Chasing the Sunset is a West Marches-style exploration game using Fellowship 2nd Edition‘s Horizon rules.
The fellowship: Boris the Remnant, Ol’ Jardiner the Harbinger, Yonne the Rain.
Last time, the Fellowship researched the Forgotten Lands. This time, they try to go there, even though no one remembers the way.
Ol’ Jardiner has made this trip before. He explains that his other friends went there on a ship chartered by the Sea King, but he wanted diplomatic influence there, and they didn’t trust him. The Fellowship did plan to commandeer the ship, but the crew also thought they’d try it and forced their hands early. Long story short, that’s the ship now floating over Von Till’s Castle.
Boris: Forced into doing what you planned on doing.
Ol’ Jardiner: But that makes it not our fault. We dropped off the crew on the Sapphire Islands, because we didn’t trust them to go to the Forgotten Lands. I’m sure they’re fine. Anyways, I shouldn’t go to Vieport.
Yonne: We would obviously prefer to stick together. We’re apart from you half the time already. We don’t want to be apart from you even more.
The Fellowship considers options:
- go to another port & book passage
- hire a ship
- buy a ship
- build a ship
Yonne wants to build a ship, but Boris wonders if they could make the journey without outside help.
Boris: None of us know boatsmanship very well.
Yonne: Seamanship?
Ol’ Jardiner: Sailoring? The other port that I know of is Vieport, led by my former boss.
Boris: Oh, Vieport’s the good one?
Ol’ Jardiner: Hold on. I made a mistake. Vieport is to the south and is run by the Sea King. Port Fennrick is run by Edna.
Boris: Let’s see if we can strike a deal with your previous employer.
Yonne: Should be easier than with a stranger.
The Fellowship walks down the volcano’s slope and along the Mighty River to reach Port Fennrick. It’s a double city on a river delta. Dry buildings are on stilts, connected by boardwalks and bridges. Underneath are underwater buildings for mer-folk and other creatures that prefer the water. There’s a new City Hall, built extra-large to accommodate the large mayor.
Ol Jardiner: The halls of City Hall are very large!
The first Ogre the Fellowship meets is Bork, who is in charge of the docks. She’s even taller than Edna (18ft. vs. 16ft.) and wears a suit and tie like a bouncer. That’s her other job: making sure no one causes trouble in town. Most of the time she just needs to yell orders to the dockworkers. She’s not impolite, just in a hurry. Boris sees her as a useful contact and wants to endear himself to her.
Boris: Are you grinding the mill or is the mill grinding you, buddy?
No one has used that slang in hundreds of years. There’s a ship full of grain waiting offshore for a tardy ship to vacate it’s berth, and Bork thinks Boris is teasing her about the delay. She picks him up and puts him down further away from her.
Yonne: That doesn’t seem to have gone well for you. Is this your friend, Jardiner?
Ol’ Jardiner: We’ve met, but my former boss is the mayor. Better dressed. A little shorter.
Yonne: Perhaps we should head to–Where does one find a mayor?
Boris: In the biggest building, usually.
Yonne looks at a fancy hotel and Boris heads for the clocktower. There’s no mayor here, but it’s the tallest building in town, so Ol’ Jardiner and Boris have a great view.
- What is hidden or out of place?
- A secret door slides up in the shared cobblestone wall of a row of houses & small businesses. Two people wearing hooded capes emerge, carrying a chest. A third figure follows, with their hood down.
- Tell me about the large ship that is causing the delay? What are they doing? What will they do next?
- The ship’s cargo is produce: dried seaweed, dried fish, rice. It’s already loaded and ready to leave. The unhooded figure shakes hands with a dockworker and the two hooded figures take the chest onto the ship. That’s probably a bribe, and the chest is probably contraband. The ship was waiting for this suspicious chest before leaving.
- What will happen if I try to hire a boat for a special trip?
- There’s a certain building on the edge of the boardwalk where one can hire boats. The office has arrangements with captains in the area, so larger ships are available for longer journeys. Some boats are moored in front of the office, but only one or two large boats. Most of the boats are dingies or paddleboats.
Ol’ Jardiner blows a thought bubble that floats down from the clock tower to Bork.
Ol’ Jardiner: That ship should be the one you randomly inspect for today.
Just as the crew is ready to cast off, Bork hails them, loud enough to hear from the clock tower.
Bork: Hold up! You’re one of the ships that we randomly inspect. You can declare the value of your own goods, but we check to keep people honest. It’s routine.
