3 Years, 300 Posts: The Map of the New World

Made in Azgaar's. Click for full size.

And here we are: post 300, three years to the day since I started the blog.

Thank you all: for your support, your guidance, your friendship, and above all thank you for everything you do to sustain this little pocket of creativity.

Twice before I have made this map, now it is time for a third. As before, my method is "fit as many things as I own or know well enough about into a single map." If you don't see your favorites, I apologize in advance.Room is limited. Thankfully, this map is not canon.

Enough sentimentality. It is time for The Goods.

Everything with a hyperlink is available for free.

AS IT IS WRITTEN IN THE PRINCIPIA APOCRYPHA...

Regions

• Bastionland - All the territory that owes its allegiance to Bastion, as opposed to some other, non-Bastion-related city.
• Electric Bastionland, Chris McDowell
• Autumnal Wilds - The rustic old hill country. Filled with hobos, puritan halflings, cicadafolk and lowmen.
• Chromatic Soup vol 2, Evlyn Moreau et al.
• The Coal Dukes - Fragmentary duchies in the southern Wilds who together claim a near-monopoly on the export of coal.
• Unicorn Meat, Dan D.
• The Commonwealth - Diverse collection of states and cities that collectively murdered the old aristocracy but forgot the clean the skeletons out of the closet.
• Unicorn Meat, Dan D.
• Low Country - Backwoods, haunted houses, and pluff mud fields.
• Low Country Crawl, John Gregory
• The Biting Marshes - The wetlands along the Black Snake River.
• Chromatic Soup vol 1, Evlyn Moreau et al.
• Deep Country - The untamed northern wilds in the iron grip of the past, far beyond the reach of Bastion, filled with petty kingdoms and the ruins of older days.
• Electric Bastionland, Chris McDowell
• Weird Marches - Unclaimed territory where the world goes strange.
• Weird Marches, Michael Kennedy
• Tveland - Frigid, dark, diseased, miserable, dying.
• Mork Borg, Pelle Nilsson
• Circle Sea & the Rainbow Lands
• Ultraviolet Grasslands, Luca Rejec
• The Ultraviolet Grasslands - The lands between here and the most utter west.
• Ultraviolet Grasslands, Luca Rejec
• Swordfish Islands - Home once to a decadent elfin civilization
• Hot Spring Island, Jacob Hurst
• Rift of Mar-Millior - The place you go when you've neither got nor want other options.
• Rakehell vol 1, Brian Richmond
• The Great Road - The artery across the continent, from Bastion to the Black City.
• Against the Wicked City, Joseph Manola
• Meatlandia - An island offshoot of Xor.
• The Chaos Gods Come to Meatlandia, Wind Lothamer & Ahimsa Kerp
• Xor - A land of flesh and gristle.
• Elfmaids & Octopi, Chris Tamm
• The Winter Lands - The place untouched by time.
• Wolf Packs and Winter Snow, Emmy Allen

Cities and Kingdoms

• Lon Barago - The free city of the central plains, overflowing with wealth and wickedness.
• Lair of the Lamb, Arnold Kemp
• Bastion - The only city that matters, at least according to the Bastionites
• Electric Bastionland, Chris McDowell.  
• Infinigrad - The endless city of unnumbered guilds and their dogs, forever warring with itself.
• Infinigrad, Michael Raston. 
• Umberwell - Blackened be its name, a teeming hive of grot, crime, and corrosion
• Umberwell, Jack Shear
• Endon - A city on the cusp of making some terrible choices that seemed reasonable at the time.
• Magical Industrial Revolution, Skerples
• Emerald City - Metropolis, home of the Cogflower megacapitalists and their church.
•  Ultraviolet Grasslands, Luca Rejec
  
