Tags

Hi all:  I was witness to “DocSavage2001” over at BoardgameGeek post a fascinating string of posts (post – post – post) about an old classic game “Magic Realm.”  It was big, it was pretty and, well, Very Wordy.  So I asked if I could post it here, too, since it fit in and he agreed!  So I can say this is my first “Guest Author”!  Now over to David!

I know a lot of people find this game hard to learn despite three different editions of the rules, guides to learn how to play, simplified rules sets, etc etc. But I looked and I didn’t really see any SOLO session playthroughs of the regular base game.

So, what I want to do is what I did with Bios: Megafauna (Second Edition), and do a step by step detailed solo playthrough, complete with pictures of everything. I will be playing solo with a single character, the Amazon, the Second Edition rules with no Optional Rules and no Advanced Rules, and proceed Encounter by Encounter. (The Second Edition rules break the game up into four Encounters, adding in parts of the game, encounter by encounter.)

The first series of posts will be the First Encounter: Treasure Hunt. This includes moving, searching, trading, and running into Monsters, though there is no combat in this first encounter. The Monsters and natives can still block you and slow you down though.

And the first post will just be about setup and what my thoughts are on the various strategies I will be attempting to use. I’m writing this as I’m playing it, so everything might fail miserably, but at least I hope to explain what is happening and why and how. To try to demystify this excellent game which STILL holds up (in my mind) with the best Fantasy games of all time.

This is the initial setup for the Amazon with her Character card, the Setup sheet with all the Monsters and Treasures on it, (But no Spells yet, Spells come in the Fourth Encounter), and her Personal Record sheet where she will log all her moves and discoveries and progress towards victory (or defeat).

This is the Amazon herself. She has a Shield, a Breastplate, a Helmet and a Shortsword. In this First Encounter, she won’t need any of these (without combat), so a key priority for me is to find some natives to sell these things to so I can get Gold to buy things to help me find Treasures.

She has (like all characters) 12 Action chits, 7 Fight chits(which she mostly likely won’t need in this First Encounter either) and 5 Move chits. All her Move chits are MEDIUM weight. That means, unless she gets a Horse someplace, she won’t be able to carry anything of HEAVY or TREMENDOUS weight-only Medium or lighter. That may limit her ability to pick up some treasures.

She has one Special Ability she can use in this First Encounter, STAMINA, that will give her an extra MOVE Phase every turn. This is a good advantage in this First Encounter. She has no Allies in the Magic Realm, but no outright Enemies either. She is Friendly with the Lancers, Patrol and the Shaman (a visitor to the Realm). The Company and the Bashkars are Unfriendly towards her.

She needs to record FIVE Victory points. Here is what I chose for her in the First Encounter and why:

She can’t collect Spells in the First Encounter. Notoriety can be gotten from Treasures, but is more often awarded for killing things, which won’t happen until the Second Encounter. So, she is going to go for trying to find a lot of Treasure, with hopefully one or two providing the Fame she needs, two Great Treasures, and then sell off everything else she finds for the Gold value.

She starts with 10 Gold and 25 Gold worth of equipment, NONE of which will count for her final Gold total. All the more reason to sell all her equipment in the First Encounter. With 35 Gold to spend, hopefully she will find some Small Treasure with the Lancers or Patrol that she can buy to help her find more treasure. That’s my hope, anyway.

If she CAN find the Lancers and Patrol, that is. In the Solitaire game of Magic Realm, none of the Dwellings where the natives hang out start on the map. She has to find them as well as the treasures.

I did the Setup card and chose my character and have a game plan for her. Now to build the map. To do that, you put the Borderlands tile in the center of the table and shuffle the rest of the map tiles and play them to build the map one at a time. Except for the first tile you play after the Borderlands, all the rest of the tiles have to touch two other tiles. Any tile with six Clearings on it has to have ALL six Clearings connect back to the Borderlands tile (even if that path goes through secret passages). All other tiles have to have at least one Clearing connect back to the Borderlands.

