When to Hang Up the Hat

One of the best play-by-post DMs I've played under, old school forum-goers will know him as "Jeffery St. Clair" (DMJSC), announced yesterday that he's got to shut down his games. He's been running his AD&D game over 17 years now, and I've been playing in it for exactly 13 years (my request to join was April 26, 2011, and today is April 25th, 2024). 

He's also shutting down a much shorter lived Mazes & Minotaurs game that I was in, that never quite found its footing. He also, over the years, ran a great Star Frontiers game until we ran out of his prepared adventures, and for a short time he ran a high level AD&D game. 

His main game, called Mines of Nemrac, was actually two campaigns, as he ran an Oriental Adventures game on the other side of his campaign world (there were connections/portals between the two game zones, but they were rare to stumble upon). This is the one I was in for 13 years, and I had four characters in it, two in each zone. 

Wehostan, Son of Bardolph (Halfling Fighter 4/Thief 6) was my main and longest running PC. He had some great adventures over the years and got to do many of the things players dream of when playing D&D. He helped slay a dragon, battled an evil wizard while his party was paralyzed, got the snot knocked out of him by an ogre-sized bullywug, and lots of other fun stuff. 

Gwire (Human Cleric 7) was my attempt to run a cleric not as a holy crusader but as a Van Helsing/Solomon Kane/Simon Belmont type monster hunter (which was the original impetus of the class in Arneson's campaign), and he also had a lot of great adventures over the years. Starting out penniless, his first two forays earned him no treasure, but in the end, he was slaying demons and whatnot. He amassed a huge pile of treasure and magic items. 

Chie Enokido (Human Kensei 5) was my main character in Pingbo Lake. She was the daughter of a disgraced landholding family, and specialized in naginata. She was racking up fame and honor in the campaign, and was trying to avenge her honor on an ogre-mage (or full oni?) who pretended to be a kensei but wasn't. She was very upset about that. 

Five Dragons Xiong (Human Sohei) was a fairly new addition, still first level. He managed to help his party overcome some bandits, and that was his career. 

I'm actually sad that I won't be able to continue the careers of these characters. Well, not so much Xiong, who I was just starting to get a feel for. But the other three were well developed and fun to play. And sure, I could maybe take these characters to another campaign if there's an opening, or remake then in a new campaign some day, but it won't be the same. A lot of the fun of the characters were the way they interacted with their parties. Especially for Wehostan, as his group, known as Gang Green after the green dragon they slew, were just the most rowdy, scruffy-looking scoundrels you could ever find, and a blast to game with. Especially in the OOC, when certain other players would get seemingly very offended that we were pretending to run a protection racket for new players in the game. 

Nemrac players, if any of you read this blog, feel free to memorialize your PCs in the comments!

And to get back to DMJSC, he's had some family issues, and some health problems recently, but he says he's actually in a good place these days. In fact, he's just too busy to keep the game up. And I don't blame him. Nemrac has 75 PCs (yes, 4 of those are mine, and other players also run multiple PCs, but not all!). I'm not sure how many players, exactly, there are. It's a lot to manage. It's impressive that he kept it going for so long and managed to grow the game as large as he did. Most of my attempts at PbP have ended abruptly in failure. [Fingers crossed, my current Gamma World game will keep going.]

To thanks to Jeffery St. Clair/DMJSC, for all the years of gaming. And to all the players in the game as well!

Price Discrepancies

I'm continuing to work on the GM Guide for TS&R. I'm at the Dominion Management section now. I've never really come up against the prices for stronghold construction in the Expert Set/Rules Cyclopedia before, but while putting my version together (including some Asian style architecture and a few other things that I thought should be added), I checked out both the 1E DMG and the 2E Stronghold guide (one of the splatbooks...which I could only find in a fan-edited OCR version, not a scanned original PDF) and there are some big differences! 

The BX/BECMI prices are generally a lot higher for most buildings compared to 1E. 2E goes a bit overboard IMO with a whole formula to calculate the type of terrain, climate, vegetation, available materials and workforce. So instead of a simple price list, there's a (badly formatted in the version of the book I found) table with lots of numbers that seem all over the place. It may be a list of prices for the example castle they present. It doesn't seem very usable to me. Maybe if I had the original version with proper formatting, it would make more sense. 

Anyway, this leaves me with BECMI and 1E for my sources (and I suppose I could look at 3E+...but nah). 

For the construction costs, I stuck to the numbers I know. It's more expensive, but castles and other strongholds should NOT be cheap. 

However...in addition to structure costs, the Companion Set (and RC) have a list of monthly wages for various retainers and officials for your stronghold and the domain at large. Some of these seem very overly priced to me these days, and others are comically underpriced. Really, the Seneschal of the castle, the most important person you can hire, only gets Mercenary pay rates? Assuming it's a human knight (heavy horse), you only need to pay 20gp per month for this official. Meanwhile, the guard captain gets 4000gp per month. Say what? 

1E doesn't actually provide listings for these sorts of officials, from what I've found so far. Maybe it's in a sourcebook I haven't looked at, or a Dragon Magazine article somewhere (I don't have the archive...maybe I should track that down). So I had to just adjust the numbers to something I thought was more fitting. Every official I list is given a price to hire them, and most have had significant reductions from the Companion Set numbers. 

When we were kids, first making our own strongholds, our PCs were already pretty wealthy for their levels (my cousin Ben was a bit of a Monty Haul DM when he ran games), so paying the prices in the book for the various retainers didn't seem so bad. Besides, as we got up into the high teens and low twenties in level, we had copious amounts of treasure even without Ben giving out generous amounts. 

But if, going by the rules, a PC were to start a domain in a Wilderness or Borderland territory, it would take them a long time to build up the funds just from the domain income to hire many of these positions, so the money would have to come from adventuring spoils (as we did as kids). And going by the rates of treasure going to my group these days, by the time they reach Name Level, they will be spending most of their money on the strongholds, not leaving much for staff. So I feel fairly justified in reducing the staff costs. I may want to reconsider the construction costs as well... We'll see.

Mundane-scape: Planar gaming advice is hard to give

 I've been slowly working my way through TSR advice on planar gaming. 

Mentzer's Companion Set has some rudimentary, but functional, advice on the Ether and Elemental planes. There's not a lot to go on there, but as a kid, I felt it was enough that I could riff off of for planar adventures. 

The Mentzer Master Set, however, gives some information on Immortals and Artifacts, and adds to the planar monster roster, but doesn't actually give much good advice about the Outer Planes (something advertised in the Companion Set). As such, as a kid reading these books I always felt a bit hesitant to do much with the Outer Planes. I was familiar with the Great Wheel of AD&D, but Mentzer suggested a different type of Outer Planes which intrigued me, but there was never enough stuff for me to really dig into the implications. 

I only acquired the Immortal Set a couple of years ago, and was reading up on the Outer Planes the last two days. Hmm. It definitely sets things up in a more interesting fashion than the Great Wheel, with an infinite number of possible planes, weird planar intersections, and planes hidden behind other planes. But there's too much focus on statistical measurements (how big, how many stars/planets within, how many dimensions, what mix of the five Spheres or the four elements) and not enough examples of what a plane might be like on the inside. And from a straight reading, each one is just a mundane little pocket universe. A limited area of space with stars, planets, etc. within. Maybe those planets are unlike anything in our universe, but they're still planets. No vast infinite plains of blood-soaked land under an ominous orange sky. No paradise of solid clouds. No M.C. Escher-esque mind-bending realms. Or rather, you could have them, but the game implies just lots of Class M planets to explore. 

