Well, it's been a long time since I posted anything...I apologize. We've been doing a lot of gaming and rule-testing so I've been very busy. That and the fact that my computer died a while back and I had to upgrade to a new version of Word and Windows.
My party finished the frost giants in G2, slaying the Jarl and allowing his wife to escape with much of the loot from the dragon horde. All were teleported to the fire giant lair. When the party attempted to follow her, they realized they were in way over their heads. So they grabbed what they could from the treasure pile at their feet and retreated from the entrance to the fire giant halls. After that, they agonized over how they were going to get all their treasures back to their base of operations in Quasqueton. We spent the last 5 months or so recovering treasure, henchmen, and training those that made levels at the conclusion of G2. I allowed the players free reign on what to do next and a lot of planning and complaining ensued. They complained about not being able to recover every bit of treasure. They kept coming up with ideas and shooting each other down, thus nothing was accomplished for a long while. In the meantime, the druid gained new followers (2nd level druids) which I made up to be as uniquely unusual as the player character druid. The magic-user took on an apprentice (henchman) to train and have carry some of her myriad magic-items. The thief henchman of the druid reached 9th level (with x4 backstab). Once all that was taken care of, they were asked once more how they were going to proceed.
Well, they all came up with different plans! During their brief stint in the fire giant realm, the druid did an aerial reconnaissance of the terrain, looking for a safe place to make their forward base (by now they were convinced that a safe base existed at all three locations). I presented them with a choice of 3 locations: a crater formed by a pyroclast blown out of the nearby volcano. The crater allowed 360 degrees view of their surroundings and the leaning center hunk of lava rock provided shade and some shelter, but the place was too exposed for their liking. (This didn't stop them from using it as a place to stash their loot until they could return, though.) The other location was a lava tube about a mile south of the giant lair. However, I mentioned the fact that gases seemed to be present in the area (a fact later established by a commune with nature spell). The final location was a fissure about 3 miles to the west, formed from the faulting of the land due to volcanic tumescence. The fault cut through old dwarven ruins located at the bottom of the fissure and also bisected a hot mineral spring which could provide a water source. So the party decided to make this their base.
At this point the party split in half - the ranger, the cleric, the human fighter henchmen, and the dwarf fighter henchman - took 4 mules into the mountains east of Quasqueton seeking the Darokin Pass into Rockhome to seek the assistance of the dwarves in their mission against the giants. The other group - the druid, the magic-user, and the remaining henchmen and followers - took off in the druid's new flaming chariot spell to the safe base to set things up and await the others. The "Rockhome Quartet" took a very long time to make the journey, underestimating the number of encounters, the travel speed, and even their reception among the dwarves. They did encounter a number of wolves and worgs in the western portion of the pass, but not much else otherwise. They managed to push on into Rockhome and to Lake Stahl. From here they took a barge to Stahl city and spoke there with the council of guilds. The Guildmaster of the city played the various clans against each other and in the end the party found themselves accompanied by 2 companies of dwarves, each led by a sergeant, with a healer and guide to get them there safely.
Still, it took the party about 2 months of journeying to cross the distance, including the distance from Stahl into the western mountains to Muspelheim, home of the fire giants. They ran into trouble with some shadows, then a will-o-the-wisp, but eventually made it to the outskirts of the volcanic lands. Once there they encountered a patrol of giants, trolls, and hell hounds, but the druid merely transmuted rock to mud and they all sank rapidly to their deaths....
Once the party was all together once more, they spent even more time investigating and traveling, since they now moved at halfling speed over lava rock. It would take all day to get to the fire giants even though they were but 3 miles distant. This would leave little time for a return trip to their safe base. So they opted to make the northern crater a stopover camp, and from there entering the lair.
They were unphased by the enormous doors at the entrance and handily took out the door guard and an ettin who heard the horn blast. They moved into the great hall and took down the second ettin without any difficulty. Then they spotted the king on his throne to the east and his giant guards. However, the fire giants were already mobilizing for an attack and I started tracking their movements. As the party started to attack the king and his guards, more giants approached from the northwest corridor and the northern corridor. Separated into three smaller groups, with the spellcasters trapped in the center, the party started a battle that would last two more sessions before ending with the king fleeing through a secret door and all his guards and hell hounds slain. The druid had cast a wall of thorns spell across the north corridor to prevent more combatants from entering as they guarded the northwest corridor and started looking for secret doors. They found none and I kept hinting that sooner or later they would be discovered. They were almost out of spells and had barely entered the place!
After finding a group of giant guards waiting in the southern corridor (alerted by the king who had snuck off to his bedchamber), they hastily erected some walls of ice and beat feet out of the hall altogether. Given that the giants slain were probably worth enough XP for the ranger to make a level, they decided to come back fresh on spells and hit points and try again.
We'll be playing more this coming weekend after I calculate XP. No player character has leveled in the past year; the ranger will be the first of the PCs to actually make a level since the druid made 12th back in June 2017. Heck, it's been several years since the magic-user made 11th level.... They may be surprised to see what the giants have concocted in their absence!
Wednesday, July 11, 2018
Friday, February 9, 2018
DC Heroes RPG: Module Development
I've been on a superhero kick lately, specifically looking back at Marvel and DC RPGs. My computer is stuffed full of character conversions between these two systems, as well as conversions to Villains & Vigilantes. None of the systems ever seemed detailed enough to cover all the nuances of the characters, or they were just too complex to meld well into a role-playing game. I come from a D&D background, so if the opponent is not killed and looted it just seemed wrong. Also, most dungeon settings are static - they exist pretty much as is until the characters explore them. This is not always the case. I've run adventures in dynamic dungeons, but it's hard for the DM to keep track of the positions of all the creatures and objects that move around. This is better to do with a simple wandering monster random roll and then adjust circumstances to fit the dungeon setting. For example, if a wandering monster is indicated, determine which of the residents in the dungeon could be found in that area and what they are likely to be doing.
In a superhero RPG, though, the situations are NOT static. A hero team can decide to do just about anything (within reason), although the players usually wait for cues from the GM as to what will happen. I find that original characters created to adventure in a scenario are harder to control than pre-made, established heroes in the system. Original heroes generally have no established personalities, especially if the players are using them for the first time. Personality emerges during play, unless you are lucky enough to have a very good role-player in your group. Established heroes are generally easy to play - Superman is a super-powered boy scout with midwestern US upbringing; Batman is a grim and gritty hero with a tragic childhood and years of deductive reasoning; and Wonder Woman is a determined warrior who is secure in her pagan beliefs.
The written adventures should feel like a comic book plot. In other words, there should be interaction with the usual cast of extras (for example, Clark Kent interacting with the staff at the Daily Planet, Bruce Wayne having a soiret or board meeting at Wayne Enterprises, and Wonder Woman would be involved in a military exercise as Diana Prince). Action should NOT be the only thing in the module, although it could be! Combats are too random though, and cannot be easily scripted. Not all eventualities can be pre-determined - there are too many variables, especially with original heroes. Results of the combat are also not all able to be pre-determined. Comic books resolve some combats with ways that are not typical of role-playing games. Most players keep running combat until they defeat the villains (i.e. knocked out, killed, etc). Most comic book battles end with the villain escaping, having an obscure death, being talked out of continuing, or being duped into fleeing the scene. Character interaction is much more involved in the comics.
Also consider that plots are secondary in a role-playing game, but they drive a comic book story. So don't expect a plot to end the way it would in a comic. For example, take the plotline from Crisis on Infinite Earths. The heroes could succeed beyond what happened in the comics and save all the infinite earths from being compressed into one. They could have saved Supergirl and the original Flash from their "deaths." Or they could have failed miserably and the Anti-Monitor could now be lord over the entire universe - an anti-matter universe! The dice determine the outcome of combat, not the players and not the plot. The players' decisions are the next important, because they drive the actions of the characters. Finally, the plot is the least important, although a skilled GM can weave elements of the plot around the character's decisions to make circumstances follow a pre-determined path. The path taken may be different from that plotted by the GM, but in this case the end result is the same. This is the method that works best when writing adventures for superhero RPGs.
Now let's consider one game in particular. I've owned DC Heroes 1st edition for 30+ years. I never played it while it was popular. In fact, I learned the game only after the Third Edition printing, and by then it was obsolete. However, I prefer 1st printings of games. They give me insight as to why certain rules are used and the ideas behind the game design. So I've decided to revisit this version. It is simple to learn, but not so simple to run. The GM is called upon to make a lot of decisions in the game and resolve actions using the examples provided. But the system supports characters from as weak as Lois Lane (Str 2) to as strong as Superman (Str 50) in the same game. Everything is handled by comparisons. There are Acting and Opposing Values which are compared on a chart to see if an action succeeds. Then a second chart is consulted to see how well the Effect Value overcomes the Resistance Value. These values come from the characters Attributes, Powers, or Skills. All these abilities are rated with Attribute Points (APs), and these have a specific relation in the game.
If this version of the game has any shortcomings, it is that the lower-end of the heroes blends into normal humans and you can't expect any villain of the ordinary sort to defeat Superman. However, if role-played properly, Superman rarely if ever uses his full abilities against normal villains. This goes against ALL desires of typical players who seek a fast and effective resolution to most situations. The GM must know his players and steer their choices for characters to play. This is also the reason why it is suggested that the players begin using their own generated heroes before tackling the established heroes. But really, if you are going to play in a DC Universe, don't you want to play a DC hero?!?
Back to writing adventures... Instead of scripting a story like a comic book, you have to reverse engineer a story to become plot points and clue analysis. When making a story with a hero like Superman, you have to think on a grander scale than if you choose to play Batman or the Teen Titans. Most Batman stories occur in and around Gotham, but Superman can fly to the moon and back in a few seconds, could have adventures traveling in the timestream, or even respond to distress signals he picks up from deep space. The same applies to adventures for Green Lantern, who has an entire space sector to worry about! The less-defined a character's powers are in the comics, the more the player and GM have to work together to allow the power to work. Powers like Sorcery, Matter Manipulation, or Force Manipulation are open-ended powers that need a firm but fair GM to direct their use.
An adventure needs to be written with an introduction - this explains the adventure to the GM and the reasons why the adventure exists. It is the module's background history. Each adventure also has a list of recommended heroes, villains involved in the adventure, and any non-player characters involved. Then the meat of the adventure is a series of interconnected Encounters. These do not necessarily occur in order. Unlike a D&D adventure, the plot drives the story, not a location. A hero can visit various locations to get clues to set them on the right path, or the path may be linear with each Encounter leading to the next. Another departure from other games is that the characters are typically static - they don't change, but their actions change or affect people and places around them.
For example, in the first Teen Titans adventure (New Teen Titans #1), the heroes were assembled by Raven to rescue Starfire from the Citadel. Lots of background story happens for the benefit of the reader, but most of that has no bearing on the action of the adventure and is not written into the encounters. The first encounter is essentially the Citadel aliens attacking the United Nations building in New York City. Raven is an NPC in this adventure (as is Starfire). The remaining characters (Cyborg, Changeling, Kid Flash, Nightwing, Wonder Girl) must defeat the aliens and protect the human guards while trying to locate their mysterious ward (Starfire). While the others fight, Raven searches for Starfire, finally locating her in an apartment not far away. This apartment belongs to Grant Wilson and his girlfriend, and they are caring for the injured Starfire when the Citadel arrives to claim her. It is assumed that Raven locates her and teleports ahead after telling the others. Using their various powers they then arrive to help rescue Starfire. Failing that, they have to rescue her from the Citadel spaceship in orbit. This is a linear plotline helped along by the Raven NPC. The 1st encounter is a combat encounter. The 2nd encounter is a role-playing/combat encounter where the villain escapes with a hostage, and the 3rd encounter is a rescue mission on the spaceship with one half the heroes battling the aliens and the other half seeking a way to destroy or disable the spaceship before it can leave orbit. The action continued into issue #2 of the New Teen Titans comic, and the GM would expand the adventure to include that as well. For instance, the 4th encounter would be a role-playing encounter with the Titans returning to the apartment to see if Grant and his girlfriend are alright (followed by restitution by the Titans for destroying the place). The 5th encounter happens poolside at Gar Logan's mansion out in the Hamptons on Long Island, where the Ravager appears (with the Terminator) to attack and eliminate the Teen Titans (under contract from the H.I.V.E.), but several days have passed since their first meeting occurred. Obviously the GM can insert other non-combat encounters in between the action. This final encounter ended in the comics with the death of Grant Wilson (the Ravager) as a result of his powers (Fatal Vulnerability to using his Attributes at full strength). This should still happen, thus making the Terminator even more determined to kill the Titans (since that was his oldest son). It also sets up future adventures with H.I.V.E. as behind-the-scenes villains
The heroes did not change at all, but their actions not only stopped an alien slaver from recapturing an alien princess, it also reunited the team into a stronger version and created one of the Titans' most hated enemies (Deathstroke the Terminator). Subplots would continue from these initial adventures: Cyborg's anger issues with his father, Starfire learning about Earth cultures while dealing with the sadness of her exile, an unresolved past for Donna Troy, and Garfield Logan's unrequited romances. Raven should probably remain an NPC until such time as she confides in the Teen Titans and remains with the group for any amount of time. Starfire can be considered a player character as of the end of the adventure since she would now speak English (absorbed language through extended physical contact with Robin in issue #2).
