Spes Magna Games

So, what with the meeting restrictions imposed by governments local and beyond, the game convention has gone the way of the dodo, but with the qualifier that perhaps the dodo will recover and waddle once again. Some conventions have moved to an online format. One of these is Founders & Legends, running the weekend during which I typed up this paltry review.

The Good

Curious to experience the online convention thing, I registered my son Christopher and me for the weekend. I’m not quite sure why I paid as much money to get through the virtual door as I would have to paid to get through a real door at a convention held in a facility somewhere, but, in fairness, I could have paid for a lower level of access, so that’s on me. Also, Founders & Legends has partnered with Extra Life, so some of the money spent goes to a noble cause. That’s a good thing, and kudos to the Luke Gygax team for supporting Extra Life.

The registration system via Tabletop Systems worked smoothly. In short order, Christopher and I were registered and signed up for two Adventurers League (AL) games, a sort of part one and part two of a continuing saga. We made up two 1st-level characters using AL guidelines, which are straightforward and pretty much exactly what the 5E Player’s Handbook says to do. Our characters, from start to finish, took about 15 minutes, all off-line the old-fashioned way, recording information via pencil on paper.

I found two pictures online to represent our characters and uploaded those via Discord to the DM, who turned the pics into tokens for use with Roll20. After this, we relaxed a bit, waiting for the first event’s beginning.

The events amused well enough. The situations the characters found themselves in were clear, and there was a good mix of roleplaying and action. The DM kept the game moving and used the Roll20 tools to keep things organized. While there were a few technical glitches (more on these in a bit), the Roll20 learning curve isn’t that steep (at least from the player’s side), and the same DM had the game running more smoothly during the second event.

I did have a few difficulties early on after registration. I’ve barely touched (metaphorically) speaking Discord. The virtual help desk and the DM proved most helpful for navigating the details of how to get the audio to work, how to access the correct channels, et cetera. The people working “at” the convention were polite and professional.

The Bad

Not everything we experienced with Founders & Legends evoked thoughts of puppies and ice cream sundaes. Fortunately, most of the bad was pretty much beyond anyone’s control.

Discord and Roll20 both had system wide crashes due to some sort of server or something. I’m far from the most technical person you can find, but I do know that both programs were inaccessible for about an hour. That said, the outage occurred after event one ended and before event two started, so it didn’t affect our convention experience. To paraphrase Suicidal Tendencies, it’s not a problem if it doesn’t affect me. We also had players in both sessions who got booted by Roll20 and/or erred with using Roll20, making communication somewhat inconsistent.

Discord was used for audio, which had a mandatory press-to-talk feature. My Discord settings had me designate a key (or combination of keys) on the keyboard that I had to press in order to be heard. When I stopped pressing the key, nothing on my side of the screen was audible. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but too often folks stopped pressing keys before they stopped speaking, especially during session one.

This meant that Christopher and I missed the last words of the DM’s statements. “The monster claws you, inflicting —” proves to be less informative than it needs to be. Another player saying “Can you move to —” does not convey the request. Unlike the system crashes, the press-to-talk problems were nothing other than human error.

The lack of video other than Roll20’s virtual battlemat bugged me. I didn’t particularly enjoy gaming with disembodied voices that I could only hear when the owners of those voices were pressing to talk. Most of human communication is body language and voice tone. With no video of the player’s faces, et cetera, the quality of communication necessarily degrades.

The Ugly

It’s been months, if not a year-plus, since Christopher and I have participated in Adventurers League. When we did, we did so solely to reunite with a long-lost gaming friend. (Hi, Don!) If Don had not been playing in the AL games, we’d have stayed home.

AL adventures, much like the earlier version Living City, occur within the Forgotten Realms, which must be popular, but with which I’ve never been a huge fan. Every AL and Living City adventure) I’ve ever played in or run shared a these characteristics:

1. An Almost to Totally Linear Structure
2. A Preponderance of Do-Nothing NPCs
3. Offenses against Player Freedom

Permit me to explain with reference to a Living City adventure I played in way back when at local gaming convention.

Our party of adventurers were hired as security for a dinner party. The Lords of Waterdeep attended. No character in our group had advanced past 4th or 5th level. The Lords of Waterdeep hired low-level characters for security. The Lords of Waterdeep, who often had double-digit levels in at least one class along the the magic items one would expect powerful characters to have, had no need of low-level guards, and yet there we were. Fine. Whatever.

