Session Capture: Varens Session 8, Our heroes are nearly killed by a widdle iddy biddy puddy cat.

A short session, but this was a
memorable encounter.

Our heroes have a nigh uneventful first day of hiking, which ends in a near total party kill at the paws of a triger due to risky behavior and awful rolls.

The Cast

• Sophie - A young artificer girl, the opposite of self-aware, but wants to be recognized as a genius of her time. Her poor social graces put a damper on the possibility of that ever happening. She doesn't care. Results should speak for themselves.
• Stuart ("Corduroy") - an Innkeeper saddled with the family business, but would much rather travel the world. He can't part outright with the family tavern out of respect for his family, but he needs to find and hire people that he can trust to take care of it in his absence. Additionally, he will need to gather enough money to pay them in advance; he doesn't know how profitable the inn will be in his absence, nor how long he'll be gone.
• Wynter - a Scholar who has just wandered into the town of Wood's Edge, she is just going along with whatever Sophie and Stuart are doing. She's not from around there and doesn't know what's what, and as a result, is unfortunately using Sophie as a barometer for "normal".
• Michelle (NPC) - A high ranking Merchant Guild member. She is a coleopteran, so she has a few unique mannerisms that are unfamiliar to the party, but is shy about her voice, so she speaks mostly through her partner Vincent, to whom she communicates using a complicated form of sign language. She is both an excellent artisan using rare techniques known only to coleopterans, and a master of business. Her shell, however has been cracked, and has been repaired in a kintsukuroi shell.
• Vincent (NPC) - Although technically her assistant, and in terms of profession, subordinate, Michelle calls him her partner out of respect, appreciation and genuine mutual friendship. Vincent is a Xenophile gnome extremely fascinated with Coleopteran culture. Coleopterans are a rare sight in this setting because they have very exclusionary policies, and they live atop a giant tree inaccessible to most but those races gifted with flight. Besides his extreme fascination with Coleopteran culture, he holds etiquette in very high regard and hates when people snub the rules or interrupt him.

A map of events.

Summary

Artistic representation of the
three headed triger.

Day seven ends uneventfully, except for Wynter hearing a rumor from a loon that there is treasure in the direction she is heading in. The party doesn't know what to do, but Wynter believes it without a second thought. [A combination of Obliviousness and Curious] and the party prepares for a long day of travel tomorrow. 

Day eight begins and the party travels in lavish style due to Corduroy's excellent guild connections. Sophie decides now would be a good day to test a technique she had heard about and she sets cow pats on fire inside the carriage to keep it warm. [It is established this session, for no especially good reason, that it is the fall season, and starting to get colder. Sophie failed a self control roll for compulsive invention and pyromania.] Neither Vincent nor Michelle are bothered by the scent, but Wynter and Corduroy decide to spend the majority of the trip on the roof of the carriage instead.

Late in the evening, Corduroy spots a Triger in the distance. The cart pulls over and before any strategy is formulated, Sophie shoots for it, but misses [As mentioned earlier, the dice were so unfavorable today. This failed even when using Luck.]

This caused the Triger to surge forth, Wynter peppering it with weak bolts that couldn't pierce the flesh, while Corduroy evaluated with his Broom ready for close combat..

With Extra Attack 2 it was often exhausting active defenses as the party held on for dear life. Corduroy takes a big hit and decides to hang back while waiting out the shock penalties, circling around back. The Triger then focuses it's three attacks in the next turn on Wynter and Sophie. With Active defenses exhausted, Wynter is reduced to 1 hp in a single attack, is stunned, shocked, and falls down. Sophie's bad luck continues as she fails to protect herself [with a 14 parry.] but thanks to a double deuce on the dice, is able to absorb all damage, just barely, with her armor.

In the next turn, Corduroy and Sophie turn the fight around, Sophie is able to get a stab in with a deceptive strike, and Corduroy is able to easily hit it from behind with no active defenses.

Corduroy beating the dead triger while
Wynter and Sophie see stars.

The shock should have made it easier to keep the triger in the death spiral, Sophie says very meta-like... but she rolls a critical failure and flings her sword in the air. Corduroy also fails to hit even from behind, and the shock wears off. Sophie uses a gizmo to magically retrieve her sword, but rolls really bad again while defending, losing more than half her HP in one hit, getting stunned, shocked, and falling prone.Corduroy by himself gets a really lucky two hits, two turns in a row, and doesn't get hurt any further. The Triger critically fails an HT roll at -5 HP, which I rule as death instead of fainting.

Sophie uses the rest of her gizmos to make healing potions, and the group performs first aid on each other. Wynter remembers she has wild talent, and uses surgery to skin the triger, for a rug that is said to be worth $1000.00.

The party, weary and wounded, decides to set up camp in front of the forest.

After Action Report

• I asked why Speaks With Animals wasn't attempted, and i was told that it was thought to be a wasted opportunity since Sophie already annoyed the Triger by shooting at it.
• Wild Talent is cool, and this is the first time it was used.
• The session was really short because it couldn't start on time, and it had to end early.
• That being said, for being one of the shortest sessions we ever had, I think there were more Critical Failures in this session than any other session before.
• I think that having the players read the session recap before the start of the session lead to a lot less of the "what was I doing 20 minutes ago in game time?" questions. I hope that we can continue doing this.