The final portion of writing an adventure involves determining the rewards for participating in the adventure. Unlike D&D where Experience Points are amassed from creatures killed/overcome and treasure brought back to home base, DC Heroes uses spendable Hero Points to allow the characters to advance and also to be used during the game to soften blows, increase chances of success, and purchase new Powers, Skills, Equipment, and increase Attributes. In essence, Hero Points are Experience Points that assist the character in succeeding during the adventure. Unlike Experience Points they are expendable and the current totals is not reflected in a steady increase in power. This can be confusing to some people. After all, in order to improve the character, one must bank quite a number of Hero Points. However, spending Hero Points is an integral part of play and must be done for most heroes of the non-Superman caliber in order to succeed. Most adventures are written with the "15 Principle" in mind. In other words, the important plot points should be Dice Actions requiring a 15 or better to succeed. Therefore, the OV/RV of such actions are typically slightly greater than the matching hero's abilities. For example, if Cyborg has Scientist Skill of 4 and needs to figure out how to disable a Gordanian Computer, his expected OV/RV would probably be 8/8 in order to require a 15 to succeed. This would likely be a time where the Cyborg player would spend Hero Points in order to succeed at the important task. If he has none left, he is likely to fail, but doubles could come up on the dice to assist with the check. He could also Team Attack the problem with another teammate with Scientist Skill. All these considerations should be taken into account as the adventure is being written. Hero Points are gained for doing heroic things. Encourage the role-playing aspect of the game and discourage players from taking advantage of the numbers to make their decisions for them. Overcoming an obstacle or villain through difficult odds makes for a much more memorable adventure than playing the numbers game and succeeding at every task without risk or emotional investment.
So, unlike D&D or other adventures, DC Heroes adventures are written with a hero or group in mind, taking into account all their abilities and weaknesses to make the adventure fair but challenging. D&D modules are typically written for a group of a range of power levels and success requires cooperative play from all to succeed. Even so, death is a constant threat in D&D, but not really much of a factor in DC Heroes. In order to keep the plot moving in DC Heroes, the GM has to provide clues and hooks to lead the players along the path. How they arrive at the next encounter is not as important as having them get there; also some encounters could be skipped entirely if they figure out the clues ahead of time or are determined to come at the problem from an unseen angle. A good GM changes the plot and outcomes based on these decisions, possibly changing the environment to accommodate a good plan. In D&D, the environment is static and if the PCs don't have the right tool for the job, they may have to come back at a later time.
I prefer to use the actual comics as the bases for my adventures. In the past I have written adventures for new mutant characters in the Marvel Universe based off of X-Men #1, adventures for the all-new X-Men characters based on GIANT SIZE X-MEN #1 and X-Men #94-99. I have also used plots derived from the Manhunters in the MILLENNIUM mini-series for Green Lantern and Green Arrow solo play which was very successful but ended when I lost that player. I have not written much since 2001 since my group disbanded, but I did play in a Hawkman/Atom adventure that I helped to keep alive by role-playing well and helping better define the powers of these Pre-Crisis versions of the heroes. My current projects include writing Teen Titans adventures for the Pre-Crisis Titans based off their final encounter with Doctor Light, and the aforementioned New Teen Titans adventure that follows the actual events in issues #1 and #2. Future possible adventures include a Blue Beetle solo play, and possibly a Justice League of America adventure arc. I recently picked up the Legion of Super-Heroes sourcebooks, but I have yet to read much of their adventures, so I'm not that confident writing adventures for those heroes. I'd like to write a Wonder Woman solo adventure, but I'm still learning her Pre-Crisis history, since all I have to go on are 1970s TV plotlines and the Super Friends. I could do a post-Crisis George Perez version of Wonder Woman, but I prefer the 1980s version to the later versions.
In a superhero RPG, though, the situations are NOT static. A hero team can decide to do just about anything (within reason), although the players usually wait for cues from the GM as to what will happen. I find that original characters created to adventure in a scenario are harder to control than pre-made, established heroes in the system. Original heroes generally have no established personalities, especially if the players are using them for the first time. Personality emerges during play, unless you are lucky enough to have a very good role-player in your group. Established heroes are generally easy to play - Superman is a super-powered boy scout with midwestern US upbringing; Batman is a grim and gritty hero with a tragic childhood and years of deductive reasoning; and Wonder Woman is a determined warrior who is secure in her pagan beliefs.
The written adventures should feel like a comic book plot. In other words, there should be interaction with the usual cast of extras (for example, Clark Kent interacting with the staff at the Daily Planet, Bruce Wayne having a soiret or board meeting at Wayne Enterprises, and Wonder Woman would be involved in a military exercise as Diana Prince). Action should NOT be the only thing in the module, although it could be! Combats are too random though, and cannot be easily scripted. Not all eventualities can be pre-determined - there are too many variables, especially with original heroes. Results of the combat are also not all able to be pre-determined. Comic books resolve some combats with ways that are not typical of role-playing games. Most players keep running combat until they defeat the villains (i.e. knocked out, killed, etc). Most comic book battles end with the villain escaping, having an obscure death, being talked out of continuing, or being duped into fleeing the scene. Character interaction is much more involved in the comics.
Also consider that plots are secondary in a role-playing game, but they drive a comic book story. So don't expect a plot to end the way it would in a comic. For example, take the plotline from Crisis on Infinite Earths. The heroes could succeed beyond what happened in the comics and save all the infinite earths from being compressed into one. They could have saved Supergirl and the original Flash from their "deaths." Or they could have failed miserably and the Anti-Monitor could now be lord over the entire universe - an anti-matter universe! The dice determine the outcome of combat, not the players and not the plot. The players' decisions are the next important, because they drive the actions of the characters. Finally, the plot is the least important, although a skilled GM can weave elements of the plot around the character's decisions to make circumstances follow a pre-determined path. The path taken may be different from that plotted by the GM, but in this case the end result is the same. This is the method that works best when writing adventures for superhero RPGs.
Now let's consider one game in particular. I've owned DC Heroes 1st edition for 30+ years. I never played it while it was popular. In fact, I learned the game only after the Third Edition printing, and by then it was obsolete. However, I prefer 1st printings of games. They give me insight as to why certain rules are used and the ideas behind the game design. So I've decided to revisit this version. It is simple to learn, but not so simple to run. The GM is called upon to make a lot of decisions in the game and resolve actions using the examples provided. But the system supports characters from as weak as Lois Lane (Str 2) to as strong as Superman (Str 50) in the same game. Everything is handled by comparisons. There are Acting and Opposing Values which are compared on a chart to see if an action succeeds. Then a second chart is consulted to see how well the Effect Value overcomes the Resistance Value. These values come from the characters Attributes, Powers, or Skills. All these abilities are rated with Attribute Points (APs), and these have a specific relation in the game.
If this version of the game has any shortcomings, it is that the lower-end of the heroes blends into normal humans and you can't expect any villain of the ordinary sort to defeat Superman. However, if role-played properly, Superman rarely if ever uses his full abilities against normal villains. This goes against ALL desires of typical players who seek a fast and effective resolution to most situations. The GM must know his players and steer their choices for characters to play. This is also the reason why it is suggested that the players begin using their own generated heroes before tackling the established heroes. But really, if you are going to play in a DC Universe, don't you want to play a DC hero?!?
Back to writing adventures... Instead of scripting a story like a comic book, you have to reverse engineer a story to become plot points and clue analysis. When making a story with a hero like Superman, you have to think on a grander scale than if you choose to play Batman or the Teen Titans. Most Batman stories occur in and around Gotham, but Superman can fly to the moon and back in a few seconds, could have adventures traveling in the timestream, or even respond to distress signals he picks up from deep space. The same applies to adventures for Green Lantern, who has an entire space sector to worry about! The less-defined a character's powers are in the comics, the more the player and GM have to work together to allow the power to work. Powers like Sorcery, Matter Manipulation, or Force Manipulation are open-ended powers that need a firm but fair GM to direct their use.
An adventure needs to be written with an introduction - this explains the adventure to the GM and the reasons why the adventure exists. It is the module's background history. Each adventure also has a list of recommended heroes, villains involved in the adventure, and any non-player characters involved. Then the meat of the adventure is a series of interconnected Encounters. These do not necessarily occur in order. Unlike a D&D adventure, the plot drives the story, not a location. A hero can visit various locations to get clues to set them on the right path, or the path may be linear with each Encounter leading to the next. Another departure from other games is that the characters are typically static - they don't change, but their actions change or affect people and places around them.
For example, in the first Teen Titans adventure (New Teen Titans #1), the heroes were assembled by Raven to rescue Starfire from the Citadel. Lots of background story happens for the benefit of the reader, but most of that has no bearing on the action of the adventure and is not written into the encounters. The first encounter is essentially the Citadel aliens attacking the United Nations building in New York City. Raven is an NPC in this adventure (as is Starfire). The remaining characters (Cyborg, Changeling, Kid Flash, Nightwing, Wonder Girl) must defeat the aliens and protect the human guards while trying to locate their mysterious ward (Starfire). While the others fight, Raven searches for Starfire, finally locating her in an apartment not far away. This apartment belongs to Grant Wilson and his girlfriend, and they are caring for the injured Starfire when the Citadel arrives to claim her. It is assumed that Raven locates her and teleports ahead after telling the others. Using their various powers they then arrive to help rescue Starfire. Failing that, they have to rescue her from the Citadel spaceship in orbit. This is a linear plotline helped along by the Raven NPC. The 1st encounter is a combat encounter. The 2nd encounter is a role-playing/combat encounter where the villain escapes with a hostage, and the 3rd encounter is a rescue mission on the spaceship with one half the heroes battling the aliens and the other half seeking a way to destroy or disable the spaceship before it can leave orbit. The action continued into issue #2 of the New Teen Titans comic, and the GM would expand the adventure to include that as well. For instance, the 4th encounter would be a role-playing encounter with the Titans returning to the apartment to see if Grant and his girlfriend are alright (followed by restitution by the Titans for destroying the place). The 5th encounter happens poolside at Gar Logan's mansion out in the Hamptons on Long Island, where the Ravager appears (with the Terminator) to attack and eliminate the Teen Titans (under contract from the H.I.V.E.), but several days have passed since their first meeting occurred. Obviously the GM can insert other non-combat encounters in between the action. This final encounter ended in the comics with the death of Grant Wilson (the Ravager) as a result of his powers (Fatal Vulnerability to using his Attributes at full strength). This should still happen, thus making the Terminator even more determined to kill the Titans (since that was his oldest son). It also sets up future adventures with H.I.V.E. as behind-the-scenes villains
The heroes did not change at all, but their actions not only stopped an alien slaver from recapturing an alien princess, it also reunited the team into a stronger version and created one of the Titans' most hated enemies (Deathstroke the Terminator). Subplots would continue from these initial adventures: Cyborg's anger issues with his father, Starfire learning about Earth cultures while dealing with the sadness of her exile, an unresolved past for Donna Troy, and Garfield Logan's unrequited romances. Raven should probably remain an NPC until such time as she confides in the Teen Titans and remains with the group for any amount of time. Starfire can be considered a player character as of the end of the adventure since she would now speak English (absorbed language through extended physical contact with Robin in issue #2).
