Unhallowed Rites, Part 2: Kidnapped!
We talk shop about RPGs ’round these parts. It’s where my academic research and my design credits collide. It’s also where the vast majority of my hobby hours go. But even though I usually like to keep wargaming separate from Handbook-World, I think today might mark an exception. That’s because my poor band of adventurers just got steamrolled down in the depths of Mordheim.
It was a multiplayer scenario called “Ambush!” Because I was campaign leader at the time, I was the “lucky” sod who started play carrying all the scenario’s treasure. So in addition to the natural incentive to leader bash, my opponents were further incentivized to target my dudes thanks to the call of cold hard cash.
By the end of the game, no less than nine of my guys had gone out of action. Six of them were permanently killed. Considering the game’s 33.3% mortality rate, there was only a 4.2% chance for such gruesome casualties. So now, for your schadenfreude enjoyment, I present the post-session write-up.
GAME 6: DIRTY TEAMING AMAZONS/SKAVEN vs. POOR INNOCENT ADVENTURERS
Their coffers were bursting, and their camp was silent.
The Holy Gnoman Empire had pulled no less than 16 shards of precious wyrdstone from The Rock. The holy sisters who dwelled there — beg as they might — could not even afford to buy them all. And though the exhausted warband now numbered among the richest men in Mordheim, no one who stared into the fire that night felt like a fortunate soul.
Gunthard Rühl, the bowman, was dead. So were the elder of the Lobe brothers. So was every last one of the Bergmanns, from old Isenbert down to his young nephew.
“At least they got a decent burial,” said Dardrik. “That’s more than most these days.”
No one answered him. All thought in private of the Bergmanns’ red scarves. Those bright family colors now hung like rivulets of blood pouring from flinty cairns. It was as if Mordheim had birthed a charnel springs to help fill the River Stir.
“Does your leg feel any better?” Bridgen’s voice was tremulous and small, hoping for good news but expecting none. And when the mage Noro and the dwarf Bodill both answered, “No,” the pair could only glare at one another. There had been some argument between the two since they’d been recovered, wounded and limping both, but miraculously alive.
“You would make slayers of us all,” he’d accused.
“If ye dinna like my tactics, why not fly away?” she’d answered.
It might have come to blows then if either could walk on their own. As it stood now, only the motley dregs of Cutthroat’s Den seemed happy. These new recruits had been gleaned from the gutter outside the Inn of the Red Moon, pleased to take their first gold crowns from the ‘famously successful’ adventurers. Still half-drunk, they’d taken to calling themselves “the irregulars,” and chatted merrily of the land they’d buy or the inns they’d own when at last they returned to the Reik or Ostland or whatever country they called home. But the veterans knew one and all what they truly were.
Before, when the leaders of the Holy Gnoman Empire had called their hirelings ‘cannon fodder,’ it had been in jest. Now they knew better. And each could hear the screams of ghosts out beyond the fire, or in the darkness of their heads.
TLDR: The dwarf sacrificed herself to act as a speedbump. The mage, so shaken by the sight, failed his flight spell three friggin’ turns in a row before getting arrowed to death. I managed to win the scenario by speeding away with the goods before my opponents could coordinate a zone defense. But by opting for the strategic victory, I strung out my forces and left them vulnerable. My opponents nearly tabled me, and the post-game casualties turned a marginally profitable venture into the most pyrrhic of victories. Suffice it to say that I now know how the perpetually unlucky Thief must feel. One can only hope that Ranger is carrying her towards happier environs, but I somehow doubt it.
Question of the day, then! What is the most exceptional string of bad luck you’ve encountered? Can you beat the ever-popular 1/400 odds of a crit-fail with advantage? Tell us all about your own run-ins with Murphy’s Law down in the comments!
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I have gotten the dreaded double natural ones on advantage. I’ve also had sessions where literally every roll seemed to go against the party. Delving into Castle Ravenloft, we’d run into some of his minions and the Dread Lord of Barovia himself and it was going very poorly. I’d gotten a Shield of Faith up on myself twice and failed the concentration check upon taking damage twice (natural 1s and 2s), and critically missed on multiple attacks. None of my party members did much better. All in all, a very frustrating session in which we were forced to flee much sooner than expected.
You remember that comic about “bell curve losses?”
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/bell-curve-losses
Sometimes it applies to whole sessions rather than individual encounters. Yeesh.
We’ve never had one that bad again, but it really set the mood for what delving into Castle Ravenloft was like in this campaign.
Team Bounty Hunter has really stepped up; they used to be unable to capture anyone in the main Team…
I guess the fear of losing Magus forever made them bring out their A-game.
I don’t think you can really call it fear when they did in fact lose Magus.
Key word is “forever”. For the moment, Magus hasn’t suffered any permanent harm; just an ill-timed and inconvenient case of death. But her friends are too broke to get her proper medical (veterinary?) care, so now they’ve got to deal with an angry tiefling whose weird luck might be contagious, an intolerably smug werewolf, and a none-too-subtle but quick-to-anger wizard.
Do catfolk get multiple lives?
That depends on whether they believe in and observe the precepts of a faith that offers the option of reincarnation.
Or take the appropriate racial feat…
Weeeeeell…. It might also suggest that Team Bounty Hunter is more effective without Magus…
<_<
Come on, now.
Let’s not speak ill of the dead.
Yeah, the opening session of our Dragon Heist campaign wasn’t a great start for my character. First attack roll of the campaign, made with advantage… double-ones. Second attack roll, another one.
Things did get better after that, but it became something of a running joke that the rest of the party would look for cover whenever my bard reached for her crossbow.
Though perversely, the trend over subsequent sessions was that she was actually more accurate when rolling with disadvantage, and so the best way to hit something would be to close her eyes and shoot into the air. That’s dice for you.
Absolutely mad how your performance in Encounter 1 colors the rest of your campaign. Those snap judgements about “he does crazy damage” or “she’s and incompetent bowman” tend to stick around forever.
It works pretty well for the character anyway… she’s about as much of a pacifist as you can reasonably be in a D&D game, preferring words to weapons. And of course, the words of a bard can be pretty effective weapons…
A recent session my d&dgroup had, had some very badly-balanced luck: my fighter made about 4 wis saves against a gauth’s main gaze weapon in a row, on a +1 modifier, while the sharpshooter that hardly ever missed couldn’t make a saving throw or hit a target to save her life. Left both of us feeling bad about the situation, and even trying to fix it by giving the lucky d20 to her didn’t work.