• Jukai City - Slumbering swampland city of dark organic towers.
• Fire on the Velvet Horizon, Patrick Stuart & Scrap Princess
• Corpathium - The city that's never the same way round twice.
• In Corpathium, Logan Knight
• Marlinko - The fever-dreaming capital of the Hill Cantons.
• Fever-Dreaming Marlinko, Chris Kutalik
• Carrowmore - Deep Country township at the foot of an ancient dam. Has recently gone quiet.
• Deep Carbon Observatory, Patrick Stuart & Scrap Princess 
• Opeth - A tiny town that sits alongside the eastern expanse of the Great Road.
• Faux Pas, Nick Whelan
• The Wicked City - King of the Great Road, a city of clockwork men, hydraulic despotism, and impossible wealth.
• Against the Wicked City, Joseph Manola
• The Immortal Capital - The only city that mattered, a long long time ago.
• Kidnap the Archpriest, Skerples
• Thule - Ancient stronghold of the church and home of the archpriest of the Heliopapacy.
• Kidnap the Archpriest, Skerples
• Gathox - Migratory alien slum-mountain
• Gathox Vertical Slum, Davis Lewis Johnson
• Whispershire - De facto capital of the Weird Marches, a place where the Commonwealth sends the adventurous, foolish, and unwanted.
• Weird Marches, Michael Kennedy
• Troika - The Troika on the earth is only part of the whole: the true body of Troika sits in orbit high above, the jewel in the center of the humpbacked sky.
• TROIKA!, Daniel Sell
• MR-GR-KR- The Death-Rolled Kingdom; the river demesne of the crocodile lords.
• Thousand Thousan Islands 1, Zedeck Siew
• Kraching - Kingdom of cats and the god Auw.
• Thousand Thousand Islands 2, Zedeck Siew

Points of Interest

1. Tomb of the Serpent Kings (Skerples)
2. Gullet of the Rust Demon (Dan D.)
3. Prison of the Hated Pretender (Gus L)
4. Monastery of Dor Amon (Dale Horstman)
5. Challenge of the Frog Idol (Dyson Logos)
6. Ruinous Palace of the Metegorgos (Evey Lockhart)
7. The Maw of the Mountain (Brian Richmond)
8. Night School (Camilla Greer, Demon Collective Vol 1)
9. Bad Faith (@comradepollux, Demon Collective Vol 1)
10. She's Not Dead, She's Asleep (Mabel Harper, Demon Collective Vol 1)
11. Meal of Oshregaal (Arnold Kemp)
12. Hidden Tomb of Slaggoth the Necromancer (Nick Whelan)
13. Silent Titans (Patrick Stuart)
14. The Halls Untoward (Michael Prescott et al)
15. Sleeping Place of the Feathered Swine (Logan Knight)
16. A Hole in the Oak (Gavin Norman)
17. The Tower of Nicanor (Fco. Javier Barrera)
18. Lighthouse on the Spur (Dan D.)
19. Call of the Light (Michael Prescott)
20. Gelatinous Dome (Jeff Call)
21. Aeon Caves of Treasure (Aleksander Petrovic)
22. Hounds of Low Tide (Michael Prescott & Kiel Chenier)
23. The Man From Before (Michael Prescott)
24. Unicorn Meat (Dan D.)
25. The Hyqueous Vaults (Various)
26. Flesh for the Witch Queen (Jason Sholtis)
27. Lorn Song of the Bachelor (Zedeck Siew)
28. Scourge of the Tikbalang (Zzarchov Kowalski)
29. Under the Waterless Sea (Zzarchov Kowalski)
30. Misty Isle of the Eld (Christ Kutalik)
31. Slumbering Ursine Dunes (Chris Kutalik)
32. From the Vats (Various)
33. Through the Gates of Flesh (Carl Niblaeus)
34. Blood in the Chocolate (Kiel Chenier)
35. The Inverse Tower (Michael Raston)
36. Basilica of the Leper Messiah (Michael Prescott)
37. Arsenal of the Warrior Princess (Alessandro Dullemotta)
38. Fallen Throne (Gus L.)
39. Hush (David Shugars, Demon Collective Vol 1)
40. Comes the Mountain (Gus L.)

