Erin Hunter - The Last Hope

Narrator Tips:The players’ cats got so lost in the whiteout that they have left familiar territory entirely. The cats will have to find some kind of landmark they can use to guide their travels or they might never make it back to the Lake and their Clans.

Have each cat make a Ponder Check (adding in the Pathfinder Knack if they can and wish to) and add the results together to get a group total. If that group total is equal to 20 or less, the cats wander around for a very long time, and only find something familiar when they’re already half-starved. They have no choice but to go straight back to the Clan territories and report their mission as having been a failure.

If the group total is 21 or higher, the mission is still a failure in that they did not accomplish what they’d intended. But as Narrator, you may want to give them a small story bonus for such a great effort. If so, run the group through scene 19, saying that in their search for familiar land, the cats came across a small warren of rabbits. Instead of ending the scene as described, though, have the players’ cats suddenly see other Clan cats come into the clearing. The players’ cats wandered so far off course that they have intruded on the area that another group of warriors was supposed to search. Although they will bring some fresh-kill back for the Clans, the mission was not a success, and the players’ cats have to tell their leaders that the effort failed.

What Happens Next:The adventure is over. The players’ cats do not get any Experience rewards for this adventure. The players’ cats can, however, play the adventure again.

6. There They Are!

Read Aloud:“Look! Over there! Did you see that flash of fur? Are the foxes back?”

Narrator Tips:The players have just finished dealing with the foxes (in one way or another), so you can have some fun playing with their expectations at the beginning of this scene. You can ask them to make See Checks (even allowing the Track Knack) and if they don’t have impressive totals, you can hint that what they saw might have been a fox.

Of course, if any of them get very good results (totals of 12 or higher), you should absolutely tell them the truth of the situation. (As Narrator, you sometimes get the fun of intentionally misleading the other players, but when the cats perform a task well, you should always reward them with useful results.)

In any case, the deception should be short lived. Tell the players that their cats see a group of rabbits—scrawny, skinny rabbits, but rabbits just the same. Half the rabbits scamper up a nearby hill; the other half run deeper into the valley. Almost immediately, the rabbits are out of sight. Perhaps they’ve gone over a rise or behind a snowdrift. Perhaps they’ve reached their burrows and gone underground. Perhaps they heard the cats approaching and have gone into hiding. There’s no way for the cats to know without investigating further. But which group of rabbits will they follow?

What Happens Next:If the players’ cats decide to follow the rabbits up the hillside, continue with 7.

If the players’ cats decide to follow the rabbits in the valley, continue with 21.

7. High on the Hill

Read Aloud:“In greenleaf this hill is shaded by tall trees. Now, even with the trees bare, the snow is clearly less deep than it was in the valley. But as you step away from the trees, the wind becomes quite strong and the snow gathers in drifts.”

Narrator Tips:Tell the players that there are no immediate signs of prey—no tracks in the snow or obvious locations for burrows. Then ask them what their cats want to do next. How will they go about hunting for their prey? Based on their answer, decide what Skill (and perhaps an associated Knack) would be most appropriate for that activity. (It’s likely that the See Skill and the Track Knack will be helpful, or perhaps Ponder and the Animal Lore skill.) Let them all make Checks for their appropriate skills.

Any cat whose Check total was 13 or higher is thoroughly absorbed in the hunt. Tell their players that the cats are certain that there are no tracks or clues to be found here.

If a cat’s total was 12 or less, tell that player the cat was distracted by the howling wind and drifting snow.

Then have all the cats make a Focus Check (with which the Alertness Knack can be used) and add all the cats’ individual results together to create a group total. As a bonus to this total, add +2 for every cat that wasn’t distracted by the winds on the earlier Check. If the group total (including the bonus) is equal to 20 or higher, they notice that the wind isn’t just stronger on the hilltop, it’s increasing because bad weather is about to blow in. It would be best for the cats if they found shelter somewhere.

There really are only three options open to the cats—try to press on despite the weather (which they automatically do if they failed to notice the coming storm), seek shelter under the tall trees, or try to outrun the storm and get down into the valley.

What Happens Next:If the cats press on or head toward the valley, continue with 2.

If the cats decide not to seek shelter, continue with 8.

8. Shelter from the Wind

Read Aloud:“The sound of the wind and the bite of the blowing snow only increase as night falls. Huddling together for warmth, hopefully you can dream of a beautiful, warm newleaf.”

Narrator Tips:Briefly describe what it is like for the cats, as they lay on top of one another, like they did when they were kits. When the weather turns this bad, it’s the only thing you can do. And despite the terrible conditions, the familiarity of the situation provides a feeling of safety as they drift off to sleep.

Their dreams, however, are not of carefree days when they were kits. Instead, they each receive a message from StarClan. The details of each dream should be tailored to the individual cats—featuring cats and situations from their past (both past games, and the background story each player has created for his or her cat). This will require you, as Narrator, to improvise extensively but, since this is a dream, it also gives you the freedom to take a stronger hand in crafting the scene.

In dreams, things don’t always happen in the logical way they do in real life—you can move the players’ cats from place to place, or even time to time. You can make the situation as strange as you like, even put the cats in extremely dangerous situations since, no matter what happens, they will awake safe and sound when the dream is over.

Before beginning the dream, ask each player how many chips they have of each color. Although they may have to spend chips on actions in the dream, when they awaken they will get those chips back, plus the normal Healing a cat gets every morning. (See Chapter Five of the game rules.)

The dream should begin with a situation the cats know well, but someplace dangerous—perhaps a climactic scene from one of their previous adventures. Make them play through the scene as if it were real, except nothing they do succeeds, no matter what totals they achieve with their Checks. Things look bad for the cats, like they may actually fail or, worse, die. But just then, a bright light comes from behind them and the cats’ enemies disappear like fog in a strong wind.

When the cats turn around, they see a member of StarClan that has some personal significance to them. Different cats may see different members of StarClan, but they each receive the same basic message: The cats of StarClan know that leaf-bare has been long and difficult, but the Clan cats must see it as a test, which, if they pass, will leave them even stronger in the future. “The test,” the StarClan cat says, “is to find a green shoot in a white field and bring it back to your Clans. If you do this, newleaf will arrive before the next moon. If you fail, leaf-bare will continue for at least one moon more.”