AD&D is interesting. In the PHB, we get a basic rundown of the planar geography of the Great Wheel. We get a few notes on adventuring in planar realms, plus encounter charts, in the DMG. But not that much. I don't have the Manual of the Planes in hard copy, so I haven't dug into that yet. That's gonna have to wait until I get a bunch of assignments graded, and Halloween costumes finished. But I will. But just from the core books, there's a bit to spur your imagination, but not much. 

Anyway, while I can appreciate the need for all the statistics and discussion of how 3- or 4-dimensional beings interact with 6-dimensional spaces, the Immortal Set is a bit of a let down. AD&D without the MotP is also a let down. 

Why is it so hard to come up with good material for outer planes? Is it just that the game designers didn't want to infringe on DMs' imaginations? But the Great Wheel suggests otherwise. I guess I'll need to find some time to read the MotP, and later get into some 2E Planescape stuff to get a better grasp on what TSR thought planar adventures should be like.

Who Did Worldbuilding Advice Better, TSR or WOTC?

 Recently, there was a comment on JB's excellent B/X Blackrazor blog by Simulated Knave claiming that they found 1E AD&D lacked solid advice for interaction with NPCs outside of combat or for worldbuilding, something that the commenter found that 3E D&D/Pathfinder was better at. 

Now, I've played a bit of PF but it has been many years since, and I never had the books. I've only briefly looked at the PF 2E thing. So maybe the good folks at Paizo went above and beyond with advice for NPC interaction and worldbuilding. But I did play plenty of 3E/3.5 D&D, and I have those books on PDF still to reference. 

WAY back, I did also make this post about how OD&D has more pages of rules for exploration of the game world than for combat within the game system. The sixth post I ever made here. I think that's relevant to the discussion as a bit of context.

Let's examine Simulated Knave's claim. 

Of course, SK, if you're reading this, feel free to comment and let me know if I misunderstood your intent or points you brought up. It's always possible, and I'm open to having my mind changed on this front. 

Also, one last disclaimer. As most regular readers know, I'm a Frank Mentzer edited BECMI kid. That's my go-to D&D set. And Frank did a pretty good job (I feel) giving the budding DM advice on how to build the dungeon, how to build the home town, how to build the world, and how to set up the politics, and how to set up the planes of existence/powers that be/legendary artifacts* of the world all in an easily digestible format that provides just enough advice to get you going on each of these fronts without overwhelming. 

*Having only relatively recently acquired the Immortals Set, and still not having read and digested it thoroughly, I do have to admit that a bit more advice on creating planar adventures could be helpful than what's in the Companion and Masters Sets. 

But the claim by Simulated Knave was about AD&D giving "garbage" advice compared to d20 system games. 

So let's start with d20. 

3E etc. obviously have some simple and direct player facing rules for NPC interactions. There are skills for lying to NPCs, sweet talking with NPCs, trying to see if the NPC is lying to you, and so on. Bluff, Intimidate, Diplomacy, Sense Motive, Perform...are there anymore? Maybe I'm missing one or two. Roll d20+skill bonuses vs a set DC or the NPC's contested roll. 

Sure, it's simple, it's easy to remember, it's in the PHB so players can know the rules. But it doesn't always make sense. I don't care that you've got a +15 bonus to Intimidate, your Barbarian with the +5 greataxe is not going to make the Lich Lord, who commands the army of the dead outside the gate, tremble in his boots. I don't care what you say, or that you rolled a natural 20. Maybe try again after his army has been decimated and you've located his last phylactery. Then you might have a chance.

And yes, I know that d20 has advice to not allow a roll in that sort of situation, but I've seen plenty of players demand things like that over the years. 

What advice or rules does the 3E DMG (I found my 3.0 DMG before the 3.5 one, so I'm referencing that) have for interactions with NPCs outside of combat? 

Two pages on using the Leadership feat to manage sidekicks and cohorts for PCs, including a half page sidebar on animal companions. 

Then we've got a bunch of pages on NPC stat blocks (mostly combat stats). And a big section going over all of the combat rules, procedures, and so on. It's 25 pages long. 

Then there are a few pages on dealing with environmental dangers, which counts as world building advice. 

The next section is on skill and ability checks, so we get detailed rules on how each skill can be used, and example difficulties for them. This includes the various skills for NPC interaction mentioned above, of course. It's a little over 4 pages. Then we're on to saving throws and adjudicating magic. The second part could be considered world building advice. 

Now we get into the dungeon, wilderness, adventure and campaign creation advice. And it covers around 60 pages for all that. But with in that, it's not all world building advice. A lot of it is combat encounter creation advice. Or how to mechanically handle traps. Or dungeon dressing suggestions. Encounter tables. Random town generation. Advice on linking adventures and player goals into a coherent campaign. Not bad stuff, but a lot of it reads as very surface level to me. There are world building tidbits in there, but also a lot of combat encounter (or challenges requiring skill checks) explained, more so than there is advice on crafting a fantasy world. There is world building advice, as I say, but I don't find it as deep as SK seems to. Or maybe the 3.5 DMG or Pathfinder improved on this base. 

There is a section in all of this on running NPCs. Or rather, there's some advice on the stock types of NPCs you might include in an adventure or campaign, and advice on how to use them as allies or opponents. There are some rules for DCs to influence NPC attitudes. Some hirelings you could hire explained. 

After all this, there's the XP and treasure sections, some reference charts, and the index. 

So for NPC interaction, SK claims that 3E/PF provide the following: "What are the odds of sneaking past an NPC? Of stealing from them? Of convincing them of something? Of them knowing some particular fact? Of them existing at all in the particular town?"

3E does do these things. But AD&D gives you all of that, as well. It's different. Instead of giving you the NPC's Perception skill for the player to roll their Stealth score against, AD&D gives you the surprise round and the Thief skills for hiding and moving silently. AD&D has NPC reaction tables. In fact, they're more robust than 3E's. It's got modifiers for racial animosity, for example, in addition to general reaction rolls. How do you decide in AD&D that a particular NPC lives in a particular community or knows a certain thing? Well, that's called making a decision on your own, rather than rolling some dice. 

All of the NPC interaction that SK seems to laud in d20 systems is just a very mechanical functional take on interaction. d20 gives you lots of skills and difficulty numbers to beat, while AD&D gives you actual advice on crafting a medieval fantasy world (granted, a very specifically Gygaxian one) and lets you extrapolate from there how you want your NPCs to interact with the PCs. 

As for world building, I mentioned above that d20 gives you lots of lists of challenge ratings (how hard is it to climb a wooden wall vs a stone one, or how hard is it to pick that lock vs the lock over there), and a lot of surface level dungeon/world dressing. But everything is centered around making some sort of skill roll, saving throw, ability check, or...yes...combat. There's not a lot of fodder for interesting world building and organic, dialogic play. 

AD&D's 1E DMG has tons of pages of charts, lists, and what not to give flavor to the world. It's got lists of gemstones and flowers and their folk belief uses. It's got that random harlot table. 

There are 9 and a half pages near the front of the 1E DMG giving advice on NPC hirelings, retainers, specialists, and so on. Way more detail than 3.0. And yes, much of this is also mechanical. Will your spy complete their mission? How long will it take the sage to research your questions? How will the dwarven mercenary crew react to your Elf trying to hire them? But it's also a lot of extra information on running these NPCs as well. 

Anyway, I'm out of time so I can't dig for more examples right now. But they're there. 

Yes, there are a lot of combat rules in AD&D. There are a lot in 3E. But in my opinion, AD&D gives richer information on all of these things. Sure, it lacks really detailed stronghold development rules. But BECMI has them, so it was never a problem for me. Maybe that's a cop out, but it's true that a lot of gamers I know mixed and matched what they liked from the TSR editions to fill the gaps.

