Update on planning session 1 #10

D&D, RPG, session planning


SPOILER ALERT TO MY ADVENTURERS! The following post contains spoilers for the up and coming campaign. You may want to avoid this post and join me in a future one.

You know when you get something like an ear worm or an idea that you just can’t stop thinking about?

That’s how it’s been for me the last couple of days over the distances my players will be travelling in session 1. Just how long will it take for them to sail from Saltmarsh and the Angrath’s pirate island base?

I kept thinking that it would take about 14 days or more. Once I remembered that the map had a scale on it. Yeah I know I’m slow and old. I dug out my physical copy of the Sword Coast Adventurers Guide turned to the area map and roughly measured the distance. They were closer than I thought. I estimated 350 – 400 miles.

Referring to the Ghosts of Saltmarsh appendix A the stats block for a keelboat says it travels at 3mph or 72 miles per day.

With some quick simple maths I put the travel time to 5-6 days. Considerably quicker than I had initially thought.

I then looked at Mintarn and the islands around it, which is where session 2 and potentially session 3 are taking place. It looks like a days travel at most from Mintarn to any of the islands (that isn’t the northern 2 islands the players ended up on, they are about a day and a half away).

The upshot now is that when I look at the map I can make a rough estimate of the distance between places.

I started listening to Rising Tide by Mel Odom, which is the first volume in the The Threat From the Sea trilogy. It’s got me thinking that the party will be bumping in to sahuagin early on.

I have one or two options or adventure ideas. The first is a D&D Beyond Encounter Of The Week. Which is “a combat encounter in which the characters must prove themselves as worthy gladiators to escape the clutches of a ruthless sahuagin baron.” This encounter acts as a follow up to the encounter I’m borrowing for my session 1, the group skill challenge. However this could be dropped anywhere in the campaign.

I also like the idea of the sahuagin attacking the party while at sea. Similar to the attack described in Rising Tide. This would see the sahuagin using a manta. Which is an oblong barge made up from wood salvaged from shipwrecks. This would be a ship to ship combat. In fact this idea could lead into that encounter of the week.

I also like the idea of malenti. Which are mutated sahuagin that look like sea elves. The malenti are often used to spy on said sea elves. I want the party to have dealings with sea elves, and having them stumble upon a malenti spy, and a sahuagin plot of some sort would be a cool thing to explore.

The idea of having the sahuagin, or a group of them terrorising towns and communities along a stretch of coast line, and having the party sort it out also seems a good idea.

Also inspired by Rising Tide and the attack on Waterdeep the party might feel the wrath of a dragon turtle.

Which once again could lead into the encounter of the week. Or have different repercussions for the party. Seeing the party shipwrecked and leading into another adventure idea, say The Jurassic Park/Ixalan based island.

In the photo above I decided to recreate the opening of the campaign and session 1. Naturally the miniatures will be different. But it gives an idea.

I pre-calculated the passive perception for my players, and with the exception of one, the values are either 11 or 12. I just have the image of the party wandering around oblivious to what’s going on around them. While that one player with a value of 16 is saying “did you see that?” Or “how did you miss that?”

I’m so glad I brain dump in these posts. It might be boring for everyone else. Plus maybe some-one might find it interesting.

Second best

Uncategorized

I’m starting this post off with a photo or two of Attack Chihuahua number two Loki snuggled up on my lap as he patiently waits for mum to wake up next door and let her dogs out. As soon as the backdoor opens he will be round there, and snuggled up with Nan quicker than a Tory MP pocketing the cash from their banker overlords.

So what is this post about?

That was it, just sharing a doggy picture today.

Update on planning session 1 #9

D&D, RPG, session planning

SPOILER ALERT TO MY ADVENTURERS! The following post contains spoilers for the up and coming campaign. You may want to avoid this post and join me in a future one.

So I have painted the well that was printed off for me. I had run out of primer which put a stop on doing the boat tiles themselves.

But once finished I decided to knock up another part of the dungeon. Which is the photo below.

I did eventually get my hands on more primer (probably not nearly enough) and have sprayed an initial batch of boat tiles.

It was annoying me that I had enough pirate figures, or ones that can be used as pirates, but they needed trimming and gluing. So I finally caved and ordered a cheap model builders kit off Amazon that got me the needed clippers. It also got me a mini self healing mat for cutting stuff on, a scalpel with spare blades and a file.

So Saturday evening I spent clipping and gluing to make the pirates/vikings. This really is my least favourite part of the hobby. How anyone gets enjoyment from this I don’t know.

