This is one of the easier ones, very few insta-death paragraphs. There's an interesting mechanic where due to a contrived plot reason, you start off without the leather armor, sword and backpack that are standard issue for all other FF adventurers, and the initial challenge is in acquiring this stuff without getting murdered first.
Here's what the book has to say about equipment:
You can also pick from several skills to start off with, although these seem a lot less awesome now than when I was 14; they're nothing that a first level D&D rogue isn't capable of.Equipment
This adventure is an unusual one, for you will start with absolutely nothing beyond the clothing you stand up in! You have no food, no equipment, no weapon- only your native wit and Skills (see below) to help you- You will have to get hold of the equipment you need by cunning and ingenuity during the adventure. Finding the money to get properly equipped is an essential part of this adventure, and you must keep careful track on your Adventure Sheet of Treasure spent to buy the items you need so badly - and record these in your Possessions Box.
If you enter into combat without armour and a weapon, you will be penalized. If you lack armour and a shield, you must deduct 2 points from your SKILL when fighting, as you are an easy target to hit! Of course, as soon as you obtain a suit of leather armour and a shield, this penalty no longer applies. Likewise, without a sword you can only use your fists to fight with; if you land a punch on an opponent, you will do only I point of damage, as opposed to the 2 points you can inflict with a sword; if you use Luck to increase the effectiveness of a punch and you are Lucky, the damage is doubled to 2 points (not to 4, as it would be if you were using a sword). If you are Unlucky when you Test your Luck fighting without a weapon, your blow will glance off and do no damage at all!
Provisions
A backpack can hold enough Provisions for up to twelve meals - you cannot carry more than this. When you begin your adventure, you will not own a backpack, and you will have to find the money to buy one, otherwise you will not be able to carry food for more than four meals with you! You may rest and eat at any time except when fighting, but you may eat only one meal at a time.
The bulk of the book is going to be spent bumming around a Port Blacksand-esque hellhole of a city, trying to prepare for long desert trek to where the BBEG is hanging out. The time you can spend gearing up is limited by:Skills
You are a seasoned and accomplished adventurer and you possess advantages over most warriors - one of the reasons why you have been asked to undertake the desperately perilous adventure ahead of you! Therefore you have certain Skills which reflect this experience and ability. Do not confuse Skills with SKILL. SKILL is a measure of your fighting prowess, as explained earlier. Skills are the more limited - but still very useful! Abilities and talents which you have learnt over the years. You may choose the three Skills you would like your character to have, out of the six listed below. This is a totally free choice; pick any three you want but no more than that! The Skills are explained briefly below- (In certain situations you will be asked whether you have a particular Skill, and you will soon learn how different Skills affect your chances of success. However, each description below is adequate for you to choose which Skills you wish to select.) Each time you play the adventure, you are, of course, free to choose any Skills you like, so you can play heroes with different Skills if you want to!
Now read through the descriptions of the Skills available and make your choice: when you have decided on the three you want for your character, record them in the Skills Box on your Adventure Sheet.
ACUTE HEARING; If you have this Skill, you are able to pick up faint sounds much more easily than most people can. You may be able to overhear fragments of whispered conversation and hear those sounds behind doors which can give you valuable clues about what may be lurking behind
them!
ANIMAL WISDOM: This Skill gives you a natural feeling for, and understanding of animals. If you possess it, you will be able to ride common beasts like horses and camels better than most, and you maybe able to understand why the animals you see on your travels are behaving in the way they do - which at times may give you important clues!
BLINDSIGHT: This Skill allows you to fight effectively in darkness (at night, for example), and you have superior night vision. Usually, if you cannot see, you will have to fight at a major disadvantage; but with this Skill you are able to sense your enemy moving around and can strike at him more effectively than most warriors could!
CLIMBING; With this Skill, you are adept at climbing rock faces and scaling walls and heights. You have a greater chance of completing such climbs successfully and you may be grateful for having this Skill, should a fast escape across the rooftops become necessary!
