Sevryn's Shanty

Start-class article

Sevryn’s Shanty is a comic sea-shanty recap of sessions 1 to 16, written as a Wellerman-style 4/4 call-and-response for catching new players up at the table. Its chorus has Sevryn shrug off each disaster (the lost egg, three dead party members, a fortnight of questing spent chasing the wrong dragon) with “it’s all going to plan, lads”, a refrain of the song’s own, and the last verse turns to the one line of his the table heard, “everything is happening the way it’s supposed to” [14]. It is a reader extra rather than canon, and its verses are checked against the sessions they sing about.

Overview

A comedic sea-shanty recap of sessions 1 through 16, for catching new players up at the table.

The form suits the story. The party ends session 16 setting sail on a skiff, shanties are built for a table to sing together, and the cheerful call-and-response sits against what the verses describe: a devil’s pact, body horror, a decapitation or two, and a fortnight of questing wasted on the wrong dragon. The song is a reader extra, not part of the campaign, but its facts are held to what happened at the table. Each verse’s source events are listed under History in the campaign below.

  • Style: Sea shanty, Wellerman-adjacent (4/4, call-and-response, single lead voice on verses, full table on chorus).
  • Recommended tempo: Bouncy, not mournful. The dissonance between the cheer and the body count is the joke.
  • Performance note: The chorus gets a beat louder each time. The final chorus is shouted by everyone; one player (the “Sevryn voice”) delivers the closing line dead calm.

The shanty

Chorus (sung between every verse)

And soon may the Sev’ryn come, To point at the dragons that need to be done, We’ve lost the egg and we’ve lost three sons, But it’s all going to plan, lads!

Verse 1 (sessions 1 to 3, Wyrmbough)

We answered the call at the Hollow Hall, Five strangers, one egg, and a dragon to maul, Sev’ryn the wizard said “magic shall fall, Unless you absorb a hoard, lads!”

(Chorus)

Verse 2 (session 3, the first death)

Sunset Is Nigh went down in her lair, The egg turned green from the essence in there, Then Cholmondeley caught a yuan-ti pair, Of fangs, and he died, oh dear! His final words were a curse, in fact: “I hate you all,” and that’s a fact, We buried his moustache, we shouldered our packs, And we marched on south to Mirestrand!

(Chorus)

Verse 3 (session 4, the Mask)

At the Still Current Inn we met a Mask, Hugo signed up for a ten-year task, A devil’s pact (don’t bother to ask), For a ring he can’t take off, lads! The Mask said “Corvin” and Hugo went pale, And the Project recording told quite a tale: A hundred-and-forty thousand, and seven survived the trial, And our Hugo was one of the seven!

(Chorus)

Verse 4 (sessions 5 to 7, the Warrens)

We crawled into Umbrafall’s Warrens of slime, Through phase spiders, bookshelves, and biogloom grime, Caelumn lit a flame in the spores one time, And he downed himself in the blaze, lads! Maelis Dirn sneered, “I see the project’s mark,” Then her Titan said “no more” in the dark, A natural twenty ended her arc, And the Titan, he vanished forever!

(Chorus)

Verse 5 (sessions 7 to 9, Mercy and the Quarry)

Vasquez got nabbed, with a cellmate, Jack, And Terry said “Bruise!” and the nickname stuck back, The urn smelled of lye, and we sensed the attack: Somebody was stealing the gifted! Then off to the quarry where the miners had died, And something inside Vasquez whispered with pride, “Take the weight,” and he did, and his elf-blood lied, And horns grew right through his skull, lads!

(Chorus, slightly darker)

Verse 6 (sessions 9 and 10, Harvo)

A succubus charmed our Hugo for spite, She pointed his axe at Harvo that night, Twenty-three damage on a critical strike, And the artificer dropped, “well, fuck”-ing! We burned him on a pyre by the mine that day, And a letter from Sev’ryn arrived to say, “I knew he would die, but he had to, in a way, So the rest of you keep going.”

