Last night I attended a game night and brought along the 6 iconics for In the Shadow of the Horns.
I had 4 players and a scant 2 1/2 hour slot so I had to rush the ending.
They picked Karolina, Varg, Taika and Gerald.
Turn 1:
Approaching the pastures Taika’s instinct kicked in to find out about the Helgeit. Success! I let them know they were banishable in the right circumstances and immune to fire and charm effects.
Varg cast his charm spell on the nearest goblin to distract him. Success! The goblin lied about summoning the goats, it was obviously a lie but let slip they needed to eat at the ruined tower.
Karolina wanted to unseat the goblin stealing the livestock to force distract the one chasing Olrun and the children. Success and Karolina earned a check, Heart of Battle made her thirsty for unnecessary blood!
Turn 2:
Taika, helped by Gerald wanted to sneak the children to safety while the goblin was distracted by his ally’s struggles. Failure, Taika made afraid and Gerald made hungry.
The goblins took the livestock but not the children and escaped.
The party returned to the homestead but found it too had been attacked and raided for the grain.
The party decided to camp.
Karolina used her instinct, she hunted and caught some rabbits.
Varg used his instinct to map the area but also the charmed goblin had mentioned the ruined tower so Valbjorn tried to describe the route. Failure and Varg was made angry due to Valbjorn’s communication skills.
Gerald cooked the rabbits and alleviated his own hungry and thirsty.
Karolina had intended to donate the check to Taika but instead chose to give it to Varg.
Varg recovered from his angry condition.
Linna and the Huskarls showed up and were invited to retaliate upon the goblins.
Back to the adventure phase, Karolina is still fresh and Taika is afraid.
The party see 3 loose helgeits eating a sheep carcass, the two goblins guarding the livestock and the tower itself sheathed in smoke. The other 3 helgeit had recently been ridden out to go elsewhere.
Seeing as the goats were split up and riderless the party decided to attempt to banish them back to Hel using the mounted Huskarls as a barrier to physical retaliation.
Turn 1: Banish conflict lead by Varg. Goats each had 2hp, Varg and Taika had 2hp, Gerald and Karolina had 1hp
Manoeuvre, Manoeuvre, both sides made gains.
Attack, Attack, one goat was taken out along with Varg.
Attack, Feint, the goats freely took out Gerald and Taika.
Only Karolina left…
Defend, Attack. Karolina succeeded using nature, we discussed whether demanding made this within nature and decided it was, and brought back Gerald and Varg to 1hp each.
Attack, Manoeuvre, Varg took out another goat. Gerald had started using his salt-wise to aid every test.
Defend, Attack, Gerald used beginners luck this time and brought back Taika to 1hp.
Attack, Defend. Taika took out the last goat. Team was at 4/6 so the compromise was that the goats shriveled down to python sized fiery worms and wriggled off into the night.
We called the session there as a one shot. The goblins were no match for the Huskarls and the party, they divided up the treasure and got a bag of silver each and Valbjorn got his supplies back.
But they never found out the conspiracy or the goat rider badges, the other 3 goat riders abandoned the ruined tower and who knows what became of the fire worms.
The party overcame some fantastic odds on the dice, my rolls were so poor! They came back from the brink of defeat with Karolina who was totally underestimated for that conflict type. Karolina remained fresh and instincts and spells made up a majority of the rolls. Even if they hadn’t camped at the steading they would have only done 3 turns.
It was a little tricky to get their heads around the fact they they didn’t need to be “magical” to banish stuff. I described what my family actually does in real life when we feel like things are “off” in our house, we burn some herbs and jingle bells, say words into each of the rooms. Was I magical for doing it? Nope I’m not doing anything magic, at least don’t feel like I am. Does it make the house feel right again? In my experience it really does. So I said to colour all the descriptions with their imaginations of me going through my house doing stuff like that. That’s where they got the ideas for the salt and the demanding nature.