Rollohi-chapter4-episode05

-/-- Welcome to SoloBickering, the podcast where I—an aging Kiwi with too many dice and not enough players—explore solo TTRPGs, variant rules, and the occasional philosophical meltdown. Today, we journey into the world of Rollohi: a PG-rated realm of fantasy, where a party of eight attempts to survive the wilds. I hope it becomes a full drama, with discovery, treasure, and arguments I lose with myself. Whether you’re here for the rules, the roleplay, or just the bickering—there’s always something brewing in SoloBickering.

--/-- Death and/or glory! Half the party become reckless!

Script: https://larrymannplayssolobickering.blogspot.com/2026/05/rollohi-ch405-script.html

--/--Background sounds attribution: Joel Steudler: www.joelsteudlermusic.com

SFX attributions:

Arrows Krzysztof Szymanski, and Dennis, both from Pixabay;

Special mention goes to DragonStudio on Pixabay for various swordfight sounds, buy them a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/dragonstudio

May 2026, includes a specific warning about mature content.

Intro music acknowledgment: Thanks to ADMFreeMusic: https://pixabay.com/users/admfreemusic-34079374/

April2026 plug for SRPN

https://larrymannplayssolobickering.blogspot.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

We've reached a beat, a downbeat, in our narration of the villa fight. And as the leadership try to get their heads around what the courier runner has brought them, we'll just run through our character capabilities. Aaron the Fighter 18 of 23 hit points Seed Halfling seventeen of seventeen Podby twelve of fifteen hit points Jack the Thief thirteen of thirteen hit points. Kylie the Elf eight of ten hit points and spells remaining to her Magic Missile, Shield, and Detect Evil. Xantu the Dwarf took an arrow through the shoulder and is at eleven of eighteen hit points. Ambert the wizard has had a couple of lucky escapes and is at seven of nine hit points. And he still has his full spell menu of Charm Person, Ventriloquism, Knock, and Invisibility. Finally, Engel the Priest who often acts as party leader is eleven of fourteen hit points, and because he prepared the day expecting to go exploring, his purify food and water and find traps spells won't be much use, but he has recently cast Protection from Evil. As the characters signal in different ways to the defenders on the wall, and the defenders on the wall signal as best they can to let the characters know where the next opposition is, and as a matter of interest, not counting the fleeing remaining buccaneer, it's 130 feet to the next major part of the attackers. We'll also pop over to have a quick look at Kopia and Caxton. The level 7 fighter Kopia is not wearing his best armor. He's wearing light mail. He has strength 15, intelligence 13, wisdom nine, dexterity twelve, constitution thirteen, and charisma eight. And he currently has twenty nine hit points. The level 5 magic user Caxton has 12 hit points, and he has learned Shield, Sleep, Knock, Detect Invisible, and Protection 10 foot radius for today's mission. Now that he has reached his position where he could conceivably be struck by missiles, Caxton has deployed shield and protection ten foot radius already. Jack finishes quickly looting the fighter that he's just put down. So nice these chaps to carry their loot around with them, he gloats. He reads the body language of Kylie and Eren. Like veritable Valkyries. The two women are flashing fire from their eyes, hungry for more blood. Jack rolls a five on his wisdom perception and tracks the general way that the courier must have run. If you'd like to follow me, ladies, I can lead you to where the next lot can be found. Wait. I really got to do something about this arrow, Xantu says. Ingel closes up to Xantu to help him with the lacings on his mail, and seed and pod pop up from some nearby bushes. Watchfully, showing no sign that they want to pursue the enemy. Umbert turns to Ingel. I'm going to get my invisible on, he says excitedly. Head out with the others. He waves vaguely at Jack, Kylie and Aaron. Well, Ingle can't think of everything all at once, and he waves at Umbert dismissively as if to say Be it on your own head. Ingel presses the flesh behind Xantu's shoulder, and Xantu grits his teeth, forces the arrow point through, and Ingle and he snap the two pieces away from the dwarf's body, and over the next further round, Ingel uses his staff of healing on Xantu. The results are disappointing, as Xantu only recovers three. Still, fourteen out of eighteen is a lot better than eleven out of eighteen. Meanwhile, Umbert casts invisibility and with a terrible sense of freedom rises casually and walks