The Book Arrived

 Yesterday, I received my print copy of Joseph Bloch's Swords of Wuxia for his Adventures Dark & Deep retro-clone system. I've had the PDF since I ordered it, but I've only barely skimmed through it so far. Now that I've got the physical book in hand, I intend to dive into it in detail. I really prefer printed matter over screen reading. However, I don't have time to get into it today or even over the weekend. So a review of the content will have to wait. Oh, and if you didn't know, this is Joe's attempt to re-imagine what the old OA book would have looked like if it had take inspiration from Chinese myth and cinema instead of mostly Japanese inspirations.

I will say for now, that this book is well designed. It's got that orange spine that makes it look pretty good alongside the later printings of 1E books. It's a bit darker, but all of my older books are faded to differing degrees so it doesn't look out of place. The print size is a little different, though, with Swords of Wuxia being just a tad taller than the old TSR books. The cover is a nice painting of Sun Wu Kong (the Monkey King), looking like he's about to spring into action to beat down some demon or other. The back cover is text only, with a gradated turquoise (darker at the top, lighter at the bottom) background, similar to the trade dress of the old books. 

The interior is nice and cleanly laid out, with two column text and a sans serif font (Futura like the originals, I assume), and is easy to read. The book contains a lot of tables, and most alternate between three lines unshaded, three lines shaded. At least one table contains quite a bit of information in each cell, so alternate lines are shaded. The interior illustrations are all black and white, but look pretty good. There's a big list of artists, so there are quite a range of styles, some simple line art, some more detailed, a few just silhouettes. I don't find the mix of art styles jarring, but art is always subjective. Most of it looks good, in my opinion. 

The book contains races (two types of human, two demi-humans), three completely new classes plus extensive notes and conversions for all the other classes in Adventures Dark & Deep. There are rules for combat and martial arts, for creating families, Asian-style societies and organizations, and lists of spells and equipment, of course. There are campaign guidelines including wuxing (Taoist 5 elements) elemental planes. There are also lists of magic items and monsters. All this takes us up to page 128. Beyond that, there are some very extensive random encounter tables. Finally, there are some tables for weapons vs armor and the like if you use those rules in your AD&D games, and some inspirational sources. 

I'm happy to see that a lot of the inspirational sources are not only things I've read or viewed, but also listed in Flying Swordsmen. There are a few I'm unfamiliar with, which is always nice. New things to check out! 

So that's my initial impression (unboxing) review. After I've had some time to read through it, I'll of course provide more detailed thoughts, and how I think it compares to my own ideas in Flying Swordsmen and TS&R Jade (maybe Chanbara, too!).

Choosing Your Ruleset as Difficulty Level

This is an idea that's been knocking around in my head for a while, but playing some emulated games with Steven (my 8 year old) this evening* reminded me about it. 

Video games used to have difficulty levels that you could choose before you started the game. I'm sure there are still a few games that use them, but one reason I don't play a lot of video games anymore is that they seem to be designed to either give you "an experience" or else they want you to subscribe/pay lots of microtransactions, so either they are too easy (experience or subscription) or too hard (microtransactions), with no choice. But back in the day, we had this.

So, here are my very subjective and probably wrong estimations of which version of D&D is at which difficulty level. This assumes a few things. One, it's difficulty for the players to play the game, not for the DM to run the game. Two, it assumes you're running things more or less by the book, at least as far as assumptions for things like encounters, healing, goals of play, and the like are concerned. If you play 4E in an "old school style" then that's outside of what I'm talking about here. I'm considering a group that plays 4E (or whatever edition) as the designers intended it to be played. Three, let's leave supplements out of the equation for now, they just complicate things. So no Skills & Powers, no Greyhawk/Blackmoor, no Unearthed Arcana, no Tasha's Cauldron of Everything. Just the core rule books.

And I'll reiterate -- this is just my feeling about it. Feel free to tell me how wrong I am down in the comments. But the next time you start up a campaign, consider selecting the rule set that fits the challenge level you wish to give the players.

 I'm Too Young to Die (Very Easy Mode)

4th Edition D&D This is about as easy as it gets for the players. It's designed so that you would have to go out of your way to create a "suboptimal" character. The play assumptions are two to three easy fights then a tougher but still winnable "boss" fight as an adventure. Magic items are fairly easy to acquire, and you're not expected to have to do much more than ride the railroad from set piece battle to set piece battle, with a few "skill challenges" here and there to spice things up.

5th Edition D&D A bit more challenging than 4E, but still a lot easier than most other editions. It's possible to create a suboptimal character, but the rules tend to be a bit more forgiving with character creation. Advancement is very fast at low levels. Healing is ridiculously easy. And again, the adventures seem to be mostly an assumption of a few easy fights leading up to the boss battle. If players just go along and make sure to rest often, and the DM only places recommended encounter difficulties, it's not too hard at all.

Hey, Not Too Rough (Easy Mode)

2nd Edition AD&D The rules and systems for play, including character creation and character advancement, can lead to challenges for the players. You might get stuck with a suboptimal character through dice rolls as much as through character choice. But, the big mitigating factor of this edition is the design goal that players play "heroes" and go on epic narrative adventures. So while death is very much possible from the way the rules are written, the DM advice suggests that this be mulliganed or nerfed to serve the ends of the story. 

 Hurt Me Plenty (Normal Mode)

BX or BECMI D&D  I'm lumping these two together because while BECMI incorporates a lot more complexity of play at the high levels (not to mention Immortals level play being a completely different and more challenging game), at the earliest levels, play is pretty much the same in them. Character creation by the book can be a challenge (roll 3d6 down the line), but ability score bonuses are more generous than in the AD&D line. There aren't many choices to make at character creation, either. Adventure design assumptions are that encounters are not balanced, and it's up to the players to know when to push on for more and when to quit. But there are also rules that make treasure pretty generous, which speeds up advancement if the characters do survive.

3rd Edition D&D This edition has a lot of the design assumptions of the later editions. Character creation is generous with abilities and ways to optimize the character, but the complexity of the "exception-based rules" design, with all the skill points and feat choices and whatnot make it more of a burden to play than other editions. The adventure design assumptions are not quite so forgiving, but still, healing is fairly easy to get, magic items are easily purchased, and it's pretty easy to get around the "save or die" type effects. If the rules weren't so complex and fiddly, this would be in an easier tier.

Ultra-Violence (Hard Mode)

Original D&D It all started here, and it wasn't easy! Characters were randomly generated and didn't have a lot of "powers" to rely on. Monster encounters can easily be with overpowering odds. There's an assumption of thinking your way through encounters, rather than just hacking and slashing. You're dead at 0 hit points, and healing is not easy to come by. The incompleteness of the rules (remember, this is assuming the base rules only, not the supplements) may also up the difficulty a bit, as the DM will need to make a lot of guesses as to what's an appropriate challenge, and players will have to have their wits about them to survive.

1st Edition AD&D This edition has a good mix of difficulty in character optimization (it's got generous die rolling for ability scores but stingy bonuses for high scores, race/class combo restrictions, ability score restrictions, level caps for demi-humans, etc.) and difficulty in adventure assumptions. Monsters are challenging. Tricks, traps, and whatnot are expected, and can really mess you up. Sure, there are lots of opportunities to find powerful magic items, but the most powerful have serious drawbacks. And the level of detail in the rules give the DM all sorts of ways to make things difficult or more challenging for the players.

