Stranger Things (Season 5)

A nice Thursday Thanksgiving filled with Turkey and the traditional fixings was followed by a binge-fest of the new Stranger Things season by my family...something my daughter had been eagerly anticipating since the last season of Wednesday wrapped up. We (the fam) stayed up till roughly 2am this morning watching the season in its entirety...although my wife begged out about 1ish. 

As usual it was pretty good.

I have only the following few things to say:

#1 The music contained no glaring anachronisms that I noticed. Tiffany's album did, indeed, come out in 1987 (I remember being in Mrs. Kearnan's class at the time and remember it was about this time I was completely done with pop music...I was heavily into Def Leppard's Hysteria at the time). So that goes in the "good" column.

#2 No glaring D&D mistakes until the last damn episode where they work an incredibly obnoxious 3rd edition reference into the conversation. Just so awful. And while most folks probably won't notice, for me it completely breaks my suspension of disbelief and makes me want to throw things at the screen...do your damn research, morons. However, I kept this to myself so as not to spoil the show for everyone, stewing in silence.

#3 Millie Bobby Brown is still great. 

#4 Actually everyone is pretty good; the cast is quite likable, the performances believable (mostly) and...I don't know..."heartfelt?" But the energy seems to be a tic down...I think the writing is starting to wear thin. It feels like everyone is ready to move on from this story...on to bigger and better things (film) or, at least, different things from Stranger Things. Maybe touring the comic con circuit is getting old? I don't know. Maybe it's just the writing.

#5 I'd really like to see a film of Elric of Melnibone with Finn Wolfhard in the titular role. He needs a couple more years under his belt, but he has the "wolfish" look I've always associated with the character...spent a little time messing around with AI modifying photos of the kid and I am more convinced than ever that he's perfect for the show. Of course, I hadn't realized till just now that someone had already acquired the rights to the literature with an idea to turning it into a television series. Of course, considering this was "news" six year ago, one can only speculate what's happened....

#6 The AI in episode #1 isn't great. But this is the way things are going to be.

All right, that's it. Later.

Let Slip The Dogs Of War (Part II)

In which I continue to describe the games I ran at Cauldron 2025, spoiling secrets and providing insights into the mind of a geezer DM...

SATURDAY NIGHT BLOCK: Ship Of Fate

The rousing success of Caul’s Dark Citadel…as well as the final three runnings of the tourney module in Saturday Block II...led to dinner being a boisterous affair, especially at my table. Everyone at Cauldron was in a fine mood and, plied with copious amount of alcohol, a lot of money ended up being shucked out at the auction, with much backslapping, congratulating, and toasting of each other.

A lot of palinka. A lot of whisky.

Thus the set-up for the so-called “night block:” a 9pm to WHENEVER affair (no time limit). At Cauldron 2023 I had skipped this (to my later chagrin), instead unwinding and bantering a bit before calling it an early night. THIS year, I had originally left the slot open hoping to get into one of Prince’s epic night-festivals…and then he decided not to run a game in the block! “Sorry, man, there are games I want to play in,” is he wrote to me last month.

SO determined not to miss out, I decided I would be the one to fire up a big-ass, high level adventure into the wee hours. Enter Ship of Fate, a high level extravaganza I wrote for Prince’s NAP II contest (get it HERE if you like).

Ship of Fate is quite obviously inspired by (and heavily based on) Michael Moorcock’s Elric story Sailor on the Sea of Fate. If you haven’t read it…um, why not? Elric stories are pretty much required reading for high level AD&D play, especially Elric of Melnibone, Sailor, and Stormbringer. But, yeah, I know some people think D&D is supposed to top out around 7th level. *sigh*

Good read.

I digress…Ship of Fate is an adventure designed to be played by from four to 16 players, four of whom take the part of high-level lady and gents (the “Heroes”) and 12 of whom are mid (7th – 10th) level “Companions.” The idea being that each Hero has three Companions. The kicker is that all 16 of these characters were once actual player characters, played either by myself of by my friends…however, I’ll note that – with regard to the high-level guys – they’ve been considerably “toned down” from their original stature and abilities. *AHEM*

I have only had the chance to run Ship of Fate one time…for my home group…and we did not finish more than five or six encounters due to an abbreviated session. Alas, we never returned to it because, being a one-off with pre-gens, it held a lot less “spice” for us than using our regular, organically grown PCs; such is life in a living campaign. Because of this, I wasn’t exactly sure how the adventure would play out. Certainly it was much too big for a standard 4-hour time slot. But we were in NIGHT BLOCK, baby! There aren’t any rules! Go all night like when we were 14 and high on caffeinated drinks!

[it’s possible I was a little drunky when I decided to register this game, pre-Cauldron] 

So, unsure of how I was even going to seat 16 people around the table I’d been assigned, I found myself somewhat relieved when “only” nine people showed up to the game. And then while handing around the pre-gens I immediately lost one of the four “Heroes” (the 12th level fighter)…noooo!

[I might have been a little drunky…again]

Fortunately, Tom still had his 14th level fighter pre-gen from Settembrini’s earlier high-level game. I knocked two levels off, reduced the hit points to a reasonable amount (they were set something like 2 points below max), and axed a magic item or two, but most of the character was allowed to stay.

And we were off!  Just organizing such a group was a bit of an ordeal, but it wasn’t too long before they got it together and decided to send the thief into the first cavern and…

Oh, wait…what’s the point of the adventure?

So, in Ship of Fate the heroes are sailed across the Dunkle Zee…a kind of phantom ocean that connects the various planes of the multiverse…to an island nexus where two sibling wizards (brother and sister) are using a rift in the space-time fabric to drain power from all the planes in existence, gradually snuffing them out. Players are supposed to find the building at the center of the island, kill the wizards, and then fire the building using special magic firebrands designed for the purpose. The ship has a cargo hold full of gold for the players after success in their quest and the wizards themselves are likely to have treasure, too. However, they also have many minions and protectors.

SO…big ass building (like the length of three football fields). Players did spend a flare trying to burn the place down with the wizards in it, but the structure…a monstrous, twisted behemoth that looked something like an amalgamation of alien machine and melted giant humanoids…simply extinguished the flame itself. Which the players had been told it would do which is why they needed kill the wizards FIRST. Amateurs.

A couple entrances suggested themselves to the PCs…a large cave, overhung by vines OR a large stairway leading up. They sent the thief down into the cave where he was soon filled by needles from the needleman forest inhabiting the cavern. Retreating, the party had the wizard nuke the plants with a fireball before proceeding. Into the troglodyte caves.

Those proved nightmarish to try to map, let alone explore in a coherent fashion [it’s possible the players were a little drunky] and the group eventually decided to give it up and go up the grand staircase to the “main gate” (as they called it). At this point, James (the guy playing the 12th level cleric) gets a brilliant idea: “Why don’t I use a find the path spell to locate the wizards?” Can’t…the spell can’t target living beings.

“What about the nexus rift? We know it’s there…and the wizards are likely to be with it!” That seemed reasonable and the spell immediately starts pulling the cleric (who leads the party) the way of the shortest route to the object desired.

Which worked pretty well for a while, as it ignored or helped bypass several encounters, while revealing secret doors and hidden passages. Great stuff; great use of available resources! Plus, it lasted a good long time (12 turns!) meaning they were covering a LOT of ground. No sweat, guys, we got this!

Then it led them through the cavern of the shadow demons.

Mean.

