Everytime at the Table: Wobbling Around Midnights 1-3

 Running Wobble on Friday nights has been one of the easiest things I've done in a few years. Peryton and Iron Curtis indulge my particularly idiosyncratic obsession when it comes to this setting. Fridays just work for me as well. I get off of work in the evening, I am relaxed, just heading into my weekends of soccer, beer, and writing coming up. These Wobbles, the campaigns, help me revisit the published stuff as well as explore the newer ideas that pop into my head (always) set in these universes (or Verses). A couple of hours, stories told and notes made, WALLAH (not viola).

Viggo needs a shave

The Characters are Rudolpho Viggo, of the Primrose Corporation of Mu-Soufrik (Our World but Charlie Jade influenced), and Daisy Adair, pilot extraordinaire of Mu-1920 (Our world but the roaring 20s). I retconned the end of "the Art Show" from about three, maybe four, years to where the Professor (Rudy) had a lover aboard the insectoid space station. They were separated by the rush of people running for the escape pods just before the big bang that concluded that campaign's finale. Starting back on Soufrik, his supervisors task him with continuing his explorations of the Tau Verse. Daisy Adair had been hanging out on that world as well, working as a contract pilot of various flying craft for smugglers and whatnot. Since Viggo was pining for his boyfriend and Adair was getting bored with "the Future," it wasn't too hard to get them wobbling again. Taking charge of the Albatross-class "float" (Wobble-boat) christened The Dodo, by its crew, our two protagonists headed off into the wide, Tau yonder.


Though the species of pirates that attacked The Dodo were named Galareans, I couldn't stop calling them Onion-heads. Their rather radish-looking spacecrafts didn't help. Though the float took plenty of damage, being unarmed and all, a patrol of Strike-crafts ("bananas") representing the Radio-Apes controlling the area drove them off. Our players did have to make an emergency landing on the Overmind-63 (the Radio-Apes' home). 63 is a ring biosphere connected to a hub increasing its gravity with centrifugal spinning.

The primary purpose of Overmind-63 is to house the massive organic computer (known as Overmind-63) which is floating in the upper reaches of the contained atmosphere. The space station is big enough, rather huge, to where the speed of the spin isn't uncomfortable for its denizens. The hub of this wheel is not only the control centers of the platform its reflective exteriors provided daylight to most parts of the habitation areas when not facing the local star. Along the rims of the wheel are thousands of miles of farmlands. Floating "collecters" harvest various parts when their produce comes into maximum nutritional stage, and float up to the brain-ish looking Overmind. Smaller beings, mostly radio-apes, live in settlements, some as big as major cities. In these population centers, tens of thousands of beings live, work, and play. Space commerce and even tourism is a significant part of life here.

Helped by the Akkerbarick (Goat-head) Jax Biznez, lawyer at Law, the crew of the Dodo would be able to sue their now apprehended pirate attackers for damages to their ship. This lead to some court room drama. Of course, the Galarians didn't have enough money to make amends, but their ships' insurance company, the Gyyko Clan, had plenty of liability coverage. Viggo and Adair played up their emotional distress for the Monitors (video camera headed-baboons). So once the Galarians were put to death, on the spot, in the middle of the court room, our daytime TV stars where awarded plenty of Zed (dollars) to fix and improve their wobble-boat.
Of course, our Wobblers weren't able to leave the space station, because it was theirs _and_ the Overmind's. So they left illegally. A quick spaceship battle session, Daisy Adair made pretty quick work of their pursuing Strike-craft (Bananas), even without a weapon aboard the Dodo, with amazing pilot skills (Robin rolled really well). Afterwards, they were able to salvage wreckage from one of the strikers and get a Phazer Cannon, a weapon of their own, with Viggo's Fixer skills.

Back to the Search for Alejandro (Viggo's boyfriend), the Professor, using Technobabble, discovered "communitrons." These are sub-atomic molecules released by Faster-than-Light transmissions, that can be traced "for a certain amount of time" across the depths of interstellar space. This led our PCs to Planet Mondrom.

This world, though not really that well known, is one of the better spots in the multiverse for Wobblers to come across. The planet has two indigenous species, the Mon and the Drom. The drom are human-like beings that tend towards blue to gray skin and very similar hair to humans. The mon are intelligent mineral collections that form into rectangular blocks of very hard stone. Mons get larger and larger as they become more psychically powerful. Folks also call them "monoliths" for fun. The junior partner in the symbiotic relationship between the two, the Drom are monitored and mentored by the Mon, into becoming very capable psychics, and Wobblers as a side product. Now this relationship has a price. The drom of the planet are very stratified. Differing castes of them are identified by their "development level" as defined by the Mon. This is indicated on an adaptive tattoo of a number on the left side of the humanoid's neck.