However Sunday was spent painting the miniatures. I only finished 2 completely because they were the least complicated. The others are in various stages of painting.

I had decided early on whilst I was painting I would concentrate on the models I needed for the first session, and leave the ones that appear much later to last. However as I painted the models in the stages, ie applied the Viking blue to all those that were going to have that colour, or apply the barbarian flesh colour to the models all of a sudden apart from some hair Angrath is almost complete and just needs washes and dry brushing.

It appears that the players have a date for our first session now. Boy has that been like extracting teeth. I’m glad I put the onus on them to make the decision. It was painful to watch them discussing it. I would have been infuriated if I had been trying to arrange it. The whole “I’m thinking of a number, can you guess it?” part of the process I find so frustrating.

I have shared a copy of an excel spreadsheet with the players that summarises the players characters stats.

I have asked them to check the information and let me know of any corrections. One or two of them the hand writing is hard to decipher.

While I was in excel I decided to start to populate the encounters with creatures. I just need to copy the stats across, pre-roll the initiative (to speed combat up a little) and work out the passive perception.

I’ve also been doing minor updates to the other planning notes, like finally setting a DC level for the locked doors. I added a couple of items to the treasure room, one of which is cursed!

I’m also getting inspiration for one or two of the adventure hooks. There was a recent Encounter of the Week on D&D Beyond that uses a skill challenge to navigate successfully through a wilderness. This would be a great way for the party to navigate through the wood covered part (which is most of it) of Mintarn to locate the secret cave of the Ironstar Dwarves.

On the model front I will try and get some viking villagers, put an order in with my guy for the 3D stuff for some 3D trees, and some viking huts. I might try and get some generic figures that can be used as ship crew and townsfolk.

That’s the thing about this part of the Forgotten Realm. There is two real distinct groups of humans. One is viking influenced, whilst the other is more medieval European. There are definitely elven and dwarven communities as well in the area. And they will break down into at least a couple of sub races, like sea elves for example.

Other races will be present but as enclaves within the major settlements.

So when it comes to models to get, I know that I have a focus on the prominent races of the area.

That’s the progress I’ve made on planning and prep since the last update.

Goatnapped!

Game day, magic, MtG

Yesterday was the hottest day of the year so far.

There was only one way to spend the day. Indoors playing MtG at my FLGS The Hobbit Hole’s Open House event.

The last couple of days I’ve been on a lucky streak. In the two new Planeswalker decks I bought I got a Leyline of Sanctity, in my Modern Horizons packs, a foil squirrel token, pain land and an Unbound Flourishing (recouped the cost of the packs back in that card alone), a new Karn in the War of the Spark boosters.

The Leyline is needed for my Standard deck, whilst the Unbound Flourishing is going straight into my big green stompy Commander deck.

Naturally I was wearing the coolest tee of the day at my FLGS. Yep I had the card Ferocious Pup made into a tee. I had hoped the white would have come out better. It looked distressed at best. But otherwise I was happy with the rest of it.

I went with the new Green Welcome deck. Which was fortunate because after loosing a game with it against Kar-Fai. I was able to trade the Aggressive Mammoth that is in the deck with Kar-Fai for the Reckless Air Strike he pulled from the booster in his Planeswalker deck. I wanted the card to go in my mono red goblins Commander deck that I was about to use.

Other new cards in the deck were the new Krenko, and Goatnap. The new Krenko was also being tested as the Commander.

Our four player Commander game was great fun. Naturally being goblins I was quick off the mark, and was basically the major threat. But after Elesh Norn hit the battlefield that was me scuppered. As was the Markov vampire deck. Until that card was removed it basically stopped me playing any goblins, or creating tokens. During that period of being locked down, Dean and his Atraxa super friends deck started to get really powerful with a few Planeswalkers out and firing off their abilities.

Luckily I got an Immortal Sun out, not early enough. But at the right moment to stop him ultimating them and winning the game. It then became in the interest of the other players to keep me alive and locking out those Planeswalkers.

Once Dean had been removed, ok killed. I didn’t last much longer despite firing off a board wipe.

But earlier in the game I did get to use Goatnap to steal Elesh Norn. That was pretty cool.

It was a fun Commander game. With the usual ebb and flow. We introduced a new player to the format. Got to play cool cards.

