As my players have once again FAILED ME by having lives unrelated to roleplaying, I won’t get a WoW: the RPG session this week. So I thought I’d take the opportunity to try my hand at some solo roleplaying, since everyone keeps talking about it. I’ve been dragging my feet with it, because, you see, I think of roleplaying as akin to making luuuuuv, so that would mean that solo roleplaying is akin to… er… yeah.
But, it’s not like I’m a stranger to that pastime either (I’m rather more familiar with it than I am with making luuuuuv, if we are to be brutally honest), so let’s give it a go. And I can at least give it some kind of social element by posting my experiences here.
… which in this analogy would make me a cam girl, wouldn’t it? Crap.
But, never mind my tattered self-respect, let’s get to it! I’ll be trying Solodark, the solo version of Shadowdark, of which I have gushed before. It’s a nice, simple system, and it might even help me finish another one of those dungeons that I’ve been meaning to work on – which might in time allow me to run a game for actual people and not feel quite this much like a loser. To this end, I have rolled up four probably-doomed misfits to brave the hostile depths:
- Rinariel the Elf Squire (male), veteran of the the Bitterash War where the elves of Everwood mounted un ultimately unsuccessful defense against an invading orcish horde.
- Indra the Human Robber (female), with a shady past as wound-dresser and sawbones for a bandit gang in the Lumpy Hills.
- Fern the Halfling Seeker (female), a devotee of Ord the God of Magic, wandering the world pursuing secrets and mysteries to gain wisdom.
- Sorak the Half-Orc Squire (male), looking for a fresh start after a life of leg-breaking for a loan shark in the town of Coalsmoke.
The dungeon they’re braving is the Temple of the Unholy Twilight, which I have rolled up using the Shadowdark dungeon creation system but not done much work on beyond that. My vague backstory for it is that it used to be a temple to Memnon, the God of Chaos, but it was sacked by some right-thinking crusaders centuries ago and has stood empty since. Now a kobold shaman and her tribe has moved in and are starting trying to figure out how to appeal to Memnon for power, so it’s time someone did something about it.
THE STAIRWAY
The stairs leading up to the temple, according to the random generation, have a Ranged Ensnaring Trap. That one gives me some trouble, so I ask ChatGPT for some ideas. It suggests that there are chains embedded in the pillars around the stairs to the entrance which, propelled by an ancient mechanism, will erupt and bind an intruder to the wall if he places his foot on the wrong step. It won’t hurt them, but it’ll slow them down and might alert enemies. Sounds good. Let’s give it some flavour text:
The Temple of the Unholy Twilight lies in a marshy delve in the hills, surrounded by moss-shrouded trees, a great grey building with high columns along the walls. There are scarce windows in places around the hulking structure, none of them lower than 60 feet above the fungus-grown ground. There are broad stairs leading up to a set of heavy oaken gates, though halfway up the stairs there is also a side door, perhaps once used by lesser acolytes. Through the cracks in the stone of the stair and the columns around it you can glimpse links of rusty iron, like the half-exposed bones of a rotting corpse.
Now, I assume that that my adventurers have the sense to make the Thief go first and check for traps, but I don’t think that they know precisely where to search for them (which would make finding them automatic), so we’ll have Indra make a WIS roll for it. I’ll also be merciful and say it’s pretty easy – the traps are in bad repair, parts of them exposed. Indra also has advantage on the roll from her Thief class abilities, and she succeeds with a result of 17. She spots the traps and warns the others where the pressure plates are.
Now the adventurers have a choice. Open the main gates, or slip in through the side door? I make a roll for it, and it turns out that they favour the side door. Indra lights a torch and goes first, so she can spot any more traps.
THE ACOLYTES’ BARRACKS
Through the side door from the stairs is a long room full of moldy blankets, broken beds, and the shambles of chests. The air smells of rot and mildew, and the wooden fragments that crunch beneath your feet are little more than dust. There is another door leading east from the hall’s northern end.
This is just an empty room. The adventurers go straight through it.
THE TEMPLE GARDEN
Daylight floods in through the door as soon as you open it, and you step into a walled, wild-grown garden. The air is filled with a mad mixture of scents, some sickening-sweet, others sharp or bitter. Crooked, malformed trees war with creeping vines and sprawling thorn bushes for the limited space, and fungi and swollen, sickly-purplish berries spread across the ground. As you step onto the soil, parts of the foliage quivers oddly in response, like your very presence disturbs some fragile equilibrium. Through the greenery, you can see that there’s a door each to the west, east and south.
