Campaign for Ravensflight - Assault on the Ratlings Lair!

This is a game report for this week's adventure in our Campaign for Ravensflight - a tabletop adventure campaign using Advanced Song of Blades and Heroes!

After Pursuing the Ratling Raiders to their camp after the Defence of Gromlet, Lady Ismira Ravensflight returned to Gromlet to raise a larger force to assault the Ratlings lair, deeper into the mountains. Some were deeply saddened by the loss of their friends at the hands of the brutal Ratling Assassins that waylaid the party during the pursuit. Many more were buoyed by the tales of Lady Ismira's daring and bravery - and the number of Ratlings slain - at the Ratlings camp. A number of additional farmers and woodsmen volunteered to join the expedition. More importantly, two retired warriors were recruited! 

Karl was a soldier from the Vale of Ravensflight that marched off to war with Lady Ismira's parents over two decades earlier, campaigning with them for a dozen years or so. Ten years ago he returned to the Vale with a husband he'd met and married while on campaign and the two settled into a farmstead near Gromlet! Not the most deadly or well armed of warriors... They were definitely a step up from the farmers armed with pitchforks!  

Preparing to assault the Ratlings Lair... 

Lady Ismira and her retinue enter the Lair of the Ratlings... 

Erik charged after a Ratling slinger that had been harrying the party, pelting them with stones... unfortunately every time Erik took a swing at the filthy little beast, it would duck and slink back further into the shadows. 

Lady Ismira, always one to lead from the front, was attacked by a Ratling Assassin! It leapt upon her stabbing deeply into her neck! The group panicked and about half of them fled out of the cavern. Luckily a few had teh wherewithal to drag their wounded Lady with them! 

Kark and Erik continued trying to take down the Ratling slinger. Two of the woodsmen/archer remained along with Megan... 

Raloros regained his wits and returned to help out, though things were getting increasingly desperate! 

MORE Ratlings kept arriving - drawn by the sound of fighting! 

A pair of them assaulted Raloros. One tackled his legs bringing him down. The other lept on his chest stabbing him repeatedly while Raloros screamed... 

So... in Song of Blades and Heroes combat is worked out by each player rolling a d6 and adding or subtracting any modifiers and comparing rolls... if one character doubles the other, they have taken their opponent out of action - though the character taken out of action can roll for survival later to see if they survived their wounds... If one combatant triples the result of the other it is a gruesome kill... the character dies instantly and all friendlies within a certain distance make an instant morale check... 

Raloros rolled a one... to which nothing was added because his combat ability was cancelled out by being outnumbered and the powerful blow the Ratling dealt... 

The ratling attacker ended with modified roll of EIGHT.... so... EIGHT TIMES what Raloros rolled... so he was SUUUUUPER DEAD!? 

At this point it was decided to cut losses and make their way out... 

Unfortunately a Ratling warrior cut down Karl as he retreated. 

The Erik was knocked down while he tried to retrive his fallen lover... 

He briefly got up again, but was overwhelmed by Ratlings and cut down... 

After the battle Orion rolled to see if Lady Ismira survived her injuries... and rolled THREE FAILURES... and died... 

and... that was it for the campaign!? 

With Lady Ismira dead (along with Raloros...) there was no real point in continuing... 

It was decided that Megan and Amelia decided to settle on a farmstead near Gromlet and give up on their life of adventure. They adopted young Yorrick and raised her as their own. Amelia's sister Luciana stayed on with them for a time, but eventually heard the call of adventure and had to move on. 

We decided to reboot the campaign with a party of Dwarves that would enter the Vale of Ravensflight from the Northwest - tho opposite direction from which Lady Ismira and her retinue had approached. They would be tasked with recovering some artifacts which had been gifted the Ravensflight family, now that the last of their line had passed... 

And that's the Campaign for Ravensflight Game Reports all caught up! I still have three to do for Warhammer Quest and one for Bolt Action... 

Campaign for Ravensflight - The Pursuit of the Ratlings

This, finally, is the game report for the games played last week in our Campaign for Ravensflight - a tabletop adventure campaign using Advanced Song of Blades and Heroes!

After the Defence of Gromlet, Lady Ismira and her retinue decided to pursue the surviving Ratling Raiders hoping to track them back to their lair and destroy that threat once and for all... 

They were not able to pursue instantly... They waited for morning and quickly tried to press a number of Farmers and Woodsmen into service! They ended up with only a handful and left shortly after lunch... 

The progress was slow, but the tracks were clear and easy enough to follow. 

As evening approached it was decided to set up camp for the night. Watch shifts were detailed and those not standing sentry tried to get a few hours of fitful sleep. 