Dice are fickle beasts. Of course you can’t just hand ’em to another player!
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/dice-rituals
I had a character that became cursed in-game by acquiring some dodgy magical items. The clincher was an abyssal spear that had some interesting effects on natural 1’s and 20’s. I immediately found out what rolling a 1 did…
Before that point in the campaign, I would describe my character’s rolling as average. After that point, everything went to hell for poor Daud. At first, it was a few combats where I just… couldn’t hit anything. Then, a level up – minimum hitpoint roll. Enemies keep critting him. Important saves keep bombing. Easy attacks keep missing. Then another minimum hitpoint roll. And ANOTHER.
At first there were a few jokes at the table about me being the cursed one. Then everyone started to notice that it was becoming an actual pattern. For about three months, the character managed to spiral from a valued team member to an actual liability, culminating in a fight where, out of 10 attacks and a 50% hit chance, I landed one hit before getting laid out by exactly his remaining hitpoints in damage. As it was a VTT, I couldn’t even burn my dice.
Shortly after that (and a conversation with the DM), the character failed a few crucial wisdom saves against his other cursed magical item, turned into a monster, and was killed by his former friends. I guess the DM had different ideas for what “retiring the character” meant, but the end result was the same. Hopefully the curse that rested over his rolls will not haunt my next character.
Correct my math if I’m wrong, but I believe that making only one out ten coinflips is a 1/1024 probability. Woof.
does 4 critical fails in a row count as an unlucky streak from the depths of the Nine Hells?
Fortunately this is not my (un)luck, but the ranger/rogue player in our group has nearly Wil Wheaton levels of dice rolling “skills” and rolls very consistently low rolls. Not usually quite as bad as the king of all bad numbers, but without advantage, he typically rolls pretty damn badly (which is why he makes it his goal in a situation to HAVE advantage whenever he can).
This “predetermination of advantage” makes the next tale of unluck with a d20 especially sad…
I don’t remember the exact circumstances of what he was rolling for, but I am certain it was critical (pun intended) to our success in the scene. I can further assume it was for stealth, since, as the rogue/ranger, he does stealth checking a lot. He had advantage and rolled the super unlucky double 1s (not the first time this has happened to him… tho I think it has only happened to him these two times so far, at least I can’t remember any additional times it has happened, and I would hope I would). Fortunately for his character, he took the Lucky feat, to help mitigate some of his natural player unluck, so he got to roll again.
Another 1 (and the first signs of building rage in our bad-luck-with-dice player. He’s thrown a dice into a wall before O.O). He said that was okay through gritted teeth, and rolled one last time. We use a one time per long rest Inspiration rule, so we always have a “free reroll” available for situations that need it… like this one).
We all heard the tell tale sounds of fury on the other end of the Zoom call and he disapeared off cam as he went to punch something and cool off. We could only assume it was another bad roll, but he did not even say what it was as he stormed away. The DM moved on with the scene while he was gone and we waited when it was important until he returned so he could be involved again.
He returned maybe 5 minutes later with a drink and sat back down, anger having subsided to simple disappointment and acceptance again. The DM told him where the scene had gone and asked if our assumption was right that it was a failed roll again. He said it was worse than another failed roll… it was another 1.
None of us laughed. It was too sad to be funny. It was as tho the gods of luck were punishing our fellow player for some slight against gaming. We literally took a moment of silence for his dead dice (he actually threw the dice out!) and then continued the game in solemn honor of the sacrifice made.
(Note: we DO often laugh about it later, and he does have a morbid sense of humor about his “luck”, but I truly felt his pain in that moment, just the same.)
Gotta admit, a 1/160000 chance is pretty bad.
I always think of that Tiamat meme in these situations. You know the one. “My Character, My RP, My Dice” –> https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/1503249-three-headed-dragon
The dice usually feel like they’re on my side, but in one recent campaign, we were having some trouble defeating the enemy. Most everyone was in serious danger as we tried to pull back. My well armored adventurer chose his chokepoint and took up the dodge action to block the path. First rolls, at disadvantage and both are plenty high enough to hit (despite this being like level two, so they needed 15+ on a d20 twice).
My guy goes down, but the others manage to finish off the enemy. This isn’t so bad. Everyone’s out of spells and healing potions, but surely I’ll stabilize.
Roll: 6.
Okay, not great, but three more chances.
Roll: 4.
Okay, at this point, people are panicking and prioritizing stabilizing me over helping the other adventurer who’s been off dueling one of the enemy for the entire battle.
Medicine check: 1+6, fail a DC 10.
Medicine check: 3+4, fail a DC 10
Other adventurer can’t get to me.
Death Save: 5.
Well, no one can say they didn’t try to save me!
It’s bad when Murphy’s Law spreads from one player to the entire group. There really is no substitute for Healing Word in these situations. Absolutely mad to me how necessary it can feel in 5e. Sort of like the cure light wounds wand over in Pathfinder.
If this mess is so necessary to survival, why not bake it into the core mechanics?
My old character, Elliot the unlucky, unsurprisingly, got alot of bad luck. Enemies would consistently make every save against him. He would consistently roll 1s for all his skill checks. From around level 2-9, he just had the absolute worst bad luck. Some particularly notable examples were when be cast hypnotic pattern kn a group of level 7-8 trolls, each with a 15% success rate, and they all suceeded, the time where he rolled a 1,1,2,1,1 on his checks to try to diplomasize his way into a giants castle, to his massive embarrassment, and the time he got dominated and consistently failed every save for the entire duration despite having a pretty good chance and alot of saves due to the get damaged and make a new one rule. He was just by far the unluckiest character any of us had ever seen. I know the dm wasnt faking saves cause he rolled in front of us, and I know it wasnt just the dice because to check me and the dm switch dice for a while. It was just a truly absurd degree of bad luck.
You’re a generous spirit, but maybe not donating 16K of your 20K bankroll to RP projects would have helped. I mean, you don’t have to singlehandedly bankroll your old bard college in Silverlight. Spending a bit more on gear has a surprising way of turning luck around!
This was 5e, so it wouldnt have effected my dcs, and at this point i hadn’t actually done any of those rp projects. Those all came later when my bad luck had already ended. By the point i was doing those projects i was actually the strongest overall member.
