Building Bhakashal - Session Report - Dungeon Crawling!

As it happens, dungeon crawls are not common in our game, but this week my Dad’s group continued their delve into Tamoachan! This is a great opportunity to show how crawling works in Bhakashal and discuss adjudication. I have yet to run a game where there isn’t at least one or more instances where I have to make a ruling on something that isn’t covered directly or obviously in the rules. This is a regular part of refereeing that is ignored by many, but helps to put the RAW vs rules improv issue into a more nuanced light.

The vibe in this module is creepy, it is pitch dark except for torchlight, I’m tracking turns, torch burning times, and rolling for random encounters every turn, 1 in 12 odds. This means that taking time to do anything has a cost. I periodically mention moaning or howling noises, that the party has decided are the air moving through the complex, or maybe not. I’ll randomly announce that they hear a, “hiss”, or “shriek”, or “chittering”, or whatever else comes to mind, to mimic the hundreds of small creatures that inhabit this complex. The whole shrine is waterlogged and hot as hell, miasmatic and fetid, in places the stucco is sliding down the walls, giving the whole place a decrepit, decaying vibe. Their splashing through watery areas masks other noises, one time when they were standing looking at something I told them they heard splashing behind them. That sobered them up fast.

Add that they can see about 40’ ahead from the torchlight, anything further ahead is enshrouded in pitch black darkness, which means that as they explore corridors can look endless and thing sort of appear as they advance without warning.

It’s delicious.

I don’t know why people say AD&D “can’t do horror”, never underestimate the fear of the unknown, my players were genuinely terrified, the atmosphere created a mountain of tension.

This week they decided to double back and go into a corridor they avoided, finding that about halfway down there was an entrance to a side room that was blocked by a giant stone. They heaved on the stone (four of them) and managed to push it back to gain entrance to a room. That movement plus pushing took a turn, so I rolled for a random encounter, nothing, and noted a turn off of the torch burning time. They slid past the stone to a chamber with doors. There was lime on the stone that now began to burn their hands after pushing on it.

So, they spent a turn washing them off to stop the burning. That required another random encounter roll, which came up negative. The party Seer cast Find Traps on the door ahead of them, which lasts 3 turns. They turned up a trap!

At this point the party Thaumaturge (thief/magic-user) came forward and I had to make a decision, does find traps just tell you a trap is there, or does it tell you what kind of trap it is? The spell description says that traps will become “visible to them”. So, I ruled that this allowed the caster to see the outline of the mechanics of the trap, like an X-ray, in this case a trip switch on the door that released when it was pushed in, breaking a glass sphere.

The Thaumaturge rolled to disarm the trap and was successful, she jammed an iron spike in behind the trip switch so it couldn’t break the glass sphere.

They entered the room and looked around there was an axe imbedded in the wall and a raised area of stone. They extended the Find Traps to the whole room. Here again I had to adjudicate. First, there was a vampire in the raised stone area, it was a tomb.

And there is a mechanism to open up the tomb, you have to turn some dials, so there is a mechanism to turn dials and release a vampire. Is that a trap? I decided it wasn’t; it was a tomb.

Then there was the cursed axe. Note it casts a shadow that looks like a severed arm! That was a juicy detail that creeped them out.

It can’t come off the wall until the vampire is slain, but when it does it is cursed and can’t be put down. Is that a trap? I vacillated on this one, but ultimately decided it wasn’t a trap, it was a cursed weapon that would be entirely functional in the hands of a chaotic evil warrior. So, in this case they found no traps. However, the party Seer then got smart and decided to cast Detect Evil, and both the tomb and the axe pinged as BIG E evil. The DMG spell description gives some options, I chose “longing evil”, as both creatures longed to have the PCs interact with them.

They decided at that point to book it.

That was another turn, so we rolled for a random encounter, nothing. They left and headed down the corridor to a rubble filled stairway. They spent a turn digging and then their Find Traps spell expired. They spent another turn digging only to have debris keep falling down.