Then, Trouble started, and the Lords of Waterdeep huddled in the ballroom and imperiously ordered our low-level characters go deal with the trouble. Any one Lord of Waterdeep could have solved the problems single-handedly, but Do-Nothing NPCs don’t solve problems. They do nothing unless interacted with, and then they stick to the script. They’re tabletop RPG versions of MMORPG shopkeepers.

Then, our characters moved from A to B to C. Each encounter ended with rails leading to the next encounter. Even being presented with a choice going from A to C doesn’t change this since C leads back to A, then to B, et cetera. Sure, this isn’t linear strictly speaking, but A becomes the center of a wheel with spokes and no rim. In another scenario, this one an AL adventure, the final act of the adventure was prescribed. Nothing our characters did at any point during the adventure would avoid or alter the final act. The adventure’s author dictated that the adventure end This Way Only.

Again, every single AL adventure I’ve run or played has these problems. The wiser DM retools the adventure’s structure to remove or at least reduce the severity of these problems, which are purely the result of bad adventure design.

The End

Would I participate in an on-line gaming convention again? Probably not.

Supporting a worthy cause such as Extra Life is a good thing to do, but I think my time and money would have been better used donating directly to Extra Life and spending time with Christopher (and perhaps my wife and daughter as well) doing something else. I don’t regret Founders & Legends, and I only experienced one small part of it, so it’s possible (even likely) that my experience was an anomaly.

Tags: Convention Gaming, reviews

In the mail last week, I received James M. Spahn’s exceptional second edition of The Hero’s Journey (THJ hereafter) and the supplemental The Hero’s Grimoire. I’ve already received The Hero’s Journey Narrator’s Screen. I await with straining patience the arrival of The Hero’s Companion. I’ve read through the PDFs of the books, and I’m nothing other than pleased. Mr. Spahn’s latest offering to the gaming world stands as his best work to date. THJ ranks as the game I am most eager to play. (Nota Bene: The previous links are affiliate links.)

THJ has several Lineages (read: races), including the familiar dwarf, elf, half-elf, halfling, and human, and the somewhat unfamiliar changeling. The human lineage includes the errant variant human for those who might want to play, say, a teenager who rode of a plane-shifting roller coaster from the 20th century into a fantasy world.

The Companion book expands these to include the gnome, goblin, rover, scion, and skin-changer. The rover is an intelligent, plucky canine, almost certainly inspired by J. R. R. Tolkien’s enchanting Roverandom. I see further Tolkien influences with scions (humans descending from once-glorious noble families), skin-changers (towering humans who transform into bears), and tree folk. Attributes for a Lineage are determined by rolling one or more d6s, perhaps adding a modifier. Skin-changers roll 2d6+6 for Might and 1d6+2 for Bearing, compared to the elf’s 3d6 for Might and 2d6+6 for Bearing.

Each Lineage also may or may not qualify for certain Archetypes (read: character classes), and Lineage determines Archetype level limits. Thus, a dwarf can earn only six levels as a burglar, but a goblin can rise to tenth level. Each Lineage also includes several traits, somewhere between three to six of them, depending on Lineage. Changelings can See the Unseen, dwarves have an Artisan’s Eye, and Halfings move Silent and Unseen. Traits may impose limitations. A rover, being a plucky canine, cannot speak and doesn’t have fingers.

Good stuff.

For whatever reason, I cannot seem to disconnect THJ from the epic stories of Redwall by Brian Jacques and the classic The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. I’ve read about half the Redwall series, including reading the title story more than once. I’ve read The Wind in the Willows several times as well. (Show me someone who does not love tales of plucky woodland heroes matching wits and muscles against nasty weasels, stoats, and rats, and you’ll be showing someone who probably can’t be trusted.) Thus, as much as I love Mr. Spahn’s treatment of standard fantasy races in THJ, I cannot help but think I ought to make up my own races drawing on the aforementioned books for inspiration.

I’ve taken a stab at this once before for 5E D&D. You can download those via this link. I don’t imagine repeating myself within the context of THJ should be all that difficult. For example, let’s take a stab at Badgers, with this picture acting as a visual muse. The miniature was painted by Michael Proctor, and the Frothy UK Badger is part of Dark Swords Miniatures fascinating catalog.

New Lineage: Badger

Large, strong, and driven by honor and duty, badgers rank among the greatest warriors. Badgers most often live in cavehomes or burrowhomes. Such as homes seldom have fewer than a half dozen entrances/exists, and most of these are hidden. Badgers are clannish and patriarchal. When a male badger nears adulthood, he leaves his home to find his way in the world.

