Frostgrave campaign game fourteen

Oh dear, it's been over a week since this game was played. July can be so busy sometimes.

So, this game was the last game of Thaw of the Lich Lord campaign. My circus folk were attacking the floating island of the Lich Lord together with Sigilist warband.

I took a picture of the board before deployment was made. There's a lot enemies around for sure, so fighting against each other wasn't definitely main priority between warbands.

Quite a few enemies went against Sigilist warband. I almost felt sorry for the guys, but at that point I didn't know better...

Surely there was the Lich Lord disguised as an Armored Skeleton that attacked my warband. At best that skeleton was surrounded by three soldiers of mine. And yet - that Armored Skeleton took down Barbarian, Apothecary and Rangifer plus dealt the Wounded status on my Captain. Well, okay, I don't remember exactly if that skeleton dealt the finishing blow on each of these soldiers, but without exaggerating Apothecary, Barbarian and Captain suffered their fate against that Armored Skeleton from hell.

Lich Lord's minions weren't exactly easy on the Sigilists either. I guess the amount of rolls of 20-19 and 1-2 were at least very close to the average. It just happened so that NPC's took all the maximum values...

Next one Wraith Knight started to close in against each warband. The one who got against my circus proved to be an annoying nuisance that Jack (my wizard) had to eventually come and butcher up with his Fight +10 against undeads.

Though my Wraith Knight dragged fight for several combats, I must say Sigilists took the harder Knight this time. I think opponent had stacked something like +11 or +12 for his wizard and yet the Wraith Knight killed the Sigilist wizard with just one attack. After that other sigilists fell to it's blade, too.

It started to look like Lich Lord might be the winner here.

I had been advancing closer to Lich Lord under Fog spells. Opponent had cast Draining Word on Elemental Bolt and had tried to pepper the Lich with missile fire. The archers and/or crossbows removed Elemental Shield from Lich and caused five damage points in.

Lich Lord's performance started to look very, very suspicious when it had already failed to cast spells so many times that it had taken three damage points in from miscasts only. What was this guy? An Armored Skeleton in fancy clothing?

Sigilists eventually succeeded to take down the Wraith Knight. Jack had taken whipped himself into a maniacal rage (Fleet Feet, Possess, Leap spells, everything...) and was rapidly getting close to Lich Lord. He really wanted to challenge the Lich in melee.

One dream came true when he did exactly that.

And, uhm.

If there was any question about the real Lich Lord, they all vanished now. Lich Lord died to just one hit.

The untrustworthy circus folk robbed five treasures out of the eight present in this scenario.

My apprentice had been injured at some point, had a movement value of 5 and was stuck in difficult terrain. There were only three turn left to escape when Adon the Apprentice finally got out.

Sigilist wizard rolled "1" on the injury chart and, well, died. That was pretty critical 20 that had been rolled, seems like.

Well. We'll see if these warbands continue their existence beyond this Thaw of the Lich Lord. Not in any organised way at least for sure.

However, if Jack ever continues his exploits, I still kept the details about the campaign as detailed as possible:

--

Jack Saturn is level 45 with 4570 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +4*, and health by +6.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +6*, Elemental Ball by +4*, Leap by +2, Possess by +2*, Spell Eater by +2*, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3.
He has learned Plague of Insects, which has been improved by +3.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned Willpower spell, which has been improved by +2.
He has learned Plane Walk spell.
He has learned Planar Tear spell*
He has learned Bind Demon spell*

Home base is Inn with Crystal Ball, Sarcophagus of Healing, Carrier Pigeons (+2 gold) and Kennels
Reputation: (personal) Death of Lich Lord

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 2x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering, Hand Weapon (+1 Fight)
Amulet of the Ghoul King
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Fire Heart Gemstone
Horn of Hellfire
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Furious Quill, Enchant Weapon, Shield, Miraculous Cure, bought: Planar Tear
Grimoire of Lichdom
Quiver of the Soul Seeker
Scroll of Planar Tear
Ivory Scroll (Familiar)
Ring of Slow Fall
Boots of Leaping
Unbreakable Orb
Robes of Arrow Turning
Gloves of Casting


Unspent gold: 181.

Warband roster is worth 1520 gold (level 45 apprentice is 650) and includes:
Apprentice has Smashed Leg
Barbarian
Marksman
Ranger
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
(miss next game) Bard
War Hound
Rangifer
Captain: Stat increase: +1 Move (cost so far: 185 gold), leather armor, sword of undead slaying and dagger, Amulet of the Ghoul King, 150 experience
- Tricks of the trade: Sprint, Furious Attack (+3F before attack rolls are made)

Frostgrave campaign game thirteen

Scenario was the Bone (stone) Wheel, where treasures were riding human ponies like a carousel, and there were two ticket inspector banshees around, too.

Scenario had an interesting deployment scheme, where players deployed in corners instead of along board edges. Additional scenarios like that would be most welcome, as it makes the board feel bigger.

We used random encounters in this scenario for some extra challenge. I was against Sigilist warband.

For some reason I didn't check my detailed notes here, and my wizard sheet was a bit of a mess. I remembered someone was supposed to miss a game, but I had marked two such soldiers. I wagered it was my ranger instead of my bard - and of course it was the other way around. Oh well, I suppose losing ranger hurts more.

It took quite a while before I started taking pictures. For example, there are no more banshees around at all. First one fell to a shot by my Marksman, who had Quiver of the Soul Seeker equipped. Second banshee went to torment Sigilist warband as it chose the worst possible direction to go. Something like six models had to take the Will check.

Sadly the wail did only a few stray points of damage here and there instead of anything that really mattered. Then it died to a barbarian with magic weapon, who was aided by Blood Crow. I guess well trained birds can distract incorporeal ghosts. Why not.

Now we're slowly getting to where first picture is. Rangibear has both Possess and Fleet Feet on, a combo that is replicated in the Barbarian also. A Treasure Hunter has Fleet Feet.

Two explosive cocktails have killed a war dog from between Rangifer and Captain. I don't think anyone else, other than the dog, took much damage.

The turning mechanism of the Bone Wheel was funny brought an additional treasure token close to my warband. Blood Crow that has often been blocking treasures had been called elsewhere, so Captain was able to take the third treasure. Random Encounter roll was 16+, but spawned only two Wild Dogs. But... they were dogs, after all. Caution is advised whenever dogs threaten you in Frostgrave.

Dogs spawned closer to me, and of course they started to approach my treasure carrying soldiers (a treasure hunter and rangifer)

Closer to the Bone Wheel some sigilist Treasure Hunters had been creeping to, perhaps, snatch the treasure from Captain, or just to cause general anxiety and uncertainty in the Circus.

Using Leap on Captain would have been too obvious and easy (even if there was Draining Word upon that spell), so Jack blasted both of the Treasure Hunters away with a well placed Elemental Ball. Or, that was the plan. Casting that spell almost dealt more damage to Jack than to the 'hunters. First one took nothing, but at least second one was wounded.

