There's a lot in the published Tyranny of Dragons campaign that's nonsensical, and the whole reason is because this storyline is a bad fit for the Forgotten Realms. Stripped of the setting of Faerun, and this adventure is almost exactly the Dragonlance storyline condensed into two volumes. The way to fix the fundamental story flaws is to bring that War of the Lance goodness back into plot.
No, I don't mean bring back Goldmoon and Raistlin.
In the adventure as written, Tiamat is almost an entirely passive entity and if run strictly by the book she should not appear at all at the Well of Dragons, as the Cult of Dragon's plans to resurrect her would be completely thwarted. What fun is that? Instead of such an anticlimactic end, Tiamat should be given a more active role in the story by taking cues from Dragonlance's Takhisis and restored to her place as the main antagonist of the story.
Similarly, Bahamut is not mentioned or used at all in this storyline, and the only time the Metallic Dragons are involved is during a turgidly dull political council scene. Instead of that scene, whisk the players away to Bahamut's castle, in Celestia from 4e's Scales of War adventure path, or Paladine's Glitter Palace, and have the heroes undergo Paladine's tests of worthiness.
The final assault on the Well of Dragons is meant to be a massive clash between the armies of good and the Cult of the Dragon, exactly like the climax to the War of the Lance, but this first publication for 5e lacks any sort of mass combat rules so it all falls by the wayside. Honestly though, I would rather leave it there, as I feel that shoehorning in a mass combat wargame would only detract from the chapter. Contextualize the PCs as a special unit sneaking behind the battle lines while the main forces of good hold off the enemy just long enough to give the players an opening.
The Well of Dragons itself is a terrible dungeon, as it only exists as an area for a large battle and a pit for Tiamat to rise from. Replace it with any of the Temples of Takhisis or Tiamat.
These suggestions change the ending, and in doing so re-contextualizes the whole adventure. Now it truly is an epic battle between good and evil, between the two dragon deities, and not a hodgepodge collection of loose allies from around the Sword Coast fighting a demented cult and some scheming wizards.
To build up to this finale, I sprinkle in references to the two dragon deities and explicitly have their mortal avatars show up in certain instances. For example, Takhisis speaks to Frulam and Cyanwrath in the dragon hatchery just before they are interrupted by the players, and Paladine is encountered during the long caravan ride and offers words of wisdom and caution.
This also resolves my issues with the "half-dragons" introduced in Hoard of the Dragon Queen, as they are clearly meant to be Dragonlance's Draconians, but the official races of 5e have already retrofitted Draconians into the Dragonborn race, so why do half-dragons even exist? Well now they don't, they're just evil dragonborn leading an army of dragon kind in service of the Queen of Dragons.
Monday, December 9, 2019
Monday, December 2, 2019
Retooling Hoard of the Dragon Queen...again Chapter 1
I'm starting to run this campaign again, because I just can't let it go. I posted a retrospective and a "what I would have done better" blog entry earlier, but now that I have more experience as a DM I have a lot harsher criticisms for this module and a lot more restructuring I would want to do.
Starting with Chapter 1, I like the metaplot of this chapter - a dragon attacks a town. It's the stuff of high fantasy and a great set-piece introduction. However the implementation of this chapter is terrible. The missions and encounters are written to be given to the players in a purely reactive manner. The DM is supposed to spring the encounters on the players in a random order, or have a quest giver NPC, Governer Nighthill, merely give players the missions in sequence, like an NPC in a video game. I do not like running my games this way and I prefer players to be more proactive and choose the encounters that they are involved in.
I never run the opening as written, where the PCs are assumed to be a random band of adventurers who see Greenest being attacked in the distance, and take it upon themselves (i.e. are railroaded) to help. Instead, I always use the classic opening - the players meet at an inn. I give them time to introduce themselves and their characters, and form some base level of comfort with each other. Then I tell them that they can hear sounds of an attack outside. The tavern that they're inside is in Greenest.
From there I let the players choose what they want to do. I've given them the basic hook - they're being attacked and the city is burning around them. Whether they choose to fight or flee is up to them. I'm still using some subtle railroading, but its much more interesting than the heavy handed method that the module itself provides.
But I do run one thing as written, which is the first encounter with Linan Swift and her family. I use this to give the players their first goal - run to the Keep for safety, and it helps me keep them on the rails in a subtle manner. The usefulness of Linan Swift as the voice of the DM cannot be understated.
