Tournament Arc, Part 1/8
That’s right, folks! It’s an eight-part tournament arc! No, not that kind of tournament arc. We’re talking this kind of tournament arc. Knights and damsels. The roar of the crowd. Shattered lances, grand melees, and more rearing stallions than you can shake a spur at. Of course, in Paladin’s case, I guess that’ll be a rearing mare. Snowflake is very much a lady.
The opportunity to go High Medieval can be a refreshing change of pace every once in a while. While I love dungeon-punk, over-the-top APs, and the kitchen sink approach to fantasy as much as the next gamer, a return to chivalry and romance makes a lovely palate cleanser. It also gives you access to some fun tropes.
For example, the last time Laurel and I participated in a jousting tourney we got to go full on Black Knight. Laurel was playing a young noblewoman in that one. She’d been sent to the country to prevent her from following her six older brothers into the local order of knighthood. You can imagine the mother figure in this scenario: “I will not have my only daughter charging about the countryside on horseback fighting monsters!” It should go without saying that the young lady in question fell in with adventurers, then proceeded to charge about the countryside on horseback fighting monsters. Still, respecting Mommy Dearests’s wishes, it was a very hush-hush adventuring career. Our lady knight didn’t want word to get out, and so she took on the guise of the Knight of the Fangwood rather than let the bards sing her proper name.
You can probably see where this is going.
When word got out about a jousting tournament, it was my job as the party wizard to thoroughly disguise our knight. Because of course m’Lord and Lady Parental Units would be in the audience, and of course Laurel had to fight the championship bout against her older brother. There were tense moments galore. The Knight of the Fangwood had to keep up the ruse in conversation with her parents, preserve the dignity of her brother, and make the dramatic reveal at exactly the right moment. It was also good fun watching our bard imitate Chaucer during the introductions.
As fantasy nerds we all have bits and pieces of Arthurian legend, medieval pop culture references, and snippets of actual history bouncing around in our brains. I think it’s worth our while to use those resources. After all, the dragons and magic spells are that much more believable when they appear alongside traditional, respectable pseudo-history.
So what about the rest of you guys? Have you ever gone medieval on a game? Which elements did you use? What tropes paid off? Let’s hear all about your courtly love affairs, well-researched period costumes, and epic grail quests down in the comments!
ADD SOME NSFW TO YOUR FANTASY! If you’ve ever been curious about that Handbook of Erotic Fantasy banner down at the bottom of the page, then you should check out the “Quest Giver” reward level over on The Handbook of Heroes Patreon. Twice a month you’ll get to see what the Handbook cast get up to when the lights go out. Adults only, 18+ years of age, etc. etc.
I played a character once like that one you described that Laurel played.
Mommy wanted her daughter to be a noble lady, but all the boys got to be knights. Well, my girl stewed in this repressed state until her father (who was more agreeable) at least managed to convince his wife to let him train their daughter in a delicate, ladylike weapon for self-defense.
Do I even need to say that she became a strength-based barbarian who beat enemies about with her rapier as if it were a broadsword? Suffice to say she’s bottled up a lot of frustrations as a “noble lady” prior to her adventuring career.
Never got to see mom’s reaction to it, because her traitorous younger brother started kinslaying to try and get all the family’s inheritance for himself. She did manage to save her father in the end, though, and got a touching “I’m so proud of you” moment for her efforts.
Awww… Too bad about the dead mother. Watching mumsy get all pissed off and then reluctantly thank you for saving her from [insert danger here] is the whole point!
I dig the barbarian noble trope. I always wanted to give it a shot myself, but never found quite the right game.
Heh. My first larp character almost fit. She was so sick of being the Worse Twin (they were physically identical but her manner(ism)s outed her every time) that she cut her hair, joined the fight against a Crusade, snuck into the enemy camp and followed them home to England. Good twin was a Proper Lady, manipulative as heck and a skilled alchemist/medic/poisoner. My character was a completely illiterate berserker with so few brains she was immune to head damage – nothing in there to concuss – and had all the sense of a brick. She once started a plague because someone gave her a pocketful of rats to spread around the town and in a superpowered instance of the “fools don’t catch colds” trope she was the only person she knew who didn’t catch the blimmin’ plague.
She got a bit better as she aged – she even learned enough reading, writing and ‘rithmetic to join the local warlocks, but she never got the message that she should quit with the clanky armour now her armour class had changed and was forever strapping the stuff on and zapping herself. Good job she had all those hit points, she needed them.