(Chorus)

Verse 7 (session 10, Mercy cracks)

Three nat-twenties Caelumn pulled in a row, On an orderly Drew at the Mercy below, Who cracked like an egg and let the truth flow: The Aurelians were taking them home! Mira Hale, gone, by boat at Dock thirteen, An ambush followed in an alleyway scene, The paladin’s blade burned through Vasquez’s spleen, And the demon inside hissed in fury!

(Chorus)

Verse 8 (sessions 12 to 14, the Cottage)

Ruin had come from Sev’ryn anew, A tiefling warlock to round out the crew, We met Phil the baker with a tale we pursued: A small red dragon in his oven, lads! We chased a candy trail east through the wood, To a cottage of sugar (you knew that we would), We faced Uncle Nibblecheek (toothless and rude), And we bluffed our way past the slaughter!

(Chorus)

Verse 9 (session 14, the wrong dragon)

But the dragon, oh dear, was gold-red, not the kind, The egg in the backpack had nothing to find, A fortnight of questing was wasted, you’ll mind, And Sev’ryn’s own magic misfired! Then Aurelia took Eldwythe while we were away, Wanted posters of all of us hung in the way, White-and-gold banners and tabards of Pure, And we ran for the trees in the moonlight!

(Chorus)

Verse 10 (session 15, the chain)

A kobold named Althea rolled into our camp, With a gorget of silver and a holy gem’s stamp, The Aurelians chased her, and out of the damp, Stepped a chain-master, smiling like murder! Mharos said “blame her,” but Vasquez said “no,” He stepped to the front and he took on the blow, And the chain went through Ruin and his head went below, And the egg in the smoke was taken!

(Chorus, the loudest yet)

Verse 11 (session 16, the sewers and the sea)

Down through the sewers with Phil at our backs, He’d been a brigand (we’d had our hunches in fact), He gave us a name and a note and some facts, To a man called Hett Varn at a shrine, lads! Now three of us sail on a skiff towards the south, Towards the city that wants every word from our mouths, And Sev’ryn’s calm voice murmurs into our doubts:

Final Chorus (slow build, full table, ALL CAPS energy)

EVERYTHING’S HAPPENING THE WAY IT’S SUPPOSED TO, EVERYTHING’S HAPPENING THE WAY IT’S SUPPOSED TO, EVERYTHING’S HAPPENING THE WAY IT’S SUPPOSED TO, THE LOST AND THE DEAD AND YOU, LADS!

(Beat. Then quick and bouncy, one last hit:)

So soon may the Sev’ryn come, With a riddle and a hoard and a “told you so” run, We’ve lost the egg and we’ve lost three sons, AND WE’RE GOING WHERE THEY HATE MAGIC!

Style notes

Why a sea shanty is the right call

The party boards a skiff at the end of session 16, so the form is already diegetic. Shanties are built for group recitation around a table. The 4/4 march tempo and the cheerful call-and-response carry the comedic dissonance against what the lyrics are actually describing (devil pact, body horror, decapitation, an erased family, a fortnight of questing wasted on the wrong dragon).

The Sev’ryn refrain is the engine. Hit “it’s all going to plan, lads” right after every disaster. The bigger the disaster, the more deadpan the delivery.

Reference tracks to listen to before performing

The Longest Johns or Nathan Evans, “Wellerman.” Build your metre from this. “Drunken Sailor,” any version. For the call-and-response intuition. “Leave Her Johnny Leave Her.” For the melancholy chorus energy that lets the comedy land.

Alternative styles, if you want a different colour

Hamilton-style hip-hop opener (think “Alexander Hamilton” or “The Story of Tonight”). Better if you want plot density delivered fast, with rhythmic name-checks of every NPC. Less group-singable, more single-performer showcase. Works if one of your players can actually rap.

Tavern bard ballad in the Flight of the Conchords or Tenacious D vein. Slower, melodic, more space for individual jokes to breathe. Solo guitar performance. Best if someone at the table actually plays.

Broadway ensemble opener (think “Belle” from Beauty and the Beast, or “Tradition” from Fiddler on the Roof). Each PC gets their own verse with character-defining lines. More rehearsal-heavy but very rewarding if your group is into it.

