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"So, why exactly are we cutting out their livers?" Aury asks conversationally. The beefy cleric has his head on a swivel, mace in hand and shield strapped to his left forearm as he keeps a vigilant lookout for further threats. And the truth is, he'd rather have to fight again than have to put his hands in frogling entrails.

Mattie finishes carefully placing another frogling internal organ in one of a pair of plast bags hanging by strings from a low-hanging cypress branch. "The livers are for Chudwick, Cimmer the Glassblower's boy — he has viddimen deficiency." The mage returns to the corpse of the same frogling and begins work on extracting its heart. "The hearts are for the goblins, proof of our effectiveness — but also good eating, or so I'm told."

The cleric grunts. "I'll take your word for it." While continuing to scan the shadows of nearby trees and other flora, he reaches down and peels another leech off his leg, just above a knee. "I don't get it. The water only comes up near the tops of our boots, but I keep finding leeches higher and higher on my legs."

Mattie stands and deposits a frogling heart in a plast bag that dangles next to the fuller, heavier, bag for livers. "They're making their way toward your groin. It's their preferred dining location." He stoops over and cleanses his hands and forearms with bog water.

"Makes sense," muses the cleric. "That is where my single largest vein is located..." Mattie looks up sharply, but the cleric is dead-panning, ostensibly focused only on the hazards of the surroundings.

"Well!" rejoins the mage, sealing the two plast bags. "You go ahead and luxuriate in that mistaken notion. Meanwhile, I have finished my collecting. I think these should suffice to convince our unfriendly lizardmen not to do anything untoward, at least not in the next few weeks." He hefts the bags, grimacing with a pained grunt as the weight aggravates a cut on his right arm. "Shall we head for home?"

Aury turns as he hears his friend grunt in pain. "You know, I'm hurt, too, actually. One moment..." The cleric lowers his head and closes his eyes briefly, whispering words too soft to hear.

Aghh... sighs Matthias in relief, having not noticed the impact on his right hip until his comerade's Healing Surge rights the injury with an audible click of a socket realigning. And so the two Seekers begin slogging their way — sloshing step by mud-sucking step — back east toward Helix village.

But of course, things can't be that simple, right? We can't just spend the morning in the bog collecting some froglings organs. No. No, a pair of lizardmen, who just might have been on their way to confer with their erstwhile frogling allies, have spotted you. And clearly, these lizardmen have seen the cut-open bodies of those small, no-longer-jumping amphibious ne'er-do-wells. They draw up just long enough to cast spears at about thirty feet distance, and are already charging forward even before those projectiles find or miss their marks.

For this fight, we'll eschew mapping. It'll be a tough fight, as these lizardman cannot yet be targeted by our cleric hero's Fray Dice. As combat erupts, Mattie is at 10/10 HP, and Aury is at 11/13 HP.

Lizardmen are 2+4 HD creatures.

We resolve the hurled spears and, luckily, our heroes aren't hit. Matthias' mage Fray Die makes things much more manageable for the PCs, and in short order the combat is over.

Between the two of them, the lizardman have thirteen chroma, no royals, and a dozen red cuprous copper pieces.

However, no sooner have our heroes looted the bodies of this pair of lizardmen and again begun their eastyard trek, than they are set upon by quite a sizable band of bog denizens arriving from further west. In fact, could this be a group intending to attack the Scarface Goblins? Our heroes count five lizardmen and a dozen froglings.

The froglings are generally leading the lizardmen. No doubt, this group came across the floating corpses of the froglings you slew earlier this morning.

We'll do this theatre of the mind, to save website disk space and speed up combat. Fortunately for Aury and Mattie, these lizardmen either aren't bearing spears, or else they're forbearing hurling them in order to not endanger their frogling allies who are leading the charge.

As the initial wave of froglings leap to the attack, Aury and Mattie lash out with their mace and magic, respectively, slaying two. Then Aury's mace sweeps a frogling on its downward arc as it leaps for him. The frogling that leaps for Mattie misses the mage, just as Mattie's dagger fails to connect. It's the end of round one, and no PCs are further injured, while three froglings lie dead.

The second round of combat begins, and Mattie uses his Fray Die against a leaping frogling whose attack would otherwise have hit.

Mattie pivots lashing out with his quarterstaff to slay another frogling as it leaps toward the cleric. Aury's Fray Die slays a frogling menacing him from the west, and then the cleric's backhand mace swipe slays another frogling! The remaining frogling in melee range misses Aury. Meanwhile, other froglings have been positioning themselves for leap attacks, and the lizardmen have spread out, ready to menace the PCs once their frogling cannon-fodder allies succumb.

