Showing posts with label Dragons at Dawn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dragons at Dawn. Show all posts

Stocking Blackmoor Adventures in 1972

Author: DHBoggs / Labels: , , , ,

After “messing up” the defence of Blackmoor during the great Coot invasion in the spring of 1972,  the Blackmoor players were banished to the area of Loch Gloomen (Lake Gloomy).

We are fortunate this happened, because it led Dave Arneson to create new stocking tables for the buildings and ruins found in the area.  Unlike whatever stocking tables Dave made for Blackmoor dungeon, these tables survive, mostly intact, though in a jumbled format on pages 86 and 87, 1977 print of the First Fantasy Campaign.

In fact we not only have the tables, but we have the results Dave got when he used the tables, which is really useful when sorting out certain lacunae and typos in the tables themselves.  So I’ve sorted it all out, in a much more user friendly fashion.
Note: the tables below only cover the stocking portion, and not the generation and distribution of the adventure areas themselves.

Once the areas to be stocked were known, Dave assigned “Magic” points.  These are in fact what he calls Protection points in Blackmoor dungeon – the points to buy the monsters, not the points to buy the magic items (see yesterday’s discussion). Dave used “magic” and “protection” points separately in Blackmoor dungeon, but here the term is conflated.  For further confusion, Arneson’s notes specify the point range for any given adventure area as 30 – 180 (3d6 * 10) but the lists themselves have nearly double that range (90, 110, 110, 120, 140, 170, 190, 310, 330, 330, 370).  Strangely, there’s nothing in the 200’s. <sigh>

A way to emulate the actual range found in Loch Gloomen would be (3d6 +1) * 10 and I suppose you could add 200 points ¼ of the time.  It’s worth noting here that several different methods seem to have been used on different levels in Blackmoor dungeon and perhaps I’ll ruminate more on that in another posting.   
Once points have been assigned it is time to pick monsters.  Arneson gives us this list for  Lock Gloomen:

2d6
Monster
2
Giant
3
True Troll
4
Roc
5
Air Elemental
6
Ogre
7
Basilisk
8
Goblins
9
Ghouls
10
Lycanthrope
11
Balrog
12
Dragon

No doubt monsters were usually chosen to match the amount of protection points in an area, but clearly they could be diced for also.  The cost of a given monster is as given in CHAINMAIL, however, should one wish to, any monster can be used with this protection point method by using its average hit points as its cost.

In Loch Gloomen, where there were monsters, there were treasures, and every place had a monster.  Here is how Arneson generated the treasure: follow the results on the table below to the subtables indicated.
  

D6

1
Wealth
2
Potions & Amulets*
3
Weaponry
4
Tech and Intel
5
Combination Two of the above
6
Combination Three of the above
*33% chance (1 or 2 on a d6) it is an amulet instead of a potion.  Note what I labeled "Tech and Intel" Arneson had labeled as "Information".

Wealth  = 1d20 +4 times 1000 (4000 – 24000) Gold Pieces.

Potions & Amulets
2D6

2
Shape Changing;
3
ESP
4
Longevity
5
Flying;
6
Strength
7
Sight
8
Obedience (animal)
9
Reaction Time
10
Magic Spells
11
Invisibility
12
Teleportation; (Maximum 6 Turn Durations and 12 Uses)

Note: in the text it reads “Magic 7 Amulets (+1 …2)” – I think this means amulets instead of magic potions on a roll of 1 or 2 on a d6. The number seven looks like a typo, possibly for an ampersand (same key).


Weaponry
2D6

2
Super Roc, level  8
3
Hero Roc, level 4
4
Swords
5
Fireball Wand
6
Hero Horse, level 4
7
Swords
8
Armor
9
Bow and Arrows
10
Lightning Bolt Thrower (laser) (Wand)
11
Super Horse,  level 8
12
Bow and Arrows

Note: The fire ball wand is not listed, but there is no listing specified for pip number 5 or for 11 either.  Since fireball wands show up twice in the Lake Gloomen rooms, it must have been in one of these slots.  Also at the spot in the FFC list where one would expect number 11 to be is “super animals 4-8” and notes indicating that horses are at pip slot 6 and Rocs are at pips 3 and 2)  So horses level 8 (lower probability) are presumably at the 11 pip slot where the note was positioned, and level 4 horses at pip slot 6.  So, by default the empty pip slot 5 is where the missing fireball wand must be and that fits with its relatively frequent appearance in Lake Gloomen rooms.

