Dear Readers, I want to wish each and every one of you a very Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays/ however you celebrate this time of year! I’ll see all of you next week! Sincerely, ~The Daily Dungeon Master

The Ingrates really have it rough in this continuation of the followup to the fallout with WAR. Enjoy!

Dear Readers, as you can tell it is coming up to Christmas!

When we last left the gang, they found themselves underneath the burned out ruins of Dr. Ford’s old home, in a room filled with purple crystals, and a large spinning contraption, all hooked to a table.

Dear Readers, I’ve made some good progress on this miniature this week.

The Ingrates’ battle with WAR is now over, but what about the rest of the kingdom? What are the consequences of this conflict? The Ingrates find out what’s in store for them!

Dear Readers, as previously stated, I am taking a break from the Ingrates for a bit to get a chance to play. Arkon’s player is running a modified Kids on Bicycles campaign, using “Tales From the Loop” rules. The Ingrates will continue soon. Additionally, the last week of the month will be the KoB (Kids on Bicycles) campaign to keep me from burnout and to enable me to keep writing. With no further ado, enjoy! It’s the Friday before the last week of school, and all of “the gang” are meeting up. Anton, the bookworm, Goblin, the junkyard weirdo, Neil, the computer geek, Kelly Ann, the hick, Zane, the rocker, and Jessica, the popular girl. Everyone lives in the small New England town of Arkham Falls, Massachusetts. The town, while fictional, is based on a real town in New Jersey, location-wise Leaving school, the gang stopped by Smokey Joe’s, the local convenience store, to buy pop before our meetup. Meeting up at Goblin’s family’s junkyard where our hideout is (two side-by-side aluminum Airstreams; decked out with a generator and lights and such), the gang found out that one of Goblin’s brothers (one sibling of 12) was missing. He was found inside the gang’s clubhouse with two other children, his age (9), one of whom was crying. Assessing the situation, the gang learned about Dmitri’s (Goblin’s brother) friend Liam said that his deceased friend Stuart Lovecraft (who was not well liked; the rumor is that he died of apparent suicide in Miskatonic Lake but no body was found) was haunting their clubhouse. The other friend of Liam said that Liam was making up the story for attention. According to Liam, he had taken a nap in the clubhouse, had a nightmare where Stuart had grabbed him from behind, and when he woke up, had two handprint bruises that Liam could not have made himself. He also mentioned some writing on the wall but that he didn’t catch what it said. When asked where their clubhouse was, they proudly announced that it was in “the Woods.” This was a place best avoided after dark, as it was well-believed by children that it was haunted. The gang, seeing the hour, decided to head to Park Ranger Briggs Johnson, a close friend of Kelly-Ann, where we acquired one of a pair of maps that Ranger Johnson had found by accident, both located behind a picture, likely left behind by the previous park ranger. This map contained the information we were looking for (known trails in “the Woods”), as well as markings for other places, some with a question mark. Decided that we would not be entering into “the Woods” until the morning, we parted ways, each to our own homes, except Liam, who stayed the night at Goblin’s house with Dmitri. After asking our parents, most of us got the runaround when discussing the Lovecraft boy, only noting the sadness of the situation. Goblin’s conspiracy-theorist/doomsday prepper father, on the other hand, told Goblin about Mr. Lovecraft’s wife and daughter had been allegedly murdered some years ago, with the former town doctor, Dr. James Madison Ford believed to be the culprit. When brought to trial, it ended in a hung jury, acquitting Dr. Ford. It was also discovered that Dr. Ford had apparently died in his home during a freak house fire. Each member of the gang made their own preparations the night before, Anton having made a copy of the map using tracing paper, and Neil using his computer to create a database to cross-reference, and others deciding what to pack for the day to come. The gang met at Goblin’s, and headed out, at 8 am. As they passed Smokey Joe’s, Anton spied a strange man, someone that, after some thought, seem to have been following him of later.  While trying to relay this to Neil, he blacked out, seeing a strange arcane sigil, one he couldn’t keep in his head, crashing to the ground. Kelly-Ann chased after where Anton said the man had been and found only an owl’s feather; a horned owl’s feather – one that was not native to the area…When checking for tracks, the tracks ended at the feather.