MOVE SILENTLY: If you have this Skill, you are a veteran at sneaking past people or monsters that you might prefer to avoid! This Skill gives you a better chance of getting past guards, of avoiding alerting distracted or sleeping creatures, and so on. Of course, it doesn't always work; for example, moving silently across sand is not at all tricky, but moving silently across a glade strewn with thin dry twigs would be extremely hazardous!
TRACKING: This Skill endows you with the ability to track creatures and people by following their footprints (or hoofprints, or whatever), a spoor, subtle clues, and gives you a dash of some 'sixth sense' which just lets you know where sorneone or something has gone. Again, it will not always be possible for you to track even with this Skill - tracking a large creature across sand is easy, but tracking someone in a bustling city is almost impossible- With this Skill, however, you will almost always have a better chance of pursuing a quarry!
And here is the prologue:Notoriety
In order to lay your hands on the equipment you so badly need for the later stages of your adventure, you will find yourself getting involved in certain activities that may alert the militia of the unpleasant city you will soon be visiting. Since this city, Ashkyos, is a vile place where the militia don't bother themselves much about minor infringements, you may get away with this - up to a point. Your Notoriety starts at zero; you are anonymous in the town you are visiting. However, if you are caught infringing the law of the land, you will soon gain Notoriety points (you will be instructed about this in the relevant paragraphs). The authorities in Ashkyos take an unpleasant interest in foreigners who make themselves conspicuous, so actions which draw the attention of the public to you will also increase your Notoriety and may get you into trouble sooner or later!
When your Notoriety score totals 8 points or more, you must leave town and set out on the dangerous trek ahead of you in pursuit of your quest; you not not stay in Ashkyos any longer. This will be a pity: the longer you can stay in the town, the more money you may be able to make, and the more valuable the equipment you can amass. So think twice before doing illegal things - but, above all, don't get caught! You will be kept fully informed about Notoriety as the story develops, so don't worry about the details for now; just bear in mind that you will need to be careful about the ways you try to make money in the disreputable place you will shortly be visiting!
So we're a total badass... except for the fact we apparently let ourselves get bullied around by pasty, skinny wizard types.Background
A conclave of wizards is a rare event for a warrior - even one of your talents - to be invited to; but here you are, intrigued by their summons. Finding them gathered round the deathbed of a venerable Great Wizard suggests that matters of great moment must be afoot!
'It was an Astral Slayer. The spell to ward it away takes so long to cast, and we had not expected it…' The old wizard's chest convulses with a hacking cough, and he weakly spits blood into the bowl held out to him by the healers. 'We have failed...' and his voice fades away into another spasm of
coughing. The younger wizard puts his hand on the fevered brow lined with age, and murmurs words of consolation. 'It could not have been foreseen. Such a thing has not been known for scores of years.'
'Yet the Staff has been taken! If only we had possessed the power to destroy the infernal thing. Now it is surely in the hands of someone of great power and evil - who else could want such a thing?'
The grey-robed healer holds the old man's hand and bids him rest. The effort of talking seems to have drained the sorcerer for, with a few inaudible words, his head slumps back on to the pillow and his eyes slowly close.
You leave the sickroom with the younger wizard, both silent for a few moments. “That man was the foremost of our fellowship, my greatest teacher', he confides, 'and his power was as a candle in a strong wind, pitted against the evil that opposes us. That staff has to be regained. It is a Staff of Rulership, one of the old staffs of power; in the wrong hands, it can be used to unify the forces of chaos and evil that are usually divided against each other. Any power strong enough to send an Astral Slayer is also strong enough to use the Staff to that end. The havoc such a mage could wreak is unimaginable.' The wizard's manner, and the urgency with which you have been summoned to the inner council of the wizards, tells you that he is not exaggerating. 'But if this is an affair of great magic, why have you sent tor me? I'm only a warrior.'
'Only? Are there not giants who speak of you with fear?”
“Well... possibly,” you agree, taken aback by this outburst. 'And then, there was also the matter of that fire-breathing Great Wyrm a few years back, was there not?' Amberon the wizard adds tartly. You plead that you had enjoyed some good fortune in that triumph, but Arnberon has made his point. 'We cannot send a wizatd to recover the Staff. The man who now has it would sense the approach of a magician long before he could ever get near it. It has to be a warrior.'