Nightmare (Extra Hard Mode)

Holmes D&D Rolling 3d6 down the line for stats and rolling your hit points randomly and you can only go up to 3rd level, but the book expects you might run into all sorts of dragons, vampires, purple worms, and the like? Yeah, this is the most challenging version if you play it straight.

*We have a Super Console X, an Android TV box with EmuElec, Retroarch, and about 30 systems emulated, with thousands of games. Tonight, we played some Twisted Metal on PS1 and Gauntlet 4 Quest Mode on Sega Genesis.

Clunky

Gygax, for all his marketing and conceptual genius when creating D&D, really wasn't very good at creating elegant rule systems. I'm at the stage of Treasures, Serpents, & Ruins (TSR) where I think if I put this out, it will either be a generic rule set or a specifically kitchen sink Asian fantasy inspired rule set. Either way, I'd like a system for multiclassing, but 1E AD&D is just such a mess that I think I need to look elsewhere.

First of all, AD&D has the weirdness of demihumans multiclassing (fairly straightforward, but with lots of corner cases and provisos depending on which two classes are being combined, and limits on what can be combined) PLUS human dual classing (a bit more complex with required ability scores, limits on what powers you can use and when, etc). Why two completely different systems? Obviously Gary wanted distinctions between humans and non-humans. Also, allowing carte blanch demi-human style multiclassing could create some unbalanced nightmares (Paladin/Rangers? Cleric/Fighter/Magic-Users with no level limits on them?).

At first, I was thinking to just allow humans to multiclass, but with level limits. I even considered removing level limits from single-class demi-humans, so level limits are only a check on multiclassed characters. Multiclassing though a bit easier than dual classing, still has some headaches. Especially with energy drain. If you get level drained, which class's level gets drained first? If you maxed out one of the two classes, but have still been accumulating XP in it, and it gets drained, that's a huge chunk of XP removed! Although it probably won't matter much, if you go from Fighter 4/Thief 8 to Fighter 3/Thief 7 with a double energy drain. You'll probably make that Fighter level up pretty quickly. 

But to get to the point. I want a more elegant system for TSR (or TSR-East, whichever). My current version of TSR has premade classes that combine two base classes. A few of them are pretty popular. The Lark (Fighter/Magic-User) has seen a lot of play [four PCs]. Next most seen is the Paladin (Cleric/Fighter) [2 PCs]. Finally, we've had one Warlock (Magic-User/Thief) in the campaign. Assassin (Fighter/Thief), Bard (Cleric/Magic-User) and Darkstalker (Cleric/Thief) have been ignored so far. 

In service of a more elegant rule system than one with 10 character classes, of which 4 of them each come with 4 subclasses for a total of 26 options BEFORE considering character's race, I want to strip things down to the five core classes of my current TSR-East rules: Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thief, Xia. No subclasses. 

Then, with these five classes, we can have 10 multiclass combinations. But these don't need to be separate classes the way they are now in my main TSR rules (the house rules for my West Marches campaign). 

I plan to simply create an XP progression chart and hit die for each combination. I'll have none of this dividing XP in half and leveling up separately of 1E, and halving hit points rolled at each level. Like the Elf of BX and BECMI, it will have all the powers of both classes, which level up at a certain rate. Attacks and saves will be done by whichever class is better. 

For example: A Fighter/Xia (kensei style)

The PC could use any armor (fighter), or go unarmored with level-based dodging (xia). They could use any weapon (both classes), but could also do better unarmed damage (xia). As they level up, they could sweep (1 attack/level vs 1HD opponents), get a combat style, multiple attacks, and a smash maneuver as a Fighter (if they are allowed to get high enough level). They also get all the monk-like abilities of the Xia like improved jumping ability, stunning fist, various resistances, and so on. 

Since the Fighter needs 2000 XP to level 2, and the Xia needs 2200 XP, just add them together. The multiclass Fighter/Xia would gain level 2 when they have 4200 XP. Since I give Fighters a d10 hit die and the Xia has a d8 hit die, I'd give the multiclass the d8. The Xia has slightly better saving throws, so use those. Base attack bonuses are the same. 

Example Number 2: A Cleric/Magic-User

This PC could wear any armor, use blunt weapons plus daggers, cast both Cleric and MU spells, and turn undead.  They would get a d6 hit die (average of Cleric d8 and MU d4), and would need 4000 XP to reach level 2 (1500 XP from Cleric, 2500 XP from MU). Cleric generally has better saving throws, so use them for all categories but Paralysis/Turn to Stone, which would use the MU save until 5th level when the Cleric save gets better. They'd also use the Cleric BAB progression. 

This seems like it should work. The only thing I need to consider now would be level limits for the combinations. Would different races get different limits? Would humans also be limited in this way? That would be a pretty big change, but I think in general this is a much more elegant way to handle things. And then I don't need BX-ified versions of the Paladin, Ranger, Illusionist, let alone Sohei, Ninja (1E OA style), or Kensei. 

It also eliminates the need for subclasses which also fill in archetypes like the above. Want healing magic and undead turning but better fighting ability? No need to have Paladin AND Sohei classes. Just play a Cleric/Fighter and style it as one of those...or a Vampire Hunter, Templar Knight, or whatever.

Outed Myself

 In an AD&D 1E play-by-post game I've been in for years now, the DM started up an Oriental Adventures game section, and I joined in. He also (knowing I was the author) decided to use some elements of Flying Swordsmen in his game. Mostly he's using martial arts maneuvers and monsters. 

Anyway, it had been our secret all along that one of the players in the game was the author of the supplemental rules to the game we're playing (it's still 1E OA, just we get a few extra martial arts powers bolted onto our classes -- I've got a kensai PC in the game). 

Some people have commented on how much they like the martial arts maneuvers, but I'd never let them know it was my work until today. Not sure why, but a new player had joined the game and had no idea what Flying Swordsmen was. Another fairly new player was complementing the game, so I fessed up and gave the new player the link to download the rules. 

And immediately, I got questions about interpreting the rules. I deferred to the DM, of course, since it's his game and his place to decide how to mesh the base OA rules with FS. 

It's been a little while since I've done much with either Flying Swordsmen or with Chanbara. I think I should probably promote them a bit more. My sons have both tried their hands at YouTubing (yes, even my 6-year-old) so tonight my wife suggested I make some videos to promote my games. 

I think I will. Expect a link to a video on the blog some time in the near future.

The Great Kobold Debate

Now that the orc alignment/racism thing seems to have blown over, time to move on to a more pressing question about D&D humanoids: Kobolds -- dog-men or mini dragon men?

Starting with Mentzer, I took the dog-like description as more telling than the hairless & scaly description (like I thought that meant they were mangy and diseased) but when later editions made them specifically little crappy dragonmen I didn't oppose it since it was an interesting twist. Anyway, here's the evolution of the kobold for the first 30 years or so. Feel free to chime in in the comments about how you view them.

In Chainmail, they're interchangeable with goblins, and no description given.

In OD&D, they're still just slightly weaker goblins.

Holmes goes with the folkloric description. Interestingly, they've got a save bonus to everything EXCEPT dragon breath.

In AD&D 1E, we get a lot of description, and for the first time they are described as hairless, scaly, and with small horns. The Sutherland illustrations have very dog-like faces, but the bodies are scaly (or wearing chain mail?)

Moldvay is the first time the kobold is described as dog-like. The Errol Otis illustration seems to support my 'diseased' assumption. Mentzer was the first set I owned, but I had seen BX before I got it. So maybe this picture colored my view?

Mentzer's text is nearly identical to Moldvay, but there is no illustration.

AD&D 2E of course gives us more information on kobolds than most people really need, although a lot of it is identical to the 1E information. The DiTerlizzi picture is definitely a hybrid dog-lizard here, which likely shaped their future development by WotC.