I didn't dare to bring Barbarian and the other Treasure Hunter to aid in the fight because there was enemy Barbarian behind the REAL threat: a war hound. Somebody needed to guard the bottleneck. So instead Bard and Apothecary came to protect Jack.

Adon the Apprentice cast Plague of Insects on the healthier enemy Treasure Hunter.

This plan backfired a little when the Treasure Hunter gave the penalties for my troops also, and once I brought Barbarian to the fight, road was opened up for enemy war hound or something. It could attack Apothecary with Apothecary having effective Fight -4. Somehow Apothecary still held fast.

After my Marksman fell the banshee, ranged attacks were jinxed for both warbands. Bone Darts really did nothing or did not succeed at all, and none of the mundane ranged attacks did damage, often rolling sub 5's.

And it was proved that Wild Dogs are not lesser dogs in any way compared to War Hounds. I thought that a Rangifer with Possess could attack one of them alone even if it was carrying a treasure. Wild Dog rolls 20. How else.

Now, the dogs were sent to their graves easily enough when Treasure Hunter came to help. But not before Rangifer actually suffered the "wounded" status. This was the moment when I finally stopped fooling around with my Wizard and Apprentice, and started casting Leap.

My wizard escaped the battle with four hit points remaining, and apprentice did the same with only one hit point remaining. I may have a problem with unnecessarily empowering spells...

So.

Scenario was over and treasures had been evenly shared. Cruor et Caedis found 210 gold, Ring of Slow Fall, Grimoire of Miraculous Cure and Ivory Scroll of Familiar.

Now that is one pretty rad Ivory Scroll. After levelling Jack's hit points to maximum value, he can automatically begin with 22 health. Plague of Insects and Willpower spells gained a level.

Jack got 310 experience points. A War Hound was badly wounded, so it had to be put down. I got a new one right away, bringing my total benefit from Carrier Pigeons to two gold coins!

Captain took her share from gold again, this time taking a little bit more as she is level 1 now.

I bought a Grimoire of Planar Tear for future use.


Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 38 with 3835 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +3, and health by +6*.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +5, Elemental Ball by +3, Leap by +2, Possess by +1, Spell Eater by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3.
He has learned Plague of Insects, which has been improved by +3*.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned Willpower spell, which has been improved by +2*.
He has learned Plane Walk spell.

Home base is Inn with Crystal Ball, Sarcophagus of Healing, Carrier Pigeons (+2 gold) and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 3x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering, Hand Weapon (+1 Fight)
Amulet of the Ghoul King
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Fire Heart Gemstone
Horn of Hellfire
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Furious Quill, Enchant Weapon, Shield, Miraculous Cure, bought: Planar Tear
Quiver of the Soul Seeker
Scroll of Planar Tear
Ivory Scroll (Familiar)
Ring of Slow Fall

Unspent gold: 476.

Warband roster is worth 1450 gold (level 38 apprentice is 580) and includes:
Apprentice has Smashed Leg
Barbarian
Marksman
Ranger
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
(re-hired) War Hound
Rangifer
Captain: Stat increase: +1 Move (cost so far: 160 gold), leather armor, sword of undead slaying and dagger, Amulet of the Ghoul King, 120 experience
- Tricks of the trade: Sprint, Furious Attack (+3F before attack rolls are made)

Frostgrave campaign game twelve

Scenario was Dark Cauldron, number eight from Thaw of the Lich Lord.

Summoners were fighting over the zombie pot.

Jack succeeded in casting Reveal Secrets. I started planning on grabbing four treasures, then. I could get into contact with all four treasures close to my side, and pick up three of them. Oh boy.

If it all could have been as easy... None of my spells succeeded that turn. Two death cultists engaged War Hound, and opponent's wizard or something shot Captain very dead.

Next turn Jack tries to cast Elemental Ball to clear the melee that had my War Hound and two death cultists involved. Failed. Next Adon tries to cast Elemental Ball somewhere where there was a couple of enemy warband members close to each other. Failed.

Hey, let's not give up just yet!

Well, my apprentice gets tied up in melee with war hound and knights and what else. Jack casts Possess on bard and goes to help Ranger, who got into a fight with zombie from the cauldron. Bard brutally slaughters some hapless enemy warband member.

Enemy apprentice binds that bard, though. Since she's a demon now. Nooooo! After Jack dealt with the zombie, it was time to turn his blade against the bard. This bard is notorious for killing everything almost as regularly as War Hound. And make no mistake - she dealt damage in to Jack. Next turn, though, Jack gets angry and lops off her head.

Apothecary and a Treasure Hunter are speeding to the board edge with treasures. One Treasure Hunter had already escaped. Looked very much like I was going to get three treasures after all. Adon the Apprentice was reeling with only two hit points remaining, but that didn't stop him from defending himself twice from knight, and almost nailing enemy wizard, who entered melee combat. If it wasn't for those meddling Fate Stones... ah well.

Ranger was fighting valiantly against a greater demon. Enemy warband had long since toppled over the cauldron. There was no longer anything to win, but still everything to lose.

Any stray bullets and/or arrows didn't drop any of my treasure haulers and once they had passed over the border, Jack cast Leap on himself and leapt to safety.

During the course of the entire game I succeeded in casting two spells. My warband killed one zombie and one death cultist.

190 experience points gave two levels. Treasures were 100 gold (90 after captain), third Sword of Undead Slaying, Hand Weapon with +1 Fight modifier and Grimoire of Shield. No too bad. Still I decided finally to sell a two-handed weapons with +1 extra damage modifier. Gained another 90 gold, captain another 10. With these I dismissed Ranger that was badly injured, and got a new Ranger. Bard will just have to wait for a game. Traitor.

Adon the Apprentice rolled a smashed leg.

This was the worst performance of Cruor et Caedis, ever.

Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 35 with 3525 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +3, and health by +5*.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +5*, Elemental Ball by +3, Leap by +2, Possess by +1, Spell Eater by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3.
He has learned Plague of Insects, which has been improved by +2.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned Willpower spell, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned Plane Walk spell.

Home base is Inn with Crystal Ball, Sarcophagus of Healing, Carrier Pigeons (+1 gold) and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 3x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering, Hand Weapon (+1 Fight)
Amulet of the Ghoul King
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Fire Heart Gemstone
Horn of Hellfire
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Furious Quill, Enchant Weapon, Shield
Quiver of the Soul Seeker
Scroll of Planar Tear.

Unspent gold: 798.

Warband roster is worth 1420 gold (level 35 apprentice is 550) and includes:
Apprentice has Smashed Leg
Barbarian
Marksman
(re-hired) Ranger
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
(miss next game) Bard
War Hound
Rangifer
Captain: Stat increase: +1 Move (cost so far: 138 gold), leather armor, sword of undead slaying and dagger, Amulet of the Ghoul King, 100 experience
- Tricks of the trade: Sprint, Furious Attack (+3F before attack rolls are made)

Frostgrave campaign game eleven

Last Thursday the Frostgrave campaign continued to Thaw of the Lich Lord scenario seven, Lair of the Ghoul King.