Viggo and Adair tracked Alejandro from a crash landed escape pod into a Mon nursery-- the species is made of rocks so don't sweat the crash landing. They then were directed to the city of Population Center 47. As you all know, Center-47 is one of the best places to be when one is on Planet Mondrom. Know for its Really Big Decorative Bridge over the Salt-Water Inlet over the Western Side of the Planet Ocean, and great dance club scene. Here the PC's met the Triangles. The triangles are mons that have chosen to divde themselves into triangles of various sizes to lead various differing lives to one day come back together about ten thousand years later, to be Elders among the Mon. They tend to be skilled technicians of the rocks' society, while also providing the fastfood workers and gas station attendants for the metropolises over the world.
Viggo would meet the triangle Trixar. Trixi had taken a particular interest in the elusive Alejandro. Meanwhile Adair would be doing the Luke Skywalker on Dagoba thing, with a triangle on her back, ultimately dueling a clone of 14 y/o Amelia Earhart with light-sabers. After the Professor would take a particular interest in the triangle, our players would have their next lead as to where their quest would take them. Sex with the geometric block of stone was a matter of finding "the right angle." Afterwards, the Professor would hear the Warden (Trixar) mutter, "I only deal with criminals, usually."
Most of this last session was me getting the players to clean up their Roll-Playing XP tallies, through the "leveling" of the Mondroms. It also helped me continue to refine my Wobble rules as to how to, you know, wobble. If only I had done this before I published the source book.

So with Daisy Adair ready at the helm, Professor Rudolph Viggo wobbled them to the last known location of his GM-imposed love interest. Surprisingly, I am sure, had pirates awaiting them. But this was not because of rote script writing. Viggo would do an open channel hail to the attacking ships. The attack would come to a halt. On the Dodo's vid screen, Alejandro flanked by two pirate-looking Pyramid-heads would appear.

"Hello Rudolph." The dread-pirate Ajahando of Inasfar would say with a little chagrin.

GenCon 22: Back to Big Blue

On Saturday night at GenCon during my Crawlspace scenario "Scary Monsters and Super Creeps" someone found a reason for everyone at the table to identify their pronouns. I was beginning to think it was not going to happen. For all the warnings from many about "the wokists" being all over the convention, supposedly as ubiquitous as police informers at an antifa get-together. I came face to face with the advent that so many of the more, well, reactionary gamers warned me about. There it was, right in front of me. I could only say "Finally." I was so damned proud. The cool kids are showing up at my games! 

It's not like I wasn't busy before then though. There I was at GenCon. Thrown into the indy game ghetto of the third floor suites of the JW Marriott, Suite 313 to be exact. There was only one other official event in my room all four days of the convention. I was either at the end of the world or had finally gotten my corner office. Folks would come in the late evening to do open gaming and some partying as my evening games were finishing up, but for six out of my seven games I had a private setting with a great view.

Thursday's morning event was a Monsters! Monsters!/Tunnels & Trolls session called "Off the Rez." I had not prepared the pregenerated Characters for the session, so we did a quick roll up. The group were a band of goblins, but I forgot modify their Stats because, you know, GM busy-ness. Most of my listed encounters were pretty much overpowered, but we concentrated antics and storyline instead. The players were downright rebellious in disregarding my leads, but were being hilarious. The ten or so players were a pleasant mix of teenagers, folks, in their 20s, and a couple of guys close to my age, which happens to have been my target audience for this event. I met Todd Petersen the author "Raganrok Tunnels" for DT&T as well. Awarding the copy of M!M! signed by Ken St Andre to one of the players was only a part of my salesmanship. I hoped to be spreading some sales of all things Tunnels-ish. Of course, I'd find out an hour later that Flying Buffalo did not show up to Indy-- typical luck me.

My Thursday night game "Night of the Cryptids II: Bigfoot Babies" was surprisingly a wash. But I demoed the Crawlspace system to three guys from Peoria, Illinois. I'd run into them throughout the week. We have plans for the Wednesday night party next year.  I'd get the email from the folks that had bought the tickets telling me that they couldn't show up later in the night.

