Mythras Solo Play Report (St. Millê): Session 1 Part 1

In the Wilderness

During the last session I tried the Mythras rules for the first time. Rayburn St. Millê arm wrestled a friend and got into a bar fight with one of Lord Gillesby's henchmen. I enjoyed the relative crunch of the system.

In this session, I will make Mildred (barmaid from Session 0) into a fully-realized character and do some completely random hex-crawling. Should be fun!

Tools

• Mythras Core Rules

• Recluse v1 Oracle

I’ve been using Recluse as my oracle for these sessions since I was introduced to it. I’ve previously used Mythic, which is a good system, but I enjoy that Recluse offers quick resolution and still seems to provide a good degree of interesting outcomes.

Recap

In the last session, blacksmith journeyman Rayburn St. Millê felt the injustice of Lord Gillesby who paid only half for the sword that Ray and his master had toiled over for many months. Rayburn confronted the henchman at the tavern and had his ass handed to him in a bloody fistfight that left the young man groaning on the floor.

Ray has spent some of his winnings from the tavern on quilted/padded leg armor. Since he’s an armorer himself he gets a discount on their manufacture.

Interlude

Meanwhile, at Lord Gillesby’s keep…

Harlon Gillesby had a gentler countenance than one might imagine given his reputation for cruelty. His dark curls were now streaked with silver, as was his beard, but his brown eyes were deceptively soft, and he had a winning smile. He sat next to a fire in the evening, and his much younger wife, Elaine, sat in the chair next to him. Despite this being her home, she looked stiff and uncomfortable, and she said little.

Gillesby admired a fine sword in the light of the fire, the blaze casting a shimmering hue along the perfect blade.

“It is good, is it not, Elaine?” he said.

“A very fine blade, my lord,” Elaine said, keeping her blue eyes on the fine rug. She disliked her husband, but also feared him, and kept her feelings to herself.

Gillesby sighted down the length of the weapon, then tested the heft and balance of the blade.

“I’d hate to be the poor soul on the wrong end of this weapon,” he said, chuckling.

“Indeed, it is the finest sword I have ever seen,” Elaine said.

She knew that it had been crafted by the young blacksmith Rayburn, who had worked as a smith at the keep a few years ago to practice his craft. They had been friends, and she knew that he had great potential as a smith, but this blade was surely the craftsmanship of Arnulf, the master smith who taught Rayburn. She had no idea that the smith had been cheated out of his fair price by her husband, and she would’ve been appalled if she had known.

“Indeed…” Gillesby said, sheathing the sword. With the blade stowed, Elaine let out a sigh of relief. Gillesby had never mistreated her, but nonetheless she never quite felt safe around him, especially not with such a blade in his grip.

We pick up the story of Rayburn a week after the fight at the tavern. He’s still a bit bruised but he’s healed up, and he’s also had a chance to cool his heels after getting walloped. Arnulf has talked sense into him – there’s no benefit to crossing Gillesby – and Ray’s been heads down working in the smithy.

Rayburn beats the glowing iron with the hammer, sparks flying. It’s good, beating this steel into shape, folding it, and flattening it for hours. He takes the anger out on the iron, though he wishes the metal was Gillesby, and his hammer was justice. The thought of Elaine in the keep, married to that awful man, already had set Ray’s heart against the Lord of these lands, but seeing how he had also cheated his own teacher and master Arnulf… Ray wonders how there can be a God if men can flaunt their evil so brazenly and yet live and prosper.

He’s deep in thought when he spots someone drawing near to the work shed. It’s Mildred, the tavern-keeper’s daughter. She’s around his age, and he’s known her for years. She has dark hair and green eyes and carries herself with a certain pragmatic bearing. He nods as she approaches.

“Mildred,” he says in greeting.

“Rayburn,” she replies.

“I never thanked you for taking care of me after the fight,” he says.

“Well, I couldn’t have a man passed out on the floor of the tavern. It’s bad business.”

“I suppose,” he says. “I take it you’re here with some purpose?”

“That man you fought,” she says. “Griel. The soldier.”

Ray grips his hammer tighter at the sound of the man’s name. “Yes.”

“I overheard what he told you. About hidden treasure?”

“You… How could you have?” Ray asks, surprised. He’d thought the conversation had been quite stealthy.

“You’d be surprised what a tavern wench overhears,” she says. “We’re practically invisible, except when we’re not. You two were so intent on the bad blood between you that you wouldn’t have noticed if I lit your tunic on fire.”

Ray laughs. “Perhaps.”

“In any case, this loot he mentioned… I know where it is, and what guards it.” She looks quite serious.

“You… What?”

“I know where the loot is stashed,” she says. “Griel knows what’s guarding it, and that’s why he knows he needs help. I’d wager he knows even more than he’s letting on about.”

Ray sets down his hammer. “What are you talking about?”