Round three arrives and two-thirds of the froglings float in the bog, slain. Undoubtedly, they would have broken and fled were it not for the presence of their lizardmen allies. A frogling west of Aury is slain by the cleric's fray attack as it leaps, and Mattie's fray attack slays the only other frogling that is currently in immediate melee range of the heroes. Hoping its timing will avail, two other froglings leap at the mage, but Mattie criticals one of them and the other fails its to-hit roll. Two other froglings get smart and use the remainder of round three to position themselves to leap upon the heroes from behind them, assuming the PCs remain facing the advancing lizardmen. A spear chucked by a lizardmen due north of Aury at the bottom of round three hits the cleric, dropping Aury from 11/13 to 10/13 HP.

As round 4 begins, one of the five lizardmen turns and begins hurrying back west, leaving the scene.

Aury takes a single sodden step to the northeast, slaying (with his fray attack) one of two froglings menacing Mattie. The mage pivots and slays the other nearby frogling with a haphazardly flung eldritch bolt of energy. Two more froglings leap at the mage. Mattie brings his quarterstaff to bear on one of them, killing it. The other frogling completes its leap and scores a hit for a single point of damage with a rather poorly fashioned club. Aury remains at 10/13 HP, but Mattie drops to 9/10 HP. The westernmost lizardman closes to within ten feet and hurls its spear at Aury. It's a hit, and our cleric drops to 09/13 HP.

Two other lizardmen don't have spears to throw and so step into melee range from north of the cleric — one critting the cleric (but still just 1 damage, dropping Aury to 08/13 HP) and his compatriot doesn't land a solid hit. At the bottom of round four, the other two lizardmen have adjusted their position, preparing to attack.

Round 5 arrives. Aury's melee attack misses the lizardman to his immediate northeast, but his fray attack injures it. Mattie makes a wise split second decision and slays the surviving frogling with a stray magical bolt of energy. The mage then, not without fear, takes a step northeastward and attacks a lizardman, actually landing a solid hit with his quarterstaff and injuring the reptilian humanoid. Unfortunately, that foe returns the favor, and Mattie drops to 8/10 HP (Aury is at 8/13 HP).

The lizardman NW of Aury lands a solid blow, but Aury catches it on his shield and remains uninjured. The westernmost lizardman closes and attacks Aury, and the cleric barely gets his shield up in time and is jarred, taking a half-step backward from the force of the lizardman's blow.

Round 6 arrives, and from somewhere west of your location a hunting horn sounds sonorously. It's the lone lizardman who left the fight, signaling for reinforcements! Surprisingly, at the top of round 6, Mattie's quarterstaff connects solidly once again, slaying the lizardman SE of the mage's position. The mage pivots northward and an icebolt takes out the throat of the injured lizardman that has been menacing Aury. The cleric attacks another lizardman, and hits! Mace rolls 5 and we add 1 for Aury's strength, so he deals 2 converted damage to lizzie and kills it in round 6! Therefore, the cleric uses his fray attack to injure the lone remaining lizardman. Despite the fact that all its fellows are slain or fled, the remaining lizardman is in a battle frenzy, hating other humanoids too much to realize his perilous position. He attacks Aury again. Misses. And Aury and Mattie's fray attacks end the remaining foe's life.

END OF COMBAT. Total encounter experience: froglings yield 780 XP and lizardmen yield 500 XP, totaling 1,280 — split between the two, each hero gets 640 XP. The froglings carried a total of 8 chroma and 64 shiny cuprous. The lizardmen carried a combined 20 chroma, 8 royals, 32 shiny cuprous coins. Converting chroma to GP yields 10 royals total; converting shiny cuprous, we now have 10.32 GP of treasure. Combining this with the froglings coinage converted to GP, we have 11.76 GP total. Mattie is at 8/10 HP and Aury is at 8/13.

"So..." Aury says, minutes later after you have looted the dead and resumed your trek east, slowly making progress back toward Helix village, that was not entirely expected."

"It was not," Mattie agrees, glancing over at the cleric. The mage grins as Aury detaches yet another leech. "I hadn't counted on that much organized resistance, based on what Chief Scarface had shared. I think we were just victims of an unfortunate coincidence."

Aury turns, brow crinkling. "What, you don't think they were heading for the goblin camp? I don't know, that was a fairly sizeable group..."

