RiftWalker Campaign - Overview and Thoughts (30-31)
This week I discuss the big rocking sessions of my home game. It is in my own designed tabletop roleplaying game RiftWalker.
The battle map in the fight against Malachor - towards the end.
The Guardians in the Forest
The group decided to explore the legend of cleansing the corrupted spirits of the forest in Gloom world. A former promise made to Sylvana. This week, Heckin McGeckin is introduced to the party, by Johannes of the Hunter’s Guild. He was set to help the group out because, the Rift Guards are missing, and the Hinter’s Guild has set in to help out. The group was standoffish at first, as they missed their former partner. Stepping through the rift, Sylvana states forest is corrupt. the group was directed to seek help of the 5 forest guardians (Guardian Bear, Wise Owl, Swift Fox, Enigmatic Panther and Majestic Stag. Skittishly they get the totems of 5 forest guardian spirits together, and lead them to parts of the forest they can rest. In doing this they piece together tale of Draden and Malachor (a follower of Mosacul) previously fought. Through the totems draden was able to lock the evil shadow of Malachor away. During this time, Esbara found kinship with the head of the guardians, the Stag. His curse returned, when they laid to rest. The group tried to stop him reforming into a shadowy being, they failed…
Esbara: Soul of all Forests
The fight was on! The group set to battle Malachor’s returning spirit. He was filling a shadowy tree with his essence, while summoning clones of the RWs. The guardians returned to stay on the battlefield, lending the group their powers. The tree was first targeted and destroyed by the group. Khaz was in tears being told he was forever alone. Malachor took him over during parts of the fight. McGeckin armoured up the group, and juiced up the Bear spirit. Ralph went big, broke the trees and Malachor! Esbara mounted stag and rode into battle. The end was caught with a surprise. Esbara’s water broke (she had been pregnant the entire time in RPA)! As she was, the keep er of the gift of Sollos, and the beard the child of Isha, she decided to live in the newly cleansed Twilight Grove, allowing the remaining friends to come back and visit. She will look after her child. A beautiful ending was seen between close friends, Khazgan and Esabara.
Thoughts
My first use of RiftWalker session prep sheet.
These last two sessions, was the introduction of one new character and the leaving of another! The group was sad to see Esbara leave. It was also comical to see the sadly iconic moment of the group not trusting a new character coming in, when in an out of character moment, we all knew it was another player’s new character. I felt these sessions, while dramatic in story, were mild in play. The initial ideas I had for the forest guardian puzzle fell a bit flat, and I had to tell everyone the idea of it. It could have been the low, mid-week energy of the group. It could have been too much of an information dump, after such a great session, the fortnight before. I decided to have a multifaceted combat the next session, to try and build more energy. This was much more enjoyable for the group. It was funny to note that the shadowy tree in the combat session was there to act as a sort of timer for the group, but ended up being targeted by the group. It was a reminder to act fast on my feet and improvise with this group of players. I also tried out one of my experiments, a session prep sheet. It was really useful to have all I needed in one spot on my iPad during play. I will continue to use and tweak it for future sessions.