Ghoul King definitely hadn't thought this ambush through very well. I mean, both wizards were competing who'd get to lure the king to his warband! I decided to sacrifice my Captain in this attempt. She used Sprint trick of the trade and was the closest model to Ghoul King when the creature phase began.

There was this one pesky ghoul who fell from the ceiling. It single handedly killed my Bard (how can that be? She has beaten even enemy wizards!) and even tied up Jack. Jack had cast Possess on himself and he was carrying the Sword of Undead Slaying, and he had a friendly warband member in melee with the Ghoul. That's a +13 attack. And yet Jack didn't score a kill. Nonetheless it's quite rare to deal five damage points in to a target when you roll "2" for attack roll...

Anyway. This distraction combined with Ghoul King refusing to die made it look like Necromancer would snatch both treasures in the middle without any contest whatsoever. Loyal War Hound had to run to the throne to block treasure picks.

Necromancer warband got their very own elite ghoul to stall them, which probably saved war hound for a turn or two.

But the Ghoul King. I had Possessed Rangifer, my captain and barbarian beating him for multiple turns. I decided to use drastic methods and cast Plague of Insects on my own Treasure Hunter, who then ran within 1" of the Ghoul King. Of course the casting roll was 18 or so, so getting rid of it would be difficult. Eventually Ghoul King fell thanks to the -4 Fight from insects and it was the Captain who scored the kill. For a moment I was worried that she'd keep the Amulet to herself, thanks to Captains not giving back items that are given for them.

Well. Back home I kind of found it very fitting for the theme of my warband if Captain did steal the amulet. So I gave it to her anyway.

Once I had taken down the King, it looked like I overwhelmed Necromancer completely in the middle. Four treasure tokens and the amulet looked like they'd fall easily to my greedy hands. But how things change when you become too overconfident.

A couple of (finally) good damage rolls from enemy warband killed my Barbarian and Marksman. War hound had only one hit point remaining and Rangifer would soon be all alone versus three enemy models. Oh, sure, there was my Trasure Hunter with Plague of Insects on him... but I considered him useless. He was tying up two enemy soldiers with success, though.

If it hadn't been for the super ghoul that ate enemy Apprentice, I would have probably lost both treasures. I had started to fall back with Captain, as I didn't want to get her killed with the amulet. Ghouls had been slowing down and damaging my apprentice. Once Rangifer fell dead, both Jack and Adon tried to barrage a dense group of three enemy models and my own war hound with Elemental Ball. Results weren't too inspiring though both spells succeeded. Two models died. Only one enemy model, though.

Ranger went and picked up one of the treasures on the throne - just in time, as the Treasure Hunter who had Plague of Insects was finally put down.

I won a critical initiative and was able to Leap away with treasure carrying Ranger. Opponent had more than enough models to pick up the other treasure in the middle. Necromancer soldiers had also been pulling the levers to open doorways, and there was a door in both of our deployment zones. Game was pretty much over then, as the LoS was only 12" in this scenario. Both players seemed to be more interested in securing a treasure than to wreak havoc.

So, it was a clean 3-3 game. My warband had killed Ghoul King, Jack had escaped through a door and quite a few ghouls had been put down. Jack got 400 experience points from this scenario.

Treasure rolls were lackluster. I got 220 gold, a Grimoire of Spell Eater, a +1 damage modifier dagger and Quiver of the Soul Seeker.

Grimoire and dagger were sold right away, with Captain insisting on her share of the loot.

War Hound died from roster and Marksman and Rangifer need to miss next game. I bought Grimoire of Plane Walk for Jack.


- - -


Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 33 with 3335 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +3*, and health by +4.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +3*, Leap by +2, Possess by +1, Spell Eater by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3.
He has learned Plague of Insects, which has been improved by +2.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned Willpower spell, which has been improved by +1*.
He has learned Plane Walk spell.*

Home base is Inn with Crystal Ball, Sarcophagus of Healing, Carrier Pigeons (+0 gold) and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 2x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering
Amulet of the Ghoul King
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Fire Heart Gemstone
Horn of Hellfire
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Furious Quill, Enchant Weapon
Quiver of the Soul Seeker
Scroll of Planar Tear.

Unspent gold: 717.
(I've forgotten if I have included sold items to the collected gold, so I'll ditch it from these statistics from now on.)

Warband roster is worth 1400 gold (level 33 apprentice is 530) and includes:
Barbarian
(miss next game) Marksman
Ranger
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
War Hound (re-purchased)
(miss next game) Rangifer
Captain: +1 Move and Sprint trick (cost so far: 118 gold), leather armor, hand weapon and dagger, Amulet of the Ghoul King, 90 experience

Frostgrave campaign game ten

Despite forgetting my own models home, we played the next scenario of Thaw of the Lich Lord campaign. Scenario six, the House of Longreach. I was afraid that it would be an awkward scenario to play because of the small area you might get teleported into. After all it worked out quite fine and didn't devolve into figuring out poorly explained rules and unexpected rule interactions.

I'm going light with pictures because I forgot my miniatures home, but I'm including one that gives out the position of treasures and magic portals.

Sigilists succeeded in casting the Reveal Secrets spell. That treasure, as well as treasure #4 were easy grabs for Sigilists.

I had my greedy eyes on treasures 1-3. The number one was an easy one for me, but there was more contest with #2 and #3.

Opponent sent (accidentally, through a portal) some soldiers behind my lines that were nearing #3, but I had outrageous luck with dice there. At the same time Sigilist war hound had entered the treasure chamber through a magic portal. These dogs are a thing in this game. The pup single handedly... pawedly? took down both of the Frost Wraiths that were guarding the treasures! Possessed Jack entered the area right after, and even he was terrified of the dog. Instead of engaging in melee, he shot it down with empowered elemental ball.

On turn three some death cultists and zombie troll entered the board. By this time I had seized both treasure #2 and #3, and though Sigilists were peppering my troops with archer fire, they weren't actively threatening those treasures. Now and then some Sigilist soldier took his chances to teleport right into my troops through a magic portal, but those plans didn't yield fruit.

In the treasure chamber, however, was Jack who had cast Possess on himself and Fleet Feet. He picked up the special treasure. In the chamber at the very same time was the Sigilist wizard, who was invisible. The death cultists were moving towards the portals, so the chamber might get crowded very soon. This in mind Jack picked the special treasure so that Sigilist wizard could be able to pick the other treasure up without Jack denying it - if I had walked next to both treasures, a battle would've ensued with just about one hundred percent chance.

Thankfully Sigilist wizard deemed it better to get one treasure for sure than try to attack Jack.

Two death cultists entered the treasure chamber. Jack fought one and killed him. Sigilist wizard used this time to pick the second treasure and start casting Invisibility on himself again.

Now, Jack only had nine hit points left thanks to my extravagant empowerments. If the last two Death Cultists entered the area and ganged up on Jack, they might actually kill him. Because of this my Possessed Treasure Hunter attacked the death cultist and zombie troll party to buy time for Jack to escape.

It worked, kind of. Kind of, because opponent succeeded in bringing one Treasure Hunter of his own to the treasure chamber, and suddenly Jack was there, outnumbered by enemy warband members instead of +0 Fight death cultists.

