why you want Domains at War

May 17th, 2013

There’s about a day left in Autarch’s Adventurer Conqueror King: Domains at War kickstarter. I was lucky enough to get a Domains at War war-game playtest with Tavis Allison. It’s very impressive for the same reason Adventurer Conqueror King is impressive: it marries simple D&D mechanics with rock-solid behind-the-scenes mathematical rigor. That may not sound like much, but that combination is a rock on which many RPG-design ships have foundered. I still can’t believe that ACKS has pulled it off, and I keep peeking behind the curtain, only to find that the system is even more solid than I expect.

Let me tell you two stories: the first is why you should have ACKS on your bookshelf, and the second is why you should back Domains at War right now.

Ask Adventurer Conqueror King: How many knights per square mile?

Right now I’m reading Charles Oman’s A History of the Art of War, a giant volume that, according to Jon Peterson, was a primary text for Gary Gygax’s Chainmail. I’m reading a chapter chock full of the meaty medieval economic information I love:

We have seen that “knight-service” and “castle-ward” were ideas not altogether unfamiliar before the Conquest, and that the obligation of every five hides of land to send a mailed warrior to the host was generally acknowledged […] A landholder, knowing his servitium according to the assessment of the vetus feoffamentum of the Conqueror, had to provide the due amount of knights. This he could do, in two ways: he might distribute the bulk of his estate in lots roughly averaging five hides to sub-tenants, who would discharge the knight-service for him, or he might keep about him a household of domestic knights, like the housecarles of old, and maintain them without giving them land. Some landholders preferred the former plan, but some adhered, at least for a time, to the latter. But generally an intermediate arrangement prevailed: the tenant-in-chief gave out most of his soil to knights whom he enfeoffed on five-hide patches, but kept the balance in dominio as his private demesne, contributing to the king for the ground so retained the personal service of himself, his sons, and his immediate domestic retainers.

OK, this seems pretty clear: each knight needs five hides of land to support him. Problem is, what’s a hide? Apparently, it’s an extremely variable amount: the land needed to support one farming family. Its area is most often given in old texts as 120 acres.

Given this information, I extrapolated two useful pieces of information: how many families can be supported by a square mile of farmland, and how many knights defend it? (Stuff like this can be very useful for D&D worldbuilding, whether you need to know, for instance, the size of a country’s army or, conversely, the size of the country needed to support the army you want to use.) According to my initial calculations, a square mile of farmland, 640 acres, contained about 5 hides: about 5 farming families and one knight.

I thought I’d compare this to ACKS. I discovered that each hex of civilized land contains, according to ACKS, about 4x as many peasant families as I expected. I had a feeling that Autarch hadn’t missed a trick here. I emailed Tavis and Alex to see if they could unravel this riddle for me. Alex responded:

It’s quite confusing because a hide is not a fixed area of land. It’s 60-120 acres, but the acres in question are “old acres”. ACKS uses “modern acres”. A hide is about 30 modern acres. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_medieval_land_terms. […] Now, 1 6-mile hex is about 32 square miles, which is 20,480 acres, which translates into 682 peasant families. At sufficient densities I assume a surplus that includes non-farming craftsmen, so we end up with the cap of 750 families per 6-mile hex in ACKS.

In any event, 5 hides supports 5 families in ACKS. Each peasant family generates on average 12gp per month in revenue for their lord. 5 x 12 gp = 60gp. The monthly cost for a knight is 60gp (see Mercenary Wages, Heavy Cavalry). So each 5 hides can support 1 knight, as per The Art of War in the Middle Ages.

Mystery solved! My estimate for peasants per mile was off by a factor of 4 because the area of an acre had increased 4x! Furthermore, I was delighted to see that five families exactly supported one knight, as Oman suggested.

That’s one of the big selling points of ACKS for me. I like to do historical research and tweak my game accordingly, but if I want to double-check my answers, having ACKS on my shelf makes things easier. And if I consistently fall back on its prices, domain rules, end economic model, I’ll end up with something more plausible than what I could cobble together on my own.

Domains at War: Richard and Saladin

A few nights ago I went over to Tavis’s house for a playtest of the Domains at War system. I hadn’t read the rules, but I was deep in Oman’s descriptions of the major battles of the Crusades, and I’ve read a lot about medieval tactics. I figured that my ignorance of the Domains at War rules was actually a boon for the playtest. If I could command an army using only the tactics described in historical battles, and get plausible results, without knowing rules, that would be a win for the system.

On the train ride over, I’d been reading about the battle of Arsouf between Richard the Lionheart and Saladin. I think Tavis had some other playtest planned, but after I enthusiastically recounted the battle, he said, “That sounds fun: let’s play that.” Oman gives a rather detailed troop breakdown of both sides, including the generals in charge of various divisions of the Crusaders. D@W includes rules for subcommanders, each with their own initiative and attributes, so the wings of my army were led by their historical commanders: King Richard at the center, King Guy of Jerusalem in the rear, and the Duke of Burgundy in the van. I put the Bishop of Bauvais, a cleric, at the head of the small band of heavily-armed Templars at the fore. Although D@W includes rules for battlefield heroics by PCs, King Richard and Saladin never met for a decisive D&D-encounter showdown.

The Battle of Arsouf is exceptional because the Crusaders, for once, held their ground and stuck to their game plan instead of charging disastrously into traps set by Saladin’s more mobile cavalry. I set myself the same challenge: could I maintain discipline and resist the temptation to charge Tavis’s skirmishers?

NO!

After a few turns of being peppered by arrows, I deviated from King Richard’s strategy. I saw an opportunity to send my cavalry into the flank of Saladin’s wheeling cavalry. It was worth it to see how beautifully my rolling cavalry charge checked Tavis’s advance and sent a few of his units fleeing for the woods.

