Session 2: The Belly of the Beast

[Marullus]

(Ulrich doesn't light more torches, retaining six. Someone can light a campfire.)

Hungry, thirsty, and exhausted, Ulrich sits along the back wall of the chamber and begins sorting through his pack and beginning to fold and refold his cloth strips for bandages. The smell of roasted meats and the warmth and light of fires reaches them until Norgrim closes the door, raising his ire and stoking his indignity. A clammy, dark alcove with no hospitality... he expected better of any true Paladin, of any true Orderly society. His thoughts turn dark as he mulls this... he once commanded respect, he once ate at banquet, and now he is snubbed by goblins and orcs, sitting in a dirty hovel. They have no knowledge to help, no tools to aid, and not even the decency of hospitality. Even a win feels like a loss. They deserve to be consumed here in this Hell. They will never touch the Daakan relic, nor see it, if he has his way... they cannot even feed those that could reclaim it.

He steels himself. I cannot afford those thoughts, not with a Daedra so close at hand. He wars internally, reciting the litanies of his order to himself again, forcing himself to review the uses of his collected-herbs as he wraps them to make pads and poultices. He pushes back against the dark thoughts, reminding himself of the power of unity of purpose, as he reminded the Hobgoblin Paladin earlier. His fingers find comfort in the repeated actions with the bandages, repeating the lessons of Diedre the Healer to himself, despite his distraction and exhaustion. He finally finishes, regarding the handiwork, and looking to consider the injuries of the party to which the bandages could be suited.

Instinct to make bandages when we camp. Check against Healer 2, taking -1D for Feared in Hell (avoid evil thoughts).
Making bandages: Healing 2D-1D = 1D [1d6] = 4

[Rusty Tincanne]

Marullus. before you decide on traits or roll those dice, you might want to know the Ob you are up against. You are exhausted, which effectively adds one level of Ob to the test (-1s on your roll). If the Ob is the same as it was for me (Ob1) and you are exhausted (-1s), it is effectively an Ob2 test. Using your trait against yourself isn't a great idea unless you were really just going for a check. But since your instinct is to make the poultice "in camp," I don't believe you can accrue checks.

If you wanted the check, it'd have to be a regular test (advancing the turn counter), which is fine as long as we aren't going into another grind, which it shouldn't if Norgrim's action is an "in camp" instinct as well.

If you wanted success on a Test, you have 2D. You could recruit Norgrim's laborer skill to gather supplies/crush herbs/boil water, etc and/or Garen's cooking skill (perhaps) to boil water, simmer herbs, etc. (I have been looking up poultice making on the web because of this game and for my two sick kids. It looks a heck of a lot like cooking to me!)


Either way, Steven has us separated now, so if you want to help in freeing me it'll likely be a test (pre-camp) or a check (in camp). If it is in camp, I will happily donate a check to whoever does the test, since it is my fault for getting into this pickle. I did not foresee such tangled twist coming from that test...

[Marullus]

Yeah, I was going for the Check. Can I not earn a Check?

[Rusty Tincanne]

Enoch or Steven will know better, but my understanding is that we cannot earn checks in the camp phase, so I believe you cannot. Though your wording is, "when making camp," I think the intent of that is to say 'when we have made camp and my character has some down time to work on it.' Steven and you can hash that out, though.

But as I said, if you were to attempt making a poultice prior to making camp, then you'd have yourself a check. And either a twist (and failure) or condition (and success).

Subtle intricacies, but as Enoch mentioned somewhere, TB seems to be a game that rewards metagaming. There seem to be a lot of loopholes left in by design, which are acknowledged as such if you read through the Burning Wheel forums. For example, clerics can use scrolls to perform prayers outside their alignment without penalty, so having two clerics of opposing alignment making scrolls for one another can give both access to some nice prayers. And I deliberately used my previous fate point to earn another; plus a persona point because my instinct is so in line with my belief now. (All I have to do is survive somehow... )

[thesniperknight1]

If you need help Rand, just shout

[C. Steven Ross]

Hey sorry for the silence. Unseen Servant stopped emailing me on post updates (weird?) and I just checked in to see if you guys really hadn't posted anything in awhile. You had!