Bork sends an Inspector Octavia to inspect the ship, a half-Octopus mer-folk. She’s great at fitting into tight spaces and prying things open. She climbs up the side of the boat and slips in through a hatch.
GM note: Let’s temporarily leave our characters behind and become the universe. We made a contested roll: 2d6 each.
Captain: That other ship is waiting for this berth. Things would go more smoothly if we left right now.
The Octavia feels rushed and checks many boxes quickly. The ship’s crew guides her and passes the suspicious box around so she never finds it. She emerges and raises a tentacle.
Inspector Octavia: It’s all produce, as advertised.
The ship is allowed to leave. Ol’ Jardiner is disappointed.
Yonne: What were you trying to do? I don’t understand.
Ol’ Jardiner: I think they were trying to cheat Edna by not paying the full value of their goods.
Boris: You could tell Edna who it was and they could keep “randomly” checking them until they find something.
Ol’ Jardiner transforms into the unhooded boss of the smugglers and heads down towards the secret door. Yonne transforms into a hooded figure, but the face underneath is the same face Ol’ Jardiner is wearing.
Yonne: Twins exist. I’ve seen people who look like they were copies of each other.
Ol’ Jardiner knocks on the secret door and a hooded figure answers
Ol’ Jardiner: It worked. They tried to inspect us, but we got the goods out there. Let’s get ready for the next shipment.
Hooded figure: Did you want to inspect it, or?
Ol’ Jardiner: Yeah, I gotta make sure you’re concealing it well, now that the authorities are looking.
The hooded figure stands aside to let Ol’ Jardiner and Yonne in. Boris dashes in at blinding speed and hides on the ceiling. On his way up the wall he steps on a decorative weapon and cuts himself. He mustn’t bleed on anyone and reveal himself!
The hooded figure leads the imposters through the candle-lit den and shows them two boxes of dirt. O’ Jardiner runs his hands through the dirt.
Ol’ Jardiner: Oh, yes, this is good stuff.
Ol’ Jardiner keeps a handful of dirt. He doesn’t know what it’s for, but it might be useful. Boris knows, but he can’t tell without revealing himself. The hooded figure holds out his hand. Ol’ Jardiner hands him a few coins. That was the correct response. The hooded figure hands him a paper with instructions for the next shipment. Ol’ Jardiner opens the secret door, turns back, and presses himself against it.
Ol’ Jardiner: You did a really good job today.
Boris sees the opportunity and dashes out. Ol’ Jardiner and Yonne leave like normal people. Once out of sight they regroup and shed their disguises.
Yonne: You seem to be bleeding. I’m confused. What–are they sending dirt?
Ol’ Jardiner: Let me look at this paper.
Boris: It’s Vampire dirt. Yeah, Vampires need the dirt of their homeland so they can rest. Otherwise they don’t rest and they die.
Yonne: Then why do they leave their homeland?
Boris: If you’re a predator and you eat all of your food source, you move to a different place for more food.
Yonne: That seems like an unsustainable way of existing.
Boris: There’s not a lot of Vampires.
Ol’ Jardiner: A lot fewer now!
Boris and Ol’ Jardiner high-five.
Yonne: Why don’t they live in the volcano with the librarian?
Boris: I don’t think the librarian would like them living there because they would eat their patrons.
The paper Ol’ Jardiner received includes the name of the ship, the cargo, the name of the dockworker to bribe, and the amount of the bribe. Ol’ Jardiner takes the information to City Hall.
Yonne: We get to meet your former employer now? What kind of job did you do? You said you traveled around a lot.
Ol’ Jardiner: I just helped her out. Brute force can’t solve everything, so she needed me.
Boris and Yonne are surprised to find that City Hall isn’t the tallest building in town. Ol’ Jardiner explains how a clocktower needs to be visible from everywhere.
Yonne: So everyone can say, “Wow, that ship is late.”
The clerk at City Hall is Gardner, another Halfling, wearing similar clothes to Ol’ Jardiner, but fine, not rugged for travel.
Ol’ Jardiner: Did she just replace me? I hate this guy already.
Ol’ Jardiner walks up to the desk:
Ol’ Jardiner: Let Edna know that one of her oldest friends is here with evidence of a conspiracy taking place under her very nose!
Gardner gives a double-take at Ol’ Jardiner, but he brings the Fellowship to Edna’s office. The ceilings in the hallways and this room are 20 feet high. Her desk is the size of a small building and has steps so smaller people can climb to the top to meet her. She wears half-glasses with magnification for reading tiny documents.