“We Didn’t Start the Fire” (Billy Joel). Rapid-fire reference dump, every NPC and event named, almost no narrative. Great nostalgia hits for returning players, but actually bad for onboarding new ones (the whole point is you already know who the names are).

Rules to keep the comedy working

Quote the actual table dialogue. “I hate you all” and “well, fuck” are funnier verbatim than paraphrased. The shanty already does this; don’t sand the edges off.

Resist the urge to make the dark verses musically sad. The Harvo verse and the Ruin verse should still bounce. The dissonance is the joke.

Sev’ryn’s catchphrase is sacred. Do not paraphrase “everything is happening the way it’s supposed to” anywhere it’s quoted. The closing line is the campaign’s thesis statement delivered as a punchline.

If you want to extend it at the table, give each PC one bonus verse roasting them specifically. Caelumn’s would obviously open with the spore cave he set off himself. Hugo’s would be the ten-year devil pact for a ring that won’t come off. Vasquez’s would be “Bruise.”

History in the campaign

Session 1 was not recorded, and session 11 has no verse. Each entry names the verse that draws on the session and the events behind it.

Session 2: The Bark, the Dryad, and the Riddle that Wasn’t a Tree

Main article: Session 2

Verse 1 rests on the recap that Cholmondeley’s player gave of the unrecorded first session: the meeting at the Hollow Hall Tavern, Sevryn, a chronurgy wizard, warning that magic was failing, and the egg that feeds on chromatic dragons and their hoards, which sent the party to the ancient green dragon near Wyrmbough Grove [1]. The “magic shall fall unless you absorb a hoard” line compresses that briefing.

Session 3: The Lair of Sunset is Nigh and the Death of Cholmondeley

Main article: Session 3

Verse 2. Death-at-Sunset was long dead, her skeleton in the cave; the party killed her wyrmling son, who gave his name as “Sunset is Nigh” [15], and Vasquez beheaded him [16]. The egg drank the hoard’s essence and turned fully green [17]. Cholmondeley died to the yuan-ti woman’s bites, his last words “I hate you all.” [18][19]. The “moustache” is the half Caelumn’s flame had singed off earlier [20]. The funeral followed [21].

Session 4: The Still Current, the Black Mask, and Hugo’s Pact

Main article: Session 4

Verse 3. After the road south to Mirestrand [22], the Black Mask met Hugo at the Still Current Inn and played him the Project Veilbreak recording: 140,000 candidates, “a mere total of 7” left [23]. Hugo’s pact, signed alone, was ten years of service after the egg quest, his soul forfeit if he died in the first seven and free if in the last three, for a barbed ring that cannot be taken off [24][25][26]. The Mask called him Corvin [27].

Session 5: Black Hollow Market Tunnels and the Hollow Guardians

Main article: Session 5

Verse 4 begins in the Warrens. Caelumn cast Produce Flame in a cave full of spores to see what would happen, and the room exploded, burning him down to the ground [4][28]. The blast cleared a wall and showed the way on [29][30]. The table called it a fireball [31][32], but the spell was Produce Flame; nobody in the party has Fireball.

Session 6: Maze of the Minotaur and the Titan

Main article: Session 6

Verse 4 continues. A phase spider dropped on Caelumn from a storeroom ceiling [33], and the mind-controlling bookshelf had him grovelling until Hugo dragged him out by the leg [34]. In the Titan fight Maelis told Hugo she could see the project’s work on him and that he would become a pet [5]. The verse’s “I see the project’s mark” paraphrases her.

Session 7: Maelis Falls, Vasquez Captured

Main article: Session 7

End of verse 4 and start of verse 5. With the last node gone, the Titan looked at Maelis, “no more”, and slammed her twice, a natural 20 that pounded her into a fine mist; it then looked at Hugo “like he knows you” and disappeared [6]. Later, in Umbrafall, Vasquez was cut down in a street fight with the Nightwatch and left in their hands [35][36][37].

Session 8: Bruise the Cellmate, the Succubus, and the Quarry Ghosts

Main article: Session 8

Verse 5. In the cell, Jack asked whether Vasquez liked chicken (the rats sometimes taste like it); Vasquez gave his name as “Cruz”, the DM heard “Bruce”, and Terry declared that he had a prison name now: “Bruise” [38]. Hugo smelled lye in the urn [39]. At the quarry the miners proved to be ghosts, and Terry’s Blade Ward started a fight [40].

