Paper Heroes for One and All -or- How I Made Custom Minis for Next to Nothing

Thanks to the brilliant HeroMachine, I spent a little of my downtime tonight crafting customized paper minis for my players.  I started out trying HeroMachine v3, but it had way too many bells and whistles so I just retreated back to the more familiar v 2.5.

The cut-and-fold-able mini template is just a Word table set to the right dimensions.  Detail gets a little lost at that size, unless you have a better printer than my old, over-used Epson.

I already posted these to our group's private Facebook page and they got rave reviews.

Ambiorix the Fighter
(complete with a cursed shield he thinks is AWESOME)

Bob the Cleric

Elazti the Magic-User

Filibert Fairbarn the Halfling

Indis the Elf
(Complete with crowbar. Not pictured: grizzly bear bones sharpened into spikes.
She's pretty metal for an elf.)

Xanna the Thief and Rapida the Cheetah

Foldable minis!

Addendum: Xanna sans cat and with a
more tactical bendt.

All Hail the Slime Spider! *ribbit* *ribbit* (part 2)

Nearly stabbed to death by frog monsters? That aggression will not stand, man.

With only a little deliberation, the party stuck poor Fil under a bush (I prefer to think it was a Fil-odendron, nyuk nyuk) and formulated a fantastic plan to return to the Frog Room of Doom to seek their revenge (for... um... breaking into the monsters' home in the first place).

Indis the elf (my wife, Cori) would animate four long-dead dwarven skeletons from the mine to lead the charge, supplemented by a Phantasmal Force spell depicting several more skeletons.  Next, Elazti (Aisha's magic user) would hide, invisibly, and wait to see if the frog creatures bunched up enough to be taken out by a Fireball spell.  Finally, Ambiorix (Sam), Fil (Ben), the dwarves (NPCs) and Bob the cleric (Andrew) would swoop in to deliver the killing blow if necessary.  (The frog beasts seemed to have a pretty significant number of hit points in addition to three deadly attacks per round.)

To make a rather involved combat story shorter, the party's strategy worked. The monsters rushed to attack the skeleton "army" invading their temple and, after a couple of rounds, were close enough together for Elazti to loose a fireball.  They weren't killed outright, but they were severely wounded enough that the dwarves, Bob, and Ambiorix made short work of them.

Hiya, fellas!

But then the huge stone sarcophagus on the north end of the chamber began to rattle a bit.  And then the lid came off.  And out popped... a big-ass miasmic mess of oily black slime that formed itself into a 20' tall octopus-spider shape.  It shot pseudopods out of its writhing bulk, snapped up the remaining skeletons, and absorbed them into itself. The party members still in the room got the hell out of Dodge pretty quickly as Elazti tossed another fireball at the monster that, it seems, was the "god" of the chamber and the thing the frog creatures were trying to protect.  Fortunately, Aisha rolled really well for damage and the creature exploded into a million little oozy bits.

Cue massive XP award and much leveling by the PCs.



NEXT TIME:
The Breaking of the Fellowship -- Goblins, Gnolls, Bandits, and the long road to Ravensport.

All Hail the Slime Spider! *ribbit* *ribbit* (part 1)

The party stood before the massive iron door and its ominous epitaph. Just as Xanna the thief began to pry it open, they heard footsteps on the spiral stairs above.  Descending to meet them was a cloaked-and-hooded human in fine-wrought plate mail and armed with a mace. He, in turn, was being trailed by... a cheetah?  Yes, a cheetah.

Bob* the cleric and the Rapida the cat**, had independently followed the party's trail of bludgeoned bugs and eviscerated ettins looking for adventure. They were also the characters of our two new players: Andrew, a longtime friend and recording client of mine, and Adeline, Amanda (Xanna)'s super-smart-but-still-kinda-scared-of-the-DM's-monster-voices seven year-old daughter.

Armed with fresh hit points and new allies, the party pried the door open and stared into the blackness beyond. An acrid stench stung their nostrils like acid and the slow, steady drip of liquid echoed along the quiet, finely-chiselled hallways beyond.  At this point, Arda the dwarf drew forth an ancient map that she'd kept hidden up to now. Unlabeled though it was, it provided a decent overview of the main living and working level of the mine:

The entrance is on the bottom of the map.
Click to enlarge. It's a big damn dungeon.