But the worst part of the opening chapter is how the players get to the keep. By the book, for every 100 feet the party moves, the DM is to roll for a random encounter, then have those encounters sprung on the players. This is awful, because who is going to measure 100 ft increments? And with what map, the tiny quarter page one in the book? What is there to keep the players from simply making a beeline to the keep? Instead, I run this sequence as scenes of rioting or street fighting. I have Linan direct the way to the keep, but the party will frequently find their path blocked by fighting, looters, or fires and other hazards. This lets them choose whether to fight or find another way around. Sometimes I let them escape from the bands of kobolds and cultists roaming the streets, sometimes I have them give chase. Eventually the players reach the keep and bargain for entry with the Sergeant of the Guard, where they can finally rest and recover some HP and spells. By this point they should advance from level 1 to 2, and make it a little of the way to level 3. Since level 1 characters are fairly fragile, only one or two encounters are really necessary for them to cross into level 2, and if HP is a concern, a single short rest somewhere in the town should be enough, or the encounters can turn into roleplay or skill challenges instead of combat for XP. Inside the keep, I offer professional healing services and some minor provisions for the players to replenish their fighting capacity.
The advice in the DMG is that players should have around 6 encounters per level, one easy, one hard, and four of moderate difficulty. I think that results in a bit too much combat for this chapter, so by granting all players 100XP just for reaching the keep I lower the number of encounters necessary to level up by two. Using the option to grant players XP for saved civilians also lowers the necessary requirement, and boosts them on their way to level 3.
This means that the missions in the Keep bring the characters along the way to level 3. Honestly, I only run 3 of the encounters in this chapter - the secret tunnel with the swarm of rats, an optional save the mill, sanctuary or sally port, whichever is the player's choice, and the dragon assault. After the dragon assault, the players engage in the duel with Cyanwrath. With these 3-4 encounters, the players can make it just shy of level 3 and prepare themselves for Chapter 2.
As I said before, I think the assault on Greenest is a fantastic set piece battle, but the actual direction for running it in the book is lacking. By restructuring it so that players have more freedom of choice and more agency in their character actions, and by keeping a closer eye to the mechanical details of XP progression and encounter challenge, the event becomes much more enjoyable for the players, much less frustrating for the GM, and a better springboard into the larger campaign.
Starting with Chapter 1, I like the metaplot of this chapter - a dragon attacks a town. It's the stuff of high fantasy and a great set-piece introduction. However the implementation of this chapter is terrible. The missions and encounters are written to be given to the players in a purely reactive manner. The DM is supposed to spring the encounters on the players in a random order, or have a quest giver NPC, Governer Nighthill, merely give players the missions in sequence, like an NPC in a video game. I do not like running my games this way and I prefer players to be more proactive and choose the encounters that they are involved in.
I never run the opening as written, where the PCs are assumed to be a random band of adventurers who see Greenest being attacked in the distance, and take it upon themselves (i.e. are railroaded) to help. Instead, I always use the classic opening - the players meet at an inn. I give them time to introduce themselves and their characters, and form some base level of comfort with each other. Then I tell them that they can hear sounds of an attack outside. The tavern that they're inside is in Greenest.
From there I let the players choose what they want to do. I've given them the basic hook - they're being attacked and the city is burning around them. Whether they choose to fight or flee is up to them. I'm still using some subtle railroading, but its much more interesting than the heavy handed method that the module itself provides.
But I do run one thing as written, which is the first encounter with Linan Swift and her family. I use this to give the players their first goal - run to the Keep for safety, and it helps me keep them on the rails in a subtle manner. The usefulness of Linan Swift as the voice of the DM cannot be understated.
But the worst part of the opening chapter is how the players get to the keep. By the book, for every 100 feet the party moves, the DM is to roll for a random encounter, then have those encounters sprung on the players. This is awful, because who is going to measure 100 ft increments? And with what map, the tiny quarter page one in the book? What is there to keep the players from simply making a beeline to the keep? Instead, I run this sequence as scenes of rioting or street fighting. I have Linan direct the way to the keep, but the party will frequently find their path blocked by fighting, looters, or fires and other hazards. This lets them choose whether to fight or find another way around. Sometimes I let them escape from the bands of kobolds and cultists roaming the streets, sometimes I have them give chase. Eventually the players reach the keep and bargain for entry with the Sergeant of the Guard, where they can finally rest and recover some HP and spells. By this point they should advance from level 1 to 2, and make it a little of the way to level 3. Since level 1 characters are fairly fragile, only one or two encounters are really necessary for them to cross into level 2, and if HP is a concern, a single short rest somewhere in the town should be enough, or the encounters can turn into roleplay or skill challenges instead of combat for XP. Inside the keep, I offer professional healing services and some minor provisions for the players to replenish their fighting capacity.