And in the Rules Cyclopedia, of course the text is again nearly identical to Mentzer, only adding in the note about spellcasters (from Mentzer's Masters Set).

And in 3E and forward, the kobold is finally specifically tagged as "reptilian" and given the draconic heritage. The heads are still described as dog-like, though.

The indie (and very fun) Kobolds Ate My Baby rejected the reptilian/draconic angle, and made them little furry nasties. I really appreciated that. I don't have a copy of that game to post, though.

Are they dog men? Mini dragon men? Something in-between? Or do you go to the folklore sources and make them evil little fae like redcaps? Something original?

Does Edition Matter?

Big question, and I don't have a definitive answer (that's your TL/DR), but a few recent things have got me considering the effect of an edition on the play experience.

While I was in Illinois, Dean started a third campaign (still using his fractured fairy tale Eberron setting, I think) but using 4E. Now that I'm back in Korea, he asked if I wanted to join, and I declined because I'm just not that fond of 4E.

Then Jeremy started asking me if I'd play in a 4E game that he wants to run, only instead of using a standard array or point buy for ability scores, adapting my West Marches Classic D&D house rule. My rule is as follows:

• Players may choose one of two methods to roll ability scores: roll 3d6 six times, and place the scores where you want them to go, or else roll 4d6-lowest die, in order.

This forces players to choose between slightly higher stats but not where they might like, or being sure to play the class you want, but having slightly lower scores on average. It doesn't always work out. As dice are random, sometimes a 3d6 PC has better scores than a 4d6-L PC. It happens. But in general, it works.

Now, for 4E, which was carefully crafted to be "balanced" and not easily allow you to make a crappy character, and every PC should be equally useful in a fight, I wonder if Jeremy's switch would break the game. Not enough to play in it, though, but it did help me think of this topic for a blog post.

The edition matters, I think, in this case. 5E could definitely be played that way without much hassle. The online play-by-post West Marches game that inspired my own uses random ability score rolls instead of point buy, and it plays just fine. 4E, though, I think might break down. Maybe not, though, as it does also seem to be designed for each character to rely on only one primary ability score (or at least to allow you that luxury if you choose your powers right). The fact that the game was designed assuming all characters would have equivalent scores (through the standard array or point buy limits) makes me think randomizing it wouldn't work.

Maybe I'll give it a try and see.

The other thing that got me considering the effects of edition choice on the game was my reading through 1E Dragonlance Adventures. The more I read it, the less likely I think I'd be to run a game set in Krynn using 1E. I much prefer Classic D&D over AD&D anyway, but I don't hate AD&D.

But what I would possibly do would be to try and run a game set in Krynn using 5E.

I'd posted about that idea a few years ago, even came up with rules for the white/red/black robe mages and Knights of Solamnia in 5E.

And I'm thinking 5E might be a better fit, especially for the original module series, for a few reasons. First of all, adventures in Krynn don't seem to be strongly "murderhobo." The nations use steel coins, but any ruins or monster lairs are likely to have pre-Cataclysm gold/silver/copper coins, which are pretty much useless to Krynn PCs. And since AD&D relies on treasure for the bulk of XP earned, it's harder to get in Krynn. 5E awards most XP for combat, so that's not a problem there. It actually fits better if you want a game that may actually see mid- to high-level play some day.

Secondly, the more streamlined 5E rule set is probably more suited to the more "narrative" style of an adventure path (or railroad if you prefer that term) series of adventures. Since 1E was designed with streamlining tournament play, IMO it's bogged down with a lot of rules minutia that don't really help make the game better (feel free to disagree, I know some of you will) EXCEPT in the case of tournament play, where exact and consistent rules are needed across multiple, competing tables.

For a home game? Meh.

The only thing that stops me from starting a 5E Dragonlance campaign setting right now is that I really didn't have much fun DMing 5E. But I am considering the following and wondering if it might be fun:

• Play through the original module series
• Using 5E with a few modifications for the setting
• Players who are familiar with 5E and adventure path style games, but not with DL/Krynn

Uncovering Treasure

Been on vacation. My family spent most of 2019 in the USA while I remained in Korea. I've been in Illinois with the family for the past three weeks, and two more to go before I head back for work. The family's sticking around here for a while longer. It's hard, but it's been great for my wife and our boys.

Back in December, I ordered myself a copy of the AD&D Dragonlance Adventures as a birthday present for myself. Since the seller only did domestic shipping, I had to wait until I visited here to get it. Been reading it in short bursts when I have time.

It's not the best copy, pretty beat up, but it was only $20 or so. I'll have thoughts on Krynn coming soon(ish).

The real story I want to tell tonight is that I met with my second cousin and his wife two weeks ago. They're a generation older than me, and their son was one of my best friends growing up. He died of cancer when he was only 20, during my senior year of college. They mentioned that they still had a lot of his old gaming stuff in their home, and that I was welcome to have any of it that I wanted.

I stopped by a week later and found some long lost treasures. There weren't any of his old character sheets or dungeon notes, and if there had been, I most likely would have gotten really emotional looking through them. A lot of his gaming collection is probably now in the hands of one of his brothers. But I did get some gems. Another copy of the 1E PHB, a Mentzer Basic DM's Guidebook, both books of the Immortals box set (which I had only in PDF form until now), Unearthed Arcana (which I also only had in PDF form and almost ordered instead of DLA back in December!), and his old crayon-fill TSR dice (minus a d6, plus a few other d6s from other games). Also, there are the cards and some tokens from Tom Wham's Mertwig's Maze.

This is some unearthed treasure that I will cherish for a long time. I have so many fond memories from elementary through high school playing D&D, Star Frontiers, and other games with him, not to mention the usual stuff kids did back in the 80's and 90's. People knock nostalgia, but this trip has been full of it, and it's really recharged my gaming batteries. 

I'll have some updates on gaming with my sons soon, too. Some cool developments there as well. 

Skill Resolution

End of semester grading and some personal stuff have taken up a lot of my time. So not much blogging lately. And no real time to put together my final response to Alexis on why it's good to have some results of rolls secret from the players. It'll come eventually.

In the meantime, Jeremy was wanting to try a different game tonight -- Sharp Swords & Sinister Spells, but everyone was busy or not enthused. No offense intended to the game designer, who is a cool dude. I, at least, am feeling mentally drained from wading through the research papers of ESL learners and didn't feel like trying to learn a new system tonight.

Jeremy shared a Questing Beast video review of SS&SS, and he mentioned that there is a "background" option to let you flesh out the three character classes more. Of course 5E also has that. And maybe some other game Jeremy was pushing recently (or he just bolted that on from SS&SS into something else maybe).

It got me thinking about how skills have been handled over the years. OD&D through the RC has set abilities for some classes (dwarf detection, elf secret door finding, halfling hiding) that is usually X on d6, where the default is either "can't do it" or 1 in 6 chance of success. Then there are Thieves with their % skill system completely unlike any other. And later, other things not covered by the rules were usually suggested to be done by a roll under an appropriate ability score (on a d20, 2d8, 3d6, 2d12, or whatever). With the exception of Thief skills that improved every level, these skills also didn't change over time (unless you found some way to raise/lower ability scores).

Of course, the ideal of unified mechanics (a bad idea for many games IMO) in 3E meant that skills needed to be handled with the same swinginess of combat, that flat d20 distribution plus modifiers. This was, IMO, a bad move. Unless you really focused your character build (ability score boosts, feats, magic items), your skill use was really unreliable. Especially since the DCs for skill checks tended to go up along with your skill levels.