The strongest smells (identifiable thanks to Rapida's keen nose) emanated from the western passages. Never ones to pass up trouble, that's where the party decided to head first.

Winding their way through the labyrinthine hallways, the characters' first encounter was with a handful of deadly Black Puddings blocking their path.  Some oil, fire, and magic quickly cleared the way (once Ambiorix and Fil discovered that smashing the puddings with swords only created more puddings).

And then the party had a tasty snack.

Moving on, the group next found a huge, high-ceilinged chamber lined with intricately-carved pillars and various frescoes and relief carvings. At the far end of the chamber was a massive stone sarcophagus (think the big stone box that covered the Ark of the Covenant in Raiders of the Lost Ark).  As our heroes moved closer to investigate, two 5' humanoid frog creatures carrying spears and wearing crude loin cloths*** emerged from each of the northeast and northwest passages.  Angry and stabby, they proceeded to spear, claw, bite, and poison the party.  The battle did not go well for our heroes, and this adventure's second TPK almost occurred. In the end, both Fil and Aesopos the NPC cleric (aka "The Intern") were killed while almost everyone else was either knocked unconscious or severely injured. Someone managed to grab Fil's lifeless body and drag it along during the retreat but the remains of the poor "intern" had to be left behind. Thankfully the frog-monsters were more interested in protecting their territory than chasing the characters.

The PCs retreated back outside the mine to hide in the forest and heal. Fortunately, Indis the elf had found a Raise Dead scroll on a previous adventure and it was used to bring poor Fil back to life. That said, being frog-filleted to death takes a lot out of a guy and he would be in no shape to travel or fight for at least two weeks.

Thus, a choice had to be made: hang out in the woods with Fil and risk random encounters and maybe more frog-monsters coming from the mine to hunt everyone down, or go back in with a strategic plan and try again?  I'll give you one guess as to which one they chose.



---
* I have a theory. At some point, nearly every D&D campaign will have at least one quickly-rolled-up character named Bob. That's been my experience over the last 30 years of gaming, anyway.

** Kudos to Aisha (Elazti the magic-user) for the kitty's badass name.

*** Are there fancy loincloths?

Silver, Centipedes, and Sticky Doom

Fee Fie Foe Fum... squared.

In the last installment of our campaign journal, our heroes were offered a chance to help a pair of ettin-mauled dwarves, Arda and Delath, reclaim an ancient silver mine in the mountains southeast of Frostwyk. The prize? An even share of any treasure found within AND a split of the future mineral rights.

Knowing a good thing when they saw it, they readily accepted the offer and soon discovered that the same ettins (brutish and smelly two-headed giants, if'n you don't know what those are) who had attacked the dwarves were also holed up in the "abandoned" mine... along with a nasty array of centipedes, fire beetles, and other vermin. There was a lot of "ewww"ing and "yuck"ing at the table that night.

On the bright side, a particularly hairy encounter also led to the formation of my group's new Old School D&D-themed metal band and our soon-to-be-released debut single:

Props to +Sam Ferguson for the cover design and the name of the group.

In good time, the ettins were dispatched, the bugs got squashed, and everybody gained a fair amount of treasure and XP. Yay!

Spit, stick, fling, repeat.

In the course of clearing the top level of the mine, the party found an ultra-heavy-duty dwarven secret door leading down to what was once the main living and working area of the complex. A steep spiral stair descending into darkness, it was also the lair of a family of cave fishers who had turned the center of the stairwell into a tangled mass of amazingly-sticky webs.  While clinging to the walls, the fishers proceeded to snatch up the characters one-by-one and fling them down into the webs where they had to make very difficult Strength checks to break free. At this point, thanks to the element of surprise and some not-so-great die rolls on the part of the PCs, there was nearly a Total Party Kill. In the end, it came down to severly-injured halfling Fil Fairbarn and one cave fisher. At the very last second, Fil managed to stab his short sword deep into the creature's belly and then slowly cut the rest of his (largely unconscious) party free.

