Hexplore24 — Day 7
Mild weather. Snow will start to melt.
The sky dawns bloody, swirls of clouds and the snow casting a pink and gruesome reminder of the carnage from the night before. 3 dead people and 3 dead giant beetles lie still and unmoving in the snow.
Let's meet the lone surviving Peddler
Name is Goster, Teen, patchy beard. Cynical, loves art. 1
Motivated to become a maker, and drawn by guilt.
Family were all merchants. He was injured much of his childhood.
Using a motif style roll of 3d6, each for anger, sadness, shutdown. He’s 6/6 anger, 6/6 sadness, 2/6 shutdown. 2
The lone surviving peddler, a young man with a patchy beard named Goster, is quiet in the night, his wounds keeping him delirious until he sleeps for several hours.
Now, though, he is awake and standing and screaming, shouting. He curses the gods and Satis and Belus for letting this happen.
As Goster sobs and shivers, Satis and Belus discuss what to do. They need to find a way to bury the dead. They have to calm down Goster. They need to plan their next move back to Beacon with him. Last night has made it clear these lands are too deadly for just the two of them.
Had the beetles not fled after Satis’ spell, they would have all died.
Within the packs of the peddlers, they find a shovel but the ground is frozen from the cold winter. So Satis begins to gather stones to build burial mounds until they can return to bury the dead.
Goster is now 5/6 angry, 6/6 sad, 3/6 shutdown. 3
Goster, tiring himself out, goes a ways off and sits beneath a tree.
Belus and Satis work to gather stones. By the evening, they have created a mound large enough for the three bodies to remain protected for the time being.
Belus goes to ask Goster if he wants to help them honor his companions.
CHA test [+] because Belus is a Cleric 4
Goster agrees and silently works with them to complete the project.
As they work, Belus and Satis also gather some wood - enough for 12 hours.
The sunset is a golden embroidery as they stand staring at the heaped mounds, all 3 exhausted physically and emotionally.
Goster 3/6 anger, 4/6 sad, 4/6 shut.
Goster then, for the first time in hours, tries to speak – but he cannot find the words, and he has tears in his eyes. Belus pats him on the back and he gives a nod of appreciation in return.
Belus cooks food successfully.
The fire is built and Belus cooks up the remaining food Satis had foraged the day before. They all eat, hungry.
Satis passes story check. 5
Satis tells a story about her grandmother, who after her passing had saved Satis' family from a flood by warning them in a dream. By the end all three are crying softly.
They sleep soundly, undisturbed. 6
← Yesterday | Index | Tomorrow →
Character traits from Mythic Bastionland.↩
Motif is a solo oracle system where you roll d6 dice, usually 3 of them, and each gives you a score for a certain aspect from low to high. Here I have the challenge of giving Goster an emotional reaction that fits the trauma. I decided a score of how angry he is, how sad he is, and how shutdown he is would give me info on how to role play him. Note I don’t dig too deep into what’s going on with his grief. I want to feel like his emotions and the story carry weight, but I don’t need him and this event to take over the game.↩
I do a motif roll again to see how Goster’s emotional state has changed.↩
In Whitehack, characters pick a specific attribute that their vocation can help them with. Belus has a low Cha of 8, and lists being a Cleric next to it. Because it makes sense his Clerical training would help him I let him roll twice and keep the better result.↩
I’ve been playing these stories as times for them to bond and laugh - but given today’s somber mood I role play it another way.↩
Today was about giving the characters time to process the events yesterday - something that I think is essential to allowing them and this world to feel real↩