So, they abandoned the area. Two random encounter rolls in these turns came up negative, then I informed them their torches were about to burn out, there was some scrambling and they lit new torches. At that point the Detect Evil spell wore off. They headed back to the room with the pool and the underwater ledge. I rolled and the Nerid was not there.

They continued to the next door, and the party Thaumaturge checked it for traps. She’s earning her keep! That takes a turn, so another random encounter roll with nothing turning up. The party fighter stepped up and heaved, opening the old, jammed door.

They sloshed through water (ruining any chance of surprising any foes) and found more doors. The Thaumaturge once again checked for traps and found none. That was another turn, no wandering monsters. This opened up into a long hallway. Because their light only reaches 40’ ahead, they essentially advance into an area of pitch blackness as they move forward.

The Seer decided to cast Detect Traps again, and they set forward down a long corridor. Then came another adjudication question, does Detect Traps find secret doors? The rules don’t specify, but in this case I decided that it would not register, a secret door is not a trap.

However, as they went down the hall they saw some artwork on the wall, the Thaumaturge checked it out and ended up activating the secret door. That was another turn, and another failed wandering monster check. They went a bit further down the hall and the spell pinged on the end of the corridor where there were arrow traps, which they avoided. They went back to the secret door and went through.

They found a corridor with carvings of animal heads on the side, and what appeared to be a bracelet caught in the mouth of one of the animals. The Seer used his spell to check for traps and found that the beak of the animal would close on anyone grabbing the bracelet.

The Thaumaturge jammed in an iron spike to keep it from closing and the party warlock pulled out the bracelet. While the rest of the party investigated the other heads, he spent another turn casting Identify on the bracelet to find out its powers (it allows flesh to stone or  the reverse to be cast three times, then it becomes a ring of stone shape, three times for that and it stops working).

Another wandering monster failed check. They continued down the corridor, pushing through the darkness, when suddenly a mummified human body was floating in the air in front of them. There were screams and jumping in chairs. Soon they could see a number of hanging mummified corpses.

 The Find Traps spell was still active, and they found a pressure plate trap in the middle of the room, they noted it’s location, turned around and took a different corridor.

They found a side chamber in this corridor with a chest. They used the last of the Find Traps here to discover at pressure plate trap. The party warlock cast Levitation and was pushed forward with a rope around his waist, he opened up the chest and took out a statue of a strange fish like being that looked like nothing natural they had ever seen. That creeped them out too.

During this process I rolled a wandering monster encounter with two huge spiders (these are horse sized), crawling along the ceiling. They gained surprise and dropped on the party Thaumaturge and second Mercenary (both NPCs!). The Mercenary took some minor damage but made his poison save, the Thaumaturge was missed.

The Mercenary split the spider in half with his bastard sword, the Thaumaturge cast Burning Hands on the beast and did enough damage to drive it off with a failed morale check. They pressed on to find a door, which the party Mercenary opened handily (and noisily).

They entered into a room, It was filled with statues, they couldn’t see all of the room, so they were a bit spooked. They wandered around the room for a time looking at the statues and the cairn on the far side, then they found doors and left the room.

I told them before leaving that their torches were burning out again.

They replaced torches and moved on, checking the doors for traps then forcing them open. Another turn, another failed wandering monster check. They walked down a long corridor, seemingly endless in the dark, and came to a large stone blocking the corridor. Three of them put their shoulders into it and pushed the stone up an incline on rollers, slowly but surely. That took another turn, and another failed wandering monster check.

At the top of the incline, they settled the stone and continued on. The corridor twisted and turned, and they saw pictures on the walls depicting some sort of game, which they studied for a time. They came to a turn in the hall and a capstone, covered with runes, was in the intersection. The party warlock cast Comprehend Languages on the runes, and they saw the message, “Dare not open this pit unless you be willing to meet the challenge of the game”.