The final portion of writing an adventure involves determining the rewards for participating in the adventure. Unlike D&D where Experience Points are amassed from creatures killed/overcome and treasure brought back to home base, DC Heroes uses spendable Hero Points to allow the characters to advance and also to be used during the game to soften blows, increase chances of success, and purchase new Powers, Skills, Equipment, and increase Attributes. In essence, Hero Points are Experience Points that assist the character in succeeding during the adventure. Unlike Experience Points they are expendable and the current totals is not reflected in a steady increase in power. This can be confusing to some people. After all, in order to improve the character, one must bank quite a number of Hero Points. However, spending Hero Points is an integral part of play and must be done for most heroes of the non-Superman caliber in order to succeed. Most adventures are written with the "15 Principle" in mind. In other words, the important plot points should be Dice Actions requiring a 15 or better to succeed. Therefore, the OV/RV of such actions are typically slightly greater than the matching hero's abilities. For example, if Cyborg has Scientist Skill of 4 and needs to figure out how to disable a Gordanian Computer, his expected OV/RV would probably be 8/8 in order to require a 15 to succeed. This would likely be a time where the Cyborg player would spend Hero Points in order to succeed at the important task. If he has none left, he is likely to fail, but doubles could come up on the dice to assist with the check. He could also Team Attack the problem with another teammate with Scientist Skill. All these considerations should be taken into account as the adventure is being written. Hero Points are gained for doing heroic things. Encourage the role-playing aspect of the game and discourage players from taking advantage of the numbers to make their decisions for them. Overcoming an obstacle or villain through difficult odds makes for a much more memorable adventure than playing the numbers game and succeeding at every task without risk or emotional investment.
So, unlike D&D or other adventures, DC Heroes adventures are written with a hero or group in mind, taking into account all their abilities and weaknesses to make the adventure fair but challenging. D&D modules are typically written for a group of a range of power levels and success requires cooperative play from all to succeed. Even so, death is a constant threat in D&D, but not really much of a factor in DC Heroes. In order to keep the plot moving in DC Heroes, the GM has to provide clues and hooks to lead the players along the path. How they arrive at the next encounter is not as important as having them get there; also some encounters could be skipped entirely if they figure out the clues ahead of time or are determined to come at the problem from an unseen angle. A good GM changes the plot and outcomes based on these decisions, possibly changing the environment to accommodate a good plan. In D&D, the environment is static and if the PCs don't have the right tool for the job, they may have to come back at a later time.
I prefer to use the actual comics as the bases for my adventures. In the past I have written adventures for new mutant characters in the Marvel Universe based off of X-Men #1, adventures for the all-new X-Men characters based on GIANT SIZE X-MEN #1 and X-Men #94-99. I have also used plots derived from the Manhunters in the MILLENNIUM mini-series for Green Lantern and Green Arrow solo play which was very successful but ended when I lost that player. I have not written much since 2001 since my group disbanded, but I did play in a Hawkman/Atom adventure that I helped to keep alive by role-playing well and helping better define the powers of these Pre-Crisis versions of the heroes. My current projects include writing Teen Titans adventures for the Pre-Crisis Titans based off their final encounter with Doctor Light, and the aforementioned New Teen Titans adventure that follows the actual events in issues #1 and #2. Future possible adventures include a Blue Beetle solo play, and possibly a Justice League of America adventure arc. I recently picked up the Legion of Super-Heroes sourcebooks, but I have yet to read much of their adventures, so I'm not that confident writing adventures for those heroes. I'd like to write a Wonder Woman solo adventure, but I'm still learning her Pre-Crisis history, since all I have to go on are 1970s TV plotlines and the Super Friends. I could do a post-Crisis George Perez version of Wonder Woman, but I prefer the 1980s version to the later versions.
Monday, December 11, 2017
Classic D&D: "The Rule of Four"
When it comes to RPGs, how many choices are enough to make you feel that you actually have a choice, as opposed to having such an overwhelming number of choices that it is difficult to pick just one? I think that the early fathers of RPGs determined that the optimal number is "four" -- just enough to feel like you are making an informed decision based on min/max stats, preferences, and elimination processes, but not so many choices that you have to mull things over for a few minutes to an hour before you happen upon the best combination for you to play. If you think about it, most multiple choice surveys and tests also have four possibilities to choose from. I will refer to this as the "Rule of Four."
Classic D&D uses this principle, and it's one of the reasons I actually like the system. Choices are few but you feel like you have made an informed choice whenever you choose a race or class to play. By elimating some choices based on other choices you take a possible 16 combinations and whittle it down to a manageable amount. Moldvay Basic took some of that choice away, but in the end the results are not too different.
What more do you need than the basic four classes (Cleric, Fighter, Magic-user, Thief) and four basic races (Man, Elf, Dwarf, Halfling)? You can call them anything you like (Priest for cleric, Warrior for Fighter, Wizard for Magic-user, or Rogue instead of Thief; or exchange Hobbit for Halfling) but those four principle races exist in almost every version of the game from the original to the latest version. What you make of the class is up to the individual player. One player's fighter might prefer to use two-handed axes, light armor, and paint his face and shield to reflect his tribal colors; another fighter might use only noble weaponry, disdain missile weapons, and seek plate mail as soon as possible (as well as a warhorse) to be the stereotypical "knight in shining armor." Both are FIGHTERS, but they are played differently by their players. Sub-classes, which were added later in D&D and cemented in place with AD&D, simply serve to muddy the waters. They are not truly necessary and add very little to the gaming experience.
Now, races have changed dramatically from the original concepts. Dwarves can now be clerics, magic-users, paladins, and various other classes that were off limits to them in the original form of the game. I think that allowing all races to be all classes is fine if that is what all the players desire, but there must be some form of control to keep the demi-humans in check. This took the form of level limits for demi-humans. This is valid if most of the players stop adventuring in the mid-teen levels (say 14-16) and settle down to rule kingdoms. It otherwise handicaps the demi-humans severely. Demi-humans are also the only races allowed to multi-class in the original system, although even humans could have two classes, so long as they only operated in one at a time. Options were limited based on available classes, but all multi-class options were base-classes (except perhaps for ranger, which wasn't official until AD&D).
Now, there is little reason to play a human in a world where demi-humans exist. Only demi-humans gain bonuses and penalties to ability scores, only demi-humans can see with infravision, and only demi-humans can multi-class. So what's so great about playing a human? This was the reason for the limitations in the game regarding classes and levels. I would go one step further and say that only humans should gain the experience point bonus for high stats. I think that the lower limits in the original game were very harsh, but upper levels probably were only just being reached by the initial developers of the game. The higher level limits in Basic D&D and later versions is probably the way to go, with the Unearthed Arcana system allowing single-classed demi-humans to advance 2 levels higher than their maximum if they could have multi-classed and didn't. My current AD&D game has a 6th level halfling fighter running around with 9th-12th level characters in the G-series of adventures and he not only holds his own, he does better than some of the higher level characters! Due to his strength, he was originally limited to 4th level, but when we found the rule in UA, I allowed him to reach 6th. The limitation has not adversely affected his performance, although he is an NPC henchman to the party magic-user and run by that player, so I guess it's not the same.
Lots of pre-generated characters in the G and D-series of modules were demi-humans at their level limit (although some of the levels were in error according to AD&D rules). AD&D and D&D are similar but not exactly the same when it comes to level limits. For example, a Basic D&D Dwarf is essentially a Dwarven Lord at max level (12th), but an AD&D dwarf may be able to go no higher than 9th or so based on Strength. Original D&D dwarves I believe were limited to 6th! Elves in Basic D&D can get to 10th level (the equivalent of a 10th/10th level fighter/magic-user in AD&D) whereas they are limited in fighter in AD&D and may advance as high as 11th if their sub-race and Intelligence qualify them. Original D&D elves could go no higher than 4th in Fighter and no more than 9th in magic-user (depending on ability scores of course). Halflings are generally limited to 4th level as fighter and unlimited as thieves in AD&D and original D&D, but in Basic D&D they are sneaky fighters that can get to 8th level maximum regardless of ability score. In all systems, Men are able to advance unlimited in level (although 36th is the hard cap in Basic D&D). Most campaigns petered out shortly after 14th level -- I can think of only one or two TSR modules published for AD&D 1E that went beyond that level barrier (Isle of the Ape being one, and one of the Bloodstone modules as the other, but there could have been more). A level limit on demi-humans means very little when the campaigns only go on for about 3-5 levels beyond the cap.
The Rule of Four was also carried over to other games by TSR, most notably STAR FRONTIERS. There you have four basic races for characters to choose from -- Human, Dralasite, Vrusk, and Yazirian, with four Primary Skill Areas (their form of profession or class) - Weapons, Biosocial, Scispec, and Vehicles. It's interesting to note that most Fantasy MMORPGs also use this same method when determining roles -- tank (fighter), healer (cleric), melee dps (thief), and ranged dps (magic-user). Adding more than 4 choices starts to muddy the list up with unnecessary roles. One can simply add more 4-choice options to the game to make the permutations increase! This is why I believe the race as class system of Basic D&D never really caught on. It locked the choices to a set of 7 static categories which limits some creativity on the player's part. The race + class options of original D&D, AD&D, and later versions is superior as it keeps choices simple but opens up more permutations.
Classic D&D uses this principle, and it's one of the reasons I actually like the system. Choices are few but you feel like you have made an informed choice whenever you choose a race or class to play. By elimating some choices based on other choices you take a possible 16 combinations and whittle it down to a manageable amount. Moldvay Basic took some of that choice away, but in the end the results are not too different.
What more do you need than the basic four classes (Cleric, Fighter, Magic-user, Thief) and four basic races (Man, Elf, Dwarf, Halfling)? You can call them anything you like (Priest for cleric, Warrior for Fighter, Wizard for Magic-user, or Rogue instead of Thief; or exchange Hobbit for Halfling) but those four principle races exist in almost every version of the game from the original to the latest version. What you make of the class is up to the individual player. One player's fighter might prefer to use two-handed axes, light armor, and paint his face and shield to reflect his tribal colors; another fighter might use only noble weaponry, disdain missile weapons, and seek plate mail as soon as possible (as well as a warhorse) to be the stereotypical "knight in shining armor." Both are FIGHTERS, but they are played differently by their players. Sub-classes, which were added later in D&D and cemented in place with AD&D, simply serve to muddy the waters. They are not truly necessary and add very little to the gaming experience.
Now, races have changed dramatically from the original concepts. Dwarves can now be clerics, magic-users, paladins, and various other classes that were off limits to them in the original form of the game. I think that allowing all races to be all classes is fine if that is what all the players desire, but there must be some form of control to keep the demi-humans in check. This took the form of level limits for demi-humans. This is valid if most of the players stop adventuring in the mid-teen levels (say 14-16) and settle down to rule kingdoms. It otherwise handicaps the demi-humans severely. Demi-humans are also the only races allowed to multi-class in the original system, although even humans could have two classes, so long as they only operated in one at a time. Options were limited based on available classes, but all multi-class options were base-classes (except perhaps for ranger, which wasn't official until AD&D).
Now, there is little reason to play a human in a world where demi-humans exist. Only demi-humans gain bonuses and penalties to ability scores, only demi-humans can see with infravision, and only demi-humans can multi-class. So what's so great about playing a human? This was the reason for the limitations in the game regarding classes and levels. I would go one step further and say that only humans should gain the experience point bonus for high stats. I think that the lower limits in the original game were very harsh, but upper levels probably were only just being reached by the initial developers of the game. The higher level limits in Basic D&D and later versions is probably the way to go, with the Unearthed Arcana system allowing single-classed demi-humans to advance 2 levels higher than their maximum if they could have multi-classed and didn't. My current AD&D game has a 6th level halfling fighter running around with 9th-12th level characters in the G-series of adventures and he not only holds his own, he does better than some of the higher level characters! Due to his strength, he was originally limited to 4th level, but when we found the rule in UA, I allowed him to reach 6th. The limitation has not adversely affected his performance, although he is an NPC henchman to the party magic-user and run by that player, so I guess it's not the same.
Lots of pre-generated characters in the G and D-series of modules were demi-humans at their level limit (although some of the levels were in error according to AD&D rules). AD&D and D&D are similar but not exactly the same when it comes to level limits. For example, a Basic D&D Dwarf is essentially a Dwarven Lord at max level (12th), but an AD&D dwarf may be able to go no higher than 9th or so based on Strength. Original D&D dwarves I believe were limited to 6th! Elves in Basic D&D can get to 10th level (the equivalent of a 10th/10th level fighter/magic-user in AD&D) whereas they are limited in fighter in AD&D and may advance as high as 11th if their sub-race and Intelligence qualify them. Original D&D elves could go no higher than 4th in Fighter and no more than 9th in magic-user (depending on ability scores of course). Halflings are generally limited to 4th level as fighter and unlimited as thieves in AD&D and original D&D, but in Basic D&D they are sneaky fighters that can get to 8th level maximum regardless of ability score. In all systems, Men are able to advance unlimited in level (although 36th is the hard cap in Basic D&D). Most campaigns petered out shortly after 14th level -- I can think of only one or two TSR modules published for AD&D 1E that went beyond that level barrier (Isle of the Ape being one, and one of the Bloodstone modules as the other, but there could have been more). A level limit on demi-humans means very little when the campaigns only go on for about 3-5 levels beyond the cap.