Some other map building notes for the Solitaire version. You can’t play Valley or Woods tiles next to OTHER Valley and Woods tiles if there is any other place you can put them. You can see below that as I ran out of tiles to place, I didn’t have any other place to put some of the Valley and Woods tiles except next to each other. Here is my completed map:

Even building the map, I tried to use a strategy wherever I could to place tiles that would make things as easy as possible for me. The Amazon (if I recall correctly) does a bit better in the Mountain tiles than the Caves tiles (plus the Caves tiles can really slow your game down). So, I tried to put the Caves tiles out of the way whenever I could. I also tried to put “dead end” tiles out on the edges of the map, rather than in the interior where I would have to go around them. As an example, I put the really gnarly Cavern and Crag tiles out on the very outskirts. (Of course, those two tiles will probably end up being where the Lost City and Lost Castle end up being.)

One last bit of map-building strategy I used. In the regular game, all the Dwellings are placed on the map and your character starts at one of them. In the Solitaire game, your character enters from off-map and their first move of the game is to move onto the map.

I’ve plotted my first couple of turns to come in through Evil Valley, Search to see if I can peek at what chits are there (which will tell me what Dwelling is there or the Ghosts) and then end my first turn in the Ruins where I will flip all the chits and see what is there. (I covered the name on the Ruins tile with chits, sorry!).

From there, I can use the nearby Deep Woods as a hub location to get to pretty much anywhere on the map I’ve built. Also with a minimum of Cave Clearings or Mountain Clearings (that slow you down). I think the map turned out pretty good for me and I’m happy with the layout right now.

My initial plan is to spend one week (7 turns) trying to discover as much of where things are (with emphasis on tiles with treasure sites). The next two weeks, I will try to meet my VP goals based on the places I found. The final week will be heading to a Dwelling where I can cash in. I might not need a whole week, but I have played before where I started heading to sell things just a day or two too late. That’s the general plan.

Let’s talk about turn structure for the solitaire game. There are a lot of phases, but they are all pretty simple in the solo game. If I don’t mention it, it’s not relevant for solo play OR the First Encounter.
——————————————————

Birdsong: Record your planned actions for your turn.

Sunrise: Roll two dice (for the solo game) to see which one/two rows of Monsters and Denizens are prowling this turn. If this is the end of a week, put all the prowling monsters (except the Ghosts) back on the setup sheet in this phase.

Daylight: Take your turn. Summon/move any prowling denizens.

Sunset: You won’t do anything here in the First Encounter.

Midnight: If you’re playing solo, you don’t need to flip the map chits back down as long as you remember denizens won’t be summoned to your Clearing if you are hidden in the First Encounter.
——————————————————

There are only five actions I can do on my turn in the First Encounter. In the early part of the game, I will be mostly doing Move and Search.

When playing the First Encounter solo, with no Combat, I will only need to Hide if I get yourself boxed in by monsters with no way around them. The Amazon will try to use it as little as possible in the First Encounter.

Trade will be useful later when I find Natives or Visitors to trade with.

Unless I find one of the Treasure sites like the Pool or get Cursed, I shouldn’t need to Rest in a solo First Enounter game.

——————————————————
DAY ONE:
Birdsong: (A)M EV5, M EV2, S, S, M R1
I am going to move from off the map (using my Amazon Extra Move phase) to Evil Valley 5, Move to Evil Valley 2, do two Search phases, and finally Move to Ruins 1

Sunrise: I roll a 4 and a 6 for prowling monsters. Giants, Trolls and Bats.

Daylight: I do my two Moves and then I do two Searches on the Peer Table because I want to see what is in Evil Valley. Since, in the solo game, all the Valley chits are “substitute” chits, I can replace them immediately with whatever inhabits that tile. A Dwelling or the Ghosts. (in the regular game, all the Valley chits are turned up before the game starts and replaced with the Dwelling or Ghosts.) I use the Peer table because I want “CLUES” or “CHOICE” (which will be CLUES) and that table gives me a better chance than the Locate table.