Attributes: Might 2d6+6, Finesse 3d6, Resolve 2d6+6, Insight 2d6+1, Weal 3d6

Archetypes: Bard 4, Burglar 4, Knight 5, Ranger 5, Swordsman 7, Warrior 10, Wizard –, Yeoman 5

Born for Battle. Badgers learn to fight. They select two weapons (melee or ranged) that they may wield without penalty, regardless of any restrictions placed on them by Archetype.

Fearsome Bark. Badgers are the most fearsome of gentlebeasts. They have advantage on Saving Throws made to intimidate others, and their Bearing modifier for the Saving Throw is never less than +1.

Indomitable Courage. Badgers receive advantage on Saving Throws to resist all forms of fear, magical or mundane, including Despair.

Burrower. Badgers can burrow through earth with a movement rate of 1 regardless of the number of significant items carried. With cautious movement, the burrow is unlikely to collapse under normal conditions. With normal movement, the burrow is less stable, and burrows dug while running are unstable at best.

Dark Vision. Badgers can see in starlight, moonlight, or perfect darkness at a distance of up to 90 feet.

Tags: reviews, THJ

I can count on one hand the number of Kickstarters I’ve backed. I don’t remember most of them. One that I remember produced a nice PDF (the level I bought in at), but I’ve never used it, and I’ve only ever skimmed it. The virtual book just didn’t grab me like I thought it would.

I’ve also backed James M. Spahn’s The Hero’s Journey (THJ hereafter). I’ve gotten PDFs of THJ, The Hero’s Companion, and The Hero’s Grimoire. I’m waiting on the print-on-demand copies. I also have the GM screen. I’ve not played THJ…yet. (Note Bene: The first THJ link is an affiliate link; if you click and buy, I get a few coppers.)

But I’m going to.

THJ started out as a variation on Swords & Wizardry: White Box (itself a great game). While vestiges of its White Box roots still show, THJ has moved into its second edition and become its own thing.

And I think it’s a great thing, and its greatness shows even in THJ’s introduction. Mr. Spahn concludes the introduction with these words:

“It’s not a perfect game but is a love letter to heroic fantasy and a heartfelt expression of gratitude to every player, Narrator, and fellow gamer that has walked with me on this long, strange journey we’ve taken together.”

THJ is heroic. It’s an expression of love and gratitude. It uses Oxford commas. Fabulous.

THJ has nine chapters, an appendix, and a character sheet. The first four chapters deal with character basics, character creation, and equipment. Chapter 5 covers how to play the game, covering about 19 pages with about half of those covering combat. Chapter 6 explains spells, divided into three groups: Apprentice, Journeyman, and Master. Chapters 7-9 are for the Narrator (the GM), and include how to be Narrator, a respectable selection of folk and foes, and many magic items, including Heirlooms, character-created items tied to the character’s Lineage.

So, let’s make up a character.

My character has six basic Attributes: Might, Finesse, Resolve, Insight, Bearing, and Weal. The values of the Attributes are determined by rolling a pool of d6s, and my character’s Lineage determines the number of dice in each pool. My character’s profession is also influenced by Lineage.

Lineages are changeling, dwarf, elf, half-elf, halfling, or human. I’m going dwarf. Two tables tell me about Attribute dice pools and Archetypes. Attributes are first.

Might: 2d6+6. I rolled a 13.
Finesse: 2d6+1. I rolled an 8.
Resolve: 2d6+6. I rolled another 13.
Insight: 3d6. I rolled a 10.
Bearing: 2d6+1. I rolled a third 13.
Weal: 3d6. I rolled yet another 13.

All of those Attributes fall into the “average” range of 7-14 and have no attribute bonuses. The thirteens are near the upper range of average. Finesse is on the opposite end of the range. So, my character is fairly strong, durable, and charming. Fate has almost noticed him enough to matter (that’s a function of Weal), but he’s a tad on the clumsy side. I revisit the Professions table and roll a 72, which makes my dwarf a stonemason. This gives him a large hammer, a chisel, and 2d6 x 10 gold pieces. I roll and get 90 gold pieces. I make note of my character’s Lineage abilities: By Axe and Hammer, Artisan’s Eye, Tough As Nails, Underground Senses, Magic & Poison Resistance, and Dark Vision.

