Harpyshaft! Notes

Harpyshaft! is a delightful D&D scenario by by Matt Halton of the I Don't Remember That Move blog. It's a joy to read, but the humor, background, and hypothetical text makes it a little hard to run without first taking notes.

So these are my notes.

I've mostly just removed information that I wouldn't want to have to skim over during play, but there are a couple of minor alterations. Probably most notably, I've simplified the rules for prey that gets dropped into the shaft at sundown, and I've included the random prey table in the section for the floor of the shaft rather than the section for the top. Also, I put a little summary of what someone would see if they were standing at the bottom looking up, because that's probably the first thing that's going to happen and otherwise you need to read every other section really quick.

If you used the Comeliness characteristic, what would a harpy have? 4? 14? 

If I ever get the opportunity to run Harpyshaft! again, I'll definitely stick with having the party start out at the bottom, rather than trying to rescue a princeling. It's so beautifully structured for struggling up meter by meter, and I don't want to shoot myself in the foot by dodging the premise.

I would also reread the original blog post, not just my notes, because the whole thing has a really consistent voice that translates well to running the game.

Oh my god imagine the same party that makes it out of one harpyshaft getting trapped in another one. Just getting so mad. Gradually escaping worse and worse shafts until they are climbing through the gigantic megashaft of the Actual Queen of Harpies with their crippled dragon friend, knowing if they can just find a pool of water deep enough Thalassa Nova can shout for help from his magic water friends.