The Rule of Four was also carried over to other games by TSR, most notably STAR FRONTIERS. There you have four basic races for characters to choose from -- Human, Dralasite, Vrusk, and Yazirian, with four Primary Skill Areas (their form of profession or class) - Weapons, Biosocial, Scispec, and Vehicles. It's interesting to note that most Fantasy MMORPGs also use this same method when determining roles -- tank (fighter), healer (cleric), melee dps (thief), and ranged dps (magic-user). Adding more than 4 choices starts to muddy the list up with unnecessary roles. One can simply add more 4-choice options to the game to make the permutations increase! This is why I believe the race as class system of Basic D&D never really caught on. It locked the choices to a set of 7 static categories which limits some creativity on the player's part. The race + class options of original D&D, AD&D, and later versions is superior as it keeps choices simple but opens up more permutations.
Monday, November 6, 2017
AD&D Against the Giants - High-Level Play
Last weekend we had a great time running the end portion of G2: GLACIAL RIFT OF THE FROST GIANT JARL. It's been a long year and a half of trying out different systems and playing alternate characters, but the players have slipped into their old character roles like putting on a pair of well-worn, but comfortable gloves. They are now in the 9th-12th level range and loving playing their high level characters!
The last session, I think, truly displayed the power at the beck and call of these high-level characters. The party magic-user can fire off 6 magic missiles nearly every round, doling out a consistent 12-30 points of damage. She also has a wand of fire, a wand of frost, a wand of conjuration, and 2 charges left in the Ruling Staff of Amun-Re (thunderclap ability only) as well as a robe of blending, ring of protection +4, cloak of protection +2, and now bracers of AC 3 traded to her by the cleric (who is now wearing magical plate mail). This provides a -3 AC....for a magic-user.... She also typically carries 2 fireballs, 2 slows, a hold monster or two, and several strength spells cast upon the party henchmen to make them more formidable.
The druid particularly impressed me. He is now able to summon an earth elemental AND a fire elemental, as well as casting his usual fire-based spells like produce fire, heat metal, and wall of fire, all of which cause creatures to burn and catch on fire! During this last session, his random roll for the fire elemental produced 3 salamanders! Not to mention that he also has with him 3 1st level druid servants, most of whom carry slings, and with extra spells to boot!
The party ranger is ridiculously powerful against giants, given his damage bonus of +9 per hit, and the fact that he attacks 3/2 due to his level. He lost his dancing falchion, but has replaced it with a +2 scimitar which he wields with a magic shield for a better armor class.
The party cleric is currently being run as an NPC because the player is away for the time being. She has been relegated to healer role and also takes protection spells and party boosters like bless and prayer.
Each of the henchmen have their own roles to play in the party. Most of these are straight fighters, but two are a dwarf and halfling who have excellent ACs against giants. The other wields a +3 longsword and has a low AC with magical plate and shield (his employer hooked him up). Two of the henchmen are now 7th level fighters and get 3/2 attacks. The halfling, although he is stuck at 6th level, owns a short sword of speed (once belonging to Markessa) which allows a first strike each round he begins next to an opponent in addition to his normal attack. As I mentioned before, all three fighter henchmen are strengthened by magic to be in the 18-percentile range of strength (most of the time).
They took out one frost giant guard at the entrance to the Jarl's personal chambers, two additional guards outside the Jarl's bedchamber, and 3 frost giants that came to investigate the noise from the Caverns of the Carls. The magic-user used a fireball in the large chamber (one of the only times this is a good idea to cast underground) while the druid simply commanded his elemental creatures to swarm in and attack (the salamander's were happy about the fireball, while the earth elemental simply sunk down into the earth to wait for anyone to approach the druid and the rest of the party in the rear). It took them only about 10 rounds total to complete the battle, and most of that was simply opponents moving into range. The Jarl sent out his winter wolves to attack the party, but they died shortly after emerging from the curtain. We ended with the party only slightly wounded outside the chamber with the Jarl and his wife.
Now, I'm all for them succeeding, but this frost giant is no stooge. I think there is something going on between the Jarl and the other giant clans. I believe he suspects that the giants are being used by the dark elves as pawns, and had the ancient temple to the Elder Elemental God collapsed in order to somehow regain control over his frost giants. However, he will probably escape with his wife (and the treasure) to the fire giants instead of letting the party kill him. This would leave the bulk of the lair's females and young behind, as almost all of the males are now slain.
But perhaps there is an alternative. I could have the cleric (with permanent tongues ability) talk with the Jarl and convince him to break the alliance in exchange for a ransom. In return the party would spare the lives of the remaining giants if the Jarl told them the easiest way to the Fire Giant Lair. The party knows the giants likely took the dragon hoard for their own, so they are looking to get that back - and since it was "found" treasure, the giants are likely to part with the bits they can't use. Then again, these giants are Chaotic Evil and will likely screw the party over somehow if they don't watch out.
I'm thoroughly enjoying this romp against the giants - almost as much as I did as a 13-year old playing a human fighter in my first actual campaign ever! The by-the-book timekeeping is really giving the campaign a realistic feel and the players are making more intelligent choices given the information they have. I can't wait to see how they are going to get all that treasure back to Quasqueton, including the horde of the two white dragons they killed on the mountainside the last time they treked home....
The last session, I think, truly displayed the power at the beck and call of these high-level characters. The party magic-user can fire off 6 magic missiles nearly every round, doling out a consistent 12-30 points of damage. She also has a wand of fire, a wand of frost, a wand of conjuration, and 2 charges left in the Ruling Staff of Amun-Re (thunderclap ability only) as well as a robe of blending, ring of protection +4, cloak of protection +2, and now bracers of AC 3 traded to her by the cleric (who is now wearing magical plate mail). This provides a -3 AC....for a magic-user.... She also typically carries 2 fireballs, 2 slows, a hold monster or two, and several strength spells cast upon the party henchmen to make them more formidable.
The druid particularly impressed me. He is now able to summon an earth elemental AND a fire elemental, as well as casting his usual fire-based spells like produce fire, heat metal, and wall of fire, all of which cause creatures to burn and catch on fire! During this last session, his random roll for the fire elemental produced 3 salamanders! Not to mention that he also has with him 3 1st level druid servants, most of whom carry slings, and with extra spells to boot!
The party ranger is ridiculously powerful against giants, given his damage bonus of +9 per hit, and the fact that he attacks 3/2 due to his level. He lost his dancing falchion, but has replaced it with a +2 scimitar which he wields with a magic shield for a better armor class.
The party cleric is currently being run as an NPC because the player is away for the time being. She has been relegated to healer role and also takes protection spells and party boosters like bless and prayer.
Each of the henchmen have their own roles to play in the party. Most of these are straight fighters, but two are a dwarf and halfling who have excellent ACs against giants. The other wields a +3 longsword and has a low AC with magical plate and shield (his employer hooked him up). Two of the henchmen are now 7th level fighters and get 3/2 attacks. The halfling, although he is stuck at 6th level, owns a short sword of speed (once belonging to Markessa) which allows a first strike each round he begins next to an opponent in addition to his normal attack. As I mentioned before, all three fighter henchmen are strengthened by magic to be in the 18-percentile range of strength (most of the time).
They took out one frost giant guard at the entrance to the Jarl's personal chambers, two additional guards outside the Jarl's bedchamber, and 3 frost giants that came to investigate the noise from the Caverns of the Carls. The magic-user used a fireball in the large chamber (one of the only times this is a good idea to cast underground) while the druid simply commanded his elemental creatures to swarm in and attack (the salamander's were happy about the fireball, while the earth elemental simply sunk down into the earth to wait for anyone to approach the druid and the rest of the party in the rear). It took them only about 10 rounds total to complete the battle, and most of that was simply opponents moving into range. The Jarl sent out his winter wolves to attack the party, but they died shortly after emerging from the curtain. We ended with the party only slightly wounded outside the chamber with the Jarl and his wife.
Now, I'm all for them succeeding, but this frost giant is no stooge. I think there is something going on between the Jarl and the other giant clans. I believe he suspects that the giants are being used by the dark elves as pawns, and had the ancient temple to the Elder Elemental God collapsed in order to somehow regain control over his frost giants. However, he will probably escape with his wife (and the treasure) to the fire giants instead of letting the party kill him. This would leave the bulk of the lair's females and young behind, as almost all of the males are now slain.
But perhaps there is an alternative. I could have the cleric (with permanent tongues ability) talk with the Jarl and convince him to break the alliance in exchange for a ransom. In return the party would spare the lives of the remaining giants if the Jarl told them the easiest way to the Fire Giant Lair. The party knows the giants likely took the dragon hoard for their own, so they are looking to get that back - and since it was "found" treasure, the giants are likely to part with the bits they can't use. Then again, these giants are Chaotic Evil and will likely screw the party over somehow if they don't watch out.
I'm thoroughly enjoying this romp against the giants - almost as much as I did as a 13-year old playing a human fighter in my first actual campaign ever! The by-the-book timekeeping is really giving the campaign a realistic feel and the players are making more intelligent choices given the information they have. I can't wait to see how they are going to get all that treasure back to Quasqueton, including the horde of the two white dragons they killed on the mountainside the last time they treked home....
Monday, October 9, 2017
AD&D: Against the Giants - Musings
We're back to our regularly scheduled campaign (already in progress) and have had a good run for the past couple of sessions. The party just reached the throne room of the Jarl in G2: GLACIAL RIFT OF THE FROST GIANT JARL, and I had to rearrange a few things based on what transpired before. Here are some details and thoughts about the module and how my party is proceeding...
First off, the party ran into the two white dragons some time ago. They ran afoul of the male who breathed on the party not once, but twice. This killed half the party (including the 0-level lantern bearer)! The rest of the party fell back to the entranceway and hid behind the boulder, taking shots when they could while the cleric valiantly held the dragon at bay. They were able to take out the male dragon with spells and melee but were in no shape to continue. When they moved forward to retrieve the fallen, the magic-user spotted the female moving in to investigate. They hastily threw up a wall of force, collected the dead, and hid out in one of the abandoned rooms of the glacier.
Meanwhile, the female dragon whacked her head on the force field, then shook off the pain and roared in rage at the sight of her dead mate. She took off, climbing the wall to the hole in the ceiling that opened on the rift. The dragon circled the rift for a few hours before retiring to the lair. Eventually, the giants checked in on the dragons (for feeding time) and found the male dead and the female agitated (these are non-speaking dragons that serve as mounts for the Jarl and his wife).
Once the party was feeling safe, they used their djinn servant to help transport the deceased back to their safe cave outside the glacier. Here they began the week long task of raising the dead, healing, and resting from the ordeal. Fully three characters died (plus one hireling), and all were raised successfully. The dwarf henchman, who had died several times before, is starting to see his Constitution drop to perilous levels. But his loyalty remains high, so he remains in the party (besides, where else would he go?). During the rest period, the magic-user periodically used a crystal ball to scry on the dragon and see what it was up to. She got various scenes of the Jarl's wife riding the dragon, searching the glacier for signs of the attackers. She also saw some feeding times, and the host of frost giants moving the dragon hoard to a more protected location (the Jarl's throne room, amidst the stone columns supporting the immense cavern). So the dragon cave was now abandoned, and the female white dragon was safe and secure, watched over by the frost giant guards of the throne room.
Several days later, after resting from their ordeal, some of the party members continued to explore the lower levels, but left the dragon cave alone and always scanned looking for the dragon. The last session, I rolled for random encounters and got one. Now, there are no inhabited encounter areas remaining in the upper level of the glacier (the party is very thorough), so the only thing left to encounter was the dragon! It was the first encounter roll of the day (early morning, with the winds whipping the snow across the glacier), and the dragon was clawing her way up the glacier walls to gain some height in order to take flight. It so happened she climbed up the same side and the same location as the party entering along the ledge on the eastern side of the rift.
The druid went to cast wall of fire and the others scrambled into the tunnels as the dragon breathed. We rolled simultaneous initiative, and the spell and breath went at the same time. So I reduced the effect of the cold breath by the damage done to the dragon, but still managed to catch three party members in the effect. They retreated quickly (as did the dragon) and hid out in the tunnels for a while, afraid to expose themselves on the ledge outside. Eventually they got brave enough to continue forward (meaning they crossed the ledges after much investigation) and headed down to the lower level.