Now for Archetype. As a dwarf, my character can be a Bard (4), Burglar (6), Knight (3), Ranger (4), Swordsman (7), Warrior (10), or Yeoman (6). He can’t be a Wizard. The numbers in parentheses are his level limits for each Archetype. I skim through the Archetypes. He has the Attribute requirements needed for any of the permitted Archetypes. Let’s go obvious and make him a Warrior.

That gives him 8 Endurance, a +1 attack modifier, and a saving throw of 15. He has no armor or weapon restrictions. Archetype abilities useful at 1st level are A Greater Valor Against Lesser Foes, Shattered Shield, Terrible Blows, and Weapon Specialization. He also gets Advantage on saving throws versus Grievous Blows and poison (the latter of which he already had from being a dwarf). Since he’s got a hammer, Weapon Specialization in hammer seems a no-brainer. It’s not the best weapon for damage out there, but if he wields it two-handed, his hammer does 1d8+2 damage, thanks to Terrible Blows and Weapon Specialization.

I spend 50 gold on plate armor and another 10 gold on a small shield. That leaves me with 30 gold for other equipment, which I’ll worry about later.

Tags: reviews

Nota Bene: The first link below is an affiliate link. If you use it to purchase the PDF, then I got a few coppers. The second link is for the store that sells copies from the first print run (not print-on-demand as I mistakenly had thought). That’s the route I went. All direct quotes come from the book itself.

Jonathan Newell’s Genial Jack from Lost Pages astonishes from cover to cover. Within its 50ish 8.5-inch-by-11.5-inch pages, one finds a fascinating introduction to Genial Jack, “a whale the size of a mountain” that has been for hundreds of years “the host to the teeming town of Jackburg”. Oodles of creatures representing more than a dozen different races/species call the buildings both within and without Jack their home. Ships anchor in Jack’s cavernous mouth. Elevators climb Jack’s inner mouth to reach Mawtown. One can ride the Esophogeal Tram to reach the villages in Jack’s guts. If that’s not one’s cup of tea, then wander across Jack’s immense back, marveling at the Coral Fortress or sampling the wares of the Dorsal District. Able to breathe water? Then dive in and swim down to the Grooves or visit the Barnaclebank Fish Market. All along the way, rub elbows with Draugar, Finfolk, Fomorians, Jellyfolk, and nine other races ready for use as PCs.

After a short introduction that includes a bit of Jack’s history and suggestions about how to use Jack in your campaign, the book details the People. Each of the 13 races are presented on a single page along with a portrait of a representative member. The races include 5E D&D stats, and each is sufficiently detailed and different to avoid Finfolk seeming too much like Jellyfolk. Unsurprisingly, many of the races are aquatic. Each race has a niche carved out in or on Jack. For example, Octopoids “have become merchant princes and princesses par excellence, with tendrils in every business in the city.” The shark-like Selachians tend to live on the fringes of Jackburg society as they hail from “nomadic warrior-bands who roam the seas, taking contracts as they come from islanders and other merfolk, living off what they kill, and in some cases turning to piracy.” I like this approach to handling races. Each has its distinctive appearance, racial abilities, and a societal role within the context of the setting.

Oddly, none of the races have subraces. Perhaps these will be detailed in the next issue of the Genial Jack? If so, it seems an odd way to present the information. If not, it seems a blank space that begs the application of creativity by the players and DM.

Jackburg itself is divided into two sections: Outer Jackburg and Inner Jackburg. Multiple districts comprise each section, and Genial Jack doesn’t so much as detail the districts as it presents them in a few paragraphs of evocative text that introduce the general flavor of the district and then briefly describes possible encounters and noteworthy locations. The encounters and locations sections are like oysters. Pry them open, and one can find pearls, if by “pearls” one means hooks for adventures both short and long. Along the way, the reader gets to meet some of the power groups and movers-and-shakers of Jackburg, from the Whaleguards to spectral pirates to Selachian clerics serving the Sharkfather. Jackburg’s government, laws, and criminal organizations (of which there are five mentioned) also get some description as well.

Smack in the middle of the book is a wonderful double-page poster of Genial Jack, showing the locations of the different districts. It’s not really a map per se. There’s no scale, for example. A nice touch is that back of the right half of the poster includes examples of Jackburg slang. When a ratfolk ruffian says you’re “eelish”, you’ll know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. (Hint: It’s not a good thing.) Then, if you’ve got the “cannonballs” for it, you can pummel him until he’s half “crab-eaten”.