Realms Above, Below, and Beside

• The Ghoul Market - Accessible from graveyards. 
• Vacant Ritual Assembly 1, Clint Krause
• Gourmet Street - Accessible from the side streets of any major city. 
• Gourmet Street, John Gregory
• The Gardens of Ynn - Accessible from any garden where the proper invocation has been made.
• The Gardens of Ynn, Emmy Allen
• The Stygian Library - Accessible from any room filled with books where a murder has occurred.
• The Stygian Library, Emmy Allen
• Goblintown - Accessible from any filthy hole in the ground.
• Goblin Punch, Arnold Kemp
• The Crystal Spheres of the Humpbacked Sky - Accessible via a golden barge out of Troika.
• TROIKA!, Daniel Sell
• The Mysterious Menagerie of Dr. Orville Boros - Found in whichever metropolis one wishes
• The Mysterious Menagerie of Dr. Orville Boros, Skerples
• The Isles of the Dead (Arnold Kemp) - Accessed through total party death.
• The Isles of the Dead, Arnold Kemp
• Zyan - Through a dreamlike door-break in reality.
• Through Ultan's Door, Ben Laurence
• The Veins - Accessed by delving too deep.
• Veins of the Earth, Patrick Stuart & Scrap Princess

The Grand Tour

Players start in Lon Barago, poorfolk tossed into the Lair of the Lamb as sacrifices to that terrible creature. Those that survive will likely not want to spend any more time at the mercy of the city's hospitality, and will take off on the plains-roads Their direction is determined by their great desire.

• Civilization - Take the east road towards Bastion, first stopping at the Gullet of the Rust Demon.
• Riches - Follow the river southward to the arid hills and ruined cities that house the Tomb of the Serpent Kings.
• Freedom - Take the rough and ill-kept road northward, passing the Prison of the Hated Pretender on the way to the true Deep Country.
• The Great Unknown - Take the west road, stopping at the Monastery of Dor Amon before passing on to The Wicked City and Circle Sea.

Play Report: Two Birds with One Sword

Finally! After entirely too long, the crew has finally made their way to Hot Springs Island, searching for any secrets of the ancient elves that could save their floundering chocolate factory. Despite a surprise outbreak of hives on the boat, the team safely arrived in the harbor of the ruined elven city on the island's southern coast.

The away team consisted of:

• Blue, Carcosan blue man warrior, level 3
• Robin, Sister-Knight of the Order of the Sable Maid, level 3
• Simmons, a skeleton, level 3
• Xeno, a tiefling, level 3

Welcome to Hot Springs Island

The group leaves the ship at dawn, tying their boat up to the ruined piers at the bottom of the Iridescent Stair. In the misty morning stillness they hear the sounds of a squabble from up near the top of the stairs, and go to investigate.

At the uppermost pool, the group spies a half-dozen combustarinos in the middle of a heated (har) argument. A cube of stone, engraved with typically grotesque elven sex acts, sits cracked and lopsided on top of one of the troop: a twitching arm and part of a wing stick out from underneath.

Simmons, distracted by flipping through the Field Guide, bungles the stealth approach they were taking, but the combustarinos are more confused than hostile. Introductions are made.The combustarinos explain that the Big Bossman (Svarku) had sent them out for some new material for his current construction project. With the best carving now broken, they're stuck: the Iridescent Stair has been picked over pretty well, and the Bathhouse at the top of the hill is far outside their pay grade.

The party was assured that the dead combustarino, Gary, absolutely had it coming.

With both groups looking towards the Bathhouse as the source of what they need, an agreement is made. ("When there's a chance the Big Bossman might get angry, we become really good at compromising with others.") One of the combusterinos, Terry, is sent along with the party as a scout and guide as the four progress through the ruins upwards to the Ruined Marketplace.

(Note: The combusterinos are named Gary, Terry, Larry, Harry, Merry, and Phil.)

The Library

Upon reaching the marketplace, the party decides to investigate a vine-infested museum / library. They spend several hours sorting through books, using Simmons' passing knowledge of ancient elvish to sort through the contents (Vornheim tables came into play here.) Of what they found, they decided to take with them a dessert cookbook, a collection of historical fiction of weird biotech fascist elves (the Eld of the Misty Isle) a guide to local tree species, a collection of travel essays for lands to the east, a book containing the secret path to Goblintown.