up beside Jack, who is aware of his presence thanks to the moving of the grasses and the slight noises the magician makes. But cannot see him. This is how you feel in that cloak and boots It's be gulling. Right you are, old man. It's pretty clear that Erin and Kylie are ready to roll. Jack leads the way quickly. The only question I have in my mind up to this point is Is this the time that Kylie cast shield? Yes, in the preceding round, Kylie did cast shield so that she has almost nothing to fear from incoming arrows. They therefore strike the next clump of Buccaneers and a male level four fighter before those individuals can properly get set. Initiatives characters three, Buccaneers three Jack with Umbert following him maneuvers relatively invisibly around to prepare to backstab the powerful looking fighter while Kylie and Erin will charge at the ill-prepared buccaneers, only one of whom has a malay weapon ready. For their part, the Buccaneers will fire at disadvantage at the two women coming in hot with shields up. So as you would expect, the arrows either glance off or strike the shield of the two ladies, and then the women finish their charge. The level 4 buccaneer has been plying a bow, or more likely, a crossbow, and chooses not to drop it, perhaps it's a valuable one. He instead falls back. Unlike the previous fighter, this fighter is using very light armor, the same as his men. Much more apt for ship to ship fighting. He is in fact sacrificing his four men. Here's Kylie and Aaron's longsword blows. Two buccaneers fall. The other two immediately throw down their bows and surrender. Aaron does pause, but it's only for one round. Throw up your sword belts and flee. Barely glancing back to make sure they're doing that, she and Kylie run after the fleeing fighter. That gent may be in trouble or he might make it to the next large group, which is attacking the villa from in front of the command pair. Jack is permitted one bow shot. And it's a crit. Of course this is at range, so there's no extra thief type damage, but the fighter drops to 18 hit points of 24, and playing by my brutal rules, will continue to take damage if he keeps running. That feels like a natural place to take a beat. And we're going to drop back to find out how quickly Ingle, Xantu, and Seed Pod move after the rash half of the party. Having administered healing to Xantu, Ingle finishes relacing Xantu's mail from the back and gives the dwarf a light rap to let him know that it is done. Xantu grabs up his war hammer, settles his shield once again, and moves slowly and purposefully in the track of the front party. Seedpod near invisible as they loop from bush to bush. Simply keep pace with Xantu. Ingle uses his staff as a way of letting the wall defenders know which way they're headed. Can the wall defenders warn them about the command group? No. I thought not, that would be a little too much to ask. And so Engel simply stays immediately behind Xantu. And the rare Echelon of the party move out at a normal pace, which, considering how heavily Xantu is armoured, is slow. It will take them six rounds to get to where the last fight that we've just dealt with took place. Does the level four Buccaneer Fighter Bellow for help? Yes and he's answered. Already Kopya has resolved to send out a side squad to reinforce what could be an incipient disaster. There's no immediate prospect of the defenders sallying out, so he could send up to eighteen. He sends eight. Are they bow armed? No and they have shields and scimiters ready. It would seem that Kylie's use of the shield spell is pointless now, but you never know. It will take those eight, four rounds to assemble and two rounds to get to where the level four fighter can limp to. A new front line, if you will. During that time, Umbert and Jack, who in my mind were left hooking to cut off the level four's flight towards the command group, have outdistanced him now and close in and stalk him. How confident is Jack? He's not all that confident with a three, and so he whispers assent to the magic user. Because what Umbert has prepared now is ventriloquism. As the Buccaneer whirls to meet an unseen threat, Jack rises from the opposite direction and backstabs him. With a scream of pain, the Buccaneer drops to six hit points. Initiatives. Jack six, Buccaneer 3. Jack's plan is to engage the Buccaneer until the women come up. He's aware of oncoming Buccaneers in a rough fighting line. And there's a lot of them. So he only has this round to deal with the enemy. Here's his attack. Crit the Buccaneer falls dead. Unbelievable Umbert squawks. Aluminada's work now let's be going. Subjective round two of the current fight. Here's the initiatives. Characters