But all this thinking (on my bus ride home this evening) reminded me of something I've been wanting to dust off and implement for TSR and TSR-East. AD&D's Secondary Skills table.

It seems, from the Questing Beast video review, that SS&SS does something similar to this, although a bit more free-form. You get to pick a background and whatever it is, if you're trying something related to that background, you succeed (or get a good chance to succeed on a roll).

When I was a kid, looking at AD&D for the first time, I thought this Secondary Skills system was too generic. I wanted discrete skills that could be applied, with defined mechanics for how to use them. After all, BECMI demi-humans and Thieves had that, in different ways.

But these days, I think the freedom to just negotiate what your character can do with the DM based on a descriptor like this is a good way to handle these things. We kind of did that when we were kids anyway without having a chart to roll on. It was often impromptu, and something that we just made up about our characters on the spot if it ever came up.

I had a Fighter named Falcon, and somewhere along the way his father's profession became important. I said he was a blacksmith. No reason, I just thought it sounded cool to have a blacksmith for a dad. From that point forward, Falcon was assumed to know a thing or two about smithing, including weapon/armor repair.

I really like that, and I think it's a much simpler way to add some flavor to the characters in an RPG than having to pour over skill lists and micromanage skill points or whatever. Complete 180 from when I was young.

The Pendulum Swings Back

I've been using my house rules to Classic D&D for many years now. Call it a Franken-game, call it D&D Mine, call it a heartbreaker. It works for me. But I'm constantly tweaking it. Sometimes based on how the rules play, sometimes just based on my feelings.

Ever since I started this blog 10 years ago, I've been using additions to Classic D&D based on AD&D and WotC editions. Ever since Gamma World 4th Edition came out in the early 90's, I've been a fan of ascending AC. Yes, the math is the same. But there's one less step involved compared to descending AC. And I've been using it so long that if I use a module with descending AC, I'm instantly converting the number in my head to the ascending value.

It really does save time, as sometimes you know just based on the die roll that it's a hit before the math gets applied. So I don't think I'll ever move my house rules back to descending AC, even though sometimes the nostalgia of having an AC 2 or AC -1 makes me reconsider.

Recently, for fun and as a bit of an experiment, I did start a (play-by-post) game using the RAW. OK, there are still a few house rules. But just the classes from BX/BECMI, descending AC, all that. And it's been pretty fun. Of course, being PbP it's slow at times. If I'm busy, or the players are busy, we end up waiting around a long time for things to move forward. But the main thing is, I'm playing it mostly by the book. And the house rules I'm using are as follows:

Spell Progression -- not technically a house rule, but my printed edition of Mentzer has different spell progression for Magic-Users, and Elves than the PDF version or the RC (print or PDF). So I'm using the version in the printed book I have, which give more low level spells earlier. And for Clerics, I'm using the BX spell progression. This gives more high level spells earlier, but limits them to 5th level spells.

Fighters (but not Dwarves, Elves or Halflings) get the AD&D ability of one attack per level against 1HD or weaker creatures.

Thieves use the BX advancement table for their abilities, which again is a bit more generous than BECMI.

And that's it. That's the extent of my house rules. Nothing is actually made up or cribbed from an outside source, it's just taking a few pieces of other old school TSR versions of the game. And as I said above, it's been fun.

So now I'm looking at the Gothic abbey that is my house rules document that I've been tinkering with for over a decade now. At the moment:

9 Races: Human, Dwarf, Elf, Halfling, Gnome, Half-Elf, Half-Orc, Dragonborn, Changeling

12 Classes, divided into the 4 main classes and 2 subclasses each: Cleric [Cavalier, Druid], Fighter [Berserker, Ranger], Magic-User [Bard, Illusionist], Thief [Acrobat, Assassin].

And yes, there's a chart with what races can be what class, and what level they can rise to in each class. And each race has a list of allowed multiclass options.

Humans can dual class as in AD&D. I also gave them a perk where each level above 1st they roll twice for hit points and take the better result.

I won't go into all the minutia of the other races and classes here. But Fighters  have a list of combat styles and they get one at 1st level and more as they level up, plus the BECMI high level combat options when they get to 9th level. So they're not the simplest class to play any more.

For spells, Bard spells are all pulled from the Cleric or Magic-User lists. Druid spells are mostly as in BECMI (most Cleric spells plus a few special unique spells), although I think I added in a few of the unique spells from AD&D as well. Illusionists have  simplified lists based on the AD&D spell lists. Cavaliers just use Cleric spells [didn't call them paladins because they're not forced to be lawful only].

For gear, I've slightly expanded the weapon list from BECMI. And I added some general equipment from other editions of the game. Nothing too noteworthy. Except for one thing. I added large shields that grant a +2 to AC instead of a +1. But since I'm using old school modules for a lot of my West Marches adventure locations (and my monsters & treasure house rule document was made before I added the large shields) all of the magic shields found so far or placed so far (2 found, a few more placed) in West Marches aren't tagged for size. So I'm defaulting to small. And players are wondering why they would give up a normal large shield for a magical small shield +1. Good question.

So even though I think large shields deserve to be in the game, and shields really deserve more than a +1 to AC, the way the game has been designed I'm seeing some small problems with this addition. I think I'll do away with it in my next revision.

And all that blather brings me to my point. I'm having fun with my heavily house-ruled game. I'm having fun with my barely house-ruled game. And I'm feeling like it's time to simplify. Go back to Race-As-Class. Get rid of the extra classes and races. Reduce the amount of pondering players do when they roll up a new character (having just come off a TPK, I realized how much faster it would have been to get everyone up and rolling again if it had just been the seven classes of BX/BECMI to choose from).

But if I pull another switch like that on the West Marches, I don't think it will go over so well. So I'll probably just save the simplification for the next campaign. 

Development?

Following along with yesterday's post about Clerical healing from OD&D through Classic D&D and to 3E (skipping AD&D because I play it less and didn't feel like opening up more tabs in my pdf reader), I was thinking about Talysman's post I inspired and things I'm doing for Chanbara.

Side note - I did a little more work on Chanbara today, since I finished my academic work sooner than I expected.  Had a whole hour to work on it.  I removed the Kensei as a baked in class, since any Samurai, Ronin, Sohei, Kagemusha or Shinsen could just take the combat maneuvers to focus on one weapon and call themselves a kensei.  I also did some work on the Adventures and Rewards chapter, describing different types of adventure design and guidelines for awarding XP.

So, back to the random navel-gazing post where I speculate wildly and likely piss off some people.

Why did the Cleric develop the way it did over time?  Why have the Fighter and Thief/Rogue developed as they have?  Magic-Users/Wizards have been fairly stable across editions, while the other four base classes have shown greater or lesser change from OD&D up through Pathfinder (4E takes every class in a totally new direction, and I'm not up on the Next playtest stuff to be sure what they're doing with it)?

I took a look at the Cleric yesterday.  Mostly, they've gotten more and more healing powers as the years have gone by.  They've also had increases in spell levels, with only 5 levels of spells in OD&D, up to 10 levels worth of spells in 3E/PF.  Pathfinder also gives Clerics quite a few perk powers, such as the channel energy thing discussed yesterday, and two Domain powers usable 3+stat modifier times per day each.

Thieves were fairly stable across TSR editions.  There were slight changes to the skill progressions (noticeably a lowering of percentages in BECMI to stretch them out to 36 levels, and a slight raise early on in AD&D thanks to Dex and racial mods to the basic scores but high levels were slower than BX).  2E gave Thieves the ability to allocate their skill percentages as they liked, giving flexibility but otherwise leaving the class more or less alone.  Then in 3E, suddenly Rogues became the super-customizable skill class, and also with a lot more combat power thanks to the way Sneak Attack worked compared to Backstab in older editions. 

