S1 – PotLantern – LY5 Screaming Antelope Lvl1

It’s been a busy week, so I started to fall behind a little when it comes to typing out these lantern years, but here we are, trucking along. Today’s quarry was a Screaming Antelope Lvl1. Maybe I should have continued fishing for that Frogdog chest piece. Maybe I should have gone for a level 2. But what can I say? I was (am) still a bit fearful of the longer hunt.

First things first: Settlement Event! And I drew Jousting again.., really? Well, its still a new event, so here we go. I nominated Hysteria and Thalas and they both rolled a 7. Wow. The exact other extreme – ALL survivors gained an understanding! Lucille turned into a tinker from this and gained +1 ACC. (And I drew the seed pattern for Tempered Dagger.
One more event: Hands of Heat – an oldie and a goodie. I nominated Sir Hermes for the honors and he almost burned to death. Luckily we got a 4 in the end and he gained +1 STR and the Red Fist SFA as we innovated Lantern Oven.

The rest of the Settlement Phase was quite quick. I used Shared Experience once to give Glow a Hunt XP, so she’d age up upon completion of this hunt, used the War Paint option on Face Painting successfully and augured once, with Glow getting an additional Survival. Oh, and I built a Monster Tooth Necklace from the Butcher’s lanterns and the bone we got. Then we were already setting off into the darkness.

The chosen hunters:
Lana (frogdog bits, spiked buckler, bone dagger)
Glow (nothing, bone darts)
Sir Hermes (rawhide bits, bone club)
Calys (rawhide set, twilight sword)

The hunt began by us setting off a Migration. Great. Just what I wanted – the lope behind Overwhelming Darkness.
Trying to follow quickly also proved ill advised as we stumbled into a Sinkhole (Basic HE77). Lana was the straggler and she almost got sucked in. Luckily she only lost her stone noses.
Then we came across a Dead Antelope. And whilst we were able to loot it for a Crab Spider, pelt and shank bone, we did manage to avoid the White Lion LVl2. Or did we? The Feline Entity made her presence know and attacked the hunters instead.
Barely able to flee this antediluvian terror, my hunters were assailed by Cleaner Birds (Basic HE89). This time Sir Hermes was the straggler and got a brutal deep cleanse (-1SPD, +1LCK). Again, could have been worse, but I was wishing for a whip at this point.
One more event before we reached the barrier and it was an inviting assortment of fruit. Banquet Trees (Basic HE47) stood full with a ripe and delicious bounty. Well, that is what we thought at least. I spent the survival where I could and ultimately only Calys had to roll. Before she was done with her meal she had lost 3 survival in total.
The first Overwhelming Darkness of the campaign: Glow got PTSD (D), Lana gained +1 understanding, Sir Hermes took 1 damage to the arms and Calys started lashing out wildly, punching everybody in the chest. We could have done without the last bit, but surely it should be fine.

Lopes I fight tend to fall into 2 categories. Either they are absolutely docile, putting up no fight whatsoever or they are honed in on a single opponent just kicking their faces in until nothing remains. This particular lope would have some trouble deciding on its target of choice, but it definitely tried to be the second type.

This would also be the first time I drew random terrain for a quarry this campaign. It’s incredibly how much of a difference this makes overall. And.., its a dead monster! Nice!
Of course, we immediately swarm the monster and take our free turn to start off the fight. Ser Hermes attacks and draws a hit location he is able to critically wound on 6+! With a wound attempt total of 28 even the Gold Smoke Knight would have received a dent and the lope was knocked down.
This also turned into an ideal opportunity for our Twilight Sword. Calys swung and wounded with ease. Glow threw a dart as well and managed to just sneak a wound in. Finally I wanted to try and wound with Lana’s shield, but I remembered that she was Honorable (D) and sent her to loot the dead monster instead. No attacking downed monsters for her. We just found a skull though.

With 7 cards remaining, the Antelope got up and bolted away as it drew Run Down. The following charge ultimately hit Lana in the head. Meanwhile the Feline Entity kept knocking down Glow. Something she would do repeatedly over the course of the fight.

She stayed in that spot for almost the whole fight.