three, Buccaneers four. Naturally, the Buccaneers will charge. They couldn't exactly see what happened to the neighbouring boss, but they know he was cut down by a lone figure, so that's easy pickings. And beyond that, although probably closing in this turn, are a mere two heavily armoured figures. The only thing that contradicts this rosy picture is arrow shot from the wall and a fleeing lone buccaneer who has been sprinting past them during all this time. So I feel that rather than saying they automatically charge, I do need to do first a check on arrow fall and second a morale check. Are the defenders able to drop arrows at that distance? No and have switched their remaining defenses to those loosing at them. The morale check is therefore going to be at plus two given the odds. A shift of two gives me morale seven against the Buccaneers eight. They're confident but not blood mad. One of them directly engages Jack and two more surround him. Jack takes a wound. He drops to eleven of thirteen. While the other two have surrounded Jack, they are well aware that if they turn their backs on the approaching two women, they'll be simply chopped to mince meat, so they do not attack Jack. Kylie faces four buccaneers, Erin three. For the first time since the fighting began out on the lake, the swordswomen are facing men with shields ready and will be attacking at disadvantage. But each of them has at least one spare hit dice that they could use to improve things if need be. Here's Kylan. The shield stops the longsword. Here's Eren. Unlucky for that buccaneer, the longsword does get just past the kill, and the Buccaneer falls. Eren faces now only two Buccaneers. Perhaps it's Kylie's shield spell or perhaps it's simply that she's well ready with her shield up, but none of the four Buccaneers manage to do any damage. Eren, however, does get a slight nick, and she is now 17 of 23. Subjective round 3 Characters 5 Buccaneers 3 Initiative. Distance between this current fight and reinforcements from Engel and Co 140 feet. During the movement phase, Seed and Pod close the distance by 50 feet, meaning that they are a mere 90 feet away from the fight. Before going to deal with what Jack does during this round and touching on what he did last round, I'm just going to check whether or not Ambert thinks it's worth using Charm Person. No, it's not the time. He knows that in the heat of battle, opponents are far less likely to fall victim to that spell. Does he decide to physically intervene though? 5. Yes. He sneaks behind the buccaneer, tormenting Jack, and he will use his mighty dagger. He does have advantage. And he crits. The Buccaneer falls dead. Umbert becomes visible abruptly and Jack blinks rapidly. Since Jack's intention had been to withdraw last round, he had made no attack, and in fact none of his intended actions are relevant this round, and so he simply drops low to where his elven gear can help conceal him and mutters Thanks old man, you're a lifesaver. He checks the cut in his ribs and finds it insignificant. Now let's head to the women and find out how their sword strokes dealt. Would have been a crit, but at disadvantage, it still kills a buccaneer. Unfortunately, that's a miss at disadvantage. She still faces two buccaneers and Kylie now faces three. The Buccaneers have lost significant numbers of the eight already. And so, as we begin their bound, it's time for a morale check again. I roll a six, they're still in the fight. Do any of the three facing Kylie peel off to deal with Jack? Six. Yes, and two of them do. Perhaps they are the two who were supposed to box him in. Jack is back to being concealed while Umbert is in plain view. Do they both go after Umbert? Yes. I now have to follow up that declaration decision by a further question. Do they both peel off immediately or make fighting withdrawal? As a D6. 6. They do both immediately break off, exposing their backs to Kylie and jump towards Umbert, who's within a combat move and attack. The first buccaneer closest to Eren's fight and furthest from the walls peels off first. But he's opened himself up to Kylie. That unequal his unshielded armour, she's going to use a hit dice given the gravity of Umbert's danger. It's a crit that was well worth spending. And since she sees the chance, she's going to use a second hit dice on the next Buccaneer who's peeling away. And that's a five, that's perfect. Another kill. To their remaining Buccaneer's horror, two of his friends seeing easier prey peel off and are immediately killed by the deadly elf. But he's committed himself, and so here is his attempt. Completely fails to get past her defenses. Two Buccaneers against Eren. Both negative.