Fun & Games with Rolemaster

We’ve been playing a new Rolemaster (RM2) campaign for about 4 weeks now so this post will act as a synopsis of the mayhem to date. It should be noted that this is our first time playing RM2 as this group.

We all diligently spent anywhere between 3 and 5 hours to lovingly craft our new characters. My character is a Nightblade, which is effectively a legalised murderer, who is a little weird to say the least. His trusty companions are a Beastmaster, a Magician, and a Conjurer. We are all elves, and I am a raving Dwarf (stunty) hater.

We are all members of a guild and our first mission is to investigate a spate of chicken rustling (yes, CHICKEN rustling!!). On our journey to our destination we encounter a spot of highway robbery and decide to intervene and protect the poor merchant who is being robbed. Our trusty Mage (Orophin) stands aside and summons the forces of magic to cast a water bolt at an archer who was covering the other robbers. Nige (our GM) tells Neill (the Mage) to roll his dice to see if he is successful. On his first roll with his new character in our first ever RM2 game he fumbles it! Nige says you want to roll low, and he rolls high. The Mage starts to ooze blood from his eyes, nose, ears, and mouth, and subsequently collapses to a heap on the ground. What a wonderful start to his illustrious career. And this is only the beginning of a developing pattern for the unfortunate soul. After the rest of the players pick themselves up from the ground in fits of hysterics they get their characters to dispatch the nefarious highwaymen.

Fast forward to our second session. We are at the village and investigating the cause of the loss of hundreds of chickens. Willy comes up with loads of theories about what may have happened to them using the fact that they will generate a lot of chicken crap if they are still alive or a lot of bones or carcasses if they are being eaten to rule out various scenarios. Corvus (my Nightblade) comes up with the idea that they have all gone to Chickentopia led by a chicken called Moses who has freed them from slavery and taken them to the promised land. He believes that Chickentopia resides in the lower levels of the local abandoned mine. The rest of his party looks like he has gone mad but decides to humour him and investigate the mine.

Fast forward to last nights game. We are investigating the mine and wander amongst some giant spiders that ignore us. We find a small natural passage that leads down. Corvus takes the lead and nimbly slithers down to the cavern below. He has just stepped to the side of the exit to look around when he hears this cry, followed by the noise of something sliding uncontrollably down the passage. Orophin flies out of the bottom of the passage and lands face first into the 4 inch deep pool of water that is covering the end of the cavern. He is not moving! Corvus quickly grabs him from behind, yanks him up and drags him to dry ground. Orpohin is covered in bruises and is out cold. Neill has managed to fumble it again. It’s the second time that night. The first time was on a perception roll, where he banged himself on the head with his torch and singed his eyebrows. I told you it was a developing pattern.

In the end it turns out that the chickens have not set up Chickentopia in the mine. They are nowhere to be found. Corvus is distraught. He hatches the plan to get Bruenor (the Beastmaster) to talk to the chickens that are still at the village and persuade them to run away and set up Chickentopia.