After a few turns of opposed cavalry charges and countercharges, I was rolling up Tavis’s left wing while my own left wing was close to routing. We’d each taken a lot of casualties. Tavis needed to kill only one more of my units to force a potentially game-ending morale check; I needed two. And in real life, it was well after midnight. We played one more turn. On my left wing, Saladin concentrated his forces on one of King Guy’s cavalry units, trying to force it to flee, but it held. Meanwhile, on my right wing, I chased down and defeated one of Saladin’s light cavalry units, and sent a thundering charge into a second, but, bad luck for me, it made its morale check. Night fell on the battlefield, ending the battle inconclusively after a tense final turn. I got home around 3 AM on a work night – the sign of a good game.

As the game went on, I found myself trusting the rules more and more. If I had just role-played the part of King Richard, I think the game system would have given me the victory. In fact, I role-played the part of an undisciplined, impetuous Crusader cavalier, and, as they so frequently did, I nearly turned victory into defeat. Maybe Tavis will give me a rematch sometime. This time I’ll stick to the plan.

Posted in game design, news, other systems, play, RPG Hub | 3 Comments »

a moment of dread on the Isle of Dread

May 14th, 2013

The 5e playtest version of Isle of Dread encourages the DM to spindle, fold, and mutilate the original adventure. The module suggests (spoilers ahead) having NPCs who visit the jungle center of the island return as undead, possessed, or otherwise corrupted versions of their former selves.

I went with this idea: the natives of the friendly village warned that explorers often come back “wrong:” not undead, but with an imperfect memory of their former lives and with a cunning tendency to act normal until they found a way to kill as many of their fellow villagers as possible. Therefore, the villagers had instituted a password and security-question system for letting explorers back in the village.

When the PCs met some native villagers walking around in the jungle interior, they somehow forgot about these hints. They trustingly hired the natives as guides: furthermore, they insisted that the villagers keep watch at camp so that all the PCs could go to sleep at once (including the high elf, who insisted that “I don’t NEED to sleep, but I LIKE to sleep.”)

That night, the corrupted villagers tried to creep up to the sleeping PCs and slit their throats. Only a series of improbably high PC Listen checks prevented a sleeping TPK. The PCs killed the corrupted villagers and then finished their rest.

The next day, surveying the carnage, the PC druid had a horrifying thought. “What if the villagers were sneaking up to put mints on our pillow or something? What if we’re the ones that are “wrong”? They went through the checklist: do we leave piles of their bodies in their wake? check. Are we remorseless? Check: this was the second night in a row the PCs had gone blissfully to sleep among corpses of their own making. Do we have poor memories? Sure, they’d forgotten that natives in the jungle might be dangerous. Besides, PCs never remember any plot points from week to week.

For a while, the players seriously entertained the notion that I was acting as an unreliable DM narrator, and the players had “gone wrong” and were killing innocents. And I? I cursed myself for not thinking of it. If I’d planned it, and managed to pull it off, this could have been The Creepiest D&D Game Ever.

OK, I don’t 100% encourage you to try this trick in your own Isle of Dread run. It could go horribly wrong and really alienate all your players. But on the other hand, it could go horribly right. Either way, it’d be a memorable campaign, and I’d like to hear about it.

Posted in play, RPG Hub | 3 Comments »

de vetula, the 13th century d&d poem

May 10th, 2013

I was amazed when I read in Playing At the World about De Vetula, the 13th-century poem that addressed the most important problem of science: how likely are you to roll an 18 STR?

De Vetula is a real poem, and amidst the gambling adventures of its protagonist, it really has probability calculations for 3d6. I love that the world’s first accurate discussion of probability is so directly applicable to D&D. This plus the Roman d20 almost makes you think that there’s been a secret society of D&D players throughout history (the Brontes were probably members).

I decided I’d track down the relevant section of the poem. Here’s a page of the manuscript:

That’s a bell curve there, and along the right side, you see the familiar 3-18 range familiar to D&D players. This doesn’t look much like a medieval poem. What it looks a lot like is the beginning of the 1e Dungeon Master’s Guide:

In case it’s of interest to D&D players or people interested in probability, here’s Nancy Prior’s translation of the relevant section of the poem:

Perhaps, however, you will say that certain numbers are better
Than others which players use, for the reason that,
Since a die has six sides and six single numbers,
On three dice there are eighteen,
Of which only three can be on top of the dice.
These vary in different ways and from them,
Sixteen compound numbers are produced. They are not, however,
Of equal value, since the larger and the smaller of them
Come rarely and the middle ones frequently,
And the rest, the closer they are to the middle ones,
The better they are and more frequently they come.
These, when they occur, have only one configuration of pips on the dice,
Those have six, and the remaining ones have configurations midway between the two,
Such that there are two larger numbers and just as many smaller ones,
And these have one configuration. The two which follow,
The one larger, the other smaller, have two configurations of pips on the dice apiece.
Again, after them they have three apiece, then four apiece.
And five apiece, as they follow them in succession approaching
The four middle numbers which have six configurations of pips on the dice apiece.
The small table set out below will make these things easier for you:

18 666
17 665
16 664 655
15 663 654 555
14 662 653 644 554
13 661 652 643 553 445
12 651 642 633 552 543 444
11 641 632 551 542 533 443
10 631 622 541 532 442 433
9 621 531 522 441 432 333
8 611 521 431 422 332
7 511 421 331 223
6 411 322 222
5 311 221
4 211
3 111

These are the fifty-six ways for the numbers to fall,
And the number of them can neither be smaller nor larger.
For when the three numbers which make up the throw are alike,
Since six numbers can be matched up with one another,
There are also six configurations of pips on the dice, one for any number.
But, when one of them is not like the others,
And two are the same, the configurations of pips on the dice can vary in thirty ways,
Because, if you duplicate any of the six numbers,
After you have added any of the numbers which remain, then
You will come up with thirty, as if you multiply six five-fold.
But, if all three numbers are different,
Then you will count twenty configurations of pips on the dice
For this reason: Three numbers can be successive
In four ways and non-successive in just as many, but
If two are successive and a third non-successive,
The figure set out below for your perusal makes this clear:
You will discover from the one side twice three ways and from the other thrice two ways.