During the last shift before dawn, Raloros - the Spellcaster (Played by Finnegan), was standing guard with two farmers - brothers; Jake and Elwood. Jake and Elwood had secretly got into the supply of spirits and had gotten quite drunk and fallen asleep. 

A few Ratling Assassins snuck into camp and before Raloros could do anything or wake anyone, they struck - killing several of the farmers! So horrified was Raloros, they ran off into the woods in fear! 

Lady Ismira Ravensflight is a light sleeper and was one of the first up and fighting back against the Ratlings. 

Raloros also regained their composure and aided by Lady Ismira by making the Ratling Assassins fall into a magical slumber... 

Luciana killed one of the assassins with her crossbow! 

Ratling Assassin desperately tried to wake up his sleeping compatriot... but was cut down before he could! 

Teh following day the remains of the retinue buried their dead and continued tracking the ratlings... 

They came upon their raiding camp and approached it under cover of darkness... A lot more Ratlings were awake at night! 

Luciana shot down one of the sentries. 

Lady Ismira charged out into the camp, cutting down ratlings left and right! 

The others were bewildered by her insane bravery!?

Most hung back and shot at the scrambling Ratlings! 

Megan, who was STILL recovering from her initial injuries... was injured again... eventually the Ratlings were overpowered and when the Ratling Commander and Wizard were slain, the rest melted into the woods... 

The party scouted ahead and discovered this was not the Ratlings main base of operations, it was mearly a forward raiding camp. Though they did not go all the way there, it was clear there was a more permanent lair deeper in the mountains. It was decided they should return to Gromlet and raise a larger contingent to march on the Ratlings lair! 

Campaign for Ravensflight - The Defence of Gromlet!

I've gotten a bit behind on these as well... so... 

A few weeks back, the Retinue of Lady Ismira Ravensflight buried their companion Yodrick and continued along their way to the Hamlert of Gromlet. Along their way they noted abandoned farmsteads. It was difficult to tell what had become of the inhabitants. 

Had the families died of plague? Had they been murdered by raiding ratlings? Some had been burned down. Other simply abandoned. Some were abandoned long ago, others more recently. 

When they finally came upon an inhabited farmstead, they discovered they were very close to Gromlet. There were quite a few farmsteads now packed in tightly around the hamlet. Indeed, the hamlet itself was a small cluster of a half-dozen or so farmsteads with a small community hall and dilapidated chapel and a blacksmith.  

The community was ambivalent to the arrival of a feudal lord returned to reclaim their ancestral lands, complaining that they'd already been taxed twice this season... and it wasn't even harvest time! The tax collectors claimed to be the King's tax collectors, though when leaving the capitol, the King himself said taxes had not been collected from the region for many years and stated that was one of the main reasons he'd urged Lady Ismira to return to her lands

The community was shocked and dismayed that the retinue had encountered ratlings on the road, which they had slain, and now feared reprisals. The Ratlings had been a nuisance for more than a few years now, but the villagers had discovered if they put up no resistance and let the ratling raiders steal the occasional livestock (or small children) they wouldn't kill too many of villagers - to them it was just ANOTHER tax they had to pay. 

Originally, Lady Ismira had planned to continue her march to Ravendown, but stayed on to pacify and show she was willing and able to protect her peoples against the scourge of the ratlings.

As the villagers seemed to think they ratlings always came from the East, they camped out in the farmstead furthest to the east for the first night, saying they would sound Lady Ismira's war horn as a signal for all of the villagers to come to the defence of the town... Luckily, nothing happened. 

It occurred to them however, that there was likely little chance that anyone in the region would HEAR the warhorn in their farms, spread out over several miles, and fewer would bother to answer the call. The next day, they arranged for a group to stay each night at the community hall and some would keep watch and if there were signs of a raid, would march out from the central location. Some were not impressed with this idea - as it would mean the outlying farms - in which ever direction the ratlings came from would surly be razed (and possibly occupants killed!) be the response group could possibly get there... but they also could not be sure where the ratlings would come from and which farm would be hit first. 

A very small group of farmers and a woodsman armed with a bow gathered to stay at the community hall. As it turned out the second evening the ratlings did attack. The sentries keeping watch alerted and woke up the group in the hall after they spotted a fire off to the east. Shortly thereafter, farmers and their families from the eastern farmstead came running into the hamlet proper fleeing the ratlings. 

The group marched out to meet their foes... 

The met the Ratling Raiding Party near one of the farmsteads east of Gromlet! 

The defenders quickly took up positions at a hedge surrounding the farmstead.

The Ratlings attacked! 

The Ratlings had a wizard who was throwing fireballs around, lighting up the night! 