Tech and Intel
2D6

2
Special Devices
3
Flying Machine
4
Teleportation Machine
5
Ancient Books and Manuscripts
6
Clothing, etc.
7
Store of Normal Weapons
8
Ancient Books and Manuscripts
9
Crysta1 Ball
10
Fighting Machine
11
Water Machine
12
Special Devices

Note: Special Devices - I suppose this could be anything, however the only unaccounted treasure found in Lake Gloomen rooms is scrolls of level 3 spells.  Scrolls do not appear anywhere on these tables so I assume the spell scrolls were chosen via Special Devices.  I'd recommend substituting scrolls in the special devices slot  to anyone wanting to use these tables for stocking, 

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The Difference between Dragons at Dawn and Champions of ZED

Author: DHBoggs / Labels: ,

I get asked this question from time to time, so I wrote up a "pat answer" to point to:

Dragons at Dawn focuses on Dave Arneson and the Minnesota group of gamers. It deliberately tries to build on the quirks and unique things happening there while excluding more familiar game elements - so there is a Merchant class and a Sage class, in D@D for example; the magic is alchemical, combat involves saving throws to avoid damage and so forth.
Dragons at Dawn also looks to a lot of the root elements found in Adventures in Fantasy that were present in early Blackmoor, the combat modifiers, and elven song magic, for example.
Dragons at Dawn is set up around a core game of two ability classes (warrior, wizard), in the basic game, to which everything else can be added or ignored without affecting play much.

Champions of ZED on the other hand, has none of that "experimental" or quirky stuff from Blackmoor and AiF. Wherever possible, CoZ hews as close as good play and the law will allow to a combined and collated version of the game information found in the 3lbb's, Beyond This Point Be Dragons, CHAINMAIL, the appropriate sections of the Fist Fantasy Campaign, Supplement II and Gygax and Arneson house rules and comments from interviews and web posts, etc. My efforts are to make the game what it was meant to be in informed compromise between Gygax and Arneson and nobody else. Hence, only two or three little bits from Greyhawk.

There are some points of agreement and crossover between CoZ and D@D of course, but those using Champions of ZED will generally find themselves in much more familiar D&D territory with interesting twists and turns they probably never heard of, whereas Dragons at Dawn is its own game entirely.

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Armor Class Numbers?

Author: DHBoggs / Labels: , , ,

Because you died when you were hit in Chainmail, we were using damage dice, hit dice and armor classes within about a month of our starting to play Blackmoor (winter of 1970-71). Dave Arneson told me he based the armor class system on an American Civil War Ironclad game, although I can not tell you what game it was at this point, though.” Original Blackmoor  Player Greg Svenson.

(As it happens, the Ironclads game was never published, but the rules were related to the Napoleonic game Don’t Give up the Ship)

It’s the special nature of Ironclad ships that requires different wargame rules.  The point of Ironclads weren,'t just that they were low to the water and hard to hit, it was also that the armor plating was famously hard to penetrate.  Arnesons' Civil War Ironclads game may have had ships with hit points ranging from 1-100, and a combat table or some mechanic indicating the chance to penetrate armor class by weapon type (6pdrs, 12pdrs, musket etc.), resulting in variable damage by weapon.   This is entirely consistent for both a ACW Ironclads game, and for Blackmoor.  In such a game, the hit points for a given type of ship/individual are fixed, but stronger attacks have a more damaging effect against weaker armors and vice versa, once a hit is successfull.   This would require two steps (presumably two tables) a chance to hit/penetrate step and a damage step - as with D&D.  Arneson might easily have translated Weapon type vs Armor Classs into attacker level vs Armor Class.  So as the character/monster levels up and becomes a stronger weapon on the table, they gain more attack/damage dice. 

It has been suggested (and repeated on Arnesons own website) that Armor Classes in original D&D reflect ship classes, i.e. 1st class ship of the line, 2nd class ship and so on..)