On Friday I ran my homebrew Gotham City PD Major Crimes "Two Jokers in the Deck" to a full house. Major Crimes is a whole lot of fun for me. This group of players was especially creative. The plot developed nicely as well as the climax of session being a really big bang. Because of their antics during the course of play, I have some ideas for next year. It's going to quite a production. This will be because of these guys. 

"The Horrible Fate of the Haunted House Hunters" went great. This repeat of a favorite Crawlspace event, just goes great every running. This year the Deputy's Player, Brennan would get the killing started early. My NPC, pervy-douchy Tom died from an accidental shotgun blast, though the PCs would not know this for a few scenes yet. Oh that Delaney Mansion gets 'em every time.

Crawlspace's "The Sleep Study" was not only full, but Mister Geiger from previous years graced the scenario. I felt like I was struggling, the gang around me seemed to be enjoying themselves. While I was pretty much railroading everybody, I did keep things creepy. Nose bleeds to incest, it stayed interesting. I'd end up having beers with a new bru named Ryan and his twin brother.  Of course when I was trying to have dinner and drink with the boys, Robin would phone me. She had finally showed up and would not leave the car. It was time to go.

Saturday noon, I'd run Peryton's Crawlspace scenario "TerrorHog". Luckily there were only four players, but what players they were. One was a perfect voice actor, another was indeed a professor, the other played the indolent technician too well, and being a diva came natural to our anchorman character. The author herself would show up and play as well. I think my choices made the session as interesting as the movie (Hogzilla) that it is based off of, but Robin was there to point out everything that she thought I missed. She'd also go on to post her thoughts online. Godshead woman, no pressure or anything, eh?

The previously mentioned "Scary Monsters, Super Creeps" was awesome. Despite my weariness, I kept the players in a perpetual state of creep out. Not to brag, but I would love to see the movie that I constructed in everyone's mind on TV. It was that good of a UFO horror story.



Peryton and I would spend the rest of Saturday and Sunday, leisurely enjoying the small city of dorks that downtown Indianapolis was. And pizza. We enjoyed all sorts of pizza. She'd stay on until Monday morning. It was a wonderful culmination to my "Convention Season" this year.

VengerCon 2022: Running the Blockades

 So to my mother, dog, and clowns, I went to VengerCon. Apparently I not only supported it, I became a sponsor. Sadly, there were no goosestepping parades and burning of books by Tranny authors for me to wring my hands over and clutch my pearls. JerryTel, one of my token conservative friends, showed up as we like to do micro-cons every now and then. I had a great time.

 
On Friday, I was a little drunk by the time I started hanging out. This was more from doing pre-gen Characters for my scheduled events than needing liquid courage-- still, it was helpful. After a dinner with Venger Satanis (Darrick Dishaw) and Jerry, we jumped into the host's Friday night session of Cha'alt. I recognized the setup from the first book, I think, as we were inside a giant worm. For all the players that were there (like 11 or 12), it wasn't hard to jump in and participate in the action. I found myself sitting next to a fellow that struck me as awfully familiar. I just couldn't say where.
Afterwards, I stuck around to imbibe more drink and partake in my once-a-week-smoke with company. I met fellow gamers named Greg, Phillip, Collin, and Matt. We had a rollicking debate party, I couldn't tell you the details but it was fun.



As there were only like thirty participants, on Saturday there was no one to play in my Gangbusters scenario. Yes, the one where I worked so hard to create PCs the day before. So Jerry and I brainstormed on his unnamed game (J.U.G.) for a bit before we jumped into Ivan Richmond's Dream of the Dragon scenario. Greg and Phillip, buds from the night before, joined in. I really enjoyed how Ivan's (Eye-Man for fun) game had classic fairy-tale elements while being a hardcore dungeon crawl. As an added benefit, I loved watching the traditional D&D players, including Jerry, get frustrated over Charm spells that broke the rules so to speak.

At dinner, I invited Oakes Spalding, a fellow I'd been chatting with on Friday night as well, to jump in my Crawlspace premier of "Florida Man" . That means test run from incomplete notes by the way. JerryTel and Ivan showed up as well and we did a quick take. Worked nicely and the players felt the roleplaying drug hit their bloodstreams, my game generally does. Though it only lasted about three hours, I had a chance to sit back as a GM and watch the players move things along for almost twenty minutes. GM popcorn time, as I call these instances. I do need to work on the transitions, ties, and clues of the scenario though.