My first roll is a 5-6, You find nothing. But my second roll is a 5-5 and I find the Bones V chit which means the Ghosts live here! I remove the chit and place the Ghosts in Clearing 5. (All Dwellings/Ghosts go in Clearing 5 unless it doesn’t connect back to the Borderlands tile.) That’s why I waited till I got to Clearing 2 to search. If I had found them in Clearing 5, they would have Blocked me and ended my turn.

I do my last Move to Ruins 1. That ends my actions for this turn, so I turn up the chits in the Ruins tile and find Bones C Warning chit and Patter 5 Sound Chit. The Bones C chit goes anyplace on the tile because the monsters it summons can appear anywhere and if you are unhidden, they will appear in YOUR Clearing. Sound chits go in a specific Clearing, in this case, the Patter chit goes in Clearing 5. If it summons anything, it will go to Clearing 5 this turn, not to where I am.

Warning chits activate before Sound Chits, so Bones C brings two Heavy Armored Trolls to my Clearing. They block me which is no big deal in the First Encounter. Note that my planned turn would be totally different in the Second Encounter with Combat. I would never end my turn unhidden in a Caves tile with the Amazon when they could fight me! The Patter 5 would bring the Goblins to Clearing 5, but their row is not Prowling this turn so they stay where they are on the Setup card.

For completeness sake, I should mention the Ghosts are also prowling this turn, because they are Prowling on EVERY turn. But only monsters on MY tile will ever move from one Clearing to another, so the Ghosts stay put. Forever.

I will show the Setup card here, after the Trolls have come to me.

This is how things look at the end of Day One:

Although I didn’t find any Treasure sites or a Dwelling with Natives I could Trade with, I’m not unhappy to find the Ghosts out where they are. It’s also valuable to know I will really never need to come back to these two tiles again. And I know all the other Valley tiles DO have Dwellings in them.

——————————————————
DAY TWO:
Birdsong: (A)M R2, M DW2, M DW3, S, S
I have to move for my first action or the Trolls will Block me and end my turn. Even if monsters are not Prowling, they will Block you if you are unhidden in their Clearing at the end of a phase. And I don’t plan to waste action on Hides just yet.

I had two options here. Go through Deep Woods, pause and look for Clues, then continue up north to Bad Valley 5 to see what Natives are there. But there is only one tile with possible Treasure sites reachable from Bad Valley and then I would have to backtrack back through the Deep Woods. That seems like a waste of time.

Instead I decide to head to Deep Woods 3 and search for the Hidden Path that connects Deep Woods 3 and Deep Woods 6. Once I find that path, I can mark it off on my sheet and use it for the rest of the game. That seems like the better option at this point in my exploratory game plan.

If this was the Second Encounter, I would have picked the first option, but I’ll talk about that if I ever get to a detailed Second Encounter playthrough! (I hope he does! – Adam)

Sunrise: I roll a 1 and a 4 for prowling monsters. Dragons and Giants and Trolls, oh my!.

Daylight: I move out of the Clearing with the Trolls and head to Deep Woods 3. For my Search phases, I want to find the Hidden Path now (because I’ll see the chits here at the end of my turn!), so I use the Peer table again. First roll is a 2-6, nothing is found, but second roll is Snake Eyes! 1-1 and I find the Path and mark it off on my Personal History Pad. I can use this path the rest of this game.

I turn up the chits and find Bones M and Howl 4. The Bones M Warning chit goes off first and summons a Giant to my Clearing. It blocks me, but First Encounter so… The Howl chit goes into Clearing 4, but the Bats it would summon from Row 6 are not Prowling this turn, so no Bats appear there. Note that the Trolls in the Ruins are also Prowling, but again, since they are not in MY tile, they do nothing.