Now the dragon, burned and in pain, fled back down to the lower level and back to the throne room. While the party hid and snuck around, she was licking her wounds. This also put the giants on high alert, although they had no idea what happened to the dragon (can't speak, remember?).
The party made its way to the western end of the main tunnel in the lower level and encountered 4 giants on guard in a roundish cave. Three engaged the party while one ran off to alert the guards. This set in motion the largest giant combat I have run in a while.
Now, the fact that lighting in the lower level is non-existent hurts the party. Plus, they rely on infravision and a continual light lantern to see. I know that all monsters in AD&D are supposed to have infravision of some sort (hokey, but hey, that's what Gygax said), but I decided that the giants have something akin to low-light vision (hence, the fire-beetle cages throughout their inhabited areas). The light was a big hindrance to the party - they could not see the entire cavern and the giants had them dead in their sights. But the stone columns hindered the archers from getting a clear shot at the party which mostly remained at the entrance. I had some of the carls from the other cave move in with two polar bears in order to prevent the party from attacking the Jarl. The dragon was waiting on its treasure pile in the center of the room.
We ran a good 20 rounds of combat between 4 giants at the entrance with 2 polar bears, the white dragon, and another 4 giant guards coming from the south. The Jarl was warned to prepare for battle and the other carls moved to protect the women and young. I got a lot of good hits on the party, dropping the magic-user with an unseen ballista missile, and nearly killing off the party fighters with a final dragon breath before the dragon died an untimely death (pinning her killer under her fallen body). One of the carls fled to save his own ass (chaotic evil, gotta love it!), but all the others were slain. The western ballista archer never got a good bead on a target, but no one knows he was even there! The party quickly retreated to the entrance, healed those they could back to consciousness, then fled the rift as quickly as possible (running into a random encounter at the top of the glacier - some camped ogres which they killed in a few rounds).
It seems that the conditions of the combat have me wondering what the giants will do next. The party has returned to the safe cave, rested, and returned to the glacier to retrieve treasures left behind on previous forays (the magic items frozen into the mural wall on the east, and the clear quartz gems in the pool of water on the west). They spoke to the snow leopards and are on good terms with them (druids, go figure), so they were left alone. All the male and female giants left below will likely make a last ditch stand to defend their home, but I'm toying with the idea of letting the Jarl and his wife flee to the fire giants through the magic teleportal behind their suite. The hill giants never had a chance, but things look grim for the frost giants, who are very aware of the situation with the hill giants (due to the cloud giant who escaped to warn them, and the stone giant females and young that were allowed to live and leave).
If this happens, the party may well defeat the frost giants and find nothing of value remaining to loot. I'm not sure what the frost giant Jarl should take with him, but I'm assuming that the invisible chest of goodies by the teleportal and maybe some trusted guards and his winter wolves would be all he needs. I've never had something like this occur in all my years of DMing, and it would be cool to actually use the tactics laid out in the module (for a change). I'm debating on whether or not to vacate the lower levels completely and have a mass exodus of frost giants to Snurre's Halls. To me, this seems counterintuitive, since the frost and fire giants are more likely to fight among themselves than cooperate, especially since the fire giants are in their element and the frost giants would be weakened. It would make sense for the frost giants to protect the women and young, but the males would likely also seek to escape certain death (chaotic evil = "save thy own ass first").
I don't know if the party will even locate the teleportal, but even if they do, it's unlikely they will seek to use it (because they have no idea where it leads) and will instead loot the giant lair for all they can get and then head home with all their treasure they stored in the safe cave. I've already given them XP for the treasure stored there (as suggested in the module), so we'll have some sessions of treasure removal to contend with before they move on to G3 HALLS OF THE FIRE GIANT KING. I'm tempted to add in a side trek against the ogre magi. I see them as assassination agents of the giants (and the dark elves) who could infiltrate Quasqueton (the party's base of operations) invisibly and attack the party when they least expect it. I'd like to keep this adventure going. The players are having a good time, even if they are wary about getting in too deep. I don't think D1-3 is an option for continued adventuring for them (they hate railroaded plots, and it seems that the drow will be beaten back). However, if I can keep Eclavdra alive and have her retreat as stated in the module, then I have given them incentive to chase down the dark elves and eliminate their threat once and for all! The druid in the party might simply decide to collapse the tunnels behind the retreating drow and be done with it. But knowing them, they never leave an enemy alive if they can help it! Besides, I've had dark elves pop up in the past - in the desert of desolation under the slaver's guild, directing frost giant attacks outside of Reedle, and involved with Zelligar at Quasqueton (detailed in his journals only). The dark elves should prove to be a threat enough for the party to take on.
Now, since this campaign is set in Mystara, I've toyed with using Shadow Elves instead. However, I much prefer the drow designed by Gygax (and the Elder Elemental God patron of Eclavdra) to the tragic shadow elves led by Rafiel. I'm not going to use Q1: QUEEN OF THE DEMONWEB PITS unless I highly modify it to be less of a cartoon-like romp and more like a terror-inspiring epic into the Abyss (as it should have been!). As I've stated in the past, the connection between D3 and Q1 is tenuous at best. Lolth had no involvement with the giants (Eclavdra was involved with the Elder Elemental God, not Lolth), and she might even applaud the party for eliminating that splinter cell of renegade drow from her Vault. She is a demon, though, and is not likely to allow them to live regardless, so perhaps Lolth now has designs on the weakened EEG to take over his power (and perhaps the EEG now has need of adventurers to protect him from the ambitious demoness)...
I just thought of something! What if the Elder Elemental God is Arak of the Hundred Eyes (from dungeon module B3)? They have already encountered this extraplanar entity and dealt him a blow in Haven. Perhaps the whole giant uprising was his doing, and now the PCs will have a chance to put an end to his meddling in the Prime Material Plane once and for all! Eliminating Lolth from the equation means completely redoing the whole premise of the adventure - but if Eclavdra is slain, the other drow will seek safety in numbers, perhaps recanting their worship of Arak and returning to Lolth in order to save their asses from the party! This could work, and allows me to introduce other enclaves of Arak worshippers in the underworld. I'm already blaming the "day without magic" at the end of the year as an effect of "Arak's Eye." This could really turn into a mind-stunning epic conclusion to a very long AD&D campaign! Now I need to work out the particulars.....
I like linking the demons and gods of AD&D to Earth deities. Perhaps Lolth's true name is Ariadne (of Greek Mythology fame), and Arak of the Hundred Eyes would be Argus (guardian of the Garden of the Hesperides), also a figure from the Greek myth of Hercules' 12 labors. Of course, they have transformed into new forms over the centuries and gained and lost power several times, but these entities are immortal and always seeking to increase their power across the endless planes. yes, this could work out quite well in the end, especially since I use Greek/Roman deities for Thyatis.
First off, the party ran into the two white dragons some time ago. They ran afoul of the male who breathed on the party not once, but twice. This killed half the party (including the 0-level lantern bearer)! The rest of the party fell back to the entranceway and hid behind the boulder, taking shots when they could while the cleric valiantly held the dragon at bay. They were able to take out the male dragon with spells and melee but were in no shape to continue. When they moved forward to retrieve the fallen, the magic-user spotted the female moving in to investigate. They hastily threw up a wall of force, collected the dead, and hid out in one of the abandoned rooms of the glacier.
Meanwhile, the female dragon whacked her head on the force field, then shook off the pain and roared in rage at the sight of her dead mate. She took off, climbing the wall to the hole in the ceiling that opened on the rift. The dragon circled the rift for a few hours before retiring to the lair. Eventually, the giants checked in on the dragons (for feeding time) and found the male dead and the female agitated (these are non-speaking dragons that serve as mounts for the Jarl and his wife).
Once the party was feeling safe, they used their djinn servant to help transport the deceased back to their safe cave outside the glacier. Here they began the week long task of raising the dead, healing, and resting from the ordeal. Fully three characters died (plus one hireling), and all were raised successfully. The dwarf henchman, who had died several times before, is starting to see his Constitution drop to perilous levels. But his loyalty remains high, so he remains in the party (besides, where else would he go?). During the rest period, the magic-user periodically used a crystal ball to scry on the dragon and see what it was up to. She got various scenes of the Jarl's wife riding the dragon, searching the glacier for signs of the attackers. She also saw some feeding times, and the host of frost giants moving the dragon hoard to a more protected location (the Jarl's throne room, amidst the stone columns supporting the immense cavern). So the dragon cave was now abandoned, and the female white dragon was safe and secure, watched over by the frost giant guards of the throne room.
Several days later, after resting from their ordeal, some of the party members continued to explore the lower levels, but left the dragon cave alone and always scanned looking for the dragon. The last session, I rolled for random encounters and got one. Now, there are no inhabited encounter areas remaining in the upper level of the glacier (the party is very thorough), so the only thing left to encounter was the dragon! It was the first encounter roll of the day (early morning, with the winds whipping the snow across the glacier), and the dragon was clawing her way up the glacier walls to gain some height in order to take flight. It so happened she climbed up the same side and the same location as the party entering along the ledge on the eastern side of the rift.
The druid went to cast wall of fire and the others scrambled into the tunnels as the dragon breathed. We rolled simultaneous initiative, and the spell and breath went at the same time. So I reduced the effect of the cold breath by the damage done to the dragon, but still managed to catch three party members in the effect. They retreated quickly (as did the dragon) and hid out in the tunnels for a while, afraid to expose themselves on the ledge outside. Eventually they got brave enough to continue forward (meaning they crossed the ledges after much investigation) and headed down to the lower level.
Now the dragon, burned and in pain, fled back down to the lower level and back to the throne room. While the party hid and snuck around, she was licking her wounds. This also put the giants on high alert, although they had no idea what happened to the dragon (can't speak, remember?).
The party made its way to the western end of the main tunnel in the lower level and encountered 4 giants on guard in a roundish cave. Three engaged the party while one ran off to alert the guards. This set in motion the largest giant combat I have run in a while.
Now, the fact that lighting in the lower level is non-existent hurts the party. Plus, they rely on infravision and a continual light lantern to see. I know that all monsters in AD&D are supposed to have infravision of some sort (hokey, but hey, that's what Gygax said), but I decided that the giants have something akin to low-light vision (hence, the fire-beetle cages throughout their inhabited areas). The light was a big hindrance to the party - they could not see the entire cavern and the giants had them dead in their sights. But the stone columns hindered the archers from getting a clear shot at the party which mostly remained at the entrance. I had some of the carls from the other cave move in with two polar bears in order to prevent the party from attacking the Jarl. The dragon was waiting on its treasure pile in the center of the room.
We ran a good 20 rounds of combat between 4 giants at the entrance with 2 polar bears, the white dragon, and another 4 giant guards coming from the south. The Jarl was warned to prepare for battle and the other carls moved to protect the women and young. I got a lot of good hits on the party, dropping the magic-user with an unseen ballista missile, and nearly killing off the party fighters with a final dragon breath before the dragon died an untimely death (pinning her killer under her fallen body). One of the carls fled to save his own ass (chaotic evil, gotta love it!), but all the others were slain. The western ballista archer never got a good bead on a target, but no one knows he was even there! The party quickly retreated to the entrance, healed those they could back to consciousness, then fled the rift as quickly as possible (running into a random encounter at the top of the glacier - some camped ogres which they killed in a few rounds).
It seems that the conditions of the combat have me wondering what the giants will do next. The party has returned to the safe cave, rested, and returned to the glacier to retrieve treasures left behind on previous forays (the magic items frozen into the mural wall on the east, and the clear quartz gems in the pool of water on the west). They spoke to the snow leopards and are on good terms with them (druids, go figure), so they were left alone. All the male and female giants left below will likely make a last ditch stand to defend their home, but I'm toying with the idea of letting the Jarl and his wife flee to the fire giants through the magic teleportal behind their suite. The hill giants never had a chance, but things look grim for the frost giants, who are very aware of the situation with the hill giants (due to the cloud giant who escaped to warn them, and the stone giant females and young that were allowed to live and leave).
If this happens, the party may well defeat the frost giants and find nothing of value remaining to loot. I'm not sure what the frost giant Jarl should take with him, but I'm assuming that the invisible chest of goodies by the teleportal and maybe some trusted guards and his winter wolves would be all he needs. I've never had something like this occur in all my years of DMing, and it would be cool to actually use the tactics laid out in the module (for a change). I'm debating on whether or not to vacate the lower levels completely and have a mass exodus of frost giants to Snurre's Halls. To me, this seems counterintuitive, since the frost and fire giants are more likely to fight among themselves than cooperate, especially since the fire giants are in their element and the frost giants would be weakened. It would make sense for the frost giants to protect the women and young, but the males would likely also seek to escape certain death (chaotic evil = "save thy own ass first").
