We kicked off a First Edi­tion game Sat­ur­day and learned a) com­bat goes a lot faster in First Edi­tion than in Fourth Edi­tion and b) com­bat is a lot more lethal for mon­sters and char­ac­ters alike at low lev­els (I know this well, but that’s because I learned under ghetto rules 1e/2e games dur­ing lunch in mid­dle school. I still remem­ber my old DM’s glee when­ever we’d do some­thing stu­pid and die!)

The Story So Far

Our anti-heroes (Grom and Gar­shak, two half-orc fight­ers; Roy II, a halfling assas­sin; Mil­ton, a half-elven illu­sion­ist, and a human magic user now named Tim the Younger–he was for­merly named Beatzza the Hut until the DM threat­ened the player…) are agents of the Black Swan mer­ce­nary com­pany. They are serv­ing The­rion the Thau­matur­gist as scouts and quar­ter­ing party to a trav­el­ing adven­ture car­a­van. Hamza’s Heretics, a band of mer­ce­nar­ies from the far dis­tant deserts, pro­vide secu­rity for the car­a­van as it travels.

The road is prov­ing haz­ardous; Mil­ton was mauled to the brink of death by a mother moun­tain lion defend­ing her two cubs. A week later, the party was almost wiped out by a band of gnomes fly­ing the sigil of Clan Iron Badger.

After hos­til­i­ties broke out, Tim cast ven­tril­o­quism on the gnomish leader and gave a false order to halt. Mil­ton dis­rupted the for­ma­tion with a phan­tas­mal force whirl­wind. The half-orcs and the assas­sin felled five of the gnomes, includ­ing their leader, before the gnomes’ archers laid waste to the party. Tim set a brush fire to cover their retreat, then he and Gar­shak dragged their wounded com­rades to safety. The gnomes did the same, and are plot­ting their retribution.

Our party finds itself blood­ied, bewil­dered and pre­sum­ably at war with the whole of Clan Iron Bad­ger. Their wounded are are recov­er­ing in the rel­a­tive safety of the car­a­van, and The­rion the Thau­matur­gist con­tem­plates what to do with his hap­less scouts…

Clan Iron Bad­ger attacks!