STAR-CROSSED BLADES OF THE GREEN PEONY SESSION IX

This is the Ninth session of our Star-Crossed Blades of the Green Peony campaign for Wandering Heroes of Ogre Gate (session I can be found HERE, session II can be found HERE, session III can be found HERE, session IV can be found HERE, Session V can be found HERE, session VI can be found HERE, Session VII can be found HERE, Session VIII can be found HERE). It is set in Zhang Chang prefecture (which I hope to release a blog entry for). In this campaign, every player rolled randomly to determine who their family are, how many siblings they have and whether individual family members are still alive. The players also gave very rough sketches of their background (no more than a few sentences) and I secretly added a "20-year" backstory to each one. I have implemented a special rule in this campaign that every encounter has a 3 in 10 chance of being connected to their secret backstory in some way. Note in this session I was play testing a specific scenario and the players were made aware prior to play.

CHARACTERS

QI YUN: A roaming martial expert who has secretly learned his martial arts from two different masters (and the masters have no knowledge of one another). 

XING GE: A traveling pipa player and the son of Lu Guiying the Iron Flower. His father died when he was five, and his mother married Gongsun Yuan, the chief of Black Parrot Society. Gongsun Yuan despises Xing Ge. 

TU JIN SHI (THUNDER LEGS): A wandering fighter seeking to be the strongest and most upright hero in the region. His father, Tu Haitao sent his mother away when he was young, after being consumed by grief over the passing of Jin Shi's brother, Tian. Shortly after his father died consuming a lethal concoction in a misguided effort to become immortal. 

LU LI (THE UNFILIAL ARCHER): A traveling physician who comes from a family of successful fishermen. 

THE BLOOD OF THE DEMON MOON 

The Party decided to track down Thundering Scorpion to get to the bottom of the matter by venturing into the Yiaoguai Forest in search of bandits. They eventually came upon the aftermath of a robbery and followed tracks, where they found a man with a dragon long pole sitting atop a large stone*. 

"I am Tu Jin Shi, who are you?"

The man perked up and spoke "I am Long Pole Huo, and you are disturbing my camp."

"We happened upon a robbery down the way," Said Tu Jin Shi, "And I wanted to get to the bottom of the mater. Are you a bandit?"

"Some mistake me for such," Said Long Pole Huo."And you are still in my territory, leave or face my long pole!"

Tu Jin Shi asked to spar, and Strange Dragon Long Pole Huo met him with ferocity and lethal intent. They traded blows, then Strange Dragon Long Pole send a ripple through the air with his spear tip, and the energy split Tu Jin Shi in two. 

Instead of one Tu Jin Shi, there were two. And the two halves were completely unharmed, each a perfect copy of the other. 

Strange Dragon Long Pole chuckled and planted his long pole in the ground. "Now be gone before I get angry!"

The two halves of Tu Jin Shi felt an instant enmity towards one another, and one half, launched into the air to deliver a Kick of the Chaos Star, hitting both his split self and Strange Dragon Long Pole Huo. 

As the fight unfolded, Lu Li made a point of observing, trying to identify the technique Strange Dragon Long Pole Huo had used. However he could not. It was an utterly baffling spear technique to his eyes. 

In moments, Tu Jin Shi had pulverized his other self and Strange Dragon Long Pole Huo. He left the latter alive, but defeating his other half caused him to rejoin with himself. 

They dragged Strange Dragon Long Pole Huo to the local magistrate in Xi An. On the way they question him about Thundering Scorpion, and he said he didn't know the man, but knew his brother, a mad beggar named Chu Leng. They learned the Chu Leng was a wanderer who could be found in the forests and along the rivers of the region. 

They got luxurious rooms at the Orchid Bridge Inn, an ornate tower that is perched over the canal and only accessible by boat. They set out again to the forest, but cautiously as they were in the early days of the Demon Moon. As they traveled the road in the Yaoguai Forest, they heard an eerie song, sung by creatures in the shadows. They became lethargic and fatigued, and passed out. 

Eight Hours later they awakened, and it was dark out. Each one of them had a narrow wound near a vein, and had been drained of blood**. Their possessions, everything except their clothing, were gone. 

Lu Li healed tended to everyone's injuries but could only do so much. Still weak and near death, Xing Ge found tracks that lead deep into a wide dell, and lounging amid the party's belongings, were small creatures with black claws and sharp tusks: Yaksha Demons. It seemed they had recently feasted and the players could see more treasures gathered nearby. As the Yaksha Demons were sleeping, they launched a surprise assault, with Qi Yun leaping to retrieve Lu Li's bow, and Tu Jin Shi launching a barrage of kicks that left the thieves in a bloody pulp. 

They picked up their property and sifted through the other treasures finding spears, swords, meteor hammers, twelve ounces of gecko cinnabar, a brick of Menglao's Black Tea, fine quality robes and dresses worth thousands of spades, a box of seven golden taels, and two bolts of silk. They left the clothing and silk but took everything else. In addition they found The Manual of the Golden King, which contained the Majesty of the Lion technique. 

As they left the dell and returned to the road, they saw a man with a group of nine spearmen standing there. He was familiar. Tu Jin Shi recognized him as the Wan Di, the man from Huo Long Cavern sect, whose disciples they had bested (see HERE). 

"Impressive!" He said. "You dealt with those creatures skillfully."