Now, I'd guess there are a lot of us for whom the phrase "shadow demon" conjures to mind the little toadie/spy who follows Venger around the D&D cartoon like a whipped dog. Yeah, no. Shadow demons are highly intelligent, vicious 7+ hit die creatures that are 90% undetectable and can leap and claw and tear at opponents while also having the abilities to dowse lights (darkness 15' radius), cast fear, and magic jar opponents. In this particular instance (not a mandatory encounter, by the way...just the shortest path to the wizards!), it turned into a nightmare scenario for the PCs. Their lights were dowsed, and then the attacks from the shadow demons ended up preventing casters from turning on the lights: every time they lost initiative...or won by too low an initiative amount....they'd get attacked and have their spells interrupted. Fighters were swinging away in darkness and hitting their companions. Two characters blew their saves against fear attacks and fled into the darkness, never to be seen again (one of those blundered into a room full of spectres and was sucked dry in the darkness; I think the other just went to bed). 

They eventually managed to overcome the demons, but it was a brutal toll: only three PCs (all Heroes) had survived. Sonka (now playing Tom's fighter, as he decided to go to bed), Ollie (as Lucky the 12th level magic-user), and James continued on, the find the path spell still functioning. They made it to the nexus chamber, but no wizard was present (50% chance, and missed the roll). However, some minor exploring found her in her workroom, toiling away at constructing flesh golems, with three completed. No surprise, everyone attacked!

Again...pretty brutal encounter. The cleric was felled by a fistful of magic missiles, the wizard badly damaged while the fighter tried to fight his way through flesh golems and mirror images. Tired of having his spells interrupted, the wizard backed off to use his scroll on monster summoning VI, conjuring a pair of weretigers...who did not appear for a couple rounds. Meanwhile, the fighter was stunned with a power word and the flesh golems proceeded to curb stomp him in a fashion unseen in Germany for four score years.

[too soon?]

However, Ollie/Lucky managed to hold on and the were-tigers finally showed up. Something happened to neutralize Giz-Kala (though that part is hazy...perhaps yet another hold person spell?) and the golems bereft of an order-giver allowed the much reduced party to escape, the fighter left with three hit points to his name. 

Deciding "stealth" was now the order of the day, the two utilized a potion of polymorph and a polymorph self spell to change into rodents, with which they finished their exploration of the main chamber, were-tigers in tow. They found the other wizard, laying in a comatose torpor of slumber, and slit his throat. "Now how the hell do we get out of here?!" Neither had been mapping.

It was decided to risk teleporting to the exterior, despite having only observed the island terrain once. Fortunately, Lucky was high enough level to take the beefy fighter with him. The die roll was successful and they fired the dungeon from outside, the flames quickly consuming the structure, and declaring victory, agreeing to split the gold between them. The time was after 2:30am, the players still standing thanked me, and headed off to bed, as I cleaned the table and turned off the lights of the floor (we were the last group still going).

I did not bother to reveal how much treasure they'd left behind.

*****

SUNDAY BLOCK I: Ybarra Florin

Our final session of Cauldron, the "brunch block" took place only after breakfast and the award ceremony had been completed. Some of us (*ahem*) had continued to drink into the wee hours of the morning, by which I mean 5:50am. Given one hour sleep to work with I was...not in great shape.

Thus it was a good thing I chosen an easy adventure to run! The original idea had been to run my I3: Pharaoh re-work, Desert of Kartha, but it's not anywhere close to being finished, let alone prepped and cut to fit a four hour time block (I would have been running the thing with a few sketchy notes). So, realizing my ass would be dragging at the end of a long three days, I decided to go with something I've run several times before: Ybarra Florin.

Again, this NOT really a "Becker original." Kenneth St. Andre penned a short adventure called Tower of Yrkath Florn for the first edition of his Stormbringer RPG. It's a nice little introductory scenario, one I've run two or three times over the decades I've owned the game. About three years ago, I converted it to AD&D; but it's mostly unchanged in terms of layout and premise. Mostly.

A wealthy patron hires the party to go check out the ruins of a dead Melnibonean sorcerer, and bring back any relics you find. Of course, "Melnibonean" in my campaign world means "high elf," all of whom seem to have a Spanish bent to them (hence, the name change. Don't ask me why...).

[I'm not even the first one to do "Spanish elves;" see Aaron Allston's Principalities of Glantri]

The ruined tower is two levels of a once three-story structure that's been wrecked by an earthquake...in my world it's on the Olympic Peninsula, right off Dabob Bay near Quilcene. The St. Andre version of the adventure has a family of clackars...winged gorilla creatures...lairing in the lower portion of the dungeon. But, of course, AD&D doesn't have this monster...

[other than in the 1980 DDG with the Melnibonean Mythos, page 88: they have HD 8, 2x 1d12 damage claws (+rending), immunity to fear and surprise, etc., etc.]

...so I didn't something else for my conversion. Now, when I say "fur, feces, and feathers," does anything D&Dish spring to mind immediately? Of course it does.

I ran this adventure when we were introducing Maceo's younger brother, Winston, to the AD&D game. Of course, he was ripped to shreds. Later, their family took them to see the new Dungeons & Dragons movie and Winnie told his mom, "That's the thing that killed me! An owl bear! See I told you they were scary!"

ANYway, they're scary for adults players, too. Our group (another eight stalwart souls) brought not one but TWO paladins to the adventure. The first paladin was killed by the pair of juveniles in the first room of the main hall. As the rest of the party maneuvered to lure the creatures out into a killing area, the Papa Bear came out of a different door to investigate the sounds of battle (and smell of blood) that had disturbed its slumber. Things got very dicey for the group very fast, despite having a ranger who kept negating the "completely surprised" rolls of the party (without the ranger, it could've got real ugly...)

However, give bulk of the credit to Ludwig the magic-user for saving the party's bacon. Ludwig's pre-gen had a wand of wonder and he wasn't afraid to use it, luckily getting decent results throughout the session! A stinking cloud and failed saves from the 'bears allowed the party to move outside the tear gas and missile the critters to death before they had a chance to clear their nasal passages...a pretty fortunate outcome, all things considered.  After slaying the mother 'bear (combining a slow spell from the wand along with an insect swarm from Paul the druid), the party claim to the family's nest of eggs and young, all worth a pretty penny on the open (elven) market.

Then it was up to the second level and Old Ybarra's workroom, hidden behind a magical door. The door is unlocked but electrically jolts individuals crossing its threshold for some pretty gnarly damage; fortunately, it was Michal the (last) paladin who took the blast, thereby rendering the thing inert. Inside lurks a demon...the same creature that killed Ybarra two centuries before when an earthquake cracked the pentagram that contained it. For AD&D purposes, I used a Type II demon, which is about the right power level, despite being vulnerable to normal (iron) weapons, thanks to an excellent armor class and magic resistance. Using it was nice (it's been a while since I've dropped any demons in an adventure) and I should probably use them more often. In the end, it was defeated without inflicting a single casualty (although it did force both the paladin and druid to flee the tower in terror with its cause fear ability)...and while in retrospect it probably should have caused more casualties through the liberal use of teleport and gate, I will not blame my lack of tactical badassery on "going soft." The fact of the matter is: I forgot about these abilities.

One hour of sleep, remember?

SO...an easy adventure to run and only a light challenge (in my opinion) for the players, thanks to a little good fortune and a heavily hung over DM. And that's okay...the con had been a looong three days (not counting the 5,000 miles of air travel), and I was happy with how the session wrapped up. I even took the time to calc out the experience and treasure take for all surviving party members...per their request. It wasn't a bad haul for the ADDKON characters.

[to be continued...]

Also mean...

Sorcery I Like

Well, what do you know: a quiet moment around the old home front, for a change.

I'll be honest: I've (perhaps) had the opportunity to blog recently, just not the spirit. Just lots of things over-occupying my brain/attention. It gave me some peace to simply withdraw from the whole blog-o-sphere for a few days, rather than tread water with throwaway posts and comments. Not that this isn't (perhaps) a throwaway post, but there's enough quiet right now that I can sit and type-type-typity-type.