Fighters have had the least changes over editions, being able combatants from the beginning.  Mostly what they've gained were all the feats in 3E and later editions to tailor their combat style.  That was more or less an extension of Weapon Specialization in UA, and various combat oriented NWP and kit abilities in 2E.  Oh, and there was the Weapon Mastery optional system in the BECMI Masters Set/RC.  They've become flashier in their combat ability over the years, but the class has remained more or less the same.

Like I said above, Magic-Users have been the most consistent.  Weak physically, few spells at low levels, the most powerful characters at high levels.  Spell lists have grown over the years.  Low level spells have increased, but at high levels, BECMI Magic-Users have more spells than their similarly leveled 3E/PF counterparts.  Oh, and while the M-U has remained more or less unchanged, spells have suffered from years of developers deciding such and such creative exploit was overpowering and having the spell restrictions become more and more detailed and limiting.  Spells have changed, but the class is very similar.

Why the changes?  I think it went something like this:

OD&D is really fun to play.  Players want more.  Gygax and co. crank out supplements, making changes and adding to the power curve slightly (new classes, new spells, variable hit dice and weapon damages, new magic items, new monsters, etc.).  Players like this and buy stuff.

D&D/AD&D become big business.  Now, marketing people get in the equation.  They look at the game and try to see what sells.  Lots of modules, lots of supplements, the 2E glut.

WotC buys TSR.  Looking at D&D, they try to figure out what makes it so popular.  Surveys tell them that players find combat exciting.  Marketing realizes that selling books aimed at players should make them more money than the glut of supplements aimed at DMs.  Changes are made to the game.  Now, combat is the focus of all classes, and supplements are written for players as a way to make their characters more effective in combat.

Then we have a split, with the development of 4E and Pathfinder.  4E takes the combat focus to the logical extreme.  The game is really just a series of tactical battles strung together with some roleplay in between.  No, I realize it doesn't always play out that way (Dean's game that I played in was an exception), but that's the way it was presented and marketed.  On the other hand, Pathfinder takes the 3E base and instead of adding endless supplements, gives every class a shitload of options in the core book, so that players can customize their combat-ready classes however they see fit.

Did WotC make the right calls?  Well, 3E/3.5E did really well.  They're so popular that when they brought out 4E, many players stuck with it and now play Pathfinder.  However, the OSR also rose up and showed everyone that sometimes simpler is better.  I don't think WotC was wrong with the direction they took the game, there was obviously demand for it.  However, I do think some of the premises they based it on were wrong.

Those marketing surveys.  I remember taking one out of a Dragon or Dungeon magazine when I was working for Waldenbooks, filling it out, and sending it in.  This was in the late 90's, just after WotC had used their Magic: the Gathering earnings to buy out the bankrupt TSR, but before the Hasbro buyout of WotC, I think.  They were doing the survey to see what people wanted in 3E.  Apparently, lots of players responded that combat is the most fun part of the game.

I think this is a misunderstanding.  Combat is one of the most exciting parts of the game.  It's traditionally been fairly risky.  That risk makes it exciting.  One or two bad die rolls could end your PC's career and send you to your dice bag for 3d6 (or 4d6 depending on how you roll).  Players sit up and notice when things like initiative rolls or saving throws happen.  No doubt, combat is exciting.  But is it really the most fun part of the game? 

It can be, don't get me wrong.  But it's not always the case for me, and I would guess for most other players.  Hanging around a tavern looking for rumors about the next big score, pockets to pick, barmaids or bar-lads to bed, or surly locals to sock in the jaw can be pretty fun too.  So can engaging in a battle of wits with the Archduke in the King's Audience Hall.  So can exploring a ruined city without a single creature to battle, but with all sorts of mysteries and treasures of the ancients to discover. 

Combat is not universally "the most fun" part of D&D.  Yet 3E to an extent, Pathfinder a bit moreso, and 4E to a large extent were created with the idea that combat is where the fun is at, and every class needs to be good at combat so that everyone can have fun.  Not a new insight here, but it bears repeating from time to time.  So, the classes have evolved to be more hearty and more useful in combat situations when originally they were not expected to be worried about combat.  Healing increased, because if combat is the focus, PCs need to heal up to engage in another fight.  But, for example, Pathfinder and 4E both find alternate ways for the Cleric to be the healer but still allow them to do "fun" stuff in combat, because apparently healing your companions is not as fun as knocking around goblins with a mace.

Now, I did say I'd likely piss some people off.  And if you've read this far (this is getting long, I must be channeling JB), just let me say this before you fire off an angry comment.

There's nothing wrong with running a combat heavy campaign.  It can be a lot of fun.  Combat is exciting, and often fun.  If you enjoy a combat heavy game in any edition, that's fine with me.  But just remember that it can also become tedious.  And there are other things to do in the game besides just fight things, and they can be fun, too. 

It's when I'm doing those other things that I remind myself that I don't mind if Magic-Users only get one spell per day at level 1, Thieves have pitifully low chances to use their skills, Clerics aren't healing machines, and even Fighters need to be careful after taking one or two hits because they're at risk of death.  The non-combat parts of the game are just as fun, for me, and no PC needs a ton of special abilities in order to take part in most of the non-combat stuff.

Busy day!

Today, the package from home, with the second hand AD&D books I ordered, arrived.  The MM is in worse shape than advertised (cover is all bubbly and the bottom of the spine smooshed - the fact that about one in ten pictures have been colored bothers me a little, but at least whoever it was had good sense for the coloring schemes used), but the MMII and OA books are in very good condition. 

Also, as you've probably heard, the next D&D5 Play Test packet is available for download.  Downloaded it, haven't looked at it yet.

Ditto for Hackmaster Basic, which is now free in .pdf.  Downloaded, haven't looked at it yet.

I've got about 100 pages left of A Dance with Dragons, though, and it's due back at the library Thursday but I don't have time to take it back then.  Tomorrow, Wednesday, is a public holiday here in Korea (V-J Day) so if I can get it finished tonight or tomorrow morning, I can take it back and not have to worry about being overdue (although the penalty here is just not being able to check out more books for as long as you went over the due date).

And I kinda need to put something together for my next Flying Swordsmen game, too.

All that RPG reading will have to wait.

Odds and Ends

The other day, I clicked on Amazon.com to look for the current release date of A Dance with Dragons in paperback.  I noticed I had one item in my shopping cart, and couldn't remember what it was.

Clicking on the cart, it was a used copy of the AD&D Monster Manual (now sold and unavailable).  I'd stuck it there back when WotC announced the reprinting of the AD&D core three books.  I'd briefly thought about buying them, but I've got the PHB and DMG.  Used Monster Manuals in good condition are under $10 on Amazon.  So I'd put it in my cart but never bought it.

Well, I decided to look for another copy, since the one I'd tagged already sold.  Found another listed in "very good" condition for just under $9.  Then I noticed a copy of Oriental Adventures for about the same price.  And a copy of the MM2 for around $6.  With domestic shipping to my parents' house, the whole deal was just around $35, the price of the reprint MM without shipping.

We're going to be ordering some clothes for our son online (much cheaper, even with shipping costs, than buying them here in Korea), so my folks can just throw the books in with the clothes when they ship them. 

__________________
After our game of Arkham Horror, Josh, Pat and Alex all were asking when I'm finally going to get around to running some Flying Swordsmen.  Friday nights are good for them, so as soon as I get some adventures ready, I'll try to get them - and anyone else who wants to play - on G+ for some FS wuxia action.

