Ships of Crannog

The Heroes of Tara liberated six dryads with the help of clever magic, a friendly elephant and an old druid. In the process, they learned much about Crannog's plans. "Dozens" of dryads had been captured in their trees, turned into "dryad poles" against their will for use in creating "live ships." A sentient ship allows a sea captain to harness the dryad to do his bidding.

In rare cases, a dryad may be convinced to give her life towards creating a live ship, but it would be rare, requiring a dryad with a sense of adventure and desire to experience everything the world offers. Dryads, by nature, don't travel far from their home oak, so such a one would be very rare indeed. That ship would be as unique and amazing as the dryad within it.

Putting the pieces of the puzzle together, the "dryad poles" were meant to be used as main masts, turning a newly built ship without memories, into a living ship. The elven silk and rope were also destined for a ship, providing fire resistant "masterwork" sails ready for enchantment. But why all the iron? Wooden boats use some iron, but not in the quantities Crannog was stealing from Tara's iron mine. The plans uncovered in the lair of The Beastmaster, where the dryads were liberated, tells the story.

As many as 600 slaves are to be stored in the hold of one of Crannog's ships, the iron used as shackles after another ritual that creates a permanent "Cure Disease" to those "wearing" the item. With a couple dozen ships, Crannog could enslave a city of 14,000 inhabitants. Tara, with it's 5,000 people would be a short stop along the way.

Humanity, according to Crannog and his followers, is simply too dangerous to let run loose on the surface of the earth. They have shown themselves to be irresponsible with magic, amoral when it comes to war, and unable to learn from their mistakes. Killing them all is drastic. One does not kill chickens or cattle, one controls them and uses them for the benefit of all. Yes, proper stewardship of humanity, according to Crannog's philosophy, requires control.

Typical Ships Crew

Captain Morgan    CR 8
XP 4800
Male Human Expert 4 Fighter 6
LN Medium Humanoid (human)
Init +1; Senses Perception +10

---

Defense

---

AC 19, touch 12, flat-footed 17 (+7 armor, +1 Dex, +1 dodge)
hp 85 (6d10+4d8+30)
Fort +8, Ref +4, Will +6 (+2 vs. fear)
Defensive Abilities bravery +2

---

Offense

---

Speed 30 ft.
Melee +1 Trident +15/+10 (1d8+8/x2)
Ranged Masterwork Composite longbow (Str +4) +9/+4 (1d8+3/x3)
Special Attacks weapon training abilities (thrown +1)

---

Statistics

---

Str 17, Dex 13, Con 14, Int 12, Wis 10, Cha 10
Base Atk +9; CMB +12; CMD 24
Feats Blind-Fight, Dodge, Master Craftsman (Profession [sailor]), Persuasive, Quick Draw, Rugged Northerner, Skill Focus (Profession [sailor]), Toughness +10, Weapon Focus (Trident), Weapon Specialization (Trident)
Skills Acrobatics +3, Climb +15, Craft (ships) +5, Diplomacy +12, Escape Artist -1, Fly -1, Intimidate +2, Knowledge (engineering) +5, Knowledge (geography) +10, Knowledge (history) +5, Knowledge (local) +5, Knowledge (nature) +10, Knowledge (nobility) +5, Linguistics +5, Perception +10 (only -1/20' while using a spyglass, instead of -1/10'), Profession (merchant) +5, Profession (sailor) +21, Ride -1, Stealth -1, Survival +10, Swim +10
Languages Auran, Common, Northman
Other Gear +1 Breastplate, +1 Trident, Arrows (20), Masterwork Composite longbow (Str +4), Gloves of swimming and climbing, Spyglass, You have no money!

---

Special Abilities

---

Blind-Fight Re-roll misses because of concealment, other benefits.
Bravery +2 (Ex) +2 to Will save vs. Fear
Master Craftsman (Profession [sailor]) +2 to chosen craft skill, its ranks count as CL for Craft Magic Arms and Armor and Craft Wondrous Item.
Quick Draw Draw weapon as a free action (or move if hidden weapon). Throw at full rate of attacks.
Rugged Northerner Frostbite, hypothermia, and extreme cold effects lessened
Weapon Training (Thrown) +1 (Ex) +1 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Thrown weapons

---

Crewmen    CR 1/2
XP 200
Male Human Expert 1 Warrior 1
N Medium Humanoid (human)
Init +1; Senses Perception +6

---

Defense

---

AC 14, touch 11, flat-footed 13 (+3 armor, +1 Dex)
hp 12 (1d10+1d8+2)
Fort +3, Ref +1, Will +2

---

Offense

---

Speed 30 ft.
Melee Dagger +2 (1d4+1/19-20/x2)
Ranged Longbow, Comp. (Str +1) +2 (1d8+1/x3)

---

Statistics

---

Str 13, Dex 13, Con 12, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 9
Base Atk +1; CMB +2; CMD 13
Feats Alertness, Skill Focus (Profession [sailor])
Skills Acrobatics +5, Climb +5, Craft (ships) +3, Knowledge (nature) +3, Perception +6, Profession (sailor) +8, Sense Motive +2, Survival +4, Swim +5
Languages Common
Other Gear Masterwork Studded leather armor, Arrows (20), Dagger, Longbow, Comp. (Str +1), You have no money!