Mmm. With cup of hot coffee at hand.

Yesterday (or maybe the day before) I had the chance to read Clark Ashton Smith's second Xiccarph story, The Flower-Women (to give credit where credit's due, I only learned about Xiccarph after Maliszewski wrote about it a week or so ago). I like Smith's stuff, though I've read precious little of it (perhaps a dozen of his short stories). His work is reminiscent of other writers, though I recognize he was probably the influence on them, rather than the reverse. But his stuff is (usually) punchy and short, perhaps only slowed down by an expansive vocabulary that requires me to look up two-three words with every reading. 

[quick: who can tell me the definition of odalisque off the top of your head?]

I also like this bit about Smith's writing, aptly summed up by James in his (previously mentioned) post:

Smith is almost unique in the history of pulp fantasy for sympathizing with his evil sorcerers, or at least presenting their thoughts and perspectives sympathetically. It's what sets him apart from both Lovecraft, whose antagonists' motives are largely inscrutable, and Howard, whose dark magicians are never portrayed as anything but villains to be cut down.

I think it's fair to say that, for much of my life, I was one of those who tended to "root for the bad guy" both in story and film. Not always, but often enough. Many times over the years I found myself wishing the villain would triumph, the hero would be cut down (or disgraced), the evil plot would unfold according to its nefarious plan. However, this was certainly more the case when I was a kid...having (in later life) viewed films and such where evil did triumph, I confess that the result is generally unsatisfying.

[perhaps my initial rooting for bad was fueled by too much sympathy for Wile E. Coyote and Sylvester the Cat. My wife, to this day, HATES Tweety Bird, and I can't say it's difficult to understand why]

*ahem*

Anyway, black-hearted sorcerers have long been "my cup o tea;" I think it's fair to say that's part of my fandom of Moorcock's Elric stories, despite the general whininess of their protagonist (for me, his constant bitching-moaning is balanced out by his dark sense of humor and occasional bursts of action). But I like necromancers and black magicians of all sorts; when it comes to sorcerous characters, I become a BIG champion of the flawed, antihero type...a cardboard stereotype that I usually loathe in other genres (action films and supers comics, to name two).

I guess I just like my magic a little transgressive? I mean, sorcery transgresses the laws of reality, so shouldn't a sorcerer transgress cultural/societal norms (the laws of man)?

Eh. Not trying to get too deep here. The heart wants what the heart wants. The funny thing is this: with regard to Dungeons & Dragons, I have long said that my personal play style lines up far better with the fighter type than any other archetype. Even when playing another class (bards, clerics...even thieves) I tend to run my character like a fighter. Bold. Brazen. Hacky-slashy. My old DM famously precluded me from playing anything but a fighter in the last campaign she ran, because I 'always acted like a fighter anyway.' 

I've played a lot of too-loud "war priests" over the years.

Magic-user was the last class I was interested in playing...so much so that, with regard to D&D, I'd never run one as a PC until a Con game in 2019.

[okay, okay...I did play ONE wizard back in a SINGLE session of 3E/D20 years ago, but I gave him feats like "martial weapon proficiency" so that I could use swords, etc. Natch, I was doing Gandalf...and the DM quit the game in disgust when he saw I hadn't taken an "optimal build" for the character. One of the events that led to my disillusionment with that particular edition...]

HOWEVER, while I've generally stayed away from the magic-user class over the years, upon reflection (after reading The Flower-Women) I realized I actually had a hankering to play just such a character...a proper D&D (or, rather, AD&D) -style sorcerer. An old school magic-user. 

That character I played back in the 2019 convention? Probably the best time / most fun I've had as a player in a loooong time. And just to re-tell an old saw (for folks who don't want to read the old post):

• We were using Holmes Basic rules, MINUS the wonky combat (no double attack daggers!).
• PCs were rolled randomly at the table (3d6) in order; I took magic-user only because I didn't have the stats for anything else.
• My one spell was protection from evil and it was expended in the first room of the dungeon.
• I spent the majority of the three hour time slot with 1 hit point (due to being wounded) and no spells.
• I was only slain by another party member at the end of the session for (reasons).

And it was still a great time. Despite my character's fragility and lack of "usefulness" (sleep spells, charm spells, combat ability, etc.) I was able to contribute and...many times...take the lead on our eight-man band of misfit adventurers. I used the character's multiple languages and negotiating ability, I used poles and oil and torches, I preceded others into trap doors and tight spaces (okay...probably a little foolhardiness there, but not much to lose in a con game), and I was able to help direct attacks...and throw the occasional dagger...such that we didn't lose a single party member over the course of the session. And that's with 1st level characters and zero healing magic.

I was the only magic-user in the party.

The challenge of playing such a character is/was fairly exhilarating. Trying to find ways to be useful (without getting killed) was far more challenging than other (D&D) games I'd played: games where I had lots of hit points and/or good armor and a feeling of invincibility (at least for the first hit or so). I can only imagine the fun that could be had with the increased effectiveness (more spells) and survivability of playing such a character in the Advanced version of the game...it's not difficult to visualize the manifestation of an "imperious sorcerer" the likes of Maal Dweb. Gradually, of course.

The main difficulty, as always, is finding the right Dungeon Master. *sigh*

I've messed around over the years with a lot of different design tweaks for the D&D magic-user. Most of these have ended up being nothing but junk. What follows are my current "house rules" for the magic-user class in my home game (if not otherwise stated, rules are as per 1E PHB/DMG):

• Magic-users begin the game with three 1st level spells, randomly determined (per the DMG). 
• There is no read magic spell; magic-users can read magic-user spell scrolls automatically.
• All spells known may be cast once per day; a particular spell may not be cast more than once per day (no multiple memorizations of a single spell).
• New spells are added after training upon reaching a new level of experience; new spells are presumed in the cost for training. Preferred spells are chosen by player and then diced for based on Intelligence (per PHB). Spells from spell scrolls and spell books may not be added to the magic-user's repertoire of spells...a magic-user knows what he/she knows.
• Spell books are part talisman, part grimoire, part journal/scientific notes. Study of the spell book is needed to regain spells. Spell books can be prohibitively expensive to replace; losing (stealing) one's spell book is akin to losing (stealing) one's power. Magic-users will endeavor to recover lost (stolen) spell books (and will punish thieves with great vengeance, if possible).

We've been using these rules for a while now (a couple years) and they work for us; i.e. there haven't been any complaints. I'm sure long-time AD&D players will recoil at the thought of NOT having the option of adding "extra" spells to their spell book; in practice, it's been a non-issue (and it's a lot more convenient to simply HAVE the spells available then to need to search them out). The bonus spells at 1st level provide additional effectiveness to the new character, and the randomness and single memorization clause ensures creative use of even the most "worthless" spell (all spells are precious commodities to be treasured by the first level magic-user). 

We have yet to see a thief reach 10th level (or any high level illusionists/rangers) so it's hard to say how their abilities to "read (magic-user) magic" will interact with these rules. As it's a bridge we've yet to cross, I'm content to leave the issue alone and continue with what works...for now.

As an aside: spell-casting dragons in my world know spells as a magic-user equal to their hit dice (a red with 10 HD, for example, would know spells as a 10th level magic-user). This makes dragons considerably more magical...at least the ones that can use magic (I've toyed with the idea of making ALL dragons speaking and magic-using, but I like the idea of there being more "vermin-esque" dragons who are ignorant...and mundane...threats to civilized folk). For me, in addition to dragons being more sorcerous, this helps justify the dragons' hoards, as magic-users pay them in coin and treasure to be trained in higher level spells (what "magic schools" there are being few and, often, strictly regulated).

