Posts Tagged montreal dungeons and dragons

5 results.

Big Fish D&D: The Time We Started Spelljamming

by on February 17, 2019 at 5:48 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Gaming, Homepage, Jon, Jon's Junk, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

Where our heroes find themselves suddenly transported into outer space and find that they are now in the most logical of Dungeons & Dragons settings: Spelljammer.

I’m in black and Jon (the DM) is in blue. Eric has a few comments in red. To find out how we got here, check out our last adventure.

If this is your first time checking out our little D&D Adventure Blog, you might want to check out this post that explains the setup and format of the game.  You can check out all “Big Fish” content on this nifty landing page. And if you’re enjoying our little GameTale Adventure Blog, please tell your friends on whatever platform you interact with them. If you think Jon and I are at all entertaining please consider checking out the geek-centric podcast we do every two weeks “9ES” right here.

Right, so I’m not really sure how much time I should spend trying to explain Spelljammer to the reader here. And there’s a number of reasons for that. First of all, it is batshit crazy. Second of all, I knew very little of it myself (despite the setting being my suggestion at the end of last game).

So I guess you can prime yourself for some of the concepts at play here by just skimming through the Wikipedia page for Spelljammer or you can enter into it with the same knowledge that I had of the setting. Here is what I knew about Spelljammer when I sat down at the table for our first adventure in Spelljamming:

It’s sci-fi mashed into Dungeons & Dragons where magic explains away a lot of the “science” problems you can think of. People fly around on actual ships that function like spaceships between realities or whatever.

I would later learn that the realities are called “crystal spheres” and the ships didn’t even have to be ships. Also, the stuff connecting the crystal spheres is called the phlogiston. A word I wlll try to avoid typing from here on out.

Are you kidding me?  That word is a stroke of genius.  I can just hear gnomish space marines taking phlogiston seriously.  It’s some Dr Who / Hitchhiker’s Guide quality.

It’s actually a real word. It is “a substance supposed by 18th-century chemists to exist in all combustible bodies, and to be released in combustion.” ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Big Fish: Expedition To The Barrier Peaks (Deeper Still)

by on July 11, 2018 at 1:37 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Gaming, Homepage, Jon, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

The one where one of the heroes dies.

Thanks Gary.

If this is your first time checking out our little D&D Adventure Blog, you might want to check out this post that explains the setup and format of the game.  You can check out all “Big Fish” content on this nifty landing page. And if you’re enjoying our little GameTale Adventure Blog, please tell your friends on whatever platform you interact with them.

Keith (me, Jim Clocks) is writing again this week, and just like last time it’s going to be a little fast and loose. I’ll be in black, Jon (our DM) is in blue. Another player, Eric shall be in red, as the prophecy foretold.

This is a Bonus Adventure where Jono takes old classic modules and updates them for 5e. It’s a fun chance for all of us to play versions of some of the classics.

I don’t want to spoil anything but one of the Cads dies in this one.

Rope-a-dope

The Couatl tells us that the people who used to inhabit this vessel travelled across worlds and planes, collecting creatures and vegetation. It doesn’t think they were inherently malicious in their intent, but it does think that they took on more than they could handle. Hence the whole creatures breaking out of their pods and everyone being dead thing.

The Couatl heals us up with fun flying snake magic and tells us we can seek out its aid later if we need to. We agree to let it know if we find a way out in return. Couatl friend!

I’m super pumped about this, another creature with the same alignment as me! I’m certainly the only lawful character in the group, and I may even be the only good character. (I’ll have to sneak a peek at some character sheets next session.)

I asked the Couatl for a feather. 5e item creation is pretty vague, but traditionally it’s a component in a bunch of magical items. I know it’s not a small request, but hey, if you don’t ask, you don’t get! He told us that he’d think on it, which is better than “no”.

That was a really nice touch.  More or less guarantees the Couatl will show back up at some point.

The Couatl explains to the party that on the floor above us there is a great and terrible evil, and that it can probably handle it on its own. In fact, if we go with it we would probably hinder it more than help. We didn’t really want to face a great and terrible evil anyhow!

We press onwards and downwards.

We come across what looks to be relatively intact bar/leisure area. The booze crazy warlock gets giddy and we get attacked by 3 Ropers.

Typically, Ropers stay very still to resemble stalagmites in caves to lure in their prey. But this is a spaceship. So they’re just big flesh cones hanging out in the corner of a 70’s sci-fi drinking establishment.

Real smooth Ropers. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Big Fish: Expedition To The Barrier Peaks (We Need to Go Deeper)

by on June 27, 2018 at 5:14 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Jon, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

The one where we all learn a valuable lesson about key cards.

If this is your first time checking out our little D&D Adventure Blog, you might want to check out this post that explains the setup and format of the game.  You can check out all “Big Fish” content on this nifty landing page. And if you’re enjoying our little GameTale Adventure Blog, please tell your friends on whatever platform you interact with them.

Keith (me, Jim Clocks) is writing again this week, and just like last time it’s going to be a little fast and loose. I’ll be in black, Jon (our DM) is in blue. Another player, Eric shall be in red, as the prophecy foretold.