I’ve never seen a statement directly from Arneson confirming that "descending" AC numbers were his idea, but, on the other hand, there have been a couple from Mr. Gygax.  On the Troll Lords (C&C) forum Gary Gygax wrote:

“I rather stepped in it when I reversed the AC system in the Chainmail man-to-man rules for the OD&D game. Had I not, then better armor classes would have simply progresses in higher numbers.”  Sun Sep 23, 2007 4:47 pm

What Gygax points to is that the Armor Classes in D&D are identical to the categories for armor in the Man to Man section of CHAINMAIL, except, in CM the first category is Unarmored and the last (for people) is plate and shield.  So if one were to simply assign numbers or “classes” to those categories, Unarmored would be AC 1 and plate and shield would be AC8.

It’s not known if Arneson used the CM categories, (or, perhaps more likely the 8 categories of armor found in Domesday Book #7 that became the basis of those in CM), for AC from the start, or if he simply adapted them at some point, but it does look like he did originally equate unarmored with AC 1 and so on.  Consider this quote from the FFC:

"To figure out when you got to a higher level, you took the creature's Hit Dice (whatever it was on that level) and AC and multiplied by 1000 for the points needed to progress to 2nd level. After 2nd level, the creature would simply need 50% more points for each subsequent level: 2000, 3.000, 4500, 6,750, etc."

So a character with 1HD and an Armor Class of 9 (Unarmored) would need a whopping 10,000 points to get to second level!?  Likewise a 2 HD creature would need 11,000 points (2+9 * 1000).  It makes sense, however with an ascending, worst to best system.  If AC1 is the normal AC for an unarmored human and they start off with 1HD, then by Arnesons system (1+1*1000) they need 2000 XP to advance to second level.  This is exactly the XP a fighting man needs in OD&D for 2nd level and it is also the exact figure Arneson gives in his example of how the system works.  Indeed, the example he gives (“2000, 3.000, 4500, 6,750, etc.") would be a very unlikely scenario unless AC1 was typical for HD1 creatures.

That’s circumstantial, to be sure but that’s not the only reference in the FFC;

"Robots: I roll one 6-sided dice for Armor Class, and another dice for the number of Hit Dice."  Of course, this gives robots a AC range of 1-6.   Why not 1d8? Possibly this is a very old note of his, predating the use of polehedral dice.  Arneson doesn’t indicate anything to suggest anything other than AC1 through AC6 is meant.  AC1 doesn’t exist in D&D.

And yet:

In the FFC we are told that the first six levels of Blackmoor dungeon were re-keyed for the 1976 Gen Con tournament using the standard Original Collectors Edition print of OD&D.  Most of the monsters do indeed match exactly those found in Monsters and Treasures, but there are a few critters that aren’t from the M&T lists.  Of those, seven are given an Armor class of 1:


Conjuror
Magician
Warrior
Giant Scorpions
Thaumaturgists
Evil Priests
Giant Beetles

To me, it looks very much like AC for non-standard “monsters” was determined randomly exactly as Arneson advocated for Robots, which sometimes results in AC1.  Since AC1 makes no sense in OD&D, it might be that Arneson was simply comfortable switching between ascending and descending systems in his own head.  In any case it strains credulity that unarmored magic users and presumably lightly armored priests would have an Armor Class rating better than that of a Dragon or a paladin in full plate and shows again how much Arneson loved random elements in his games.

And lastly there’s this memory from original blackmoor player John Snider:

 “Armor .. I thought it was 1-8, my Boozero character started at 1 if I remember correctly” (personal correspondence)

Who can say for sure?; but it does look like the first AC system was ascending. unarmored at AC1 to plate and shield at AC8.  As far as I know, there are only two games that incorporate an AC system that is identical with what seems to be Arneson’s original: Spellcraft and Swordplay and my own Dragons at Dawn. 

Basic Fantasy, it should be mentioned, is almost identical, except it adds 10, so that, instead of AC8, in BF it’s AC 18.

ACKS, unfortunately, really missed an opportunity here for a nice symmetrical homage to both Arneson and to CHAINMAIL.  ACKS also has an ascending AC system like Arnesons, but instead of starting with AC1 as unarmed, they went to AC 0.  So ACKS is “wrong” by one point, which is not hard to add, of course.  Shame that the designers let that one slip by.  (I brought it up during development, but as often happens, I feel like a voice howling in the wilderness).