666 555 444 333 222 111 665
664 663 662 661 556 554 553
552 551 446 445 443 442 441
336 335 334 332 331 226 225
224 223 221 116 115 114 113
112 654 543 432 321 642 641
631 531 653 652 651 621 521
421 542 541 643 431 632 532

Again, if one looks more closely into the configurations of pips on the dice,
There are some which have only one way of falling,
And there are others which have three or six, since the ways of falling
Cannot be different when the three numbers in question
Are the same. But, if one of them should be unlike,
And two the same, three ways of falling emerge
After a different number turns up on top of any of the dice.
But if they are all unlike, you will discover
That they can vary in six ways, since,
When you give any position to one of the three, the remaining two change places,
Just as an alternation of the configuration of pips shows. And so
They vary in fifty-six ways in the configurations of pips on the dice,
And the configurations in two hundred and sixteen ways of falling.
When these have been divided among the compound numbers which players use,
Just as they must be distributed among them,
You will learn full well how great a gain or a loss
Any one of them is able to be.
The table written out below can make this clear to you:

How many configurations of pips on the dice and ways of falling any compound number would have 

3  18  configurations of pips on the dice  1  way of falling  1
4  17  configurations of pips on the dice  1  way of falling  3
5  16  configurations of pips on the dice  2  way of falling  6
6  15  configurations of pips on the dice  3  way of falling  10
7  14  configurations of pips on the dice  4  way of falling  15
8  13  configurations of pips on the dice  5  way of falling  21
9  12  configurations of pips on the dice  6  way of falling  25
10 11  configurations of pips on the dice  6  way of falling  27

Thanks to Jon Peterson for letting me know that this poem existed!

Posted in legacy D&D, RPG Hub | 3 Comments »

how to get the PCs to the Isle of Dread

May 7th, 2013

A lot of people are probably running (or have recently run) the Isle of Dread adventure that comes with the last 5e playtest packet. The module encourages you to start in media res, cast away on the Isle with a few days of food, possibly after an encounter with pirates. As a DM, I can’t bear to defeat the PCs in an off-screen cutscene. I wrote an introductory mini-adventure to get the PCs to the island, with a slight chance of avoiding castaway status. In case it might be useful to you, here it is.

The Notebook

The module says that the PCs have found a notebook which led them to the island. However, it provides little information about the contents of the notebook. There are a few paragraphs of exposition about the fact that there is a friendly native village and dinosaurs. Furthermore, “this log can also contain rumors and details you need to give the players to influence the characters’ decision about how to explore the island.” I wrote out some journal excerpts and gave them to the players. (I decided that one of the PCs had inherited the journal from Marcus Silverhand, an Indiana Jones-like Fourth Edition character belonging to the same player.)

Here was the handout I provided:

You are a great great grandchild of Marcus Silverhand and the inheritor of Silverhand Manor. Among Marcus’s 100-year-old notebooks: one containing references to the legendary Isle of Dread. Marcus was shipwrecked on the way home from that expedition, and his journal is nearly ruined, but his sketch of the island’s coast is in good shape. The other thing Marcus saved was a giant egg, which hatched into Matthew, the loveable bronto which guarded Silverhand Manor for more than 100 years. It died when you were small.

Here are the legible passages from the notebook:

————–

…beam of light struck a point on the map 1000 miles ESE of the Misty Isles. The Isle of Dread is there, I’m sure of it!
March 6: We hid in the abandoned tomb until the guardian…

…May 3: Our ship is at Port Lily, outfitted with three months of provisions, and all crew is aboard. We set sail tomorrow!
May 4: As we left the shipping lanes behind us, we spotted a mysterious gray sail following us. Belloq again?
May 24: Land ho! The island is just where I knew it would be! We’ll follow the coastline and survey the coast.
May 27: The island is big – 200 miles long perhaps. We’ve reached the southern harbor. Sketch of the coastline: [map] There’s a friendly village by a ziggurat. They’re open to trade. We’ve traded our cargo for 5 giant emeralds. Each is engraved with a Supernal rune I’ve never seen before. The village is cut off from the island by a giant wall, 50 feet high. What’s it keeping out?
May 28: There are indeed Supernal runes on the ziggurat. First rune on the south side is “Stone”, I don’t recognize the other two. The natives tell me that there are many more on the ruins in the interior. Apparently the “City of the Gods” is at the center of the island and contains many treasures. However the villagers never travel very far beyond their great wall. They send their zombies…

…made camp at the ruined temple.
June 12: Awoke to find Belloq and his thugs smirking at us, swords …
five emeralds. The stones were worth 1000 GP each, but the loss …
Museum is incalculable. They headed west. I don’t know if they …
sheer cliffside, but we’ll follow…

…June 15: Bordag says that we’ve stumbled over a gold vein. If …
mining equipment we’d be able to make a fortune. No sign of…

…The natives say that a stranger swam to the taboo island. Belloq…

…June 25: Hold filled with treasure, and my new lightning whip on my belt. Set sail for home. Discovered Belloq’s ship in a cove. Unfortunately he and his gang were not aboard. We burned the ship to the waterline. He may still have the emeralds but I don’t know how he’ll get them home!
June 26: A dragon has been sighted over the island, heading for our ship. If it’s hungry, we’ll give it a fight.

Getting to the island

We had a pretty big D&D group, half of which came with already-made characters and half of which would be making their characters at the session. I decided to “reward” the more-prepared characters by giving them some logistics choices which would influence their chance of reaching the island with useful gear. I brought three constructible pirate ship minis from the Wizkids Pirates of the Spanish Main game. The players would be able to hire one of the ships. Here’s the handout I prepared:

You’ve put together a company to explore the island. You’ll share alike in its profit.

You’re at Port Lily, the southernmost port in the Misty Isles. You have enough money to hire and provision a merchant ship for three months (1000 GP). You could also get a better ship, but you’d have to take loans from the Bank of Tiamat (you’re pre-approved for up to 10,000 GP, 10% interest quarterly).

Ships available:
1,000 GP: A merchant cog, the Butter Churn. A pretty average merchant ship. Master Rudrick and 10 crew.
2,000 GP: A blockade-runner caravel, the Gull. Can outrun anything in the navies of the Free Coast. Captain Draco T. Farnsworth and 20 crew.
5,000 GP: A warship, the Lily Queen. A galley rowed by devils and crewed by the men who captured them from hell. Captain Jill Smith, 30 fighters, 30 hellish rowers.