"It was, but I don't think they were launching their attack on the goblins. For one thing, there weren't enough lizardmen. Whenever they decide to make their move, I'm guessing there will be at least a couple dozen lizardmen. No, I suspect that what we encountered was a patrol, perhaps doubling as a hunting party."

"All right, I'm still with you, so far," says Aury.

"Remember, froglings and lizardmen are naturally enemies, competing for resources. So, I think they were intentionally working together to build a certain degree of trust and familiarity with each other's methods — probably at the behest of their respective leaders."

The cleric nods. "Okay, makes sense. Well, I'm glad we didn't encounter them in force, if what we ran into was just a patrol."

Our two heroes had, briefly, considered harvesting more frogling livers, but Aury hadn't wanted to push their luck, and Mattie had been inclined to agree. Their backpacks jingle intermittently as the two progress eastward, evidence of coinage collected as treasure. By the time that the sun reaches its zenith, our heroes are perhaps another hour from the goblin camp.

"I've been wondering..." hazards the mage.

"Yes?" Aury disentangles a booted foot from where it has snagged in a root.

"When you did that ... healing thing..."

"The healing surge."

"Yes, that. Why did you speak under your breath? Other clerics in our chapterhouse — and for that matter, more broadly around Stigrix — loudly proclaim when they pray. I assume you were praying?"

"You assume correctly," Aury answers. Then he sighs, comes to a stop in the bog, hands on hips and staring off into the distance. "The reason is this. I believe that those other clerics... whoever or whatever they're praying to cannot hear them and grant spells unless they speak aloud."

"Yesss... but they do that to proclaim their faith boldly, to—"

"—to conspicously consume the blessing of diety," Aury finishes, shaking his head dismissively. "It serves as an explanation, I suppose. But I have never seen any other cleric invoke whatever ... Power it is that is listening without an audible request."

Matthias nods as the two Seekers again begin walking east. "So you've been experimenting, and you have discovered a god who can hear you even when you are silent..."

"Not a god," Aury rejoins. "The God. If I'm right, and I feel strongly that I am, there is only one god. One all-knowing being, all powerful. Those other clerics—"

"Aren't gods?" Matthias exclaims incredulously. "Well, I can't wait to see how your fellow clerics react to that!"

The two are silent for a full minute as they slog along. Finally, the mage says, "So you're ... testing this being."

"Not testing, no," Aury answers. "Displaying my faith. Resting in it..." And that is the end of that conversation, at least for the time being. Matthias shakes his head a minute later, still pondering it.

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"Mattie, what have you gotten us into?" the cleric asks an hour later as the two Seekers trudge westward and only a bit southward. "And why..." he asks, breathing deeply as he disentagles a soaked boot from bog detritus, "are we ... heading toward The Blackened Forest? Are you... trying to get us... killed by Renata and her brigands?"

The cleric halts, spits, and fusses at his lips, pulling away a cobweb he's walked into in the shade of a black ash tree. Mattie has paused too, hands on hips, robe gathered up high on his torso and belted there in an effort to keep it dry. The water is now almost above the two's boots.

"We won't actually enter the forest," the mage-scholar answers, taking a sip from his waterskin. "But the frogmen are most populous near its eastern border."

"I won't murder any of their youth!" the cleric asserts solemnly. "They may or may not have souls, I cannot say, but they have language and culture. And we're planning on killing them. It's our express intent!

"We won't initiate hostilities," Mattie says after a few moments of sober silence. "We'll only resort to violence in self-defense." He leans on his staff with his right hand, left picking a leech off his right shin just above the boot. Then, leaning on his staff with both hands, he sighs, staring westward. "Listen, Aury, they aren't people. They're bestial. Hells, they sacrifice their children to Herne, for Petarkian's Sake!"

"They do," Aury acknowledges, "but only the sick ones, and they believe it results in the bog's bounty, extending the life of the other tribe members. We can't know because it's lost in the Far Ancient, but our own species was most likely every bit as barbaric once upon a time." The cleric slogs over to the scholar and places a hand on the thinner man's shoulder. "Listen, why do the goblins want this anyway? You can at least explain that."

Mattie wipes muggy condensation off his brow. "Fine. Well, as you know, I've been studying the Scarface goblin tribe, befriending them; it's taken me two years to reach this point of trust with them. I bring them medicines, sometimes food. I've spent nights among them, warm by their fires, unharmed while I slept. These efforts have not only furthered our aims as Seekers of Knowledge, but they also have the practical result of making the goblins better disposed towards the people of Helix." He looks up at the cleric. "Did you know not a single villager has gone missing in the last six months?"