They decided against it and moved on to the end of the corridor. By that time another turn had went by, and another failed wandering monster check. They came to another door, the Thaumaturge checked it for traps again, coming up clean, and the party Mercenary tried to force the door. He failed, and the NPC mercenary tried and succeeded. Another turn, another failed check.

This room had a cat motif, with a cat statue, a bunch of stuffed cats, and a cat mural on the wall. They briefly went around the room then decided to leave and go back to another door they had abandoned. That took a turn, another failed check followed.

They have been mapping, and they traced back the route to the room with hanging mummified corpses. They avoided the trap and checked the door on the far side for traps. The Thaumaturge found nothing, and the Mercenary heaved the door open, in this case releasing a waft of stale, stench filled air that made their torches sputter and give off a wan, greenish light.

That was just for effect, but it got them nervous.

Another turn to check the door, another wandering monster check failed.

They entered the room and found two bodies lying on slabs with a knife, a flask and goblets in between them. They looked around, avoiding the bodies, and decided to take knife and the flask and leave, thus not triggering the two bodies to come to life. Some of my groups turn over everything in the room before leaving, the Dads were moving along after a short inspection.

Another turn, another failed check.

The warlock, who had been towed along by the mercenary NPC, settled to the ground as his Levitation spell wore off.

They backtracked to the room with the cairn and statues. They decided to explore the room more closely and went to the cairn. They smashed it open and found some jade bead pectorals and a silver amulet.

The party Mercenary tried to pry a lantern off the floor and opened a secret door!

“A blackened humanoid corpse lies in the chamber beneath the floor, it’s skin blackened and cracked with age, it’s clothing mere rags, and an unbearable stench wafting out and filling the room around you. Then, it’s eyes snap open!”

A wight in the secret compartment woke up! It reached out to grab the Mercenary but he managed to dodge it’s grasp. The Mercenary brought his magical trident down on the beast and rolled a critical, doubling damage, and slaying the thing instantly, as it emitted a horrifying, unliving scream!

Another turn, another failed encounter check.

They saw an amulet on the wight and took it off, leaving the room immediately and making their way back to the cat motif room. That took another turn and another failed wandering monster check.

We stopped there.

Observations

This module is very atmospheric. The per turn wandering monster check is a constant time pressure on the party, as well as the torch burning. Systematic exploration of a dungeon with it’s strange distant sounds and encroaching darkness creates a constant low-level dread. Every time they explore an area, use a spell or move around time passes, every time they check for traps they spend a turn. Every turn brings the possibility of some monster descending upon them.

Yes, they have very handy spells, but every step they take is dangerous, so they may be able to avoid traps, but they are still at risk. They also have to abandon potential loot if they find a trap and decide to bail. They unknowingly bailed on a vampire, good call really, but there was loot in that room they abandoned.

I was personally shocked no one tried to take the evil axe.

I have played with refs that want to nerf divination magic like this as it “takes all the challenge out of it”, but they forget how detecting a trap just makes the players dread it and worry about whether or not they should be trying to disarm it. And traps in AD&D can go off when you try to disarm them, so even if you know it is there, it’s still a danger. Not to mention that you have to concentrate to find traps, so you can’t be casting other spells when you are looking.

So, using the spell doesn’t really take away the challenge, it just changes the course of action.

High tension combines with awesome art.

When we finished they were 21 turns, 3-1/2 hours into their delve, and they have 3 turns remaining before their current torches burn out. They have enough torches to last for 4 more hours, at that point they will have to resort to spells, and the Seer has been using up their low level spells for divination magic, so they might end up getting caught flat footed.

This session was a reminder of how valuable each member of the party can be, the Seer and Warlock cast divination magics, the Mercenaries muscled the doors and the giant stone blocks, the Thaumaturge checked for traps regularly, finding several.

Dungeon exploring is a team sport. The claustrophobic, wet, decaying environment, the mysterious sounds and utter darkness of the space, and the unique monsters/mythology of the shrine make this one of the most atmospheric and terrifying modules in TSR’s catalogue.

They are having an absolute blast.

Hopefully we won’t take a month to get back together again.