(Note: It has been decreed by my players that Flavortown is a ghetto of Goblintown, and that both cities are located within the Funkytown Greater Metropolitan Area.)

The extra time spent searching put them in the path of a hunting trio of zip birds, who charged the group with aggressive wooping.

For combat I subbed in Shadow of the Demon Lord initiative, and I don't think it shall ever go away. I love it.

Xeno and Robin held back and waited for the birds to charge, while Blue rushed to meet them and Simmons climbed up a bookshelf and attempted to get a drop on them. He critically failed, and ended up falling flat on his face while his head went rolling away. As the others scramble to defend themselves from the birds, he fails around to find his head, rolls behind a bookshelf, and consults the Field Guide.

Blue is dropped to 0 HP and falls unconscious, but he manages to avoid critical injury. One of the birds ends up tripping over his comatose body. Simmons rushes in with his sword, critically fails again, and slams right into another bookshelf.

Robin ends up carrying the day as she lands a critical blow on one of the birds with her greatsword, killing it instantly. Xeno's player says "why not kill two birds with one sword?", the table has a great laugh, and I rule that if Robin can succeed on a second attack, she can hit the next bird on the same swing and carry over the remaining damage.

She rolls another critical.

The remaining bird panics and flees, as one would do. The party sets up a brief rest and spends some time recuperating, cooking up the remains of the two dead zip birds. Terry informs them that zip bird hearts are a favorite treat among the Fuegonauts, and that he'll be able to trade them for some goodies.With evening approaching, the combusterino flies off to his fellows with the two hearts, promising to return in the morning.

At this point the players and myself take a short break to go out for drinks.

The Restaurant 

For the rest of the evening, the party investigates a ruined elven restaurant on the opposite side of the plaza. Inside they find a wounded goa warrior; Xeno makes a successful languages check and is able to pantomime that they can provide help. Robin seals the wound up, and the warrior seems to honor the action.

Further pantomime leads to two pertinent strings of information.

• Point to kitchen -> blowing noise and waving hands 
• Pointer fingers upright beside jaw -> sharp downward motion -> point to wound.

Exploration of the kitchen goes smoothly: Simmons avoids the broken pipe that is venting steam, and Robin stuff the hole with her blanket. A book of elementalist cooking techniques is found among the wreckage, and in the office they find a corpse holding a small glass cube filled with diamonds, function unknown.

With night falling, the party sets up camp with the goa in the restaurant.

Final Notes

As smooth and clean as I could have hoped. The additional resources for HSI (the automatic generators, the easy-reference stats for monsters) are astoundingly helpful on top of an already helpful book.

The players reacted well to having the Field Guide available to them (referring to it as a Pokedex, most aptly), as well as having Terry there (This being the not-big-into-rpgs group, I could definitely see the positive difference.)

Return to the Distant Lands of Diy

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Hail Flailsnail!

We return to the Distant Lands of Diy, now significantly bigger. And hand-drawn! As before, I've smashed together as many modules, supplements, adventures and dungeons as I could into a single map. With only a few exceptions, these are all ones I either own, want to own, or are free anyway (free ones will be marked with an *, if anyone seeing this is new in these here parts.)