I suspect that 1) Tasha’s was not out at the time and 2) you guys didn’t use magic item shops.
http://dnd5e.wikidot.com/wondrous-items:rhythm-makers-drum
Oh damn, that’s powerful, and yeah, this was during the first module hoard of the dragon queen. Also, since we didn’t have shops, to buy items that weren’t just found in the game, the dm thought it might be good to invest in projects that would eventually give them, with the big one I got for that being the one that sets your con to 19. This was our first time with 5e, so the dm wanted to keep things fairly close to the books which didn’t have magic shops as an option, but still wanted some option to use our gold so he gave us that. Still though, my bad luck was mostly gone partway through 9th, so it still wouldn’t have made that big a difference anyways since I wouldn’t have ended up with much better gear regardless, my luck was just obscenely bad.
Okay, I have to ask. What is the Holy Gnoman Empire? Is this a homebrewed empire?
The area of my brain dedicated to Warhammer Fantasy (a percentage embarrassingly higher than I care to admit), can’t recall any reference to this fabled gnomish empire. Or to gnomes for that matter.
An on a related note, have you ever played the “Mordheim: City of Damned?”
You know that Pathfinder megadungeon I always talk about? Monte Cook’s “Dragon’s Delve?” I decided to theme my Mordheim warband after my players’ PCs.
The precocious gnome alchemist from this story…
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/thwomp
…named the party, figuring that he and his paladin father figure were the most important members. Everyone else thought “Holy Gnoman Empire” was funny enough to play along.
There are no gnomes (to my knowledge) in the Old World. I kept the name anyway. For Mordheim is a silly place, and my players find the alternate universe exploits of their Mordheim counterparts amusing.
I’ve got a copy kicking around, but I never did more than a tutorial map or two. Tactical CRPGs just aren’t my jam. More of my time goes into Vermintide II.
I technically lost one of my characters to the dreaded bad luck curse.
I was playing a Halfling Ninja, who successfully sneaked up on undead caster of some sort whilst scouting ahead for the party.
Knowing the party was right behind her, she did the obvious thing and sneak attacked it. Unfortunately, that attacked missed, leaving the caster unharmed and aware.
The lich then backed up and cast disintegrate, which I failed the save on. It was level 15, I was around level 12 with everything I could afford put into having more hp. It dropped me from full hp to negative-dead-turn-to-dust in that one spell.
Or it would have, if the DM wasn’t merciful and opted to have it ‘merely’ KO me instead of outright dusting me on the spot. My party arrived quickly from the sounds of combat and saved me, dealing with the lich whilst I was unconscious.
In another instance, we lost a lizardfolk when an NPC alchemist decided to use the heat of combat with a nasty critter to betray us, tossing crit-damage bombs at them and being finished off by the critter as he failed saved that would have avoided some of the damage. We were forced to flee that battle with dimension door, leaving his corpse there and hoping the treacherous alchemist would be finished off by the critter.
I think you’ll find that the traditional term is “burglar.”
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kg-cW9SIAxU/VQhw4SYR8qI/AAAAAAAAT8s/vBvp5HUi3TQ/s1600/goblin1.jpg
Funnily enough, this was her token art:
https://www.deviantart.com/sirtiefling/art/The-Expensive-Visitor-287078004
She was actually the daughter of an NPC merchant / grocer guild leader (Danvakus, one of the Sandpoint official NPCs), so she was very much non-thieving.
I had one, as a DM, sending a Beur Hag at the party:
Me: Excellent. The dwarf NPCs added in specifically to die here are dead, and the hag has reached their bodies. Next turn, it’s time for a set-piece Maddening Feast use to really sell the horror of this creature.
Ranger: 3 Consecutive Crits
Me: Frick.
Even if I’d been willing to fudge her hp by the amount needed, I’d have to do so by robbing the party of the high they were now riding. The ranger was stoked, they’d already given this monster a solid beating, everyone knew the hag couldn’t survive that. And if she did live she’d… what? Topple over after her turn to the other npc hirelings?
So I gritted my teeth, let them have their moment, and vowed that next time I ran the encounter to fudge the dwarves’ rolls to death in the first round.
Appropriate call back given your story and today’s comic:
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/best-laid-plans
Good call letting them have their moment. Those wacky outliers are part of the fun.
What inquisitorial domain/judgement is Inquisitor, if she’s referring to the holy legal scripture of Murphy?
That’s Thief’s dossier.
So the party bard had just asked to add the Wish spell to their list, and being a proper PC-fearing DM, I decided to nip this problem in the bud by making the players explain in character why they should be allowed to have this power to the goddess of magic.
The bard’s argument was, of course “because i’m awesome and will do cool magic with it” (paraphrased). So over the course of this encounter, im having him make persuasion checks to see how well he can sell the argument in character.
1
1
1
Three times in a row, three different checks. The worst part here is that he was a lore bard who could inspire himself and was expertised into persuasion, so the total still ended up being something like 32 each time. At which point i gave in and decided it was meant to be. Anybody who can fast talk the goddess of magic that consistently was going to get the darn spell.
I guess that’s what we call a “fail forward.” :/
What did the guy wind up wishing for?
Nothing, oddly. He strictly used it to duplicate existing spells. Out of character, the player has severe risk aversion when it comes to losing Wish.
I was running a series of home-brew D20-based sci-fi sessions with the Redshirts! theme. There was an endless pool of red-shirted “space marines” with energy pistols, two blue-shirted medic/mechanics in the deck, and one yellow-shirted morale-buff/ranged-attack specialist. The plot of the evening was lifted from classic sci-fi, with a downed ship, a macguffin, survivors to be rescued, enemy troops to outfight/outwit, and nasty local flora & fauna. One redshirt saved the team by using his pistol as a grenade (at one hit point, it was easier to pull a new teammate from the stack of names than heal the old one). Another stoically set her makeshift spear to receive the pounce of the planet’s apex predator, mortally wounding it as she was reduced to chunky salsa.
Finally, the team was faced with another of the multi-limbed terrors. Everyone was low on power to their pistols, but the yellow-shirted leader took aim, pooled his dice (exhausting his pistol) and…Rolled a Mighty 1.
Remembering their Action Points, one player slid a red glass bead to his teammate. “Try that again,” he said confidently.
Another “1.”
Someone else gave him a different d20 and another bead. ONE.
Again. ONE.