At the bottom of the Stairwell of Sticky Doom was another massive door, this time made of iron. The party gave it a cursory look and, upon discovering the words below etched into its surface, decided that a couple days of vigilant dungeon camping (i.e. healing up) would be a good idea before going any further.

Here entombed is Mjothvitnir

228 - 453

Lord of silver

Master of mithral

Mighty in battle

Wise in craft

Taken With his kin

Nar

Blain

Motsognir

Nyi

Suthri

Nain

An

Onar

Ai

Vigg

Vindalf

Thekk

Vit

Sviur

Frar

Aurvang

Fraeg

Nyrath

Jari

Hlevang

By walking darkness roused 

from deepest depth below

the very bones of earth 

Let forever 

these doors be sealed

leave the dead to their slumbers

and the ichorous dark  to itself

Yeah, I'd sleep on it, too.

NEXT TIME: Frog-Men, Oozy Spider Gods, and a Cleric Named Bob.

Among the Giants

[Edited 4/5/15. Because typos. Holy cow.]

Peering over the edge of the cliff, the party saw a vast pine forest stretching out below them. Far off to the west, Rothslake glittered in its cold enormity. A single brown thread--the road from Ravensport to Frostwyk--snaked across the landscape about a day's journey west-southwest. The late winter wind blew icy cold and a steady snow began to fall.

Using her magical bat-wings (acquired from the Swamp Witch's hut ages ago), Indis began ferrying her companions down the side of the cliff to the forest floor below. Just as she set Fil down and was on her way back up to collect the next rider, a gigantic wild hawk appeared and decided that she looked like a tasty morsel. Streaking up from the forest, it grabbed her with its enormous claws and began to fly away.  A few stray arrows from the party whizzed past or between its feathers but for a few tense moments, it looked like Indis would be taken away.  Fortunately, she had the ability to wrest free her arms and cast a magic missile spell on the bird, as Elazti did the same from the ground below.  Injured and afraid, the raptor released Indis (who deftly employed her bat-wings again) and disappeared into the forest canopy.

A cold night followed, as the group made camp amid the rocks at the base of the cliff. They did their best to sleep sitting up beneath a layer of shared blankets, while Xanna the thief rekindled one of her patented clay-pot-and-candle portable heaters. By the time morning broke, some 14" of snow had piled up around them.

The journey to the road took longer than expected thanks to the heavy snowfall and dense forest, but eventually they did make it. Once on the path, the group struck west in the hopes of making it to Frostwyk before they froze to death or ran out of food. Having grown up in the area, Ambiorix recalled rumors that savage berserkers, dangerous Ursari (bear-men), giants, and other unsavory creatures often frequented the area.

Two more days passed and luck, it seemed, was on the party's side. No one--or no thing--disturbed them. They were about a day and a half from Frostwyk when the sight of smoke from the road ahead gave them pause. Using her crystal ball, Elazti scried the remains of a camp.

Two smashed and overturned wagons lay wrecked on the road, the body of a half-eaten horse plopped between them. A short, humanoid figure stumbled off the road and into the forest to the north while a wide path of broken trees and huge footprints pointed southward. Following the path with her magical sight, Elazti saw a pair of two-headed giants smashing their way through the forest. One carried a dwarf under each arm while the other carried a dwarf and a horse.

Ambiorix, Indis, Elazti, and Panopé rushed ahead to see if they could find any survivors at the destroyed camp while Xanna and Fil sneaked through the woods to try and gain information on (and possibly an advantage over) the two-headed giants.

Two heads are better than... uh, never mind.

At the camp, the first group found a dwarf woman unconscious and bleeding just off the road. Panopé healed some of her wounds and, once she was conscious, the dwarf identified herself as Arda, part of a group sent from the far-off dwarf realm of Arkencairn to try and reclaim an ancient silver mine.

Meanwhile, Fil and Xanna used their stealth to tail the giants.  That is, until Xanna made an unfortunate misstep, tripping over a snow-buried branch and stumbling, face-first, onto the giants' path.  They immediately noticed her and the closest monster gave chase.  Xanna took of at top speed, simultaneously running and rummaging through her pack.  Just as the two-headed beast was almost on top of her, she found what she'd been looking for: a potion of flying! She downed the pale blue liquid and instantly took to the sky.

