The awakening...

Chia stepped forward, looking around at the 9 bloody, battered figures gathered around the pile of lanterns with her and utters the first purposefully formed words, giving birth to Language. She then settles herself in front of the Lanterns at the center of their new home and ponders the meaning of... everything. Wondering how they will survive in this dark world where their only form of light comes from these lanterns in front of her.

After rapidly expanding the newly founded settlement of Cannerbrie, Chia's mastery of language ignites the Inner Lantern, instilling confidence and purpose in the others. Jo and Kara sneak off into the dark, clutching the Love Juice; returning with twins (Chris and Lara). These new additions are greeted with joy and Affection. The rest of the settlement worked hard crafting some equipment for the next hunting party.

At this point, our settlement looks something like:

Cannerbrie

Lantern Year: 1
Settlement: Lantern Horde, Skinnery, Organ Grinder, Bone Smith
Innovations: Language, Inner Lantern, Protect The Young
Quarry: White Lion
Equipment: 2 bone swords, 2 bandages, monster grease, 4 cloth armour, 4 founding stones
Population (alive/dead):  12/0

• Chia (leader)
• Jo
• Kara
• Tim
• Albert
• Winifred
• Tobin
• Gregor
• Alice
• Nina
• Chris (Parents: Jo & Kara; Sibling: Lara)
• Lara (Parents: Jo & Kara; Sibling: Chris)

---

I started my first game of Kingdom Death tonight and went through the tutorial fight against a low level White Lion.  I think my band of brave new souls must have the luck of the gods. The number of Lantern 10s that came up during their first ever encounter was pretty good and everyone survived, which seems to be a rarity from the few reports I've read.

Each time you hit a creature, you draw location card. Each card has possible after effects and critical wound options. A Lantern 10 is an unmodified wound roll of 10, which triggers the Critical clause on the location card. These critical wounds generate additional bonus effects, like -1 movement for the creature, or knocking it down.

As you can see from the little story, there is a lot of post game stuff to sort out, which really brings your settlement to life. We'll see how long that lasts against a more powerful lion in the next Lantern Year. As the game slowly introduces each monster and nemesis type, it seems like a reasonable aim to try and paint up everything needed for the next Lantern Year before carrying on. In this case it would be 4 survivors and the Lion. 5 figures shouldn't be too hard, right?

You'd think that... but the story behind this world leads to some interesting thoughts and questions about *how* they should be painted. The only light in the world is from lanterns carried by the populace, or from lanterns and fires out in the wilderness. We won't mention the creatures that use unnatural light as a lure for the humans yet *shudder*. So. If the only light is from lanterns, does this mean I should technically be painting everything using OSL? I've only ever seen this done once or twice and that was by real masters, like Haley's Cleric on CMoN... I'm not entirely sure if I can pull it off or not :/