NIGHTWICK ABBEY: The Purple Eater of People Session 73 WAR!

Previously...Level 4!

Blossom (Rogue 5)
Mayfly (Magician 4)
Mechtilde (Fighter 4)
Yevegniy the Coward (Cleric 4)
Verinka (Changeling 3)
Cherwe (Cleric 3)
Liminal Space (Changeling 3)
Krupe (Cleric 1)
Bluegum Lemony Spice (Changeling 1)

AT THE MEDUSA'S HEAD...

Despite last week's discovery of yet another level of the dread Abbey's gullet, the party turns its attention to more earthly matters. South of Nightwick, bandits and pagan forces have combined to harry and pillage the towns along the southern road to Blackleg. Lord Ekard recently suffered defeat there and is licking his wounds. Additionally, the forces of Castle Blackleg emerged to hold the line and throw out Lord Ekard's weak ally.

Hearing about all this, the party previously traveled north back to Lychgate to secure mercenary forces in order to ride south and once again save the Dark Country from lawlessness... or at least lawlessness not originating from the party's own actions. Lawlessness such as opening and reading a lord's sealed letter outlining said bandit problem.

...CRAWL ACROSS THE DARK COUNTRY...

DAY ONE: The party embeds with the Corby Calvary (Black Sheild) in Nightwick Village (1507; the titular Nightwick Abbey is 1607) and ride south to meet with the forces of Netta of Blackleg in 1113 lead by her sister Nethe

Mayfly is almost thrown from his horse, Crow. An ill-omen.

DAY TWO: The party continues to make good time traveling south.

At midday the sortie comes across a strange sight on the road: a Bogdani man is being surrounded and violently questioned by a group of elves (PC NOTE: Think as in North Pole not Tolkien). Liminal steps forward to interpret as neither group understands the other.

Elves: "He is a man in violation of our home! He deserves to be flogged!!"

Bogdani: "I don't understand what they want?!"

Liminal to the man: "Don't worry, you'll be safe as long as you cough up a lot of money"

Bogdani: "I...I don't have any money, but I do know about the trap being laid for Blackleg!"

Liminal to the elves: "Oh we can take it from here. This man will be flogged. Repeatedly."

The party learns that the forces of the bandit Yim Yimsely have laid a trap for Nethe of Blackleg in the Fog-Bound Forest in the form of a false camp. It is decided to dispatch our thief and changelings to recon the supposed bandit camp in 1409 and send Mectild and Cherwe on a forced ride south to warn Nethe's forces. Mayfly is left with the Corbies.

As the sun dips low, Mectilde and Cherwe ride into the Blackleg camp and warn them of the trap. Blackleg agrees to hold until the Corbies arrive. Nethe, out of frustration, proceeds to wail on a tree with her two-handed sword.

Nethe of Blackleg
(who will be fixed by Mechtilde)

Meanwhile, the changeling sortie arrives to find at least one of the bandit camp is only lightly guarded. They quickly sleep the guards and ransack the place recovering 200GP, 800SP, a silver rod, a crown, and 3 amaythest gems. And then slit the guards' throats in their spell-induced sleep as non-evil people do and make off into the night to meet up further south.

A night envelopes the land, Mayfly makes walks the parameter of the Corbie. He comes upon shoe prints forming on the frosted ground. Invisible intruders! Mayfly quietly follows the foot prints (DEX 16) and when they stop- he immediately casts web snaring the would-be saboteur. Mayfly raises the alarm and the camp only loses a few tents to fire. Unfortunately due to some miss handling by the guards the invisible intruder slips away.

DAY THREE- A PLAN: All allied forces gather together and form a war council. As it currently stands, the Corbies Calvary, the Blackleg Calvary, and the PCs form "the good guys", while Yim's Company, Yimsely's Company, The Pagan Liberation Front and a Bogdani Band form "the bad guys". Not exciting odds.

However, scouts return word that a Bogdani Band has been spotted moving south from Frogguts. Given that the party did clear the tomb of Father Winter and we might be able to fork over the crown of Bogdani make-- maybe these forces will flip? 

Liminal rides forth to meet the Bogdani Band and the minute the crown is offered up a deal is struck. 

[PC NOTE: Wait...too easy. Maybe we should have investigated that crown a little more. But that is a problem for future us. ]

Apparently, the "Black" Bogdani are those who resisted the rule of the Relmish Kings (aka Lychgate). The "Red" Bogdani are those who have more integrated in Relmish society in the Dark Country.

So basically the party has just handed over a uniting symbol for the "Black" Bogdani potentially against Lychgate who the party fight's for so they will flip sides and fight with us against Yim Yimsley's Company who are against Lychgate.

[PC NOTE: YOLOjimbo]

The plan is revised. The party will hide itself in the Black Bogdani Company (star on black field) which take a right flank position as normal in Yim's (green man) trap. Corbies (solid black field) will take the left flank and Nethe (yellow diamond, triskelion) will "fall" into the trap. However, as the battle commences, the Black Bogdani will attack Yimsley's Company (red snake) and press into the Liberation Front's Flank (red deer) where all "good guy" forces will converge.

DAY FOUR- BATTLE!: Nethe of Blackleg is more than willing to walk into the heart of battle and wet her sword on the sap of humans, pagans, and whatever else can "bleeds" or at least be cloven in two. 

[PC NOTE: Alright, as noted, this time Miranda decided to try out The War Machine which is a set of rules I think found in later additions of BECMI, but you, dear reader, might most easily find on pages of the Rules Cyclopedia pg 117. 

Basically, each force shown above has a rating from 00-126 based on troop class, which is modified by its composition in terms of missiles, magic items/weapons, spells, and speed. There can also be modifications based on the leader's WIS, INT, CHA or morale, tactics and/or even PC actions before battle. 

Once those scores are determined, each side rolls a d100 and adds it to their base score for a final combat result. The difference between that score determines the scale of casualties, fatigue, and location for the winners and losers

From the above picture, there were three battles that were fought so three rolls of a d100-- and that was it!]

With the Black Bogdani converted and the bolstering from the party, Yimsley's Company (red snake) was met with 2:1 odds, and despite some trouble (Rolled a 32 on the d100) the right flank collapsed allowing us to push in on the Pagan Liberation Front (red deer).

The Corbies easily defeated the far less battle-hardened Yim's Company. And Nethe, full of bloodlust, routed the Pagan Liberation Front, gave chase across the river, and smashed them on the other side. What became of the "witch" who was leading this rebellion?

Yes that is the Abbey north in 1607

...AGAIN THE PARTY IS A POLITICALLY STABILIZING FORCE IN THE REGION-MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

THE WAR MACHINE (tWM) IMPRESSIONS

I like it. I think for the scale of what our group wants to do and the level at which there is interest in large battles it is a good middle ground. tWM basically has you calculate a combat check. And while the math is a little extensive it's nothing that also could not be rolled into an Excel sheet for quicker automation. But even without that, a little back-and-forth in a Discord chat will establish the biggest parameters for a DM to have all the math ready.

But maybe most importantly, it was easy to allow the party to perform some hijinks or make some critical decisions that factored into the battle. Which is most likely how a majority of players would prefer it. We were still able to use the resources of our ~3-5th level characters while not having to drop down into Chainmail scale.

Does this mean that tWM is better than Chainmail? No. It is just a different tool. If our group consisted of more war game nerds then I would have no problem maybe doing an off-cycle Chainmail battle to determine outcomes. But that is not the case and instead, we have a system that allows the resolution of regional-level battles in an evening. And allows the players to see the effects of their choices on the world.

That last bit is key to most RPGs: player actions result in (majority) observable change. This is what keeps players coming back.