This is how things look at the end of Day Two:

Two potential Treasure site tiles explored (Ruins, Deep Woods) and all I’ve found is Monsters and monster sounds. But at least I’m finding this out on Day Two, not Day Twenty when I’m looking for that last Great Treasure!

——————————————————
DAY THREE:
Birdsong: (A)M DW6, M DW1, M DV4, S, M BL1
Again, the first thing I have to do is move away from the Giant. I could go north to Bad Valley, but now on the way back, I will have the Giant blocking my way past. I could also get to Borderlands 2 using the extra Amazon extra Move to get me in and out of the Cave clearing.

Instead, I make use of the Hidden Path I found last turn to move south to Dark Valley, do one Search there (to see if I can find out what Dwelling is there) and then move to Borderlands 1 without using any Caves (which reduce the number of Phases I can do on a turn).

Sunrise: I roll double sixes for prowling monsters. Only Bats to worry about this turn!

Daylight: On the way to the Borderland tile, my one Search fails in Dark Valley (rolled a 2-6).

I turn up the chits in the Borderland and find Dank C and Patter 2. Dank C would bring Serpents to my Clearing if they were Prowling. They’re not. Patter 2 would summon Goblins to Clearing 2, but they are not Prowling either. So no Monsters appear. Good. But no Treasure sites found yet on three tiles! Bad!

This is how things look at the end of Day Three:

——————————————————
DAY FOUR:
Birdsong: (A)M BL6, M BL4, M CL2
Do I go north to Ledges and High Pass? Or take a slow day through the Cave clearing in the Borderland to get to the Cliff?

If I go the Ledges/High Pass way, I can only get to those two potential Treasure tiles and even then I won’t be able to reach half the Clearings in those two tiles.

If I go to the Cliff, I not only can also get to the Cavern and the Crag, but also to the Dwelling that will show up in Awful Valley 5. That seems like the more flexible option. Plus now I am convinced that I really AM going to find the Treasure sites out on those tiles I stuck out on the edge of nowhere!

Sunrise: I roll a 1 and a 3 for the Monster roll. Dragons, Ogres, Wolves, Goblins and the Octopus all Prowling!

Daylight: I make my way to Cliff 2 and turn up the chits. JACKPOT! I find the Dank M chit and the Lost Castle! The Lost Castle drops FIVE more chits in the Cliff. Three are Sound chits, Flutter 1 (in Clearing 1 up on the mountain), Slither 6 and Roar 6, (also up on the mountain), AND TWO Treasure sites! Clearing 3 ends up having both The Vault AND The Lair!

The Vault is useless to the Amazon unless she can find the Lost Keys somewhere because she is not going to have any Tremendous weight counters needed to open the Vault. But… The Lair, that is a good one with 4 Small Treasures and 3 Large Treasures.

There’s just this little matter of the Tremendous Dragon, who guards his Lair. Dragons ARE Prowling this turn, so he shows up at the Lair to keep me away from my looting desires! The Tremendous Troll does NOT show up at the Vault because his row is NOT Prowling this turn.

The other chits go off in this order: Dank M – Nothing since Spiders are not Prowling. Flutter 1 – brings two Heavy Flying Dragons to Clearing 1 (not where I am). Slither 6 does NOT summon Serpents but it DOES summon another Heavy Dragon to Clearing 6 up in the mountains and Roar 6 does NOT summon a Giant. (Giants and Serpents are not prowling.)

This is how things look at the end of Day Four:

Now I’m in a pretty pickle. I wanted a tile with Treasure sites, but so many monsters! (or potential monsters!)

It took me awhile to decide what I wanted to do on Day Five (and I haven’t played it out yet so stay tuned…), but I will try to show you some ways to try to get to those Treasure sites.