Each ship has room for 20 extra people. Besides yourselves, the following are available for hire:

Each extra crewman, and their supplies for 3 months, take 1 slot of room.
-Each 2-person ballista crew: counts as 5 people. Costs 125.
-Each 3-person mining crew: counts as 4 people. Costs 100.
-Each soldier: counts as 1. Costs 25.
-6 months of stores for 1 person – counts as 1. Costs 25.

The PCs mulled over that for a while and ended up taking a small loan, hiring the Gull, and equipping it with extra provisions and soldiers. Then they headed to the island. Here’s what I prepared for the journey:

The journey to the island

The Ships:

  • The Butter Churn has no interesting secrets. Its captain and crew will not fight and will panic in a crisis unless the PCs lead them. The ship has no armaments. The journey will take 3 weeks.
  • The Gull is more of a smuggler than a blockade runner. Captain Draco is wanted by most of the local navies and will run from any navy ship. Luckily, his ship is fast. It mounts 1 rear ballista. Its crew will fight to defend the ship if they can’t escape. The journey will take 2 weeks.
  • The Lily Queen is actually rowed by tieflings captured from the Isle of Fear (the crew claims they are devils). The tieflings are kept in bad conditions – you can smell the ship from half a mile away. Captain Jill wants to know where you are going before she agrees to sail with you. She’s allied with the evil pirates on the Isle of Dread. If you agree to sail with her, she’ll promise to deliver you safely to the island. If you tell her your destination but end up hiring someone else, she’ll follow you and try to capture your ship. If you sail with her, she asks you not to go near the devils rowing her ship. During the journey, a few tieflings will die at their oars and be thrown overboard. The journey will take 2 weeks. Captain Jill has a magic lamp that, when lit, lets her communicate with the leader of the pirates on the island.

    Whichever ship you take, the journey to the island will trigger 2 random encounter checks.

    RANDOM ENCOUNTER CHECK 1 (after 2 weeks)

    Have the players roll a d6, telling them not to roll a 6. On a 1-5, nothing happens. On a 6, roll again on the following table:
    1 green dragon: from area 22 in the adventure, demanding either 5000 silver pieces or 1000 GP (it prefers SP for some reason) or it will attack the ship.
    2 pirate attack: only a danger to the Butter Churn: the Gull can outrun it and the Lily will signal it to leave.
    3 storm: the captain will give the PCs 3 tasks to help out (DC 10 for Lily and Gull, 15 for Butter Churn): climb up and cut a sail free (Dex), hold the wheel steady (Str), and pump water to keep the ship from sinking (Con). Each character can lead a task, and each leader can get aid from one other character. 1 failure: the ship will be delayed for 1 week. 2+ failures: the ship is destroyed, the PCs and 1d6 sailors escape on a raft with 10 days of food. They land on the island in 5 days.
    4 wreck: at night, the ship runs aground on a hidden shoal. It takes 6 hours to launch boats and build rafts before it sinks. If the ship is the Lily: Jill and the crew will get in the lifeboats. The players will not be allowed on without a fight. The PCs must build rafts (1 per hour) and the tiefling rowers will be allowed to drown unless the PCs rescue them.
    5 bull whales: Aggressive horned whales (stolen from Titan: the Fighting Fantasy World) who can be heard bellowing before they attack. Unless the PCs can kill the charging whales in one turn, the ships have a 50% chance to escape (25% on the Butter Churn). Failure: The ship is wrecked, as 4 above.
    6 sirens: Enticed by the beautiful music, the crew jumps overboard, and the PCs must make saving throws to avoid doing the same. If all the PCs fail, they’ll be enslaved by the sirens for an adventure or two. Otherwise, the PCs must figure out how to sail the empty vessel (lots of skill checks, and a good chance to get lost or run aground on the way to the Isle of Dread).

    RANDOM ENCOUNTER CHECK 2 (1 day before landing)
    In the second encounter, the ship is sure to be greeted by either the pirates or the island’s green dragon, both of which are patrolling the seas. The results of encounters are different for the three ships. Roll 1d6:

    BUTTER CHURN
    1-3: attacked by pirates, who easily board the ship
    4-6: attacked by dragon, who demands tribute as above
    GULL
    1-3: pursued by pirates (the Gull can outrun them easily unless they have been joined by the Lily Queen)
    4-6: attacked by dragon, as above. Cannot be outrun.
    LILY
    1-3: no encounter (pirates will not bother the Lily Queen).
    4-6: Green dragon will shake down the PCs as above. Jill has an understanding with the dragon and will insist the PCs pay but she knows that she and her ship are safe from the dragon. If the PCs fight, the crew will attack the PCs nonlethally “to save the ship.” In any case, if the PCs have discovered that the rowers are tieflings, Jill will have the PCs marooned on a random part of the Isle of Fear in a boat with 5 days of food, to preserve her secret. “I promised to see you to the island safely so I won’t kill you now.”

    My players, who hired the Gull, had no trouble getting to the Island of Fear. They met the green dragon and sent it fleeing back to the island after a few rounds of missile fire and a critical hit with the Gull’s ballista. Now they’re ranging over the island looking to finish the job.

    My players got to the Isle of Fear with an intact ship, so they have more supplies than the adventure expects them to, but I think that’s a fair reward for good play and good luck. You can steal this adventure intro if you want to give your players the same chance.

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    what level is king joffrey?

    May 3rd, 2013

    In D&D, kings are often statted up as high-level characters. How you level them says a lot about your D&D fantasy politics.

  • If you think that cream rises to the top, you might stat King Robert (who fought his way to the throne through hand-to-hand combat) as high level, and Joffrey (who’s never had to do much of anything, and who isn’t related to King Robert) as low level.
  • If you think that cream is injected into the top, through high-level tutors and opportunities for military training, you’d say that Joffrey was at least mid-level, despite his youth and lack of any redeeming talents.
  • If you think that the rich can buy the cream, you’d stat Joffrey as high-level because, hey, 1 GP = 1 XP. (Littlefinger is, like, level 50.)
  • If you think that cream is just as common in the peasant’s cows as in the royal herd, you’d say that Joffrey is lower level than, say, Arya’s friend Hot Pie, who has at least mastered a skill and who has seen some real adventures.