I don't know if the party will even locate the teleportal, but even if they do, it's unlikely they will seek to use it (because they have no idea where it leads) and will instead loot the giant lair for all they can get and then head home with all their treasure they stored in the safe cave. I've already given them XP for the treasure stored there (as suggested in the module), so we'll have some sessions of treasure removal to contend with before they move on to G3 HALLS OF THE FIRE GIANT KING. I'm tempted to add in a side trek against the ogre magi. I see them as assassination agents of the giants (and the dark elves) who could infiltrate Quasqueton (the party's base of operations) invisibly and attack the party when they least expect it. I'd like to keep this adventure going. The players are having a good time, even if they are wary about getting in too deep. I don't think D1-3 is an option for continued adventuring for them (they hate railroaded plots, and it seems that the drow will be beaten back). However, if I can keep Eclavdra alive and have her retreat as stated in the module, then I have given them incentive to chase down the dark elves and eliminate their threat once and for all! The druid in the party might simply decide to collapse the tunnels behind the retreating drow and be done with it. But knowing them, they never leave an enemy alive if they can help it! Besides, I've had dark elves pop up in the past - in the desert of desolation under the slaver's guild, directing frost giant attacks outside of Reedle, and involved with Zelligar at Quasqueton (detailed in his journals only). The dark elves should prove to be a threat enough for the party to take on.
Now, since this campaign is set in Mystara, I've toyed with using Shadow Elves instead. However, I much prefer the drow designed by Gygax (and the Elder Elemental God patron of Eclavdra) to the tragic shadow elves led by Rafiel. I'm not going to use Q1: QUEEN OF THE DEMONWEB PITS unless I highly modify it to be less of a cartoon-like romp and more like a terror-inspiring epic into the Abyss (as it should have been!). As I've stated in the past, the connection between D3 and Q1 is tenuous at best. Lolth had no involvement with the giants (Eclavdra was involved with the Elder Elemental God, not Lolth), and she might even applaud the party for eliminating that splinter cell of renegade drow from her Vault. She is a demon, though, and is not likely to allow them to live regardless, so perhaps Lolth now has designs on the weakened EEG to take over his power (and perhaps the EEG now has need of adventurers to protect him from the ambitious demoness)...
I just thought of something! What if the Elder Elemental God is Arak of the Hundred Eyes (from dungeon module B3)? They have already encountered this extraplanar entity and dealt him a blow in Haven. Perhaps the whole giant uprising was his doing, and now the PCs will have a chance to put an end to his meddling in the Prime Material Plane once and for all! Eliminating Lolth from the equation means completely redoing the whole premise of the adventure - but if Eclavdra is slain, the other drow will seek safety in numbers, perhaps recanting their worship of Arak and returning to Lolth in order to save their asses from the party! This could work, and allows me to introduce other enclaves of Arak worshippers in the underworld. I'm already blaming the "day without magic" at the end of the year as an effect of "Arak's Eye." This could really turn into a mind-stunning epic conclusion to a very long AD&D campaign! Now I need to work out the particulars.....
I like linking the demons and gods of AD&D to Earth deities. Perhaps Lolth's true name is Ariadne (of Greek Mythology fame), and Arak of the Hundred Eyes would be Argus (guardian of the Garden of the Hesperides), also a figure from the Greek myth of Hercules' 12 labors. Of course, they have transformed into new forms over the centuries and gained and lost power several times, but these entities are immortal and always seeking to increase their power across the endless planes. yes, this could work out quite well in the end, especially since I use Greek/Roman deities for Thyatis.
Monday, August 21, 2017
Dungeons & Dragons Through the Versions - Part 20 (Final)
Well, it's been a little over a year and a half since our regular campaign went on hiatus and we began a great experiment to see which version of the D&D game best fits our concept of the campaign we would like to play. Although the conditions of the experiment kept changing (different campaign worlds, different character classes and races, and differing numbers of players), I think we were able to come to a definite conclusion about a few things. Each system will be rated on the scale of: VERY FUN, FUN, INDIFFERENT, NOT FUN, NO FUN AT ALL.
BASIC D&D: This was our first attempt at something outside of the players' comfort zone. I think it went well, and the players all had a great time. We used the upper levels of the moathouse from T1 as the adventure for this version of the game. The combats went rather smoothly, even though I took extra time to explain everything that happened each round. The combat system was streamlined and easy to work with. The lack of rules is actually a benefit since the players are less concerned with specifics and able to enjoy themselves more. Character creation took a little over an hour, and most of that was me explaining the differences between this and AD&D, the players making gear selections, and coming up with names. The rulebook is well-organized and we were able to find most rules without much problem. My biggest problem was getting them to think in simpler terms with fewer options.
RATING = FUN
ADVANCED D&D DOGMA: This version took us back to AD&D, but using all the rules strictly as written, inconsistencies and all. We used the lower level of the moathouse for this version with different characters (all given enough XP to make a fighter 2nd midway to 3rd level). We found that multi-classed characters suffer from a lack of power that is disturbing at the lowest levels. Mortality rates are high, but the action is very exciting. Keeping track of large combats can be a bit of a chore, but the work is well worth it. I think this version was the most fun...and also the most disheartening. We spent a long time getting all the details of the characters right (a full 5 hour session to make sure 3 players had all their characters complete), but then spent a long time in town interacting with the populace. This, to me, is the essence of why T1 is such a great module. It gives the players a base home in which to invest their time and interest. If the DM makes the NPCs memorable and worth interacting with, then the whole thing comes alive. The party died once in the beginning to the zombies; we rebooted and continued since the cleric was unaware of how turning worked in this version of the game. They did very well until the final encounter, which I think is way too hard for a party of 1st level characters. The rulebooks are the biggest problem for this version of the game. The rules are spread out between three books (or more!) and rules were constantly being added in modules and supplements over the life of this version. We restricted our run to the core three books (PHB, DMG, and MM) and had trouble locating some specific rules during play.
RATING = FUN
2nd EDITION AD&D: I used the Forgotten Realms as the setting for this adventure, and used the adventure the Haunted Halls of Eveningstar. In retrospect, I think that this was a bad move. I should have stuck with Greyhawk and used the Temple of Elemental Evil for 3rd level characters or higher instead of breaking the groove we had. We also should have tried keeping the same characters, but since those died in the last encounter, I felt a change was in order (plus half-orcs don't exist in 2nd edition as PCs). The party made more characters than usual, two players running 2 characters each, so we had 5 PCs this time. The module was not very well written or presented, and it seemed that the tricks and traps were deadlier than a 1st level dungeon should have had. The players were frustrated by choke points that prevented their advancement into the dungeon. They had spent one full session (plus a little more) to complete their characters. They were not impressed with non-weapon proficiencies. The strange thing is that I had run these players in 2nd edition before, but they had no memory of it. In the end, the players aborted the adventure because they just weren't getting anywhere. I don't think this version got a fair shake. The rulebooks were a bit better organized than 1st edition, but the rules were written almost verbatim from 1E, inconsistencies and all, with little or no editing!
RATING = NO FUN
3rd EDITION D&D: I decided that pre-made modules would not work with this group so I made up a quick scenario to see how this version of the game worked with my own homebrew campaign of Sturmgard. The character creation took about 1 full session because only some of the players had already played this version of the game. All the fiddly math was a bit much for one of the players. We played this version only a few sessions because I wanted to move quickly through the versions. The players tend to drag their feet even when I explain that we're not making these characters to keep forever. The scenario was a bit hard but rewarding. The characters survived, although they did take their lumps. I think this version played well, but I would have preferred a more neutral GREYHAWK type adventure. Players enjoyed the new character classes and how much more they could do even as 1st level characters. The rulebooks, although well organized, were quite dense and hard to locate specific information. The rules are so integrated that changing one stat affects a host of other stats. Creating encounters is a CHORE for DMs - one that I was not happy to re-experience.
RATING = FUN
4th EDITION D&D: I had a hard time explaining the rules on this one. The game is so different from anything resembling D&D that it was really hard to explain how it all related. The character choices were not based on intelligent decisions, but rather on following a template blindly. The character types selected were probably not optimal for the adventure and they were only a party of 3 characters, instead of the recommended 5. That was my fault, as I ran the adventure, Keep on the Shadowfell, straight from the book, without regard for the shortage of players. If we had the full complement of players, this could have actually worked better. As it was, we ran the first encounter twice, then, by the final encounter with kobolds the players had had enough! They kept dying to creatures who could stymie their powers easily. I think the players just felt embarrassed being beaten up by kobolds.... We aborted under player request and never got past the second encounter! The rulebooks were organized strangely, and I found myself constantly flipping back and forth. The plethora of powers, each with a few paragraphs of important data, would get to be a nightmare at higher levels.
RATING = NO FUN AT ALL
PATHFINDER: Although technically not D&D, it was a direction that D&D 3.5 went after the great diaspora of D&D fans. This time we had 5 players and a full complement of character types. I ran the old module Citadel by the Sea by Sid Fisher from DRAGON Magazine #78(?). The concept was sound and showcased all the things I wanted to highlight in the system. The players enjoyed role-playing their wacky characters and had a blast running the combats. I got more positive feedback on this adventure than any others we ran. The system had some very good points and ran well out of one rulebook. Characters were strong, even at 1st level, and had access to many powers that they could use continually. Level advancement was graded so one could run on a fast track, a normal level of xp, or a slow track. Many of the rules were optional. I have to say that this was one of my favorites to run, but took a lot of behind the scenes work to stat out all the monsters (most of whom were classed). This is one of the downfalls of the 3.5 or Pathfinder systems - DM burnout! The rulebooks are the best organized that I think I've ever seen. I knew just were to go to find each and every rule I needed, and as I said, the rules were mostly in the Core Rulebook.
RATING = VERY FUN
5th EDITION D&D: I did not run this adventure, it was run by one of the other players. She had experience in the 5th edition system as both player and DM, so I jumped at the opportunity to play. I found the character creation took a long time, seeing as the players had more decisions to make and additional role-playing options to incorporate. The system seems fairly robust and easy to run, but there seemed to be something lacking to me. The scenario we ran was not usual D&D, but a Ravenloft horror scenario. Therefore we were isolated and experiencing opponents that were dumbed down for our level. The XP system seemed a bit arbitrary - I never really looked at it myself, but it seemed that XP levels were assigned rather than actual points tallied for what we accomplished. Also, the creatures for the scenario were way out of our league! I suppose that highlights 5th edition's ability to use monsters of any level in any scenario? The at-will spells were very helpful to the party, but I can see this being a problem when used against the party. Despite all these boosts to the characters, we still managed to lose one character to the final encounter with a critical hit one-shot death. Talk about brutal! I didn't see anyone clamoring to continue running this scenario. The books had minimal information on some things (like skills) and too much information on others (backgrounds and other RP bits) for our tastes. Also, the digital versions were very hard to read due to the fonts and colors used. Rulebooks should be legible, not artistic expressions that conceal text and blur page numbers!
RATING = INDIFFERENT
I had planned to try two other clones - Basic Fantasy RPG and Castles & Crusades, but the players decided that they had had enough. We all just wanted to return to our characters stuck in the middle of G2 for the past year and a half!
The whole point of this experiment was to do what 5th edition should have done - take the best pieces of each system and stitch them into a coherent campaign setting and rule set. I like to think of it as Flesh Golem D&D (or FrankenD&D). We found nothing of use in 4th edition. 2nd edition was similarly useless as little more than a re-write of the 1st edition rules. 5th edition had its strengths, but those were mostly related to what I house-ruled in my own campaign already. Basic, 3rd edition, and dogma 1st edition rules were the most fun, even though the players found some bits useless or restricting. Everyone agreed that Pathfinder was by far the superior system. We had the most fun with this system.
So, to recap:
✰✰✰✰✰ PATHFINDER
✰✰✰✰ BASIC D&D, AD&D DOGMA, 3RD EDITION D&D
✰✰✰ 5TH EDITION D&D
✰✰ 2ND EDITION AD&D
✰ 4TH EDITION D&D
It is important to note that the players have taken to calling 4th edition "The Edition That Shall Not Be Named!" Whenever it comes up in conversation, they all groan and shake their heads. It had that much of an effect!