Safely out of reach, she began firing crossbow bolts at the giant, shouting "death from above!"

Having heard the commotion, the rest of the party and their rescued dwarf friend rushed to the scene. Before the giant closed in on them, Eazti used her Staff of Power to unleash a fireball at it, which severely burned the beast. The monster only got in a single attack (which mildly injured Elazti) before Ambiorix and Indis closed in and finished it with their magic blades.

The Widow Arda

Fil, seeing no better option, jumped from his hiding place and began taunting the second two-headed giant with his own bizarre, two-headed companion: Herbert the Golden Piglet.  The giant, confused, enraged, and hungry, gave chase.  Like its companion, it stumbled headlong into our band of deadly adventurers.  A lightning bolt from Elzati and some melee attacks from the rest of the party and that giant, too, was soon dispatched.

A quick investigation showed that only one of the dwarves, Delath, had survived. The other two (which included Arda's husband) were laid to rest in the forest.

Delath

Once the funerary rights were conducted, Arda and Delath made an offer to the PCs: help them reclaim the ancestral mine and the party members would be rewarded with a full share each of the future mineral rights.  They agreed to do so after a quick return to Frostwyk for healing, supplies, and a visit with Ambiorix's father and half-siblings...

NEXT TIME: Brothers abroad, a merchant and his strange servants, and the beginning of the Abandoned Silver Mine adventure!

Below the Ice in Forgotten Lands (part II)

Holed up and healing their wounds, the party discovered that the health of at least a couple of members (Fil and Panope) had suffered permanent damage to their constitutions. While discussing what to do next, they suddenly noticed a faint light trailing through the ruins and making its way toward their hidey-hole. In a few short moments, they were face to face with a young human woman dressed in wizard robes and leaning on a rather potent-looking magic staff.

Elazti the Magic-User, as envisioned
by Aisha and drawn by Amanda.

A master of levitation, lightning, scrying, and fire, Elazti (new player Aisha!) had come to the Frozen City alone to investigate stories that the ruins contained long-lost artifacts, lore, and magical knowledge. A gentle soul, the sorceress agreed to travel with the party (safety in numbers!) for as long as it suited her.

Over the next day, the party covered a large swath of the abandoned city, encountering and/or (thanks to Elazti's crystal ball) spying out:

• A pen of albino apes who had been enslaved by the Morlocks. The beasts were soon set free by Fil and Elazti, while Indis created another illusion of the Morlocks' six-legged dragon god to befuddle and frighten the ape-handlers.
• A trio of ice trolls in a rough-built tower, ready to pounce on or icicle-skewer any who traveled beneath it. (The party wisely gave the trolls a wide berth.)
• Charred skeletons who rose up from thick, ancient ash that covered one whole block of the city. Beneath the dust of aeons and bones, the heroes eventually found a few magical trinkets.



The spire inside the dome (or something not unlike it).

• The cracked remains of a great stone dome which seemed to be filled with tall, metallic boxes covered in jewels and levers. At the center of the dome was a round, cavernous chamber with a tall spire in the middle. The spire had been cracked and some kind of fire had apparently blasted out of it in the distant past. Smoke and an orange glow still emanated from deep within.  Wrapped around the spire, apparently asleep, was the Morlocks' dragon god itself.

Leery of engaging a possible deity (or even just a typical dragon), the party decided that they had had enough of the Frozen City.  Besides, they had already found more silver than they could easily carry (~600 pounds of coins).  They quietly made their way back toward the entrance Elazti had first used, where three small streams cut through the ice and ran to the outside of the glacier.

Afraid to disturb the water too much, Fil ingested Indis's polymorph potion and transformed into a giant eagle. In his new form, he was able to carry (with a few trips), the party members and their treasure to the exit.  After a treacherous trip down what was essentially an icy waterslide, the party emerged at the base of the glacier, which was, itself, perched on the edge of a tall mountain-cliff.  After countless days underground, even the gray late-winter sun of the frozen north woods seemed blinding.

