Drunk in a Space Hulk

In my quest for a solo TTRPG that actually fun to play and grabs my attention for longer than it takes to download I recently discovered Kal-Arath, Castle Griefs brilliant rule set and setting. I’ve played sessions in a number of games that get talked about all over the internet that I just seemed to bounce off of (i swear I will return to you Starforged. I just need some time for myself) before I landed in the steppe’s of Kal-Arath.

There’s a few things about the game that immediately grabbed me and now won’t let my brain go. A major factor is the easy to pick up rules. I’m not running Mythic or strapping “just one more table” to it. I jumped right in and found everything I needed right there waiting for me to start up a solo campaign. A game being thig light weight is such a blessing in a world of crunchy systems, where I’m not flipping endlessly back and forth through pages trying to find some exact rule. I had most everything memorized after one or two sessions, so there isn’t much to take me out of the flow of the game .

Another thing that really drew me in is that this flavour of sword and sorcery fantasy – that of Robert E. Howard’s Conan, the Death Stalker movies, that Barbarians movie from the ’80s with the super oily muscle twins that go by the name The Barbarian Brothers. Seriously, look it up if you haven’t seen it. It’s great. It’s also directed by Deodato and produced by my favorite shlock slingers Gollan and Globus so how can you go wrong? Add to this list the countless paperbacks with lurid covers of barbarians fighting skeletons/giant snakes/giant skeleton snakes – that filled bookshelves back in the day.

This niche of the genre isn’t as deeply explored in modern games as your more Tolkien style fantasy worlds and I get it. I also love some Forgotten Realms style hijinks involving all manner of elves, dwarves (I’m a day one dwarf lover forever and always. They will always be my main army in WH Fantasy), halflings and whatever else you can play in 5e now. That’s where I entered the world of TTRPGS a million years ago as a kid, but I always appreciate more stipped down human-centric settings. Don’t worry though, those humans still worship demons and do blood magic, so it’s not some “grounded” realism thing going on here, it’s just a lot less high fantasy.

If you haven’t already stumbled across Kal-Arath or their other work, I highly recommend taking a dive into the Castle Grief Itch.io store. Rules-lite OSR styling is the order of the day (as it should be), with evocative hand-drawn illustrations to really sell the “old-school “I’m playing this in 1992” feeling. The PDF for the core book is only $5 which is incredibly affordable given how much opportunity it presents. Then once you’re hooked you can grab the rest of the supplements for it for the same price. I’ve been playing Kal-Arath fully analog, the only device involved (for now anyways) is my phone so I can throw on some appropriate music at the start of my session.

I’ve decided to post about my solo journey across the grasslands of Kal-Arath as my character Sevvard chases down his sisters murderer, a member of the Ash’Hashim order. There won’t be dice roll information or what the oracle prompted me with in the first few posts as I didn’t start with the intent of posting anything and so didn’t write them down. My future posts will eventually include that information so you can see how I got to where I did, once I get through posting about what I’ve played so far. The thought of documenting my time with Kal-Arath on this blog came after I found myself more invested than I expected to be after a few sessions; the journey and watching the world unfold around me has been incredibly fascinating and I wanted to share some of that. This is also an excuse for me to work out my writing muscles and world building skills, which is something I always embrace and anyone who’s played a game can attest to. I need the lore dammit, justify my dice rolls!

This playthrough is being written in first person, in the form of a journal Sevvard is writing as while he searches for his sister’s assassin. There may be some inaccuracies to what he believes is happening that will come up later when more information is revealed to him. But we shall know how wrong he is, we shall know.

Day 1

Sevvard

STR 2 TOU 1 AGI 0 INT 0 PRE 1

HP 8

Rations – 9, Silver – 50, Sword

Skills – Roll Attack and Damage with a specific weapon type at +1 (Sword)

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My journey has taken me far from home into the wind ravaged steppes of Kal-Arath, a place I know little about aside from the tales told to children of bandit kings and horse lords. I have been tracking a member of the Ash’Hashim for months now, my journey taking me through unfamiliar cities and lands. A man in a nomad camp I passed through a few days ago told me of a nearby hermit that sometimes trades for supplies with them talking about a mysterious traveller he witnessed recently. Perhaps this is the assassin I seek. The rumours speak of this hermit as a former warlord – a brutal man who led warriors on horseback raids, sacking camps and waylaying travellers. There are hundreds of such groups that carve out this brutal existence on these vicious steppes, fighting for control of a land that destroys all but the strongest. 

As the sun hands its crown over to the twin moons, I come upon the hermits camp. A simple tent, a small fire, a drying rack for freshly-caught game; a life’s needs reduced to their most essential. In the orange glow of the waning sun, I spy the man hunched by the fire and as I approach he turns his head towards me. I sense no hostility in his manner, and greet him. The disheveled but hale looking man waves me over to the fire, asking that I sit and share a meal with him. Low on supplies and hungry from days of walking I readily agree and seat myself across from the hermit, the low fire between us.

I find the man to be an affable sort, not what I would expect from one who is said to have stood at the head of a band of killers and ordered the slaughter of villages. How does one keep their humanity while visiting such evil upon others? What has this man discovered of the nature of ones self during his time of solitude? The dichotomy this man’s existence presents is odd to me, and something I know I will not be able to shake from my mind for a long while.

Over the meagre dinner of gamey meat and roots, we speak of our pasts; that which has brought us to meet under the open skies of Kal-Arath. He is as interested in where my path leads me next as I am in the rumours of his past as a warlord and we spend hours exchanging stories. 

I tell him of my sister’s murder, of the assassin I have tracked for months through inhospitable lands and unwelcoming cities. I speak of revenge, and as I do I feel pain and rage in equal measure well up inside me. I tell him I no longer feel whole, and that this thief of life stole more than just my sister’s time on the mortal plane that day.

He tells me of a betrayal, the hand of fate that plucked him from his former path and set him on this new one. His most trusted lieutenant – their bond forged over blood spilled on the battlefield and wine spilled in celebrations – made a deal with a village that they had planned to raid. This deal saw the former warlord lead a a dozen of his men to their deaths, impaled on the end of spears before they could even react. Overwhelmed with the shame of betrayal and a loss of so many brothers, the warlord abandoned his sword, turning to his current life of solitude and allowed his betrayer to take the mantle of leadership. 

Despite the simple peace of the man sitting across from me, I sense a soul tormented. One that seeks the truth and reason behind his betrayers actions. A truth he knows he may never find, though knowledge of that impossibility does nothing to quench the fire inside of him. I know this feeling; this desire for something that may not exist but must be attained at the cost of everything else.

With a lull in the conversation and the night deepening, I stand and prepare to find a suitable place to bed down for the night. Before I can even pick bag up, the hermit offers me a place to lay my head in his camp. He tells me of the dangers the lie in the darkness, waiting for lone travellers such as myself, and with no desire to meet them I quickly accept his offer to share his camp for the night.

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That’s the end of Day 1. A little bit of surprising world-building thanks to the roll of the dice , and maybe an ally whose story will thread into Sevvards’ in the future. If Sevvard lives long enough of course.

– Scott