The High Hunt

The High Hunt is a secret organisation popular among the spoiled sons and daughters of the Yellow City's elite. It is organised into cells of between six and twelve; each cell has a leader who knows a member of another cell, and there is no central leadership.

The High Hunt was formed as a means of relieving the boredom of pampered upper-class living. As the common Yellow City saying goes, "A life of sex, opium-eating and feasting is a blessing for a year but a curse for a lifetime"; without edge, danger and excitement life loses its fascination.

The main activity of The High Hunt is catching crabmen in the ghettos by the quayside. Crabmen are the untouchable caste of the Yellow City and humans and slugmen are forbidden to enter the areas where they live, so members of The Hunt do so in secret. Once a month they steal down to the docks and attempt to track down the biggest specimen they can to kill and bring back to their home base for consumption. Needless to say the crabmen are well aware of the danger posed by The Hunt, and their vigilante groups practice ritual dismemberment of Hunt members who they catch - usually while the victim is still alive. This makes Hunts a frightening and thrilling event for their members, which is exactly what they crave.

A typical Hunt is composed of d6+2 men and d4+2 women. 75% will be fighters of level 1-3 and typically armed with spears and axes; the others will be magic-users. There is always one leader, a fighter of level 3.

If a Hunt encounters other human beings, or slugmen, in the ghetto they will attempt to kill them on sight, fearing that their presence might be reported to the authorities. There is a 10% chance on a given night that a Hunt is taking place.