The advice in the DMG is that players should have around 6 encounters per level, one easy, one hard, and four of moderate difficulty. I think that results in a bit too much combat for this chapter, so by granting all players 100XP just for reaching the keep I lower the number of encounters necessary to level up by two. Using the option to grant players XP for saved civilians also lowers the necessary requirement, and boosts them on their way to level 3.
This means that the missions in the Keep bring the characters along the way to level 3. Honestly, I only run 3 of the encounters in this chapter - the secret tunnel with the swarm of rats, an optional save the mill, sanctuary or sally port, whichever is the player's choice, and the dragon assault. After the dragon assault, the players engage in the duel with Cyanwrath. With these 3-4 encounters, the players can make it just shy of level 3 and prepare themselves for Chapter 2.
As I said before, I think the assault on Greenest is a fantastic set piece battle, but the actual direction for running it in the book is lacking. By restructuring it so that players have more freedom of choice and more agency in their character actions, and by keeping a closer eye to the mechanical details of XP progression and encounter challenge, the event becomes much more enjoyable for the players, much less frustrating for the GM, and a better springboard into the larger campaign.
Monday, November 11, 2019
Wargaming
Tony Bath's Ancient Wargaming including Setting Up a Wargames Campaign
This book is amazing
Fuck Dungeons & Dragons and fuck roleplaying games, true tabletop gamers play wargames. This book contains all the material that's also in the original Dungeons & Dragons LBB, and then some, but written by someone who could actually write a coherent system. The book is divided into three parts, the first section is a straight set of rules for war games set in the ancient era, the second section is the meat of the book and describes the creation of wargame campaigns, and the last section gives a sample setting called Hyboria and discusses fantasy wargaming. In effect, everything that was covered in original D&D is also here, just much more fleshed out, coherent, complete, and sensibly written.
The byline for 0e D&D was also "Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures". Did Gary Gygax read Tony Bath's Ancient Wargaming, and if he did, did he assume that his audience was familiar with the material and so didn't belabor it in his own book? I think the further that D&D strays from its wargaming roots, the less real appeal it has.
The real bonus in this book for me is the section on creating and traversing a hex map, which is explained in much better terms than in either OD&D or AD&D, and hexcrawling isn't even mentioned in later editions.
Donald Featherstone's Solo Wargaming
Wargaming also lends itself more easily to solo play, and to faciliate that I've also picked up another book. This one is more focused on playing single battles solo, so is more focused on mechanics. Maybe when I dive into it more fully, I can incorporate more ideas for my own solo play.
This book is amazing
Fuck Dungeons & Dragons and fuck roleplaying games, true tabletop gamers play wargames. This book contains all the material that's also in the original Dungeons & Dragons LBB, and then some, but written by someone who could actually write a coherent system. The book is divided into three parts, the first section is a straight set of rules for war games set in the ancient era, the second section is the meat of the book and describes the creation of wargame campaigns, and the last section gives a sample setting called Hyboria and discusses fantasy wargaming. In effect, everything that was covered in original D&D is also here, just much more fleshed out, coherent, complete, and sensibly written.
The byline for 0e D&D was also "Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Miniature Figures". Did Gary Gygax read Tony Bath's Ancient Wargaming, and if he did, did he assume that his audience was familiar with the material and so didn't belabor it in his own book? I think the further that D&D strays from its wargaming roots, the less real appeal it has.
The real bonus in this book for me is the section on creating and traversing a hex map, which is explained in much better terms than in either OD&D or AD&D, and hexcrawling isn't even mentioned in later editions.
Donald Featherstone's Solo Wargaming
Wargaming also lends itself more easily to solo play, and to faciliate that I've also picked up another book. This one is more focused on playing single battles solo, so is more focused on mechanics. Maybe when I dive into it more fully, I can incorporate more ideas for my own solo play.