All right, the coffee pot is empty and the brew in my mug is considerably cooler than when it was first poured (and the house is not nearly as quiet...the wife is wanting me to make lunch), so I'll sign off for now. Hope y'all are having a good January.

: )

Pix of the New Book

Kelvin Green asked me if I could send his some photos of the new book to post on his blog (though I'm not particularly sure this is his plan...at the moment he seems very into pie). Anyway, since he DID do all the art for Comes Chaos, I figured the least I could do is mail him a print copy; however, international postage being a bit wonky at the moment, it might take a while to get to him.

SO, I sent him some photos, and I figured I might as well post them here as well...just in case folks are considering the book as a stocking stuffer this holiday season. Here you go:

Softcover, 64 pages

Some really good art pieces from K.G.

It's a B/X setting supplement, so
includes rules for designing/running the setting.

A few adjustments to the standard B/X
rules to incorporate the vagaries of the Chaos gods.

For folks like me, who grew up wishing they could find a way to make GW's Realms of Chaos books in their D&D campaign...well, this adapts many of those books various ideas (as well as stuff from other games/works of fiction). Works well for a Moorcock style "Chaos takeover" or medieval-style Mutant Chronicles. It is NOT designed for Advanced D&D (most of it was written while living in Paraguay, back when I was still "all B/X, all the time") but most of it is pretty adaptable. And it should work perfectly well with OSE...although the chapters are written in the same layout format as B/X.

People might be wondering why and how they might ever find a use for a book like this. "I'm not planning on blowing up my campaign world, a la Moorcock's Elric saga...and I definitely don't want my PCs running around as mutant champions of evil!" There are still many ways to use the book. It has new monsters, magic items, and spells that you can throw into your campaign world. It has alternate B/X rules (and an alternate B/X class or two) that you might find useful. It can be used to create small pocket areas of "bad juju" for PCs to heroically explore and combat. It has ideas for how to unify various "kitchen sink" themes found in D&D (like all the weird, Chaotic humanoids and the "funhouse" dungeons in which they live).

Anyway, it's a neat little book. And I just happen to have a big ol' pile of them on hand.

; )

By the way: just while I'm on the subject of hocking my wares, my B/X Companion is once again sold out. A new print run HAS been ordered, so I'll be able to send out copies in the next week or so, but if you don't want to wait there ARE retailers (like Wayne's Books) that have it in stock. You should NOT need to buy copies from eBay for hundreds of dollars (those keep popping up for some reason; not sure why). If your money is burning that big a hole in your pocket, email me directly...I'll take your $300 and send you my kid's copy (he'd happily split the money with me and wait for a copy from the new print run). 

[okay, no, don't send me hundreds of dollars for a book that costs less than $30. My POINT is, please don't be a sucker]

Finally, one last thing I want to note before I sign off and start prepping for Football Sunday (I'm going to the Seahawks game today, which will be really depressing given the way they're playing this season...): while Comes Chaos is the work of myself and Kelvin Green (illustrator), the impetus for creating it AS A PROJECT is largely due to James V. West who, back in the days of G+, issued a challenge to folks to design a 64 page "setting book" for B/X. When I took up his gauntlet...many years ago...I do not think I envisioned actually publishing a printed book. I'm not sure who else might have participated or completed their projects (if any of my readers do, I'd be interested in being informed) but...well, I did. Finally. 

Now, onto the next project. Cheers!

Straight Up Villains

A potential buyer of the new book, started a discussion thread at DriveThru with this:

"Information on running a villainous campaign for aspiring champions of evil" How does this part work? Does it provide a structure or sandbox tools for a campaign of forces of darkness besieging the "points of light"?

Figured I might as well turn my answer into a blog post while I while away the early (Sunday) morning hours.

COMES CHAOS as a B/X supplement, provides rules (game systems) for ripping apart the fabric of your campaign's "reality" with incursions of chaos. It's not Rifts (though some sort of mash-up of B/X, Comes Chaos, and Mutant Future would make for an interesting game), but there are tears caused by the worship of demonic powers that allow access to a different dimension: the Chaos Realm. As people do "bad things" these tears/rips open wider allowing the stuff of Chaos to blight your regular D&D world, creating mutants and monsters and wrecking the joint, as well as allowing demons to enter and cause more mischief and misery. 

That's the "default" idea behind the book: that you're going to use the rules to run a blighted campaign, where the PCs get the chance to fight back against the spread of Chaos, attempting to stem the tide. DMs can make the campaign as heroic or as hopeless as they want. You want this to be Elric and Moonglum fighting a losing battle against the forces of Pan Tang and the might of the Chaos dukes? You can do that. You want the PCs to be inquisitors and witch-hunters rooting out secret covens in the heart of the kingdom? You can do that, too. 

Of course, B/X is (generally) a game of looting crazy dungeons and hauling off tons of treasure; with Comes Chaos, you have a reason such places exist as towns and regions conquered by Chaos become havens for insane monsters chaos worshippers, hoarding the treasures of their terrorized (or converted or eaten) subject peoples. PCs that liberate such dungeons not only help beat back the blight, but can also get rich in the process!

Art by Kelvin Green

However...to the question asked. It is perhaps inevitable that folks will want to use Comes Chaos to play individual Chaos champions in the old-timey Warhammer fashion. While the book provides rules for creating NPC champions (including the gifts of their patron demons, the mutations that will eventually consume their bodies, and the minions that will serve as their slaves), these same game systems can be used for player characters wishing to be straight up villains. Such a campaign would involve the PCs working "cooperatively" (I use the term in the loosest of all possible senses) to spread blight themselves by conquering regions of Law and order. Scenario ideas are provided, x.p. adjustments, rules for several Chaos powers (which could, of course, be expanded upon by the enterprising DM), in addition to the systems needed to gradually transform player characters into hideous monstrosities or (even worse) mindless NPCs!

It's all good fun, and I imagine it would probably work in conjunction with the mass combat rules found in my B/X Companion (not sure, as I haven't tried doing so). Such campaigns, however, require participants to approach them with a different perspective than "standard D&D," as bits of player vs. player conflict are bound to crop up in such a game. For some groups this is a boatload of fun...at least in the short-term. But it does not make for good, long-term gaming, and the rules in Comes Chaos are written to ensure such forces of evil don't last. Chaos champions have a built-in shelf life, and even should they survive the challenges and conflicts that pervade their existence, their careers will eventually, spectacularly flame-out...generally in mutation and madness.

Hope that all makes sense. 

; )

Killing Gods, Part 4

All right…that’s a long enough break since my last post on “killing gods.” More than enough. 

As a precursor, I need a moment to talk about the relationship between clerics and deities; I realize this will seem yet another digression, but it’s pertinent to the conversation. You see, this whole subject came up because I was unsatisfied with the way I feel (many) adventure designs of recent years have been unreasonable with their treatment of gods…but it’s quite possible that this trend (and my preferences) come in part from learning different styles of play. 

I will elaborate.

I’ve written before about the shift in perspective of What Exactly A Cleric Is that came about in 1983 with the publication of the Mentzer version of Basic. As I’ve recounted (often enough) this was NOT the brand of D&D by which I learned the game. The clerics in my first campaign (which I ran up till circa 1988) didn’t receive their spells from “the strength of their beliefs.” No. Un-uh. Spells come from the gods they worship…they are divine favors, pure and simple, miracles granted by higher powers. 

This is, of course, EXPLICIT in the text. The 1981 Moldvay Basic set described it thusly:

Since clerical spalls are divinely given, they do not have to be studied; the cleric need only rest and pray for them.

