A Feast for a Sphinx 1-on-1 Play Report
Had a great time running tab:https://evlyn.itch.io/a-feast-for-a-sphinx one on one with my partner yesterday. He hasn't played a ton of tabletop, but he really enjoys the simplicity of Mork Borg, and it was a rainy Saturday!
He rolled up a character named Drenner Ken, pretty low stats, highish Agility, with some rope, a shortsword, no armor, and a magic scroll. And 2 HP. Pretty dire.
SPOILERS FOR A FEAST FOR A SPHINX AHEAD:
Drenner arrived in the snowblasted town of Kalldalen pretty late at night, haunted by a horde of spirits that had been shepherding him to this town at the end of the world. (He rolled the Haunted hook, very evocative stuff that he really ran with.) After a spooky encounter with the strange oracle reading tarot cards in the inn (I had him draw from the Portents of the Degloved Hand card deck), he gained a Dying Wish which allowed him to live for a 1d5 rounds longer after being killed.
The wanderer set out for the temple at the other end of the valley, and came upon Syrus, a grave robber, hurrying out of the tomb to a cart and oxen parked outside. Leaving the man alone, Drenner headed into the tomb, and found a corpse full of crossbow bolts at the first intersection. Did Syrus have a crossbow? Before going back outside to find out, Drenner stuck his shortsword into one of the strange slimy holes in the wall of the temple.
For his pains, a golden centipede with a human face popped out, shrieked, and attacked. After a harrowing few rounds of swinging his sword around, the wanderer killed the creature and hauled it back outside, where Syrus was struggling to get the oxen to go anywhere in the snowstorm.
Catching the grave robber by surprise, Drenner hacked into his neck with his shortsword, driving him down into the snow. He then tossed the golden centipede carcass into the back of the wagon and relieved the grave robber of his breastplate and crossbow.
The spirits haunting Drenner drew him back down into the temple, and he made his way to a room choked with coalsmoke and a roaring hearth: a forge. He found a pot of strange purple powder that ignited when tossed into the flames. (An improvisation on my part, the purple lotus powder said nothing about being flammable, but I figured why not?) This loud noise drew a mummy from deeper in the temple, and a cat and mouse game ensued throughout the forge, as Drenner hid from the shambling creature.
Maneuvering himself between the mummy and the door, Drenner set up a trap in the hallway outside with a trail of purple powder. As soon as the mummy stepped out, he ignited it with his torch, catching the creature on fire. It groaned and shuffled after him, it's wrapping ablaze, giving Drenner just enough time to load and fire his crossbow through it's head.
In a vast ruined antechamber, Drenner found another pilgrim, this one wounded and giggling in the dark, gold dust smeared across her face. She recited a poem about the tomb to him and devolved into cackling, so he left her alone to bleed out, urged ever onward by the ghosts hounding his steps.
Down a hallway of corpses stuffed into burial crevices, probably where the mummy from before came from, and through another junction, Drenner made his way deeper into the temple.
It was here that I made a bit of a mistake, missing the Sphinx's feasting room. I think it was mostly user error, because after going back to look at the hallway description, I think I just misread it's location.
Anyway, the wanderer found himself in a huge throne room of sorts, full of strange statues and piles of treasure. On a pedestal that surely once held the statue of a god lounged the Sphinx, slathered in the blood of a recent kill. Drenner offered a golden shard of carapace he found in the forge room, and the Sphinx, satisfied, made him an offer. Go deeper, to the heart of the temple, and bring her back the carcass of someone called the Golden One, and she would grant Drenner one wish.
The spirits at his back urging him on, Drenner accepted, heading back out to the hallway junction (through the feasting room that I realized I'd skipped...) and through a ruined chapel full of corpses and giggling pilgrims high on Golden Dust to a frozen staircase winding down into darkness.
Here, he lit a row of candles set into a wall crevice (gaining an Omen), and doused his torch so his eyes would adjust to the dim light. Just as he was to descend, a strange figure came up the stairs, dressed in a priestess' garments, it's head covered in melted gold. (Huge lucky reaction roll here, it was FRIENDLY).
The gold priestess took his hand and led him down into the dark depths, where they arrived at a room half-flooded and frozen over. Under the ice, a massive golden centipede with the torso of a man: the Golden One.
Utilizing a variety of techniques, including boring a hole in the ice, stuffing it with rope and setting that rope on fire to create a slush, Drenner cleared away enough ice to get at a section of the Golden One's flank.
The gold priestess nearly shoved him out of the way to chow down on the beast's flesh, but Drenner managed to carve out a significant chunk to take to the Sphinx.
Back up the stairs, taking care not to slip, and then into the ruined chapel where a giant golden centipede was busy devouring one of the giggling pilgrims. It turned it's alien gaze on Drenner, and he froze, hoping it would go back to it's meal. Unfortunately for him, the carcass of the Golden One was too tempting and it lunged for the wanderer, who caught it's mandibles on his shield (that he found in the feasting room). Using his Omen, and then his Dying Wish, he nearly survived, but alas, the giant centipede proved too much for our doomed wanderer, and he perished, deep in the depths of the temple, only steps away from his goal.
Overall, a blast of a module! The art really sells the grotesqueness of the creatures, and the map is legible and easy to use, besides my user error. Definitely grab it off itch.io, or if they do another print run pick up a copy, because it's gorgeous!