You don't have a reply ready for that comment, but at least you do have a query for this wizard who seems to have everything arranged for you. 'So you must know who has it?'
Amberon nods. 'We know where it is, too.'
'Well, that's something,' you agree.
'That depends on how you look at it. Its in Khul.'
The land of Chaos; the Dark Continent, home to grim-faced men of evil nature, sorcererous horrors, monstrosities of warped Chaos. This is hardly reassuring. 'ln Kabesh, to be exact. A ruined city swarming with monsters and the Undead.'
'Oh, wonderful,' you reply drily, 'l think I've heard enough.'
But Amberon grabs you by the arm and won't let you make for the archway which leads to the outside. 'Two scryers nearly died to find out that much. They aren't going to have taken that risk for nothing. And anyway, while the Staff is in Khul, don't think for a moment that you or anyone else will be safe from its power anywhere on Titan.'
His look tells you with complete certainty that he is not deceiving you You will not be able to ignore this problem.
'Your passage has been arranged. You'll travel on the Diablo, a nasty little vessel under the command of Captain Shagrot. He is a criminal, a liar, and a sadistic bully... about the only sort of man who would set sail for Khul nowadays. Of course, you won't be able to travel as a warrior; that would arouse suspicions at once. You are going to be press-ganged tonight and shipped out as a galley slave on the night tide. We have arranged for this.'
You cannot believe your ears. 'I absolutely refuse,' you blurt out.
'I don't think so,' Amberon says coolly. 'Take it as a tribute to your resourcefulness and reputation that we consider that only you will have a fighting chance under these circumstances. Surely I have already made the importance of this task obvious.' Ambion grips your arm with a greater strength than you would have believed this slim young man possessed. 'The Staff has to be retrieved. If you refuse, a weaker man will have to go in your place; and, before long, Shanzikuul will overrun this land. Then you will be dead in any event.'
The wizard's remorseless logic and powerful persuasion win you over; Grimly you agree to accept this quest. It is going to be the most challenging one of your eventful life!
'When you get to Ashkyos, you’ll have to slip away from the ship. That shouldn't be too difficult - by then the crew will be as drunk as lords. But you'll have to find a way lo equip yourself with armour, enough food and a weapon, and either have some gold for a passage by riverboat up The Ashen River, or make your way to Kabesh some other way. How you get that money is up to you but we can give you a headstart.' One of the other wizards hands you over a pair of dilapidated boots. These are going to help? you think. But Amberon takes them and deftly twists the bootheels. Inside each is a small depression containing a single gold piece. He shows you how to twist the heel to reveal the secret cavity, and how to seal the bootheel again. 'These will buy you enough food to keep you alive, for a few days at any rate,' he says. 'One more thing I can tell you: about the man if, he is a man who has the Staff. We have found out that he is a wizard, as we feared; his name is Shanzikuul. Oddly enough, at one time long ago there was a very powerful and evil wizard of the very same name who allied himself with the Dark Elves. He and his warped Elven followers were captured and slain by a huge band of wildmen who flayed and quartered the wizard and then watched as the vultures picked his bones clean. All that happened some three hundred years ago... and our magical scrying leaves us in no doubt that this is the same man who now has the Staff of Rulership. A wizard, of such powers, and with this terrible relic to wield! You must overcome him and return the Staff to us. This will give you some idea of the gravity of the problem.'
After further feeble protestations, you are forced to fall in with the plans. Hoping desperately that the meagre amount of money you have in your bootheels will be enough to keep you alive when you land in Khul - if you manage to get that far – you walk out into the night, down to the docks where, feigning drunkenness, you await the blackjack blow on the back of your head, and waking up, a galleyslave, aboard the Diablo...
Taking the liberty of rerolling ones, I rolled up Skill 11, Stamina 17, and Luck 12. We start out with nothing except the boots containing 2gp.
So! If there's interest, take a vote on what Skills we should pick, and what dick-related name this hero bears proudly into battle, and we'll begin.