But hey, no problem, really. Jack only needed to cast Leap on himself and leap to the magic portal and enter the main board from some safe location. Easy.

Well, only half of that was "easy" (Jack entered main board from just about the best portal he could - in the middle of my treasure carriage #3.) The casting roll had been "1". Draining Word was raising the difficulty of Leap to ten, so Jack didn't have enough hit points to empower the spell to succeed.

With a heavy sigh Jack drained all empower points from his Orb of Power [8] that he had found last game. I surely hadn't planned to use such an artifact of great power to empower... Leap.

Game started nearing end. Sigilist warband was the one to kill Zombie Troll. My Possessed Treasure Hunter had just been a short-lived practice target for the troll. As an added annoyance, an archer shot killed Jack's apprentice.

My captain, whose debut last game had not been anything to write home about, did a little better in this game. She killed enemy blood crow and managed to flee the scene even if she was injured from some arrow by an archer. That was +30xp for her.

Treasures were four for Summoner warband and three for Sigilist warband, so that was pretty even.

- - -

Apothecary and War Hound died, but there were no other casualties. Apprentice rolled fourteen, and the troll-beaten Treasure Hunter survived without a scratch.

In this game Jack gained a total of 370 experience points, which gave him four levels. Treasures included Fire Heart Gemstone, Horn of Hellfire, Dagger with +1 damage modifier and 320 gold coins. Make that 288, thanks to Captain. After replenishing losses, gold gained was 180. Let's just hope that Fire Heart Gemstone will be worth an Orb of Power (8) in the long run...

Since none of my soldiers use daggers as main weapons, I sold the magic dagger I found for 90 gold, greedy captain taking that 10 gold from the trade.



Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 29 with 2935 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +2, and health by +4*.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +2, Leap by +2*, Possess by +1, Spell Eater by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3.
He has learned Plague of Insect, which has been improved by +2*.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned Willpower spell.*

Home base is Inn with Crystal Ball, Sarcophagus of Healing, Carrier Pigeons (-1 gold) and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 2x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Fire Heart Gemstone
Horn of Hellfire
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Furious Quill, Enchant Weapon*
Scroll of Planar Tear.

Total gold that has been collected is 2880, unspent gold is 656.

Warband roster is worth 1360 gold (level 29 apprentice is 490) and includes:
Barbarian (with the club of battering)
Marksman
Ranger
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary (re-purchased)
Bard
War Hound (re-purchased)
Rangifer
Captain: +1 Move and Sprint trick (cost so far: 83 gold), leather armor, hand weapon and dagger, 40 experience

Frostgrave campaign game nine

Last Tuesday I played a game of Frostgrave.

It was part of our campaign. Scenario was the number five from Thaw of the Lich Lord, Run of the Rangifer.

Game was played on a suspicious part of Felstad, where technology of times long since gone still show signs of surpassing the mechanical advances of these days. There were six rangifers on the board (or were they descendants of a tribe that had had far too much radiation leaking into their lineage?) kind of guarding the treasures. After game ends, each wizard would gain extra experience for all rangifers that had not been slaughtered, chopped to pieces, had their heads bashed in, bled out or life force being drawn out.

On first turn a death knight wraith thing would appear to hunt them also, so they would be in danger even if two wizards didn't cause enough collateral damage.

I marked treasure locations to the first picture. Two treasures with no number I gave to opponent without contest.

The #1 treasure was, by far, the easiest to grab. The rangifer was put down easily enough, though I think I played Plague of Insects incorrectly - spell gives the penalties to each model within the range, even to my own models! But since the rangifer was already wounded from a bolt fired by Marksman or Crossbowman, I doubt it would've changed things that much. Though, rolls of 20 are always rolls of 20.

Then. My sellsword captain.

Tresure #3 was guarded by a fierce rangifer indeed. It held its own against both captain and treasure hunter, and even dealt damage in to captain. In the process the rangifer became wounded.

Later I brought bard into combat with it, but didn't make attacks because I wanted extra experience for the captain.

Well. Wounded rangifer in combat with three uninjured warband members still managed to kill captain. Just as planned.

Fleet feet on a Treasure Hunter, clouded by a Fog made a quick rush to treasure #2 after the rangifer had wandered off, wounded from missile fire, and had a little encounter with my Possessed barbarian.

Leap made for an easy retreat.

Eventually rangifer at treasure #3 died and someone started to move the treasure away. Player interaction had not been much of a deal in this game aside from some ineffective archery.

Opponent had secured the two treasures, but #4 was still unclaimed. Opponent started rushing for it, and it would nigh impossible for me to get there before enemy summoner would just cast Leap on the treasure carrier.

Except...

My possessed, uninjured barbarian might be able to Leap twice to get on top of the roof! Nobody would stop my possessed barbarian! Especially when opponent didn't have any war hounds!

After first Leap enemy wizard tried to cast Bind Demon on the barbarian. What? First use of that spell, like, ever. Casting roll was really poor, I think opponent boosted to get the minimum result for a successful cast. Bard right next to my barbarian saved the day, and he passed the Will check.

Then then Adon cast second Leap on the barbarian, and he stood right next to treasure #4. Enemy apprentice tried to cast Bind Demon on the barbarian and... and... and he failed. Noooo!

Well. There was no way for me to contest treasure #4 now. It was a clean 50/50 game. Opponent had killed the wraith knight and exactly one (1) rangifer had made a peaceful retreat from the zone.


- - -


Post-game Jack found 260 gold, Orb of Power, Eyes of Amoto and Grimoire of Enchant Weapon. Jack thought he doesn't need such amount of eyes, so they were sold off. Greedy and useless captain took her share, so total gold gained from this game was 369.

Captain survived and bard died.

Since captain screws up the gold coin amounts, I bought Carrier Pigeons for home base for five gold. Bard had died, so I got a new one for 99 gold. I wanted to wait for the crossbowman to die of... natural causes, so to speak. But I ditched him and got a Ranger in his place for 99 gold.

Jack gained two levels, and I got so scared of Bind Demon that I raised Will by another +1 and levelled Spell Eater by one.

Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 25 with 2565 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +2*, and health by +3.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +2, Leap by +1, Possess by +1, Spell Eater by +1*, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3.
He has learned Plague of Insect, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing, Carrier Pigeons and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 2x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering
Orb of Power (8)*
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Willpower, Furious Quill, Enchant Weapon*
Scroll of Planar Tear.

Total gold that has been collected is 2560, unspent gold is 636.

Warband roster is worth 1320 gold (level 25 apprentice is 450) and includes:
Barbarian (with the club of battering)
Marksman
Ranger
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard (re-purchased)
War Hound
Rangifer
Captain: +1 Move and Sprint trick (cost so far: 41 gold), leather armor, hand weapon and dagger

Frostgrave campaign game eight

edit: Oh, whoopsie. Forgot the pictures.

Last Thursday I played in a Frostgrave campaign game. It was the fourth scenario of Thaw of the Lich Lord, Storm of Undeath.

