players: Christian, Isen, Ben, Wilhelm GMing
Aug 4, Gamma Ray

Christian already summed it up quite nicely:

Tonight I played Barbarians of Lemuria, in which my physician-turned-sorcerer was looking for secret magic in a ziggurat ruin with which to revive the girl he loved but couldn't save. So he took over the dark power of the ziggurat, melted another PC's head, turned his nemesis into a flaming pillar, and then missed his high-level spell attempt at reviving her... so she dragged him to hell instead and she entered the world as the Goddess of Death. Good times!

My character was a happy-go-lucky fortune seeker, a minstrel turned noble (the queen was a cougar) turned priest (skipped after he realized he didn't read the fine print on being on the human sacrifice list) turned pirate (the other pirates thought he just too swell to kill or ransom, so they made him captain).

I alone survived to tell the tale, mostly by staying out of the way. After Isen's crazed barbarian went PvP, I was spared by the dark goddess so I could tell the world of her return. In the epilogue decades later, my character was a shattered wreck of an old man, squating in the market place telling his unbelievable tale to any who will listen, The Man Who Would Be King style. My new career: beggar.*

Props to Christian for embracing dark, dark power to save the woman he loved (and basically giving our tale of adventure a human heart and soul) and Wilhelm for some excellent "yes, and" GMing that ran with just about everything thrown at him. Would-be GMs of the world, take note.


* In BoL, you build your character Conan-style, by listing all the previous careers you've been through to get where you are now. So you might be a noble prince who loses his kingdom and gets enslaved, then emerges as a prophet leading the desert tribes (noble / slave / priest).

I showed up not even planning to run anything, and happened to have BoL in my bag. It was an act of faith that was well rewarded to assume I'd have players that were willing to step up and riff their own ideas and support me as I improvised my way through an adventure. Good GMing is easy when you have good players, and that's what I got!