In the end, the players decided that our house-ruled AD&D 1st edition campaign is the system that best fits their needs for their current characters. Perhaps, if this campaign ever ends, we will create characters to adventure in Pathfinder, but I don't see this ending any time soon. It would have been better I think to have played through the versions as they came out, giving us longer time to experience the flaws and merits of each. No system is perfect, even Pathfinder (with its lack of carrying capacities for containers), and in the end it comes down to the preferences of the players and the DM as to which system is the best fit for them.
BASIC D&D: This was our first attempt at something outside of the players' comfort zone. I think it went well, and the players all had a great time. We used the upper levels of the moathouse from T1 as the adventure for this version of the game. The combats went rather smoothly, even though I took extra time to explain everything that happened each round. The combat system was streamlined and easy to work with. The lack of rules is actually a benefit since the players are less concerned with specifics and able to enjoy themselves more. Character creation took a little over an hour, and most of that was me explaining the differences between this and AD&D, the players making gear selections, and coming up with names. The rulebook is well-organized and we were able to find most rules without much problem. My biggest problem was getting them to think in simpler terms with fewer options.
RATING = FUN
ADVANCED D&D DOGMA: This version took us back to AD&D, but using all the rules strictly as written, inconsistencies and all. We used the lower level of the moathouse for this version with different characters (all given enough XP to make a fighter 2nd midway to 3rd level). We found that multi-classed characters suffer from a lack of power that is disturbing at the lowest levels. Mortality rates are high, but the action is very exciting. Keeping track of large combats can be a bit of a chore, but the work is well worth it. I think this version was the most fun...and also the most disheartening. We spent a long time getting all the details of the characters right (a full 5 hour session to make sure 3 players had all their characters complete), but then spent a long time in town interacting with the populace. This, to me, is the essence of why T1 is such a great module. It gives the players a base home in which to invest their time and interest. If the DM makes the NPCs memorable and worth interacting with, then the whole thing comes alive. The party died once in the beginning to the zombies; we rebooted and continued since the cleric was unaware of how turning worked in this version of the game. They did very well until the final encounter, which I think is way too hard for a party of 1st level characters. The rulebooks are the biggest problem for this version of the game. The rules are spread out between three books (or more!) and rules were constantly being added in modules and supplements over the life of this version. We restricted our run to the core three books (PHB, DMG, and MM) and had trouble locating some specific rules during play.
RATING = FUN
2nd EDITION AD&D: I used the Forgotten Realms as the setting for this adventure, and used the adventure the Haunted Halls of Eveningstar. In retrospect, I think that this was a bad move. I should have stuck with Greyhawk and used the Temple of Elemental Evil for 3rd level characters or higher instead of breaking the groove we had. We also should have tried keeping the same characters, but since those died in the last encounter, I felt a change was in order (plus half-orcs don't exist in 2nd edition as PCs). The party made more characters than usual, two players running 2 characters each, so we had 5 PCs this time. The module was not very well written or presented, and it seemed that the tricks and traps were deadlier than a 1st level dungeon should have had. The players were frustrated by choke points that prevented their advancement into the dungeon. They had spent one full session (plus a little more) to complete their characters. They were not impressed with non-weapon proficiencies. The strange thing is that I had run these players in 2nd edition before, but they had no memory of it. In the end, the players aborted the adventure because they just weren't getting anywhere. I don't think this version got a fair shake. The rulebooks were a bit better organized than 1st edition, but the rules were written almost verbatim from 1E, inconsistencies and all, with little or no editing!
RATING = NO FUN
3rd EDITION D&D: I decided that pre-made modules would not work with this group so I made up a quick scenario to see how this version of the game worked with my own homebrew campaign of Sturmgard. The character creation took about 1 full session because only some of the players had already played this version of the game. All the fiddly math was a bit much for one of the players. We played this version only a few sessions because I wanted to move quickly through the versions. The players tend to drag their feet even when I explain that we're not making these characters to keep forever. The scenario was a bit hard but rewarding. The characters survived, although they did take their lumps. I think this version played well, but I would have preferred a more neutral GREYHAWK type adventure. Players enjoyed the new character classes and how much more they could do even as 1st level characters. The rulebooks, although well organized, were quite dense and hard to locate specific information. The rules are so integrated that changing one stat affects a host of other stats. Creating encounters is a CHORE for DMs - one that I was not happy to re-experience.
RATING = FUN
4th EDITION D&D: I had a hard time explaining the rules on this one. The game is so different from anything resembling D&D that it was really hard to explain how it all related. The character choices were not based on intelligent decisions, but rather on following a template blindly. The character types selected were probably not optimal for the adventure and they were only a party of 3 characters, instead of the recommended 5. That was my fault, as I ran the adventure, Keep on the Shadowfell, straight from the book, without regard for the shortage of players. If we had the full complement of players, this could have actually worked better. As it was, we ran the first encounter twice, then, by the final encounter with kobolds the players had had enough! They kept dying to creatures who could stymie their powers easily. I think the players just felt embarrassed being beaten up by kobolds.... We aborted under player request and never got past the second encounter! The rulebooks were organized strangely, and I found myself constantly flipping back and forth. The plethora of powers, each with a few paragraphs of important data, would get to be a nightmare at higher levels.
RATING = NO FUN AT ALL
PATHFINDER: Although technically not D&D, it was a direction that D&D 3.5 went after the great diaspora of D&D fans. This time we had 5 players and a full complement of character types. I ran the old module Citadel by the Sea by Sid Fisher from DRAGON Magazine #78(?). The concept was sound and showcased all the things I wanted to highlight in the system. The players enjoyed role-playing their wacky characters and had a blast running the combats. I got more positive feedback on this adventure than any others we ran. The system had some very good points and ran well out of one rulebook. Characters were strong, even at 1st level, and had access to many powers that they could use continually. Level advancement was graded so one could run on a fast track, a normal level of xp, or a slow track. Many of the rules were optional. I have to say that this was one of my favorites to run, but took a lot of behind the scenes work to stat out all the monsters (most of whom were classed). This is one of the downfalls of the 3.5 or Pathfinder systems - DM burnout! The rulebooks are the best organized that I think I've ever seen. I knew just were to go to find each and every rule I needed, and as I said, the rules were mostly in the Core Rulebook.
RATING = VERY FUN
5th EDITION D&D: I did not run this adventure, it was run by one of the other players. She had experience in the 5th edition system as both player and DM, so I jumped at the opportunity to play. I found the character creation took a long time, seeing as the players had more decisions to make and additional role-playing options to incorporate. The system seems fairly robust and easy to run, but there seemed to be something lacking to me. The scenario we ran was not usual D&D, but a Ravenloft horror scenario. Therefore we were isolated and experiencing opponents that were dumbed down for our level. The XP system seemed a bit arbitrary - I never really looked at it myself, but it seemed that XP levels were assigned rather than actual points tallied for what we accomplished. Also, the creatures for the scenario were way out of our league! I suppose that highlights 5th edition's ability to use monsters of any level in any scenario? The at-will spells were very helpful to the party, but I can see this being a problem when used against the party. Despite all these boosts to the characters, we still managed to lose one character to the final encounter with a critical hit one-shot death. Talk about brutal! I didn't see anyone clamoring to continue running this scenario. The books had minimal information on some things (like skills) and too much information on others (backgrounds and other RP bits) for our tastes. Also, the digital versions were very hard to read due to the fonts and colors used. Rulebooks should be legible, not artistic expressions that conceal text and blur page numbers!
RATING = INDIFFERENT
I had planned to try two other clones - Basic Fantasy RPG and Castles & Crusades, but the players decided that they had had enough. We all just wanted to return to our characters stuck in the middle of G2 for the past year and a half!
The whole point of this experiment was to do what 5th edition should have done - take the best pieces of each system and stitch them into a coherent campaign setting and rule set. I like to think of it as Flesh Golem D&D (or FrankenD&D). We found nothing of use in 4th edition. 2nd edition was similarly useless as little more than a re-write of the 1st edition rules. 5th edition had its strengths, but those were mostly related to what I house-ruled in my own campaign already. Basic, 3rd edition, and dogma 1st edition rules were the most fun, even though the players found some bits useless or restricting. Everyone agreed that Pathfinder was by far the superior system. We had the most fun with this system.
So, to recap:
✰✰✰✰✰ PATHFINDER
✰✰✰✰ BASIC D&D, AD&D DOGMA, 3RD EDITION D&D
✰✰✰ 5TH EDITION D&D
✰✰ 2ND EDITION AD&D
✰ 4TH EDITION D&D
It is important to note that the players have taken to calling 4th edition "The Edition That Shall Not Be Named!" Whenever it comes up in conversation, they all groan and shake their heads. It had that much of an effect!
In the end, the players decided that our house-ruled AD&D 1st edition campaign is the system that best fits their needs for their current characters. Perhaps, if this campaign ever ends, we will create characters to adventure in Pathfinder, but I don't see this ending any time soon. It would have been better I think to have played through the versions as they came out, giving us longer time to experience the flaws and merits of each. No system is perfect, even Pathfinder (with its lack of carrying capacities for containers), and in the end it comes down to the preferences of the players and the DM as to which system is the best fit for them.
Monday, August 14, 2017
Dungeon & Dragons Through the Versions - Part 19
Well, we finally made it to the end. This should be the 2nd to last post on "Dungeons & Dragons Through the Versions." This time, though, I was granted a reprieve and allowed to be a PLAYER (something that has not happened in almost 15 years).
We sat down to make 5th edition D&D characters a few weeks ago. We knew nothing of the adventure we would be running, only that we could only select choices from the Player's Handbook. This was fine, since the goal of this mission is to see how the base rules function without any bells or whistles. I actually jumped the gun (since I own the books) and made my character ahead of time. The others took to the internet for the rules and worked out their characters during the first session (as we have come to do through this process). In the end, the party was a mixed bag:
No rogue in this mix (not a great idea, but not planned). I went with Protection for my Martial type, the other fighter went for Great Weapon type, and the paladin went with protection also. The cleric took the doman of Life and the sorcerer went with Dragon sorcery. It took a long while to explain the concept of "proficiency" to people who come from a Weapon/Non-weapon Proficiency system. We had to tell them that Proficiency replaces the numbers on the charts for the stuff we used to be good at. The different saving throws also threw them for a loop. However, being back to the basic classes was heartening!
The next week we began the scenario, as we were pulled into....oh no! RAVENLOFT! Eeek!
Yes, Count Strahd von Zarovich had struck again, although this time I think it wasn't his fault. No, this time we found ourselves on the foggy streets of Barovia, deserted except for a pair of children in the middle of the street. We approached and learned that they were terrified of something in the basement. They were dodgy on where their parents were, and since there was no one else in this ghost town, we figured that we would enter the house and find out what was going on.
The lower levels of the place were immaculate but creepy. The place obviously belonged to some wealthy people. It was also completely empty - like totally devoid of anything alive. We spent the entire session exploring one empty room after another, even those in the upstairs. We ended just before going up to the 3rd floor.
The next session we encountered a suit of armor that tried to kill my dwarf fighter! We managed to defeat it but still could not find anything alive in the place. I was again attacked by a spectre defending a stillborn baby in a crib and nearly slain were it not for the quick actions of the party cleric. Another level up we found some bedrooms where the children were found again after they disappeared on us. We were starting to piece together the mystery of the place. By the end of this session we magically made 2nd level!
The next session had us finally locate a means of getting to the basement - from the attic no less! A secret spiral stair led down through the house to a deep cellar crypt. Here were crypts for the family; the mother and father were tucked away in their crypts (we did not disturb these), but the children (who we previously learned died in their rooms upstairs and were now ghosts inhabiting the house) were never buried. Also, the stillborn baby brother was never interred here although there was a crypt. We decided then and there to bury the bones of the children in their crypts (after we learned that the girl had possessed our cleric!). Once that was done we explored some more, until my dwarf fighter walked into a ghoul ambush! I got clobbered but not paralyzed, and retreated to let the others handle the undead. Saving throws in the game seem overused, but I suppose they had to change some of the mechanics. We walked around a bit and explored the basement, looking for the chanting that we could not find. I did manage to locate a spiked pit... did I mention we had no rogue in the group?