"Divinely given" is the key phrase here. I can understand if there is some confusion caused by the actual description of the cleric class in Moldvay; its text ("...they are trained in fighting and casting spells. As a cleric advances in level, he or she is granted the use of more and more spells...") could be interpreted as meaning that their magic is separate from their deity, that magical training is something only those who are initiated into the cult's higher secrets are taught. But unless Moldvay is speaking metaphorically (I don't think he is), the phrase divinely given in the Spell section makes clear just who is "granting" access to clerical magic...not higher level priests and patriarchs, but the god or goddess whom the cleric serves.

And Gygax is even more clear in the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide:

It is well known to all experienced players that clerics, unlike magic-users, have their spells bestowed upon them by their respective deities.

The DMG text (page 38) goes on for more than half a page detailing exactly how clerics receive their magic directly from their gods, either by being divinely empowered (1st and 2nd level spells), bestowed upon them through intermediaries (saints, angels, demigods, etc. for 3rd through 5th level spells), or granted by direct communication with the deity itself (6th and 7th level spells). It is not a cleric's "inner strength," "strong beliefs," or "mystical training" that allows the character to create miracles...it is the god itself. A cleric with no god receives no magic. Period.

As said, Mentzer changes this in his 1983 Basic rulebook...a book I never owned until the 2000s, and certainly not the book I learned to play with. But a subtle shift in thinking is evident in TSR's publications as early as 1982. I refer here to two classic modules published that year: N1: Against the Cult of the Reptile God and B4: The Lost City. I imagine both modules might be held up as inspirations for the works of recent designers I cited earlier, examples of "sword & sorcery" style adventures featuring "godlike beings" who are nothing more than actual (non-divine) monsters needing to be killed...respectively a spirit naga named Explictica Defilus and the tentacled monstrosity known as Zargon. These false gods, whether through longevity and fear or powerful mind control, have created cults of worship around themselves, followers who hold them in awe and carry out their "divine will, much as one might expect of followers duped by a charlatan.

And yet both modules include actual cleric followers of these monsters...clerics with the ability to access clerical magic. N1 has multiple clerics of Explictica using spells of up to 4th level (7th level clerics). B4 features Darius, a 6th cleric (also with access to spells up to 4th level) of the "cult of Zargon" as one of the Big Bads of the adventure. None of these characters make sense under the rules of the game; none of these characters should have ANY spells whatsoever.

Contrast this with the backstory found in the 1980 module C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan:

Eventually a new Archon mounted the throne in Pontylver, one who claimed [lawful neutral] Alia as her patron. The Temple of the Correct and Unalterable Way grew in followers and prestige, and as time passed, Myrrha noticed that her peers and superiors were becoming increasingly arrogant and arbitrary....Myrrha saw they were falling into the heresy of believing that law is concentrated in the individual and not the community. Investigating, she discovered a well-kept secret: many members of the ecclesiarchy were no longer able to cast high-level spells, thus proving their estrangement from their deity!

If N1 was properly designed (that is, written to follow the instructions laid out in the rule books), neither Abramo nor Misha would have access to clerical spells above 2nd level (and maybe not even those) and Gareth Primo would have no magic at all because a spirit naga is not a god and, thus, not capable of granting spells.

That is the game, folks, and I honestly don't think it's "open to interpretation." But...perhaps because of "satanic panic" pressure over the pretending to worship strange gods (see the 1982 Mazes and Monsters where Tom Hanks plays a batshit-crazy cleric)...TSR started to move away from its own rules. Started to say, hey, being a cleric isn't really about worshipping a god, it's about your character's training and "strong beliefs" manifesting powers...you're just a magic-user in priest's clothing and it doesn't matter whether you're worshipping the One True God or some tentacled space slug that crashed on the planet a thousand years ago. We aren't teaching children about the worship of strange pagan gods...heavens, no! There is no god except God, these are just strangely deluded fantasy priests. Pay no attention!

And you see that carried all the way down to today's designers. From Jason Sholtis's magnificent Operation Unfathomable:

...clerics operate under the delusion that their deities actually exist (they do not!). In truth, clerics are merely a distinct variety of magic-user, devoted to one or more of the ten thousand Gods of Order. Clerics manipulate chaos to achieve their results through the mental constructs of their religious practices, rather than rote memorization of arcane mummery.

From 2017's Lamentations of the Flame Princess (James Raggi):

Cleric magic is divinely inspired, and is granted to Clerics through prayer. Whether these powers are granted to Clerics by higher powers, if these higher powers are what the Cleric believes them to be, or if all Cleric spells are merely ritualized forms of sympathetic magic, are all subjects frequently debated...

I would include the 2018 adventure The Red Prophet Rises in this mix of confusion, in which a heretical priest (Khazra), mistakenly worshipping an ancient vampiric entity, still (inexplicably) retains access to the spells of a 6th level cleric of "the Bull God." Why? Is the Obelisk that Thirsts a divine entity? No. Does it serve the Bull God? No. One would think spells would be withheld from the priest, if only to inform him of his delusional apostasy.  Guy uses a sword in combat anyway.

These authors (and others) seem to have been influenced somewhat by these later (post-1982) influences when it comes to explaining the relationship between clerics and their gods. Which is to say, there is little relationship, if any. Any failure of clerical magic can simply be attributed to the cleric losing faith in herself: it is not the deity that withholds magic, but the cleric's own psychological barriers to accessing a purely internal mechanism. 

I'm not a big fan of that interpretation. It doesn't jibe with the D&D I learned to play. It is not the AD&D of Gygax; it runs counter to the DMG and the information found in Deities & Demigods. And while I'll be the first to admit to being a stodgy, groggy, grumpy old man when it comes to my D&D, I'd even say that it's not very "Sword & Sorcery," either...despite what (many of) these authors hope to emulate.

Because as discussed in my first post on the subject, much of D&D is inspired by fantasy fiction of the pulp variety...and in pulp fantasy you see PLENTY of deluded cultists following charlatans and false gods, but they aren't getting any magical powers by doing so. False priests don't get spells: they use tricks and psychoactive powders or rule through fear and tradition and superstition. Real magic linked to worship is generally called sorcery and rightly so, as it is linked to the favors granted by demonic entities...but such infernal divinities are still "divine," supernatural and extra-dimensional. Only divinities grant divine powers: when Jagreen Lern or Elric conjure in the names of their chaos gods, THEN magical stuff happens. 

But maybe I need to rein in a bit and bring this all back around to the subject at hand ("killing gods"). There is, I think, a certain prevalence or attitude or orientation in the Old School Role-playing circles that has wandered far afield from the game as it was originally envisioned. Maybe. Maybe I'm wrong. But here's how I see it:

• As Mike Mornard writes, the original designers "made up some shit they thought would be fun." It involved exploring strange environs, finding treasure, building worlds. It was inspired and influenced by adventure fiction, much of it "fantasy" in nature.
• As a game, D&D has a system; it has rules. It models something (a fantasy world of adventure) and the rules are applied to the thing it models (the fantasy world of adventure) up to and including things like "how/why a cleric gets spells" and "how many hit points a god like Zeus might have."
• That divine architect that Elric is always searching for? The supreme being that orders the lives of even the gods of his world? D&D has that, too: it's called the Dungeon Master. And just like Elric's "supreme being" (who would be Michael Moorcock...duh), the DM is not a creature to be encountered by the protagonists (in D&D's case, the player characters). The DM creates the world but is not OF the world. What will be encountered are game constructs, up to and including the gods that inhabit the game world.
• As a constructed fantasy world D&D has a cosmology. As a game that models a fantasy world, that cosmology can be exactly and minutely defined...right down to just how much damage Thor can do with a hammer blow, or how many greater devils inhabit the 3rd layer of the Nine Hells...should such info ever become necessary for play.
• The game (D&D) has parameters (structure) of play. It has assumptions and expectations of how play resolves.  These expectations of play resolution are determined by 1) the rules, 2) the way the rules model the world, and 3) the fiction that inspires the game...in that order. Don't (for example) tell me "well, Gandalf used a sword!" The inspiring fiction (#3) comes behind the rules (#1) and the modeled fantasy world (#2).

