SoloRPG - Adventure 1-01, Three bastards and a Wand

Three nameless bastards stand in a table in the Dado Inn of Riverwick, mourning their low finances. They are a town guard that just got fired, and now has debt to extinguish, a forgetful prophet of the Cold Moon, who has forgotten her home, family and to shower in a long time and a incompetent burglar that takes way too much time to pick lock and has no courage whatsoever.

They are about to check the quest board, when suddenly the Inn doors burst open and the opulent and capricious Noble of Riverwick enters, escorted by some town guards. He claims that the Beetle Mage, resident of the east ravine Rookmoond has produced a new and trendy magic wand, and the Noble wants it as soon as possible to add it to his fancy collection of magical artifact. He would compensate a generous 1200 GP for anybody who would get the wand, any means possible.

Most of the people of the inn seems used to the noble's antics and show no interest in his proposition, but our three losers, after glancing the quest board and noticing no better offer, decide to offer themselves to seek the Beetle Mage wand.

The group ventures takes the road nearby the river that crosses the town, going North, to explore better the town surroundings. While walking, though, a dense fog starts to surround them and as they continue, the three adventurers notice soft red lights surrounding them. Upon better inspection, they understand that the lights are the eyes of a pack of River Rats (HD 1; Skill 2; Bite 3 DMG; ML: 7), which seems caution but with no good intentions. The Burglar than decides to takes his bow and shoot down a Rat, action that successfully makes the creature cold in one blow. The rest of the pack, seeing the fate of their mate, decides not to take any chances and flees.

The party of three starts venturing for a day towards the east swampy forests to reach the Beetle Mage home and starts planning on how to steal the wand, but right before they can get any concrete idea, they are surprised by the Beetle Mage himself, who was taking a stroll. The wizard understands their intentions as soon as the guard moved her look towards his long bag, but he laughs it out and decides to toy with them. He is willing to part to his latest creation, as long as the three adventurers can do him a favor: one of his rival, the Owl Mage, is about to receive a prize on her career and the beetle prefers that the delivery's address would change to his home. He also have his scouting bug drones reporting that the prize is being delivered by one of the Owl Mage's apprentice, the Dove Mage (HD 2; Skill 2; Dagger 3 DMG; ML: 10; knows Bolt; +1 to cast spells), along side a pike-armed adventurer (HD 2; Skill 2; Pike 4 DMG; ML: 9). By going north they should be able to intercept them at the Radiant Tree Passage, a calm road track where the vegetation survived the ugliness of the swampy terrain. They need to take what they carry, and the wands is of the three of them.

The party takes the opportunity and panders the mage and go north to ambush the apprentice rival mage. Once arrived at the passage, they hide and wait; after some hours they see the targets approach. As soon they are in reach, the burglar reveals himself on their back and points his bow towards the mage, to catch their attention. As soon the pikeman approachs the crook, the bows fire its arrow and finds its target in the mage's shoulder and soon after the other two bastards, who hid closer to the mage position, take their shots; a side hit of the guard axe connects with the mage, but the mage manages to counterattack the prophet, who got her armor broken. But after few exchange, the mage is almost killed by the blow of the party and her mate yields to the aggressors and convinces the Dove Mage to do the same. The party lets go the two, in exchange of the deliver pack, their 55 Gold Pieces and their silence. But the Dove Mage eyes were filled with anger, and she will not surely forget this meeting.

The three of them cannot resist not to check the contents of the stolen pack and they find a metal plating with the Owl Mage name written on it and a sack of purple dust, which they ignore to avoid messing with magical items they do not know the effects.

The party successfully returns to the Beetle Mage, who welcomes it after learning the conflict and the success of the mission. The wizard gifts them the wand, changes the word on the plating with his own with a spell and invites them to dinner, in which they meet a friend of his, a wolf man, Lupastro, from the northen city of Rootcore, which is built around a gigantic artificial tree. He is no mage, but he is amused by the natures of the mages' antics and moderatly impressed by the party actions. He tell the three to reach him to his city, if they needed a job. He gives precise instruction on how to meet him at the Malt and Hops Inn.

Finally the party exits the swamps and returns to Riverwick, almost tasting the shiny reward they expected. Unfortunally, the noble doesn't even make the effort to meet them, as he had already found a replica wand to satisfy his collection. The three bastards were left with much less gold than they wanted, and with a potential magic enemy on their heels.

Currently known map (from exploration and quest directions)