The Wilds - An Ending, of Sorts

So, last week saw the end of my Wilds play by email Labyrinth Lord campaign. The party was completely wiped out in the depths of Blackpool Maze. This is just a final note to put a bow on the package, so to speak.

The entire party roster, including characters long gone:

• Grendor - 4th Fighter (half-elf) - Last party member standing, slain by a serpent horror.
• Strom - 4th Fighter (dwarf) - Diced by a serpent horror.
• Mordikarr - 4th Beastmaster - Diced by a serpent horror.
• Raúguey - 4th Fighter - Throat ripped out while held (by a serpent horror).
• Rawon - 4th Wood Elf - Diced by a serpent horror.
• Ingvild - 4th Thief - Feared, then poked, stabbed and shot to death by kobolds.
• Ohwatoo - 4th Wizard - Cut down while trying to get past serpent horrors.
• Dagmarten - 4th Cleric - Diced by a serpent horror.
• Durego - 4th Cleric - Diced by a serpent horror.
• Saurabh - 2nd Cleric (Hasuden) - Dragged off by giant lizards.
• Maro Revane - 3rd High Elf: Diced by a serpentine horror.
• Gorvil - 1st Fighter: Life sucked away by the unknown.
• Jonquil - 1st Fighter: Life sucked away by the unknown.
• Tesso - 1st Fighter: Life sucked away by the unknown.
• Jedit the lynx kit: Seared and drained by wisp-things.
• Lockwood "Locky" Leatherfoot - 3rd Halfling: Crushed by a zombie slug.
• Nissa Revane - 2nd High Elf: Eaten by a giant bug.
• Grit Seventoes - 2nd Dwarf: Eaten by a giant bug. And spit out.
• Urúvion - 2nd Wood Elf: A victim of his own curiosity, and a fire trap.

As you can tell, the encounter with the serpent horrors did not go well. The party spent quite a bit of time (in rounds) being indecisive and eventually ended up fighting a two-fronted battle, which pretty much lead to their downfall. Leaving the door to the reptile house (the room upstairs known to be home to many giant lizards) open really didn't help either.

The party is survived by their three guards, who have plenty of provisions (now), but can't use the teleportation spires to get back to civilization. Given the hostile nature of the area, I suspect they're doomed as well.

This game ran for just over three years of real time and covered about 10 months of in-game time. I wrote 275 turns for the game, which pretty much went out twice a week.

A few facts about the loose ends left dangling...

The Necromancer was a bugbear, and he was one of the mid-tier leaders of the various groups in Blackpool Maze. He had some abilities to create undead, and he used the infamous summoning circle to put together some of the bigger horrors (slug things, Locky-bear). It was less a summoning circle and more a necromantic body mixer. His ultimate goal was to raise Ishkata's dead corpse (Ishkata is a legendary dragon mentioned in some writings found by the party) and use it to consolidate the various gnoll, bugbear, kobold and other tribes near the Maze under his banner.

Ishkata was finally put down by the Old People and their allies the Natra and Rocash, shortly after the Black War. It wasn't really dead though. They simply banished it's spirit to the Unknown Ways, a sort of phantom zone alternate reality. A lot of the magic relics involved in that are deeper in the Maze. Had the Necromancer succeeded in restoring Ishkata, it's likely he would have been in for a BIG surprise.

The spires were built by aliens. They go... everywhere. Like the one place the party peeked into, the one with the endless red plains. That was another planet. Basically, spheres control planet/plane, cubes area within the sphere, pyramids, final destination. The aliens have been back since the party started using the spires, they missed each other by less than a day more than once. They aren't hostile, but they have a very different mindset. They wouldn't think twice about dissecting one of the party to see how humans work. :)

As for Stev and the Spiders, he really was afraid. Stev was pretty dumb (and childlike). While he could have killed quite a few of the drones, workers and warriors, the queen can just keep churning out eggs. The party didn't see the queen. Stev was pretty harmless if you treated him well, but if he got mad, well, it would be bad. I think he has a 25+ strength. There was some good stuff buried in the depths of the complex there.

Stev's complex is actually connected to the Maze by another teleportation system that runs through the entire complex. It's what the Necromancer used to get around.

Oh, and the coffins down the crevice? They had a bunch of treasure, but it was almost all monetary. A good haul, but I don't think there was anything there that would have really turned the tide.

The magma things down the crevice were pretty much unrelated to anything else in the area, a leftover from the very old days. BPM is sitting on top of a warped space that draws in weird pieces of other dimensions, which is why it's so chaotic. They really weren't a threat unless they touched someone. Then they all gather and drag the victim into the fire pit for... conversion.

The secret tunnel in the tree room went down to natural caves and eventually the lake at the bottom of the stairs on the trog level. It's one of the routes the trogs used to go up/down.

The elevator room was just that. It went down to two different levels, the minotaur level the party saw and a deeper area. Unfortunately, it was in bad shape, so there was a significant chance it would fail if it went all the way to the lower level.

And so, that's a wrap, the final page in a long campaign.

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