Dear Readers, here we are again with another painting update! This one is kind of big one so buckle up! First we have the completed Black Knight. I did some work on the base, including using Citadel’s technical paint called Astrogranite.

Dear Readers, I have developed, as the title suggests, an obsession with painting my new pewter Battletech miniatures. Like, I have almost totally abandoned my Dungeons & Dragons miniatures in favor of painting my Battletech ones. And I couldn’t be more excited about it. As my main shipment of Battletech miniatures should be on the way and arriving any day now (yes, I know I have said this before, but I’ve seen the Kickstarter update), I want to get a head start and painting my battlemech armies, both Clanner and Inner Sphere. As I have said before, my intention is that my Inner Sphere battlemechs will be Wolf’s Dragoons, while my Clanner mechs will be Clan Ghost Bear. Here is where I’ve gotten: Black Knight: Status – Done Issues – I might have put the decals on the wrong side of the mech. Frankly, I don’t care. It looks good. If I had to really make a complaint, it would be that the decal doesn’t show up very well on top of black, meaning that I may have to put a white dot underneath the decals in the future. That will be how I do my Atlas just to see how it turns out.  Photo:

The Ingrates slowly gathered themselves on the outskirts of Borest trying to account for every member after they had successfully found and lightly raided the goblin outpost in the dwarven cliff fortress. With the final member assembled, the party members assessed that their raid had pointed out some obvious weaknesses and traps of the goblin forces, so they planned to return and finish the goblin forces and their Nilbog leader. At dawn’s early light, the troupe made their way back to the fortress, and upon their return, the defenders had made measures to ensure the fortress was impenetrable by blocking all known entrances and portholes. However, the band was pleased to see that the desperate goblins had not found the secret entrance the party had used on their previous visit, so they companions once again delved into the depths in the hope of freeing Borest from this plight.  Plans and strategy was devised as the party soon discovered the goblin forces spread throughout the fortress awaiting the return of the Ingrates, but magical scrying had shown the Nilbog surrounded by only a handful of guards. The scrying also revealed a still living dwarf being tortured by the Nilbog. Determining this to be a good of a time as any to take on the Nilbog while his forces appeared spread thin enough, the Ingrates moved into the main temple of Falinora trying to keep an almost silent presence, and one would they would have succeeded in not drawing attention. However, the goblinoids proved to be far more patient and treacherous, for a dozen hulking and raging bugbears accompanied by hobgoblins jumped from the corpse pile to surprise their unwanted visitors. The companions rolled with the brunt and powerful strike from the bugbears and hobgoblins, but a moment later the Nilbog, as if expecting the intruders, flooded into the temple with additional goblins to make matters worse. In the course of the battle, several party members fell and were wounded in horrendous manners, and at times it seemed this may have been the final fight the group had picked. At one point, the Ingrates whittled down the dastardly goblinoids forces to only a couple veteran hobgoblin fights, but the Nilbog proceeded to call upon his cursed magical connection to take form in a hulking stone dwarven statue. This pinnacle moment proved to be the final stage of this battle, for once the heroes were able to crumble the statue’s defense, the Nilbog’s corporeal form left the statue and moved to take control of another statue. However, the combined divine and arcane magic of Avery and Dacyria disrupted and disintegrated the Nilbog’s form who only let out a maniacal final laugh as it vanished from existence. The Ingrates looked to their exhausted and wounded compatriots for reassurance the fight was over, and they were pleased to find they had once again made it through the throngs of adversity…

Dear Readers, I am usually wary of certain things sold on Etsy.  But then I came across these…