Sunday, at breakfast I finally figured out that the fellow I kept thinking I knew was James Jeffers, whom I had gamed with at North Texas Con in 2021. Our breakfasting area would turn into a gaggle of folks attending VengerCon and the restaurant staff would have to lecture us about putting chairs in their aisles. It was a fun brunch. I left early as no one was going to attending my T&T session. JerryTel left around the same time. There were though sixteen people staying to play up until the six PM closing time to the convention. It was a good time overall.

To my mother, dog, and clowns... that means to all gay, commie-ish, tranny, Christian, BLM-identifying, feministic, and pinko players that I have gamed with for years, I am especially tired of watching the RPG market just get juvenile. I am sick of gamers ostracizing people that they don't like. I am tired of the corporate type of folks doing dickish things to the creatives they work with politics being the excuse.  This does not mean that I am turning conservative the older I get. I still want single-pay healthcare, less police authority, and a decent USMNT in the World Cup one day.

I noticed, by being the open-minded liberal that I am, that Dishaw does work that is worth reading, even if it might offend you. His game-mastering is practiced. He is something of a GMs' GM. He's funny when he's being a gadfly with his "social commentary" scenarios provoking One Bookshelf. His personal politics as with a lot of his gaming colleagues which get a little delusional about some sort of day of retribution on the Cultural Marxists that tried to ban their games, gets kind of scary. Hey, though, I've watched the cottage industry veer from one pointless controversy to another, and they're actually never the same. The day of reckoning of Right V. Left isn't going to happen, sorry to both sides of the schism here. Nope no civil war, just a changing market. I am for more indy games, so I don't people who think they know better than me, telling me who to game with and who not to.

To paraphrase myself (the original quote is, "If you don't watch Santa Claus Versus the Martians the Communists win"), if I didn't support Venger, the corporates win.

Memphis For a Bit

Outside of the vendors' area, it was a typical trip to the South. Great food, dismal accommodations, all served up with exaggerated manners. But that was not the case when dealing with the Joe Bob Brigg's 2022 Jamboree managing team, Humble Enterprises. Peryton had sent me a link in late May to this TV show fans get-together. We hadn't had a date in a while and she had just released Crawlspace: 21 and Over, so I suggested we do a booth. She tried to play hard to get for about fifteen minutes. Next thing I know she was purchasing tee-shirts, baseball caps, and carry bags all with TerrorHog plastered all over them. We were able to get Charlie Flemming's film producer friend Daniel to send us a couple DVDs of Blood Freak and another movie, which I haven't watched yet so its name slips my mind, to sell. Tee-shirts and cheesy movies, we were all set up to sell roleplaying games at convention for horror movie fans.

Because of brush fires along Interstate 40, from Little Rock to Memphis, we showed up about fifteen minutes before the hordes of fandom were allowed to rush into the venue. I set up stuff in a very organized fashion, but didn't put much creativity into it-- I had been driving since 10pm EST the night before from Indianapolis with only a nap between Northwest Arkansas and Mississippi Valley. Things were a little slow but Peryton and I had some catching up to do. Sales, though, weren't bad.

Throughout the rest of the weekend, we made friends and sold product.  Peryton spent a good bit of Saturday being a fan girl and getting photos and autographs. Chants of "Hogzilla! Hogzilla! Hogzilla!" would tend to break out when she was in an area. The movies and merchandise were there to attract the non-roleplayers, I mean the ones that play with dice. A common joke at the table all weekend went like this,

Me: Do you roleplay?
(Customer, dressed like Vampira/Spike, raises an eyebrow)
Me: I mean on a table.
(Customer raises both eyebrows)
Me: ...with pencils and dice.
Customer: Oh that kind...
Me: (Leering) Well, we don't use dice.
Still plenty of RPG buffs showed up for demonstrations of Crawlspace. Plenty just walked up and asked which books should they buy. Sales were good. Both the lady and I were surprised at how helpful the people running the event were.

This was one of the few conventions where I stayed longer than I should've on Sunday. Chatting up neighboring vendors and a couple celebrities, I was sad to leave a couple of hours early to start the six hour drive back to the abode. Showing up at work Monday morning, I had to admit I was refreshed despite the long drives and the work of selling product.
Next year, I am going to try and set up a couple Crawlspace events though. I'll call them "Improvs". Get my real game on.

