More(k) Borg

The Mork Borg game, that I started on a whim to entertain friends during COVID lockdown continues. Last night, we ran our 6th session. 

Brief re-caps below (including a 10 room dungeon level).

Session 3: Prison of the Hated Pretender

I ran the classic Gus L.adventure to great effect. Our lovable rogues explored the tower, hunting for an armillary that might give prophetic clues as to how they might escape the coming apocalypse. The astrolabe granted a vision to the Scum, revealing a mega-dungeon hidden in a nearby Star Tower and a possible route to salvation.

• To my surprise, the characters naturally explored every room of the dungeon. At first they made a beeline to the top, and I feared they might find the armillary too easily and skip most of the delicious flavor of this module, but luckily for me, they got distracted and dove into the basement before visiting the roof. 
• Main Highlight: The players learning to use light to manipulate the guardians.

Session 4: Crosstown Chase

Exiting the Pretender's prison, our ex-jailbirds found the city being over-run by berserkers from the Sarkash. As buildings burned around them, they raced to the Star Tower, before their route could be cut-off. 

• I doodled up a crude street map and placed a few bad-guy spawn points. It worked a lot better than I feared and turned into a tense running melee across the rooftops. I cut the map into segments and pasted them into our shared whiteboard as they progressed. 

Session 5: Bottomless Moat

As revealed in their prophetic vision, the scoundrels found a hidden staircase under a flagstone in the Star Tower leading to a mysterious door. Behind the door, they found a chasm, with cages suspended in the void. 

• This was an old-fashioned platform jumping adventure. Battling bad-guys while figuring out how to pendulum across to the other side.
• The cages contained various prisoners that foreshadow factions in the dungeon to come. To motivate heroic rescues, I warned the players, that these prisoners will be their back-up characters for when their main PCs inevitably die. 

Session 6: These Rooms are Weird

Having crossed the moat, our "heroes" with their newly freed prisoners begin their exploration of the mega-dungeon proper. It's real strange in here. 

• This is a pretty standard dungeon-crawl, introducing a bunch of elements I plan to use later on. It worked great and I've keyed it up below in case anyone else has a use for it. All the weird little things to interact with make this easy to run.
• On our run, the party explored their way through and mostly avoided combat.  They drew a random encounter with dollface-nuns but were able to negotiate a tense withdrawal.

1. Foyer - A staging area for the party to get started.
2. Closet - Contains a Haz Mat suit with a fishbowl helmet. It counts as heavy armor, but no-one can hear your voice while the helmet is on.
3. Ready Room - Most of the floor is covered in a puddle of fluid that renders it friction-less. Anyone stepping on it immediately slips and slides into the NW corner. It's impossible to stand in the puddle. There is also a rack of pole-arms in here (mostly as bait, but extra weapons are handy).
4. This room has no gravity. 
5. Ghoul Hall - There are hundreds of inactive desiccated ghouls packed in here, chest to back, which a catwalk above them. Any blood shed on the catwalk will drip on to the ghouls below and any drop of blood will re-activate a ghoul for several minutes. Fights here will spiral out of control quickly. 
6. Research Center - A mostly empty room, with cabinets of useless books and desks. There are three lines of salt poured out across the floor (with gaps at the ends where something was dragged across). A chamber to the north, has a powerfully magnetized floor that activates whenever the second (north most) door is open. Weapons and anyone wearing metal armor in this chamber will be dragged down and pinned to the floor whenever the door is open. Closing the door deactivates the magnet.
7. An big, oily ooze monster lurks here, obstructing access to a spherical control console. The monster dissolves flesh and metal with it's touch and is immune to most weapon attacks. It is damaged by salt, and cannot cross a line of salt. If only someone could re-arrange the salt pattern in room 6...
8. A big spherical room full of human-sized moths. If let out, they will eat your clothes, food, ropes, spell books and other organic gear when you aren't looking. They suck. Don't let them out.
9. Shadow Monsters - This is the Architect (room 27) from Death Frost Doom. 
10. Hanging Gazebo - This is a cage-type elevator. The floor is rotten and will collapse if walked on, revealing a deep elevator shaft below -- grants access to the other levels of this dungeon!