Lana retaliated immediately and wounded the monster’s Palate before the maw could snap shut. That’s some nice shield progress! Glow, after getting up from being hit by the Feline Entity’s tail again, searched the bug patch and found a Nightmare Tick. Sadly, both Sir Hermes, despite dashing in, as well as Calys, who had switched to her founding stone, missed with their attacks.

6 cards remaining. The Screaming Antelope drew Gore. It ran over Lana but at least Calys dodged the attack aimed at her.

Glow continued with her gathering duties and collected her first fresh acanthus before encouraging Lana. A full round of misses follows triggering only a reaction that attack 3 people surrounding the lope, which hit Sir Hermes hard!

Still 6 cards remaining. It drew Slam, running over Lana again, Glow just able to dodge the hit to her head.

This was followed by another dash and miss for Sir Hermes, whilst the rest did not fare better either. No wounds this round, again.

Still 6 cards remaining, the Lope tried to Bite Calys. And again, it would have been a hit to the head, had she not dodged it.

Sir Hermes found himself with a prime opportunity, the monster right in front of him. A swing and a wound! Finally! We dealt some damage again! But the creature took off, running away in turn. Calys followed and from the blind spot wounded a second time! Lana was a bit too far and just blocked whilst Glow’s dart just bounced of the monster’s hide.

4 cards remained. It drew Run down again, first time through the deck, going for Calys. She was hit in the legs, a negligible amount of damage by then.

We continue with another bone dart to the side – another wound – Glow was putting in work! Things were picking up again at this point. But I celebrated too early. Sir Hermes tried to regain some survival, but instead got bit in the arm by something unseen – he took a heavy wound from that – dropping him to the floor! Next up Lana, and, with all the luck we deserve, she found the trap.
Nobody was in front of the lope, so we had that going for us, but still, only Glow was left standing at this point.

3 cards remaining. The lope drew Slam. This sent it going after a knocked down survivor. Thankfully every one eligible was out of reach and it charged just past Glow.

People got back up and we prepare the next wave of attacks. I was a bit worried about the lope getting a graze off at some point so I wanted to pick a few more acanthus. Lana immediately got bitten as well. There was something in amongst these tufts of grass and it was out to get us!
Sir Hermes dashed forward instead and with a wide swing criticals the monster’s flank, giving us an extra pelt and it a -1TGH-token!

Just 2 more cards remained. Another Slam, going for Lana again. This lope seemed unsure of who to go for, but it trampled over Sir Hermes as well. The actual attack missed, but it would just deal its damage like this it seemed.

Lana quickly helped Sir Hermes back to his feet so he could dash in again. He manages to wound, but he got hit by the reflex. A back-kick right to the stomach! That’s another heavy wound. At this point, anything else would have been a severe. He got incredibly lucky on that one. Shocked, all other attacks went wide.

1 card remaining. It was Slam. All Slam all the time would be the lope’s plan from this point onwards. Glow got hit as the monster bucked around wildly. All our attacks also missed their mark by a long shot.

Back round to the monster again. Another Slam directed at Glow – this time she took a heavy wound and got knocked over. All this was followed by another round of misses! Only a single hit by Lana’s bone dagger and that failed to wound with a 6 on a 7+.

Still on 1 card remaining, this time the Slam missed.
Nothing else to do but try again. In the end, it was Lana, her bone dagger clutched and ready – two hits and with a 1-2-combo the beast was finally felled! The last hit was even a critical wound, sadly it did not give us any bonus resources.

Oof. What a long and drawn-out Screaming Antelope fight that turned out to be. And whilst we managed to avoid all roles on the severe injury charts, Sir Hermes especially got beat up real good, with all his heavy injury boxes filled.

As we gained our rewards for the hunt, Sir Hermes (+1ACC) and Glow (Thrill Seeker FA) aged up. Glow picked sword proficiency. I had originally wanted to give her whip, but without the ability to build one – Frogdog whip wasn’t an option either with all these toothless Frogdogs so far – I though it more sensible to just start learning something useful. And – this might be a bit meta – but her age 3 milestone seed pattern would be both sword and whip, so, this should be fine.
Speaking of which, we gained the pattern for the Voluptuous Bodysuit.