Quickly the encounter (and the night’s session) devolved into a table full of people throwing glass beads at me to demand that I give them the happy, heroic ending they felt they had earned, dice be damned.
I hid behind my GM’s screen and told them how nicely it all turned out.
I’m fond of calling RPGs “collaborative” and “co-creative.” Being pummeled by tiny glass beads until you give in to the group’s demands is something I term “negotiation.”
Since you’re doing it, I will too: in a game of Warhammer I played recently, my knights were angling to kill a unit of ogres. First, the spell to buff them (needing a 13 on 4d6+4) failed. Not that unlikely, but then they followed it up by rolling six ones to hit. 1 in 46,656 odds, anybody?
I’m calculating a 94.59% chance of hitting that DC 13.
https://www.omnicalculator.com/statistics/dice
As for the Yahtzee… That’s pretty friggin’ sad, lol.
Yep. Never had much luck with warhammer dice, except when rolling Harlequin invuln saves or, amusingly, Mordheim injuries. Played an eight-game campaign four years ago now and lost no models at all until the final game, in which, following a battle fought over three boatloads of warpstone breaking up on a surge moving down the river, I lost two guys of my by-then eleven (?) man Norse warband.
I have gotten 7 nat-1s with advantage, and 0 nat-20s with disadvantage.
I don’t normally believe in critical failures/successes, but I make an exception for when it (dis)advantage is in play.
One of the worst was in Descent into Avernus: We were in a map with a lot of verticality. There was a Nalfeshnee directly above my Dwarf Warlord. The Rogue killed the Nalfeshnee no problem. When Demons have their bodies destroyed outside of the Arbys they turn into a horrible sludge. Being directly beneath it I was in the splash-zone. I made a Dex save to get out of the way… nat-1. I got the ichor in my mouth. In Avernus if you’re exposed to Demon Ichor you need to make a Con save or deal with some horrible flesh-warping. I actually had proficiency in Con saves due to a feat, and since the Ichor was a poison effect I had advantage. Double nat-1. My fingers were re-shaped into sharp daggers. We had to burn a Greater Restoration to stop the freakout.
Out of curiosity, how much more often do you roll with advantage than with disadvantage? I tend to actively seek out the former and avoid the latter, though I haven’t kept careful track of the numbers.
I roll with advantage more than disadvantage, but not 7 times more.
Funny. My body is usually destroyed and turned into sludge when I’m *inside* an Arby’s.
Oh gods the timing on this. Just this Wednesday I was playing a d100 game, Halo Mythic. We played as the aliens laying waste to humanity.
One of my party members ran over 2 children while burning crops, and ever since then our rolls tanked. One party member nearly blew himself up, the other one nearly blew him up again (didn’t help they were using their worst stats to make their attacks). I kept rolling in the 90s (a bad thing) despite using all my rerolls.
So yeah Karma hit my teammate like a brick and he only survived due to energy shields while we were caught in the crossfire.
Vengeful ghost children vs. aliens? I feel like you’ve got a Dreamworks script on your hands.
Not exactly dramatic, but it is hilarious: At one point, many moons ago, the party was going down a set of rickety, decaying stairs, so we had to make Dexterity checks to avoid breaking anything. The clumsy, heavy characters went first—if they broke something, the people at the top should be able to shimmy down without any problem.
But nobody failed their rolls, leaving just the skinny, dexterous rogue at the top. And I’m sure you can guess what he rolled on his Dex check. We poked fun at the player about that incident for years, until he accumulated enough other bad rolls and worse decisions that it wasn’t relevant. But that one stuck in my mind better than most.
Always tough when the thing you’re supposed to be good at becomes shenanigans. I hope the rogue was a good sport about it.
Ooph. Rolling multiple crits, I see you’ve stumbled into one of the three classic blunders, never engage in a land war in Asia, never bet against a Sicilian when death is on the line, and never carry all the Warp-Stone when getting ambushed by the Skaven.
Truly, the skaven + warp stone thing was my bad.
Next game is tomorrow though. If my luck holds, I have no doubt that all three “thing in the woods” will eat my lunch.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3DBkXVKEtmg/UBFzL8xtRqI/AAAAAAAAAi0/nRVmBwVJpmo/s640/DSC07598.JPG
If we ask you nicely, will you give us an account of the entire campaign?
It so happens that I do fictional write-ups after each campaign session. I keep ’em in a cell beneath my warband’s Excel sheet. Never thought they’d be of any interest to anyone, so they aren’t exactly polished. Here’s the copy + paste though. I hope you find it amusing.
WARBAND BACKGROUND: In another time… In another place… The Holy Gnoman Empire never delved for riches beneath Chordille Keep. Rather, they sought fame and glory amidst the ruins of the city of the damned! Would they return cloaked in glory, or perhaps cloaked in their own blood? Would they return at all? Only time and a set of polished knuckle bones will tell. So sharpen your swords and ready your spells. Because you’ll need more than luck to survive the horrors of Mordheim!
Game 1: Sisters of Sigmar vs. Adventurers (treasure hunt) (W) –> [West Gate]
“Can you hold that harpoon?”
“Sure I can.”
The big man grinned a pained grin. He hefted his weapon. Then he swore as it slipped from his grasp.
“Serves ye right,” said Bodill, unwrapping her fists. “Picking on a little girl like that.”
“She had a big weapon.”
“The Sisters Morticia are not to be underestimated,” said Noro. “If it was a victory bought by a finger or two, I call it worth the price. West Gate is ours,” said Noro.
“For now,” muttered his kestrel.
[“Noro” is the witch / investigator in the game. He got permission to keep his kestrel companion when got improved familiar, replacing its stats with a silvanshee’s]
Game 2: Amazons vs. Adventurers (skirmish) (W) –> [city outskirts]
“It seems to me,” said Kurat, “That you have some skill with that blade, Master Clasen. If you will accept the honor, I do hereby name you to the rank of Imperial Sergeant, and — ”
But the nobleman paused in his speech. He frowned inwardly, as if he’d forgotten something. And when he spoke next, it was as if he were addressing some unseen other in their midst: “Perhaps he is not. No indeed. There are few who would meet all of your exacting criteria. Besides which, how can you possibly be offended by Lothar’s smell?”
