Summary:
1. Koschei the Immortal Sorcerer is awakening!
2. When you see the end of a campaign in sight yet the players are still having fun and may want to continue, what do you do? I discuss campaign pace and development.

PC’s:
Llewelyn, Elf Cleric 8/Wizard 8 of Sehanine Moonbow
Rolando, Hobbit Rogue 6/Pacer 6 of Brandobaris Fleetfoot
Remi, Gnome Rogue 6/Illusionist 6 of Hermes
Belden, Gnome Bard 7 of Aengus
Sir Arthur, Human Oathsworn 9 of Celestian
Roulf, Half-Orc Drachentöten (Dragonslayer) 7 of Crom
Edward, Human Bard 7 of St. Cecelia

Game Diary:
This was a full roleplaying session. The last session ended with the players encountering a strange, pale humanoid that was not undead and may have a connection to another realm. Edward and Belden, the bards attempted Legend Lore research, Llewelyn drew on his wizardly and clerical knowledge which goes back a long way considering he is an elf over 100 years old. Sir Arthur, the Castellan of Ironguard Motte (when not banishing evil from the Barrowmaze) spoke with the Viscount, Sir Kel Ironguard. Other characters went to an elven wizard sage in Ironguard Motte, Hulda Schnell, whose legs had been turned to whispy smoke after an encounter with a sorcerous entity (later discovered to have been Koschei the Deathless).

As you can imagine with characters doing research and speaking with many NPCs there was a lot of roleplaying. From the several hours of roleplaying, they learned that Koschei the Immortal was a Kolduny (i.e. a Slavic wizard) King in the lands before the Ironguard family moved in from the west fleeing the rise of Unklar and the beginning of the Winters Dark (and well before the Barrowmaze was built in what is now called the Duchy of Aerik).

Several key things were developing this game session:
* A new story was introduced (Koschei) that precedes what is contained in the Barrowmaze setting and may return after the Barrowmaze.
* This new plot point builds on my desire of bringing forth folklore that I acquire through my folklore and mythology studies (in this case the classic and varied stories from Slavic culture of Koschei the Immortal, or Deathless).
* This also begins to tie together the current campaign with other campaigns from the past (Dragonclaw Barony) and those that are yet to come (Aufstrag is the next big campaign that we will shift to when this campaign is complete). My goal is to give the players a much larger-picture view of where this campaign fits within the larger world. In my experience when starting a new world you should start small and expand it over time. My C&C game world is in its 4th year, and enough has happened that I can now pull back and reveal more of the world at large to the players and allow them to see how plot threads from one place are connected to others.

A player at one point in the session asked “is this new plot that’s appearing going to extend the campaign for another 6 months?” I did pause to point out that after three years and over 100 sessions of gameplay that players seem to be having just as much fun (perhaps more?) than even a year or two ago. As characters are entering high level (9th-12th) and some can see domain level in view (13th+) it was my thought that as long as people are having fun is there a reason why the campaign needs to stop?

In the next few months, the players should defeat the foes in the Barrowmaze. We have several characters on the verge of some pretty cool stuff: there may be a Griffon breading area on a mountain top (Kiaria), another runs a castle and may become even more influential (Sir Arthur), there are guild masters running ever more powerful guilds in the area (Gnoosh and Martin), an elven wizard/cleric begins to rule part of the wilderness (Llewelyn), a druid runs their own druid circle on a mountaintop cliff (Rosaline), and a barbarian rules a cave people civilization (Gorgat). If you’ve somehow survived and defeated the Barrowmaze, that is a major achievement and if you now have groves, towers, guilds, castles, and temples, under your control, you would want to enjoy using them, wouldn’t you after all that effort?

Perhaps this sense of accomplishment and domain rulership phase only needs an extra few game sessions after the Barrowmaze is defeated and the campaign will feel complete at that point. We could end on a nice happy ending with a clear “The End.” But are the wild areas of the Borderlands ever truly safe? It could also be fun to end the campaign on a cliffhanger, giving the players a chance to say “we are finished for now – the Barrowmaze is defeated – but the doors are open in a year, or two, or three, to come back and do something epic (Koschei is returning!).”

I’ve never had a campaign with this much momentum and continued interest in my 30+ years of GMing, so I am entering new territory here. I don’t want to be too ambitious and accidentally create campaign fatigue, but if players are still interested in seeing what their characters can do once they’ve conquered the powerful Barrowmaze villains and reached high/domain level, then I want to have something for them to pursue on this higher journey. The challenge is balancing these tensions.

In the case of the Koschei storyline I developed, I drew from several Slavic folk stories around Koschei the Immortal (there are a lot!). I hinted at his desire for immortality. The players learned that he had supposedly negotiated with Baba Yaga herself (who is a Slavic goddess of witches in my homebrew) to acquire the fastest horse in the lands (and I let the players know that they themselves could at some point seek her out to acquire a horse of similar supernatural skill and speed…after they complete a challenging task for her, of course!). Koschei is known for kidnapping wives and seeking money for their return (this is tied to the Ironguard family going back generations). It is also rumored that Koschei may have even been imprisoned by someone once but was released or escaped…but by whom and why? Finally, the players learned that Koschei may, after all these many centuries, want to reclaim the lands the Ironguards took from him so long ago. Will he do this himself, or does he have followers to assist him?

You can imagine why some players thought this could really extend the campaign. But as I told them, this campaign will last as long as they are interested in being part of it. What seems like 6 months of plot and storyline could very well last that long, but it doesn’t have to. I have incorporated a significant amount of flexibility into this campaign, and situations can be sped up to an end or expanded outward as needed to meet the needs of the gamers.

It is always good to end a gaming session on a good cliffhanger or hanging plot point. In this case, after Sir Arthur spoke with Viscount Sir Kel Ironguard about the Viscount’s missing wife, how Koschei kidnapped many Ironguard wives over the centuries for ransom, and how now after such a large span of time Koschei now apparently wants to reclaim the lands the Ironguards took from him. But Arthur was also reminded that Koschei is patient. When you are immortal your plans move at a pace of years, decades, or centuries, not the weeks or months of those whose time is limited by a mortal lifespan. Koschei may move tomorrow, but he might wait a long time to make his move.

Sir Arthur went to sleep that night and while he thought he was dreaming he saw an image before him that seemed so real. It was that of a pale man. I showed the zoomed-in face of the Koschei art above on my 32″ monitor with only the mouth and eyes in the entire monitor frame. From there I zoomed out and Arthur could see a finger over the figure’s mouth as he said “shhhhh.” And this suggested…what? Arthur sat upright in bed and didn’t know whether this had been a dream, a vision, or an image projected in front of him. Only time will tell what this means and what will happen.