Cities and Regions

• Vornheim (Vornheim, Zak S)
• Krevborna (Krevborna, Jack Shear)
• Carcosa (Carcosa, Geoffery McKinney)
• The Immortal Capital (Kidnap the Archpriest, Skerples)
• Thule (Kidnap the Archpriest, Skerples)
• Scarabae (multiple posts, Jack Shear)*
• Karlstadt (Better than Any Man, James Raggi IV)*
• The Hills (Chromatic Soup vol 2, Evlyn Moreau et. al)*
• Biting Marshes (Chromatic Soup vol 1, Evlyn Moreau et. al)*
• Corpathium ("In Corpathium", Logan Knight)*
• Marlinko (Fever Dreaming Marlinko, Chris Kutalik)
• Slumbering Ursine Dunes (Slumbering Ursine Dunes, Chris Kutalik)
• Dunnsmouth (Scenic Dunnsmouth, Zzarchov Kowolski)
• Caversdale (No Salvation for Witches, Rafael Chandler)
• The Misty Isle (Misty Isles of the Eld, Chris Kutalik)
• Elatior (Maze of the Blue Medusa, Zak S.)
• Leuke (Bad Myrmidon, Rafael Chandler)
• Isle of the Unknown (Isle of the Unknown, Geoffery McKinney)
• Hot Springs Island (Hot Springs Island, Jacob Hurst)
• The Skyfortress (Broodmother Skyfortress, Jeff Rients)
• The Great Discape (multiple posts, Dan D.)*
• Quelong (Quelong, Kenneth Hite)
• Yoon-Suin (Yoon-Suin, David McGrogan)
• Denethix (Anomalous Subsurface Environment, Patrick Wetmore)
• The Wicked City (multiple posts, Joseph Manola)*
• Xor (multiple posts, Konsumterra)*
• The Shoulders of Giants (On the Shoulders of Giants, Chance Phillips)
• Perdition (Perdition, Courtney Campbell)
• QuVrst (Fire on the Velvet Horizon, Scrap Princess and Patrick Stuart)
• Jukai City (Fire on the Velvet Horizon, Scrap Princess and Patrick Stuart)
• Hubris (Hubris, Mike Evans)
• Meatlandia (The Chaos Gods come to Meatlandia, Ahimsa Kerp and Wind Lothimer)
• Kwantoom (Mad Monks of Kwantoom, Kabuki Kaiser)
• Gathox (Gathox Vertical Slum, David Lewis Johnson)
• Lethlygon ("Purple Lightning People", Arnold Kemp)*
• Strange Stars (Strange Stars, Trey Causey)
• A Red and Pleasant Land (A Red and Pleasant Land, Zak S.)
• The World Between (Grotesque and Dungeonesque vol 1-III, Jack Shear)
• The Veins of the Earth (Veins of the Earth, Scrap Princess and Patrick Stuart)
• The Ghoul Market (Vacant Ritual Assembly 1, Clint Krause)
• Goblintown (multiple posts, Arnold Kemp)*

Points of Interest

1. Blood in the Chocolate (Kiel Chenier)
2. Sleeping Place of the Feathered Swine (Logan Knight)
3. Death Frost Doom (Zak S and James Raggi IV)
4. Deep Carbon Observatory (Scrap Princess and Patrick Stuart)
5. Palace of the Silver Princess DIY (All and sundry)*
6. Ruinous Palace of the Metegorgos (Evey Lockhart)
7. Doom-Cave of the Crystal-Headed Children (James Raggi IV)*
8. Vile Vengeance of the Bees (Buzzclaw)*
9. Monolith from Beyond Time and Space (James Raggi IV)
10. Find-and-Replace Dungeon (Zak S)*
11. Stygian Garden of Abelia Pem (Clint Krause)
12. Tower of the Stargazer (James Raggi IV)
13. Atheneum of Yearning (Oswald)*
14. Tomb of the Serpent Kings (Skerples)*
15. Halls Untoward (Michael Prescott et al)*
16. Anomalous Subsurface Environment (Patrick Wetmore)
17. Comes the Mountain (Gus L)*
18. Gelatinous Dome (Jeff Call)*
19. The Inverse Tower (Michael Raston)*
20. Hounds of Low Tide (Kiel Chenier, Michael Prescott)*
21. Under the Waterless Sea (Zzarchov Kowolski)

Character Options 

We're not done yet! FLAILSNAILS protocols are in effect and all compatible classes are welcome (see here for a list), and to those I like to add:

• Darkest Dungeon character builds (lotfp666) 
• Lamentations homebrew classes (lotfp666)
• The ATWC Book of B/X Classes (Joseph Manola)
• Guild Dogs (Michael Raston)

Play Report: Blood In the Chocolate

There are times when being proven wrong is a wonderful and welcome thing. This was one of them.