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Infamous Characters, and the history of levels in D&D

Author: DHBoggs / Labels: , ,

Levels are at the heart of D&D, from experience to combat to hit points - not to mention how much the term is used for other things, such as dungeon level and magic level.   Knowing when character levels came to be in the form familiar to us from the 1974 rules would go a long way to really understanding the development of the game.
We know Gary Gygax used the familiar numbered levels in his write-ups of the game from the winter of 1972/73 onward.  What's been unclear is if he invented them or inherited them from Dave Arneson.
We know that Dave invented the concept of levels and experience points, but the question has always been whether Dave’s levels were ever more than “Flunky. Hero, Superhero”, or if he also subdivided into 1-3rd level flunky, 4-7 level hero, etc.
There’s no doubt that Gary gave the names to each level (i.e. thaumaturgiest), but did he also come up with the numbers?
In Arneson’s First Fantasy Campaign there is the section titled  "Blackmoor's More Infamous Characters: Giving a breakdown on the sheets handed out to the players..."  Further Down it says "Krey turned traitor and joined Soukup... during the first year."  This is followed by a list of "Blackmoor Military Manpower" (good guys) and their Hit Dice which includes Krey and thus we know this list is from a very early period of gaming, before Krey turned traitor, but also apparently after Svenson's character had been promoted to superhero - perhaps the first quarter of 1972.
This list is followed by write-ups of "bad guy" infamous characters.  It is not at all clear if these write-ups are also supposed to be from the first year handouts or from later years or a mix of each.
There is a brief "table of contents" introducing the write-ups that is particularly interesting in that it  leaves out four entries: The Blue Rider, Svenny, Mello and the Bishop. These four are all the "good guys" and appear in the text sandwiched between the last and next to last entries mentioned in the brief “table of contents.”
Okay, so what?
We know that the Blue Rider, for example, contains information from adventures that took place in 1973, a time when the D&D playtest rules were being used, and not surprisingly, there’s no weird or UnD&D like terminology in any of these four write-ups.  So that would seem to indicate that all the write-ups date to 1973 or later, unless the four good guy write-ups were additions to an earlier handout.

Now if the four heroes are additions, and the brief table of contents was really the original list of an earlier handout, then it opens the possibility that the earlier handout also dates to the first year (1971/2).  Another clue suggesting the four hero's are added to an earlier "bad guy" handout, is that the afformentioned Captain Krey is not on the list.  If the bad guy handout was made before his character turned traitor, it's sure he wouldn't be on it.  In any case, the bad guy write-ups are worth investigating to see if they indicate pre Gygax information. 
So, looking deeper we find these clues:
Intro:
“level fourteen Lord”
Egg of Coot:
“Level II intelligence”
Alchemical spell magic (non-Vancian)
Ran of Ah Foo
Alchemical spell magic (non-Vancian)
Ran is dual class
            Class: Warrior (not fighter) “skill” Level 10
            Class: Magic (not Magic-user) 10th Level
Dragon types being bred by Ran include Red and Gold dragons at “Max Level”.  D&D dragons are not graded by level.
Rans assistant is “Level 7 Warrior and Magic”
Description includes many wargaming notes, including a modifier for “morale condition” perhaps ala Don’t Give up the Ship.  There is no such thing as “morale condition” in D&D.
Gin of Salik
Alchemical spell magic (non-Vancian)
Marfeltd the Barbarian, Duke of the Peaks, Final Notes
Nothing pertaining to D&D.  Many more Wargaming references.
These “bad guy” write-ups listed in the “table of contents” show very clearly they were prepared before Gygaxian D&D introduced the concepts of Vancian Magic, named levels, and terms like “fighting-men” and "Magic-user", at a time when monsters were still graded by “level” rather than “Hit Dice”, at a time when Level II intelligence meant something and wargaming was very much a factor in the minds of the players.  They must therefore date to 1972 at the latest, and are pre-D&D, just like the Blackmoor Military Manpower listing that precedes it on the page.  Indeed, it may very well have been part of the same 1972 handout.  Note that no mention is made of Clerics either, further suggesting an early date, possibly as early as fall 1971.
We see then that Dave developed two “skill” classes, that of Warrior and Magic and divided each into at least 14 levels.  We know that heroes and superheroes were still meaningful terms, and we see “Lord” used here also.  So it follows that Dave had divided Flunky, Hero, Superhero, Lord into the familiar levels 1-3, 4-7, 8-10, 11-14 or something like that, very early on, and in any case, long before he introduced Gary Gygax to the game.   

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