- Edna Harcourt-Dragonbane
- Agenda: Merchant Defender
- Commerce: She will buy rare items for Precious items
- Mighty Leap: She can jump to anywhere she can see, and damage whatever she lands on
- Protector: Edna negates damage to any allies within her arm’s reach.
Edna scoops Ol’ Jardiner up in her arms.
Edna: I’m so happy to see you. Looks like you made some new friends out there. Ah, manners. I am Edna Harcourt-Dragonbane. On behalf of the people of Port Fennrick, I welcome you to my town.
Yonne: I–I’m Yonne. And this is–
Boris: I am Boris and thank you for inviting me into your town.
Yonne: We like it here. It’s nice, um, did you know you have Vampires?
Edna: We killed O’Later. That’s why I’m in charge and he’s not.
Boris: Well, there’s one more.
Yonne: Or maybe the same one.
Edna: O’Later’s pretty dead. He was blown up. Bat-shaped scorchmarks on the wall of the volcano.
Ol’ Jardiner gives Edna the paper and explains the situation, as he heard it from Boris:
Edna: You’re still helping me out with your cleverness and magical skill. It’s like you never left at all!
Ol’ Jardiner: No, it’s great to see you, but I’m not coming back to work for you. We have places to go.
Yonne: Instead you have that other guy who’s dressed the same was as Jardiner is dressed. Is that a uniform?
Edna: Yes. It’s based on memories of the Harcourt estate. So, what brings you here?
Yonne: We are on our way to the Sapphire?
Boris: Sapphire Islands. So we can find a connection to the Forgotten Lands.
Yonne: I recently found my people so Boris is trying to find his people. Maybe?
Boris: I’m the only of my people.
Edna is sympathetic, since being the only Ogre around was also lonely. Sending a ship all the way to the Forgotten Lands is a big deal, so she wants something out of it. She’ll give them a ship, but Ol’ Jarinder needs to faciliate trade between the Forgotten Lands and Port Fennrick with Infinite Windows. There’s also an artifact from O’Later’s contraband warehouse that needs to be returned to the Sapphire Islands. The Fellowship agrees to these two conditions, and start making preparations for the journey.
GM note: We filled out the Ship Playbook. Now every group has a ship.
- The Trilobite
- Boat/Crawler. It has many thin legs that come to a point. In the water they fold up to form the hull.
- STATS:
- Cannon: 1
- Engine: 2
- Hull: 1
- Max Ammo: 6/6
- Max Crew: 2/4
- GEAR:
- Afterburners
- Map Room
- Missile Salvo
- Repair Bay
- Sensors
- CREW:
- Captain: Ol’ Jardiner
- Engineer: Boris
- Gunner: Watson
- Navigator: Atlas
- Officer: Citrina, she/her Spider
- Pilot: Yonne
Edna and Bork pull the sliding doors of a warehouse open. The Trilobite walks out and slides into the water. Citrina gives the Fellowship a tour, pointing out three or four things at a time.
PORT FENNRICK MESSAGE BOARD
Boris: Beware of walls that are actually doors and coffins that are full of dirt.
Ol’ Jardiner: Vampires remain and are smuggling themselves to parts unknown.
Yonne: The clocktower has a great view. The biggest building is the town hall. Edna there is Jadriner’s old employer and the mayor
The Fellowship begins a Long Journey to the south.
The Trilobite passes over Finsea, a mer-folk town on the sea floor just off-shore from Port Fennrick. The Jellyfish Festival is happening. When Finsea was first founded, jellyfish were plentiful, but Finsea fished them almost to extinction. A conversation effort breeds jellyfish in a lab and releases a new batch every year. On this day, ships are not allowed to pass over Finsea, lest they harm jellyfish. Finsea blockades itself with lighter-than-air balloons raising stout cables above the surface.
Atlas uses the sensors to analyze the blockade. The balloons resemble jellyfish and the wires trailing below them act like tentacles. They entangle passing ships and sting crew. Atlas recommends avoiding action. Ol’ Jardiner concurs and passes the order to Yonne, who easily steers the Trilobite around the large, obvious, and stationary hazard. The ship does veer closely to the balloons a few times as Yonne stares at them. She feels affinity for stinging creatures that are mostly water.
Out of sight of the continent, there’s a rest-stop in the open ocean. It’s a long floating docked anchored to the sea floor by cables at each end. Water-wheels around the cables provide electrical power from the ocean currents. The center of the dock is a casino. People who owe debts to the casino are trapped in indentured servitude. Several ships have been docked for months or years, tattered and unable to move on. Some ships have been sold, stranding debtors who managed earn their “freedom.”