This room has another Ranged Ensnaring Trap (randomly generated things tend towards repetition, alas – it’s my main problem with them), but to make it different from the first one, I decide that this one is organic in nature. Some of the weird plants that have mutated here for centuries have become able to fling entangling vines when their root systems are disturbed. I decide that there’s a 50% chance of vine-tossing whenever someone moves through the room other than slowly and carefully.
But that’s not all! It has now been two rounds since the party entered the dungeon, and this is a Risky dungeon, meaning that you roll for random encounters every two rounds. I roll a d6, and get a 1 – we do get a random encounter! I decide that three kobold cultists wander in. I question Solodark’s oracle for what they’re up to, and I get the response “Active Secret.” So they’re doing something they don’t want anyone to know about, eh? I decide that they’re here to raid the shaman’s herb patch for berries to make their heads go funny.
I have Indra make a reaction roll. The kobolds are “suspicious,” it seems, but not hostile. They probably don’t want to fight here since they’re on illicit business themselves, so they just hoist their spears and snarl. The question is, then, does the party attack? I think it’s likely but not certain – their nerves are on edge. I make a roll with advantage, and get a “yes” response. They do attack.
Fern casts Shield of Faith. Rinariel shoots an arrow but misses. Indra drops the torch (I roll to see if it goes out when it hits the floor; it does. That would be bad in most rooms, but since this one is open to the sunlight it just means that it won’t set the room on fire) and fires an arrow of her own. It hits, but kobolds have an obnoxious racial ability to perfectly dodge one hit per day, and this one wisely uses it. That leaves Sorak, who would perhaps not be so clever if he charged in swinging – he’s only got 1 HP, and would be unlikely to survive the attention of three kobolds for a whole turn. But does he realise that? I make an INT roll for him, and yes, his better sense prevails. He spends his turn pounding his axe against his shield to intimidate the kobolds.
The kobolds’ turn, but they don’t attack! Instead, they slink oddly carefully over to the southern exit and hide behind the door frame there. The reason is of course that they know what happens to people who run in the garden, and they’re hoping that the adventurers will find out the hard way. I don’t think the adventurers would think of that in the heat of the moment, though, so I don’t even give them a roll for it.
New turn, and Rinariel and Indra both shoot more arrows, but they roll with disadvantage since the kobolds are in cover, and both miss. Fern, hoping to tie the kobolds down, charges at the door… and triggers the flying vines! She rolls DEX to avoid being entangled, but fails! Sorak follows her and tears at the vines to free her, but they won’t be budged, despite his advantage to overcome forces by STR per his Fighter class.
Now the kobolds see their chance and rush in! One of them stabs with its spear at Sorak, who manages to defend himself, but the other two attack Fern on the ground, and bring her down to 0 HP! What’s worse, she rolls a 1 for how many turns it will take her to expire. Oh dear.
Rinariel shoots the kobold who already dodged, and hits. This time it drops, kobolds just have a single HP so a second hit in a day almost definitely kills them. Sorak swings at another one of them and hits, but it uses its daily dodge. Indra makes it to Fern’s side and tries to apply first aid. She’s got advantage to the roll due to her Chirurgeon background, but it’s no use – she fails, and Fern fails her 1-in-20 chance to stabilise on her own, and expires! She goes to Ord’s side. Alas, Fern, we hardly knew ye.
The surviving kobolds attack Sorak and Indra, but they both miss. Rinariel shoots the vulnerable kobold, killing it, and Sorak and Indra both score hits against the last one, forcing it to use its dodge and then costing it its last HP. Our heroes are victorious at great cost. They sourly loot the kobolds, and in spite of the odds one of them actually has a Potion of Invisibility, presumably brewed from other weird herbs from the garden. Indra pockets it.
Now I need to introduce a new character, so the adventurers suddenly hear plaintive cries from the room to the south…
THE COURTYARD
I roll up a new character. This one actually has decent stats (unlike the previous bunch, of which two are single HP wonders – Fern was actually the sturdy one, with 6 HP, but the dice is a harsh mistress). He has pathetic STR and DEX but high INT, so I make him a Goblin Wizard and name him Tark. He background is Soldier, so I decide that he used to serve in the mage cadres in the Bolochian Regiments. He left in search of a subtler way to use magic than as a weapon to smite your enemies. He decided to explore the Temple of the Unholy Twilight to plumb its secrets, but ended up captured and hung up in a cage in the old temple courtyard.