“I was out hunting, and I found something I wasn’t supposed to see. You won’t believe me if I tell you, so I’ll have to show you. I would swear on a holy book that he’s talking about the place I found.”

The next step is to roll up a character for Mildred. I decide to make her a Forester/Hunter and Tavern Keeper blend. She’s 22 and 5’6”. We’d already established through the story that she’s part of the mercantile class (freeman). She fears magicians due to a traumatic experience in her past. She’s loyal to her friend Rayburn and distrusts the nobility. Her fighting style is “Woodsman”, which includes the bow, hunting knife, and axe/hatchet. She’s better outfitted than Ray due to her social class: leather armor and a metal cap/helm, a short bow, knife, and axe. She’s got some skill in stealth, tracking, healing, and craft (fletcher).

Character creation went a lot faster for Mildred than my first character. I created an Excel spreadsheet to help with the process last time, and the auto calculations certainly did speed things up. Not having to look up every little rule also helped quite a bit.

Ray reluctantly agrees to let Mildred show him the place in the woods where the loot is stashed. They agree to meet the next morning at sunup, and Mildred says he should dress for battle, just in case. Ray is skeptical about the whole thing, but he knows that Mildred is imminently practical, and she wouldn’t lead him on a wild goose chase.

At dawn he meets Mildred at the described spot at the edge of the woods. His boots are wet from the dewy grass, and he’s dressed in his padded and quilted gambeson. A wooden buckler is slung across his back and a dagger and short sword hang at his belt. As requested, he’s ready for a fight – although he doesn’t know why.

Mildred is right on time. She’s wearing a leather tunic that serves as light armor and a practical skirt and soft leather boots. She wears a steel cap, and a short bow and quiver of arrows across her back. A hatchet and hunting knife are at her belt, and she also has a satchel and canteen.

Is Mildred sure of the way? (6n, 2y) No. She could get lost. I think I’ll probably test her Track skill to see if she gets lost. Since I don’t have a map of these woods, it might be fun to try to randomly generate terrain and/or areas of interest along the way. I don’t have a tool for that and may come up with some tables to assist with that.

Mildred has the Track skill at 43%. That’s not ideal, but she also has some Locale at 39%, and generally I’d say she’s familiar with these woods, which may improve the difficulty of the check.

If she misses the Track roll, we’ll say that they will veer either too far left or too far right, by one side of a hex. If she succeeds on a Track roll, they get back on track and head toward the destination.

Each hex will represent approximately 1 mile, and the contents will be determined randomly on the tables below for each hex. If an encounter or special was rolled previously, then the chance is ½ for the next watch (3 hours). The destination is roughly 6-7 miles distant.

Roll (d100)	Terrain	Encounter / Special
01-11	Marsh / wetlands	13% / 15%
12-32	Light forest and meadows	7% / 21%
33-55	Wooded	18% / 25%
56-66	Heavily Wooded / thickets	21% / 18%
67-75	River / wetlands	24% / 12%
76-80	Wooded / rocky	27% / 8%
81-98	Same as previous area	Same / 25%
99-100	Same as previous area	51% / 100%

For wilderness encounters I’ve adapted the tables from the 1e AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide and modified them for a low-magic feel. There is still the possibility of encountering strange things, but it will be rare and unusual.

For wilderness encounters I’ve adapted the tables from the 1e AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide and modified them for a low-magic feel. There is still the possibility of encountering strange things, but it will be rare and unusual.

For special events I’ll use the following list from the interwebs: The Lair: Random Wilderness Encounters (creaturespotlight.blogspot.com). I will reskin them as necessary to fit the setting.

Mildred and Rayburn will start here and head roughly to the northeast of this location into a generally wooded area.

Tracking skill check: 91 vs 43 + 8 = 51% (Track augmented with Locale), fail. Which direction did they get off track? (4 in 6, to the right). They drifted too far to the south.

Terrain rolled is 73: river/wetland. Encounter: 65 vs. 24%, no. Special: 61 vs. 12%, no.

When they reach the river, does Mildred realize they’ve gone too far? Locale (Easy): 43 vs. 39 + 20 = 59%, yes.

Mildred leads them into the trees and roughly toward the east as the sun tints the horizon. Birds sing and frogs croak and their path leads them slightly downhill. The ground underfoot quickly becomes soft and the trees thin somewhat, and they trek through marshes. Progress is slow. In less than an hour they reach the banks of a small, swift river, which they both know as the River Mennea.

“We’ve come too far to the south,” she says. “We’ll follow the river northward.”

They travel north through the wetlands, picking their trail carefully within sight of the river. Gnats buzz annoyingly around their heads and frogs croak cheerily in the reeds.

They’ve now traveled about an hour (50% pace due to the wet ground). We’ll say they started in the 6^th hour.

That's enough fun for this episode. Next time in Session 1 Part 2, Mildred and Rayburn face their first encounter and the random wilderness generation is kicked up an extra notch!