---

Special Abilities

---

---

Lieutenant MacCorquodale    CR 7
XP 3200
Male Human Expert 4 Fighter 5
N Medium Humanoid (human)
Init +4; Senses Perception +10

---

Defense

---

AC 20, touch 14, flat-footed 16 (+6 armor, +4 Dex)
hp 68 (5d10+4d8+18)
Fort +7, Ref +6, Will +6 (+1 vs. fear)
Defensive Abilities bravery +1

---

Offense

---

Speed 30 ft.
Melee +1 Shortsword +13/+8 (1d6+6/17-20/x2) and
   +1 Shortsword +13/+8 (1d6+5/17-20/x2) and
   Whip +12/+7 (1d3+2/x2)
Ranged Heavy crossbow +12/+7 (1d10/19-20/x2)
Special Attacks weapon training abilities (light blades +1)

---

Statistics

---

Str 14, Dex 18, Con 14, Int 8, Wis 12, Cha 10
Base Atk +8; CMB +10; CMD 24
Feats Athletic, Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Whip), Improved Critical (Shortsword), Improved Two-weapon Fighting, Quick Draw, Two-weapon Fighting, Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus (Shortsword), Weapon Specialization (Shortsword)
Skills Acrobatics +10, Climb +10, Craft (ships) +4, Diplomacy +5, Escape Artist +2, Fly +2, Intimidate +7, Knowledge (geography) +3, Knowledge (nature) +3, Linguistics +3, Perception +10, Profession (sailor) +12, Ride +2, Stealth +2, Survival +5, Swim +8
Languages Aquan, Common
Other Gear Masterwork Breastplate, +1 Shortsword, +1 Shortsword, Crossbow bolts (10), Heavy crossbow, Whip, Everburning torch, You have no money!

---

Special Abilities

---

Bravery +1 (Ex) +1 to Will save vs. Fear
Quick Draw Draw weapon as a free action (or move if hidden weapon). Throw at full rate of attacks.
Weapon Training (Blades, Light) +1 (Ex) +1 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Light Blades

---

Mate    CR 5
XP 1600
Male Human Fighter 5 Rogue 1
LN Medium Humanoid (human)
Init +5; Senses Perception +3

---

Defense

---

AC 16, touch 12, flat-footed 14 (+4 armor, +1 Dex, +1 dodge)
hp 44 (5d10+1d8+5)
Fort +6, Ref +4, Will +0 (+1 vs. fear)
Defensive Abilities bravery +1

---

Offense

---

Speed 30 ft.
Melee +1 Rapier +9 (1d6+4/18-20/x2)
Ranged Masterwork Light crossbow +7 (1d8/19-20/x2)
Special Attacks sneak attack +1d6, weapon training abilities (light blades +1)

---

Statistics

---

Str 15, Dex 13, Con 10, Int 14, Wis 8, Cha 15
Base Atk +5; CMB +7; CMD 19
Feats Combat Reflexes (2 AoO/round), Dodge, Great Fortitude, Improved Initiative, Power Attack -2/+4, Weapon Focus (Shortsword), Weapon Specialization (Shortsword)
Skills Acrobatics +8, Appraise +6, Climb +10, Diplomacy +10, Intimidate +10, Perception +3 (+4 to locate traps), Profession (sailor) +8, Sense Motive +5, Stealth +5, Swim +10
Languages Common, Northman, Phoenician
SQ trapfinding +1
Combat Gear Potion of Cure Moderate Wounds, Potion of Cure Moderate Wounds; Other Gear Masterwork Chain shirt, +1 Rapier, Crossbow bolts (20), Masterwork Light crossbow, You have no money!

---

Special Abilities

---

Bravery +1 (Ex) +1 to Will save vs. Fear
Combat Reflexes (2 AoO/round) Can make extra attacks of opportunity/rd, and even when flat-footed.
Power Attack -2/+4 You can subtract from your attack roll to add to your damage.
Sneak Attack +1d6 +1d6 damage if you flank your target or your target is flat-footed.
Trapfinding +1 Gain a bonus to find or disable traps, including magical ones.
Weapon Training (Blades, Light) +1 (Ex) +1 Attack, Damage, CMB, CMD with Light Blades

Ship Crew Costs

Your ship has a minimum crew of 20. There are penalties when you fall below 20 crewmen and severe penalties below 10. It would make sense to have a crew larger than 20 to account for illness, death or injury, and other eventualities.