One oddity is the back of the left half of the poster, which is blank. Page 26 talks about the Melonward district. Page 27 is nothing but white. Paolo Greco on DriveThruRPG explains that the page “is blank on purpose, when printed is the back of the removable centrefold.” I’m a bit meh about this. There should be something there. Perhaps more Jackburg slang? A typical tavern menu? Just about anything rather than a blank page. If you’re the type of person who would unbend staples to remove the center map, don’t fret. The two-page illustration of Genial Jack appears near the end of the book as well, right after Appendix A, which is a d20 list of interesting Jackburghers, each one of which could become an adventure hook.

In addition to the lack of subraces and that blank page, there is one other oddity: The table of contents appears at the end of the book, right before the Open Gaming License. It wasn’t until my third or fourth flip through the book that I noticed what I thought was the missing table of contents. The Draugr race is also missing from the table of contents, but they’re a bit aloof, being undead and misunderstood, so they probably don’t mind.

So, Genial Jack isn’t perfect, but what is? Rather than perfection, Genial Jack achieves others effects, all on me the reader. It enchants, amuses, and inspires. Most of the money I spend on RPG products buys something that either sits in a computer folder or gathers dust on a book shelf. Not so with Genial Jack. I want to use it. I want to share it with others via the medium of a game. Indeed, I am doing so, adapting it piecemeal for Dungeon World with my group of middle school students with whom I game about once a week.

I’m most pleased with Genial Jack, and I eagerly await the next issue.

By the way, each picture below embiggens when you click on it.

Tags: 5E D&D, Genial Jack, Lost Pages, reviews

Event Horizon arrived yesterday. By John Reyst and Johua De Santo, this 59-page introductory adventure for White Star takes that game system into the realm of space horror, a genre that I’ve dug since seeing Alien in the theater way back in 1979.

I read the adventure last night. It hits many of the high points of space horror, and presents some really interesting gaming possibilities related to sanity (Sanity Events) and becoming unmoored in space-time (Time Dilation). Sanity Events come into two sizes: Minor and Major. The precise descriptions of Sanity Events are largely left up the GM. The module offers some suggestions to get the imagination working.

In game terms, Sanity Events cause a reduction of Wisdom. If Wisdom gets too low, the affected character becomes a dangerously unstable NPC. Time Dilation events unstick one or more characters from their present time and/or location. For example, a character may “flashback” to an earlier scene in the adventure or “jump” forward in time to experience something that might happen. Like with Sanity Events, examples and advice about Time Dilation effects appear throughout the module.

Without going into too much more detail about the adventure itself, it’s noteworthy that the scenario starts with new characters waking up from cryosleep after Bad Things have happened near a black hole. Event Horizon is a race against time that draws on elements from Alien, Pandorum, and the movie Event Horizon, among others. The characters must beat the clock, repairing their ship before it gets either sucked into a black hole or destroyed by alien invaders.

At first glance, Event Horizon is an attractive book. The cover and interior artwork is well-done, except for the pictures of the aliens, which still aren’t horrible. My aged eyes appreciate the single-column layout without obscuring background art or funky colors. I’d have used a different font for the headers, however; the header font in the book tricked my eyes into misreading a few words.

Similarly, while the ship’s maps are well done, the nebula background behind the maps is pretty but unnecessary, and the maps perhaps could been a bit larger. I found myself squinting at them, especially on the lower and middle deck maps where numbers appear in black over dark grey shading. In the main body of the adventure, italics are used to denote descriptive, read-aloud text, and these sections tend to blend into the main text. Boxed text or different spacing would have helped.

Most distracting, however, are the tables. Their layout is quirky, and some of the time text is missing. Table 5, for example, which uses 1d6, has results for 1, “3 thru 5”, and 6. Nothing for the number 2. (See the pic to right.) These details don’t ruin the look of Event Horizon, but they do distract from it as well as slightly muck up the coherence of the text.

All in all, however, I like Event Horizon, and I want to give it a run. I’d probably use Stars Without Number rather than White Star, since I prefer to form to the latter for sci-fi/space gaming, and that’s another selling point in favor of Event Horizon. It’s for White Star, but it’s still generic enough that Event Horizon would work well with just about old-school game.

Kudos to the d20pfsrd Publishing team!

And now, as promised, the twin heroes Hunapu and Xbalanque converted the AD&D Deities & Demigods for use with 5E D&D.

Hunapu and Xbalanque were conceived when their mother Xquic, daughter of one of the lords of Xibalba, the rulers of the land of the dead, spoke with the severed head Hun, Xquic’s dead husband. The skull spat in Xquic’s hand, and the twins were conceived in her womb. Hunapu and Xbalanque are great adventurers and resolute foes of demons and the undead. Both men love games, especially competitive sports.