Below the Ice in Forgotten Lands

Having escaped being sacrificed at the hands of the Morlocks, our battered heroes holed up on the second floor of a long-abandoned building and licked their wounds. Waking the next morning (if morning it was... hard to tell under a mile of ice), Indis the elf sensed cold and death from the next building over.

Image from
http://xxred-haloxx.deviantart.com/art/Barrow-Wight-19347748

The party slipped inside the ancient, crumbling structure and made their way to the second floor where they found a room piled high with rotting wood, chipped stone, and human(ish) bones laced with cuts. At that point, they heard from the floor above the sound of a metal blade being dragged across the stone.  Battle axe at the ready, Indis climbed the steps to the next floor and nearly lost her head to a ghostly knight in ornate armor. Though he had no face to speak of, his helm revealed a pair of glowing, icy-blue eyes. Indis suffered only a minor cut across her forehead but at the same time felt some of her very life-force drain away.

A heated battle ensued. Just as the first wight was defeated at a high cost in life-force (CON points), two more arrived on the scene. The party fled. An unscathed Ambiorix covered their exit as the others sped down the stairs and toward the front door... where they encountered a fourth wight blocking their path.  Pressed to fight, the heroes seemed to rally and quickly dispatched their assailant with a combination of spells and magic weapons. Meanwhile, the two wights from upstairs could be heard making their way down...

In the seconds following the fight at the door, Ambiorix, Fil, and Indis set up a quick ambush at the bottom of the stairs. When the last two wights finally appeared, the party attacked with everything they had. It was a short and brutal battle but eventually our heroes won out.

In all, Fil the halfling and Panope the cleric fared the worst, to the point where the latter's permanent health is now severely damaged. On the bright side, a search of the wights' 4th floor lair revealed something of a treasure trove: chests containing around 12,000 ancient silver coins, an assortment of scrolls and potions, and a magical +3 sword longsword (which was given to Xanna the thief).

At this point, the party decided to barricade themselves into the former wight lair and heal as best they could.

NEXT TIME: a new ally, apes amok, and skeletons, dragons, and ash...

Proselytizing (and Stabbing) in the Name of Herbert the Pig God

Dramatis Personae:

• Indis the Elf, aka "Crowbar" (played by Cori)
• Filibert Fairbarn the Halfling (played by Ben)
• Ambiorix the Fighter (played by Sam)
• Panope the Cleric (NPC, but run in combat by Sam)
• ...and introducing Xanna the Thief (played by Amanda)

Bones vs. Animals vs. Shiny Objects

As the party reached the top of the Treacherous Stair they found themselves face with three possible entrances into the depths of the Great Glacier.  In front of the left tunnel were scattered several broken stone tools and weapons as well as the gnawed-upon bones of many creatures.  The middle tunnel showed signs of entry and exit by a creature or creatures with long, thin lizard-like feet ending in three talons... and what's more, something just inside the tunnel was glittering!  The right-hand tunnel smelled strongly of animals and just inside its entrance lay the frozen and ripped-open body of a large wolverine.  Not-so-surprisingly, the adventurers decided to take their chances with the middle tunnel and its glittery contents.

All That Glitters...

Ice Trolls!

Inside, the glitter turned out to actually be gold.  In particular, half a dozen bricks of the metal (each about the size of a 1/4" thick playing card), stamped in an unreadable language.  It was stacked neatly in the middle of the tunnel, as if left there on purpose.

Further exploration led to a room filled with discarded bones and some kind of carnivorous beast scat* and then another chamber scattered with more gold (coins this time) and contemporary weapons (contemporary for the setting--swords and the like, not AK-47s).  

It was in the third chamber--after Ambiorix and Fil fell through a cleverly-disguised pit in the floor--that the denizens of this tunnel were identified:  Ice Trolls!  As the fighter and halfling struggled their way out of the pit, three of the monsters leapt across it and attacked the rest of the party.  (Fortunately, Ambiorix had a Rope of Climbing to aid him and Fil out.)  Thinking quickly, Indis used a Phantasmal Force spell to create an illusionary cube of fire around the trolls, which not only bought enough time for Ambiorix and Fil to get themselves out of the pit trap, but also allowed Xanna to soften up the monsters a bit using her crossbow.  The illusion trapped the trolls for several rounds and, after attacking them with flaming oil-- and finally swords--the party had dispatched them.