Monday, November 4, 2019
A breakdown of Mystara between versions
An interesting comment I found on this Dragonsfoot thread:
I think there are some distinct phases. The world was effectively rewritten four times, and each time marked a change in theme, tone, scope, cosmology, and even geography.
1981 to 1983 -- the Continent. Gods and demons are explicitly mentioned, and religion tends to be dark with a Mythos slant. Modules have elements borrowed from Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith. The known world is not yet an official setting, only a sample wilderness. Mapping was exclusively 24-mile and 6-mile B&W. The Moldvay-era world did not have any planes, but did have dimensions, including dimensions of Ice, Nightmare, Arik's prison dimension, and the Dimensional Vortex.
The tone was grim and sorcerous with no humor. The lands were wide open and fairly empty. Many modules featured lovecraftian tentacled nightmare things (B4, X1, X2, X5) or demons and cults (B1, B2, X1, X4, B5) and gods (Expert rules, B1, B4, B5, X1, X2, X3, X4, X5, O1). We have a Sauron-style villain that threatens the known world, and a secret mind-control cult.
Scope: This era included the "Map of the Continent" from X1 plus Sind, Slagovich, Hule, and the Moon. In X4, Sind is included as a part of Darokin rather than a separate kingdom. It is implied that Karameikos is part of Thyatis. Module X1 provides a paragraph on each nation and suggests a RW analogue for some, but does not say how close the parallel is. Module X5 says that the Black Mountains betwen Sind and Hule are part of the "known lands", which implies that the known world of Moldvay includes the Great Waste and Hule.
Canon: B/X, B1-5, X1-5, MSOLO1-2, O1, AC1
1983 to 1987 -- the D&D Game World. Mentzer publicly announced (in early 1984?) that the sample wilderness from X1 is being adopted as an official D&D Game World, and said that the Jurassic world map from the Master Set had already been completed in 1983. He places existing modules to fit into this map. At this time Mentzer begins de-emphasizing gods and replacing religions with philosophy, but this is not yet official and not binding on module writers. However, most writers begin adopting the Mentzerian model. The setting has no official name; X10 refers to The Continent from the Expert Set and also refers to it as "the entire civilized world." Maps continued to be 24-mile and 6-mile (see X6, CM1, X9, X11, etc). While the setting was official, it was only detailed in the core rulebooks and in modules, so canon was limited and sporadic. Demons were renamed Fiends in the Immortals rules. Mentzer adds the concept of planes alongside dimensions. Immortals are explicitly not gods and not to be worshipped, and this is reinforced in module IM2.
The tone seems a little lighter, but still not overtly humorous. Lovecraftian elements disappear. It strikes me as a mix of lighthearted "saturday morning cartoon" feel (esp the black eagle and bargle), and more serious work. We start seeing very high production values like X8 and B10. We still have world threatening mega-villains in X10 and X11. A lot of history and interesting places are established in this era.
Scope and Changes: Adds the Serpent Peninsula, Savage Coast, Norwold, Wendar and Denagoth, the Isle of Dawn, and Blackmoor, as well as the world map in the Master Set and the planes and Immortals. Module X10 expands a bit on each nation and expands on the RW parallels with cultural details and NPCs.
Canon: BECMI, B6-10, X6-12, XS1-2, XL1, CM1-8, M1-4, IM1-2, AC2-9, DA1-4, O2
1987 to 1990 -- the Gazetteer Era. To me this is distinct from the Mentzer era in that the world received a top-to-bottom rewrite in exhaustive detail, and hexmaps were changed to the familiar 8-mile color maps. There were four major changes. First, the new trail maps did not always agree with the older B&W maps. Second, while the nations had a very loose correlation with RW cultures before, they were still generic fantasy realms. The Gazetteers explicitly connected most nations to a RW culture and rewrote them in great detail as a virtual clone of that culture. Third, nations need religions, and the Gazetteers used the immortals for this, so that the immortals started to be treated as gods. There were fewer modules; gazetteers were the main published product. Fourth, the world was much more civilized and populated; cities in Karameikos have a population ten times higher than the Known World versions. Toward the end it starts being referred to as the Known World; Dungeon #26 from 1990 refers to the world as the "known world of the Expert Set and the Gazetteers."