You enter a vast, echoing hall centered around a sloping-sided stone platform. All around the sides of the great chamber stand leering demon statues, grasping curved stone cleavers and barbed stone tridents, their twisted faces unsettlingly lifelike in their malice. The air suddenly feels very cold. There is one heavy door each to the east and north, and a massive double gate to the south. In an iron cage hanging from a the ceiling in a chain you see a very nebbish-looking goblin waving sheepishly to you.
Indra promptly picks the lock and lets Tark out. He takes pains to explain that normally his awe-inspiring arcane powers would have set him free, but the courtyard is under an antimagic field; no spells can be cast there, and nor do spells cast outside of it have any effect within in. He’s more than happy to join the adventurers for some payback. So where to now? The gates to the south are clearly the main gate to the outside, so will it be east from here or back to the garden and then east from there? I roll for it, and we go through the garden.
THE HIGH PRIEST’S CHAMBERS
This is it – the party has stumbled on the boss room. Let’s see how it goes.
The walls of this mid-sized room are bedecked with hideous fetishes and blasphemous charms, things of bone and straw whose crudeness cannot disguise their malice. The air is thick with fumes that make the head spin, and beneath them hangs a low stench of rot and charnel. A robed figure is squatting on the floor, scaly hands cutting up the carcass of a cat-sized lizard. A high-pitched voice chants tonelessly from within the dark cowl. There is one door to the west, and another to the south.
The party wins initiative. Indra hands the torch to Tark and downs the Potion of Invisibility, disappearing in a flash. Tark casts Mage Armour – a particular specialty of his. Rinariel shoots an arrow but misses. Sorak rushes in with a bellow, swinging his axe and getting a critical hit. The Shaman uses her daily dodge to escape it, but the party gets a Luck token for the crit. The Shaman attempts to cast Spider Swarm but fails the roll.
Invisible, Indra sneaks around the Shaman’s back and strikes! Not only does she hit, but she too gets a critical success. Another Luck token and double damage, with two extra damage dice from her Thief ability to backstab. 18 HP! That’s far more than even this rather hefty monster has. Indra appears out of thin air behind the Shaman like an avenging phantom and slits her throat with a single efficient slice, leaving her to bleed out on the floor!
The party goes through the Shaman’s grisly possessions and find a number of decent treasures – a polished pearl, a jade-and-gold pin, ten silver spikes, and an Egg of the Cockatrice. Pay dirt! So the question is, do they push their luck and check the south door, or do they get out while the getting is good? I think they’ll probably get out – they have already taken losses – so I roll with advantage and get a “yes.” They’re leaving.
THE COURTYARD AGAIN
Lighting a new torch to replace the one that was on the verge of going out, they backtrack through the garden and back into the courtyard. But that, unfortunately, is when I manage to roll up another random encounter. I decide that two of the statues in the courtyard come to life and attack. Clearly Memnon isn’t happy with the people who broke into his temple and killed his new high priestess, clumsy in her worship though she was!
To make it worst, the party loses initiative. One statue goes to block the way to the front gate, which is still closed since the party took the way around it. The other statue approaches, twisted stone features leering, crooked stone sword raised, moving slowly but steadily.
Rinariel and Indra shoot arrows, but without success – they just plink off the statue’s stony hide. Sorak roars and charges. His swing misses, but he spends one of those Luck tokens from before and scores a hit on the reroll. The statue takes 6 HP damage, with 5 remaining. Tark yelps at the rest of them to retreat out of the antimagic field so he can be of some use, and then does just that by falling back to the entrance to the garden. That would have been a lot more useful if he could have told them before they took their turns, but since Tark has the lowest DEX of the group I figure he’d be acting last in the round.
The statue swings at Sorak and hits. I spend the second Luck token, since Sorak has decent AC and I’m hoping that the statue will fail on the reroll, but it manages to score a natural 20 instead! Not that it makes a difference, Sorak just has 1 HP, so down he goes. He will expire in 1 turns. Indra attempts to bind his wounds. Alas, it goes no better than last time. Nor does Sorak manage to stabilise on his own. He dies. Rinariel shoots an arrow but it scrapes off the stone again. Tark, without many options, opts to throw one of his daggers, but that works about as well as can be expected.