Since it was a four player game, the number of skeletons inside the pillars was doubled. There were also twelve treasure tokens on board. Well, actually thirteen, since Jack succeeded in Reveal Secrets. That's second time in a row. Let's make this a tradition, shall we?

The crude yellow stars mark locations for treasures that weren't in the middle. I forget where the last one was, but somewhere between Necromancer and Sigilist would be my guess.

I sent a treasure hunter, a war hound and a thug to get treasure number two, and hoped to get the treasure number one with the use of Leap spell. Sigilist had cast Draining Word on Leap, though.

Since scenario special rules were quite hostile for shooting attacks, a crossbowman walked off the board with reveal secrets treasure.

Sigilists sent a treasure hunter with boots of leaping to treasure #2, and along with blood crow from crow master they killed my treasure hunter. Shoo, bird! Shoo! Oh well. Jack the Wizard was right under the building close to treasure #2, so I didn't worry about it too much. War hound and Thug were supposed to keep Sigilist troops in check so that Jack could come to help after making apothecary leap to treasure #1.

But then, alas... Adon the Apprentice failed to cast fog to screen the movement of the main body of the warband. This wasn't so bad in itself, but it made me cautious. Summoner had his apprentice there on top of the little bride section. Elemental Bolt would still be Shoot +4 attack even in the snowstorm. The summoner had also succeeded in calling a major demon to the field. I had envisioned that I'd scare off summoners from treasure #4, and with some luck escape with four treasure tokens from the game. And now there was a big question marks on #2 and #4.

So, I tried to continue with the original plan and went to contest #4 with my rangibear before opponent would have the opportunity to snatch that treasure with leap spell. Too bad that the enemy punched the bear down to one hit point remaining. That only made the bear angry, though - once major demon came in for the kill, the bear dealt some five damage in or so.

On turn three the skeletons arose in the middle, and my apothecary had finally been able to pick up the treasure #1. Thug and the war hound that were trying to get #2 had failed in their attempt, and necromancers and the summoner had been cleaning up the middle from treasure tokens. Things started to look rather bad, and I became over-protective of my apothecary. Jack cast leap on apothecary, but rolled exactly one. By expending Ring of Power and all but one hit point Jack was able to leap apothecary to relative safety. I didn't like the word "relative", so Adon the Apprentice also cast leap on the apothecary. He also failed to cast it and empowered the spell so that he got three hit points remaining.

Invisible sigilist wizard had collected easy 50 experience points from the scenario. And now the wizard was after Jack! And that particular wizard was a monster in melee combat. I think he's +7 or something, where Jack is only +6, plus he was wounded. Hmm. Now I remembered that at some point Jack had beaten a war hound in melee. That was probably the soldier phase of turn 2. Anyway. The point here was that everybody around Jack had suddenly died, both friends and enemies alike. It was between Jack and the enemy wizard now. Adon and his buddies closer to the middle were unavailable to help, too, as there was a more pressing huge fight going on with knights and major demons and what else.

Jack lives for unreasonable risks, but not that unlikely rewards. So, instead he cast leap on himself. He needed 12+ to succeed thanks to being injured and suffering from draining word. If he rolled below 8, he'd die. Roll was exactly 12.

But then sigilist wizard uses scroll of time walk or whatever the spell is that lets you activate again on soldier phase. Nooo! Even after his gambit he was not safe!

In the apprentice phase my bloodthirsty bard clears the fight, dealing killing blow to knight. This freed Adon to open Eye of Amoto on Jack and cast leap on him. He effectively needed 14 to succeed. Roll was 11. Eh. Choices, choices...

But losing an apprentice isn't as punishing as losing a wizard, so Adon spent his last three hitpoints on empowering the leap. Both spellcasters disappeared from the board.

After that it was pretty much all-out rout for me.

I had managed to bring only two treasure tokens in for me. The other one was a little bit of gold and a grimoire (Elemental Ball) and another was Club of Battering. Total experience was 240, which wasn't too bad when I only got two treasures.

Rangifer died from roster and a thug would need to miss next game. I sold the grimoire, bought a new rangifer and dismissed the thug.

Thug was replaced with a captain from Sellsword mini-expansion. To go with the circus theme, I gave my captain speed 7 and Sprint as a Trick of the Trade. She's equipped with leather armour, hand weapon, dagger and bow.

Story piece for last game and this game can be found here.

Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 23 with 2305 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +1, and health by +3*.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +2*, Leap by +1, Possess by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +3*.
He has learned Plague of Insect, which has been improved by +1.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 2x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier), Club of Battering
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Willpower, Furious Quill
Scroll of Planar Tear.

Total gold that has been collected is 2150, unspent gold is 470.

Warband roster is worth 1360 gold (level 20 apprentice is 400) and includes:
Barbarian (with the two handed weapon from vault)
Marksman
Crossbowman
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
War Hound
Rangifer
Captain: +1 Move and Sprint trick.

Frostgrave campaign game seven

Last Thursday we continued Frostgrave campaign with all four players. We played Thaw of the Lich Lord campaign scenario three, Loot the Cart.

We tinkered the scenario rules a little - instead of four cultists in the middle, there were eight. And instead of four ghouls from one random table edge, we'd have two ghouls from the middle of every table edge. These modifications were made because we had four players, when the scenario had been written for two.

My circus was lucky to succeed in 15+ Reveal Treasure spell, so I'd get at least one treasure from this game. Especially when we played this spell wrong - Within 6" of deployment zone means actually the 0-6" zone area beyond deployment zone. Spell description was a little confusing.

Again first picture shows treasure locations. There are four treasures inside the cart in the middle.

There is a paper slip close to the bear, and that one is a fog template. It blocked line of sight to a treasure hunter who went and picked the closest treasure from the building, so that treasure was an easy grab.

Second picture attempts to show that there was indeed a fourth team on the table. The building corner on the left is the same building where my closest treasure was. Jack had cast Plague of Insects on the necromancer's apprentice, because I was a little worried about his maxed out Bone Dart. Necromancer himself was shooting death cultists there at the fallen cart.

So, a huge brawl starts to form up between me and necromancer. That one fight must have been the biggest I've seen yet, and it was thanks to all models refusing to die even when they were injured. Now, let's see... There were my rangifer, war hound, bard, apothecary and barbarian from my side, and opponent got a knight, infantryman, zombie and something else there when the fight was at it's biggest.

Sigilists and Summoners were mostly fighting between themselves with Summoners slowly gaining the upper hand. Of course I don't know the difficulty levels Sigilist wizard needed to pass for a successful cast, but still at one point it wasn't even comical any more how many spells completely failed for them.

Necromancer warband reached the cart. I think there were only three or two cultists remaining there at that moment. Ghouls showed up and caused a slight distraction. I wanted to bait the ghouls with my sharpshooter who was on the building, but during later turns I realised that once the ghouls were standing on the bottom floor, the marksman was no longer in their line of sight! One ghouls sprang to my treasure hunter, who was still carrying a treasure. It didn't get to combat, but it did get within 1" of the treasure hunter, so it would force combat if he moved.

