“Every Hero needs a world to save. Now there are six.”

I almost died today, and it was amazing!

We were in the great market of Sai meeting with a Drow trader named Amqt. I was at first concerned about entering the tent-stall of a Drow, as we all know their reputation. But Jerek, the ship’s quartermaster, is well traveled, having visited many of the worlds besides Ra’niah, and he is of the opinion that Drow merchants are among the most honest. They always seek vengeance if cheated, and since they expect the same in kind, they act accordingly. It seems to me a workable philosophy: so long as no one is cheated, everyone goes away happy.

I was standing just inside the curtained entrance to Amqt’s stall, where it was dry despite the rain outside. Jerek and the other sailors were working a deal for supplies when a nervous man carrying a bundle of rags stepped from the concourse and looked into the crowded stall. He licked his lips and shoved the bundle into my hands, muttering something about giving it to the Drow. I took it without much thought, and a moment later the man was gone.

Now I am not somebody who looks into other people’s belongings. But Amqt was heavily involved in negotiating with Jerek. I like to think that he knew I had this unusually heavy bundle, that perhaps he even looked askance at my discomfort, but he was too busy to break away and relieve me of my burden. It was a curious bundle, its weight was unusual, and I decided to unwrap it for a better grip.

There was a statue within, though I cannot recall its exacts details. As I first glimpsed it I felt an odd, compelling urge to examine it more closely, and as I removed the last of the rags I heard Amqt shouting, “No, you fool!”

My gaze locked with the statue and I felt a searing pain in my head. A ringing gong sounded throughout the tent. Moments later the slashing of black knives cut openings in the sides of the canvas and through the new openings poured hulking warriors swathed in black with wicked weapons of a make I have never before seen. I was frozen in place, by fright or enthralled by the statue I do not know, but I stood there as these fearsome attackers turned towards me.

I cannot say they looked upon me, as their eyes were bound, yet I felt their gaze interrogate me. Fortunately, the ring of steel drew their attention as my companions prepared to fight. I tried to shake myself from the statue’s pull and stumbled blindly against the side of the tent.

I realized my danger when one of the assassins took a menacing step towards me, his weapon rising for a death blow that never came. Instead there was a loud crack and the room filled with acrid smoke from Alvarre’s pistol, and the assassin was knocked to the ground! He leapt up and rushed at Alvarre, who drew his other two pistols and fired twice again. Only as the third ball hit this hulking beast and only then did it fall backwards and stop moving.

In the middle of the room, Tristan overturned a table to block another assassins’ rush, and Jarek clubbed it with his chair as it stumbled backwards. Amqt leapt back from the fray as Alvarre reversed his grip on the spent pistol and cracked the stumbling assassin across the face with the butt end. A moment later he shouted a warning to Tristan and engaged in a swordfight with another of the villains.

Tristan ducked and spun, catching the incoming blade in the folds of his cloak. He jerked the weapon loose, bringing its wielder off balance and into its own knife thrust.

Alvarre, his blades out now, engaged two assassins at once in a whirl of steel. He relentlessly laughed and taunted the foes through the entire encounter.

The wounded foe pushed forward, thrusting Tristan into a stack of barrels near Amqt, and the Drow took the opportunity to shatter a bottle over the attacker’s head, stunning him long enough for Tristan to run him through.

Jarek continued to lay mightily about him with his chair until it came apart in his hands. He went for his own pistol, but realized the tent was clear — and a wreck. Broken furniture littered the room and rain dripped into the tent. Tea and sake were everywhere, mingling with blood to stain the rugs.

I shook my head one final time to clear it of the statue’s curse and moved quickly toward my companions. Jarek stood over one of the fallen assassins and Amqt removed the veiling wraps. At first I’d thought the statue depicted an extremely large Goblin, but if it did the creature was unlike any I’d ever seen. Its skin was a putrescent green-black, its eyes a fierce yellow, and its form was all muscle and fanged teeth.

Amqt rose quickly, his countenance grim. “C’thbred Orcs,” he said plainly. At the time had no idea what he meant.

He took the statue from me (I was apparently still clutching it) and stored it in a sack. “You’d best be gone,” he told us, then directly looked at me. “The Keibiin will be here soon. They’ll want to know who started what, and won’t look kindly on fools with suspicious packages.”

We found the advice prudent and left immediately, Keibiin bells ringing from the other direction…

Of course! I’ve not explained how we arrived in Sai!