    I’ve always tended towards the last approach, so there are plenty of level 1 kings running around in my game world. But this quote from Crescent Throne got me thinking:

    “But why?” Zamia asked. “Why would any man—even a cruel man—do these things? What could he possibly gain?” “Power,” the Doctor answered without hesitation. “The same thing that a man gains when he murders one of his fellow men. The same thing that a ruler gains when he sends his armies to kill and die. Power and the promise of a name that will live forever.”

    Reading it, I thought, “It would be cool if there were some game representation of this ‘Powwah!’ that evil guys are always yammering on about. Like, by performing dark rituals, or merely by exercising political clout, you got some game benefit that made you more dangerous.”

    As I thought about how to represent “power”, I discovered, as often happens when I re-examine a potential house rule, that the concept is already built into D&D. Levels.

    What if the mere act of channeling power gave you a level minimum? Whatever his personal XP total, for instance, a king always has the HP, class features, etc. of at least a level 10 character. Channeling the eldritch might of some evil dimensional vortex gives you the abilities of a level 20 character – as long as you keep the vortex open.

    Whoever holds the real power gets this benefit, of course. There are no level 10 babies. The regent is level 10 until the king is old enough to take the reins of power. This translates political struggle into D&D’s vernacular. Cersei and Joffrey are squabbling over who gets to act like they’re level 10.

    • Posted in RPG Hub | 10 Comments »

    my poster on Wired

    April 29th, 2013

    My Random Dungeon Poster kickstarter was featured in a video on Wired:

    It’s fun to be in Wired, although the video is of the “look at these silly people” variety familiar to D&D fans. The tagline for the article is

    How do you define something like Kickstarter? Well, here’s one option: “An opportunity for your nutty friends to realize their nutty dreams.”

    Whether or not it’s meant as a compliment, I’ll wholeheartedly embrace the definition. As D&D fans, we’re proud of pursuing our nutty dreams. I imagine we’ve all been told something like “You must have WAYY too much time on your hands.” For creative people, that’s never true. I bet most DMs have way more campaign ideas than they have time to run them, and that usually extends to other areas of life as well. For myself, I may never finish my Mazes and Monsters RPG, or my board game in which the players are Italian Renaissance art patrons, or any of the dozens of web games half-finished on my test server. Who knows if I’ll even start my orcs-and-elves online hockey game (“Hack and Slash”), or my fanfic rewrite of Brideshead Revisited with all Harry Potter characters, or my sequel to Quest for the Crown (Quest for the Ruby Emerald).

    My hope is that I’ll always have some new inspiration: some new thing I want to make just for myself, and the luck to find some other people who just might like it too. That’s my wish for you, too, whether you’re a DM, a writer, an artist, or the inventor of a bad-ass automatic drummer.

    In that spirit, I’d like to pass on some of the awesome projects of my nutty friends:

  • Today is just about the last day to jump on nutty friend Stephan Pokorny’s Dwarven Forge kickstarter. It’s way past a million. I’m backing this to the hilt, and I can’t wait to recreate my dungeon map poster in 3D.
  • Nutty friend Anna Raff illustrated World Rat Day, a book of poems about “real holidays that you’ve never heard of”, like World Rat Day and National Sloth Day (each holiday made up, I presume, by nutty friends I haven’t met yet). I’m proud of my autographed copy.
  • Nutty friend Jason Hurst of Two Kings Games and Gygax Memorial Fund is organizing a RPG convention near Macon, Georgia, with board games, card games, and RPGs, including his Gygax-inspired D4: Basic game.
  • From my nutty poet friends: Kate Durbin’s got a new chapbook, Kept Women, a poetic tour of the Playboy Mansion. Marisa Crawford’s 8th Grade Hippie Chic, about what other cool people were doing in jr. high while I was rolling dice. Becca Klaver’s Nonstop Pop features an elegy to analog TV and crazy user testimonials about the book “The Secret” (which has so much magical thinking in it it’s practically a D&D manual).
  • Nutty musician friend Chris Warren is inventing some crazy electronic music techniques that are going to change music. If you’re a musician, you should check it out. Also, its name, Echo Thief, sounds like a pretty awesome 3e prestige class.

    What have I missed? Plug your creative projects in the comments! I’d like to check them out!

    • Posted in news, RPG Hub | 2 Comments »

    Strategic Review 3: Gotcha!

    April 26th, 2013

    Strategic Review 3, published in 1975, has an extra long “creature feature” introducing 9 new D&D monsters. It tends heavily towards gimmick monsters designed to infuriate PCs, usually by setting traps that the PC can’t realistically avoid. Most of these monsters went on to become beloved fan icons, proving how weird D&D players really are.

    The original D&D monster book, the 1974 “Monsters and Treasure”, had its fair share of “gotcha” monsters: the Black Pudding, which Gygax called a “nuisance monster”, which divides when attacked with weapons; the ghoul, which could paralyze on touch; the various undead monsters which stole character levels. The dungeons of OD&D are dangerous, and sometimes people die. But the monsters published in the Strategic Review took it to a new level. Here are the 9 creatures introduced in SR#3, along with a Gotcha! rating of 1 to 5.

    Yeti: The yeti is actually a pretty stand-up guy: sure, it paralyzes you with its gaze if it surprises you, and it has a 85% chance of surprising a party of its level, but apart from that, the yeti fights fair. It even takes extra damage from fire attacks. Somehow, though, it didn’t make it to the status of iconic D&D monster. I guess there’s no room in D&D for pushovers.
    Gotcha level: 2/5

    Shambling Mound: I believe Gygax said that the Shambling Mound was based on one of the Swamp Thing-like superheroes. It’s crazy tough.

    First of all, it has 6-9 Hit Dice, and the Hit Dice are noted as being d10’s. I’m not sure why it has better, instead of more, Hit Dice, unless it’s so that the referee can justify using it to kill level 6-9 characters.