As Time Goes By, July 2 2022

 The T&T campaign for Wizards is still ongoing
It's at the halfway point according to my paperwork. Not that that means anything in terms of the tabletopping. After being attacked by yet again another gug and then a batch of what can only be described as dream goblins and a pumpkin-head beast, I have been able to start dropping clues as to the great mystery of the scenario. The PCs Max Kitch, Zel (short for zomething or anozer), and Jazon have started to climb the Starry Tower and have discovered eleven Stargazer adepts trapped within the walls of their living areas.
Looking at my notes, once again, I down with the normal stuff. Not that much of what has happened has been very typical.

The Spacers games might be alternating with Wobble
I always have a lot of notes that I make that I can apply to the Wobble settings. Ben was not able to make it to the last Sci-Fi Saturday session, so Iron Curtis and Peryton agreed to jump back into the Tau Verse with their Characters, Professor Rudy and Daisy Adair. Their albatross-class wobble-boat was attacked by pirates but saved by Banana-boat fighters patrolling the area that they were in.
The Spacers is still going on, but spacefaring sci-fi and gonzo sci-fi just makes life so much richer to me.

Venger Satanists Defeats Abortion for OSR Gamers
To be flip, I've watched the GM/Author Darrick Dishaw do Provocateur Publishing with some adeptness over the last month, maybe six weeks-- my real counting is focused elsewhere on matters of money concerning me. 

Talks about Family-Values after mass shootings, but a GM/Author that understands working

He's taken the advice from many of self-assumed betters in the OSR telling him to not be so... well, topical and said "fuck off." Venger, as he's colloquially known, has taken events from the headlines of the real world and produced scenarios pretty much to meant to be stricken down by the main provider of roleplaying PDFs, One Bookshelf (often called OBS(WTF?) ). True to Kortthalis Publishing standards, Christian values, as pedaled by a guy with the name Satan in his nickname, were referenced in two works. And guess what? They were taken down. The controversy continued along its manufactured vector with a bag-gas collection of commentators calling themselves OSR complaining about OBS's "editorial policies".
The folks at OBS, much easier to type than One Bookshelf P (Publishing, PDF-providing, Productions... et al), err onebookshelf.com, went into reactionary mode and came up with contributing authors' guidelines about not doing what Venger is doing. They called it "Hostile Marketing." They also went on to include author's blog posts and other media presence to be a basis for exclusion from their sales outlet. Which gave more voice to many more artists of the RPG field to raise their voice, and rekindle their media presence, to the controversy. As it stands to date, Venger's second inflammatory work, something about Gay Pride month, was accepted, as long as there were some edits. I can't wait to read print copies of both works. I'm not downloading that sort of shit onto my PC though.
For the cottage industry of RPG what does it all mean?
Hell, it's sales. But does it sell?

Meanwhile, this happened

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/401229/Crawlspace-21-and-Over

Robin, that's Peryton, has worked with Beckett, Beckett Warren, to take a lot of material and make the sexiest version of the Crawlspace game to date. A lot of that a lot has been by me. This stuss has built up for the years of Crawlspacing at tabletops with me as the Producer/Director of many of the gigs. I think that is why she included me as a coauthor. You all should buy about 20 print copies each.

Remember this Independence Day folks, that you have nine more fingers after too much alcohol and access to gunpowder has led to a slight malfunction. Don't be a wuss, but this time have someone hold your beer.

A World a Week, or so: Frog Bog (first glimpse)

 

So, before titles...

If only campaigns formed like yarns coming together to make a Christmas sweater. Instead they usually come from something on the outside world, that Real one, getting my attention to suddenly granting a cool image in my head. This one started coming to me while driving past a temporary bog along a highly industrial area in late April. Because of some very warm temperatures, the frogs were out in enough numbers to overcome the noise of the area as well as my work van. The trees and the water from snow melt and rain in the near 90 degree weather had a fresh smell that for a couple days overcame the oily smell of the neighborhood. And then the words "frogs" and "bog" popped into my head and now Frog Bog is on my mind.

At least since the late 80s, I suppose, I have been always doing Monsters! Monsters! writing. This has gone from animal-headed humanoids as beat up monsters, to the inclusion, these more recent days, of talking animals. Of course, coming from a Tunnels & Trolls and Runequest perspective of the Old School Gamer (an OG of the OSG, hee hee), having some ready notes for the Player-Character that someone just had to play has lead to some long notebooks filled with Monsterkin (Monster-Kin) cultures and liked environments.

When it comes to amphibious species, I've been making scribbles in my "Surf and Turf" file for years now anyway. But most of the Kin involved have been either the undersea sorts or the avian and crustaceans along the cliffs and beaches along seas and shores of really big lakes. Believe it or not, I never had my head around frog-heads beyond one shot monsters here and there. So inspired by their beautiful voices singing away the winter residue, I came up with "Boggers."