Another one made it into contact with Adon the Apprentice with double move. Adon had tried to blast them with Elemental Ball earlier, drawing Line of Sight from a window.

I had to send Jack to deal with the ghoul who was going to harass my precious treasure. My forces finally won the fight between me and the necromancers, but it had stalled me from coming to the party in the middle. Unless...

A streak of really bad luck had devastated Sigilist warband, and the final nail on the coffin was a cheap shot by Summoner warband that killed uninjured soldier who was carrying a treasure for the Sigilists. Sigilists were unable to get it back, and Summoners were carrying astonishing number of five treasure tokens. Necromancers were falling back. There weren't that many of them even alive any more.

There was only one way I could make a meaningful move within the game that would have any impact on the big picture.

Jack used his potion of teleportation and hopped to the other side of the table. He didn't get killed, so right next he casts Possess on himself. That's +8 Fight wizard right there. Jack had only around nine hit points left or so. Well, Jack surely was pretty intimidating there, but I didn't want to risk it. I strongly implied that my level of aggression would drop dramatically, if one treasure token would be left on the ground by the retreating summoners.

A deal was struck, but I still tried to cast Plague of Insects around. Perfect disarmament spell, that doesn't damage any models. Well, it's a shame that Jack repeatedly failed the spell and was taking a little bit of damage from the miscasts.

But in the end my rangifer (who had been healed by apothecary) ran to get the treasure token. Sigilists continued to harass my retreat throughout what was left of the endgame, but no additional damage was done to any side.

From the three treasures I found yet one more Sword of Undead Slaying (yay...) a Ring of Power (1) and nothing but gold. I didn't take any extra experience from my Reveal Secrets treasure, as I wanted to balance it out somehow that it was even easier grab than it normally would be. Spells and treasures gave Jack two levels this time.

Sigilists had been so unfortunate that they didn't get even one treasure token. But I'm not too surprised that it eventually happened (I think this was first game I've witnessed zero treasures for anyone?) in this scenario - the amount of treasure tokens was very limited, and most of them were tied to one location. All it required was a cheap shot and another failed melee at another treasure token early in the game.

I had almost started to think that the section of our house rules that limited post-game sequence a little bit was nearly redundant, but this game showed at least that it's good to have some sort of safety net if D20 decides to really screw somebody over.


Roster details:

Jack Saturn is level 20 with 2065 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3, Will by +1*, and health by +2.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +1, Leap by +1, Possess by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +2.
He has learned Plague of Insect, which has been improved by +1.*
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), 2x Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier)
Book of Rangifer
Ring of Power (1)
Eyes of Amoto
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Willpower, Furious Quill
Scroll of Planar Tear.

Total gold that has been collected is 1880, unspent gold is 410.

Warband roster is worth 1360 gold (level 20 apprentice is 400) and includes:
Barbarian (with the two handed weapon from vault)
Marksman
Crossbowman
Thug
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
War Hound
Rangifer

Frostgrave campaign game six

(Updated with pictures!)

Today I played a Frostgrave campaign game. We were missing one player, so we didn't continue Thaw of the Lich Lord.

So, instead we played a three player game with the scenario Tower of Silence.

(It's possible I'll get some pictures a little later that will illustrate the board better.) Okay, I add a couple of pictures retroactively. First picture is again showing the treasure locations.

Necromancer team was directly opposite of my deployment, and the sigilists were on my right. In a way sigilists had to fight a war on two fronts.

My troops and sigilists were having a big fight over a treasure token #2 that was inside of the Tower, but on ground level beneath a stairway. My treasure hunter went to pick it, but then enemy treasure hunter came to contest. Magic doesn't work inside the tower, so picking treasure up and casting Leap on the soldier was out of question. I had tried to screen some key areas with Fog to protect my models from shooting.

My wizard had cast Possess on a war hound that tried to bite some flankers. My apprentice used Eye of Amoto to cast Fleet Feet through Jack Saturn on barbarian. Adon rolls "1", but the spell is empowered to succeed. Adon the Apprentice had one hit point remaining after that. Well, at least there were quite a few fog walls blocking Line of Sight to the apprentice...

Then a sigilist war hound tried to bite the treasure hunter who had picked up treasure. War hound came so close that barbarian could have easily enter combat even without the Fleet Feet spell... oh well.

Another barbarian vs war hound combat happened, and to no-ones surprise war hound won and dealt seven points of damage to barbarian.

Next turn things were escalating. Sigilist wizard personally enter the general area of that fight. He has Invisibility cast upon him, though. Jack replies by walking next to him and drinking Potion of Invulnerability. The picture is remarkably confusing. I thought I'd include a picture from the Necromancer side too which shows how uncontested they were able to ascend the tower. The crude black arrow tries to align the perspective.

Adon drank healing potion to make up for his last casting.

It was probably my bard who killed the war hound engaging barbarian - but not before barbarian fell to four hit points. It's also possible that the war hound and barbarian rolled equal scores, which killed the hound and injured barbarian. However it happened, the invisible sigilist wizard forced combat with barbarian, who was trying to go and help treasure hunter in fight. Wizard beat the barbarian easily. Nasty, but now the wizard was in plain sight. Next initiative roll would matter a lot.

I got to act before the sigilists, so Jack, bard and marksman ganged up on the enemy wizard. First to move was bard, and the sigilist forced combat with her. And bard won by a large margin.

Next Jack and marksman enter the combat. Marksman attacks first, and is beaten to three hit points remaining. I get worried that I'd lose the bard, so Jack attacks next. Bam. Jack is down to four hit points remaining.

Well, there's still the bard left. The heroic bard. Bam. Bard is down to four hit boxes remaining, though she and the sigilist roll a tie, so both deal damage. This puts the wizard out of action. What a fight, and what a bard.

Necromancer warband shoots down my treasure hunter who tried to escape with a treasure on the far left. They also shoot a thug that had been screening Adon, so there was no other option than to pick the treasure with apprentice. I was afraid of their ranged weaponry, so I wanted to cast fog to hide Adon. Obviously roll fails, and he goes hiding behind some stairs.

A random sigilist thug came to harass the wounded gathering of wizard slayers. I wasn't all that afraid. I thought he was going after treasure hunter, who was carrying a treasure token. Nope. He was after Jack! He lobbed a wraith bottle right next to Jack, and a spectre appeared. I tried to distract the spectre by making it force combat with a war hound, but the spectre one-shot the puppy, and was after Jack again. Apothecary had made Jack drink the healing potion, but nine hit points isn't all that much against an enemy that deals double damage.

Jack was carrying Sword of Undead Slaying, so I had pretty decent chance of surviving the attack. And after I roll 15, I'm sitting safely at attack score of 23. However, the spectre rolls 20. I was so relieved when I learned that spectre had Fight score of only +2... Well, then everyone dead or fleeing, Jack casts Possess upon himself and starts chasing the Necromancers. You know, to keep in character.

Soon after Jack cast the smoke screen for Adon to go and secure the treasure. Jack failed to catch the necromancers and even cast Elemental Ball on a nice tight group of four enemy soldiers. Bummer. So instead Jack ascended the Tower of Silence to get a little extra experience from scenario.

