Oppression Aware Podcast, Fairy Tales, and Games

The group arrives at the owlbear den to discover that the family of owlbears they are to transport is in the middle of a conflict with another pair of owlbears. The player characters need to resolve this conflict before they can prepare the owlbears for transport.

Supplemental Information: The following information is useful for running this stage of the adventure.

• Owlbear Den Encounter Map
• Owlbear Token
• Owlbear Creature Description
• Audio of Owlbear Fight with Warning Calls

Reading the Owlbear Den Encounter Map: The elevation lines, standing trees, and downed trees marked on this map the same way they were marked on the Briar Creek map for Stage 4.

• Thickets: Particularly dense thickets of bushes are marked by pale-green, shaggy, squiggles that don’t have trunks in the middle.
• The Den Site: The owlbear den site is marked by a partially obscured dip in the highest (smallest) elevation ring. The largest clump of bushes is obscuring the opening.

Owlbears: The player characters are here to collect a specific pair of owlbears, along with their two eggs. We will be calling them the defending owlbears in this section.

• Appearance: Owlbears look like large bears with owl heads. Most of their body is covered in fur. They have brown feathers on their heads, in a crest that runs along their spine, and band of feathers that goes around their bellies and hips, much like a feathery tutu. They have massive hooked beaks and large paws with powerful claws.
• Behavior: Owlbear behavior is a combination of bird and bear behavior. Like owls, they pair bond, lay eggs, and raise nestlings together. Like bears, they react aggressively when someone gets between them and food, when startled, or when protecting their young. When upset, owlbears stand up on their hind legs, puff up all their feathers, and screech threateningly. Owlbears can attack with both claws and beaks.
• Attacks: When an owlbear attacks a player character, the player must roll their character’s physical defense. Failures (zero successes) will result in an injury.
• Magic Resistance: Anytime magic would directly affect an owlbear, roll a six-sided die. If the result is a 4, 5, or 6, the magic has no effect on them. This happens regardless of whether the magic is harmful or beneficial.

Continue Reading »

Tags: adventure, Magic Goes Awry, owlbear, reintroduction, role-playing, roleplaying

The group enters the Wild Wood and encounters some of its dangers at Briar Creek (will-o’-wisps, razor briar, and vampire vine) on the way to the owlbear den site. If the player characters have agreed to collect plants for Bristle, this is where they will get them.

Supplemental Information: The following information is useful for running this stage of the adventure. The map and tokens are optional, but the creature and plant descriptions are necessary.

• Briar Creek Encounter Map (36 by 29 squares)
• Will-o’-Wisp Tokens: Red, Green, Blue
• Will-o’-Wisp Creature Description
• Razor Briar Plant Description
• Vampire Vine Plant Description

Reading the Briar Creek Map

• Briar Creek: The blue, stony line running vertically down the center of the map is Briar Creek.
• Elevation Lines: The curving gray-brown, stony lines indicate elevation. The darker side indicates higher elevation and the paler side indicates lower elevation.
• The Briar Creek Ravine: The dark brown area directly around Briar Creek where the elevation lines are close together marks a small ravine. This entire area has Vampire Vines in it.
• Standing Trees: All standing trees are shown top down and partially transparent. Their branches are shown as bushy, pale-green ovals centered around brown and black spiral trunks.
• Downed Trees: The moss covered logs of many downed tress are scattered throughout both maps. In this map there is one living downed tree that bridges the creek. Some of its roots are in the ground and some are in the air.
• Razor Briar: This dangerous plant is marked by dark red (almost black) looping squiggles.
• Willow Thickets: The pale-green, bushy areas in the creek are willow thickets. Because they have many small trunks, rather than one large trunk, no trunks are shown for the willow thickets.

Using the Map on a Virtual Tabletop: The above map and tokens are designed to be used on virtual tabletops, like roll20. If you choose to do this, keep in mind that action scene rounds are anywhere between thirty and ninety seconds, depending on what the characters are doing. As a general rule, each round a character can move a number of squares equal to three times their body number.

• Body #3: They can move up to 9 squares.
• Body #4: They can move up to 12 squares.
• Body #5: They can move up to 15 squares.

Continue Reading »

Tags: adventure, Magic Goes Awry, owlbear, reintroduction, role-playing, roleplaying

The player characters enter Island Town, meet with Keeper Silvia Aguilar, and have an opportunity to rest and prepare. The two main goals of this stage of the adventure are to make the setting feel real and to give the player characters information about the thieves.

Supplemental Information: These optional maps of Island Town are provided to assist in role-playing.

• Labeled Map of Island Town
• Unlabeled Map of Island Town

Entering Island Town

Descriptions: It is a one day journey from Fork up the West Boundary River to Island Town. At the end of that journey they see Boundary Lake and Island Town.

• The Journey Up River: “A yellow and red, medium-sized, magic-powered paddle boat takes you up the East Boundary River to Boundary Lake and Island Town. You start this journey in the patchwork fields of the Green Basin. However, as soon as you are past the juncture between the East and West Boundary Rivers, the fields on your right are replaced by the towering trees of the Wild Wood. This untamed wilderness is a stark contrast to the orderly fields to your left and you are reminded of the fact that the East Boundary River is the border between the Wild Wood and the agricultural lands of the Green Basin.”
• Island Town: “At the end of your day’s journey, the East Boundary River widens out into Boundary Lake. Island Town is a modest collection of stone buildings perched on an island inside that lake. The paddle boat drops you off at the docks on the east side of the island.”
• At the Docks: They are met at the docks by a Junior Keeper that looks over their paperwork and directs them to the local inn and the large stone building in the center of town that serves as the Crossroads Wilderness Keepers (CWK) headquarters.
  • If they took the early morning paddle boat, they have arrived on time to meet with Silvia today. If not, they will have to meet with Silvia tomorrow.
• Inside Island Town: “Island Town is the regional base of the Crossroads Wilderness Keepers—the official organization in charge of managing and protecting the wildernesses of Crossroads. In addition to the Keepers, Island Town has a few shops, one inn, a community center, some warehouses, and some local fisherfolk.”
• What do they do?

Continue Reading »

Tags: adventure, Magic Goes Awry, owlbear, reintroduction, role-playing, roleplaying