A month later, once again at work, I came across two hatchling birds that survived their nest tumbling into a parking lot. This prompted me to use my floppy hat as an improvised replacement. They then had to survive on a mixture of coffee creamer and crushed crackers through a pipette every fifteen to twenty minutes as I continued my job, until I could buy some puppy chow and dissolve it into water to make a proper gruel for them. They fell asleep at sundown. A couple of hours after sunrise and many feedings the next day I was able to get them to avian sanctuary. So now the human-like "The Grackles" worked their way into this world.
So I had a bog and needed very, very big trees. Plus a climate suited for the survival of frogs and little birds that pulled at my heart-strings and instinctive life saving skills. Hot and steamy-- I sweated forever with those grackles, but keeping them alive was worth every second-- this new place where Frog Bog was to be. Down south near the Gulf is where I can think of.

So this last weekend during my soccer games, I got tired of typing and did this map. Don't let the trees fool you. They're bigger than redwoods and the map scale is roughly eighteen by thirty miles. There also being a sea gives me some room for some saltwater baddies like Clawdads and Kuda. Heck throw in some polluting humans and hungry Hissers (crocodile-heads) to keep things balanced in a savage sort of way. So my delicate Monsterkin have a little space to begin their sagas. Just need to finish up my Wizards campaign first...

More time to get a few more notes for Frog Bog.

Times At the Table: More Arshoon T&T

 In part four, Zeluria, Max Kitch, and Jazen encountered not only the Lying Fish but the Truthful Goat. During this session, I was paying homage to all the times while playing D&D the GM would throw in "important" encounters with clues as to the Player-Characters' upcoming adventure. Given the open ended nature of real RPG sessions, outside of giving away the scoops of the campaign, I couched everything in cryptic uttering by the fish and then later the goat would give a more direct interpretation that was still vague. It was like slathering a VHS pachage with peanut butter and calling it a mystery box. I had to introduce Itchy the retired Goblin for the players to finally catch on that the water coming down from the stream where the tower is to the village of Sturach was tainted with a substance that even the fish in it were waiting to be netted to be lifted to the tributary where Lying Fish made his home. One of the Players thought to maybe drain their water skins-- I about had a heart attack.

This last session, the trio of Wizards and their Warrior escort made it to the tower itself. There was no one to greet the caravan at the gates of the compound, indeed they were open and the guard booth empty. They found the grounds around the structure in disarray. The horses and donkeys from the stables were all roaming around and foraging from stacks of hay and local foliage. While work tools were placed where they would at the end of the day, many had fallen over, as happens due to wind, and not been replaced.  

The banged on the double doors to the Tower's ground floor many times, before Ziv "Radnik" Radovsky the Wizard that is the quartermaster opened the door. Of course his demeanor was abnormal and he seemed distracted. When Max asked him, where should they put the supplies that they had brought, the NPC replied, with obvious fear in his voice, "They must go into THE CELLAR!" And with that he fled up the stairs going into the higher reaches of the Starry Tower.

Our intrepid heroes looked at one another and shrugged. They then shed their peasant clothing to get back into their wizard attire--these things are important when you're a spellcaster. Kitch stayed upstairs with  the guards, while Brock (NPC), Zel and Jazon checked out the mentioned cellar. And they found a whole lot of nothing but they did find a SUB-Cellar. Opening the trapdoor to it, they knocked over a glass vial But I didn't the two Players think much of it. Instead I focused their attention on the marvelous library of books, parchments, and other things that was in there.

Zel would find a treatise explaining the form of the universe itself. Jazon would learn a spell. Meanwhile Brock would be running upstairs yelling about how the two mages were unconscious downstairs. Kitch quickly got there to see what the heck was happening.

 After waking up both of the wizards that went downstairs, apparently having been gassed by a sleeping potion, Kitch listened to their tales. They group would have concluded that Zel and Jazon were merely dreaming, until the shadrakar (handsome furry), performed the spell that he learned in his "dream". Casting a Detect Magic, the Boyar saw, some epic GM flourish, that the subcellar was a junction of many mystical portals.

It was getting late in the day. The group back to the upstairs entrance level and decided to start resting for the night. Wun and Tree were left downstairs to keep an eye on the subcellar. Everybody in the "lobby" was just getting comfortable, Brock was making awkward passes at Zel just as the yells started coming from the cellars...