GM note: This is the “Unknown Enemy” set-piece. The Fellowship will have trouble leaving.
Thilde Shamar, is a debtor whose engineering expertise is vital to the casino’s operation. She sees Boris working on the Trilobite and makes a bee-line for him.
Thilde: Such an interest in ships and tinkering and fixing things. What a beautiful mind! Let me show you things that. I know of fixing up this place that I am currently residing in. Would you like to know more?
Boris: That sounds very interesting. A lifestyle that I have not quite learned about.
She shows him the underside of the dock. The top and bottom layers are separated with a buffer to keep the surface of the deck from rocking in the waves. They go into a crawlspace to see the series of pistons working and are both pinned Boris isn’t able to avoid a compressing piston! Boris’ pet slime weakens the piston and Boris is able to push against it and brace himself on all fours. Thilde crawls between his arms to escape, then Boris slides out. His armor took the worst of it.
Thilde: You saved me!
Mr. Barker takes advantage of Yonne’s naivety to get her gambling.
Mr. Barker: Step right up! You get five chips for free! Let me show you how. Look at this guy. He’s a winner!
Yonne: OK. I guess. How did he win?
Mr. Barker: You guess what the number will be. This pays out four to five and this space pays out five to four, and if you have really good luck, this pays out ten to one!
Yonne: Big numbers are better? OK, I’ll put it on the big number.
Yonne rolls the dice and loses.
Mr. Barker: That’s OK. There’s always another chance. You’ll have to pay in to get more chips.
Yonne: I have these things.
Yonne holds up a bag with bits of pretty glass, one of which is precious. She pulls out three gems, all worthless.
Mr. Barker: We don’t accept that kind of money here, but with your luck, you can turn it around. We’ll offer you a bit of house credit. I’m sure in no time you can pay us back with your earnings.
Yonne: With my luck? I just lost.
Mr. Barker: It’s gotta come around sometime, right? Every heads has a tails, so your loss now might mean a win later.
Yonne: But you have a head and you don’t have a tail.
Mr. Barker doesn’t have an answer for that. He leaves, disappointed. Yonne goes to Atlas to ask what just happened, because she didn’t understand it.
Ol’ Jardiner sees a mer-man named Kenneth removing barnacles from the ships docked at the casino. Ol’ Jardiner sees a magical aura on him that gives his scales an oily sheen.
Ol’ Jardiner: You seem to have a spell on you. Are you also a practitioner of the arcane arts?
Kenneth: Me? No, I don’t know any magic. Who are you?
- What is Kenneth doing? What will he do next?
- I’m working and will continue working until I am done for the day, then I will go have a sad drink where everyone goes to get their sad drinks under the deck. I don’t want to see your face down there! Then I’m going to go to sleep and do it again the next day for ever and ever.
- What does he want? How can I help him get it?
- To leave! Obviously! I just want to leave!
- What can he tell me about the spell on him?
- I don’t know anything about any spell! Good-bye!
Kenneth splashes away!
GM note: Move on to “That Was Weird” in which problems keep happening that require the Fellowship’s attention and prevent them from leaving.
When the Fellowship regroups on the Trilobite, they notice the ship and the dock moving more than normal. The casino’s damping mechanism isn’t working properly.
Boris: I feel like this is kind of my fault. I was getting shown the ropes about being an engineer and I got stuck in the mechanism that keeps this place stable so I melted my way out.
Yonne: OK, how do we unmelt it?
Boris can fix the broken piston in the Repair Bay, but the dock needs something in its place while he works. Boris wonders if Yonne’s pet slime has a useful stat. Ol’ Jardiner suggests that the combination of several amorpheous slimes could form a shock-absorbing blob.
Yonne: That’s very clever actually. The blobs aren’t very big but maybe I can also join the blobs and do some shock absorbing, but I’ll be stuck here while you do that.
Yonne and the pet Slimes keep the dock very smooth.
Mr. Barker: This is better! We should hire more Rain.
Boris fixes the piston, his armor, and (somehow) Ol’ Jardiner’s ley-lines of magic in the Trilobite’s Repair Bay.
GM note: The ley-lines of magic are in Ol’ Jardiner’s gear, and the Repair tag can restore uses to gear.
Once Boris replaces the piston, the Fellowship gets word that the de-stabilized dock knocked over a stack of crates and someone is pinned under them.
Ol’ Jardiner: This is a job for brute force, not me.
Boris: I can eat the crates!
