Chasing the Sunset is a West Marches-style exploration game using Fellowship 2nd Edition‘s Horizon rules.
The fellowship: Dryden of Conwall the Collector/Hunter, Averiela the Elf/Elven Elite, Lucia the Brave the Heir/Halfling Sheriff, Edna Crusher-Harcourt the Ogre/Knight
Last time, the Fellowship made a quick stop for fresh water during their long journey to the Forgotten Lands, only to stumble upon cursed pirates!
Dryden uses Edna’s Friendship Bracelet to open Infinite Windows. Edna steps through the portal, holding a Dragon’s head. She slams it down on the deck of the Luna Penumbra.
Edna: I just saved the world! I am invincible!
She regales the Fellowship with tales of her other friends, and how they saved the world from a doomsday weapon left by the Dragons as final revenge against the Vampires that ambushed them and wiped them out a century ago. The Fellowship are glad to have her and her companions back with them.
Lucia: Perhaps Ol’ Jardinier could break the curse.
Dryden: Yes, ever since I took this bucket, I’ve been having strange urges.
Edna grabs the bucket from Dryden and hurls it far into the forest.
Lucia: You defeated the Dragon, returned to us (which is great) and took the cursed bucket. Just to recap.
Edna: The what?
Edna took the bucket, so now she is cursed and Dryden is free. She and Lucia go into the jungle to find the bucket. Lucia’s exosuit cuts through the thorny vines, and Edna’s skin is too tough for the vines to cut.
Edna (+hope, Lucia’s assistance) Look Closely 10+
- What is hidden or out of place?
- They find the cursed bucket deep in the jungle. A Blighted Rat Swarm noticed its fall and are crowding around it.
- Tell me about the Blighted Rat Swarm
- They will attack anyone who gets close, which means anyone who tries to pick up the bucket
- Blighted Rat Swarm: Hundreds of rats, all swarming and striking as one.
- Ankle Biter: Anyone trying to Get Away from a rat must pay a price.
- Corrosive Touch: Anything that touches a Blighted with their bare skin must pay a price.
- Swarm: A swarm fills the space they are in. You cannot move into a swarm or Keep Them Busy without paying a price. A swarm can be pushed back or distracted by standard weapons and attacks, but they can only take damage from Burning, Dangerous, or Area attacks, or from attacks made by Groups, Gangs, Armies, or other Swarms.
- What will happen if I smash the bucket?
- It’s already broken from being flung such a distance, but is slowly pulling itself back together. The curse can’t be broken by destroying the cursed object.
Edna crashes through the vines and the rats to retrieve the cursed bucket.
Blighted Rat Swarm: A swarm fills the space they are in. You cannot move into a swarm or Keep Them Busy without paying a price.
Edna Pays a Price: lose 1 Precious item.
One of Edna’s bracelets snags on a branch and falls off. She reaches into the wriggling mass of rats to pick up the cursed bucket
Edna Overcome 10+
Wait, why is she enduring the annoyance of these tiny creatures? She just killed a Dragon. These Rats are nothing in comparison! She thrashes about, smashing branches and sending Rats flying and scurrying.
Blighted Rat Swarm: A swarm can be pushed back or distracted by standard weapons and attacks, but they can only take damage from Burning, Dangerous, or Area attacks.
Edna Uncontrollable Strength: Your unarmed attacks are Dangerous
Edna Finish Them (+courage, force retreat) 10+ TAKEN OUT
The Rats flee and Edna and Lucia walk back to the clearing without interference. Dryden has been watchign the show from a distance and carefully touching nothing. The entrance to the cave small enough that Enda has to liedown and slide feet-first into the cavern below. As she arrives, a Dwarf Skeleton digs its way out of the wall!
- Jellylegs she/her Dwarf Skeleton
- Just Bones: Skeletons do not take damage from anything that would slip right through them or is made to harm flesh. Most piercing weapons, ranged weapons, slashing weapons, and poison or fire-based attacks will have very little effect on a Skeleton.
- Built Strong: When Jellylegs is damaged, she deals damage back.
- Simple-Minded: Jellylegs loves one thing and one thing only, and
she is easily distracted or persuaded by that one thing.
Jellylegs: New crewmember, eh?
Dryden: Molly abandoned ship and said she had the best job.
Jellylegs: If they were good jobs, they wouldn’t be curses.
Dryden: No-Eyed Jack doesn’t have his job anymore.
Jellylegs: Then they won’t make fun of me anymore. Nicknames stick, even though we’ve been here on land much longer than we were ever at sea.
Edna fills the bucket, scurries up the exit, dumps out the water, and slides back down. What a stupid, annoying curse!
Edna: Ol’ Jardinier, what do you advise?
Ol’ Jardinier: Clearly, give the bucket to someone else and leave.
Edna throws the bucket at Jellylegs. Falls to the ground and Jellylegs stares at Edna.
Jellylegs: You think we didn’t try that?
Jellylegs starts collapsing the tunnel she came out of, then starts excavating another tunnel. Averiela looks around for some clue to their dilemma.
Averiela Look Closely 10+
- What do my senses tell me?
- Water bubbles up through cracks in the stone floor. This cave is below the high tide line, so when the tide comes in, the chamber floods. The wall around the entrance is solid rock, but the toher side of the chamber is made of rock debris. That’s the side where Jellylegs emerged.
- What is hidden or out of place?
- The rock debris is all from Jellylegs’ tunneling. She must have dug and collapsed countless tunnels, over and over.
- What will happen if I collapse the chamber?
- The curse says that whoever holds the cursed bucket must keep the water out of the cave. If water can’t get in, the bucket will be powerless.
Dryden: We could bring down the ceiling!
Edna: What about sealing the cracks in the floor?