Afterwards I got to play test my not Standard deck (well not for another 2 weeks) with 2 copies of leylines in it, and a third Nissa. The decks I played against were not competitive enough for a Showdown. They were nowhere fast enough compared to say Dean’s Dino deck, or the red burn decks. So not really a test for the deck.

Naturally the FLGS sold out of all their Planeswalker decks. Mainly to existing players though. It’s that booster pack from Core Set 2020 in each Planeswalker deck. Early early access to the cards.

I had a really great day playing MtG. This was a fun Open House.

When I got home the model clippers had arrived. Which allowed me to do my least favourite part of the miniatures hobby. Cutting and gluing models together.

So I put the Viking warriors together, and not shown the Viking berserkers.

Everything was then primed ready for painting. Which I started today. But more about that in another post.

Wine and Cities

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night at the Fenland Gamers temporary home for gaming we held a Friday evening gaming session.

Our main game of the evening was a long over due to the table favourite of both Jonathan and myself, Viticulture.

Checking with my game stats this hasn’t hit the table for 14 months. I like that the app I use allows me to check this sort of thing out (I have about 4 years worth of data now). However in situations like this you can’t help feeling guilty when you see just how long it is between plays of games you really like.

We played just the basic essentials version (without any Tuscany stuff other than that included in this edition already) plus the Moorland Visitors shuffled in. Although funny story Jonathan asked about that whilst we were playing and I had no idea. But Jonathan recognised one or two of the cards. So they must have been shuffled in!

Jonathan won with a no wine production strategy. Gaining that victory point each turn from the turn order track, and various visitor cards. I think he completed a single order. I finished a whole 4 points behind him, which an extra couple of actions would have been closed and forcing the tie breakers. I’m not sure the usual suspect really got the harvest/wine/order side of the game. He came in a far and distant last.

Such a great, great game.

Our second and last game of the evening was Citadels.

Now I won this. But an interesting question happened at the end. I triggered the end of the game with 7 buildings. However on the final turn of the round Jonathan was the warlord and destroyed one of my buildings. It wasn’t clear whether Jonathan destroying my building stopped the end of the game or we finished and scored.

I ruled the game ended, because it had been triggered on my turn. And there wasn’t anything that said otherwise. And that Jonathan was only denying me points in the end scoring.

A great evening gaming, with classics hitting the table, one long overdue. And thanks to Jonathan for the photos above.

Games Played: Viticulture, Citadels

Serious Poulp News

news

With the conclusion of the second Kickstarter for The 7th Continent (2nd Edition of the base game and a new expansion What Goes Up, Must Come Down) Serious Poulp yesterday sent some rather exciting news to fans of the game.

Let’s start with the game they are famous for. The one you can only get from Kickstarter campaigns because the game is too costly to produce for mainstream distribution, The 7th Continent.

Firstly from mid-July extra production copies of the game will be on sale from their website. “These “Collector” base boxes, expansions and game accessories will be available for sale whilst stocks last, which will vary for each geographical area. These same geographical areas may also influence when products become available.” So a chance for those that missed the Kickstarter or missed bits for whatever reason have a chance to correct that.

Next it appears that Serious Poulp have heard those contacting them about those on the internet via sites like eBay taking advantage of the games exclusivity. Or that people missed the Kickstarter’s for whatever reason and would love to be able to buy the game but can’t.

So Serious Poulp have come up with a solution that will allow them to print the game and make it cost effective to put out through regular channels. Yes that means buy it from your FLGS. Below is the image they produced showing the difference between the Kickstarter Edition aka Collector Edition and this new Classic Edition.

Some of the expansions naturally will also available and this is what they said about that.

“Parallel to this release, three expansions will also be available: “The Icy Maze”, “The Forbidden Sanctuary” and a mini expansion that will contain the introductory “The Crystal Song” curse as well as the new games modes from the “What Goes Up, Must Come Down.” Collector box. 

It goes without saying that the Kickstarter exclusive expansion “Swamp of Madness” will not be reprinted.”

So when can you get your hands on this Classic Edition? Sometime in Q4 is the plan.

That’s pretty big news. And a reasonable compromise. Hopefully fans that don’t have the game will be happy with that. But I can imagine some complaining it’s not everything. You can’t please everyone all the time.

But what of the future plans of the company? What’s next? How do Serious Poulp follow up The 7th Continent? The expansion What Goes Up, Must Come Down was their encore after all.

Well they have this awesome game engine now called Choose Your Own Path. So the natural thing to do is use it again. And that’s what Serious Poulp are doing. Their next project using the system is called The 7th Citadel.