Norgrim: PLEASE MAKE AN OB 3 SURVIVALIST TEST.
You gotta go in strict order in Torchbearer, because every test can fail, every fail could be a twist, and every twist changes the dynamic of what is going on.

Ulrich: You can't roll dice until I tell you the Obstacle. There can be all sorts of what are called "Evil GM" factors that make things harder. You are also not camping. There's been talk, but no one has set down to camp yet, so you can't use your Instinct. And when you are in camp phase, you can't earn checks (else you could set up infinite checks/time loops with really good skills).

Rand: You're starting to really grasp the rules now. Huzzah! We'll get to you digging yourself out after Norgrim.

[Marullus]

Okay, redact my post.

I am acting on an instinct, so it doesn't advance the turn counter. My intent was to get Checks, so can we interpret "when we camp" as "just before we camp"?

This was Rusty's suggestion for an instinct... what are the resulting bandages useful for should the check be successful?

[C. Steven Ross]

OK now US is back to emailing me on updates. ??? Whatever

Ulrich: Firstly, we're in the middle of someone rolling dice. It's like Enoch has the dice in his hands and is shaking them, and then you're jumping into the middle and saying you are doing something. Give the guy a chance to breathe!

Secondly, there's no twilight period between adventure phase and camp. As soon as you say that you're camping (and you have a check, etc.), then you're camping! It's too nebulous to define a time when you are about to camp but aren't there yet.

Thirdly, you cannot change your instinct in the middle of a session. It happens at the beginning, technically right after Prologue.

Fourthly, when you have a rating in a skill (as Ulrich has a Rating in Healer), you are assumed to have the barebones basics to do your job. A scholar has some paper and ink, and alchemist has a few bottles and reagents, and a healer has some splints and bandages. So, your action is already done, no test! Huzzah! But as barebones necessities, the bandages don't give you a bonus. They prevent you from taking addition penelties, similar to fighting unarmed. You could, though, try to cobble together some healing salves to help alleviate conditions. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it though.

Lastly, Rand, not sure if you alreday did this but I wanted to mention as a good example: make sure to jot down that you failed a Cartographer test. At skill Rating 2, you just need 2 passes and a fail to advance to skill Rating 3. Skill Advancement is, in my opinion, the biggest bump in abilities that you get in this game!

On a related note and to emphasize the point, Garen, if/when you make tests and such; remember that because you are sick, you cannot mark down your new passes and fails. Being sick is awful!

[thesniperknight1]

Can I use a check to cure my sickness? Or do I need a salve and what not? I am not gonna do it now, since Enoch is still in the middle of a roll but I was just wondering

[C. Steven Ross]

Garen: Of course! Sick can be recovered during Camp or Town just like any other condition. However, recovery always has to go in order, so you must clear out hungry/thirsty, angry, and exhausted first, and in that order, before you can even attempt to clear out sick.

Sick (and Injured) are at the bottom of the pile in recovery order and both have some nasty Ob's to clear out. So if you like, at any point you can "sweat out the fever" and instantly clear Sick at the cost of me choosing Will, Nature, or a Will-based skill and reducing it by 1.

[Marullus]

I am not intending to jump in on anyone. I just said I would sit back and defer to others and you said, "You decide!" That is the only reason I posted and I tried to do the failure-for-a-check like Rand did.
I took this instinct at Rusty's request and don't know its purpose. Please just redact my post and tell me what to do.

[C. Steven Ross]

Sure sure, I get ya. My point in "you decide!" was to try and cut down on the analysis paralysis. Sorry if it led to confusion!

Hey go poke Enoch and tell him to post his Survivalist test!

[Rusty Tincanne]

For the record, Enoch's instinct is camp related too. So if he is rolling, then we are camping. It would have been nicer to clear up this twist first to maximize our checks, but we can still deal with that.

Steven: Thanks for the reminder to mark off cartographer. Done! Also, you never answered the question about a campfire: is that automatically built when we say "we are camping!"?