As originally conceived, Dungeons & Dragons was never about "telling stories." It was about playing a game of exploration and survival (adventure!) in a fantasy game world. However, some folks were quite unimaginative with how they worked within those parameters, creating murder-hobo funhouses of the poorest variety and this caused pushback in the form of front-loaded drama. We shall not wait for a story to emerge from our adventures! We shall make sure there is MEANING to these characters' (fake) lives!

Combine the success of that front-loaded drama (through company supported publications like Ravenloft and Dragonlance) with an imperative to cut anything perceived as controversial (i.e. impacting the bottom line) from a game now being marketed to children (this being the shift that began circa 1982), and one can readily see the consequences: we don't kill gods. We kill demons. We kill immortal liches. We kill creatures masquerading as gods. We kill surrogates in order to have our high stakes, high drama, emotionally invested play.

Because, originally, emotional investment in a character was mainly found in long-running (i.e high level) characters. And high level characters, by necessity, required greater challenges to stay engaged...tackling gods (modeled as part of the cosmology) and godlike beings (that giant ape from WG6) are a natural evolution of challenge for characters of the highest echelon, because lesser challenges don't cut it anymore. If you want to run a high level campaign, you're going to want to study up your copy of Sailor on the Seas of Fate because that's about "par" when it comes to suitable challenges. Good old Demogorgon has been a part of the D&D tapestry since 1976...and for good reason. 

[hell, I used to fight Demogorgon...on the playground...waaaay back before I ever laid eyes on ANY D&D book. Before I even opened my first box of the Dungeon! board game, even]

Not low level characters (I'm guessing).

Outside of WotC's latest-greatest editions, D&D designers have (mostly) moved away from front-loaded drama and railroad story arcs, but they've still passed some sort of threshold from which they can't seem to return. They want high stakes, high challenge, high weirdness in their adventure...but they don't want high level player characters. They want their players to continue playing "small ball" forever after, retiring (I suppose) should they ever, somehow, reach 8th or 10th level of play. "Too superheroic," is the refrain I hear. "The game is no fun after around 5th (or 6th or 7th) level."

Bull. Crap. But that discussion is for another post.

Throwing high level challenges (like godlings) into low level adventures is an attempt by designers to have their cake and eat it, too. It's an attempt to inject Elric-levels of amazeballs fantasy into the lives of grubby, Warhammer Fantasy-level adventurers in order to draw out low-level play while still keeping long-since-jaded players engaged with the game in front of them. Is that as bad as playing pre-generated snowflakes traveling the Dragonlance railroad? Absolutely not. But it's got to be grating after a while. It would certainly bug the shit out of me.

All right, that's it. I lied about this being the concluding post...just had too much more to say. The NEXT post will definitely be the conclusion to this series. 

Killing Gods, Part 3

All right, let's get this finished up...I've got other things to blog about: secret D&D languages, the uses of audible glammer, maybe even a run at "reviewing" Ravenloft (that was a pseudo-request). Buckle up, folks...this entry might be a looong one.

; )

When it comes to the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons game, there are two inspiring sages that act as my guiding lights, two pole stars by which I steer my ship. They are Alexis Smolensk and Anthony Huso. There are other blogs that I read (and podcasters I listen to), but in the main, these two are the only external forces shaping my outlook on the game. If I had to name one more, Gary Gygax would, I suppose come in a distant third place. 

[does it seem strange to folks that Gygax isn't the brightest star in my AD&D firmament, despite being responsible for the game's existence? There is some precedent. I have it from strong authorities that Jesus is only the third-most important figure in shaping the Roman Catholic Church; the main individuals responsible for our religion (and, thus, all other Christian denominations descended from the western Church) are St. Paul (not even one of the Twelve!) and Thomas Aquinas]

Anyway, don't shake your head at me, Dear Reader; I have my reasons.

Longtime readers of my blog are surely well-acquainted with Alexis, I've mentioned the guy often enough. Huso, on the other hand, has a small enough presence on the internet (his web site has only been around since 2018) that while I'm certain I've mentioned him, he may have well fallen through the cracks of people's perceptions. He is an AD&D aficionado of the deepest stripe, and his blog deals at great length and fair eloquence with that specific rule set, the edition of D&D he's been running for his table since 2014 when he chucked his Pathfinder game for good. It is excellent reading.

However, that's not the reason I mention the man. In my last post on the subject of killing gods, I cited several published adventures of recent years that involved physical confrontations with gods, godlike beings, and pseudo-godlings, all of which were aimed at the low level adventuring party. I explained that I don't find these particularly reasonable, given the parameters of the D&D game as designed. My feeling is that D&D provides at least some guidelines (based in both instructional text and example adventure modules of the earliest origin) for how one ought to proceed with such scenarios and, baby, these ain't it. For me, it's a grating trend and, perhaps, even a disturbing one...there seems to be an aversion to high level D&D play while (at the same time) a longing for high stakes, epic adventure of the type that rightly belongs in the realm of high level characters.

Mr. Huso doesn't share this aversion (he's blogged his thoughts on high level campaign play...more than once) and has demonstrated how one might actually write a "god-killing adventure" with an absolutely exquisite book, a masterwork entitled Dream House of the Nether Prince. It is a lavish piece of art, as well as a fiendish, evocative adventure. It is, as far as I can determine, the single best gaming product I've purchased NEW for D&D since the reissue of the AD&D manuals a few years back. It may be the coolest pre-written adventure I've purchased since the 1980s. Certainly the best since Bruce Cordell's Return to White Plume Mountain (that was published in 1999), making it my favorite for at least the last 20 years.  

Yet I can't...well, I won't...review the thing. Because I haven't played it...I haven't experienced it. I can review a movie or a piece of music, but I can't give a true review of an adventure that I haven't run, because until I do run it, I can't say for certain if it's excellent or horrible or lost in translation from text to table. And there's just no way for me to run the thing at this point.

Huso's Dream House wasn't written for me...or (probably) for you, either. He wrote it for his own players, as a capstone adventure to finish seven years of AD&D play. It is a suitably epic dungeon, a mission to a massive fortress located in the Abyss, a refuge and "vacation palace" for Orcus, demon prince of the undead. The adversaries present in the adventure are truly staggering. The treasure to be looted is absolutely mind-blowing. The final confrontation might see PCs battling Orcus or Demogorgon or (perhaps) both. It is beautiful to behold. It is a pleasure to read (if, like me, you're "into demons"). It is suggested that no less than six characters of 14th level even attempt the adventure; Anthony's seven player group brought a party of ten, and many of them died, some in very permanent ways...you can read a summary of their venture on his blog.

It is an excellent example of what is possible with the D&D rules. A 135 page tour-de-force that puts H4: The Throne of Bloodstone (it's closest comparison) to shame. I really, really mean that. Dream House is a masterpiece created more-or-less by a single person, and it makes the entire Bloodstone line of TSR look paltry and hackish by comparison. The difference, however, is understandable when one considers Huso's book to be something lovingly created for his own group of players, not something churned out for the masses at a time when the company was just trying to stay afloat business-wise. I suspect a lot of people will balk at spending $50 (the price of its POD hardcover) for a niche product of a niche hobby, especially given its limited use in many (most?) campaigns.