The others looked on in confusion. Lothar Clasen, for his part, shuffled uncomfortably from foot to foot. It seemed that the hired swordsman was being asked to serve a madman. He thought of leaving the cursed city then and there with what riches he’d earned. He opened his mouth to say as much, but got out little more than an abrupt, “Erk.” It was as if a hook had been pulled within him, sharp and to the left. The bizarre sensation game from just behind his navel, and it was both uncomfortable and insistent. And then Lothar was simply gone.
In his place, a child-sized figure appeared. It was not alone, nor was it unarmed. “What deviltry is this?” demanded the little fellow. “Where am I? How did I come to be here?” The bizarre beast he was mounted upon — a lizard of some kind, large as a hunting dog and with great eyes bulging — tossed her head and glared around at all and sundry. Then the little knight (for he bore a lance with him, and by his accent and address seemed the very picture of miniaturized chivalry) broke into an amazed smile.
“My young lord Kurat! It is good to see a familiar face. For not a moment ago I was upon my rounds in your father’s holdings. I hope that my coming here was at your bidding?”
“If only,” said a sullen Bridgen.
“Hmph,” muttered Dardrik. “Seems we have a proper sergeant then. Good. The more bodies between me and this city’s she-devils the better.”
And so it was that Sir. Fitzwilliam of House Viisard found his way into Mordheim.
[“Kurat” is a bladebound magus and a nobleman. The gnome cavalier “Fitzwilliam” serves his family.]
Game 3: Undead vs Adventurers (skirmish) (W) –> [Artisan’s Quarter]
“Listen up, brother. I’d still be stuck in that Phase Prison if you hadn’t magic’d up a key. I owe you guys a favor, and I aim to pay it. But this… This don’t feel right.”
“A year and a day!” intoned Noro. “Is your word worth so little?”
The mage stood high upon a broken pillar, his kestrel Reginald circling overhead. Periodic flashes of silvery light fell among the oncoming undead, leaping from Noro’s outstretched hand. The stuff flew like arrows as it sought gaps among the ruined Artisan’s Quarter. Proper arrows from the rest of the band joined the magic, whistling through the air in a formidable volley. It was a pretty sight to be sure, but precious few struck home. Those that did proved ineffective. The ghouls did not seem to slow in any case.
“Oh, I’m used to it,” said the ogre. “Head to the front, Tunskalan. Bear the brunt, Tunskalan. Take a punch and then knock ‘em down. But maybe a few steps further back—”
“Hold your position!” shouted Noro. “And bloody hell, stop distracting me!”
The ogre had to admit that it was a good plan on paper. He looked to his left and his right. A broken gate formed the kill box, and he stood square in the middle, right where that gate used to be. The shambling horde of undead was coming straight for him. And at that moment, the plan didn’t feel very good at all.
“See how there are gaps in the fence?” they’d said. “Our archers can shoot through. Noro can fly up and cast from the old Guildsman’s Plinth here. Trust us. If he can land a few spells, the undead won’t touch you. All you have to do is look like a big target. Draw them out a little, you know?”
But as the ghouls grew closer, as the mage-in-chief on his pillar top swore in frustration, fighting his wizard’s duel with the enemy necromancer, Tunskalan regripped his greatsword. None of the undead had fallen. Not one. The ogre ground his big, blocky teeth.
“Alright, brother,” he said. “This is why we march up the field and down the field. Up the field and down the field.”
The terrified hireling plugging the gap beside him swallowed. “What… What is that supposed to mean?”
“Discipline!” roared the ogre. And that is when the vampire charged.
….
“I don’t understand it,” complained the little knight. “She never behaves like this at home. I believe the unnatural influence of Mordheim has spooked her quite!”
The Imperial Sergeant stroked his lizard’s head. The bizarre beast’s bulging eyes rolled in her head. She licked them in agitation.
“There there, Fafnira. We will get you used to this place sooner or later. You must learn to be more like Tunskalan here. Not a jot of fear in him!”
“Hmmm,” grunted Tunskalan.
“Why, did you see how he took on three of those hideous things at once? And their blood-sucking master to boot! Why, were it not for his heroics, you and I might not have scored our first tally against the forces that plague this place.”
“Hmmm,” agreed Tunskalan.
“We have him to thank for knocking that ghoul down in the first place. And for absorbing the worst of that vampiric onslaught. And what’s more, if Master Wolfenbaum had been only a trifle faster, we might have staked him ourselves! No doubt we shall next time.”
“Hmmm,” said Tunskalan for a third time. Mostly because it was all he could say. The ogre was bound head to toe in bandages, many of them showing an unhealthy coating of crusted red. He had not moved from his spot in the line.
“At least no one was seriously hurt,” said the little knight.
[“Tunskalan” is an ogre, a two-handed fighter, and played with the finest Mach Man Randy Savage impression his player can muster. Dude was a drill sergeant in a monstrous army once upon a time, so his catch phrase is “march up the field and down the field,” usually adapted to the situation at hand (e.g. “climb up the stairs and down the stairs,” “pick up the loot put down the loot,” etc.]
Game 4: Amazon, Skaven, Undead, Adventurers (Treasure Hunt) (W) –> (city outskirts)
Dardrik favored a straightforward smash and grab. Bodill proposed allying with the Amazons. But Kurat had won the argument.
“Let them fight amongst themselves. Remember how Tunskalan acted as bait last time?”
“WE ARE NOT DOING THAT AGAIN!” roared the ogre.
“Indeed not. Nor do we have to. The wyrdstone will do the job for us. Listen, we know that you can scoop riches by the handful from this place, right? Pick it right off the cobbles! The other warbands will beat one another bloody for the chance. All we have to do is take the treasure from their corpses.”
“I like not fighting,” said the quivering voice of Bridgen. “Can we do that? I favor doing that.”
And so they had. And everything went as the malformed nobleman had foreseen. The skaven dashed themselves against the undead. The amazons struck out against the skaven. Flights of arrows kept the lot well at bay, and the enemies of the Holy Gnoman Empire began to tear themselves apart.
“Listen!” came a voice. It was a dry and brittle thing, and the battlefield seemed to quiet to listen. “I propose an alliance.”
“Yes yes!” came the reply, and it was just as bad in its own way. Not so cold and cruel, but full of broken teeth and too much spittle. It was an inhuman sort of voice, and seemed to foul the air that carried it. “We friends now. Kill kill man things!”
“Oh bugger,” said Kurat. For the Amazons had fled into the darkness. The undead and the skaven turned as one towards the party’s position. Just like that, the Holy Gnoman Empire was badly outnumbered.