We’d approached on a Highsailing ship from the west. At dawn the captain began a slow descent, the sailors working the ship, constantly adjusting the canard sails to the port and stern. I had to move several times, never able to find a place that was far enough out of the way, but I wanted to catch first sight of Sai. Instead we sailed eastward for several more bells, following the track of the Yokawa River, and from this route, the city doesn’t appear in the distance so much as grow from it.

Sai is, of course, the largest trading port on Ra’niah, but it’s difficult to describe the sight of it. In the words of Master Othius, it’s a great sprawling mass. The entire Tiger Bay region is prone to earthquakes, which have reportedly destroyed, or partially destroyed, much of the city in the past.

Large portions of Sai seem to have been built with little planning. While some of the larger structures are built of timbers and stone, most common homes are constructed largely of light wood and paper. Even on our approach from the air it was difficult to discern any rational pattern to the streets.

We crossed over the city, making for Tiger Bay, and after our ship Corvus was properly set and moored, Master Othius led the expedition’s officers into the city. They carried ceremonial gifts for the House of Tiger, the ruling Jade Crown faction. This left the rest of us with an entire city to explore at our leisure.

I was given leave and decided to join Jarek and some of the more interesting sailors on a trip to the marketplace. I must say I was at first overwhelmed. The central marketplace is easily the largest on Ra’niah, a dizzying imbroglio of streets lined with colorful stalls, swarming with a bedlam of people, and filled with the exotic scents of foreign food, drink, butchered fish, and an undercurrent of animal leavings. Squat Shahani weavers sold beautiful embroidered rugs only a few stalls down the row from makeshift taverns bulging with packs of Rytacht mercenaries drinking gallons of hot shochu and singing a bawdy songs (off-key, certainly, but who would tell them?). We even saw a pack of Hothai snakemen, robed and inscrutable, on their way to who knows what.

Within minutes, we were offered food, cloth, furniture, walking sticks, and negotiable companionship. We passed a pair of city guardsmen called Keibiin, each carrying a staff with tassled bells as his badge of office, and sporting the multi-pronged disarming weapon that was invented here in Sai.

Soon it started to rain and we arrived at the stall of the Drow trader named Amqt, and of course you already know the events of that meeting…

Despite the dangers, I’m still giddy with excitement from the day. All the worlds hold such wonders, and I yearn to see more!

 
Organized Play

Many classic fantasy tropes are seen in this organized play campaign: escalating drama, rising action, widely varied character party compositions, and so forth. Yet organized play spins the action up and out to any number of player groups, rather than offering a home game’s focus on a single fellowship saving the world on their own.

The organized play format involves a player-driven story, in which the characters’ actions lead to real and tangible changes in a shared game world. This can happen via Game Master-submitted adventure feedback, with the actions taken by a majority of groups becoming the “history” of an event and the actions of individual characters becoming the canon of the campaign. Alternately, special events like convention “interactives” or tournaments that feature many characters can produce a single result, letting one character (or one group of characters) to guide the world in some way.

Organized play lets characters be famous. Not only can they gain reputation and fame within the game world, they can do the same within a community of their peers, other players. There’s a sense of prestige and notoriety for longtime, serious, and especially memorable characters in an organized play campaign, and a sense of appreciation for good volunteers who work to make the campaign fun for all. These volunteers range from adventure authors to convention and game day organizers to the innumerable Game Masters running adventures, and they reap the rewards of those simply showing up to play and those cheering the campaign on.

Organized play campaigns feature a fan-driven world. Adventure writing and Worldbook creation lies largely with the fans (players and Game Masters alike), and anyone can submit an idea, adventure, city, organization, or other detail for inclusion. The size of the contribution is largely irrelevant, allowing everyone to engage at their own scale and as long as their schedule allows. This creative flow results in a game world with something for everyone, and ultimately a richly detailed tapestry with infinite potential for adventure.

Organized play campaigns also let players meet one another in ways no other style can match. Players sometimes travel long distances in order to participate in organized play events. In the process of doing so, friendships are forged between people who would never otherwise meet.

The Wyrmstone campaign setting takes both the tropes of classic fantasy and the limitless potential of organized play to provide an immense backdrop for high adventure. Heroes can save a village, and then a city. They’ll save a nation, and then the world.

But it won’t stop there. In Wyrmstone, the character aren’t just saving one world. They’re saving six.

Wanna be a hero?

To learn more about the exciting setting of Wyrmstone visit wyrmstone.org!