Why limited? Because, despite a lot of excellent info on demons and a lot of new/unique monsters and treasures, the adventure is written for the type of adventuring group that most DMs simply don't have. There are no pre-generated characters included with the thing, and I can see why: because just handing someone a character sheet with a 15th level paladin or wizard won't make the player a savvy veteran of the kind needed to navigate this level of challenge. A group with years of experience working together in cooperation would find it a rough go of it...but then, they ARE tackling a unique demonic god in its lair. Such scenarios should be limited, niche, and incredibly difficult. 

Gygax was the first person to put encounters with gods into published adventures: the Elder Elemental (in G1 and G3), Blibdoolpoolp (in D2), and Lolth (in D3). There are two things that all these have in common:

1. These encounters are all potential in nature; none of these encounters with godlings are mandated, and all may be avoided. 
2. The adventures in which they are found are the pinnacle of what I call "hard core" Dungeons & Dragons. The novice ("N") series are clearly for beginning players. The intermediate ("I") series are fine for any group already versed in the game (i.e. players that know how to play and cooperate). The special ("S") series are random, rule breaking adventures, that provide enough weirdness to stymie experienced players or give novices a "puncher's chance." But the six modules that make up the G-D series are absolutely punishing adventures, any one of which will TPK a party that fails to operate at a high level of strategic play. 

And I find it fascinating how those godling encounters "ramp up" over the course of the series. In the G modules, the most a party might expect to encounter is an eye or tentacle that will drive a PC insane or drag them screaming to oblivion. In D2, a PC might actually encounter the goddess (on her own home turf) and might be able to treat with or bargain. In D3, the party has a chance to confront a goddess on their own plane, with the potential for actual combat and the possible destruction of her avatar. This is no naga masquerading as a god (as in N1: Against the Cult of the Reptile God)...Lolth is the real deal. 

These scenarios work within the parameters and expectations of D&D play. A party of mid-level adventurers...and to me, 8th to 10th is still only (high) "mid-level"...should not be confronting creatures of godlike power. The encounters in G3 and D2 are more in line with "traps:" really rough traps that are best avoided.  Only in D3 (an adventure for characters of level 10-14) should a confrontation with a demon queen be possible, and only in the most limited of circumstances: outside her home plane, away from the bulk of her power base. Again, Lolth is not the point of the module; exploring the Vault and dealing with the threat of the Eilservs clan is. The goddess might even be a potential ally given the transgressions of Eclavdra and her ilk, though this is not an explicit suggestion of the module.

But again, it is in adventures like these that we see the power and majesty of the D&D game. In the first part of this series I wrote how, of all the sword & sorcery fantasy that influenced D&D, only Leiber and Moorcock display their protagonists in actual interaction with divinities. PCs allying themselves with Lolth, bargaining for leniency from Blibdoolpoolp, or being used as pawns by Orcus (in Huso's book) all exemplify scenes one reads in those S&S fantasies...and while a divinity being willing to treat with mortals speaks to the fallibility (and vulnerability) of the divinity in question, it is really only those characters with world-shaking power (like Elric) who have the capability to bring actual destruction to such entities.

And this is of particular importance to the default setting of Dungeons & Dragons, because under the terms of the game, these are no "false gods." These demon queens and princes are gods that are worshipped, that are followed by devout clerics, and to whom they may bestow spells. And yet they are not safe from destruction! Player characters thus have the power to alter the cosmology of the campaign  setting and impact the reality of the game world in drastic ways. What happens to the Drow clerics of Lolth if Lolth is destroyed on her home plane? Do they cease to be a threat altogether? Doubtful, but her death (if achieved) will surely change Drow culture at a fundamental level.

That's the opposite of de-protagonizing players. 

And that, perhaps, is what I find lacking about some of these other OSR offerings that involve encounters with deities, quasi- or otherwise. There's a certain sort of "enforced smallness" that comes along with placing PCs in situations in which they are absolutely, hopelessly outclassed by a power beyond mortal comprehension. It should be hard for the PCs to even encounter such a being. Barring a long and arduous journey through miles of hostile environment and unnumbered foes to the god's most sacred (and well-guarded) temple, nothing short of a complicated ritual/sacrifice should allow access to such a being on the Prime Material Plane. And as bodily travel to the outer planes is generally outside the reach of low-mid level characters, such encounters should be an extremely rare and wondrous thing...if possible at all.

Okay...perhaps one more post on the subject (to conclude) is needed.

Killing Gods, Part 2

Man, I've got a half-dozen Real Life Important things on my plate today and if I don't get this damn post started, I don't know that I ever will. SO, without further ado, let's get down to the deicide!

The first god I ever killed in D&D was Thor.

To be clear, I was DM'ing at the time, not playing, but I am far more responsible for Thor's death than any of my players. In fact, I'd go so far as to say I was absolutely responsible. This was circa age 10 or so, on the playground, which meant we were still only a couple years into D&D play; at the time we had not yet discovered there was separation between editions of the game, and I was running my game with a combination of B/X and the AD&D Monster Manual and (occasionally) the DMG. My buddy had just acquired a copy of Deities & Demigods (the post-Moorcock/Lovecraft version) and we were anxious to put it into play. Since one of my earliest PCs in the game had a rather high-level thief who had no problem whupping up on normal challenges, I figured Thor would be the perfect encounter to put the dude in his place.

Dead duck

Now, I can't remember the exact circumstances of the scenario (this was some 35 years ago) but I can remember the outcome: Jason managed to piss off Thor (probably after I had pissed off the PC), whereupon Thor used Mjolnr to hit the thief with a 100-die lightning bolt. The thief's ring of spell turning reflected the bolt, Thor failed his saving throw, and was utterly disintegrated by the thing. If I remember correctly, Sneakshadow looted the thunder god of his mystic hammer, but I am 100% certain he never wielded the weapon (he was a thief after all, and rather small in stature for a human). 

I can also recall, later, reading the ring of spell turning description in the DMG and its specific stipulation (unlike the Cook Expert set) that magic item powers could not be turned and thinking: "darn, I screwed that up!" However, at no point do I remember thinking to myself, "hmm, maybe I should not have sent a greater god to fight a player character."

Deities & Demigods isn't a Monster Manual, but it's written like one...it has alphabetical entries for gods, each with a little illustration, a brief description, and a stat block. This is the exact same setup as any of the AD&D monster books. I'm sure I never even bothered to read the instructional text at the beginning of the book (explaining 'this isn't a Monster Manual') because I can remember reading all that for the first time (and loving it) after I purchased my own copy of DDG later in the form of Legends & Lore, sometime around age 11 (i.e. in 1985, before my 12th birthday). By that time, Jason had become a "Born Again" Christian and was no longer allowed to play D&D...though, perhaps, if his mother had been aware of his history with destroying pagan deities, she would have relented a bit.

For a kid to make such a mistake is pretty understandable...even older players can probably be forgiven for making lazy assumptions when confronted with a book with a similar format (and thus skipping over the pertinent parts of the introduction). The DDG was written the way it was to update the prior OD&D supplement Gods, Demi-Gods, and Heroes (Supplement IV) for the "Advanced" D&D format, and it is a decent emulation of the style in which Supplement IV was presented. So why did authors Rob Kuntz and Jim Ward provide god stat-lines when ambitious players were certain to treat them as challengeable monsters? The answer is in the Foreward to GDG&H:

This volume is something else, also: our last attempt to reach the "Monty Haul" DM's. Perhaps now some of the 'giveaway' campaigns will look as foolish as they truly are. This is our last attempt to delineate the absurdity of 40+ level characters. When Odin, the All-Father has only(?) 300 hit points, who can take a 44th level Lord seriously?