    Secondly, it has resistances to everything. Compare it to the “nuisance monsters” of the 1974 Monsters and Treasure book, which have a handful of resistances: “The ochre jelly can be killed by fire or cold, but hits by weaponry or lightning bolt will merely make them into smaller Ochre Jellies.” “Black Puddings are not affected by cold. It is spread into smaller ones by chops or lightning bolts, but it is killed by fire.” “Green Slime can be killed by fire or cold, but it is not affected by lightning bolts or striking by weapons.” Etc.

    For the Shambling Mound, though,

    most hits upon it do but little damage (thus Armor Class 0). As it is wet and slimy, fire has no effect, lightning causes it to grow (add 1 hit die), and cold does either one-half or no damage due to its vegetable constitution. All weapons score only one-half damage. It can flatten itself, so that crushing has small effect upon the Shambler.

    That’s pretty much every type of damage that it’s immune to, takes half damage from, or becomes stronger from. That, combined with its AC 0 and its d10 HP, make it pretty much a guaranteed session-long battle (if the PCs can last a session). Luckily,

    Plant Control and Charm Plants are effective.

    which is good news for all the 14th-level wizards who memorized Charm Plants for their 7th-level spell slot instead of Limited Wish, Delayed Blast Fireball, or Power Word Stun. It’s bad news for people who memorized “Plant Control” because as far as I can tell, that doesn’t seem to be a real OD&D spell. [Edit: OK, I found Plant Control. It’s a potion.]
    Gotcha level: 4/5

    Leprechaun: This annoying, mostly noncombat creature “will often (75%) snatch valuable objects from persons, turn invisible, and dash away. The object stolen will be valuable, and there is a 75% chance of such theft being successful.” Pretty irritating, but at least “Leprechauns have a great fondness for wine, and this weakness may be used to outwit them.”
    Gotcha level: 3/5

    Shrieker: The only function shriekers have are to give the GM a few extra wandering monster rolls. It’s “unfair” in that it’s unavoidable (they shriek when light gets within 30′, so how are you supposed to see them?) but it actually strikes me as the kind of unfair that adds energy to the game table, not subtracts it.
    Gotcha level: 2/5

    Ghost: Ghosts have various attacks that they can make on you, but you can’t make attacks back at them because they are non-corporeal. They sometimes do take on corporeal form, which is when you have a fighting chance. Or is it?

    They otherwise attack by touch which causes aging of from 10 to 40 years, but in order to do this they must assume a semi-corporeal form, and when they do so they may be attacked by magic weapons (but not spells) as if they were Armor Class 0.

    They have a unique aging attack (two hits from which will kill your human character’s adventuring career). No matter what level you are, good luck carving through all of the ghost’s 10 Hit Dice (with weapons, not spells) before he hits you twice. That’s beside the fact that, presumably, ghosts can return to spirit form whenever they want.
    Gotcha level: 5/5

    Naga: There are three types of naga, roughly mapping to Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic. They get magic-user and cleric spells, but they don’t have spellcasting ability in excess of their Hit Dice. About the roughest thing they can do is “permanently Charm the looker unless save vs. paralization is made”, but hey, at least you get a save.
    Gotcha level: 1/5

    Wind Walker: Spooky telepathic storms that, like ghosts, are ethereal, so “Wind Walkers can be fought only by such creatures as Djinn, Efreet, Invisible Stalkers, or Aerial Servants.” If you’re just a PC, you’re pretty much out of luck. There are a handful of spells that have some effect on them (interestingly, Control Weather kills them, and Slow acts like a fireball), but if your spells can’t deplete the Wind Walker’s 6 Hit Dice, you’re in trouble.

    Everyone within 10′ of a Wind Walker automatically take 3-18 points of damage. That’s a lot, considering that in OD&D, you earn 1-6 HP per level. There’s clearly been a lot of damage inflation since OD&D Monsters and Treasure, in which a troll (6+3 HD) does one die of damage and giants (8-12 HD) do two dice. It will only take 3 or so turns for a single Wind Walker to wipe out even high-level Superheroes and Wizards. Here’s the rest of the bad news: “Wind Walkers will pursue for 10 turns minimum.”

    Oh, there was a piece of bad news I forgot: “Number appearing: 1-3”
    Gotcha level: 4/5

    The Piercer:

    With their stoney outer casing these monsters are indistinguishable from stalagtites found on cave roofs. They are attracted by noise and heat, and when a living creature passes beneath their position above they will drop upon it in order to kill and devour it.

    The penultimate “gotcha” monster, piercers are undetectable until they drop onto an adventurer for a confusing “1-4 dice (6-24) damage.” 1-4 dice seems to describe a range between 1-6 and 4-24 damage; I’m not sure where 6-24 comes from.

    Although I don’t understand the damage equation, it’s clearly a lot of damage. And piercers come in groups of 2-12.

    The piercer’s initial assault is bad enough, but they presumably keep fighting until they are killed, doing an additional 6-24 damage on every hit. It’s the gotcha that keeps on gotcha-ing.

    I think the right thing to avoid death by Piercer is to Fireball every square foot of cavern ceiling before you walk underneath. Enjoy your treasure type Nil!
    Gotcha level: 5/5

    The Lurker Above: The ultimate “gotcha” monster, “its greyish belly is so textured as to appear to be stone, and the Lurker typically attaches itself to a ceiling where it is almost impossible to detect (90%) unless actually prodded.”

    OK, so the defense is to prod every ceiling? No, because “when disturbed the Lurker drops from the ceiling, smothering all creatures beneath in the tough folds of its ‘wings.'” Clearly, the DM is going to drop this guy on your party whether or not you try to detect it.

    Once the DM has sprung his trap, “this constriction causes 1-6 points of damage per turn, and the victims will smother in 2-5 turns in any event unless they kill the Lurker and thus break free. … Prey caught in its grip cannot fight unless the weapons used are both short and in hand at the time the creature falls upon them.”

