4Ward/FrankenFourth: Age of Worms, Episode 408

Cast

• Humal (level 6 wrathful cambion wizard)
• Corzale (level 6 dwarf war cleric)
• Sumia (level 6 elf rogue/ranger)
• Abby (charmed doppelganger)

Summary

Once Corzale returned from the temple, the party plotted their next course of action. Assuming Abby was telling the truth, the creator of the doppelgangers was hiding in the sewers underneath a blacksmith's shop known as the Cold Forge. Even better, Abby could both lead them directly there and provide intelligence on what to expect within.

But, before they could leave someone unexpectedly knocked on their door. Reasonably assuming the worst, Sumia and Corzale hid while Humal answered it, his cockatrice skeleton more or less hidden under a tarp nearby and poised to strike. He was surprised but not at all relieved when he opened the door and found a lone woman standing there.

She wanted to know more about the incriminating documents that Humal had dropped off the previous day. Near as Abby could tell she wasn't a doppelganger, so Humal explained that they found them in a warehouse filled with doppelgangers and worse, and instructed Abby to reveal its true form to illustrate just what a doppelganger was. This did little more than frighten the woman; after all, Humal dropped off the documents and had one of the creatures at his command, so who was to say he wasn't behind it all?

Corzale and Sumia emerged from the other room. They probably intended to support Humal's claims, but ended up making things worse until the woman saw Corzale's holy symbol of Bell-Amaranth. Apparently familiar with the dwarven god of war, nature, and healing, she relaxed and introduced herself as Athala.

While discussing whether she could accompany them  into the sewers, Corzale and Sumia noticed a half-dozen figures skulking about the other room. Athala tried to explain that they were simply her bodyguards, which might have worked had not five revealed themselves to be doppelgangers by transforming their limbs into weapons and slaughtering the sixth. One of them told Athala to flee and warn the master, but she barely got out the door before Sumia loosed an arrow. It struck her in the leg, both immobilizing and revealing her to not be a doppelganger, what with all the blood spraying out.

Humal commanded his cockatrice to retrieve her, and then instructed an illusionary chair to help the rest of his companions fend off their would-be assassins. Once three of the five doppelgangers were slain the other two fled, presumably to warn "the master" themselves. Corzale bandaged up Athala, who had fallen unconscious at some point, probably due to blood loss. Not wanting to drag her about the sewers, they sealed her up in a coffin and hid it, figuring that they could attend to her later.

Abby led the way to the Cold Forge and determined through...bloody means that the blacksmith wasn't a doppelganger. Unfortunately, this rendered the blacksmith more hostile than usual, forcing them to find another way into the sewers, but only after Humal bribed him with a handful of gold pieces to keep him from fetching the guard. Luckily, Abby knew of several nearby entrances, and after a few minutes they found themselves at a fungus-caked breach in the sewer wall.

Beyond, said Abby, was the lair of its creator.

Design Notes

This was a shorter session than usual, as we had internet problems (lag, robot-voicing, disconnections, etc) and a few of the players weren't feeling too well. We did get a chance to talk shop about various Dungeon World things (something Jacob is working on and the therianthrope, which won the previous class vote), plus something more system agnostic.

We'd made several changes to the FrankenFourth public playtest document. Specifically, wizards now have an at-will/cantrip attack (based on a public poll that nearly half were in favor of), twice as much mana as they did before (based on a playtest where a 2nd-level evoker-wizard knocked herself out after casting two spells), gain bonus talents at certain levels, and Evoker no longer generates light (that got moved to Conjurer).

Clerics had their Favor nudged down a point, fighters got some tweaks, and sorcerers will need to at least have their mana updated because part of their shtick is having more magic juice than wizards.

Announcements

If you're curious about FrankenFourth and/or Dungeons & Delvers, you can find public alpha documents here and here respectively.

A Sundered World is out (and also available in dead-tree format)! If you for some reason don't want the entire setting, you can just snag the races and classes.

The Paladin is also available!

By fan demand, we've mashed all of our 10+ Treasure volumes into one big magic item book, making it cheaper and more convenient to buy in print (which you can now do).