After a long while of warming up to the idea, I decided to run +Kiel Chenier 's Blood in the Chocolate in the Distant Lands of DIY (with a healthy amount of FLAILSNAILS character options) and it resulted in one of the best nights of gaming I've ever hosted. There was a point towards the end where I was curled up on the floor, laughing hysterically.

The first-level party, gathered under the employ of a Scarabae-Umberwell chocolatiers' guild, consisted of:

• Mel, a Guild Dog
• Robin a Sister-Knight of the Order of the Sable Maid
• Octon, a Calimarimancer
• Simmons, a skeleton
• Augustine, a plague doctor
• 108, a crab-man from distant Yoon-Suin
• Xeno, a tiefling

(Most of the characters went without names during the session itself, so I provided fill-ins for this report.)

A note of appreciation is in order for Robin's player, who supplied everyone with turkey and mashed potatoes before we got to playing.

The Arrival

They step off the boat in the early morning, amidst the bustle of unloaded cargo. Martell Company sailors and Lucia's dockworkers scramble about with carts and crates, unloading raw goods from the Swordfish Isles and loading chocolates ready for market in Vornheim, Corpathium, and elsewhere. It is frigidly cold, of the sort where the sky is completely clear and the sun uncomfortably bright.

The party quickly introduce themselves to Karl Weiss, who tells them that tourists are always welcome to observe the factory from the loading area, but they are to come no closer. Dark figures can be seen in the guard towers. The factory itself was described as "huge and brutalist, like the inside of a Vogon spaceship but on the outside."

A plan is swiftly hatched to gain access to the dock office. Simmons, being a skeleton and thus immune to drowning, bumps into one of the sailors and throws himself in the water as if pushed. Robin raises the alarm, and Karl starts shouting for a rope. In the resulting commotion, Augustine slips into the dock office building. They steal the lockbox, the pistol shot, and a glimpse of the guards' timesheets before making an exit.

With the help of some sailors, Simmons is pulled from the freezing water. Being a skeleton, he is at no danger of hypothermia. Augustine and Octon make a convincing cover that he is some eccentric northerner, and so his swiftly-freezing clothing is of no concern. The frazzled Karl agrees that this makes sense and tries to recover his stalling work-shift. He's so distracted that he doesn't notice Simmons swiping the elaborate golden key hanging from his pocket.

The party convenes behind the office. 108 breaks open the lockbox with his big, meaty claw. Augustine gives the notice that the guard shift will be changing soon, and soon enough there are two whistle blasts.

Octon takes the opening to lead the group in a flat-out sprint up the path to the main doors. The mad dash is miraculously successful, if completely ridiculous.

"Shit! Shit! Shit!" Octon shoves the key in the door and hurries everyone inside. The doors swing back closed behind them, and lock with a solid kla-chunk.

The Smash and Grab

Upon entering the factory, the party swiftly sheds their heavy coats and gets geared up. The smash and grab begins: Xeno steals the mink coat in the foyer, pocket-fulls of chocolates are swiped but not eaten, several bottles of alcohol were picked up by Mel, Xeno, and Octon (108 decided to drink much of the rest), and Augustine raided the guest bedroom. Octon was able to identify the opal broach by its twin-headed raven insignia, marking it as belonging to the Von Vorg family of Vornheim.

With nowhere left to check, the party  attempt to open the locked door in the east hallway.

The locked door in the hallway gives way to Robin's shoulder, and the paladin manages to resist the poison gas. The group enters the main river-room, to the horrifying sounds of "Primus in the Chocolate Factory" (courtesy Augustine's player).

More looting follows. Mel and Xeno pour out their rum and fill up bottles of chocolate.  Simmons and Octon fill up their backpacks with whatever plant life they can find (much of it clearly imported from the Swordfish Isles).

There is some debate as to where to go next, but the group decides to pass on taking the paddleboat or crossing the bridges and instead exits by the southwest door into the west hallway. From there, they enter the stairwell and storage room, and happen across a mummified corpse.