Session 9: The Death of Harvo

Main article: Session 9

Verses 5 and 6. A presence offered to share Vasquez’s burden and horns tore from his skull [41]. Later a succubus dominated Hugo, whose second attack, a natural 20 for 23 damage, took off Harvo’s head; his last words were “Well, fuck.” [42][43]. The party built the pyre outside the mine [44].

Session 10: Ruin Joins, the Aurelian Conspiracy, the Plate Armour

Main article: Session 10

Verses 6 and 7. A letter beside the pyre said Sevryn had known Harvo would not come back and was sending Ruin [9]. At the Dawn Mercy Clinic, Caelumn’s Intimidation, two natural 20s that the DM counted as three in a row [45], broke the orderly Drew, who said the Aurelians had taken Mira Hale and gone to dock 13 [46][47]. In the ambush that followed, a paladin’s sword burned the demon in Vasquez [48][49].

Session 12: Eldwythe and the Candy Cottage

Main article: Session 12

Verse 8. In Eldwythe the baker Phil Flowerforge confessed to having raised a dragon from an egg, and Terry asked whether he had any experience with red dragons [10][50]. The party followed a candy trail east into a cottage of sugar, where Vasquez was pushed into a taffy puller and turned to taffy [51]. The verse’s couplet on Ruin looks back to session 10, when Sevryn’s letter sent him [52].

Session 13: Bubba Walker and the Gummy Sarcophagus

Main article: Session 13

Verse 8 again, which skips this session’s detail. Inside the cottage a rolling-pin trap turned most of the party into gingerbread [11], the party bought its way past the doll Bubba Walker with a promise of three kinds of candy [53], and the Bubblegum Halfling in the basement turned out to be Edith Applegarth’s brother [54].

Session 14: The Gummy Mummy and Aurelian Eldwythe

Main article: Session 14

Verses 8 and 9. Uncle Nibblecheek appeared as a toothless, green-skinned old man in a stained baking apron [55], and Ruin talked him into lifting the curse on Caelumn and Vasquez by pitching them as workers worth more alive [56][57]. The dragon had “a little bit of red in his scales” but was “more gold than red”, and the DM said Sevryn’s magic may have misfired [12][58]. Back at Eldwythe, Aurelian banners flew and the wanted notices described all five of them [59][60].

Session 15: The Death of Ruin and Althea Joins

Main article: Session 15

Verse 10. Althea Stormsoro ran into the camp with an Aurelian patrol behind her, a gorget at her neck they wanted to inspect [61][62]. Mharos urged Vasquez to blame the arcane on her; Vasquez raised his hand himself [63], and a chain took off Ruin’s head [64]. A second chain pulled Caelumn’s backpack, with the Egg, into the smoke [65]. Verse 11 opens in the sewers, where Phil wrote a note for Hett Varn [66].

Session 16: Through the Sewers, Onto the Skiff

Main article: Session 16

Verse 11 and the final chorus. The party left the sewers on a skiff for the White Lantern Shrine, and the DM closed on Sevryn’s words in their minds, that everything is happening the way it is supposed to [67][14]. Five were aboard, but the DM retconned the ending at the start of session 17: Vasquez and Althea had been captured, so three sail [68][69], as the verse now says.

Status

As of session 23. The shanty stops at the end of session 16 and has not been extended. Verse 11 follows the session 17 retcon, which left Vasquez and Althea behind in Aurelian hands [68][69]. Later sessions have no verses.