As the undead soon discovered, however, an alliance with skaven is not necessarily an asset. The rats hung back, plunking away with ineffectual slings while the undead tried to draw out the Holy Gnomans. The defending warband fell back in orderly fashion, firing into the ranks of advancing ghouls. Frustrated, the Empire’s vampiric antagonist had no choice but to offer a gambit: a trio of ghouls to bait out the charge.
It worked. The charge was thunderous and deadly. All three of those undead fell: Luther von Wulfenbaum accounted for one, Tunskalan the ogre another, and the harpoon of the mighty Dardrik a third. The undead began to fall away in distress, but all was not well.
Kurat had succumbed to the supernatural fear of the ghouls, and so had not joined in the charge. Left alone and exposed, he combated the emotion-based magic as best he could, casting his senses through Lirima. Holding the sentient sword aloft and using her eyes instead of his own, the noble managed to shout out commands with the aid of his black-blade “periscope.” Unfortunately, neither blade nor wielder saw the pair of skaven drawing near from the flank. The rat-men charged, Kurat failed to parry, step aside, or armor save, and his leg snapped beneath the awful impact of a rat man’s flail.
The undead had already broken by then. Tunskalan turned upon the hapless rats, snapping one of their legs in turn. The skaven soon melted away into the black corners of Mordheim, and the Holy Gnomans held the field. Unfortunately, it had already been picked clean of wyrdstone.
“Well,” said Kurat, wincing against the pain. “I still say it was a good plan. Now if one of you would be so good as to fashion me a splint?”
[The “adventurers” warband is weird. Because it represents an fractious band of D&D style heroes, you roll each battle to see who gets the “leader” skill. The bladebound magus-cum-nobleman got the job that time. He failed his fear check, but the dudes fighting the undead still got to use his superior leadership score, hence the bits about “calling direction” with a sentient sword periscope. One of my favorite parts of this game is coming up with post-hoc rationalizations for what happened in play.]
Game 5: Undead vs Adventurers (treasure hunt) (W) –> [Executioner’s Square]
It wasn’t much of a fight. But that was only because there wasn’t any fighting. Not yet. There was, however, a great deal of undead shrieking.
“I don’t think they’ve found it yet,” called Bridgen. The elf had climbed atop the ruins for a better look. He dearly wished it wasn’t his job. While the others milled about below, poking into dark corners and peering into the rubble, only he could see the packs of ghouls roving. Their skin was grey. Their eyes glinted like dogs’ in the damned city’s gloom. They seemed to be drawing nearer.
Both warbands had heard whispers of the Headsman’s Hoard. Rumor held that Count Steinhardt’s headsman had kept a treasury of curios and small valuables picked from the corpses of his victims. The whisperers claimed that this royal headsman — quite in secret — was counted among the richest men in Mordheim. Or at least he was before the comet fell.
“No sign of our prize southwesterly!” called Fitzwilliam. The small knight’s voice was cheerful, and Bridgen wondered that it should be so. Both the rider and his lizard-beast came at a trot from that direction, both looking unconcerned by the proximity of the ravening dead. How was it possible to ride so heedless, when at any moment there would be claws and blood? Crooked teeth and fell magic? The baleful glow of necromancy, the pale sheen of the vampire’s axe, and the mindless hate of the shambling horde?
Bridgen furrowed his brow. There were six chateaux about the square, all in various degrees of disrepair. But none among the living could say for certain which had belonged to the headsman. So far, the Holy Gnomans could only say for certain that it wasn’t the one where Bridgen stood. And now (thanks to Fitzwilliam’s reconnoitering) they knew that it wasn’t within that strange metallic shambles at the square’s southwestern corner. It seemed that the ghouls’ terrible shrieks came from all points north of the Holy Gnomans…. And Bridgen felt the blessed relief of realization.
“It must be the sixth,” he said.
Mr. Sandwich, dark rabbit eyes watching his master from within his cage, made no reply. And then, in a louder voice, Bridgen called down to his companions. “The cache must lie in the sixth chateau! It is the only place left!”
There came a pause. Then a distant of splintering and sliding. Something crunched.
“Found it!” roared the triumphant voice of Tunskalan. He appeared from within the more-ruined-than-it-had-been wall. He carried a great chest upon one shoulder, and a broad grin was plastered across his homely face.
“Good,” said Bridgen. “Shall we depart then? Quickly? Please?”
And so they did. Amidst a fusillade of covering fire, the Holy Gnomans, along with all their baggage and sundries, retreated the way they’d come. The ghouls calls soon fell away, and the hired men began a raucous cheer as they counted their booty. But the eyes still danced in Bridgen’s mind. Like dog’s eyes they were. Or cats’ eyes. Or nothing at all that lived.
[“Bridgen” was Laurel’s dark tapestry oracle. You might remember how he got turned into a kraken lich in the Pathfinder game: https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/save-or-die. He was a half-elf in any case, so he got relegated to the role of “elf ranger” in this Mordheim warband while the witch/investigator Noro got the “mage” slot. In any case, Bridgen was an immense coward, so it seemed fitting that a skirmish where my dudes got the goods and won the scenario sans melee would be helmed by him.]
Game 6: Amazos+Skaven vs. Adventurers (ambush) (W) –> [The Rock]
Their coffers were bursting, and their camp was silent.
The Holy Gnoman Empire had pulled no less than 16 shards from The Rock. The holy sisters who dwelled there — beg as they might — could not even afford to buy them all. And though the exhausted warband now numbered among the richest men in Mordheim, no one who stared into the fire that night felt like a fortunate soul.
Gunthard Rühl, the bowman, was dead. So were the elder of the Lobe brothers. So was every last one of the Bergmanns, from old Isenbert down to his young nephew.
“At least they got a decent burial,” said Dardrik. “That’s more than most these days.”
No one answered him. All thought in private of the Bergmanns’ red scarves. Those bright family colors now hung like rivulets of blood pouring from flinty cairns. It was as if Mordheim had birthed a charnel springs to help fill the River Stir.
“Does your leg feel any better?” asked Bridgen. And when the mage Noro and the dwarf Bodill both answered, “No,” the pair could only glare at one another. There had been some argument between the two since they’d been recovered, wounded and limping both, but miraculously alive.
“You would make slayers of us all,” he’d accused.
“If ye dinna like my tactics, why not fly away?” she’d answered.