"Everyone stand back! I'm a doctor!"

Augustine, of course goes to investigate the thief's corpse, which collapses into a cloud of sugar-dust. The beaked mask and goggles do nothing, and the good doctor is infected with Bubblegum Gasbags (A re-flavored Terrible Swells, appearing as clusters of neon-pink tumors that swiftly inflate) Robin takes the map from the dust, revealing that the bottom floor has two rooms: one marked with a skull and crossbones, the other with the phrase "what the fuck?"
 

The Descent

The now-buoyant Augustine is tied to 108 with a length of rope, and the crew descend the stairs into the darkened hell of the boiler room.

The pygmies working the boilers are a horrific lot; shrivelled, macrocephalic things colored like jellybeans. They attack the intruders immediately, but manage to do little. One fumbles his attack roll, and stumbles into a grinding gear. Augustine manages to drop a knife on one, 108 gurbles a crab-man war-cry, a dead pygmy in each claw.

But the violence, though intense, is short-lived: Octon shoots a Blob of Bioluminescence at the ceiling, and the flash of psychedelic ooze-light (plus the deaths of about a third of the pygmies present) breaks their morale and sends them scurrying back into their hidey-holes, beady glowing eyes peering from the darkness and evil chitterings heard under the noise of the boilers.

The experimentation room is next and contains in the far corner an elephant-sized blob of marshmallow goo. This is ignored to deal with what is brewing in the cauldrons. The party grabs whatever beakers and flasks they can find and gets to grabbing:

• 11 pints of chocolate liquor, which is then used to overencumber Augustine so he's only bobbing a few feet off the ground, instead of up by the ceiling.
• 2 pints of normal milk chocolate (stolen by Octon)
• 3 pints of hazelnut chocolate (stolen by Simmons)
• The last cauldron explodes all over the floor, and is lapped up by the blob.

The some of the hazelnut chocolate is fed to Augustine, in hopes that it might cure him. It gives him Brittle Throat Disease instead.

The prison is broken into, and they find a blue-skinned man there, body covered in scars and tattoos. No one can understand his babbling, but the pleads of an imprisoned man are universal. Robin, being sworn to liberate the oppressed, frees him from his shackles and leads him into the light of the laboratory...

The Ojou-sama Laugh

Enter stage right, Lucia de Castillo. There are four guards with muskets in the lab's two doorways, all aimed at the party.

"Hello hello hello," she says. "What have we here? Mice in my walls, nibbling at my pantry?" 

[Aside] The timing here was perfect, and completely not my doing: by the time the party was down in the lab, Lucia had just finished her tour of the factory floor and had descended there herself, with prior warning from Karl

Also, this moment is why you buy this module, guys and gals. You get to do the laugh. You could do the laugh normally without buying the module, and the module is really good on its own, but Lucia is designed specifically for this moment and it is wonderful. [/Aside]

There is a moment of knife-edge tension, and then Simmons throws his spear at her, which successfully wounds.

"Oh fucking hell..."

(Augustine's player comes in again with the music)

Lucia draws a pistol and puts a bullet through Simmons' skull; the skeleton collapses to the floor with a clatter and clang. The factory guards open fire to cover her strategic retreat back upstairs, but it appears that Lucia hires fresh graduates from the Stormtrooper Academy, as their shots (which could have easily killed several of the party right off) miss.

All is chaos. Octon hides himself by jumping inside the marshmallow blob. Mel rushes a guard pair and successfully knocks them down, pushing on to the boiler room. Blue takes cover behind a table. 108 and Augustine charge the other pair and together fail to injure them.

Octon notices now that the blob is purring, and he starts receiving psychic visions: scenes of gothic towers choked in snow and rust. Vornheim.

The two standing guards retreat to the stairwell, to block off Mel's path out. Robin gravely wounds one of the downed guards, who is left crying and bleeding on the floor: the other manages to right himself and retreats into the boiler room, just in time for Xeno to dash into the boiler room, stab him in the side, and nearly topple him into one of the furnaces.  (Like, she has got him hanging over the edge, it's super-metal). The pygmies cheer from the darkness, howling for more blood.