From the email this is all the information that has been shared so far.

“The 7th Citadel will take place in a new unique “Dark Fantasy” world whose gameplay will be significantly enhanced compared to that of The 7th Continent. 

The game will be coming to Kickstarter in 2020 to allow us to continue its development and prepare a campaign that we hope will be just as exciting as those of The 7th Continent!

We’ll be back this autumn to tell you more about the game’s world and mechanics!”

This is pretty awesome news. The new theme appeals to me. I’m a fantasy fan in all it’s forms. And it will be interesting to see what enhancements they have made to the engine and game play.

As you can see that’s an exciting way to conclude a kickstarter and get fans excited about future projects. What do you think of this news?

Update on planning session 1 #8 Boat Tiles

D&D, RPG, session planning

SPOILER ALERT TO MY ADVENTURERS! The following post contains spoilers for the up and coming campaign. You may want to avoid this post and join me in a future one.

Last night I picked up the tiles that will allow me to recreate the decks of boats.

Once I was home I immediately primed the well ready for painting in the near future. I need to research painting stone walls first. Which I’ve started to do.

Naturally this morning I quickly knocked up a couple of boat layouts that I will use in the opening sessions.

The first to be put together is a small row boat (bottom boat in the photo above). Which scale wise is 10ft wide by 25ft long! So slightly bigger than a regular row boat!Assuming each square is 5ft. But I suppose I could say that the squares are 2ft.

The next boat to be put together was a version of the keelboat. I use the door to imply a wall at the end of the boat where the cabin is. The beds are a little on the large side. 10ft in length, nice roomy beds! But I’m really happy with the way it works.

Naturally I will use the inter locking clips to put these together before hand. It will make using them a lot easier.

I will need to get more tiles when I move away from single deck boats like long ships, row boats and keelboats. But that’s way down the line (for now).

One thing I would like to find are some small model boats of the ones mentioned above, plus say pirate ships that can go on a battle map to show at a larger scale the positions of boats in relation to each other. Kind of like a sea version of x-wing.

While picking up the tiles the news about our regular gaming haunt for the club and it’s ongoing refit wasn’t good. It looks like the seated area will not be completed until after the summer. Which means we will have to look at a plan b for a place to play. Which we have now. So I’ve put it back into the hands of the players to work out a date and time for our first session. I hate the whole guessing game of trying to find a date and time that works for everyone. It’s a real headache. So I’ve put the onus on them to work it out and come back to me. I’m usually free most of the time. I have no life.

On the planning front I now also have some hooks for session 2. I’ve come up with four, one I hope is sign posted enough that if they go for it will result in a tpk most likely. But you’d expect that if they took on a red dragon! One of the hooks even ties in with a couple of the players back stories. I’m feeling proud of that one.

But it does mean I can’t really plan session 3 until I know which hook the players want to follow. So once session 2 has finished I have a bit of work ahead of me before session 3 starts.

In the meantime I have a lot of brown paint to slap on some tiles.

Core Set 2020 Open House This Weekend

magic, MtG

It’s that time of year once again when WotC try and tempt new and returning players to the game with the promise of free MtG decks, and promo cards.

Ok the promo card part has changed. They have gone and are now replaced with the new Promo Packs. I can’t see anyone getting a whole Promo Pack for attending a Welcome event. We are more likely going to see one or two of these opened up and the cards inside given out individually as a promo for attending.

Apparently this is better!

I do believe that your FLGS will also be able to sell the 5 new Planeswalker decks this weekend as well. Which makes sense for new players, who have just learnt to play and want to buy a deck. They are fine for casual play. But I wouldn’t use one in FNM or Not Standard Showdown. The deck wouldn’t be competitive enough. I’d be looking at the new Challenger decks for that.

Anyway I know my FLGS The Hobbit Hole will be holding their Core Set 2020 Open House this Saturday. Also at mid day they will be holding a Not Standard Showdown event as well.

Core Set 2020 Spoilers I Like

magic, MtG

So here it is the post you have all been dreading.

I should give some sort of disclaimer for this post. It’s not as if I know what I’m talking about. As the title of this post says, these are cards I like, and in one or two cases may be a little unsure about. They are definitely cards I can see going into my decks, or building decks around.

I’m starting off with the card that I just love the art on. I think everyone is talking about the card just on the art alone. Ferocious Pup. Beautiful, beautiful art. Great flavour text. 0/1 isn’t amazing. But with a card later on it gets a buff, plus you get a 2/2 wolf token (which would also get that boost). If this cards art is not on a playmat then all those companies that sell official MtG playmats are fools. I want this as a playmat.