It might have come to blows then if either could walk on their own. As it stood now, only the motley dregs of Cutthroat’s Den seemed happy. These new recruits had been gleaned from the gutter outside the Inn of the Red Moon, pleased to take their first gold crowns from the ‘famously successful’ adventurers. Still half-drunk, they’d taken to calling themselves “the irregulars,” and chatted merrily of the land they’d buy or the inns they’d own when at last they returned to the Reik or Ostland or whatever country they called home. But the veterans knew one and all what they truly were.
Before, when the leaders of the Holy Gnoman Empire had called their hirelings cannon fodder, it had been in jest. Now they knew better. And each could hear the screams of ghosts out beyond the fire, or in the darkness of their heads.
Game 7: Rats in the Cemetery vs Adventurers (W)
— WIP
Game 8: Amazons in the Raven Barracks vs Adventurers (W)
— WIP
This was good incenteive to finish my write-ups. Just knocked these out today.
Game 7: Rats in the Cemetery vs Adventurers (W)
“Ow,” said Tunskalan.
“Steady on, lad. Wait for them to come to you.” Luther Wulfenbaum eyed the rat men scurrying about the broken headstones. The Cemetery of St. Voller was positively swarming with the things. And for some bizarre reason, all of them seemed to be wearing pinstripes.
“Ow,” said Tunskalan again. It was more of a growl really, filled with equal parts impatience and murderous intent.
“Excellent discipline,” said Wulfenbaum. “Very commendable. If you went out there now, those rat bastards would be all over you in an instant.” Said skaven were making finger-guns in their direction, their fedoras wagging dangerously. Perhaps they’d captured and enslaved a haberdasher?
Beside the human and the ogre (the latter of whom now sported a rapidly blackening eye), the little knight Fitzwilliam lay in a swoon. His lizard beast made a steady stream of distressed whooping noises, interrupted sporadically as she dabbed her freakish tongue against her wounded master’s face.
“The key,” said Wulfenbaum, ducking another sling bullet, “Is to wait for the opportune moment. Even a hefty lad like yourself can’t fight a full warband by his lonesome. When the enemy gets in close like, that’s when you and your cronies make your move. A target will present itself if you only—”
“RAAAWWWWR!” said Tunskalan. For a rodent of unusual size had just poked its nose from a nearby tomb.
It was, Wulfenbaum thought, an obvious ploy. Giant rats were little more than trained pets, and easily dispatched with a jab or two from any handy length of steel (provided of course that you steered clear of the pointy bits on the business end of the rat). The skaven could give a toss if the things lived or died so long as they flushed their prey from cover. And so: as Fitzwilliam swooned, and as Wulfenbaum face-palmed, and as a surprisingly bloodthirsty merchant and his bodyguard — along with the furious Tunskalan — converged upon the Old World’s most unfortunate rat, the sell-sword elected to bide his time. For half a dozen of the foul rat men now stood within easy charge distance of the already-wounded ogre.
“If only,” muttered Wulfenbaum, “You wait for them to come to you.” And as he stepped out from cover, fish-staff already wriggling in anticipation of a scrap, he resolved to misplace another shard of wyrdstone. He deserved it for dealing with these idiots.
Game 8: Amazons in the Raven Barracks vs Adventurers (W)
The ogre drifted through a fog.
The ogre sat upon a heavy stool.
The ogre looked up at the flickering images on the tiny box above the bar.
“Please pass the beer nuts,” he said There was an odd hollow quality to his voice. And the hulking chaos warrior who sat beside him, all riven armor and protruding arrow shafts, slid a little bowl across.
It was a strange tavern. Tunskalan supposed it was a good enough sort of place though. There were many interesting people inside, each sporting interesting wounds. A dwarven slayer cradled his severed head, pouring ale down his throat where it slopped onto the floor. A human mercenary raised an arm for a refill. Then he threw that arm at the barkeep. The barkeep himself was a somber man with pallid cheeks, pallid hands, and eyes like black pits. He seemed to be little more than a skull. He tapped another keg with his scythe.
“Hell of a game,” said the dead chaos warrior. He nodded up at the tiny box full of its tiny combatants, all moving through a strange haze of translucent dots and blurred lines.
“Damn static,” said the tavern keeper.
“I’ve seen better,” said Tunskalan. “Fights I mean, not television sets.” As before he seemed to speak through an empty tunnel, the words echoing within his own ears. “The one that killed me, for example.”
The bar’s patrons watched for a time as a magic carpet wafted towards a tower top. Its occupants balanced nimbly, piling out to collect the glowing bit of crystal half-glimpsed through bad reception.
“Unconventional play, that,” said the headless dwarf’s head. Then all and sundry winced as they watched an amazon fall beneath arrow fire. Then another.
“Bloody missiles,” said the be-arrowed chaos warriors.
“Bloody missiles,” agreed the ogre, remembering in a vague sort of way the pain of his own sling wounds. Their mugs clacked together hollowly. A newly-slain pair of amazon warriors bellied up to the bar beside them.
“Do you serve the blood of men in their own skulls?” asked one. “Could I have a cosmopolitan, please?” asked the other. The drinks appeared in the ladies’ hands, whisked there as if by magic.
The game dragged on. The Holy Gnoman Empire routed the Amazons. There was a vague, disinterested murmur of appreciation among the dead. And then:
“YOU!” boomed the voice of the barman.
The place froze. The dead quailed at the sound. One bony finger was leveled at Tunskalan.
“Me?” The big man’s voice sounded very small indeed.
“YOU DON’T HAVE TO GO HOME. BUT YOU CAN’T STAY HERE.”
“What?” The ogre’s broad face split into terror and confusion. And in this sorry state, Tunskalna did not think to look upon the small figures arranged on the screen. He therefore did not see them plying their magics or beginning their ritual. On the other hand, he very much felt the sudden lurch, and then the darkness descending.
When he came to, Tunskalan’s head lay hard against the stone of some barracks floor. His mind was rapidly clearing of its recent memories. Words like “television set” and “ESPN” deserted his consciousness. And as he sat up, surrounded by the smiling faces of the Holy Gnoman heroes, he reflected that resurrection left a peculiar aftertaste in one’s mouth. It was a flavor astonishingly similar to beer nuts.