SK: If I clear my afraid condition, I can offer a die to assist with your sickness. Or just make a healing test on you. Ulrich also has the healing trait.

Marullus: The poultices can be used to add +1D to recover from any condition. Very useful. Also, since it is an instinct, if you pass the test, you gain a Fate point for the group benefiting from your instinct. That is why I suggested that instinct to you - you can reap benefits from helping the group. (If memory serves, the instinct you were leaning towards was self-serving, which - though beneficial to you - would not earn you a fate point. I was trying to be helpful. Sorry if it isn't to your liking. )

When I had that instinct last session I had an Ob2 assigned - 1Ob for the poultice, 1Ob for exhausted. Was that incorrect? Because I had two twists mess me all up as a result!

[Marullus]

Thanks, Rusty. . I am not displeased with the instinct. It IS thematic IC; I took it on faith and figured you'd explain later, which you did. I assumed it was for Injured conditions which is why I didn't worry about passing. It being any conditions is awesome. We can address it when it is time.

[Rusty Tincanne]

Seeing as you have Exhausted, it will likely be an Ob2 to make a poultice. But you have that Defender 2 trait, meaning you get to use it to your advantage as frequently as you like. So how does defender work with that skill!? Get working on that reasoning because when you use an instinct, you are the only help you get.

So, your action is already done, no test! Huzzah!

Steven, did you mean that a poultice is an Ob0 test, or did I misinterpret that?

[Enoch]

Sorry, I was out of town and wasn't able to post yesterday like I thought I would be able to.

I don't have Survivalist, and I'm not going to be able to make an Ob3 test with Nature 4. So I'll go with Beginner's Luck (Health 5). Can I use a Trait against myself even though this happens in Camp phase?

Either way, I'll be rolling 3D against Ob3 or Ob4.
[3d6s4] = 2

[thesniperknight1]

Thanks Rusty Sick is too scary, I am on death's door, I would appreciate any help you give me and if it didn't work out then I will have to sweat it out and be under Stephen's mercy

[C. Steven Ross]

Enoch: No worries!

Rand: Sorry I dropped your question. When you make camp, rules say you build a campfire and it provides light equivalent to a lantern if it is necessary to track that. Generally, in Camp, I don't bother tracking light sources, the implications of the rules saying to me that it only matters if a wandering monster breaks your camp.

The Ob 0 Healer test was in response to making bandages. You already have bandages at the ready by virtue of having a rating in Healer. My end point here being to say that a rating in a skill gives you the basic tools to use that skill, and that is never tracked in inventory. That's why your inventory sometimes feels so teeny tiny. It's abstraction to take into account dozens of smaller items you would need just to do the basic job (whetstone for Fighter, etc.).

Poultices, though, are a different story and have different Ob's depending on what you're trying to craft a benefit for.

NORGRIM: You are going to fail this test, yes. Tell us what trait of yours makes you screw up so badly. Why are you an ill-suited, miserable outcast of the world? Torchbearer wants to tell the tale of misbegotten anti-heroes with deep flaws, and it incentivizes that by handing out boons (in this instance, Checks) in exchange for self-penalizing your rolls. While you are doing that ...

Norgrim goes about trying to spike down the one door in or out of this place, a seemingly wise precaution to make any camp you set up a bit safer. Unfortunately, when the hammer hits the door, it knocks it clear off its hinges. A gentle touch please, Master Dwarf! Now, your resting place does not even have the luxury of being blocked from view from the less honorable, unscrupulous denizens of this cave who may or may not heed the words of Ghaaldar.

What do you do now!?

[C. Steven Ross]

END TURN 10
8 Turns to Rewards
Candle is halfway burned down.
If you're hungry, for gods sake eat something.

Some things I remember people thinking about doing:
- make camp
- free Rand from being trapped under stone debris
- make a poultice

[Enoch]

Being Born of Earth and Stone, Norgrim simply is not used to non-Dwarven construction. Why would the builders do such shoddy work, where a door can't even stand up to normal use?! "Uhh...guys? The door...it, ah, isn't shutting right. We might want to set watches."