There it is: the book was meant to be a crack-down on what was deemed to be some of the "excesses" (as they saw it) of certain campaigns. By providing statistical representations for both literary heroes (Elric, Conan, Vainamoinen, etc.) AND the gods of various pantheons, D&D players would have a scale of comparison against which to measure their own characters and campaigns.

Which, I suppose, could be an admirable goal...if D&D wasn't a completely different animal.

The first
"monster manual"

D&D didn't really seek to emulate/model a particular setting (with an implicit scale) nor, really, a particular genre of fantasy. Elric's multi-verse spanning adventures are very different from Conan's down-and-dirty conflicts, and both pale in comparison the the physical might displayed by John Carter on the surface of Mars. D&D sought to provide rules for creating fantasy adventures - and it succeeded at that! - but it never meant to constrain or limit the players' imaginations. Telling players three years after the fact that they were "doing it wrong" was a ridiculous attempt to put the genie back in the bottle. Scale should have been baked in from the get-go if that had been the intention, instead of assuming similar minds and attitudes...and who's to say the attitude wasn't similar anyway? Both Gygax and Arneson had plenty of "wa-hoo" in their own campaigns.

But back to the discussion: regardless of what one thinks about the outrageousness of fighting...and potentially slaying...divine entities, it is absolutely clear that the D&D game provides explicit rules for doing just that! At least up through 3rd edition (the last edition for which I purchased a Deities & Demigods book), textual instruction has been provided that enable DMs to run gods as encounters against player characters. Certainly, each edition to do so (OD&D, AD&D, BECMI's "I" rules, 3E) have made the prospect more and more daunting, giving divine beings ever greater abilities...and yet, the game has never simply come out and said "nope, can't be done." The gods remain ever vulnerable to mere mortals.

[forcing a deity to make a saving throw at all...even if the chance of failure is only the 5% probability of rolling a "1" on a D20...is saying that the being is as fallible as any human. 'To err is...' and all that jazz]

And as said, the D&D game supports this type of play. It's own fiction (I admit to only having read Dragonlance and the Gygax-penned Greyhawk novels) encourages this type of play. And multiple adventure modules from D&D's "golden era" (pre-1983) provide examples of how such play might be handled.

In a reasonable fashion.

And I guess that's the part that has (recently) found my prickly hide to be chapping...well, one part anyway. The unreasonableness of the encounters being given. Or...perhaps...not even the unreasonableness of the scenarios, but the disconnect I see between the game and the...the...

Hmmm. It's not "style." Or "fiction." It's more of an attitude or outlook. An orientation. Folks want to play D&D in a particular way, a particular fashion. Okay, that's cool...that's fine. It's still D&D. But then they want to have these god-encounters that aren't reasonable...at least not in the manner of the game as designed.  

Hmm...I'm having a hard time expressing this. 

Let me try a different way. I've heard people say: "If my DM put a wight in a first level dungeon, I'd punch him in the face" (or words to that effect). Okay, great...I get your point, and it's a reasonable one given the parameters of the game as written. Low-level adventurers don't have the abilities to confront such a creature. Low-level adventurers don't have the abilities to confront a LOT of creatures.

SO...why would you put a god or godling in any sort of low level adventure?

Halls of the Blood King (levels 3-5)

Palace of Unquiet Repose (levels 3-5)

The God That Crawls (levels 1-2)

Operation Unfathomable (levels 1-?)

There are others...of course there are others, there are always others. These ones just spring immediately to mind, and I'm too lazy to go hunting up others. 

[that's another part of the hide chapping: I've lost track of how many low-level adventures see players encountering godlike beings. It's become such a regular choice for scenarios, it could be included in Moldvay's list of standard scenarios (page B51) between "Fulfilling a Quest" and "Escaping from Enemies." Call it "Confronting Godling Made Flesh" or something]

An adventure that pits a party of 4th level characters against "The Lord of All Vampires" is not, to my mind, a reasonable execution of the D&D system as intended, nor is an adventure that finds a party of 1st and 2nd level characters accidentally wandering into the lair of "Shaggath-Ka the Worm Sultan." It belies the dynamics and expectations implicit in the game's design. Yes, I'm sure that some (like the authors of these adventures listed) would beg to differ...as I wrote previously, this is all my (strong) opinion. So, I'd imagine some folks (those I haven't hopelessly offended) are wondering what I'd put forward as a reasonable adventure involving a godling?

Q1: Queen of the Demonweb Pits.

Q1 is not, of course, one's only tussle with Lolth, the demon queen of spiders...she first appears in Gygax's own D3: Vault of the Drow as a god made flesh, dwelling incarnate in the lowest level of her chosen people's greatest shrine (although why she's there is never explained). To be sure, Q1 is a flawed adventure, but I've found it to be a very fun adventure in play, and a rather solid example of possible "god fighting" in D&D. 

Note the high level: 10-14 is pretty darn high for AD&D. My very over-powered bard was something like 15th level (max levels for fighter/thief) when I tackled Q1, but the character's total x.p. was equivalent to a fighter of 11th or 12th level. 14th level spell-casters have close to 30 spells per day to play with (more, for high WIS clerics), and all such characters have a ton of resources, both magical and mundane, to draw upon. Attacking an arch-devil or demon prince (or queen) in its lair is a legitimate challenge for D&D characters that have otherwise grown too big for their britches.

Beefy monster

"Come on, JB, Sutherland's adventure is the height of cheesiness...you're just being nostalgic here!" Not at all. Given sufficient time adventuring, PCs will acquire resources such that normal logistical problems no longer apply: the ability to create food and water. Bags of holding and portable holes. Magical mounts and constructs that can carry immense burdens, rarely (if ever) tire, and that can bypass obstacles by flying. Magical means of entry and egress - or escape! - including teleportation, passwall, word of recall. And, of course, the power to bring fellow party members back to life whenever it suits them. Some Dungeon Masters recoil at the thought of their campaigns getting to such a level, it no longer resembling a game of "scurrilous rogues" in running battles with lizard people while trying to hide a gemstone up their nostril. That's right: it doesn't. High level characters have graduated from such grubby affairs and require larger challenges to test their abilities.

Planar travel becomes an option at high levels, and rightly so...because other planes provide the opportunity for DMs to throw the greatest challenges at PCs. And I'm not just talking encounters with gods and godlings...on other planes, all bets are off with regard to what might be thrown at PCs. Different physics, different rules, screwing with spell effects, reducing or limiting magical abilities. Pocket dimensions and demi-planes provide all sorts of justifications for strange, non-book monsters and unique, fantastic treasures. Q1's problem (in my opinion) isn't one of steam-powered spider ships; rather, it's too many damn bugbears and coin piles...the adventure could be even weirder and stranger than it is (though the demonweb map itself is a rather beautiful thing). Talking about D&D's literary roots, Moorcock's Elric stories provide excellent examples of just how weird and messed up things get when you start skipping around the multiverse...and just how much trouble PCs can get into when their magic and magical items stop functioning the way they're accustomed to on the Prime Material plane.

But that's not low-level stuff. Elric is sometimes accompanied on his extraplanar adventures by low-level characters and (spoiler alert) things usually go very, very badly for them; insanity and death are both par for the course. Which is as it should be. Your high level party isn't going to get any positive results out of taking a small army of men-at-arms into the demonwebs, nor should they. Soldiers have their place in the D&D world, but planar invasions of a demigod's home plane ain't one of them. Such an scenario shouldn't be a place for any character with less than a million experience points. Literally.

Okay, that's enough for Part 2. Part 3 coming up!

[here's Part 1 and Part 1b for those who missed them]