OK. That tears it. Between this thread and the werewolf nobles in the novel I’m reading at the moment…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fifth_Elephant
…I think I’m reading to savage-noble it up for my next adventure.
You just perfectly described my character Princess Tara. She disguises herself to go adventuring. I haven’t had a chance to play her yet, but I want to. She has a level of Falcata Swashbuckler, a level of Bard, and the rest Vigilante.
You ever read “Monstrous Regiment?” That one is my favorite take on the ‘girl who became a boy to become a soldier’ trope.
She doesn’t disguise herself as a boy though. She wears a wig and mask and pitches her voice differently so no one recognizes her. I’m actually planning to go to AWA as her. I’ve got everything except her armor.
Well, this is easy. Pendragon is THE game with knights in shining armour having a go at each other with lances, and swords and stuff. Be it during battle, or during the joust. Joust scores are even a part of the Character sheet, because they are that important. In the later half of the Pendragon Campaign jousts become increasingly important, and extensive. Both from a social standpoint (everybody and his dog will be there) and from a training standpoint, as real wars become less common, so the only way to test your mettle, and show your art, is during a Tourney. And Arthur has this gand tourney once a year, in which knights reputations can be made, or broken… So lots of time, and place, for flexing muscles, courting ladies, starting, and ending, feuds, alliances and engagements. There is even a whole KAP book just with adventures taking place at tournaments. And, as Lancelot is wont to fight in these tournaments as an anonymous knight (and quite a few others imitate him in this), there is always lots of intrigue, and behind the scenes investigation, and cloak and dagger work, to either ensure the secret identity stays that way, or there is a dramatic reveal, preferably in front of the king and queen.
I thought you might have some input on this one’s Louis!
Care to give a plot summary on your latest tourney intrigue? I’d be curious to hear what your players have got up to.
Nope, never went full-on Malory ’till now. It feels very antithetical to dungeon delving and favors very specific PCs and worldbuilding (meaning a jarring shift in tone if the two were not attuned beforehand). Especially in those kitchen-sink games it’s seems difficult to pull off without it turning silly (and which setting isn’t kitchen sink these days).
When you have a snake-man artificer riding her metallic pterosaur brandishing a thunder cannon, a gnaked but very hairy gnome wildshaping into a mammoth to ride himself and a bisexual orc ranger riding just about everyone, the experience swiftly turns from GRRMs ‘Mystery Knight’ (the last chivalric novel I read) to Hearthstones ‘Grand Tournament’ expansion. The one with frog-riding murloc knights and hippo-mounted gorilla champions.
It’s gloriously silly and very much fun, but probably not what one pictures when watching ‘A Knight’s Tale’ or reading Arthuriana.
However, my group started playing The Witcher TRPG, and the arthurian inspiration behind it is very overt in the books and even more so in the video games. So it’s just a matter of time untill heraldry is expounded, lances get shattered, the demoiselles start to swoon and the Black Knight shames the competition by a Samus-Aran-Type reveal.
In response to “which setting isn’t kitchen sink these days”: that has been quite common, with both 5e having released Ravnica and Eberron. Hence why I’m so glad for the release of Theros; while greek mythology is different to Arthurian legends, with different tropes and locations, they should both have the same general feeling.
Sword and sandals is one I’ve always wanted to try out. Haven’t had the chance yet, bit I bet it would be fun, especially with all the setting fluff in Theros to offer support.
Already reserved MOoT at my local gamestore. The alternative cover looks incredible
You ever read any Gene Wolfe? His “Wizard / Knight” duology is one of my favorite knight’s tales, and actually offers an interesting middle ground between the kitchen sink and the chivalric romance.
“Which setting isn’t kitchen sink these days?”
The ones I create, for starters, but it does lead to many applicants being upset that I won’t let them field the Kenku Gunslinger they have been planning for ages. XD
Aside from some Dark Heresy/Rogue Trader games early in my RPing career I’ve always designed my own settings. These are much more restictive than out-of-the-box ones, me being no fan of maximalism, but there is the tradeoff that you have to convince players to build characters within the setting provided, not just within the library of sourcebooks.
Another named pet (have we seen her before?)! Funny how the heroes are nameless, but their pets and animal companions/familiars have names. I suspect that’s why the humanoids seem to snuff it more than their pets – gotta have that named character plot armor.
Well sure. You can’t kill adorable critters. That would be animal cruelty!
What does violence against wildshaped druids/Kitsune count as then?
A potential comic. Excuse me whilst I pencil something in.