The mage tucks his damp handkerchief back into his belt and continues, "The Scarface's shaman has learned through his magic that the froglings have made a pact with the lizardmen that live between the Merisc and The Blackened Forest. They are planning a joint assault on the Scarface tribe. The goblins won't stand a chance if that happens. Not only will my research subjects be destroyed, but Helix will also lose an important buffer separating the villagers from the worse inhabitants of the bog." The skittering trill of some nearby swamp bird echoes through the cypresses, ashes, hemlock and spruce trees. "However ... were the froglings to have their numbers thinned..."

"Yes," Aury nods, "they'll think twice about coming closer to Helix when two humans from there have wrought carnage among them. And, the lizardmen will be derisive. They have contempt for anyone who shows weakness. The alliance will be ended, or at least retarded. You can continue your research, and we will have further promoted the growing trust between you and the Scarface tribe, while simultaneously making Helix a bit safer" the cleric concludes, smiling in spite of himself.

"There, you see," answers the mage, "there's that first-class mind that got you into the Seekers' brotherhood!"

Midmorning finds our heroes further west in the bog. Continuing the philosophical discussion of the past several minutes, Aury explains, "And that is the gist of where not only my reasoning leads me, but also what my gut insists must be true: there cannot be multiple gods. There can only be one. Knowledge and power of that magnitude would abhor division and inevitably be held within a single Entity."

"Then what of clerics of other faiths?" Mattie asks. "Where do they get their power if there aren't numerous gods?" This isn't the first such conversation they've had on this subject, but Aury is always bringing it up, and — truth to be told — Mattie enjoys getting the cleric wound up.

A loud splash off to the right has Aury withdrawing his mace from its loop in his gear belt. He rests the head of the weapon on one shoulder of his studded leather hauberk and makes significant eye contact with Mattie.

"I heard," says the scholar-mage. "They're pacing us." The two slowly slog past a cypress tree. A large water moccasin undulates across the surface, disturbed by their passage. Fortunately, it is heading away from the two. "Probably a hunting party. Either that, or a trio of scouts." The mage's left hand dips into a belt pouch that holds spell components.

The cleric turns toward the mage. "Oh, they travel in threes to scout? And how large are their hunting—"

Loud, warbling amphibious warcries shatter the relative quiet, cutting off the cleric's question as froglings attack from the moss-laced trees surrounding the two Seekers.

The mace icon represents Aury.    The wand icon represents Mattie.

I rolled 10 froglings. The froglings normally need an atk roll 13 to hit Aury and 9 to hit Mattie, but for their first attack they use their leaping ability, needing only a 12 to hit Aury and an 8 to hit Mattie.

Aury needs an 8 to hit froglings and Mattie needs a 13 with thrown dagger or a 14 with his quarterstaff in order to successfully hit a frogling. Because our two Seekers were expecting trouble, they aren't surprised and can therefore act first, in keeping with Scarlet Heroes combat rules.

Because these froglings are 1-1 HD, our heroes' Fray dice cannot help but take one enemy apiece out of the combat equation. Aury's mace crushes the airborne creature due north of him, while a burst of arcane force from Mattie slays the creature leaping toward the mage from the northwest. We'll indicate these slain froglings by coloring them red below.

The mace icon represents Aury.    The wand icon represents Mattie.

Now I must make attack rolls for our two Seekers. To do that, I'll pull pregenerated d20 rolls from this resource. Just to keep myself honest, I'll randomly determine which line I choose to pull from first: 1d6 yields a 5; and because Matthias has the higher Dexterity score, we'll grab his d20 result before getting Aury's:

I roll an 18 for Matthias, and a 6 for Aury's attack. Matthias hits and Aury misses. Although frequently used two-handed, I'm going to rule that Mattie's quarterstaff qualifies as a one-handed weapon in Scarlet Heroes parlance, and that it deals 1d8 damage, but because Mattie is a mage only (not multi-classed), he can only deal 1d4 with it. I get a 2 result. Translated to SH-style damage, that's a single HD of damage, enough to take out another frogling.

The mace icon represents Aury.    The wand icon represents Mattie.