Necromancers won this scenario big time, as they got the mega treasure from the tower, as well as one regular. I got two treasures and sigilists one. Those were all treasure tokens available in this particular scenario.

Jack got two levels. Treasure rolls were a little underwhelming, as I got only 160 gold and a magical bow with +2 to damage. At least I didn't lose any warband members - but still, if I count together the used potions by their sell price, I didn't break even in this game. Unless I would sell the bow that nobody is able to use at the moment.

Well, I didn't do that. I kicked one war hound out of the roster and replaced it with Rangifer. I got a very sweet rangifer model coming up...

Jack raised Fight by +1 and consumed the grimoire of Plague of Insects.

Story section that relates to events in this game can be found just above, or here.


So here's the more detailed roster I try to keep updated as accurately as possible:

Jack Saturn is level 18 with 1835 experience.
He has levelled fight by +3 and health by +2.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +1, Leap by +1, Possess by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +2.
He has learned Plague of Insect
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier), Sword of Undead Slaying, Magical bow (+2 damage modifier)
Book of Rangifer
Eyes of Amoto
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Willpower, Furious Quill
Scroll of Planar Tear.
Teleport

Total gold that has been collected is 1630, unspent gold is 160.

Warband roster is worth 1340 gold (level 18 apprentice is 380) and includes:
Barbarian (with the two handed weapon from vault)
Marksman
Crossbowman
Thug
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
War Hound
Rangifer

Frostgrave campaign game five

Last Monday I played a fifth campaign game of Frostgrave.

It was the second scenario from campaign book Thaw of the Lich Lord.

Second scenario, where there is a frozen river flowing through two of the board edges, was problematic to modify to a multi-player scenario so we just played it as 1v1 game. My opponent was the necromancer team.

A non-player controlled wizard would appear from the shipwreck on the creature phase of turn three.

There were only two treasure tokens per player. The NPC wizard would be carrying a special treasure that's worth two rolls on the Thaw of the Lich Lord treasure table.

The four regular treasure tokens were placed in a loose square, so it looked pretty much 2-2 situation. At least treasures #3 and #4 were pretty much out of my reach. Treasure #1 was a slight race. Struggle would have been real if my Treasure Hunter, who had had Fleet Feet cast upon him, would have been taken out of game by stray arrows shot by enemy archers. Luckily this was not the case - he was taken down to five hit points instead. But, as it happened, the archer did not kill or injure him and I won the initiative on round three. Treasure Hunter had picked up the treasure on soldier phase of round two. A costly Leap was cast upon the Treasure Hunter, and the treasure was all but secured.

I returned the favour around treasure #4 when my marksman was able to shoot some kind of enemy warrior down to injured status while he was carrying the treasure - but killing shot never came.

Honourable mention goes to the slippery ice itself that caused enough damage to actually kill a model, had they been inflicted only one soldier.

But now the challenge was pretty much all about the NPC wizard, who emerged from the left side of the shipwreck. A well timed accidental finger is pointing pretty much directly to the NPC wizard. That guy put up a pretty good fight, surviving multiple crossbow bolts and rounds of melee combat. Who knows... perhaps he could have escaped the scene with Lich Lord's precious treasure if the most notorious killer of all engaged him. I'm not talking about the Possessed barbarian who was scaring off the enemy knight. I'm talking about the war hound.

Once the enemy infantryman was dead, opponent thought it to be of his best interest to retreat. He only had his wizard there and a knight with only one hit point plus some ranged weaponry in the distance. I had quite a few models piling in, but I'd like to think it was the war hound who scared the enemy necromancer. Since both of us had been casting Leap for quite many times, the special treasure token was last token on board. Crossbowman picked it up and he Leaped away from the closest table edge, ending in favour of Cruor et Caedis.

I rolled Book of Rangifer and Eyes of Amoto from the Lich Lord treasure table, and a little money and potions from regular treasures. Total experience acquired was 305, which translated into three levels. Jack improved his knowledge on Reveal Secret, Fleet feet and Imp spells.

I wanted to take my first step towards achieving Ascendence, so I sold one of the more interesting potions I had got: Demon in the Bottle. It was worth one hundred gold coins when sold back to the market, and I didn't want Jack to end up without any pocket money in his coffers.

So. I bought a grimoire of Plague of Insects as well as kennels to the headquarters.



So here's the more detailed roster I try to keep updated as accurately as possible:

Jack Saturn is level 16 with 1615 experience.
He has levelled fight by +2 and health by +2.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +4, Elemental Ball by +1, Leap by +1, Possess by +1, Imp by +1 and Fog by +2.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell, which has been improved by +1.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing and Kennels

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier) and Sword of Undead Slaying
Book of Rangifer
Eyes of Amoto
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Willpower, Furious Quill
Bought Grimoire: Plague of Insects
Scroll of Planar Tear.
Potions of Invulnerability, Teleport and Healing

Total gold that has been collected is 1470, unspent gold is 100.

Warband roster is worth 1230 gold (level 16 apprentice is 360) and includes:
Barbarian (with the two handed weapon from vault)
Marksman
Crossbowman
Thug
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
2x War Hound

Frostgrave campaign game 4

Last Thursday we played a four player game of Frostgrave. Scenario was Total Eclipse from Thaw of the Lich Lord. In the scenario visibility is reduced to just sixteen inches, and only drops from there. Well, technically it starts to rise up again on turn five, but usually game's very much nearing the end by that time.

Pictures are rather poor quality yet again. The first two were so dark I had to lighten them up with a photo editor.

So. Yet again I've placed approximate locations of treasure tokens right into the picture. I can't remember where one token was, but somewhere there on the opposite side of the table between sigilist and summoner.

There were (in my estimation) too many treasure tokens close to the necromancer, so I put most of my aggression in that direction. By far this game saw the most useless imp yet. Jack summoned it and empowered the spell with four health points. Then in the creature phase the imp died right away. In matter of fact the only thing it gave was 1" of additional movement for the warrior who forced combat with it.

I had been planning on taking treasure #0 and #2, plus one from #1, 3 and 4. Treasure number five might also be within realms of possibility.

The treasure #0 disappeared into thin air when a zombie picked it up and necromancer cast Leap on the zombie. Treasure #2 was an easy grab, but after that I didn't know what to do. All three treasures I was considering looked like they'd be hard to get. Random sigilist war hounds and whatnot teased troops that were going to grab #3, and one fast sigilist treasure hunter was already climbing to get #4. Tons of necromancer warriors were there at #2.

So my choices looked like either mass everything I had left to one treasure and get only two fairly certain treasures, or spread my forces all over the place and possibly end up with only one.

But then Jack did what Jack does best.

He went insane.

There at treasure number #1 he blasted two necromancer warriors with an Elemental Ball. This amount of pyrotechnics in the eclipse did not satisfy him - he scored yet another kill the very next turn. Then a thug or something came to punish him in melee, but things ended up Jack bathing in the thug's blood.

Wow.