On the final session we located a stairway leading down to a chamber housing 13 strange relics with side passages leading to a bunch of holding cells for prisoners and a submerged chamber blocked by a heavy portcullis. We managed to lift the portcullis and enter the submerged chamber, only to be confronted with floating apparitions in the chamber (which appeared after I jumped onto the central dais). This set in motion the shambling mound in the cave-like alcove across the way! While it was forming up out of the mass of rotting vegetation on the floor, everyone took up defensive positions while Torinn went to confront it! Elander and Evek threw several spells at it but most were ineffective or of reduced effectiveness. Weapons seems to work well enough, although we suspect that they weren't doing full damage. Torinn was hitting it for all he was worth, as was Varnash and later myself (hey, it takes a long time to enter melee as a dwarf when you're across a chamber). Then Varnash took a critical hit after being wounded....and died instantly! He was brought down to his negative hp value by the crit and died there on the spot, no save possible! Ouch! We managed to finish off the shambling mound after a few more rounds, but it was a tough battle. After that we tried to leave the house, but the house wouldn't let us leave! It bricked up its windows and tried to kill us with poisonous smoke from the chimneys and pendulum blades at the doors. It took some doing, but we located a shortcut to the main floor lounge and then Torinn smashed through one wall with his maul (releasing a horde of rats which were easily overcome). Evek was poisoned by the smoke but he managed to fight through the pain and leapt through the blades guarding the exit. The rest of us followed, making saves to avoid being poisoned, Torinn hauling Varnash's body. I was the last out of the house, leaping mightily through the blades. Once outside, the fog lifted and the children could be seen waving from the upstairs windows. We had managed to survive a stint in Ravenloft!
By the end of the session we all made 3rd level, except Varnish who was deader than a door nail. The experience seemed...unfulfilling. Our DM was great, the players seemed to have a good time, but the game lacked a certain quality that I've come to expect in my D&D games. Maybe I've just been a DM too long. I try to solve problems from the DM perspective. I tried to role-play as much as possible, but since the scenario was atypical of normal D&D dungeons, I felt like my character's backstory and all those other role-playing elements that seemed so important during character creation were just glossed over. Now, I know that this was a one-shot, but it just seemed like all that time was wasted during character creation.
OK. So, we have now concluded the run of all the versions of D&D (plus Pathfinder), and it seems that, like the Star Trek films, there is a pattern of like and dislike. I found 5th edition to be better than 4th edition. But it seems that the characters are still way overpowered compared to the monsters. What I did not like about the scenario (which is a D&D module) is the monster selection for a 1st-3rd level group. I mean, come on....a SPECTRE?? a SHAMBLING MOUND?? These were high-level creatures only meant to oppose those characters of upper levels (8th+) in earlier editions. I was a bit shocked to encounter them at 2nd level. I believe that the experience point advancement is too fast as well. After about 2 encounters we all leveled up. If that occurred in original D&D, Gygax would never have laughed at the 40th level characters taking on gods! I dislike the firm Forgotten Realms direction they took the game (again, make it generic for core rules). I like the variations permitted to the characters, but I also found that most players would necessarily gravitate towards an "optimal build" (like they do in all those MMORPGs). I would give 5th edition a solid 3 out of 5 stars. It seems to be very coherent in theory and after first looks, but implementation seemed a bit off to me. There were so many things in the game that seemed like a gloss-over (mainly because players would either ignore the rules anyway, or they didn't fit the play style).
I wanted to play a standard race (dwarf) and a standard class (fighter) because a good game allows those to shine, without being overshadowed by the sub-classes or add-ons. It seemed that our fighters did just as well if not better than the paladin. The paladin could not match the cleric's healing either. but what he did do well no one else in the party could do. The sorcerer seemed to have too many spells, but again this is coming from my previous expectations. I'm sure that if I was playing a spellcaster over 5 sessions in the same adventure, I would not want to run out of spells! We only rested once during those 5 sessions, but it seemed like we were able to complete the adventure rather fast. Granted, 5 sessions to go from 1st to 3rd may seem slow to some people, but we like to take our time, we were learning a new system, and we tend to think before acting. The system seemed to reward some of what we did, but penalized us for taking our time. Either that or our DM was trying to shuffle us along to complete the adventure due to some unknown time-frame restriction. Perhaps if I played a rogue or wizard I would have had a different opinion of the system. It is definitely something that I would try again, perhaps even run.
It dismays me that the only adventures I have access to buy are for levels 1-20. Are the lower levels so fast that it isn't worth writing a full adventure for them? It also seems strange (still) to not stop and train. But this version, like 2nd edition and on, seems more story driven and glosses over some details (like training) that were inherent in the earlier game.
Next time, I'll try and go through all our experiences and see where my players stand and where we're going with my original campaign. The reason we did this experiment for the past year or more is to see which version of the game best matches our concept of fun and excitement. Granted, this is tainted somewhat by the learning curve inherent in trying a new game, but the basic premise of the game changed little (except during 4th). Ideally, I wanted to see what parts we could use to cobble together our own form of D&D. So far, though, 1st edition still seems to be the popular choice.
We sat down to make 5th edition D&D characters a few weeks ago. We knew nothing of the adventure we would be running, only that we could only select choices from the Player's Handbook. This was fine, since the goal of this mission is to see how the base rules function without any bells or whistles. I actually jumped the gun (since I own the books) and made my character ahead of time. The others took to the internet for the rules and worked out their characters during the first session (as we have come to do through this process). In the end, the party was a mixed bag:
- Grumbold, male dwarf fighter 1
- Evek, male half-elf sorcerer 1
- Elander, female dwarf cleric 1
- Torinn, male dragonborn (bronze) fighter 1
- Varnash, male dragonborn (copper) paladin 1
No rogue in this mix (not a great idea, but not planned). I went with Protection for my Martial type, the other fighter went for Great Weapon type, and the paladin went with protection also. The cleric took the doman of Life and the sorcerer went with Dragon sorcery. It took a long while to explain the concept of "proficiency" to people who come from a Weapon/Non-weapon Proficiency system. We had to tell them that Proficiency replaces the numbers on the charts for the stuff we used to be good at. The different saving throws also threw them for a loop. However, being back to the basic classes was heartening!
The next week we began the scenario, as we were pulled into....oh no! RAVENLOFT! Eeek!
Yes, Count Strahd von Zarovich had struck again, although this time I think it wasn't his fault. No, this time we found ourselves on the foggy streets of Barovia, deserted except for a pair of children in the middle of the street. We approached and learned that they were terrified of something in the basement. They were dodgy on where their parents were, and since there was no one else in this ghost town, we figured that we would enter the house and find out what was going on.
The lower levels of the place were immaculate but creepy. The place obviously belonged to some wealthy people. It was also completely empty - like totally devoid of anything alive. We spent the entire session exploring one empty room after another, even those in the upstairs. We ended just before going up to the 3rd floor.
The next session we encountered a suit of armor that tried to kill my dwarf fighter! We managed to defeat it but still could not find anything alive in the place. I was again attacked by a spectre defending a stillborn baby in a crib and nearly slain were it not for the quick actions of the party cleric. Another level up we found some bedrooms where the children were found again after they disappeared on us. We were starting to piece together the mystery of the place. By the end of this session we magically made 2nd level!
The next session had us finally locate a means of getting to the basement - from the attic no less! A secret spiral stair led down through the house to a deep cellar crypt. Here were crypts for the family; the mother and father were tucked away in their crypts (we did not disturb these), but the children (who we previously learned died in their rooms upstairs and were now ghosts inhabiting the house) were never buried. Also, the stillborn baby brother was never interred here although there was a crypt. We decided then and there to bury the bones of the children in their crypts (after we learned that the girl had possessed our cleric!). Once that was done we explored some more, until my dwarf fighter walked into a ghoul ambush! I got clobbered but not paralyzed, and retreated to let the others handle the undead. Saving throws in the game seem overused, but I suppose they had to change some of the mechanics. We walked around a bit and explored the basement, looking for the chanting that we could not find. I did manage to locate a spiked pit... did I mention we had no rogue in the group?
On the final session we located a stairway leading down to a chamber housing 13 strange relics with side passages leading to a bunch of holding cells for prisoners and a submerged chamber blocked by a heavy portcullis. We managed to lift the portcullis and enter the submerged chamber, only to be confronted with floating apparitions in the chamber (which appeared after I jumped onto the central dais). This set in motion the shambling mound in the cave-like alcove across the way! While it was forming up out of the mass of rotting vegetation on the floor, everyone took up defensive positions while Torinn went to confront it! Elander and Evek threw several spells at it but most were ineffective or of reduced effectiveness. Weapons seems to work well enough, although we suspect that they weren't doing full damage. Torinn was hitting it for all he was worth, as was Varnash and later myself (hey, it takes a long time to enter melee as a dwarf when you're across a chamber). Then Varnash took a critical hit after being wounded....and died instantly! He was brought down to his negative hp value by the crit and died there on the spot, no save possible! Ouch! We managed to finish off the shambling mound after a few more rounds, but it was a tough battle. After that we tried to leave the house, but the house wouldn't let us leave! It bricked up its windows and tried to kill us with poisonous smoke from the chimneys and pendulum blades at the doors. It took some doing, but we located a shortcut to the main floor lounge and then Torinn smashed through one wall with his maul (releasing a horde of rats which were easily overcome). Evek was poisoned by the smoke but he managed to fight through the pain and leapt through the blades guarding the exit. The rest of us followed, making saves to avoid being poisoned, Torinn hauling Varnash's body. I was the last out of the house, leaping mightily through the blades. Once outside, the fog lifted and the children could be seen waving from the upstairs windows. We had managed to survive a stint in Ravenloft!
By the end of the session we all made 3rd level, except Varnish who was deader than a door nail. The experience seemed...unfulfilling. Our DM was great, the players seemed to have a good time, but the game lacked a certain quality that I've come to expect in my D&D games. Maybe I've just been a DM too long. I try to solve problems from the DM perspective. I tried to role-play as much as possible, but since the scenario was atypical of normal D&D dungeons, I felt like my character's backstory and all those other role-playing elements that seemed so important during character creation were just glossed over. Now, I know that this was a one-shot, but it just seemed like all that time was wasted during character creation.
* * * * *
OK. So, we have now concluded the run of all the versions of D&D (plus Pathfinder), and it seems that, like the Star Trek films, there is a pattern of like and dislike. I found 5th edition to be better than 4th edition. But it seems that the characters are still way overpowered compared to the monsters. What I did not like about the scenario (which is a D&D module) is the monster selection for a 1st-3rd level group. I mean, come on....a SPECTRE?? a SHAMBLING MOUND?? These were high-level creatures only meant to oppose those characters of upper levels (8th+) in earlier editions. I was a bit shocked to encounter them at 2nd level. I believe that the experience point advancement is too fast as well. After about 2 encounters we all leveled up. If that occurred in original D&D, Gygax would never have laughed at the 40th level characters taking on gods! I dislike the firm Forgotten Realms direction they took the game (again, make it generic for core rules). I like the variations permitted to the characters, but I also found that most players would necessarily gravitate towards an "optimal build" (like they do in all those MMORPGs). I would give 5th edition a solid 3 out of 5 stars. It seems to be very coherent in theory and after first looks, but implementation seemed a bit off to me. There were so many things in the game that seemed like a gloss-over (mainly because players would either ignore the rules anyway, or they didn't fit the play style).
I wanted to play a standard race (dwarf) and a standard class (fighter) because a good game allows those to shine, without being overshadowed by the sub-classes or add-ons. It seemed that our fighters did just as well if not better than the paladin. The paladin could not match the cleric's healing either. but what he did do well no one else in the party could do. The sorcerer seemed to have too many spells, but again this is coming from my previous expectations. I'm sure that if I was playing a spellcaster over 5 sessions in the same adventure, I would not want to run out of spells! We only rested once during those 5 sessions, but it seemed like we were able to complete the adventure rather fast. Granted, 5 sessions to go from 1st to 3rd may seem slow to some people, but we like to take our time, we were learning a new system, and we tend to think before acting. The system seemed to reward some of what we did, but penalized us for taking our time. Either that or our DM was trying to shuffle us along to complete the adventure due to some unknown time-frame restriction. Perhaps if I played a rogue or wizard I would have had a different opinion of the system. It is definitely something that I would try again, perhaps even run.
It dismays me that the only adventures I have access to buy are for levels 1-20. Are the lower levels so fast that it isn't worth writing a full adventure for them? It also seems strange (still) to not stop and train. But this version, like 2nd edition and on, seems more story driven and glosses over some details (like training) that were inherent in the earlier game.
Next time, I'll try and go through all our experiences and see where my players stand and where we're going with my original campaign. The reason we did this experiment for the past year or more is to see which version of the game best matches our concept of fun and excitement. Granted, this is tainted somewhat by the learning curve inherent in trying a new game, but the basic premise of the game changed little (except during 4th). Ideally, I wanted to see what parts we could use to cobble together our own form of D&D. So far, though, 1st edition still seems to be the popular choice.
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