I predict seven pages of Snowflakes descent into evil as she attempts to assassinate Elf Princess and get Horse Power / Lumberjack Explosion all for herself.
My money’s on Lumberjack Explosion hitting on her with Elf Princess none the wiser since he’s not in his Horsepower guise.
<_<
You know, i dont think i ever did a session like this, the closest thing i could think of was that my party once joined a group of nobles on one of their hunts, except we were hunting birds and our horses could fly. Turned out later that these nobles were evil, and that according to the module they were supposed to betray and try to kill us in our sleep, but due to various coincidences, alot of failed perception and insight checks, and the fact that our usually murderhobo heavy party was unusually well behaved, they actually became trusted allies for a while despite the fact they they were supposed to be fairly transparently evil.
We’re you supposed to kill a cute and cuddly Tweety bird that begged for its life or something?
I do like the idea of falconing as an adventure hook for nobles. What if your hawk brought back something it shouldn’t have? Some fey creature of the Wildwood perhaps…?
Ooh that does seem like a fun hook, and actually it was a group of sapient birds that they were hunting, but we either killed them to fast ourselves for us to realize that, or failed every skill check that would allow us to realize such with a series of very low rolls that were matched by our series of very high rolls in charming the villains. Think one of those comedy shows or comics where the main group fail to notice any of the transparent signs of villainy that surround the villains, and you pretty much get how our group was. Sorta like Elan with his father in order of the stick.
So what do you do when your hawk brings back a ticked-off druid? 😉
White hair, blue eyes, wonder if Snowflake is related to Ghost from this well worth watching series ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VImKFvFM6EI
Thought this was a Game of Thrones reference at first.
Thanks for the recommendation! Cool bit of history.
Chances are you’ve played at least one of the games his companies put out…
Oh to be a billionaire and play games for real…
Lots of really informative clips in his series, definitely worth the time to watch them.
I see Paladin finally learned to use a spell slot for something other than Holy Smite. Progress! 😉
Does it really count as “learning” if it was an accident?
It’s still an improvement. Any Paladin who isn’t using their spells is just a pretentious Fighter.
For those curious aboot how to effectively use L1 Paladin spells
Ooh, can we expect a Horsepower – Elf Princess – Snowflake love triangle in the future?
I admit nothing.
Where does Wildshape‘d [unspecified subclass] Druid fit into that?
It always struck me as odd that the anti-party uses a Divine Soul Sorcerer rather than a Druid for their anti-Cleric.
Sorcerer is the Anti-Party’s counterpart to Wizard (https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/wizard-vs-sorcerer) – Cleric is countered by Oracle. (https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/cleric-vs-oracle)
Wild Magic Sorcerer is the anti-party’s counterpart to Evocation Wizard, yes.
“Oracle” is just Mathfinder’s name for a Divine Soul Sorcerer.
Dude, could you please tone stop with the constant edition warring?
This shtick of yours where you constantly denigrate the game this comic is based around and pretend that you don’t realize it exists is pretty annoying by now.
Just stick to telling stories from your 5e games and talking about how they apply to the discussion questions instead.
I wasn’t going to start the discussion because confrontations in the comments are not something I generally condone, but… Gabriel, your periodic banging of the 5e drum does get a little tiresome after a while.
D&D 5e is very cool and is totally my jam, but there is a vast and beautiful spectrum of ways for us grown(-ish) adults to have fun playing make-believe with each other. If other people want to have adventures in systems where you can have oracles or kitsune magic archers or magical girls or a guy who is built entirely around skating around on a perpetual layer of ball bearings, their fun is just as valid as anyone else’s. Not everything has to be reduced to a viewpoint from a single lens.
I try and throw in historical/equipment accuracy all the time. The party has to deal with guilds, feuding local despots, and the like.
A printing press was treated as a major MacGuffin because it’s much more world-changing than any magic item in an edition where books are 25GP by default. (An unskilled laborer makes 2SP a day. A skilled laborer makes 2GP a day. Prior to the printing press every book needed to be hand-copied making them crazy-expensive.)
Heh. Reminds me of that argument about whether or not the creation spell let’s you recreate every book in a library.
“What? I’ve seen it before. I made sure to look at every shelf in the library!”
“I’m pretty sure your spell doesn’t have an eidetic memory.”
“It doesn’t NOT say that.”
And round and round it goes.