The Ratling Wizard (or "Rizard", as the players kept calling it?!) made the mistake of getting too close to Granny... 

pelting it with stones, the Rizard was taken out of action! 

(I think it might have been a Gruesome kill and half the ratlings failed morale and fled...? this is what happens when I write game reports three weeks after the fact...) 

Ratlings attack the other hedge line and Lady Ismira fights the Ratling Commander! 

At one point, Lady Ismira was knocked down and things looked a little perilous... 

But she got back up and cut that Ratling commander down and the rest of the Ratlings fled into the night! 

Of the Raiders, only about half were slain and it was decided that they should raise a force to track them back to their lair and deal with them for good! 

Warhammer Quest: Cursed City - Session Nineteen - Deliverance Journey

I have REALLY fallen behind on the game reports!!? This report is for a game played over a MONTH ago now (9 April 2025)! I do hope to get caught up over the next week or so... a LOT has happened in the last month! 

This week Finnegan was playing Brutogg Corpse-Eater and Octren Glimscry and Amanda was playing Qulathis the Exile and Glaurio ven Alten III

Things started off a bit crazy, right out of the gate! As soon as they stepped out of the landing zone they encountered a Vyrkos Blood-Born Vampire! In the next building, there was a VARGSKYR?! 

Brutogg laid a beating down on the Vampire... 

And Qulathis dashed past and started turning the Vargskyr into a pin-cushion! 

Glaurio swaggered up and blasted the beast a few times with his pistols... 

Brutogg rushed ahead beating the thing mercilessly... 

And finally Octren slinked by to finish it off... 

At the beginning of the third round, Brutogg was kicking in the next door (or...kicking OUT the next door, as it looks like they were leaving an interior area amd moving back out into the streets!) 

There he encountered a trio of Deadwalker Zombies which he started smashing apart... and eating... 

The others pushed through, slaying more zombies as they went... and then encountered Torgilius the Chamberlain! Again, Octren tried to warn the others that this was one of the most ancient and dangerous of the amythest wizards... Qulathis put an arrow into him and Glaurio blasted him with two pistols and the old wizard went down in a heap... 

Boldly forward! This were getting a little spread out! 

Qulathis and Octren started trailing behind... 

While Brutogg and Glaurio surged ahead. 

Encountering a Kosargi Nightguard, Glaurio blasted it with his pistols... 

Qulathis shot it with a few arrows... 

and Brutogg stepped in to knock it over.. 

then carried on to deal with some bats, along with Octren. 

Moving into another building, the group encountered skeletal guards of the Ulfenwatch...

who were quickly reinforced! 

The group fought their way through them... 

and pushed on to find another group of zombies... 

... and rats,,, 

They were getting quite far ahead of the Suffocating Gravetide! 

Qulathis killed two zombies and scattered two swarms of corpse rats in ONE TURN! 

Brutogg finished off the Corpse rats! 

Things got a bit harry in the next square when they discovered TWO Vyrkos Blood-Born... and a Kosargi Nightguard... AND a Vargskyr!? 

The Vargskyr leap into the sky and came crashing down through the roof of the building most of the group had been occupying! 

Octren, who'd been trailing behind, rushed to their aid! 

nearly finishing off the Vargskyr! 

Brutogg finished of the Vyrkos Blood-Born, then stepped into the square to deal with the undead Ogor of the Kosargi Nightguard... 

Glaurio stepped in to help finish it off...

Qulathis pushed past to reveal the next rooms... and ANOTHER Vyrkos vampire... and TORGILIUS AGAIN!?

Luckily they were still very far ahead of the Suffocating Gravetide! 

Qulathis had damaged the vampire, and Octren stepped in to finish it off.. 

Brutogg bullied his way through and beat down Torgilius... 

And they they escaped to an appropriate extraction zone and summoned The Adamant! 

Lucky they got away when they did... the last three  cards in the encounter deck were Radukar the Wolf... THREE Vyrkos Blood-Born.. and TWO Kosargi Nightguard! (as, I think, at this point, one or two were already at level three... it's been a month...) 

The mission being a success brought the fear level down, but the Influence began to creep up again... still, both at three seemed pretty low and it was decided it was time to do a scavenge journey... or two... 

Unfortunately, as the Adamant took off a number of zombies swarmed the ship and all were injured in the brawl, which would leave them still wounded at the beginning of their next journey! 

We've played three more games since this one... and will probably play another this week.. perhaps I'll get a game report finished up every day this week and then be all caught up!!

(Of course there was also a Bolt Action game that I have yet to write a game report for... AND two sessions of our Advanced Song of Blades and Heroes campaign!?)