Now the froglings attack; to keep the map clean, I'll remove the slain froglings — they've floated away in the bog's water anyway. This is the froglings natural environment and is not ideal terrain for our heroes. The froglings easily close with the two Seekers. We'll resolve attacks against Matthias first: from north to south, the three westernmost froglings attack with to-hit results of 10, 5, and 12. Two of the three attacks land. Their weapons are small and poor quality, dealing 1d3 damage. I get results of 3 and 2, which each translate to a point of hit point damage using Scarlet Heroes rules. Uh-oh! Our mage drops from 10 HP to 8.

Now let's resolve the other three froglings' attacks on Aury. We get to-hit rolls of 15, 7, and 4 — a single hit with a damage roll of 3, translating to 1 HP of injury for Aury, and dropping him to 12/13.

The mace icon represents Aury.    The wand icon represents Mattie.

A new round begins. Our heroes' Fray Dice activate, and two more froglings go down. Both heroes fail their melee to-hit rolls (5 for Mattie, 4 for Aury) and the remaining froglings attack — this time, without their leaping ability yielding a +1 bonus.

Two attack the mage and both miss (rolled 6 and 4). Three froglings attack Aury: a 9, 20, and 6 to-hit. Two misses and a critical. The successful frogling will add it's Dex bonus of 1 to the damage. Damage rolled: 3 translating to 1 HP, made 2 HP when adding crit damage. Aury is down to 10/13 hit points.

The mace icon represents Aury.    The wand icon represents Mattie.

The froglings have now lost almost half of their numbers, so a Morale check will soon be needed. In the meantime, it's a new round. Our heroes lash out with attacks represented by their Fray Dice, and two more froglings do down. Mattie pivots to the south and lashes out with his quarterstaff — a 16 to-hit result (success). But Mattie rolls a 1 on d4, a glancing blow that does no damage. Aury swipes overhand with his mace, getting a 6 result and missing.

The froglings are down to three. We'll make a 2d8 Morale check against a 7: result of 5 — their morale is steady and they will fight on! Removing the slain from the battle map, we have the following situation:

The mace icon represents Aury.    The wand icon represents Mattie.

The westernmost frogling attacks Mattie and hits with a 13, rolling damage 3 which translates to 1 more HP of damage to the mage.

The other two froglings attack Aury with to-hit rolls of 10 and 6, both misses. A new round begins, and our heroes continue to show their mettle, as evidenced by their Fray Dice taking out two more froglings. Aury twirls around and smashes the last remaining frogling in the head with his mace (to-hit of 13) for 1d6+1 damage yielding 7, which translates to 2 HD of damage, slaying the lone remaining frogling. END OF COMBAT.

Continue the story...

Steady progress is being made in developing the Scarlet Horizons setting and rules. I'm up to thirty-eight Heroic Deeds and five spells. I have sixteen character classes — four of them core classes, the others subclasses of one of the core classes.

Eleven character classes are at least marginally complete, and five others need my attention. In the rules I'm creating, I'm incentivizing multi-classing in a number of ways, and in some limited ways creating a disincentive: what long-term player wouldn't eventually want his PC to take 20+ levels in the Fighter core class, given the bonus hit point those levels offer?

It's now been three days since I did any work on furthering the escapades of Matthias d'Slaytonthorpe — scholar-mage and his cleric-mystic fellow Seeker — Aurioch 'Aury' d'Rosenberg.

It's all well and good to develop the Scarlet Horizons setting and rules, but I don't want to miss out on the actual game play. Our heroes have, after all, only recently survived an ambush by froglings in the bog southwest of Helix, near The Blackened Forest.

I'm going to have to figure out a way to convert defeated monsters and treasure into Experience. Matthias and Aury need a total of 2.0 Exp to attain 2nd level. Let's consider possible ways to translate defeated monsters into Exp.

Warning: spit-balling section below:

As a starting point, let's say that for each HD that a defeated monster possessed, we'll assign a starting fraction of 0.001; if the monster had any special resistances, we'd add 0.00025. And perhaps for each attack per round beyond one, we add 0.001.

If the monster was particularly weak or mediocre, subtract 0.00025.

Armor class below 7? Add 0.00010; below 4? Add another 0.00010. Below 1? Add 0.00015.

What does this give us in composite for a single frogling?

0.001 (per Hit Die)
subtract 0.00025 (weak vs robust creature HP/saves)
AC 6 (add 0.00010)
Special ability 'Jump' (add 0.00015)
Attacked as part of a group (add 0.00015)
PC(s) harmed by monster or compatriots at least once (add 0.00015)

This yields 0.0013. Multiplied times ten froglings: 0.013.

End spit-balling section

I did land on Fractional Experience values for defeated froglings.