Going medieval as in acute recreation of the medieval times? Not so much. While in our campaigns the times by similar things they are not the same. Like the medieval times nut not ours, other ones. Also i have got lots of Crusader Kings II so i know where the fun part of the medieval times are: Incest incest incest, ask Jewish moneylenders for money and then expel them from the realm, marry your daughter to a landless but rich man and then conspire to kill him and take the money, breed a hell-spawn castration-proof heir, stablish the Emirate of Iceland and depose the pope crown your very own anti-pope so you can finally divorce your wife to marry and young one with a better political alliance. That is what medieval times are, prove me wrong 😀
As for the “Choose thy words with care”, do you know the tale of The Euphinator? 😛
Nope. But I do know the tale of Darth Plagueis the Wise. Does that count?
This reply made me laugh out loud. You guys make a good comic, but I think the comment replies are just as much of the experience.
Completely agree 😀
Yes, i think it counts 😛
But “wise” is overestimate that guy. You only are a good master if you can tell your student: “Everything you know you learned it from me, but not everything i know is what you learned”. You will be also an alive master in need of a new student or a dead student whose last lesson was that there was a new master 😀
#SithWisdom
Our last session ended with us running to an abbey to ask the Benedictine-style monks there for sanctuary after one of our members, a Tiefling, suffered a lasting injury to her wing. The nation as a whole is inspired by Arthurian legend, so knights will eventually become a major deal. We’re basically members of one of several Robin Hood style groups trying to spark a general uprising. My Fighter/Paladin is the BBEG’s good nephew. His father, the previous king, was incompetent and deposed by the uncle, and is currently living as one of those monks to learn discipline after a life of debauchery.
We’ll be finding out if the monks accept us or not on the 23rd of this month. The characters are banking on the very medieval concept of the abbey and town sustaining it belong to the religious organization rather than any of the actual feudal lords (or ladies). The main concern is that the tiefling is also a vampire, but my character has had a positive opinion shift with regard to her after the two of them were the only ones left in decent shape after a deadly encounter two sessions ago.
Well, let’s hope the vampire doesn’t spontaneously combust upon entering the abbey.
Oi! I wanna read the conclusion to that! What was the reaction to the reveal? You can’t stop telling the story right at the dramatic point!
I can when my artist refuses to make this a three-panel comic. Something about tripling her work load.
Seriously though, I had to rewrite this one a couple of times when I realized you can’t fit “oblivious to horse” and “reacts to sudden horse” on a single facial expression.
I meant to your campaign story actually! The whole “Hidden Sister” doing exactly what her family doesn’t want her to do! I want to hear the conclusion to THAT tale!
M’lady Parental Unit was none too pleased, though dad and brother were pretty happy with the whole affair. They were secretly proud to have another knight in the family.
I believe that Mumsy came around when the Knight of the Fangwood subsequently saved her from poison / assassination. The lesson was that danger would find you whether you were a knight or a lady… or both.
The last campaign I ran was in fact medieval – but early medieval, being set in 8th century Britain. A clash of cultures between Britons, Gaels, and more expansionist Anglo warlords than you can shake a spatha at. And forewarnings of impending Norse invasions. I tried to stay true to what we know of Briton and English cultures at the time, and had a lot of fun working out a fairly accurate map of all the petty kingdoms of the era.
Of course, against this background I did have a wealth of fantasy elements, based on the myth and folklore of the time – dragons, a whole raft of fey folk including elves and dwarves And all sorts of creepy things from Gaelic tradition.
It was a lot of hard work trying to keep within even a quasi-historical mold though, and not something I’m likely to try again soon; but for two and a half years we had a lot of fun with it.
I wasn’t aware azata were part of medieval Britain. 😛
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/azata/ghaele/
The closest to actual (completely fictionalized centuries after the fact) medieval any of my groups have ever gone is made note that life as a peasant isn’t all that great and complaining that the people who write D&D have no understanding of medieval armor. (What is studded leather even supposed to be!? We don’t even have proof leather armor of any kind was ever a thing as far as I’m aware. And what inverted reality do you live in where padded armor makes you bad at stealth? Have these people never once mentally compared the noisyness of linen to plates or chains of…. anything. Anything at all. Any plates or chains or scales or whatever of any material at all!)
I need to sit down and read some actual arms and armor history one day. Every time I see and internet argument about what a longsword actually is I want to roll my eyes and be like, “NONE OF YOU PEOPLE ARE HISTORIANS!” Of course, insofar as I’m not an historian either, I don’t have much room to talk.
I recommend Shadiversity on youtube
Same.
Dude’s entertaining, and I appreciate his hands-on Mythbuster style. But unless I missed a disclaimer on one of his sites, I’m not sure he’s a proper historian himself. He strikes me as a well-read and enthusiastic amateur, but I doubt the Journal of Medieval History is citing the guy.
