The Rumour Mill's hearths are warm and Saraj's honey buns are fresh, but nobody is eating. Karle Rumour has just come in from the northern field with mud to the knee and a face the colour of flour.
"There's a man dead in our wheat," he says to the room. "Throat cut. Grain sacks everywhere."
By the fire, someone says the word everyone is thinking: wolfsheads. Someone else says hang them. Karle looks along the bar at the strangers with swords, and he does not look away.
Harvest is in, the Rumour Mill's common room is full, and a stranger lies dead in the mill's northern wheat. Harford wants a hanging. The trail leads into Thornskull Forest, to hungry people who did something terrible, and past them to something worse that has been feeding on the forest's edge all autumn.
An investigation that turns into a rescue. The party reads a crime scene, tracks the thieves, decides what justice means for them, and then goes after the men who drove them out. Four Level 1 characters; two sessions.
Harford is a market town on the Horsfield, in Hawthornfell Earldom, where the farmland road meets the forest edge. Three mills turn on the river, the grain plaza is busy from dawn, and the Rumour Mill, a sprawling inn at the river-road junction, is where every deal and disaster gets talked over.
North of the town, the Rumour family's fields run up to the hedges; beyond them, the Forest Track runs northwest and climbs into Thornskull Forest, charcoal country, where the burners' smoke lies low between black pine and thorn-oak.
Harvest is just in. The nights are getting cold, the market is full of carters, and the common room is full of opinions.
Murder at the Rumour Mill
The one-page handout for players. It prints on one page.
Print one per player. Nothing here is a secret.
The job. A man has been found dead in the Rumour Mill's northern field, outside Harford. Karle Rumour, the mill's factor, will pay you to find out who did it, and Reeve Edda Holm wants the culprits brought in alive.
Who's who in Harford.
| Name | Who they are |
|---|---|
| Karle Rumour | Factor of the Rumour Mill. Shrewd, exact, pays in Silver Boars. |
| Jered Rumour | His brother, the miller. Calm; people bring him their troubles. |
| Saraj Rumour | Their sister, the baker. Sells Courage Buns at 3 Skarns (one eaten in a short rest gives back 1 extra fatigue, once a day). |
| Gasgoine Rumour | Their father. Seventy, retired, sits by the fire, remembers everything. |
| Edda Holm | The Crown Reeve. Keeps the market honest and the peace when she can. |
| Old Bram | A trapper. Honest, but every story grows in the telling. |
Rolling. Say what you want to do. The GM names the skill (or the attribute) and the tier. Read your target number for that tier from your sheet and roll d100: over the target number succeeds. Your chance is 100 minus the target number.
What the tiers mean (target numbers for a skill total of 45):
| Tier | Target number | Chance | Feels like |
|---|---|---|---|
| Routine | 30 | 70% | ordinary work for someone trained |
| Simple | 40 | 60% | straightforward if you're prepared |
| Easy | 50 | 50% | favourable, still needs attention |
| Moderate | 66 | 34% | the usual real challenge |
| Hard | 77 | 23% | risky, pressured or opposed |
| Very Hard | 86 | 14% | severe opposition or awful conditions |
| Improbable | 91 | 9% | at the edge of what's possible |
Raw attribute rolls (senses, Faith, Strength, Discipline, Memory) use three quarters of the attribute (rounded down) as the total. Untrained skills (under 5 points) show a * on your sheet above Easy: that target comes from the skill's main attribute.
The bands.
| You roll | Result | At the table |
|---|---|---|
| 96–100 | Critical Success | it works, with something extra |
| Over the target number | Full Success | it works |
| At it, or less than 20 under | Partial Success | progress, with a cost |
| 20 or more under | Partial Failure | no progress |
| 01–05 | Critical Failure | trouble gets worse |
Opposed checks. Your chance is your total ÷ (your total + theirs). 45 against 45 is 50%.
In combat. On your turn you get your movement and one main action (attack, defend someone, sprint, stand up, use an item). Initiative is on your sheet. An attack or a defence needs a Full Success: in combat a Partial Success is a miss, or a failed defence.
Helping. Say how you help. A Full Success on your help check gives the leader +5; a Partial Success still gives +5, with a cost. Two helpers at most.
Fatigue. Fresh (under 40% of your pool spent), Winded (40%: −5 to physical skill totals), Taxed (70%: −10), Exhausted (empty: −20). A sprint or charge costs 1, each round of climbing 1, a forced march 2 an hour. A short rest gives back 2–3; a long rest, everything.
Hit points. After a night's rest, someone trained in First Aid or Herb Lore can tend your wounds (Easy, or Moderate without bandages or a healer's kit): all your lost HP on a Full Success, half on a Partial Success, otherwise 1 HP a night.
Statuses you might meet. Prone (melee and defence −20; a main action to stand). Bleeding (Endurance −2 a round until First Aid). Downed (unconscious until First Aid). Exposed (Endurance −2 an hour, Discipline −10, until shelter). Disoriented (Navigation −15, half movement). Off-Footing (your next social check −10). Rattled (Discipline −10 on social checks for the scene). Distrusted (social checks with that person −20).
Money. You start with your trade's starting kit and a small purse set by your social standing: from 2 Silver Boars and 5 bits for an outcast to 60 Silver Boars for a noble. 1 Boar = 10 Copper Skarns; 1 Gold Stag = 10 Boars. Prices are in Boars: rations 5 a day, blanket 8, tarp 20, rope 10, torch 2, hooded lantern 25, oil flask 5, bandages 6, healer's kit 50, manacles 45.
Running this adventure? Sign in as a game master to read its 7 scenes, encounters and GM notes, and to add it to a campaign. Scenes stay hidden from players, titles included, so nothing is spoiled.
Sign in