Sunday, July 7, 2013

Magic Realm: Day 10

I had an interesting comment from a reader, yesterday, regarding the impossibility of moving into a clearing, unhidden, with the Black Knight's enemies, the Guards, and selling items to their leader.

That sequence of events is permitted, under the Magic Realm rules, as Denizens only block characters during an action that requires a Meeting table roll. Those rolls are required when we are BUYING an item from an unhired leader, attempting to HIRE Denizens, and during the combat encounter step at the end of the day. Passing through a clearing occupied by Denizens does not attract a Meeting table roll, nor does SELLING an item to an unhired leader.  The Magic Realm rules for Denizens differ from those related to Monsters.  Monsters do block you if you move into their clearing, unhidden, but that is not the case for Denizens.

Let us move on to day 10 in the Magic Realm. We ended day 9 with the elimination of the two remaining Guards at the Guardhouse. Two of the three Patrol still occupy the Guardhouse, and there are eight treasures available for us to loot. 


Looking at the top of the screen, it displays all the individuals and treasures at the Guardhouse.  The most difficult of the treasures to loot are the ones on the left, as we need to roll low numbers on the Loot table to obtain them (remember that we roll two dice and take the higher of the two rolls).  The treasures on the left are the helmet, breastplate, and mace.  Those are not attractive treasures, as we already own a suit of armor, which is superior to the helmet and breastplate, as well as a mace.  We do want to obtain the other blue treasure card, which is in position four of the treasure pile.

During our prior turns, we have fatigued two chits and have one wounded chit.


Since we are only on day 10 of 28, with four days until the end of week two, and the Patrol poses little risk to us, we are going to rest for three of our four actions, and loot once.


The prowling monster roll is a 2, once again, meaning snakes and demons are on the prowl.  As we are in a valley, we are unmolested by prowling monsters.

We rest three times during day 10, recovering our fatigued and wounded chits, and loot once, obtaining a roll of 4 and 5, thus looting our shield, the fifth treasure in the pile. 

At the end of the day, during the combat encounter step, we roll a 2 on the Meeting table, and the Patrol once again provides a wide berth to the Black Knight.



3 comments:

  1. You should be using the optional rules for Commerce to prevent the sort of system gaming tactics that this series is utilizing.

    Why would the Guards give you gold if they would barely ever sell you anything. The commerce rules fix this and you can use either the normal meting table or the new Commerce table, I know people who go either way.

    Also, the Watchful Natives rule should almost always be used, and was intended to be official in the 2nd ed. This prevents your hit and run on the guards.

    The Black Knight is a party hero, he is designed to hire some natives and go out monster and hero hunting. Not to camp out sniping Natives as with the Woodsgirl.

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  2. Well, you have to understand several things. First, those are optional rules: this game demonstration is using the original rules. Second, this series is intended to introduce Magic Realm and its mechanics to those who are unfamiliar with the game. Third, this series is intended to demonstrate a winning strategy for the Black Knight.

    I appreciate that there are rules that provide a greater challenge to certain characters. But it is valuable for newcomers to learn the Magic Realm mechanics and win a few games before adding optional rules that ratchet up the challenge level.

    I hope you can support the above purposes during the presentation of this game play series.

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  3. I can understand that. Sorry, if my comments come of a slightly negative. Demonstrating ways to game the system, however, serves as a dubious introduction to the game.

    The Black Knight is one of the easiest characters to win with normally.


    That said a demo for new players that shows how to win with the Wizard or Sorcerer would be quite beneficial, since there is not much showing a variety of magical tactics.

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