I’m imagining something a little closer to this as a starting point: https://www.amazon.com/Arms-Men-History-Weapons-Aggression/dp/0195053605
Given certain information doesn’t require more than basic common sense, I feel in some cases that might be overkill as a minimum requirement for having an opinion.
That’s a fair cop. But any time a dragonborn with the katana starts lecturing me about about what ye olde times were “really like,” I get a little twitchy.
My point about Shad is that there’s a gulf between “historically accurate” and “plausible.” The guy’s a fantasist, just like the rest of us. He makes more effort than most to create a believable game world, but I doubt his back sheath (for example) existed anywhere in history, despite seeming like a reasonable invention. Is it reasonable to include them in your game? Absolutely! But the inevitable turn from “back sheaths weren’t a historical thing” to “well actually they were because and internet dude invented one” grinds my gears.
I’m a writer, and I love me some kitchen sink fantasy. But if we’re talking about historical accuracy, I’d rather start with a well-cited book of history than an internet video.
The only time I can remember Paladin looking this uncertain about something was when he and Antipaladin were trying to figure out whether either of them could rescue Necromancer from the Bounty Hunter party due to alignment restrictions.
Honestly, if a horse unexpectedly manifested underneath me then I would look more panicked and less uncertain.
I guess that’s Paladin immunity to fear in action.
Nah. He just hasn’t noticed yet.
Oh man… I need to return to that storyline one day. #palamancer ship all the way!
I like all three of them a lot. Paladin’s a bit of a stick in the mud, but that’s kind of to be expected since he’s, well, a paladin. He serves as a nice contrast with a lot of the more unpleasant characters like Fighter. Necromancer seems a bit ditsy (trying to heal Antipaladin with negative energy, not knowing that there’s a limit on how many undead you can control) and of course the whole necromancy thing, but sweet. And Antipaladin may be evil, but he only does so as necessary. From what we’ve seen, he’s considerably less evil than Fighter and has a better relationship with his party (except maybe Witch).
It’s too bad that Necromancer and Paladin just can’t work it out. They’re defined by what they are/do and unfortunately those things are mutually exclusive for the most part.
I don’t think I’ve ever done a medieval tournament in any of my groups… gladiatorial combat is probably the closest we’ve come, something that came up once or twice during a Dark Sun campaign.
I feel like “the fighting pit” is more common, just because it’s so bloody useful. Want an excuse to fight random cool monsters without setting up a storyline? BAM! Glardiatorial combat.
In this case, it was mostly a useful cover for a bunch of travelling subversives… my character ostensibly the owner of a couple of gladiator/bodyguards, it was sometimes necessary to put them in the ring to preserve that cover (and, you know, a little prize money never hurts).
And yeah, for the GMs perspective, that’s always convenient. No time to prep this week? No worries, the city you’re in always has an arena if you need one… all you need is an excuse to put some the players in it. Oh look, two of them are gladiators… 🙂
What’s the best arena combat you’ve managed? Any particularly cool setups to recommend?
Some of the settings that have been brewing in my head for years have rat baiting as a thing that people watch, but I haven’t gotten a chance to actually use this in a game.
“Take this reduce person potion and step right up! But be warned Sir… No one has ever beaten Scraps!”
Sadly my Kingmaker campaign fell to bits just about as the Pitax tournament was ready to start.
Man… I’m so sixes and sevens on Kingmaker. I haven’t had great experiences with the Paizo subsystems (caravans and downtime are too fiddly for my taste), but everyone seems to agree that this AP is top tier.
Did your group use the kingdom building rules? Was it fun, or just bookkeeping?
the tournament ran on normal combat rules.
mass combat was after the tournament, but from what I heard it sucks.
kingdom building…
we ran that in the background without random events.
I think the rules where ok-ish exept for some loophole regarding magic items which somehow could be sold in circles for profit with the right combination of buildings.
I never tried to figure out the loophole, it might have been due to the special reading skills of the player* who was in charge of the kingdom building. I just said „nope“.
* Mr. MBA who got honorable mentions before in my posts.
The story about Laurel’s noble lady asking the party wizard to disguise her so her parents wouldn’t notice anything game me a sudden vision of a version of that story where the local wizard’s guild had been called in to dispel any unchivalrous advantages some knights sought…
You get to bring your own armor and weaponry and warhorse, right? I should think that magic is just an accepted part of the game. Sort of like steroids. 😛