The statue attacks Indra and hits, taking her one HP. She’ll expire in 3 turns. Rinariel retreats to join Tark, shooting an arrow as he goes. Tark throws his other dagger, and it actually hits, doing 4 damage! The statue now only has 1 HP left. Indra rolls to stabilise: failure.
The statue clomps into the garden. Rinariel slowly retreats from it, firing another arrow. He hits, taking off its last HP. The statue crumbles to dust. Tark runs back into the courtyard and attempts first aid on Indra. Failed, and nor does she stabilise on her own.
The remaining statue advances on Tark. Tark attempts to stabilise Indra. Failure, and Indra also fails to stabilise on her own. Rinariel moves into the room and fires an arrow. Natural 20! He does a total of 10 damage, leaving the statue with 1 HP left.
The statue swings at Rinariel. Miss! Rinariel takes a step back and looses another arrow. Miss, and I waste that Luck token for a reroll. Rinariel has no luck with his arrows. Tark makes one last attempt to stabilise Indra. Natural 20! She stabilises, and leaves him with a new Luck token. However, the torch goes out, leaving them in darkness…
The statue swings at Rinariel again, misses again. Rinariel retreats back to the daylit garden, and so does Tark, gambling on the statue following them instead of dispatching the no longer bleeding out but still helpless Indra. Does it? I think it’s likely, so we’ll roll with advantage: 13. Yes, it does pursue. Rinariel shoots an arrow at it as it comes clomping. Miss, so I spend that Luck token. This time I am rewarded with a hit, doing 4 damage and bringing it down. The arrow pierces its stone heart and sends whatever malevolent presence animates it back to Hell!
BACK AT THE TAVERN
Rinariel and Tark grab Indra’s inert form, open the front gate, and hightail it from the Temple of the Unholy Twilight! Returning to town, they sell their loot (except for the Egg of the Cockatrice, which is a pretty handy talisman that lets you summon a cockatrice once a week. Tark can carry that, so he’s got something to do in battle when he runs out of spells, which is likely to happen) and pool the money for a 100-gp bender. Indra gets barred from the tavern for starting a brawl, and manages to get just enough XP together to level up – she now has all of 4 HP and her backstab does another die of damage. Pity that there aren’t more Potions of Invisibility lying around, or she could really clean house… but possibly Tark can learn the Invisibility spell on his next level up for some party synergy?
Well, that’ll have to wait, because Tark just wakes up in the gutter with a hangover and needs another adventure before he can level up. Rinariel spends four days in the stocks for setting a house on fire, which is very unfair: he was just demonstrating how burning pitch arrows were used in the Bitterash War, and is it his fault that humans foolishly build their homes out of dead wood instead of cultivating living trees into graceful sylvan domiciles, and that their towns are therefore more flammable than could reasonably be expected? They also meet up with a skeevy Dwarf Initiate of Shune the Vile named Ulfgar who apparently used to work for the Thieves’ Guild – all in all, not the most comfortable traveling companion, but, well, they do need a new healer and he looks like he won’t keel over from a single hit, and that’s more than you can say for most applications these days…
FINAL THOUGHTS
Okay, I admit it. That was a lot of fun. Oracle rolls are a surprisingly effective way to ensure that things feel organic, and it helps that a lot of things in Shadowdark are randomised anyway. Certainly there was plenty of drama, both in the form of sudden tragedy and of victory heroically pulled from the jaws of defeat.
It also gave me a whole new appreciation for how randomly generated dungeons and “wandering monsters” fit together. When I rolled up the garden with its ensnaring trap and the courtyard with its antimagic field, I figured that both would be nothingburgers. The adventurers would just untangle themselves from the trap and not cast spells in that particular room, what’s the big deal? At most, I thought perhaps someone would come up with a cunning plan to lure monsters into those rooms. But it’s a whole other ball game when monters can just suddenly turn up in those previously empty rooms. I had one character killed as a result of the non-lethal trap, and had another character effectively nullified during a tough battle by the antimagic.
Likewise, things that I just threw out as fluff descriptions proved to matter. The front gates are big and heavy? That means that they probably can’t be opened in an instant, so you can be trapped in the room. The garden is open to the sky? Now you have a room where you don’t need a torch to fight effectively.
And, hey, I ended up writing up half the dungeon I’ve been struggling with. I might actually get to run actual players through it at some point in the near future. And I can stop playing with myself. As it were.