She wiggles up the entrance to dump out another bucketful of water. Dryden wants to know where Jellylegs has been. He reopens the tunnel she just collapsed with his two-handed Dwarven hammer. Jellylegs emerges from the tunnel she just started.
Jellylegs: No! You can’t!
She rushes Dryden!
Dryden Get Away 10+ avoid harm, bring Averiela along
Dryden pulls Averiela into the niche that he just excavated, and Jellylegs misses them. She turns around and Dryden sticks out the handle of his hammer to trip her.
Dryden Keep Them Busy 7-9 but some time, but face retaliation
Dryden: Averiela, should we seal the floor, or open this tunnel?
Averiela: We should uncurse Edna!
She switches places with Dryden and harries Jellylegs with her titanium sword, deftly striking and dislocating smal bones: a phalange, a vertebra, a tarsal.
Averiela Keep Them Busy 10+ buy some time
Drdyen walks around the puddle of water on the floor of the cave, pondering. He kneels and tastes the water. He reaches behind his cloak and selects his underwater reaction trap. He puts his hand in the puddle and feels for where the water enters the chamber. He slams a vial down breaking it, and dives away. Three seconds later, water is flung into the air as the vial’s contents rapidly expand to fills the cracks in the floor.
Dryden Explosive Trap: block or open an entrance
Edna comes back down into the cave and tries to strike Jellylegs while her back is turned.
Edna Finish Them (+Sense, knock out) 6-
The curse stops her mighty fist just before it reaches Jellylegs! She must be loyal to the crew!
Jellylegs: Do you think we didn’t try that?
Dryden: How long have you been stuck here?
Jellylegs: I’ve hidden and rehidden the path 1233 times.
Lucia: How many tunnels can you dig per day?
Jellylegs: Hold on, let me deal with this Elf.
Jellylegs swings at Averiela, but Averiela blows a handful of powder into her face.
Averiela Elder Art Stardust: a magic powder that puts its target into a light sleep
Jellylegs looks very surprised, locks up, and falls over. Edna catches her, scoops up some more water and pushes Jellylegs and the bucket up to the surface. Jellylegs wakes up as she is manhandled (Ogrehandled?) but Edna’s body completely blocks the tunnel. She can’t get back down. Edna mocks her and swats away her ineffective blows.
Edna Wobbles: You cannot be harmed by most physical weaponry, only delayed and distracted.
Averiela Elder Arts: Sense Magic
Averiela senses magic through the wall of the cavern, and indicates the direction to the Fellowship. It’s not the direction that Jellylegs was digging. Her job is to keep the entrance hidden, and going straight for it isn’t very sneaky. Dryden digs in the direction Averiela indicates. He pockets a handful of rubble for future teleportation purposes.
Dryden Overcome 7-9 pay a price
Dryden damages Blood
Eventually, Dryden emerges into another underground chamber. In the center is a huge treasure chest, twice the size of a couch, wrapped in chains and padlocks. Lucia hesistates before going through Dryden’s makeshift tunnel.
Lucia Detect Evil: nothing evil in this chamber
Dryden wants to get into the treasure chest, but how will he unlock the padlocks? The friendly worms? Flash-freeze vial? No, the right tool for this job is the humble skeleton key! Averiela and Lucia laugh.
Dryden Curious Curios are useful
Dryden unlocks the padlocks, throws off the chains, and lifts the lid. The chest is empty!
Lucia: A decoy!
Dryden drops some rubble into the chest. Nothing unusual happens. No teleportation. No traps.
Averiela Look Closely (+hope, Lucia’s aid) 7-9 ask 3 questions, find out 1 the hard way
- What is hidden or out of place?
- Nothing. The chest is a normal, non-magical chest. There are no traps or secret compartments.
- Tell me about the chest.
- The chest is involved in the curse, but it’s not a cursed object like the bucket. They will not be cursed if they handle the chest.
- Tell us about the chamber.
- It’s a great place to hide treasure. It’s above the high tide line ,and hard to access, especially with Jellylegs repeatedly destroying the access tunnels. All that rubble from Jellylegs’ tunneling is unstable. Dryden’s tunnel collapses, trapping Ol’ Jardinier under rubble!
Lucia: This chest is so mysterious! Why curse the crew to guard nothing?
Ol’ Jardinier: *gasp* We have more pressing problems.
Averiela Overcome (+hope, Lucia’s aid) 10+
Averiela crawls into the rubble, carefully moving only non-load-bearing stones. Once she grabs Ol’ Jardinier, Lucia grabs her feets and pulls them both out.
Edna Cursed Bucket: If a scene ends and you haven’t tried to keep the cave dry for the whole scene, take damage.
Edna damages a stat
Edna’s been fooling around for too long. She scoots backwards down the tunnel and starts scooping up water again. Jellylegs follows and goes back to work, digging a new tunnel.
Back in the secret chamber, Lucia explains what they learned to Ol’ Jardinier. He laughs.
Ol’ Jardinier: Ha ha! The treasure was removed from the chest long ago.
Lucia: Should we destroy the chest? We could set it on fire, but it will repari itself, like Edna’s bucket. It’s difficult to move, but what if we take it away?
Dryden: We could shove it through infinite Windows. We could send it to the Treacherous Mountains, Vieport, Samantha’s Swamp (no, I lost that token) The Moon…
Averiela: If that doesn’t break the curse, would Edna have to leave us?
Dryden: Let’s send it to the beach.
Lucia Open Infinite Windows (+hope, Dryden’s aid): 10+ stable portal, expected destination
A portal opens to the beach on the surface. The Luna Penumbra is visible, hovering over hte lagoon. Dryden shoves the chest through, and throws the padlocks and chains after, just to be sure.
Just then, Jellylegs tunnels in.
Jellylegs: The treasure! It’s gone!
NO END OF SESSION MOVE