Dungeons & Dragons Through the Versions: Part 4

When we last left our players, most of them were unconscious or dead in the zombie chamber of T1: The Village of Hommlet under strict AD&D rules (referred to here as "dogma" AD&D). Unfortunately, after re-reading the section on hit points and death in the DMG, apparently everyone in the party (except Elmo) was dead at the end of the encounter. This was (essentially) the first encounter using these rules. Hmm, what's a DM to do?

I put it to a vote. I gave them the options of :

1. continuing using strict dogma rules (which would require re-rolling 1st level characters as replacements); since Elmo survived by retreated, all their gear was lost.
2. restarting the combat from the beginning and then continuing with dogma rules, or 
3. changing to 2nd edition and rolling new characters at 2nd level.

 They opted for the second option (a re-do). So we reset all the hit points to full and everything went back to the way it was when they descended the stairs. This time they opted to avoid the zombie chamber in favor of checking out the northeastern room off the cellar. Knowing that it was empty from the first run, they decided to check out what lay beyond the far door.

To recap, the party consisted of the following (all with similar XP amounts):

• Elana Barzan, 3rd level NG female human cleric of Pelor (16 hp)
• Gort Martin, 2nd/1st level LN male half-orc cleric/fighter of Wee Jas (19 hp)
• Trixalix, 1st/1st level N male gnome fighter/illusionist (hp: 3)
• Elmo, 4th level LG male human ranger (hp: 41)
• Marshall, 0-level militiaman (the widow's elder son) (hp: 3)
• William, 0-level militiaman (one of the brewer's apprentices) (hp: 4)
• Kevin, 0-level linkboy (the potboy from the Welcome Wench Inn) (hp: 3)
• Spugnoir, 2nd level CN male human magic-user (hp: 4)

As you can see, most of the party is in the low end of single digits for hit points. All the rules from the PHB and DMG were in play, as well as any rules given in the module itself. Therefore, Lubash the ogre, who was waiting behind the door, was 5+1 HD with a huge bardiche doing weapon damage + bonus for an 18/percentile strength (2d4+5). However, given the design of the doorway and the layout of the room, there was never going to be a way to swing that huge weapon! The players played it safe. The gnome listened at the door and heard the ogre muttering something to himself. Therefore the party was not surprised. They opened the door on the first shot but did not surprise the ogre. The half-orc shot his crossbow at the ogre at the same time that Lubash asked for the password (simultaneous initiative). The following round he advanced, weapon in hand while Gort and Elmo remained in the doorway to shield the others. The ogre tried twice to grab someone and drag them into the room, but he failed (using the grappling rules in the DMG - the first attempt flat out failed, the second was deflected by a weapon strike). The wounded ogre withdrew into the center of the room and waited for the party to approach him. A bardiche is a slashing weapon and there was not enough room to swing it through the doorway (assuming it was sized for an ogre, it would have been 10' long and required 10' space to use). So Elmo and Gort moved in with their battle axe and bastard sword. They made short work of the ogre while the others remained at the ready in the ante-chamber.

After slaying the ogre they examined the room and found his treasure chest. Although they poked around in the bedding on the floor, no one thought to cast detect magic, so the elven cloak went unnoticed among the other dirty rags and skins, carpet remnants, and tapestry scraps. They then went over to the barred southern door and found three prisoners (2 humans and a badly beaten gnome). The party opted to help them escape their imprisonment and helped them out. Elana healed the gnome with a cure light wounds spell and was given his iron ring as a reward (sign of a gnome-friend; better reaction rolls). On the way up the stairs they ran afoul of a pack of 5 giant rats, but Gort and his hunting dog Mort took them out in a few rounds while the others were stuck waiting in the stairwell.

They left the moathouse without further incident and made a litter to carry the gnome back while the mule was laden with the treasure chest and the party's packs. When they arrived in Hommlet they took the injured captives to the Temple of St. Cuthbert and donated 3 gp for the care they would receive from the resident cleric (a place to rest and be tended to, but no spells cast - cure light wounds was way too expensive for a 0-level human or 1st level gnome).

The party headed to the Druid of the Grove and explained what they found. Jaroo urged them to continue their investigations with Elmo (who finally revealed that he was a ranger in service to the Viscount). We ended the session here, but the general mood was good and the players were eager to return to the adventure. I have to calculate XP for the monsters and treasure recovered, but I can assure them that it will not be much. They killed 2 green slimes, a huge ogre, and 5 giant rats. They walked out with 823 cp, 46 sp, and 3 gp. Not much of a haul given AD&D coin conversions (I think it comes out to a little over 9 gp in total). Even if they do manage to level, they are poor and don't have nearly enough to train at 1,500 gp/level!!

So far we have determined that turning is problematic, and that it's better to wait for a group of undead to come close BEFORE actually turning (not only to get the whole group in one shot, but also to allow fleeing "free attacks" for the fighters as they run away. We house ruled death at -10 hp so long ago that I forgot what the actual rule was. Apparently, if you go from positive hp to 0 hp (or optionally as low as -3), then you start to lose -1 hp each round thereafter until you die at -10 hp. However, if you go from positive hp to -4 or fewer hp, then your character is essentially dead. The negative hp rule only applies when hp drop to exactly 0 (or as low as -3 from the same hit). This differs slightly from death at 0 hp, but not by much, and makes more sense to me now. Don't know why it took so long for me to come to this conclusion! I opted to allow the optional 0 to -3 buffer for this version of dogma AD&D. For sticklers who don't like the "down to -3" addition, negative hit points only come into play when the character exactly reaches 0 hit points. This is just another of those special cases in the DMG that was given 3 paragraphs to explain something that (in my opinion) rarely happens. Regardless, there are no long, drawn out death scenes in AD&D where the hero keeps talking for several minutes while the others look on sadly. Such is only for the movies or sappy love novels and not for swords & sorcery adventure! Curiously enough, I looked up 2nd edition AD&D and they did away with this buffer - death occurs at 0 hp!