Even though these are the first Treasure sites I have found, I am pretty happy with how things are going to plan so far, according to my general game plan. I wanted to explore and I’ve gotten almost all the way across the map, ruled out four different tiles as not being good places to go back to, and found a good Treasure site. And I still have three days to go in my first week!

——————————————————
DAY FIVE:
Birdsong: S, S, S, S, (A)M CL5
I decide to roll the dice on this turn and swing for the fences. And before you tell me how I am mixing metaphors, only the “swing for the fences” is the metaphor, the “rolling the dice” part is literally true.

In my best version of this turn, I roll a Monster Roll with a 1 and NOT a 4, AND I find the Hidden Path at the bottom of the Cliff to get from Clearing 5 (where I am) to Clearing 2 (with my back to the Cavern). A Monster roll of 1 would bring ALL the Dragons to my Clearing (including the Tremendous Dragon sitting on the Lair right now). NOT rolling a 4 means the Tremendous Troll WON’T show up in Clearing 3 to guard the Vault. Then I could run in there on my next turn and Search four times to find the Lair and try to Loot it.

My worst version of the turn is I DON’T roll a 1 and I DO roll a 4 and a 5 for the Monster Roll and I don’t find the Hidden Path in four tries. That would strand me in Clearing 2 (since if I don’t find the Hidden Path, my plotted Move with my Amazon ability will get cancelled, I can’t use it to move someplace else), drop the Tremendous Troll on the Vault WITH the Tremendous Dragon already there at the Lair AND it would bring a Heavy Spider to my Clearing. Then I’d have to back up into the Borderland, a direction I don’t want to go.

Sunrise: I roll a 3 and a 4 for prowling monsters. Giants, Trolls and Wolves and Goblins. Well, that won’t bring any Monsters to my Clearing at the end of the turn, but the Dragons aren’t going to move from where they are and the Tremendous Troll is going to join the Tremendous Dragon in Clearing 3. Not good news for me getting to the Lair.

Daylight: My first three Searches on the Peer table for the Hidden Path fail (1-6, 3-6, and 5-5) and I am getting really worried. But fourth time is the charm as I roll a 2-3 and I DO get to Move to Clearing 5 with my Amazon Move.

The Vault summons the Tremendous Troll to the Vault and the Roar 6 Sound Chit summons a Giant to Clearing 6. Since the Dragons are not prowling, no monsters already on the tile come to my Clearing.

This is how things look at the end of Day Five:

Too many Monsters here now and my goal for Week One is exploration, so I am going to leave this tile behind and try my luck in the next door Cavern and go see what Dwelling is in the Awful Valley. Besides, the end of the week is only two days away and maybe some of this crowd of monsters will go back to “sleep” on the Set up card and I can come back here later.

——————————————————
DAY SIX:
Birdsong: (A)M CN1, M CN3, M CN2
Now, I am going into a Cave Clearing in the Cavern this turn. Normally, I would only get to do two Phases this turn, but I can still use my Amazon extra Move phase even in Cave Clearings. I just want to see what is in this tile this turn, my main goal is to get to Clearing 5 in the Awful Valley next turn and see what Dwelling is there.

Sunrise: I roll a 1 and a 5 for prowling monsters. Great timing! That’s exactly the Monster Roll I wanted last turn! Dragons and Spiders are prowling this turn.

Daylight: I move to Clearing 2 in the Cavern and flip up the chits to find Stink C and Cairns 5. Oooh, that’s pretty good. Right now the Stink C Warning counter can only summon the Tremendous Troll, but his row is not Prowling. The Cairns is a Treasure Site that is REALLY REALLY good in the First Encounter, especially the way this tile is set up. It has SIX Large Treasures and only ONE Small Treasure, so if I can find it and Loot it, I will probably get some good stuff.

There is a “cost” to Loot the Cairns, every time you Loot it, you have to fatigue an asterisk on one of your Action chits. But in the First Encounter, you’re really not using your Fight Chits for anything, so I have PLENTY of asterisks to “spend”.