It seems the poster child for Core Set 2020 is Chandra. I like Chandra. So I’m down with that. But we are getting 3 Chandra Planeswalkers in this this set. There is a strong elemental tribal theme to this set. Or that’s the impression I am getting. Which might be something I explore for Showdown.


There are one or two cards in Core Set that are linked with Chandra. I like the Regulator. Doubling Awakening Inferno’s +2 ability seems broken. Two of them emblems a turn. Ouch! I like the Embercat, a 2/2 for 2. Pretty standard, but having it give mana that can get a Chandra or Elemental out early is nice. Scheming Symmetry, I like this card a lot. It’s obviously aimed at Commander players. The politics this will enable at the table. This may just find a home in all my decks that have black in them.

Thought Distortion, the card that every blue and red deck will come to fear. All those counter spells, card draws, lightning bolts etc sitting in the graveyard. All those cards that allow you to play them again from the graveyard, gone. I like this. Flame Sweep is a card that screams adding to my dragon tribal deck. It’s a token spam board wipe basically. Unless they have been buffed. The flavour text is great too. I imagine that quote wouldn’t have been out of place in A Game of Thrones. Dragon Mage I like for my dragon commander deck also. Not cheap, 7 CMC for a 5/5 flyer. But I think it could be irritating as heck with people having to discard and draw all the time. It shouldn’t be hard to the damage through.

Three contenders for my mono white angel deck.

Ok here is the deadline for the set, Leylines are back! This will hopefully push the price down. My Standard deck would love a playset of Leyline of Sanctity in it. Actually with the new London Mulligan rule kicking in with this set, might be able to get away with less. But shutting down burn decks, YES! Add Leyline of Anticipation to the deck for the flash ability to everything. It’s going to be so interesting to see how these impact the meta.

Bishop of Wings, I like for my angel deck. Not an angel granted. But it gives me a benefit for playing angels.

More recruits for my mono red goblin deck. Destructive Digger and Treasure Nabber out at the same time, I’m calling shenanigans. I just love the idea of sacrificing an opponents artifact to help pay for drawing a card. I can imagine their face as it’s done. It also means that threat unless they can stop the combo will slow them down. Reckless Air Strike has a goblin on it, so it qualifies for the deck just like Goatnap did from Modern Horizons. Goblin Bird-Grabber love the art with the goblin hanging on for dear life on the leg of some giant flying creature.

There are a handful of dinosaurs in Core Set 2020. Thrashing Brontodon is reprinted (and not included here). But these new ones I like. Amazing art on Rotting Regisaaur, and a 3CMC for a 7/6 – wot?!!!!! That’s broken. Or is it? It does mean at the start of your upkeep you have to discard a card. Is that a big enough draw back to stop this? I’m not sure. And once again the flavour text. Marauding Raptor is another I like the flavour text on. It’s also the first part of an infinite loop! Team this up with Polyraptor (that is strangely out of stock in a lot of places at the mo) and you go infinite forcing a draw. Unless you can break out of the loop at instant speed. If you have that then things get very silly indeed. It’s definitely going in my dino tribal deck. It reduces the cost of dinos for starters! Be prepared if you are a MtG Arena player seeing one of the two cards in this combo banned. Shifting Ceratops is greens answer to blue control. Is it better than the out going Carnage Tyrant? Close call I think.

Ancestral Blade is going into my token spam deck. Gives me a token and buffs it. That middle green card below, yeah the 8/7 for 6 CMC is Gargos, Vicious Warden. The translation of the card text says it’s a Legendary Creature – Hydra, with Vigilance, and Hydra spells you cast cost 4 less. Whenever a creature you control becomes the target of a spell, Gargos, Vicious Warden fights up to one target creature you don’t control. Obviously this card is going in my big green stompy deck. That has one or two hydras in it. Villis is a demon that would fit nicely in a demon deck or the Kaalia of the Vast Commander deck that I have.

Lotus Field will be a Commander staple. It also fits in nicely with Lord Windgrace decks, Muldrotha and cards that allow you to play lands from the graveyard. The middle card is Icon of Ancestry. It’s a tribal card, because you chose a creature type when it enters the battlefield. It gives creatures of that type +1/+1. Then for 3 mana you can tap it, look at the top 3 cards, reveal a creature of the type chosen and put it in your hand. The remaining cards go on the bottom of the library. I think this is a nice tribal card that gives that buff, and allows you to find a creature card. Steel Overseer is going to go into my planned artifact deck.