See also

References

  1. ^ Session 2, line 20: Cholmondeley's player recaps the unrecorded session 1 (Hollow Hall, Sevryn, the egg).
  2. ^ Session 3, line 1214-1260: Cholmondeley dies to the yuan-ti woman's bites; "I hate you all".
  3. ^ Session 4, line 1312-1322: The Project Veilbreak recording, and Hugo's pact (ten years' service, the ring).
  4. ^ Session 5, line 292: Caelumn casts Produce Flame among the spores.
  5. ^ Session 6, line 2538-2539: Maelis Dirn on Hugo, mid-fight.
  6. ^ Session 7, line 610-615: The Titan kills Maelis and disappears.
  7. ^ Session 8, line 89-95: Terry names Vasquez "Bruise".
  8. ^ Session 9, line 1306-1318: Hugo, dominated, kills Harvo.
  9. ^ Session 10, line 69-82: Sevryn's letter at Harvo's pyre; Ruin.
  10. ^ Session 12, line 739: Phil confesses to raising a dragon.
  11. ^ Session 13, line 134-145: The Candy Cottage's gingerbread trap.
  12. ^ Session 14, line 849: Brioche is more gold than red.
  13. ^ Session 15, line 111-119: Ruin's death by the chain.
  14. ^ Session 16, line 1753: The skiff, and Sevryn's words.
  15. ^ Session 3, line 912: Inline citation.
  16. ^ Session 3, line 1290: Inline citation.
  17. ^ Session 3, line 1532: Inline citation.
  18. ^ Session 3, line 1214-1218: Inline citation.
  19. ^ Session 3, line 1258-1260: Inline citation.
  20. ^ Session 3, line 424: Inline citation.
  21. ^ Session 3, line 1976: Inline citation.
  22. ^ Session 4, line 302: Inline citation.
  23. ^ Session 4, line 1322: Inline citation.
  24. ^ Session 4, line 1198: Inline citation.
  25. ^ Session 4, line 1676: Inline citation.
  26. ^ Session 4, line 1702-1720: Inline citation.
  27. ^ Session 4, line 1670: Inline citation.
  28. ^ Session 5, line 318-322: Inline citation.
  29. ^ Session 5, line 322: Inline citation.
  30. ^ Session 5, line 384: Inline citation.
  31. ^ Session 5, line 305: Inline citation.
  32. ^ Session 5, line 360: Inline citation.
  33. ^ Session 6, line 394-396: Inline citation.
  34. ^ Session 6, line 1078-1087: Inline citation.
  35. ^ Session 7, line 1340: Inline citation.
  36. ^ Session 7, line 1537: Inline citation.
  37. ^ Session 7, line 1569: Inline citation.
  38. ^ Session 8, line 82-95: Inline citation.
  39. ^ Session 8, line 117-118: Inline citation.
  40. ^ Session 8, line 1884: Inline citation.
  41. ^ Session 9, line 73-78: Inline citation.
  42. ^ Session 9, line 1310: Inline citation.
  43. ^ Session 9, line 1317: Inline citation.
  44. ^ Session 9, line 1591: Inline citation.
  45. ^ Session 10, line 639-640: Inline citation.
  46. ^ Session 10, line 648-652: Inline citation.
  47. ^ Session 10, line 688-694: Inline citation.
  48. ^ Session 10, line 827: Inline citation.
  49. ^ Session 10, line 931: Inline citation.
  50. ^ Session 12, line 763: Inline citation.
  51. ^ Session 12, line 1317-1325: Inline citation.
  52. ^ Session 10, line 82: Inline citation.
  53. ^ Session 13, line 896-903: Inline citation.
  54. ^ Session 13, line 1876: Inline citation.
  55. ^ Session 14, line 179: Inline citation.
  56. ^ Session 14, line 834-835: Inline citation.
  57. ^ Session 14, line 851: Inline citation.
  58. ^ Session 14, line 1293: Inline citation.
  59. ^ Session 14, line 1556: Inline citation.
  60. ^ Session 14, line 1561: Inline citation.
  61. ^ Session 15, line 74: Inline citation.
  62. ^ Session 15, line 89: Inline citation.
  63. ^ Session 15, line 111-116: Inline citation.
  64. ^ Session 15, line 117-119: Inline citation.
  65. ^ Session 15, line 496-501: Inline citation.
  66. ^ Session 15, line 693-695: Inline citation.
  67. ^ Session 16, line 1717: Inline citation.
  68. ^ Session 17, line 130: Inline citation.
  69. ^ Session 17, line 785: Inline citation.