A ship also needs a captain, and according to the 1E DMG, for every 20 men, the ship requires a captain, lieutenant and two mates (add additional mates for each 10 crewmen over this). I'll use generic stats for each officer position as a baseline that corresponds with the ocean going challenge ratings. We're assuming competency, non-evil, stable crew who can manage the entire operation.

I'm using a hybrid of 1E and Pathfinder when determining costs. You're paying 3sp per day for trained men (Pathfinder), multiplied by their level (1E would have been 10 times higher). It looks like this:

Minimal Crew Cost (20 crewmen, Captain, Lieutenant, 2 Mates)
Position	Qty	Rate/day/level/sp	Level	Total/Day/sp
Crewmen	20	3	1	60
Captain	1	3	8	24
Lietenant	1	3	7	21
Mates	2	3	6	36
		Daily Total		141
		Monthly Total		4230
		Monthly/Gold		423

My recommended crew of 30 looks like this:

Recommended Crew Cost (30 crewmen, Captain, Lieutenant, 3 Mates)
Position	Qty	Rate/day/level/sp	Level	Total/Day/sp
Crewmen	30	3	1	90
Captain	1	3	8	24
Lietenant	1	3	7	21
Mates	3	3	6	54
		Daily Total		189
		Monthly Total		5670
		Monthly/Gold		567

 


If you were to have some sort of "ship's share" of treasure, here's how it would work out with the crew, if you divided it by their station:

Minimal Crew Cost (20 crewmen, Captain, Lieutenant, 2 Mates)
Position	Qty	Share %	Each %
Crewmen	20	43	2
Captain	1	17	17
Lietenant	1	15	15
Mates	2	26	13

Design Diary - 1 month

Here was what I was thinking about a year ago ... I've got a private blog to journal my notes on the campaign.

So what has happened in a month?

• The Word doc is up to 140 pages of detail
• The map has been re-done to use the hex numbers. What a mistake that was. 8 hours re-do it, including re-doing the Word doc.
• Wandering monster tables by terrain. Then re-done wandering monster tables by specific terrain. So the Fey Wood is different from the forest in the Awin Rivery Valley.
• Lots of integration of Tome of Horrors monsters, animals and plants, especially those wandering monster tables.
• Increased addition of over-powered challenges, always with some built in advanced warning. 
• Character background sheets for the two people who submitted them. Lots of hooks and even additional content was created from those. Can't wait for the other two.
• Some skeletal creation of the competing folks "out there." Mostly competing goblin tribes, giants, the remnants of the cyclops civilization showing up, and the BBEG linked to these folks. I made a EL13 encounter, so I figured I've gone far enough in THAT direction. I now see how we could be playing at high levels. 
• Need to make regional map of the whole island now. I think I've gone roughly half way across it, so I need to know what it looks like.
• Discarded a lot of the advice from before: competing adventurers are mostly dead (or captured). Don't really need to advance the NPC story arcs. Not starting out with any sort of hook or adventure. The handouts have hooks. They just have to prioritize. 
• Starting to worry about the details: the look and feel, not forgetting to describe the weather and the sounds, and having the tactical stuff like battlemats and random encounters ready to go. It's probably about done then.
• Starting to worry about the older stuff I've written not being as good as the new, which shows how I've advanced in my sandbox thinking but also how I can lose interest in things.
• Worried that 1st level characters could get creamed. Thinking that having backup characters is not such a bad thing.

Khartographia of Oracle Ismela of Erythrea

Thus I came to the island of red stone where the men of the north worshiped their gods of war, while I silently prayed to Athena for protection. While most of the towns were of Northmen, some Yan Ki remained, not entirely driven from their homes. This includes  one peculiar town, where the two races intermingled in the mud. Codaver it was called, a word in the Northmen tongue that referred to the smell of rotten fish, a smell that will invade your nose and permeate your clothes the first day you spend in this wretched place.

In Codaver I asked many questions of the cyclops, enduring much laughter as usual. When they were assured I cared little about visiting the Cyclops Head, as so many adventurers are wont to do, they relaxed and told me a tale over ale and their special dish, unfortunately a fermented, rotten fish.

The limestone cliffs held secrets, I was told over my putrid meal, including the tomb of a cyclops chieftain named Bonebreaker. This was supposedly from back in the times of early men, when the folk of this backwards island were advanced in their knowledge, but enslaved by the cyclops. Perhaps they gained their knowledge from the cyclops or perhaps, inconceivably, it was the other way around.  I made a notation on my map to where it supposedly is located, nestled in the curve of the hills.

