#345
May 11, 2025
Books
This week I read:
Pavane by Keith Roberts
Which is an alternate history novel set in a world where Queen Elizabeth I was assassinated, the Spanish occupied England, Anglicanism was crushed, and a powerful combined British / Spanish Catholic force suppresses Protestantism in the continent too: leading to Catholic supremacy, a second dark age, and a 20th century in which England is still run by the nobility, the Pope has immense political power, and anything more technologically advanced than the train (though they do have “road trains”) is heavily restricted.
There isn’t really a single narrative going through the entire book, as it’s a collection of short stories. If there’s a unifying theme, it’s the “Strange & Sons” train company of “Durnovaria” (Dorchester), which shows up in a few of the stories.
Also, there’s clacks (optical telegraph towers), which is such a cool means of long-distance communication.
Realms of the Three Rings for The One Ring RPG from Free League Publishing
Covering Rivendell (to rather more detail than the pamphlet included in the Starter Set), Lindon, and Lothlorien; three different story arcs that could be a significant focus of a campaign; several adventure locales; and rules for staying in elven-realms, playing High Elves of Riven or Galadhrim of Lothlorien, and solo rules for being a solitary elf-lord fighting against the darkness.
I really enjoyed this, it definitely got the imagination going, and I’m torn between whether to be an elf or a dwarf now if I ever manage to grok solo RPGs.
Roleplaying Games
The Halls of Arden Vul
We don’t often have big combats in this campaign, the players tend to be wary enough that when they do fight they have overwhelming odds and crush the opponent in a couple of rounds, but this week they were hunting a hag, who had apparently been abducting and killing beastmen.
It was a challenging battle, especially as the players had blown a load of their spells earlier in the session fighting some big lizards (which they didn’t need to do at all), but they made it through with no casualties. I think this hag encounter and her lair is actually intended to be the culmination of a quest arc for characters a few levels lower: you enter the Halls of Thoth (the easiest part of the dungeon to access), quickly encounter the beastmen, through roleplay learn about their troubles including the hag, and then after advancing to level 4 or 5 (finding a few magic items along the way) have a really tough fight with a few character deaths against the hag, cementing your friendship with the beastmen in the process.
It’s a bit less thrilling when half the party is the same level as the hag.
But next time we’ll get our thrilling combat in! Some months ago the players heard a rumour that the Cult of Set had been seen meeting with a band of notorious evil adventurers; a few weeks ago the players learned that the meeting was about the party! These evil adventurers had been hired to kill them, but they were in no rush and were content to just keep taking the cult’s money. Last week, the party met up with their would-be killers in a neutral location and tried to buy them off. The price was high: 20,000 gold in gems. The exchange was set for 3 days time. This week, the players made the exchange, and then were followed and attacked on their way home.
They should have seen it coming.
Miscellaneous
House Buying
We’ve got a provisional completion date! On Thursday the conveyancer got in touch to say that the other side had proposed completing on the 29th or 30th, so I immediately replied saying the 29th would be excellent; now I’m just waiting for the exchange of contracts, as that’s the point at which everything becomes legally binding.
I’ve also extended my tenancy agreement here by 2 weeks, so I’ll have a bit of overlap to do the move. In less convenient news, I’m actually on call the first week of June, so I’ll need to arrange something. Ideally I’d swap out the whole week, but I don’t think anyone will be willing to take me up on that…