Hahaha… oh, that’s brilliant. Sounds like a fairly wild campaign even by mordheim standards. Just one question: had the skaven enslaved a haberdasher? Because I know for a fact there were supplement rules for doing stuff like that.
My buddy playing Clan Pestilens does not have an actual haberdasher. He did, however, name his warband “The Squeak-Easy” and give them all gangster names. I believe my ogre was slain by “Ratty Devito.” Good thing I was able to “resurrect” the poor guy by rehiring him for half price at The Raven Barracks.
I have had some really awkward dice rolls, especially in Blood Bowl.
Nothing feels worse then rolling Skulls on a 3 die block that you then reroll, causing an early turnover and then the game, though Later that game I think i crippled a Gutter runner by throwing a Gnoblar at them, so it wasn’t all bad.
I can’t even think about bad sports luck right now. I’m a Giants fan:
https://www.mlb.com/news/giants-lose-to-dodgers-in-nlds-2021
just last session I managed to fail a reflex save with three rolls of d20:
Cat‘s luck – Roll reflex twice 1/d
Good Fortune domain power – re roll any d20 1/d
it was to avoid area of effect and shaved of 50% of my health.
What was the DC and what was your modifier? I mean, if we’re talking a 50/50 then it’s not that crazy improbable.
got a modifier of +9 and rolled below 5 each time.
made it with a roll of 8 1d4 rounds later.
My 4E days were plagued with luck that, while not nearly as bad as most horror stories, was remarkably consistent. Because in literally every encounter save one that my elven ranger Anduril fought, he missed with his best power. Every. Single. Time. Across six levels worth of adventures, too, so it wasn’t even the same power each time, just the most powerful one I was planning to use in that fight.
Fortunately for me and him, he was an elf, with the racial power Elven Accuracy, giving him precisely one reroll per encounter. I used that baby so reliably that I was able to confidently invest feats into dealing extra damage with it, since that extra damage would always go towards the biggest threat in the encounter. Which led to the funny case where the one time I didn’t miss with my big shot, I still used Elven Accuracy for that extra damage.
Side note, I miss 4E’s racial powers. You still see some of them in 5E design, like Tieflings with their hellish rebuke, but in 4E they were typically 1/encounter active abilities, and really made each race feel distinct in play. Like you’ve got Dwarves healing themselves as a bonus action (minor action in 4E terms), Dragonborn making breath attacks for some sweet AOE, and Half-Elves borrowing a power from another class. Compare that with 5E where the races mostly give passive abilities and stat increases, and it can’t help but feel like a step backwards.
Ooh, and I just remembered my last penny poker session! Not really an RPG, but I’m counting it dammit.
The really tragic thing is, my cards were absolutely on fire. I was getting the best hands of my life. Flushes, straights, pairs (in a 3 card hand), even one four of a kind (with two of the wild cards, so it was extremely unlikely anyone else had more than one).
And so it was, that in almost every single round we played, I had the second best hand. Which I’d call “not quite good enough”, but really it’s so much worse than that, since it lead to me betting quite aggressively with only two or three payouts over the course of the night, one of which was split. I started with 100 cents, dropped all the way down to about 30 IIRC, and managed to claw my way back up to 54 cents at the end of the night. Meanwhile my dad, curse his luck, walked away with $1.50 more than he started with! (At least I beat my sister by a couple of cents.)
Hey, if I’m allowed to talk wargaming, I think you’re allowed to talk poker.
I think that the most painfully unlucky moments — the ones that cost us the most — are the ones that hurt most. That’s the definition of a “second best hand” in poker. Heartbreakers all the way down!
“[…] the post-game casualties turned a marginally profitable venture into the most pyrrhic of victories” XD
Reminds me of the town battle on Grimgar 😀
https://tenor.com/view/i-know-some-of-these-words-mhmm-clueless-words-i-know-gif-5609882
Gotta give me a little context on this one. 😛
Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash, it only got a season but is a good anime. It shows quite well the interactions between the characters that are basically a RPG party. There is one part where they fight on a town overrun by goblins and… you gotta watch it to know what it happens then 😀
Watch it if you got a little time, even if only one isn’t bad 🙂
That’s so animu that I feel my Genshin has been Impacted.
No, but seriously, you probably need to watch it. It’s been lauded as one of the best choreographed battle anime in recent times; there’s no super powers, just normal folk isekai’d to a fantasy realm and have to trial by fire there way through life. Much dark, such grim.
While there aren’t as many consecutive 1s as the last story I mentioned this is the actual worst string of rolls. We were doing Death House. We could not roll above a 10 all session. Then we encountered a Banshee and all failed our Con saves, getting downed by the scream. The DM showed mercy and we awakened where we were dragged. Then the our Sorcerer had a Wild Magic Surge and killed us all in a Fireball.
Friends don’t let friends play wild magic sorcerers, lol.
Friends don’t let friends play Sorcerers in 5E since post-Tasha’s they are the objective worst class.
Reminds me of our Curse of Strahd campaign. In one of the random battles with Mr I’ve-got-a-module-named-after-me-I’m-so-edgy his opening salvo once diplomacy fell through was to fireball. Reaction from the Wild Magic Sorcerer was to cast mass healing word. Rolling on the table… 7. Fireball. We only survived because the GM ruled that Strahd was so amused by this he was distracted for the next round (disadvantage) and our command “Leave” managed to stick…
Oh boy failure I got a humdinger. So I made a real cool ranger he was a little edgy, he was dressed to the nines in weapons and I had a real cool idea of who he was.
First roll of the campaign, is a perception check by me the party’s look out in the crow’s nest. I got a crazy high perception. Nat 1.
So I give bad info but we begin to row out to the ship we’re going to sneak onto. We roll for rowing and I got another natural 1 on the strength check. Ok we made it to the boat time to climb up I got this. Another natural 1 causing me to fall on all my team mates. Everyone else has been rolling fine except me who’s rolled three natural 1s in a row.
Combat ensues, I pull out my greatbow these are my favored enemies and I am ready to crush some fools to make up for my bad luck. I loose two arrows and proceed to roll twin natural 1s.
That’s right 5 natural 1s in a row equaling 1 out of 3.2 million chance of happening. The game wanted to humble me real quick.
Were those the literal first rolls of the campaign? Yeesh. I hope things got better for the poor guy!
They got better but only because I can’t roll negatives.
Well there’s your problem! You need to be rolling a d20 for all of those checks; clearly you accidentally replaced yours with a d1!