Mr. Barker: There are valuable things inside!
Boris: Not after I’m done.
Boris is quite strong and lifts the crates, but they are so heavy that it’s all he can do to keep them in place. The pinned person is injured and can’t get out from under the crates.
Yonne: I would help pull them out but my skin would hurt him so maybe–can you do something?
Ol’ Jardiner: Good thing I’m short!
Ol’ Jardiner scoots under the heavy crate and gives the victim a swig of healing elixir from his flask. With restored strength, the victim crawls to safety, allowing Boris to drop the crates.
Ol’ Jardiner: This place seems dangerous and the people who work here seem unhappy.
Boris: Concur.
Yonne: Agree. Oh, look at that.
GM note: Move on to “You’ll never Leave” when the evil plan to trap the Fellowship is revealed!
Mr. Barker: Three months time off your contracts for keeping them here! OK, six months!
The indentured servants have formed a mob between the Fellowship and the Trilobite.
- Angry Mob: Sometimes things get out of hand. A mob doesn’t listen to reason, and is very difficult to handle.
- Out Of Their Minds: They aren’t normally like this. Damaging the Mob will lose your Fellowship with this location forever, and you’ll never be welcome here again.
- Rage Against The Machine: The mob will destroy whatever their rage is turned against. Talking Sense doesn’t work, but anyone loud and passionate enough can redirect their anger. A player trying to control the mob rolls +Blood.
- On a 10+, their anger is now pointed wherever you want it to be.
- On a 7-9, they change the target of their anger, but the Overlord will tell you what they’re mad at now.
- On a 6-, you’re the new target of their wrath. Charismatic threats can use a Cut to change the target of a mob’s wrath, but it takes time.
- Mr. Barker, he/him, Politician: They have their own agenda.
- Political Power: Politicians cannot be fought without bringing the whole city down on you, and losing their Fellowship forever.
- Spineless: The Politician will work for whoever gives them the most.
Boris has felt lost and trapped by his duty to kill the people of the Forgotten Lands, so he has sympathy for the people trapped here by magical contracts.
Boris: Sentence? No, the only thing you have to break are your chains! Let your selves be selves. Grow and learn on your own and not be beholden to this place. Go after he who is charging you with this!
The mob turns on Mr. Barker.
Mr. Barker: Wait, wait! The magic!
The spell works like the old company stores. Workers are free when they amass a certain number of credits, but they must pay every day for all sorts of things, so they always fall behind. Ol’ Jardiner is worried that killing the magician who cast the spell could have terrible consequences for the people on the other side of the spell. If he can force the magician to break his end of the bargain, then the debtors might be released. Ol’ Jardiner tries to get Mr. Barker away from the Angry Mob. They run inside the casino, pursued by the mob.
Ol’ Jardiner: Here’s the deal. They’re going to kill you unless you release them. Who made this deal? We need to get them to break this promise to save all of your lives.
Ol’ Jardiner hustles Mr. Barker down the hall by the collar of his jacket. Mr. Barker swiftly shrinks until his disappears and Ol’ Jardiner is left holding his coat. Mr. Barker is the magician and Ol’ Jardiner is the Angry Mob’s only target! He runs around a corner and Doodle creates the illusion of wall around him.
When the Angry Mob rounds the corner, they can’t find him and start tearing up the casino. Someone starts grabbing chips and the aura leaves him. That’s how they can all break the spell! Boris dashes to the bank and smashes it open. He grabs handfuls of chips and runs around the room, chips trailing behind him. The aura leaves more people as they pick up chips.
Yonne: You know that everything that happened here was not because of our friend. He broke the piston, but then we fixed it immediately, and it’s now in better quality than it ever has been, and that’s not–are you guys all stuck here?
GM note: That’s such a terrible attempt to Talk Sense that Yonne rolled Keep Them Busy instead.
As the Angry Mob tries to figure out what Yonne is talking about, Boris dashes around throwing chips at people. Eventually, the workers realize that collecting chips will free them. They run at Boris, but only to grab chips, not to kill him. As people realize they are freed, they run for whatever ship is available to get away.
Ol’ Jardiner: We should go before they hijack our ship!
The Fellowship quickly boards the Trilobite and casts off. Thilde Shamar comes along and becomes the ship’s Engineer. Her original ship left long ago. Boris becomes the Muscle, responsible for finding stowaways and repelling boarding parties.
Boris:
Yonne: They will give you five free chips to play the games. Also the platforms have pistons between them to stay balanced. Don’t get sea-sick.
NO END-OF-SESSION MOVE