    Who always carries unsheathed short weapons? Not the fighter; he’s got a sword. Not the cleric either. The magic user might have his dagger out. But your hopes are really pinned on the party Thief. Can he kill the Lurker Above in 2-5 turns? Well, the Lurker Above has 10 Hit Dice. Given the generous assumption that the Thief can get in 3 hits before he smothers, can he do an average of 10 damage per hit?
    Gotcha level: 5/5

    Posted in legacy D&D, RPG Hub | 5 Comments »

    the art of titan: the fighting fantasy world

    April 22nd, 2013

    I had Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson’s Titan: The Fighting Fantasy World when I was a kid. If I may Grognardia for a minute, I have to say that I didn’t think much of it when I was a kid. For some reason I perceived it as a pretentious challenger to D&D’s dominance. Now I see that it’s a loving D&D pastiche, with orcs, elves, and D&D off-brand monsters like Tua-suo and Dvorgar. It’s not pretentious at all. It’s enthusiastic, and very charming. I’ve already stolen a few ideas for my D&D game.

    One of the most charming things about the book is the art. Like the content of the book, most of it looks like it would be at home in an 80s TSR product. One of my favorites is this painting of the world’s fantasy metropolis, the City of Thieves:

    Perhaps more useful in a game is this sideways map of a wizard’s tower. It’s presented as the home of a friendly wizard, and it isn’t immediately useful in that context. But as a dungeon it would be tops. It reminds me of Jeff Rients’s vertical dungeons. It looks like it would be great fun keying each one of these rooms – though it is a little linear, I’ll admit. And because it’s so detailed, you could actually simulate a character making a search check by having the player find an item – possibly folding or covering parts of the map so that only one floor could be searched at once.

    It would also be a kick-ass tower to give to one of the PCs as their home base.

    Finally, here’s a nice Russ Nicholson critter for your collection:

    Why is that one guy pouring from his cup into another cup? Don’t goblins care about GERMS?

    Posted in fluff/inspiration, other systems, RPG Hub | 2 Comments »

    an early bad review of D&D

    April 18th, 2013

    Issue #3 of the Strategic Review had this editorial from Gary Gygax:

    EDITORIAL

    Donald Featherstone once said in WARGAMER’S NEWSLETTER that he believed Arnold Hendrick’s chief talent and claim to fame lay in his “pinching” of Fletcher Pratt’s Naval Wargame – alluding in all likelihood to similarities between Mr. Pratt’s game and the set of rules for naval miniatures authored by Mr. Hendrick. I concurred with what was said in WARGAMER’S NEWSLETTER, and when the good Mr. Hendrick “reviewed” CHAINMAIL in a highly uncomplimentary manner I ignored what was written, for surely most hobbyists could be assumed to be able to read this “review” for what it was worth and in light of Mr. Hendrick’s talents otherwise. As an example of the comments he made regarding CHAINMAIL, the most amusing was his assertion that heavy cavalry was rated too high, imagine! In a period where the armored horseman dominated the field of battle, heavy horse are too strong! Anyway, the learned Mr. Hendrick subsequently “reviewed” DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, again in a very uncomplimentary manner – after all, he had gone so far as to play a game of
    D&D as a Cleric, completely armed with such edged weapons as spear and arrows . . . Again, this so called “review” was so obviously inaccurate and biased that I ignored it completely, although numbers of letters and telephone calls from irate D&D fans who had read the comments and wished to let me know that the
    “review” outraged them assured me that Mr. Hendrick would not escape totally unscathed. Eventually the magazine which retains Mr. Hendrick as a “reviewer” did print a contrary opinion – how could they ignore a counter-article written by Mr. James Oden, President of Heritage Models, Inc.? This brings me to the point
    of this editorial. The axe that Mr. Hendrick has been grinding so loudly and long has been exposed.

    Possibly in light of TSR’s success in publishing miniatures rules and games, Mr. Hendrick has decided to begin peddling a line of his own creations. If these creations are as well-thought out as his “reviews”, as learned and clever, they will be rare products indeed. However, being inclined towards fair play, I invite any readers who wish to submit reviews of any of these sets of rules, and as space permits we will publish as many as is possible. Note TSR is not having one of its writers or designers review the products of a competitor. If we receive several reviews for one set of rules we will publish that which is most thorough in our opinion, regardless of what its recommendation is, and as an editor’s note include the conclusions of any other reviews of the same work so as to give all opinions expressed to us from disinterested reviewers. After all, could one expect honest and fair reviews from a source directly connected with a competitor of the product being reviewed? Certainly not. As an author of rules and games I have refrained in the past from reviewing the work of other writers and designers for just this
    reason. This policy will be continued in the pages of SR, despite less scrupulous methods employed in the magazine which carries Mr. Hendrick’s “reviews”. We will depend on you for product reviews, and when we plug our own staff it will be clearly labeled as an advertisement.

    Gary Gygax

    I believe this is the first recorded case of “Gygax spleen” directed at haters — we’ll see more of it over the years.

    I don’t know about you, but reading this editorial made me want to read the original review!

    I tracked down Arnold Hendrick’s review from this dragonsfoot thread. Not sure what publication it was originally in… The Courier? Someday I’d like to find it and see Mr. James Oden’s rebuttal.

    Rules Review
    BY ARNOLD HENDRICK

    DUNGEONS & DRAGONS BY GARY GYGAX & DAVE ARNESON
    three soft-cover volumes, totalling 112 pages, with five chart sheets, availible from Tactical Studies Rules, 542 Sage Street, Lake Geneva, W.I. 53147 for $10.00

    Subtitled “Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures,” these booklets attempt to outline a system for “playing” the kind of fantasy adventures one previously read about in paperpacks. The concept is remarkably interesting, since the same person interested in matching himself against Napoleon or Manstein might also find comparisons with Conan or John Carter enjoyable.

    The “game” is played by various adventurers and a referee. The players, starting in near total ignorance, attempt to adventure in the wilderness around them, or in dungeons and underground chambers beneath them. The referee is informed of each action, and after consulting the maps he has made, the basic tables and information in the booklets, and his own imagination, gives the player a response. Those who rememeber Korn’s “Modern Warfare in Miniature” will see the parallel, although Korn’s rules were much more tightly constructed. Here, introductions are made into many possible areas of interest: finance, magic, fighting ability, language, and monsters of every type and description (from goblins, orcs, giants, and dragons to the more esoteric manticores, chimeras, wyverns, and the hollywood mummies, purple worms, green slime, grey ooze, and black pudding).