Hunapu & Xbalanque
Medium humanoid (human), lawful good

Armor Class 14 (20 with barkskin)
Hit Points 153 (18d8+72)
Speed 30 ft.
Ability Scores STR 22 (+6), DEX 18 (+4), CON 18 (+4), INT 16 (+3), WIS 12 (+1), CHA 18 (+4)

Saving Throws Strength +10, Dexterity +8, Intelligence +7, Wisdom +5
Skills Athletics +10, Investigation +11, Insight +9, Medicine +9, Perception +9, Survival +9
Damage Resistances cold, fire
Senses passive Perception 19
Languages Abyssal, Common, Infernal, Sylvan
Challenge 11 (7,200 XP)

Clever Minds. The twins make Intelligence and Wisdom saving throws with advantage. Their proficiency bonus for Intelligence and Wisdom skills is doubled.

Favored Enemies. The twins have advantage on Wisdom (Survival) checks to track fiends and undead. The twins also have advantage of Intelligence checks to recall information about fiends and undead.

Innate Spellcasting. Hunapu’s and Xbalanque’s innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 16). They can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components:

1/day each: barkskin, call lightning, divination, freedom of movement, plant growth, spider climb

Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If either of the twins fails a saving throw, he can choose to succeed instead.

Magical Weapons. Hunapu’s and Xbalanque’s weapon attacks are magical.

Spellcasting. Hunapu and Xbalanque are 10th-level spellcasters. Their spellcasting ability is Intelligence (spell save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). They prepare spells from the druid and wizard spell lists, gaining the latter without need of a spellbook. Neither twin can prepare 5th-level wizard spells, but either may use a 5th-level slot to cast a lower level wizard spell. They have the following spells prepared:

Hunapu

Cantrips (at will): druidcraft, fire bolt, message, produce flame
1st level (4 slots): charm person, cure wounds, disguise self, jump
2nd level (3 slots): darkvision, pass without trace, phantasmal force
3rd level (3 slots): conjure animals, dispel magic, slow
4th level (3 slots): grasping vine, polymorph
5th level (2 slots): tree stride

Xbalanque

Cantrips (at will): guidance, message, prestidigitation, shocking grasp
1st level (4 slots): burning hands, cure wounds, grease, longstrider
2nd level (3 slots): blur, darkvision, spike growth
3rd level (3 slots): counterspell, haste, speak with plants
4th level (3 slots): conjure woodland beings, polymorph
5th level (2 slots): wall of stone

Wild Shape (2/Day). As a bonus action, a twin can magically assume the shape of a beast that has a challenge rating of 1 or lower that the twin has seen before. The twin can stay in a beast shape for 5 hours. He then reverts to his normal form unless he expends another use of this feature. He can revert to your normal form earlier by using a bonus action on your turn. He automatically reverts if he falls unconscious, drops to 0 hit points, or dies. While in beast form, the twins attacks count as magical for the purposes of overcoming resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage.

Actions

Multiattack. A twin makes three hand axe attacks, or one ranged weapon attack with a blowgun.

Hand Axe. Melee or Ranged Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 5 ft. or range 20/60 ft., one target. Hit: 9 (1d6+6) slashing damage.

Blowgun. Ranged Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, ranged 150/600 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d4+4) piercing damage plus 21 (6d6) poison damage, and the target must succeed on a DC 17 Constitution saving throw or become poisoned for 1 minute. A target can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.

Reactions

Foe Slayer. When a fiend or undead creature within 5 feet of a twin hits or misses a twin with an attack, either twin can use his reaction to attack that creature immediately after its attack, provided the twin can see the creature.

Legendary Actions

Both Hunapu and Xbalanque can take 3 legendary actions each, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary option can be used at time and only at the end of another creature’s turn. The twins regain spent legendary actions at the start of their respective turns.

Detect. The twin makes a Wisdom (Perception) check or a Wisdom (Insight) check.

Move. The twin moves up to half his speed without provoking opportunity attacks.

Tackle. The twin makes a Strength (Athletics) check against an adjacent creature contested by the creature’s Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check. If the twin wins the contest, he either knocks the target prone or pushes it 5 feet away from him. In either case, the target takes 8 (1d4+6) bludgeoning damage.

Tags: 5E D&D, Deities & Demigods, horror, NPCs, reviews