Editing SGA 2003 Archive (section)

=Mythic Greece=
; Game System
: [http://www.fudgerpg.com/ FUDGE]
; Pitch
: 
; Game Master
: Steve Schoenberger
; Players
: Andrew, Laura, Autumn, Hunter, Jack, and Kate
; Characters
: 
; Date
: September 8, 2003
; Technical Notes
: 
; Recaps
: '''Steve:''' "Monty Python and the Golden Fleece"? That's a clever summary of how we got a bit silly.

:The adventure, when we were on topic, stared with the third Olympic games of the Mythical era, sometime in the Bronze Age, founded by Heracles in honor of the gods, in the western Peloponnese.

:Each of the player characters were contestants, competing in the Heraean Race (a race for young women, in honor of Hera, day 1), the Weight Throw (day 2), the Footrace (for men, though they didn't object when women horned into it, day 3), Wrestling (day 4), Boxing (day 5), and several unofficial events scattered through the official events -- chariot races, a riding horse race, archery competitions, a bard-oratory contest, and a musical competition (that, in spite of the silliness, somehow managed not to be called the Battle of the Bands).

:In honor of winning some of the competitions, the characters won prizes like giant jugs of olive oil (for the wrestling), barrels of wine (won by the quick-drunk Centaur), a number of Latin slave girls, the services of a sculptor who would make a bronze bust of a winner, and a wagon load of assorted dyes. Of course everyone got the customary laurel wreathes as well.

:An additional prize, offered by a very young prophetess to all of the participants in the games, was a reading of prophecies.  For the player characters, the prophecies seemed similar (after careful interpretation of the meaning) -- "battle", "battle and glory", "battle and honor in some place you've never heard of", and "battle and glory in Phoenicia against vast hordes of enemies". And sure enough, the evening after the prophetess spoke her prophecies, retainers of a minor Phoenician king approached the characters and asked them if they could help him rid his city of a plague of grasshoppers. But not just ordinary grasshoppers -- giant, flesh eating grasshoppers.

:The party agreed, and set out to the Phoenician king's island, stopping in Knossos Crete, running aground in eastern Crete, Rhodes, Cypress, and finally the king's island. The harbor was full of ships bringing food to the people, who were hiding from the grasshoppers behind the city walls, trying not to starve.

:The party quickly concluded that the nasty bugs might not like a bit of cold weather, so Tekton the priest of Hephaestus turned his weather machine on the grasshoppers. They turned sluggish in the cold, and people charged out and smashed those in range of the chill. But hordes more were outside the machine's range, and the machine was out of cold. The party set out to seek a wagon load of the Ever Frozen Ice, from atop the mountain on the island.

:After some planning and much silliness, the party had a plan to get past the hordes of grasshoppers to the mountain -- just charge through in a hurry until they reached the chilly weather on the mountain, and smash the grasshoppers if they tried to grab a bite of flesh. Hictaeon the Centaur was the first to be bitten, but he smashed many with his hooves and skewered many more with his spear. Geirahöd the exiled Valkyrie was unharmed because of her invincible skin, as she pulled a wagon (emptied of the assorted dyes). Astrila the huntress (and champion of chastity) turned herself into a giant eagle, and was also safe from harm. Tekton enclosed his horseless chariot with a safety cage. Polydactylos king of Gla had his thirty common warriors with him, and Melite the precocious Amazon princess had her dozen common Amazon warriors with her, and they fought well, taking minor injuries. Soon the heroes discovered that the bugs considered each other food if they were dead already, so they hacked them up and tossed dead ones around to distract them, and soon they had reached the safety of the cool mountain air.

:On the mountain road, they reached a sign with a drawing of a skull on it. Polydactylos gave a rousing speech to encourage his common warriors past the sign to glory. Soon, Astrila -- still in bird form -- noticed a cave, surrounded by feathers and dung.  Tekton, with his Eyes of Distance Vision device, noticed what he thought was Harpy scat. The party headed up the hill, prepared for a possible attack by Harpies.

:Sure enough Harpies attacked, thinking they had surprised the heroes and their retainers. Being Harpies, they attacked the unfortunate retainers instead of the heroes. Polydactylos managed to distract three of them away from his warriors with a seductive smile, then reached for his spear when three they came into reach. Silly Harpies, you should know better than to think a studly king would be interested in you! The harpies managed to beat up several of the warriors of Gla pretty badly, but the Amazon warriors did better, taking only scratches. Most of the heroes got in some good bow-shots at the Harpies, wearing them down. Finally, Astrila knocked one out of the sky with her eagle talons, and Melite and the Amazons knocked down three more, which were quickly dispatched. That scared off the cowardly Harpies.

:The party continued on up the mountain, and loaded the wagon with the Ever Frozen Ice. They returned down the mountain, and were again attacked by the Harpies, though the first volley of arrows drove them off that time.

:Our heroes reached the grasshopper hordes and activated the great weather machine with the Ever Frozen Ice, making them sluggish as before. Some townspeople shivered behind the walls. Those with warm clothing streamed out of the city to smash the grasshoppers.  The city was saved and all were honored as heroes.
; Player Thoughts
: 
; Additional GM Thoughts
: It was nice to finally get a chance to run this game. All have earned playtest credits, even if the credits never get farther than the next time I print it out for a game session.

: I made no strong attempt at play balance -- the heroes had both the grasshoppers and the Harpies outclassed -- but there were some challenges. The party succeeded easily at thinking up cold as the way to make the grasshopper horde vulnerable, thinking to bring cold weather clothing to the mountain, bringing a wagon for the ice, distracting the grasshoppers with their own dead, and defeating the Harpies without losing any common warriors.  They missed the idea of telling the people in the city to ready themselves for the cold, and while they didn't think about how they'd be safe from them in the mountain cold they did hurry through it. Since none of the common warriors died, there was no need to protect the corpse from being devoured or defiled by the Harpies. I forgot that the Harpies would presume that the wagon load ice was a treasure worth spoiling. In our rush, I also forgot that the story was supposed to include camping out on the mountain side.

: I found the Olympics introduction in a 1988 gaming book titled Mythic Greece, wrote up the carnivorous grasshopper adventure in advance, and improvised the kind of lame sea voyage part on the spot. The weird Olympic prizes were also improvisations.  I hope it was all fun for everyone, and not just for the silly
bits.