The BAD part of the Cairns is that a) it is guarded by a Tremendous Spider (which IS prowling this turn, so it shows up in the Cairns Clearing) and b) It is in a very hard spot to reach in the Cavern and c) You only get two Phases in Cave Clearings. I have one more day in my “exploring” week, so I am going to go see what Dwelling is in Awful Valley before I decide what I want to do starting in Week Two.

This is how things look at the end of Day Six:

——————————————————
DAY SEVEN:
Birdsong: M AV2, M AV5
I am starting my turn in a Cave Clearing, so I will only get two “basic” Phases this turn, plus my Amazon Move. In this case, I don’t even need my Amazon move since the Dwelling will show up in Clearing 5 and I only need two Move phases to get there.

Sunrise: Even though there will be no Monsters summoned to a Valley tile, I still need to do the Monster roll this turn for two reasons. First, it’s the seventh day of the week, so whatever Monsters are prowling this turn that are currently on the map will all go back to their spots on the Setup Card. It sure would be nice to roll a 1 and get all the Dragons to leave the Cliff tile! The other thing the Monster roll CAN do this turn is summon Native groups or Visitors to the Dwelling I find there. The more things at that Dwelling, the more Trade chances I will have and choices of things to buy/barter for.

Of course, what I roll is a 2 and a 6, two rows on the Setup Card that have NO Monsters currently on the map! UGH!

Daylight: I move to Clearing 5 in Awful Valley and turn up the Dank V Dwelling chit. I turn up the Chapel and that’s actually pretty good for the Amazon. The main inhabitants here are The Order, a group that is Neutral to the Amazon. They have a bunch of armor, weapons and horses I am not interested in buying in the First Encounter, but they DO have two Small Treasures that I am going to want to look over next turn. The other good thing about The Order is that there are only FOUR of them. That means it will only cost me four Gold to “Buy them drinks”, which will make them one level friendlier on the Trade table. (Changing them from Neutral to Friendly for that one Trade phase.) There’s some groups that have like 7 members in them. That can get expensive fast, since buying drinks only lasts that one Trade phase.

The other good thing about The Chapel for the Amazon is that the two wandering Native groups that could show up there are the Lancers and The Patrol, which are the only two groups in the game who begin at Friendly with the Amazon. Neither of them show up this turn because their rows are not Prowling, but they could turn up any time I come back here and they have their own sets of two Small Treasures.

This is how things look at the end of Day Seven:

——————————————————
DAY EIGHT:
Birdsong: T, (A)M AV2, M CN2
Since I am now about to start my second week in the Magic Realm, it’s time to start actively hunting for treasure. I think, despite the negatives above, the Cairns is the best place to try. But before I go there, I am going to see if the Order has anything good I want to trade for. With my extra Amazon Move phase, I can spend one Phase doing a Trade and then Move two Clearings back into the Cavern.

Sunrise: The Monster roll is a 3 and a 6. That means nothing is going to happen when I get to the Cavern this turn. The Tremendous Troll won’t show up for the Stink C and the Tremendous Spider won’t leave the Cairns.

Daylight: I have had some pretty bad luck at points in this game so far, but when I do the Trade phase and specify I want to buy from the Order so I can look at their two Small Treasures, I CANNOT believe what I find! Holy Cow! This couldn’t be better! Of the 47 or so Small Treasures, there are probably not another two I could use more right now than these:

Remember how I said I couldn’t get into the Vault without the Lost Keys and I wasn’t likely to find them? Wow! Number 1.

But even better if I want to go try to get stuff out of the Cairns is the Shielded Lantern which gives its owner an extra Phase when they are in a Cave Clearing! It has weight Light so I can carry it and it’s not TOO expensive… hopefully. Wow! Number 2.

