment to...

Nathan Explosion approves of this New Way.

We returned to the Tomb of the Bonelord, and the decided, based on a crude map they'd recovered, to head north. This was where it got fun. There was a magical trap. It made those failing the save see a vision of the Grim Reaper, following behind. Crag and Vane both failed their saves. So, Reaper Entourage. They quickly ascertained, though, that it was probably an illusion, and pretty much ignored it after that. Vane also triggered another of these traps, one that made him see the living as undead. Again, they pretty quickly figured out it was illusion, and nothing untoward followed. Also during this sequence, they party seemed a lot more cautious than usual. It's funny how not having a thief in the party and only having one character per player helps to focus the mind, isn't it?

They eventually found their way to a room with rusty metal folding chairs and a rotten podium, an assembly hall of some kind. There they found the bodies of two grey men and two weird, fish-like creatures, dead in the water between the rows of chairs, being eaten by crabs and worms. Finding no other items of interest, they pushed on to the west. The exit from the assembly hall led into a large (30 feet wide) passage, with a door directly opposite the one from which they came. Carefully (again, no thief available), they opened the door. Inside was a large, metal pedestal with a hexagonal opening in the top. A brief examination revealed a blue crystal skull resting at the bottom of the opening. They were not suckered into reaching for it, and a test with the butt of a spear showed them that it was trapped with scything blades. Vane used the handle of his maul (the Whore Whammer), a black metal monstrosity of a weapon, to stop the blades from resetting and they were able to break them and remove the skull. 

To the south were two other doors. One led into a closet. Inside, on a bronze bar, were hung a bunch of space suits with bubble-like helmets. In each of them was a dead Toothman (humanoids with 3 inch, razor sharp fangs too big for their mouths). The next door revealed a very wet room, without about two feet of water on the floor. The areas they'd explored so far had had anywhere from an inch to about two feet of water in them. In this room there was a large, stainless steel tank with several nozzles pointing down toward the floor. They entered the room, and someone approached it, tripping a trap. The tank discharged liquid nitrogen, instantly freezing the water. Two of them (including Vane and the wizard formerly known as Ian) were stuck in the ice. This also served to trigger an alarm summoning the Goblin (Gray Man) Emissary and eight of his troops. 

The party tried to fight, but soon were zapped with ray guns (set to stun) and rendered unconscious. At this point, I began ad-libbing madly. They awoke to find themselves taken prisoner, and being interrogated by the leader of this group. "Who," he wanted to know, "do you serve?" They had no fucking clue what to tell him. Vane (of course) began to threaten them with grievous bodily harm. The Emissary, Grolikus, was not impressed. Vane tried to break his bonds and got zapped with electricity for his troubles. Eventually, he calmed down, and Grolikus proposed a plan. If the party would do him a favor, they would be rewarded. He wanted them to destroy the Toothmen, he told them, and kill their leader.

This is where I kind of screwed up. I'd read about the factions on this level of the dungeon, but made the mistake of assuming that the Toothmen were a major faction. They weren't. Well, they are now. I'm going to have to figure out how to make that work, as it departs from the adventure as-written, but I think it'll be pretty easy to do. However, Grolikus was not finished. "I do not," he told the party, while pointing at Vane, "trust this one." So, he had one of his minions affix a tight collar of silvery metal to the chaotic warrior. Yes, of course it's an exploding collar. How could it not be? He promised to take it off later, should they fulfill his instructions to visit death upon his enemies. We shall see.

And that's about where we ended our last session.

UPDATE: I stand corrected. Bear (Vane's player) said, "Vane didn't get caught in the trap, but managed to kill the leader of our attackers. Also, Whore-Whammer the warhammer killed the Bone Lord with Banvha's luck donation."

MGoU-H: Adventures in the Undercity, Session 1

Well, we got the band back together again for another fun-filled session of DCC, Metal Gods style.

This time our party consisted of:

Banvha the 1st level Halfling (Adam M.)
Aram the 1st level Cleric
Vane the 2nd level Warrior
Klaus the 1st level Thief
Grumble the 1st level Dwarf
Jerkal (now Gerbil) the 2nd level Wizard
Nimue the 1st level Cleric
and...
Sybian the 1st level Warforged

I cannot, for the life of me, remember who came up with that name, or why he came up with that name, but damned if one of the boys didn't find a picture to go with the name. Behold, Sybian the Whoreforged:

Now go bleach your eyes.

About Sybian, Adam said:

The first thing we found (which happened off-camera and we retconned in as an explanation of where Gabriel's new PC came from) was a man-sized automaton of some sort that we managed to get working somehow and who then joined up with the Purple Tentacle team. Thus, the legend of Sybian the Whoreforged was born. Is he a pleasurebot of some lost species of super-hedonists? Or perhaps the personal orgasmatron of a dowager-queen from a repressed society of sexual prudes? For now, the only thing that is certain is that Sybian has a "pole-arm" and knows how to use it. Oh, and he has a lantern built into his noggin, so we periodically have to make sure he's all oiled up.

