Warhammer - The Oldenhaller Contract

Last thursday, I hosted a game of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying Game (henceforth, Warhammer) for Lu' & Sam, regular players in meat space. I've offered to run "The Enemy Within", a cult-classic campaign for First Edition, which I've always been curious about. Turns out the starter adventure in the core book is a great intro to the setting, too, so I decided to run that first to give Lu' an idea of how Warhammer differs from D&D (as it turns out, it doesn't differ a lot from my take on a D&D world, although I appreciate the differences and wealth of content to pillage).

Lu played Carina, a very short, petite but husky woman who used to work as a Gamekeeper for the local nobility.

Sam played Snori (sic) Durak, a DWARF MAN-AT-ARMS of sour mien and grudgeful disposition towards anything non-dwarf.

What Happened?
• Our heroes patiently waited for an entire day for the Nuln harbor administration to allow them inside the city, and eventually decided to sneak in during the night when the man in charge went "just come back tomorrow".

• Looking for a place to sleep, they were accosted by a shady gentleman who promised a cheap place, but led the duo into an ambush. By the moonlight, the heavily armored and armed dwarf and the axe carrying ranger intimidated the footpads, though, who decided it wasn't worth the trouble, despite outnumbering our intrepid adventurers.

[No roll for intimidation, the situation was such that it wouldn't make sense for the footpads to jump these PCs really. Why would anyone attack someone who can shoot them before they reach melee?
Lots of time in the rain led to a Toughness roll, which got Carina her first (albeit weak) disease]

• Eventually, they settled on a barn and got some rest. But not before being interrupted again by some pickpocket, whom they caught and gave to the watch for a small reward. The watch suggested the party go check out the Old Tree on Reik Plaza, which usually has odd jobs that would suit them nicely.

• Carina stayed in "bed" to rest after she caught the flu while Master Durak tracked some nice, well-paid job to a mansion called Oldenhaller, where he negociated for a hundred crowns with the mansion's master, in exchange for a gem that allegedly had something to do with the Prince of Decay, Papa Nurgle. The dwarf was cautious and slightly worried about his employer's intentions, but greed overcame the last of his doubts when he realized he could take most of the pay if Carina didn't know exactly how much they were being paid.

• According to Oldenhaller, the gem had been stolen by some street gang hiding in an abandoned part of the sewers called The Asylum, so that's where the players set out to, following indications from Oldenhaller's valet. There, they found a bunch of murdered dudes, apparently victims of a gang war, and pretty fresh, to boot. One survivor told them it was the Valantina Gang who did them, and to please let his sister in Middenheim know he wouldn't be coming back next winter. The dwarf finished the job, and they moved on.

• Exploring some more led the party to meet a bunch of survivors from the gang with whom they socialized efficiently, having found a password earlier that came in handy with the tilean that composed this group - apparently the very same who butchered the first corpses they found. It turned out that their leader, who was supposed to have the gem, had also been murdered quite recently though, and together with his right arm man, the party went after the assassin and the gem, following a secret passage out of the Valantina Boss's study.

[also they fell in the entrance's trap and wasted two good blankets trying to haul the Dwarf back up, and he did lose a lot of Wounds from a short fall, showcasing the grittiness of the system]

• Deeper into the Sewers, the group was attacked by a flood of RATS which triggered some PTSD-episode for the Dwarf, who to this day is still convinced that there are man-sized rodents hiding in the sewers and other underground places of the world. The party ran from the rats into a mine cart and rushed down a series of railways in the dark, slowly realizing they had two half-eaten corpses for company, one of which was only a head! They gained an Insanity Point and Carina found the gem in the assassin's pocket.

• Way deeper into the sewers, the party heard some ritual chantings coming from the river access, and met with yet another gang, enemy of the Valantinas. They reasoned with the thugs and everyone agreed to leave grudges aside for once and avoid the scary chanting men with potentially eldritch powers. Everyone ran away back into the HQ, the party ran further, outside the sewers and back to the Oldenhaller Mansion, and delivered the gem. 

And that's it for so far. More fun next week with "Mistaken Identity" - although we'll be trying the Zweihander Revised rules, as it seems to have most of the house rules I was considering adding to WFRP, the Damage Threshold in particular.

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