Things didn't go too badly on the sigilist side either. One real angry dog bit my marksman down to one hit box remaining, but other than that there wasn't too much aggression. I'm not sure how much my vague promise of not coming to interfere with treasure #4 helped my thug to carry treasure #3. Adon had cast Fleet Feet on the thug, though. Lot's of g's and h's there. Thug, though. Uh... now I digress.

The astonishing performance of my wizard gave me the treasure #1, but somehow I didn't manage to get to treasure token #5. I'm not sure why is that. After all, the only warband members that actually were put down by enemy attacks were both of the war hounds. It's possible my spellcasters and various soldiers were in such a bad shape that I didn't want to risk their deaths.

Apothecary carried off #1 and thug #3. Both got off the board before game ended.

Post-game one of the war hounds had to miss next game. I disbanded it and got a bard instead. There's one sweet Eden miniature clown with a music box...

Jack got an amazing amount of 420 experience points. The scenario had a special condition of giving +50xp for every wizard who are on board during turn 5. This gave Jack five levels. I missed sixty point of experience from our set of house rules. That wouldn't have given me an extra level, but considering I also lost 75xp from earlier game, I have now effectively lost one level to house rules. And I don't regret for a second. Missing one level from a course of four games doesn't seem much, but my wizard has pretty much just been lucky - he isn't geared towards spelly destruction.

A story post that relates to happenings in this game is just below or here.



Progress:

Jack Saturn is level 13 with 1310 experience.
He has levelled fight by +2 and health by +2.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +3, Elemental Ball by +1, Leap by +1, Possess by +1 and Fog by +2.
He has learned the Reveal Secret spell.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier) and Sword of Undead Slaying
Grimoire: Poison Dart, Control Construct, Willpower, Furious Quill
Scroll of Planar Tear.
Potions of Invulnerability and Teleport

Total gold that has been collected is 1170, unspent gold is 560.

Warband roster is worth 1190 gold (level 13 apprentice is 330) and includes:
Barbarian (with the two handed weapon from vault)
Marksman
Crossbowman
Thug
2x Treasure Hunter
Apothecary
Bard
War Hound

Frostgrave campaign game 3

Last Thursday I played a campaign game of Frostgrave against a rival Summoner warband.

Scenario was The Complex Temple.

We were playing at my home instead of the usual cellar, so terrain is a bit on the low side at least vertically. Temple also looks highly advanced - perhaps it had become a place of worship because it had been standing in this place long before the frozen city had been built?

Anyway. Scenario is pretty standard scenario, except that treasures are inside pillars that you have to fight to get hold of them. Every treasure is worth additional 20 gold coins.

I've numbered the treasures in most of the pictures for easier orientation.

Treasures one and two looked like they'd fall to my pockets easily. Opponent had only one just as easy treasure, the number six.

Jack possessed the barbarian and Adon the Apprentice cast fog to screen my main body from lethal missile fire from the opposing side. Those rolls were quite something. My own archer and the crossbowman who tried to take good vantage points were single shotted by archers and elemental bolts. Or crossbowman might have taken one hit first to the stomach muscles, but that's beyond the point.

Barbarian wrecked the treasure pillar, as did treasure hunter at pillar number two. Those were fine rolls, but otherwise I seemed to be unable to cause damage to enemy soldiers and to protect myself from enemy attacks. Most of my spells failed also. If it weren't for the empowering, I think I'd have failed way over 50% of my spells.

But that's enough complaining about my luck. Enemy didn't have it too easy, either, from about the middle of the game forwards.

Once enemy wizard had reached pillar #4, the pillar beat him to two hit points remaining. My wizard had already taken so much damage that Ennu the Apothecary made Jack drink the healing potion. Barbarian had picked up the treasure and leaped close to the boards edge, but I didn't want him to move out of the game just yet. I'd rather switch the treasure to the apothecary and get barbarian back in action.

In my mind the game played so that I'd get treasures 1-3 and opponent would get 4-6. As I was relocating my troops from treasure #2 to #3, they started dying one by one. Contesting treasure #3 started to look very difficult.

But as I said, luck started to swing in my favour. I started finally to get in some kills. Most notable one was Jack shooting enemy wizard dead with Elemental Ball. I was a bit too greedy with Adon the Apprentice and empowered a spell that brought him down to three damage boxes. The Elemental Ball cast by him killed something also, but in turn Adon died to missile fire. So enemy had lost his wizard and I had lost my apprentice.

By now I had recovered treasures one and two and opponent treasures four and six. Enemy apprentice was closing in to treasure five, and my lone Treasure Hunter with Fleet Feet cast upon him was faring well enough against three enemy warriors. Well enough in this case means that he didn't die to just a couple of hits - he wanted some more.

I try to bring a thug that I had forgotten completely and the possessed barbarian to treasure in the middle. Enemy apprentice gets scared of them and decides to fall back. A possessed thief enters combat with Jack, but Jack knew this trick all too well and killed the thief with one punch.

My treasure hunter falls and enemy starts to walk off with treasure #3. Barbarian manages to take the treasure from the pillar in the middle, and Jack succeeds to cast Fleet Feet on him.

An enemy archer jumps to the very same tower where my own archer had died. The archer tried to shoot a couple of shots against the barbarian and Jack, but they didn't do much. This game ended with the victory condition of all treasure counters exiting the board.

I take a moment to reflect the results with our set of house rules.

Routing was not used, though both teams were eligible to use it.

My wizard was lucky enough to kill enemy wizard with a spell attack. With main rules this would have yielded him 150 experience points, but now he got only 75. He did beat another enemy warband member in melee, so that was +115 experience for me from kills by wizard. That's one level outright. Normally it'd been +190 experience.

Since my apprentice went out of game by enemy attack, I was left with only two "actions" in between the games. However, I only needed one - to recruit additional warband members.

To me this looks good. House rules are serving their intended purposes.

So.

None of my warband members died, but Adon rolled "close call" and lost Imp scroll I had given him for the battle.

I found 260 or so gold, two grimoires and two potions.

One treasure hunter and the archer rolled close calls also and I decided to disband Archer and get Marksman it his/her place.

Jack got 150 experience from treasures, 115 from kills and only 80 or something from spells. This was enough to get three levels. With main rules that would have been four levels, which would have felt rather unfair.

Detailed roster below. I might exchange one war hound for a thug if I find a proper extra figure, though.

Jack Saturn is level 8 with 890 experience.
He has leveled fight by +2 and health by +1.
Fleet Feet spell has been improved by +3, Elemental Ball by +1 and Fog by +1.

Home base is Inn with Sarcophagus of Healing

Vault has Magical two handed weapon (+1 damage modifier),
Grimoire: Reveal Secret, Poison Dart, Control Construct
Scroll of Planar Tear.
Potions of Invulnerability and Teleport

Total gold that has been collected is 930, unspent gold is 420.

Warband roster is worth 1050 gold (level 8 apprentice is 280) and includes:
Barbarian (with the two handed weapon from vault)
Marksman
Crossbowman
Thug
2x Treasure Hunter (Miss next game)
Apothecary
2x War Hound


Part of the background story that relates to events in this game can be found just below, or here.