So expect a bit more FS content around here in the coming months.  It's about time I got back to promoting it anyway.  It's just shy of 1000 downloads on my Mediafire account, and in only four months.  Not bad.

___________________
We will be moving to a new apartment in about two weeks.  I need to remember to write up a Beast of the Week monster and schedule its posting, as I may be without internet access besides on my phone the last weekend of July.

We're past the half-way point with the year.  My plan to create 52 new monsters is going along well.  I'll compile all of them at the end of the year, and in January I'll have a comprehensive download of 2012's Beasts. 

I'm not sure if I'll continue into 2013, though.  We'll see. 

The Metagame is the Game?

Just a random thought that's been percolating in my brain recently.  It's no where near developed fully, but I figure I might as well throw the first draft out there.

One reason that different versions of D&D "feel" different is the metagame that goes on behind the actual play.  Different versions seem to encourage different metagame focuses that run parallel to the actual game play.  Here's my initial ideas about what some of the editions encourage for "metagame play"

OD&D/Classic D&D/1E AD&D: Using player ingenuity to make the most of what the random rolls give you at character creation, and what random shit the DM gives you in play.  It's a little beyond simple resource management on a strategic/tactical split.  It's really about coming up with that odd idea that makes an encounter easy (or at least easier).

2E D&D: Making your character so interesting and fleshed out that the DM grants you plot immunity.  This is not knocking the game.  2E focused on the grand plots, and clever ideas and all that are nice, but making the DM think twice about letting you fail that save vs. petrification counts more when the plot is on the line.

3E/Pathfinder:  Optimizing your character build.  When I say optimizing here, it's not necessarily about DPS (to borrow the MMO term), it's about finding the right mix of ability scores, classes, feats and skills to craft the "perfect" character for whatever it is you want to do in the game.

4E:  Optimizing your adventuring party.  4E really plays up the "tactical war game" aspect of D&D.  Making sure you've got not only a competent character, but that your character fits into the overall makeup of the party seems crucial to successful 4E play.  Fail to "play your role" and those big long encounters can become bigger and longer.

Now, like I say, this is just my initial ideas here.  I'm not trying to knock any play style, just thinking in print about what makes the play of each edition different.  If you've got comments, criticisms, or can think of anything I'm being just plain stupid about, feel free to let me know.

On the AD&D Reprints

I've decided not to try to pick up the AD&D reprints that WotC is going to be publishing this Spring.  There are several reasons for this:

• I've already got the PHB and DMG, plus back when I was working in public schools in Japan I printed out the MM and MMII and have them in clear-sleeve binders.  I might have picked up just the new MM, but for the following reasons.
• WotC are only offering the reprints through hobby stores in North America.  I'm in East Asia.  If I could have gotten one online, shipped to me, I might have bought.  Having to ask a friend to pick one up for me, sending them the money, then asking them to ship it to me is just too much of a hassle.  And if I asked my mom, who sends us semi-regular care packages anyway and could just toss it in with whatever else she's sending, she'd likely get confused and I'd end up with some 4E book.
• There are second-hand vendors on Amazon and other places that will ship internationally.  Plus, the price for an original MM in decent condition is in the $13 to $20 range.  Add in about $10 shipping, and I'll be coming out ahead this way cost-wise.
• I don't really play AD&D.  I run Classic D&D, but with some select bits and bobs from AD&D.  So it's not like I need extra copies to use around the table.

So, while I'm not a big fan of WotC, I've decided not to give them my money for these items, even though they are of some interest to me.  Sorry, WotC.  See if you can Wow! me with 5E (looking less and less likely the more I read of it).  Then maybe you'll get a bit more of this old schooler's cash.

Decisions, decisions

Jeremy sent me a link to one of the Microlite 20 games.  It's called the Golden Edition.  And at 142 pages, it's not so micro.  Haven't looked through it enough to see if it's "lite" or not.

Anyway, it reminded me that I've had the Labyrinth Lord Advanced Edition Characters pdf sitting on the hard drive unread.

I gave it a look yesterday.  I was impressed.  It doesn't remove all of the unnecessary cruft from AD&D (IMO, of course), but a lot that's left behind is optional.  I'd play AD&D more often if it weren't for my (possibly irrational?) despising certain wonky mechanics (percentile strength, different weapon damage vs. large creatures, 1-minute combat rounds with segments, lots of fiddly little things that don't add to the fun but add to the book-keeping).

I'm pretty seriously considering switching from my homebrewed version of Mentzer to LL+AEC.  Of course, there are some things from Classic and my own houserules I'd likely keep, but I may be switching.

The big decider was the notes on using AD&D style race+class along with Classic's race-as-class.  Well, that and the no percentile strength/damage vs. large creatures/1 minute rounds things.

Dungeon Design: AD&D 1E

So to continue this little series [part 1, part 2], I'm next looking at the AD&D 1E DMG.

The bulk of advice for crafting a campaign (not necessarily a dungeon) is from pages 90 to 96.  We get sections on placement of monsters, monetary treasure, magical treasure, and a bit later a sample dungeon (with map).

By this time, Gygax had moved away from the megadungeon-based campaign.  The advice he gives applies to both the dungeon (he still assumes the presence of one, it's just not assumed to be the only starting point for adventure) and the wilderness.  His monster placement advice is to try to keep things as logical and connected as possible.  The vast majority of monsters should have some rhyme and reason for being there.  And there's a very strong Law/Chaos war vibe as he stresses how adventurers tend to clear terrain of monsters, who usually don't come back, creating more peaceful settled lands -- until the monsters get forced out of the wilderness into the borderlands and peaceful settled lands beyond...

For treasure placement, both of monetary value and magical, he stresses both moderation, and challenge with the treasure.  Don't just have a big pile of gold lying around the goblin's den.  Give them a big locked, trapped chest of coppers that are a logistical challenge to return to town.  Convert coins rolled on treasure tables into trade goods that might be overlooked.  Make sure magic items are rare, well guarded, and if possible used against the PCs before they acquire them.

The sample dungeon map is serviceable, but to me at least not so inspiring.  The Holmes map, with its secret ocean harbor caves, mage's tower basement, rat warrens, and all seems more alive than DMG p. 95.  And he only gives a sample key for the first three numbered areas.

So there's not really much advice about creating a dungeon itself.

Aha, but then we have the Appendices!

Appendix A gives us the random dungeon generator.  Even if you don't roll the dice, it's still got lots of good lists for types and sizes of rooms, corridors, caverns, and what not.  It also tells us that 60% (12 in 20) rooms should be empty, 10% should have monsters with no treasure, 15% should be monsters with treasure, 5% specials (or stairs if there are too many specials in the area), 5% tricks/traps, and 5% unguarded treasure.  That's a lot more monsters and a lot less traps and specials than OD&D/Classic D&D.  It's nearly twice as many empty rooms as well.

Later, Appendices G: Traps, H: Tricks, and I: Dungeon Dressing give us some more ideas for fleshing out a dungeon.

We've got a lot less nuts and bolts advice for crafting a dungeon here, but there's plenty of good advice for adding details and life to the setting.  A lot of people I know started with one or another Basic set, then 'graduated' to AD&D, so they likely had a good idea about general dungeon design from there.  But people who only played AD&D might not have.  AD&D, at least by the book, seems more geared for wilderness gaming, where you go look for monster lairs in the wilds, rather than being focused on the dungeon.  But even then, there's not a whole lot of straight-forward advice on crafting those lairs as a challenge in and of themselves.  There's just generally more of a 'go get the monsters' tone than that of 'go out and explore.'