Octon continues to get visions from the blob; the two-headed crow of the von Vorgs on a tapestry, hanging across a long, knife-angular hallway.

Simmons reforms, picks up a dropped musket, and runs to the boiler room, just in time to see Augustine toss a vial of acid at the base of the stairs: an act that breaks the guards' defenses and forces further retreat, while simultaneously melting through most of 108's carapace and killing Mel in the friendly fire (his player immediately takes up the role of Blue, arming himself with the machete of the fallen Guild Dog). Augustine, being a balloon of healing, is able to aid 108. Xeno stabs the grappled guard in the chest and dumps him into the furnace. Blue and Robin take to the stairs. Tiny, technicolor hands pull the wounded guard into the machinery.

A third and final vision is delivered unto Octon: a table with a box of chocolates marked "Complimentary", and an invitation addressed "My dear Cordelia..."

What I'm getting at is that the squid-wizard successfully seduced a giant blob of marshmallow. 

Cordelia, now carrying Octon aloft, cascades out of the lab and up the stairs, the remainder of the party right behind.

The two surviving guards have planted themselves right at Lucia's door, and manage to avoid getting killed by Robin and Blue, but they ended up failing their saves vs. gigantic marshmallow ooze and are splattered all over the doors in a pulp (Robin and Blue manage to survive by pressing themselves against the walls)

"My dear Cordelia," Octon says in his best Lucia impersonation. "The rest of these traitors are in the next room. Open the door."

The ooze extends a pseudopod and taps out the musical key-code. The doors swing open.

Lucia stands before the party, bloody bandages wrapped around her shoulder and a pistol in each hand.

"Cordelia. Put him down. Now." Her command is like a hammer dropping down.

"No, Cordelia! I'm the real Lucia! You know me! I don't bleed, I never lose!" Octon counters.

The ooze, terribly confused by two of its mistress, cannot withstand the voice. It deposits Octon before Lucia.

GUN VS INK, LET'S GO

GUESS WHAT TIME IT IS

GO ON, GUESS.

The squid-wizard's Ink-Splash is faster than Lucia's trigger finger, and just barely. Blinded, Lucia's shot goes a hair's-width wide. Simmons takes this opportunity to commando-roll out from behind the ooze and take a shot with his new musket. He rolls minimum damage, which in this case is sillier than missing entirely.

Robin, being the paladin and thoroughly fed up with this sort of tyranny, walks up past the deafened calimarimancer and the aimless skeleton and stabs Lucia right through the stomach with her greatsword.

Final Words: "Hurk, blugh"

Now dead, Lucia's corpse gains all the years and pounds it had hidden away, which was pretty gross. Robin takes the silver necklace, which upon closer inspection is a fat elf lady getting a bit handy with herself. The vial in Lucia's pocket is given to Augustine, thinking that it is a cure.

It was marshmallow serum. The poor doctor is now a marshmallow blob, help aloft by bubblegum gasbags.

[Aside] The table (and Augustine's player in particular) just loses it in the best way here. I end up doubled-up on the floor with laughter.[/Aside]

When the laughter subsides, the safe is opened with Lucia's key. The recipe book is lost to the acid trap, but the silver bars are there for the taking, as well as shipping contracts with the Martel Company, details of their Swordfish Island expeditions, and receipts for Carcosan slave-traders.

The group decides then it is best to take over the factory themselves, which they do.  With the recipe book lost, the factory is sure to hit some hard times, even with Octon and Cordelia acting as the pygmies' new god-king. But the Old Growth remains, and the jungles and ruins of the Swordfish Isles offer greater mysteries to unfold. So to does the frozen waste of Carcosa, and the palace intrigues of Vornheim.

But mostly Hot Springs Island because dammit, I want to run Hot Springs Island.

Final Notes

 

Man, I love this adventure. I know that I said I didn't before, but past me is an idiot and a notorious liar besides.