Victorious but bloodied, everyone decided to find a defensible position and heal overnight.  (Aided significantly by Xanna's ingenious "portable heater" made of candles, clay pots, and a tent.)

I Am the Prophet of Herbert!

Morlocks.  Lots and lots of them.

The next day, our heroes decided to exit the troll tunnel and explore the left-hand passageway marked by discarded bones and stone tools.  Descending deeper into the glacier, they eventually discovered a guardroom filled with blue-skinned primitives who also seemed to keep albino apes as pets/servants.  Instead of rushing to attack, it was decided that Fil should try to communicate with them.  Who knows, maybe the creatures would honor the PCs as heroes for destroying the ice trolls?  (You can see where this is going already, can't you?)

Between Indis's ice pictograms and Fil's grunting and pantomime, it seemed like the Morlocks (for that's what they were) understood.  Suspicious but open, they escorted the characters through the tunnels (at spearpoint, it should be mentioned) and into a massive cavern filled with a ruined city, an underground lake, and a village of crude huts.

Just as it seemed that all might be well, however, the party was pushed to the center of town where there stood a crudely-carved statue of a six-legged dragon.  As the party drew closer, the hundred-some Morlocks began to chant "Ch-thisst! Ch-thisst!"  A shaman appeared, covered in tattoos and wearing a necklace made of the same kind of gold bricks found earlier.  Raising a ceremonial stone dagger over his head, the shaman motioned for Fil to step forward.  Not quite ready to be sacrificed to the Dragon God, Fil instead grunted and motioned for the shaman to stand down.  And then he produced Herbert the Two-Headed, Possibly-Enchanted, Golden Piglet Statue from his pack and raised it above his head like an idol, demanding worship. Enraged by this blasphemy, the shaman leapt at Fil while commanding his followers to attack.

And that's when Indis's illusions saved the party once again.  Just as the mob of angry, armed monsters were closing in, she made it appear that the Dragon God itself had come and was about to devour everything in its path.  The Morlock village lost its shit.  A dozen or so monsters (including the shaman) attempted to destroy the interlopers who'd made their god so angry that he decided to show up in person, but most of them ran for cover.

And thus began a running fight to the village's back gate.  It was close a couple of times--Xanna escaped with a single hit point remaining, and most everyone else was battered and bruised--but eventually everyone made it away from the village and into the dark maze of the ruined city beyond.  Taking cover in one of the ruined buildings, the party decided once again to make camp and formulate the next step in their quest for the Frozen City's legendary gold...

The Frozen City.  No, the Coke sign is not really there.
I borrowed the map from here.

Tabletop photo by Sam.

---

* Carnivorousness is the assumption, at least, when poo contains teeth and bits of bone.

When Last We Left Our Heroes...

Filibert Fairbarn the Halfling, Ambiorix the Fighter, and Indis the Most Metal Elf Ever (plus assorted henchpersons) had stopped by Frostwyk to visit Ambiorix's family home whilst en route to the fabled Frozen City of the north.  (The city being famous for its supposed hoard of strangely-marked gold guarded by white apes.)

Maeglynn Icewine, half-sister of Ambiorix

At Icewall, Rethel "The Boar" Icewine's estate, the fighter found his father had become older and frailer, though the Lord was happy to see that his bastard son had found and brought home his daughter, the missing Maeglynn. (She had been charmed and then kidnapped by the vampire Polidori.)

After a short stay, the party continued north to the Treacherous Stair leading to the great glacier and the City it supposedly encapsulates.  In the narrow canyon, they were set upon by harpies but destroyed the beasts without loss.

After several days' journey, the group now finds itself at the glacier's edge, the enormous wall of ice stretching for what seems like miles above their heads.  Here at the top of the Stair, three tunnels of man-height burrow into the ice.  Bones litter their entrances and a freezing cold breeze wafts from inside, the air smelling of steel and death...