In any case, my guide explained that Bonebreaker's tomb held treasures to be sure, but had powerful guardians both magical and mundane. The best engineers of the early people were brought in to build the tomb, and legend has it they were sealed inside after its construction, some foul ritual turning them into guardians from beyond the grave. 

I am almost certain that this Bonebreaker is Bonebreaker of Aparnisi, one of the Fabled Eight. This will be my ninth year looking for clues of the eight. Could such a backwards island as this be the location of the City of Abjuration?

If it is the same Bonebreaker, and really there could be dozens by that name, it will mean that within the tomb will be the Bearpelt of the Bonebreaker from the legendary Tales of Winter Night. The evil king in the story, as every first year historian knows, was lured out into the blizzard by the great white elk, but the king was able to find his way back to his beloved city unerringly by means of his magic bear pelt. Such children's stories.

---

Our initial attempts at the expedition was met with failure, first due to the theft of our equipment by these odd mud men, then last night our guide disappeared, his daughter near catatonic and senseless babbling of flying bird women. I will return in two months time with a contingent of warriors and proper tomb explorers and engage this expedition properly. Perhaps a month away will restore my sense of smell.

Letter from Crannog to Ravana

Ravana,

You have done well with your duties. Once you have made your final shipment, you may inform the maharaja that our debt is settled.

The final shipment of dryad poles will be enough to complete the project. Cessation of iron shipments caused the project to slow, so focus on finishing up your operation in the Fey Wood.

Consider a final strike against the elves. They have something I want. I am told they have a map in their library locating the Tomb of Bonebreaker. Within the tomb is rumored to be a spellbook with a map to Aparnisi. It may be the foothold I need to locate the first part of the rod.

Finally, although your debt is paid, consider another task for me. We have suffered an incursion of undead from a valley to your south, much as you describe against Tara. I believe it is from the same source as Bloody Erik and the hill army that has vexed you and Aillyn. 

I wish to understand who is responsible for this, and why they both attack and protect the Tarans. This incursion has taxed our resources.  There are many fine young ladies available to you if you complete this task.

Crannog

The Scholarly Details

How Did The World Come To Be?

In the beginning, a race of evil beings, The Old Ones, inhabited the world. They brought much destruction on the creatures and early humans until the great goddess Danu intervened. She defeated The Old Ones and banished them to their alien realm. She left the world in the hands of a group of primordial sidhe, celestial elves tasked with keeping the doorways between worlds solidly closed. Some of these early sidhe ascended to godhead and form the pantheon called the Tuatha de Danaan. The sidhe nowadays perform the same tasks, although some are fallen, with motivations of their own.

What Is The Nature of The Gods?
The gods set up a system to leave the world in the hands of overseers, and are thus are not concerned with the day to day goings on of their worshipers. However, they also still possess human motivations, like lust and vengeance that find them meddling on occasion.

What Is The Source of Magic?
Magic is in the physics of the world, brought to the people by the god Math Mathonwy.

What Happens When You Die?
Upon death, you go to the underworld, ruled by the god Arawn. Resurrection is frowned on by Arawn, except for one day of the year, the celebration of Samhain. Reincarnation is the natural order of things, so bringing a PC back is alright using that method. Free willed undead are despised by Arawn, but unthinking undead (animated corpses) are not his concern.

What Cycles Or Events Define The Calendar?
Samhain, or the harvest festival (our late October), is the major event of the year. Beltane is the beginning of Summer, "a springtime festival of optimism" and marks the other end of the calendar (May). Bonfires mark purification and transition along with rituals to ward off otherworldly spirits. It's when livestock would be driven out to pasture (perhaps Samhain is when they come back in).

What Do You See When You Look At The Sky?
There's a single star like our sun, along with a primary moon. There is also a secondary moon, Arianna, on a wackier orbit that is known to affect the tides and mess with the height of the oceans. This moon was created by the moon goddess Arianrod while learning magic from Math Mathonwy. Those who are concerned with the seas do not concern themselves with Arianrod, instead looking to the clerics of the sea god, Manannan Mac Lir, who act as astronomers in helping to predict the activities of the rogue moon.

What Constitutes Cutting Edge Technology?
Celtic lamellar armor is pretty cutting edge and steal is abundant. There is no steam power, printing presses, firearms, clockwork mechanisms or readily accessible alchemical items. There is also no heavy armors in use, nor polearms, or exotic weapons from other cultures. Crossbows exist. Medicine is fairly well advanced thanks to the druids. Sanitation is vaguely understood and is another reason for towns rather than large cities.

Where Do Monsters Come From?
Like the world, they were always just there, with the gods and people coming later.

Which is Strongest: Magic, Gods or Nature?
Nature battles against the dangerous influences of Magic. Wizardry is a dangerous force in need of suppression to avoid past transgressions and future survival.