I REALLY need that Lantern, so, still in my Trade phase, I “buy drinks” for the Order to make them Friendly for this Trade. (Don’t judge me for liquoring up the Order at a Chapel!) This costs me 4 Gold so I have 6 Gold left plus my belongings I can trade in as well. As long as I don’t get a “No Deal” or “Price x 4” (I will be ONE Gold short!) results, I can buy them. I roll a 2-3 on the Friendly column so they want “Price x 2” or 16 Gold. I say “Here. Take my Breastplate (worth 9 Gold) and my Shield (worth 7 Gold).” and walk away with my prize, which I immediately activate! I now have a Helmet and a Short Sword and 6 Gold left from my original starting equipment.

Note also, that even though I will be in a Cave phase during this turn, with the Shielded Lantern, I can’t take an extra phase this turn, because my turn had already been plotted and I couldn’t have guessed that I would find the Shielded Lantern at the Chapel!

I move back into the Cavern (nothing happens at the end of this turn) and can’t wait to use my Lantern next turn!

This is how things look at the end of Day Eight:

——————————————————
DAY NINE:
Birdsong: (A)M CN3, (SL)S, S, S
This is fantastic with the Amazon having the Shielded Lantern. Normally, a character only gets two Phases in any turn when they are in a Cave Clearing during any part of that turn. But with the Bonus Move phase from being the Amazon and the Bonus “anything I want” phase from the Lantern, I am going to be as capable in Cave Clearings as I am in Sunlight!

I am going to use my Amazon move to go to Clearing 3 in the Cavern and then do three Search phases to try to find the Secret Passage from Clearing 3 to Clearing 5 with the Cairns.

Sunrise: The Monster roll is a 3 and a 5. My good luck the last two turns continues. The Tremendous Troll still won’t get summoned for the Stink C chit and the Spider will LEAVE the Cairns to come to my Clearing at the end of the turn because he is Prowling!

Daylight: I move to Clearing 3 and roll on the Locate table this time instead of the Peer table (Secret Passages can only be found on the Locate table.) More good luck as I roll a 2-2 on my first roll and find the Passage right away. I don’t even bother doing the last two Search phases. I mark it off on my Personal History pad (Yes, I forgot to mark off the Hidden Path I found in the Cliff. I corrected that after I took the picture.)

Lastly, as mentioned above in the Sunrise phase, the Tremendous Spider leaves the Cairns wide open for me as he prowls himself into my Clearing. (This would be a BIG problem in the Second Encounter, mind you, but it’s REALLY good in the First Encounter!)

This is how things look at the end of Day Nine:

Hopefully, turn 10 is the Loot run I want it to be!!

——————————————————
DAY TEN:
Birdsong: (A)M CN5, (SL)S, S, S
Same plan as last turn, only this time I will be looking for a “Discover chit(s)” result. I can’t Loot the Cairns for its treasures until I actually find where it is hidden in the Clearing. To do that, I need a successful result on the Locate table again. I only have, right now, a 22% chance of finding it on any one dice roll. So I will probably need all three Searches. If I DO find it, then I mark it off on my Pad and I can just dig for Treasures any time I am here in the future on all Searches.

Sunrise: The Monster roll is a 5 and a 6. The Bats in Row 6 won’t come into the Cavern, but the bad news is the Tremendous Spider IS going to follow me right back to the Cairns. I hope I find something before he comes back!

Daylight: All the good luck I had the last two turns is lost for this turn. I need a roll of the two dice where the highest number is a 4 (and ONLY a 4)! I roll a 3-3, 3-5, and finally a 2-6. NOTHING! NADA! ZIP! and oh yeah, here comes back the Spider!

This is how things look at the end of Day Ten:

Let’s see. I am halfway into the second week of four in this game and I not only haven’t found any Treasures, Fame or Gold, but I am in the hole 12 Gold worth from where I started. And I haven’t even actually found a Site I CAN loot yet, I know what clearings they are in, but haven’t quite found their exact locations. Business better pick up soon!