    For personal combat, “Chainmail” is referred to, but the multiple-damage characteristics of characters in this game does not fit with the life-or-death struggle in “Chainmail”, and neither gives a clue for the effect of missile fire, save perhaps the firer’s normal ability is extended up to the range of the missile weapon, with restrictions and special options as allowed in the multi-figure section of the “Chainmail” rules. The resulting mess in interpretations is enough to tax the patience of most gamers to the extreme. Worse, personal combat is the area receiving the most attention, things go downhill from there.

    Play in person is usually impossible, since the referee can only show the adventurer the terrain he is crossing at that instant, plus whatever is in his sight. Only large battles are suitable for the tabletop. The optimim solution seems to be play by phone, or when distances are too great, play by mail. For those without gasoline to visit their fellow wargamers, or without a car, Dungeons & Dragons can be very, very interesting indeed. For example, in a test adventure recently concluded, the Acolyte Dorn from the village of Thane ventured into the ruins of Takator, opting for an underground Dungeon adventure instead of an above-ground wilderness expedition. After finding numerous doors beyond his strength to move, he finally opened one that woke four ghouls, who charged him directly. The well-equipped Dorn (with mail, shield, spear and crossbow) was allowed to fire by the kindly referee, and then strike first with the spear. Being rather handy with weapons and things, Dorn neatly felled two of the ghouls, but was then touched by the third, a circumstance which petrified him, while the ghouls proceeded to kill him, thus turning Dorn into a ghoul. So much for the Acolyte Dorn. Better luck in the next life!

    Beyond the problems involved in play (find an intrepid referee), the other discouraging factor is price. These booklets are roughly comparable to “The Courier” in physical quality, but at $3.50 each are priced rather high. Worse, all three are necessary. Graphics, considering the format, are decent, with some excellent illustrations, but some space could have been saved without compromising appearance.

    In general, the concept and imagination involved is stunning. However, much more work, refinement, and especially regulation and simplification is necessary before the game is managable. The scope is just too grand, while the referee is expected to do too much in relation to the players. IF you need ideas to help you along into your own fantasy adventure games, these booklets will be of use; otherwise you ten dollars will be wasted. I do not suggest these to the average wargamer.

    Gygax was mad because he felt his game was being attacked by a lesser game developer, and because he perceived a lack of ethics about Hendrick’s journalism, but let’s be fair: Hendrick’s review is not the biased screed I had been expecting. His understanding is as shallow, but perhaps not more so than most reviewers of most games. He doesn’t see that D&D is an entirely new type of game that can’t be judged by wargame standards; but that’s hardly surprising in 1974.

    Here are some interesting points in Hendrick’s review:

    “These booklets attempt to outline a system for “playing” the kind of fantasy adventures one previously read about in paperpacks. The concept is remarkably interesting, since the same person interested in matching himself against Napoleon or Manstein might also find comparisons with Conan or John Carter enjoyable.”

    It’s so interesting how important the John Carter Martian novels were at the beginning of the hobby. Gygax himself wrote rules for Martian adventures (John Carter is level 13). Carter has really fallen off the map: he has nowhere the kind of name recognition of, say, Tarzan. The John Carter movie did nothing to change that.

    “Vastly too much has been attempted in these booklets, with very little detail, explanations or procedures.” This is an entirely just description of the original D&D books. OD&D is the framework of a game. It’s pretty difficult to play without making a lot of interpretations on your own. In fact, it’s not really a game in the traditional sense: more of a set of guidelines for making games. Imagine if Clue came with vague instructions on drawing a map of an English manor, and instructions on making characters (“Appendix I: Forms of Address” “Appendix K: Colors”). OD&D is a game you have to unpack yourself over years of playing.

    “The optimim solution seems to be play by phone, or when distances are too great, play by mail.”
    I love the idea of Hendrick playing solo D&D over the phone with his spear-carrying cleric, while his referee moved figures around a detailed castle model (no doubt on a sand table). He really hadn’t made the mental switch from a wargaming table to a shared fantasy.

    “The well-equipped Dorn (with mail, shield, spear and crossbow) was allowed to fire by the kindly referee, and then strike first with the spear.”
    As Gygax sneered, Hendricks missed the section about cleric weapon restrictions. But fighting alone against four ghouls, he needed all the help he could get.

    Hendrick does come off as hapless n00b in this review. I hope Gygax’s army of fanbois weren’t too tough on him.

    By the way, Arnold Hendrick is actually a pretty interesting guy. After a little more work in boardgames and RPGs, he went into computer gaming. He worked on Sid Meier’s Pirates, one of my favorite games ever, and seems to have been a driving force behind its respect for period detail (perhaps because of his knowledge gained while “pinching” Fletcher Pratt’s Naval Wargame).

    Hendrick also worked on Darklands, which I never played, but I remember thinking it looked awesome based on its ads in Dragon magazine. Darklands seems to have sunk under the weight of featuritis, some of driven by Hendrick’s interest in obsessively modeling period detail. (Gygax was luckier. His obsession with polearms didn’t drag down his entire game.)

    Check out this interview from 2009.

    Posted in legacy D&D, news, RPG Hub | 8 Comments »

    Mayor of Newark attacked by vampire

    April 15th, 2013

    Maybe I’m late to the party, but I just learned about Cory Booker yesterday. He’s the Mayor of Newark. He saves people from burning buildings. He’s a blizzard hero. He regularly moves to the worst parts of Newark, to clean them up personally.

    If he seems more like a D&D character than a regular Earth politician, that’s because he’s a 12th level human fighter.

    That is, he had a 12th level fighter, back in January. This week:

    Lost two levels! Musta run into a vampire or something. Hang in there, Cory! I know politics is tough, but don’t let the negative energy get you down!

    Posted in RPG Hub | 4 Comments »

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