Johann’s Talomir Nights, episode 1

The best way to learn the game being to play it, I did that.

I’d just finished re-reading the WFRP Old World Bestiary, and was taken with the example NPC in the Slaughter Margin section; so decided to make a Warrior adventurer from Altengard, called Johann.

• I select a home of the heart of Altengard, alignment of the Setting Sun, and decide that Johann is a melee type armed and equipped like Altengard infantry, giving him a polearm (halberd) and AC4 (chain with some plate).
• I take the recommended Rep 4 and Hardiness 1. I roll 1d6-1 for Social Status and get a 2, reduced to 1.
• Johann’s CV is thus (4 + 4+ 0) x (1 + 1) / 6 = 16 / 6 = 2. He rolls to recruit followers, and gets two fellow infantrymen.
• I decide to be self-employed and so convert one of these to a healer, and one to a thief. I ponder for a while on what their Rep, equipment and so on should be, then I notice that the Random NPC table for caravans has a healer and a thief on it, and decide to use those as both have the same Rep as the infantry they were converted from. The thief’s weapon is “various”, so I select dagger. I take their alignments from the same table (otherwise I would have used the same as Johann’s) and roll for their SS, as I shall try out the option of giving these fellows advancement rolls.

Johann’s Company – Initial Status
Name	Reputation	Hardiness	Weapon	Body Armour	Class	Social Standing	Align
Johann (Star)	4	1	Halberd	AC 4	Melee	1	SS
Alexa	4	0	Sword	AC 2	Healer	5	SS
Gottfried	4	0	Dagger	AC 2	Thief	2	RM

Goodness only knows what Alexa is doing with the rest of us. Slumming, possibly.

March 986

Johann’s Company starts in the heart of Altengard, as I’m thinking about signing on as a caravan guard, and I’ve already decided that’s where his home is.

Since I haven’t downloaded the ER by country table I use the basic ER 5 for Encounter Rating and roll 4, 5: Pass 2d6 (i.e., both dice roll the ER or less) so there is an encounter. A roll of 3 tells me it’s with locals, and a roll of 3 followed by 1 for “Where Are They?” tells me it’s a farm in clear terrain; the Company is probably buying food.

Rolls on the Terrain Generator create a map like this; I used the generator for the terrain, and placed the actual farmhouse randomly in one of the clear areas. (Each area would be 12″ square on the tabletop.)

Clear (with farmhouse)	Woods	Hill
Hill	Hill	Clear
Hill	Woods	Woods

The terrain generator is clunky, since it uses 1d6 to place terrain, and duplicates shift along until every area is full. I see no real advantage in this other than allowing you to play the whole game with d6, so I shall use a d10 in future.

A roll of 4 on the Adventurers Encounter Table says that this is a raid; since we are native to Altengard, we are the defenders. The other side pass 1d6 on the Alertness Table so are aware.

The intruders are equal to us in strength, namely CV4; rolls on the Altengard Army List give me three infantry and a skirmisher. We’re all fellow Altengarders so we go to Talk The Talk, and the intruder leader passes 1d6 more than Johann.

Now I’m stuck, because that doesn’t seem to match any of the descriptions in the Talk The Talk table. However, I have a number of other THW games, and the description is closest to “pass 1d6” in the older games; plus, neither side has scored twice more successes, and they haven’t passed the same number, so that seems to be the one. (Later confirmed via the helpful THW Yahoo group.)

So, I have a choice between lending them one figure to help until the adventure is over, in which case I get them back later, or forfeiting one advancement roll. Again, I’m not sure how long an adventure is, so I treat it as an encounter. Since they seem basically friendly, I decide they want to borrow the healer as one of their group has been injured in an accident and is OOF (“Out Of the Fight”, i.e. injured). The healing rules on p 39 say that I move the healer into base to base contact and roll 2d6 vs OOF Rep on the Recovery Table. He passes 2d6 and recovers. (The Yahoo group advises me that an “adventure” is deliberately left vague so that you can pick what makes sense in the circumstances.)

Not what I expected, but then that is sort of the point for a GM-less fantasy campaign. Having survived the encounter, we roll for advancement; this is done by rolling 1d6 against the current levels of Rep, Hardiness and Social Standing – if the score exceeds the current value, or on a natural 6, the attribute increases by one. There’s also an option to increase skills, but that requires the Adventurer’s Handbook, which I don’t have yet, so I’ll ignore it and use Rep for skills as per the basic rules.

Johann’s Company – March 986
Name	Reputation	Hardiness	Weapon	Body Armour	Class	Social Standing	Align
Johann (Star)	4	1	Halberd	AC 4	Melee	2	SS
Alexa	4	1	Sword	AC 2	Healer	6	SS
Gottfried	4	1	Dagger	AC 2	Thief	2	RM

Alexa and Gottfried have become more Hardy, and Johann and Alexa both gain Social Standing. Talking nicely to people is clearly underrated. Maybe next time there will be a fight, and I can try out the combat rules.