In terms of Tone, we see a clear swing into overt humor (GAZ3, GAZ4, GAZ10, AC11). Previously the setting had a mix of lighthearted and serious tone; the gazetteers firmly established a light tone for the entire setting. Villains were not evil, they just had conflicting cultures and goals. The one overtly villainous nation, the broken lands, was changed to a cartoon comedy land. Dark cults were banished to the distant past of Nithia. War has been abolished by the Darokin diplomats. Instead of murder hobos, you go on a Disneyland safari in Ierendi where nobody gets hurt. While nations are modeled on historic cultures, they are flltered through an enlightened modern lens of tolerance and democratic values. Even the dwarves and elves don't fight, they just play pranks on each other. There are no world-threatening evils, and the events fo X10 are retconned into the distant future.
Scope and Changes: Adds Serraine, Undersea, Alphatia and the Sea of Dawn, planes. Rewrites and remaps the central areas, including detailed treatment of some areas never before done. Thyatis gains a corps of dragon riders, and Alphatia gets flying ships.
Canon: GAZ1-12, DOTE, B11-12, X13, CM9, M5, IM3, AC11 PC2, TM1-2
1990 to 1995 -- Mystara. This is the Allston and Heard era, defined by the Rules Cyclopedia, Wrath of the Immortals, and Almanacs. The world was officially named Mystara. in this era, immortals effectively became gods and were treated identically to gods. At this point, claiming that "mystara doesn't have gods" is reduced to a semantic technicality; they are not "gods" only because that's not their official title. The setting was given ongoing metaplot via the Almanacs, and immortals become very active in the setting. I start this era in 1990 with the publication of the Hollow World. This era saw more changes to established canon via the Hollow World, Champions of Mystara, etc. We start seeing peaceful utopian societies as settings designed for stories rather than adventures. Many new nations are nonhuman.
Scope and Changes: Adds the Shadow Elves and the Hollow World. The almanacs detail places in Skothar and Davania among others. The Heldannic Knights appear as pseudo-nazis. The great waste, serpent peninsula and the savage coast are rewritten almost from scratch, nearly obliterating all previous canon. Heavy metaplot includes gods dying and new gods forming, sweeping changes to politics (NACE, kingdom of karameikos) and even the landscape itself (Alphatia, Alfheim, Great Crater). Some old adventures and materials are rewritten such X2 and GAZ1.
Canon: GAZ13-14, RC, Hollow World, WOTI, Champions of Mystara, PC3-4, DDA1-3, HWA1-3, HRW1-3, HWQ1, KKOA, Red Steel, Almanacs
1995 to present -- Pandius. After Mystara was cancelled, fans took over and the Vaults of Pandius was established as a semi-official repository. This is really a continuation of the Mystara era, with extensive embellishment, alternate-realities, and proposed rewrites and retcons in order to reconcile the different eras that came before. Pandius really embraces and thoroughly studies all the material, not just the most recent, but as a whole the 1995 version is taken as the baseline canon. Everyone approaches it differently, but overall the fans take it much more seriously than TSR did, and Geoff Gander's lovecraftian "outer beings" pull the setting back towards its dark and grim origin.
Fanon: Everything in the Vaults of Pandius. The most widely accepted and polished products are the continuation of the Almanacs, the Fan Gazetteers (GazF), the Threshold magazines, and Thorf's maps, but these only scratch the surface.
There is some bleed-over between eras. Any modules that were in progress when Mentzer took over were building on the foundation Moldvay laid, so I would expect some stuff published in 1984 may fit better into the earlier era. I have not investigated this, its just a hunch. XS1 Lathans Gold for example mentions the temple of the spider goddess (I think).
As RogueAttorney mentioned, I tend to lump Moldvay and Mentzer together as "Known World," and Gazetteer/Mystara together as "Mystara." What is in my mind as the "known world" is actually closer to Moldvay's vision, but there was a lot of great stuff from the BECMI era too, so its mix and match. I really prefer the dark and lovecraftian version of the setting.
Monday, October 28, 2019
Original D&D (Single Volume Edition) by Greyharp Review
The DM of a group I was playing in wanted to switch over to Original Dungeons and Dragons, and shared this PDF of the 3LBBs compiled into one volume. This volume is mostly just a reorganization and mild editing of the original 3 volumes, but the results are astounding. Presented in this manner, the OD&D rules are clear, concise, and as simple and complete as E. Gary Gygax always claimed they were. In fact I'd go so far as to say that this version of the rules is flatly superior to AD&D.