Tu Jin Shi thanked him and once niceties were out of the way, Wan Di got to the point: "I want to have a rematch. I think my men," He pointed to the nine spearmen behind him "can contend with your Thunder Legs."

Tu Jin Shi agreed but said they needed to recover first. Wan Di offered to let them recover at his camp, where they were fed fine foods and given comfortable tents. 

They asked more about the Black Parrot Society and Wan Di told them they were at war with the sect, because the chief Gongsun Yuan, coveted one of their great treasures.

"He is a vile and greedy man," said Wan Di. "But I can tell you the truth, my real name is Pei Qi, and I am the son of Lady Yi Huang The Winter Phoenix." 

On the fourth day of the Demon Moon, when the party was recovered, they had a friendly rematch. Qi Yun launched a tree bounding stride, injuring several of the nine spearmen, Lu Li rained arrows on them, then Tu Jin Shi launched his infamous Kick of the Chaos Star technique. However the spearmen grouped into a formation and countered his attack. 

Satisfied he had demonstrated that he cracked Tu Jin Shi's technique, Pei Qi/Wan Di bowed and the fight ended. He expressed interest in hearing about their meeting with the Black Parrot Society and offered his hospitality any time in the future. 

Before they left the party asked about his mother, and learned she was friends with Prefect Diao Yue, a detail that interested Qi Yun. They also asked about Thundering Scorpion, and if he knew why some people said he was wicked, and others said it was White Scorpion simply ruining his reputation. 

"Thundering Scorpion and White Scorpion are one and the same. It is sad really. He was once a bandit, a ruthless bandit. And one day he slaughtered a caravan, only to discover one of his victims was his own father. This drove him mad. Filled with remorse, he turned a new leaf and became a righteous hero, but could not confront his own guilt. He attributed his crimes to a man named White Scorpion and has been seeking to bring him to justice ever since (blocking all memory of what he had done from his mind)."

After hearing this information they departed, and Pei Qi gave them a butterfly sword with his name etched into it. 

"Show this anytime you deal with Huo Long cavern Sect. They will know you are my friends when you see it." 

Tu Jin Shi graciously accepted and said he was glad to call Pei Qi a friend. 

This is where the session ended. 

*This is an example of an inverted encounter roll. Because they were looking for a specific bandit I made a d10 table on the fly with all the bandits in the area, weighted in favor of finding Thundering Scorpion because of their efforts. These are the d10 results I wrote down: 1-Thunderbolt Gang; 2-Golden Centipede Bandits; 3-Shu Bao the Laughing Thrush; 4-The Lightning Sage; 5-Strange Dragon Long Pole Huo; 6-10-Thundering Scorpion 

**They had been drained by Yaksha demons, and left with only 1 Wound each

WHAT'S REAL IN STRANGE TALES OF NEW ENGLAND

Strange Tales of New England features an abundance of locations and foes, many based on genuine New England Lore. But mixed in with that is my own lore that I created. My goal was to thread it seamlessly so people could not tell the real from the fabricated. I am not sure how well this succeeded in the eyes of others, but I am inclined to think I pulled it off because I often have trouble distinguishing my own lore from actual legends when I go through the book. So today I am going through some entries in the book showing which ones are real and which are made up. I can only go over a few entries as the book is filled with lore and to go over every single one would mean an enormous blog entry. 

First up is Old Man Blood of the Blood Forest of Lancaster: 

This one is real, and there are urban legends surrounding Arthur Blood murdering campers. However there are also legends and history involving bloody raids during King Philips war that the book doesn't cover. King Philip's War is mentioned numerous times in the history section of the rulebook and in a few other places. It was tempting to make that a central part of the setting, but I didn't want everything in the game to come down to that one conflict (GMs who want more lore though should definitely consider looking into at as background, because it was one of the most brutal and deadly wars between natives and settlers). 

Another interesting one is the Beast of Greene, a creature who haunts near the
lakes in Maine. This is one I made up, but by coincidence there is a Beast of Greene, which refers to an incident in 2006 where the carcass of an animal, later believed to be a dog, was found in a neighboring town. Here is the entry on the Beast of Greene:

Next up is The Bridgewater Triangle and its dark inhabitant John Selee. This is more a blending of two legends. The Bridgewater Triangle is famous, there are documentaries and books about it. And John Selee is supposedly a real person, a wizard who used satanic imps to build a saw mill in Easton during the 18th century. There is even a plaque to the commemorate the event. Easton is inside the Birdgewater Triangle and given the exorcist themes, I thought he would serve as a suitable heart for the location (especially since there are also urban legends of satanic murders occurring there to this day). To touch on King Philip's War again, the obvious choice would have been to make the hear of the Bridgewater Triangle Metacom or King Philip. But I thought a satanic wizard fit the theme of the setting better. It was a fifty-fifty split though in my mind. 

Now I want to look at one of the entries from the Boogie Men and the Damned section. Most of the book focuses on locations, but there are ten boogie men and ten cults. These are more like floating entries that the GM can use wherever they want or when they become relevant due to player actions. One of my favorites was The Live For Evers. Here is the blurb from the book on them: 

Believe it or not this is based on real events. You can look up the Live For Evers under various spellings and find all kinds of information. They were a real Christian cult based in Sutton Massachusetts. And while all of the entries required some degree of elaboration on my part, these needed surprisingly little. The backstory involving Ebenezer and Lucy Fletcher was real. 

I think that is enough for today. I may go over some more in the future.