So, I started the party by hand-waving the journey into the Undercity. There was some exposition about the effects of the earthquake that kicked off the Metal Gods campaign, and was part of the background of Crypt of the Lizard King. I told them that, to the north of Ur-Hadad, an island had risen from the sea. Honest merchant ships were giving it a wide berth, because it seemed to be composed of some sort of ruins. Everyone knows that islands made of ruins are haunted, and nobody in their right minds is interested in that sort of thing. That was not the adventure for this session. It was a trailer for "Things to Come." I'm hoping to do that up for the next little thing I write.

In any case, the members of the Divine Order of the Purple Tentacle would enter The Pod Caverns of the Sinister Shroom, en route to Anomalous Subsurface Environment (I'm still thinking about where I want them to come into ASE, but I'm thinking that they're a little too tough for the first part). I didn't run ASE as-written because I really wanted to do it completely outside of the implied game world presented by Patrick Wetmore. Mind you, it's a good one, but it doesn't fit with my actual game world as well as I'd like. No worries, though, Pod Caverns is a good way to bridge the gap. Mushroom people are a nice entree to robots, dinosaurs, and clowns (Can I just call them Juggalos and be done with it?).

The PCs entered the Pod Caverns and found a channel of water flowing down into the interior. The approached a waterfall and made to descend it. Vane Barbute took the lead. I made him roll for it, because the rocks were slippery. He, of course, rolled a 1. Nicely done, Vane! For your trouble, you took 3 points of damage. Ouchies! The rest of the party made the descent without such complications.

The discovered that a bamboo pipe system had been rigged to send water from the the waterfall toward the south, and into another tunnel. After a brief survey of the cavern they'd entered, they also found some plants flanking the entrance to that tunnel. Being seasoned adventurers they know that, of course, the plants were not just plants but Killer Plants, called snagwort in this case. They did what anyone would: They burned them and cut them and shot them until they were dead. Then they entered the tunnel.

As the first of them entered the tunnel, he discovered a wooden casket hidden in the stream. Inside, they found a wooden key. This would prove useful later, as the tunnel led fairly quickly to a much higher waterfall. A search of the area at the top of the fall turned up a round, wooden door on one side and a keyhole on the other. They used the wooden key in the keyhole, and it diverted the flow of water into the now-opened wooden door, revealing a ladder down which they could climb to the cavern below the fall. Once at the bottom, they found another keyhole and restored the normal flow of the waterfall.

This new cavern, they discovered, was little more than a four-way intersection, with new branches leading away to northeast, south, and west. Each contained a channel of water which flowed into the new tunnels. After listening and considering their options, the decided to go toward the northeast. This led them to the Upper Pod Chamber, where they found a variety of weird cocoon-like pods depending from the high ceiling of this large, amoebic cavern. They (of course) just had to fuck with the pods. In doing so, they unleashed... Mushroom Men.

A brief aside, here: I like Patrick's take on the Pod Men, but I decided to make them just a bit more fanciful by imagining them in the form of mushrooms, rather than just fungus covered humanoids. Yeah, yeah... it's been done, but I really like mushrooms. My grandmother used to do paintings of mushrooms, so I've always had a connection to them. So, Mushroom Men.

The PCs began to do their thing. One of the outcomes was that Jerkal the Blazin', Wizard, was forced to make another mercurial magic roll for his new spell. Once again, he rolled one that involved the spontaneous production of rodents from his underclothes. At this point, I think Jerkal has about three such in his repertoire. Very strange. I've decided he has finally earned his Company name: Gerbil. It was fairly won, and really captures what has become his particular idiom.

The fight was pretty tough, and Vane (among others) got whacked pretty good a couple of times. Adam's recap sums up the action pretty nicely:

After a severe beating on both sides, the Divine Order of the Purple Tentacle prevailed, but not until circumstances forced us to seriously consider what it should be called when Jerkal experiences a premature flamejaculation and shoots fire from his crotch in the direction of party halflings. 
Oh, and Vane's new black metal warhammer is called the Whore-Whammer. 

So, they survived. It will only get worse from here, though. Perhaps for his next trick, Jerkal Gerbil can produce a plague of rats with a taste for mushrooms. We can only hope for the best, by which I mean mayhem and bloodshed on an epic scale.

Update: Correction--Vane only took damage from himself. Others bore the brunt of the fighting. Sometimes you get the Bear, sometimes the Bear gets you, and sometimes Bear gets himself.