Especially when it gets combined with Manifold Key. Nightpack Ambusher I like, and it turns that cute little pup into a 1/2. Plus if you don’t cast a spell you get a 2/2 wolf token. Woodland Champion is going into my token spam deck, plus my elf deck. This has the potential to get huge in those decks.

Raise the alarm is also another candidate for the token spam deck. Vampire of the Dire Moon I like for an aggro deck that splashes black. Which I have been known to build. I’ve only included one as an example but scry lands are back.

I can see this Sorin Planeswalker doing very nicely in the Edgar Markov commander deck. Yarok is a nice card for a deck I plan to build that abuses ETB effects. Mu Yanling, hello super friends. Her ultimate is insane. It’s nice her +2 takes care of a flyer so you can block it with a none flying creature.

I like Season of Growth. Not sure how playable it is though. Legion’s End that is just mass token removal for 2 CMC. Dungeon Geists I love it’s ability to lock down a creature.

Pulse of Murasa I like, life gain and get a card back from the graveyard. Kaalia, Zenith Seeker is going to allow you to get that perfect card to use with Kaalia of the Vast. I want to like Golos but I’m not sure.

Rule of Law obviously a candidate for my Death and Taxes deck. Voracious Hydra naturally Big Green Stompy. But this with something like doubling season out could be insanely big. Veil of Summer I think could be a powerful card in the right circumstances.

And that folks is all he wrote about the spoilers for Core Set 2020. What cards did you like from the spoilers?

Update on planning session 1 #7

D&D, RPG, session planning

SPOILER ALERT TO MY ADVENTURERS! The following post contains spoilers for the up and coming campaign. You may want to avoid this post and join me in a future one.

Spent the morning researching Mintarn for the campaign. As you can see from the scribbled on map below my party will be ending up on a couple of the islands that make up a nine island archipelago that Mintarn is also part of.

Initial thoughts had been free the adventures had somehow got a “lift” from the fisherman they would be taken to Kythyss. Where they would take part in the big festival etc.

But after some pondering and looking at the map. It seemed more logical that the fisherman would want rid of the adventurers as quick as possible, and they would more likely also to be heading for Mintarn anyway.

So the fisherman are going to be dropping the party off at the smaller of the two settlements on Mintarn, Queen’s Cove.

There is a great Dungeon magazine supplement I found that although not Forgotten Realms specific, had a section in it that allows you to set it in the realm. As luck would have it the guidance given puts it straight on Mintarn. That’s where I got the info about the two settlements on the island. And that there is a single road connecting the two. Also the island is covered in trees. Picking up the town map for Mintarn should be easy as the above supplement mentions that the map used for the adventure in Dungeon 131 is for a town called Alhaster and is used for the city map for Mintarn. I’ve just to come up with a small basic town map for Queen’s Cove. And that is going to be much quicker and easier than doing Mintarn itself.

Over on the Forgotten Realms wiki for Mintarn there is a nice legend that can be used whilst the adventurers are on Mintarn.

So I’m going to use that as an adventure hook, along with planting ones for the 3 other islands in the archipelago. I’m not sure what those hooks are at the moment. There will be a fifth hook as well. That hook will be for the island Skadaurak, and it’s occupant Hoondarrh the red dragon. Although that hook will be very well sign posted that taking on Hoondarrh is way beyond them at the moment.

As you can see I’ve also given Vraska and her pirates an island base now. Although it’s a while before the adventurers will meet her.

I look at the map for that area of the Forgotten Realms which is basically the Moonshae Isles, and there is sooo much to do, explore etc. That’s not taking into account any of my ideas.

A good source of background info and ideas is the Adventurers League Rising Shadows : Moonshae Isles Regional Guide. There are also 3 adventures that go along with this that you can also buy.

With all those islands there are plenty of homes for my ideas. Such as a Jurassic Park/Ixalan inspired island, lost/forgotten tribes/races, Greek myth inspired. Plus under sea adventures on top of that.

I’m hoping that overtime we will get to scratch more than just the surface of the possibilities this part of the Forgotten Realms offers. It’s such a rich part of the world to explore.

As the above new comic book series by IDW Comics A Darkened Wish will show. The bottom half of the cover is how I imagine our party to be at the start of their adventure. Except that jetty is in Saltmarsh, and they are about to get onto a keelboat and head off into the unknown.