This is a Bonus Adventure where Jono takes old classic modules and updates them for 5e. It’s a fun chance for all of us to play versions of some of the classics.

In our last installment your heroes messed around a bunch more on the first floor and nearly died at the hands of vegepygmies. But we also got a big ‘ole shoulder mounted cannon (that will totally pay off later) and an elusive Red Key Card. Things were looking up for the Cads as we ventured downwards.

What could go wrong?

Stop trying to make “Cads” a thing!

It’s a thing and you can’t stop it.

In The Future, Key Card Readers Are Assholes

If you recall, most of the doors in this spaceship are locked behind key card readers. It’s a pretty simple affair. You can put your hand on the door and an orb will glow in the colour of the required card. If you’ve got the corresponding key card you can put it in the slot and it will pop back out into a little tray or whatever and the door will open.

We come across a door that glows grey.

This shouldn’t be a problem, right? After all, we’ve got red. If you read the last installment you will know that by presenting the red key card to a police-bot we were told that we had the clearance of a military General. What rooms would someone with a rank of General not be allowed in, right?

We slide in the red card (that we fought so much for) into the slot and it whirrs, makes a noise and then eats the damn card. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Big Fish: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks (Still The 1st Floor)

by on June 14, 2018 at 3:15 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Jon, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

When we last left our intrepid heroes they had just completed essentially an entire “lap” around the perimeter of a single floor of the crashed spaceship from Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. And nobody died! Perhaps our heroes will not be so lucky this time. 

If this is your first time checking out our little D&D Adventure Blog, you might want to check out this post that explains the setup and format of the game.  You can check out all “Big Fish” content on this nifty landing page.

Keith (me, Jim Clocks) is writing again this week, and just like last time it’s going to be a little fast and loose. I’ll be in black, Jon (our DM) is in blue.

This is a Bonus Adventure where Jono takes old classic modules and updates them for 5e. It’s a fun chance for all of us to play versions of some of the classics.

The Expedition Continues

As we mentioned at the end of our last entry, Jon has decided to give us the option at the end of each session we spend in the Barrier Peaks to either abandon or keep going in the quest.We decided as a party to stick it out and spend more time in this funky 70s sci-fi nonsense. So the burning question was this: Do we venture down into the lower levels of this strange building/dungeon/mage tower (spaceship)?

The answer was: No.

Instead we decided to spend even more time exploring the first floor.

I think it more or less paid off.

This entry might be a little shorter than the rest, because really at is core, it is simply the three members of the party who showed up (Jim Clocks the Rogue, Jaxxo the Lizardman Monk and Tidus the Triton Cleric) fighting vegepygmies.

Lots and lots of vegepygmies.

With grenades and laser cannons. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Big Fish: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks (1st Floor)

by on May 30, 2018 at 8:33 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Gaming, Homepage, Jon, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

Where our heroes end up on a crashed spaceship. Probably. Or maybe an abandoned moonbase? Who knows man, this is all kinds of crazy. What happens when late 70s sci-fi collides with 70s high fantasy? Find out as Jon takes us on the Expedition to the Barrier Peaks!

If this is your first time checking out our little D&D Adventure Blog, you might want to check out this post that explains the setup and format of the game.  You can check out all “Big Fish” content on this nifty landing page.

Keith (me, Jim Clocks) is this week, and it’s going to be a little fast and loose. I’ll be in black, Jon (our DM) is in blue. Because blue is his favorite color. If you’re enjoying these, tell your nerdy friends!

If you’re not familiar with “Barrier Peaks” I’ll try to keep the history lesson brief. In 1975 there was science-fiction RPG called “Metamorphosis Alpha”, created by James M. Ward for TSR. This would ultimately evolve into what we know (and love) as Gamma World today. In 1980, in an effort to bring Metamorphosis Alpha to more players, Gary Gygax created an entry into TSR’s “S-Series” of gaming modules called “Expedition to the Barrier Peaks” which was essentially Metamorphosis Alpha but intended to be played by Dungeons & Dragons players.

So what does that mean? That means Wizards and Fighters will explore an irradiated crashed spaceship for no real reason! Thanks Gary!

Monsters are plaguing the Grand Duchy of Geoff: go figure it out.  That was the plot. I really wanted to have someone named “Jeff” send you on the quest but that was an obvious Elise moment.

Maybe it could have been her cousin? “Hey guys, this is my cousin Jeff, he’s got a mission.”

One of the neat things about modules in the “S-Series” is that TSR included a special booklet of illustrations for the DM to show to the players. It’s a cool little thing that certainly helps immerse players. Especially considering these modules were from an era before a DM could just image search a visual reference.

We played the Tomb of Horrors (the first and most famous “S Series” campaign) a few years back and after wrapping it up we kind of talked about running Barrier Peaks because it seemed completely bonkers.

Those visual references are a real treat.  Mostly amateur art but whoever was drawing them was obviously having a lot of fun with it.  There are like 90 in the book which is a pretty significant investment in page count for a module.

Most of these were apparently done by Erol Otus (who brought us the amazing cover of “Deities and Demigods”. But we can also thank Jeff Dee, Greg K. Fleming, David S. LaForce, Jim Roslof and David C. Sutherland III for these hokey-ass illustrations. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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