The opening foreward of the book is written by the compiler, and he addresses the criticisms that I have had about OD&D: That they are incomplete, poorly presented, and more of a toolkit for the referee to flesh out than a full game in themselves. He disagrees strongly, and to prove his point presents the rules in a manner that does make them a complete game. I've read the original 3 LBBs deeply and can find no great inconsistencies with this volume, so I would have to say that he has succeeded by far.
Here's the thing, though. To understand OD&D you need a strong foundation in some other edition of TSR D&D - whether its AD&D, B/X, BECMI, or the Holmes Basic book. This PDF is written with such an audience in mind, one that is very familiar with classic D&D and has been playing it for some time. OD&D is not a game for beginners or newbies to tabletop role playing games.
While actually playing the game, however, I found it mechanically indistinguishable from the BECMI games I'm fond of. In fact, while playing, I was missing some of the options from a fully featured BECMI game. It felt like I was playing the same exact game, just with less stuff.
In fact I had done an experiment myself a while back, where I considered just throwing out all later rulesets and running a game of OD&D by itself. To that end I printed out the reference tables, and was in the process of putting together a game session. What I noticed was that all the material on the OD&D tables was identical to BECMI, there was just less content - less monsters, less magic items, and an entire class was missing.
However, this compilation of OD&D has also changed how I view the B/X and BECMI rules. Instead of a separate game, I now see the BECMI boxes as intro sets to OD&D, the first literally being the beginner's set from levels 1-3.
Friday, October 18, 2019
Hirelings
AD&D combat works best as a tactical skirmish game. This is hard to execute when every player only controls one character, so for this reason I think the early editions of D&D implemented retainers or henchmen and hirelings. However, I never understood henchmen as written. It seemed needlessly complicated to acquire and employ them, ordering them around added extra steps to every action, and in the strictest case the DM is supposed to run them, making it extra work on top of everything else. In the sense of using them as replacement characters for the players, I never understood why you couldn't just reroll a new character when your main one died, and a level 1 PC who would ostensibly need henchmen as backup is not allowed to recruit them as written, as they do not have enough fame to attract any followers. So its safe to say that I never used henchmen as written in AD&D.
Instead I use the hirelings list and allow players to employ mercenary soldiers as level 0 or level 1 fighters. They come with their own arms and equipment, and require the monthly cost as well as a split of treasure, and generally I let the players run the hirelings unless they wanted to do something exceptionally dangerous, which is when I call for a morale roll. The OD&D rules for retainers is much more usable, and much less complicated for handling their loyalty, morale, and general use. I still cap the number of hirelings in the dungeon to the PC's charisma score - otherwise players will march whole armies down into the dungeon for a clean sweep.
Using this method transforms AD&D into a more tactical game, and away from the traditional RPG. Its advantage is that it makes combat more interesting and less instantly lethal, and it forces players to care about characters beyond their own, but the downside is that it takes away from the pure roleplaying experience and many players do not want to run multiple characters at once in this fashion.
One thing I had noticed, though, is that players love subjugating and turning enemy NPCs into their service. Goblins, especially, are prey to players who like to threaten them within an inch of their life and then force them to become minions. Honestly, I love it. I'd prefer it if players kept turning enemy NPCs into their henchmen. The caveat, of course, is that when the PC dies, the monster henchmen all desert.
Instead I use the hirelings list and allow players to employ mercenary soldiers as level 0 or level 1 fighters. They come with their own arms and equipment, and require the monthly cost as well as a split of treasure, and generally I let the players run the hirelings unless they wanted to do something exceptionally dangerous, which is when I call for a morale roll. The OD&D rules for retainers is much more usable, and much less complicated for handling their loyalty, morale, and general use. I still cap the number of hirelings in the dungeon to the PC's charisma score - otherwise players will march whole armies down into the dungeon for a clean sweep.
Using this method transforms AD&D into a more tactical game, and away from the traditional RPG. Its advantage is that it makes combat more interesting and less instantly lethal, and it forces players to care about characters beyond their own, but the downside is that it takes away from the pure roleplaying experience and many players do not want to run multiple characters at once in this fashion.
One thing I had noticed, though, is that players love subjugating and turning enemy NPCs into their service. Goblins, especially, are prey to players who like to threaten them within an inch of their life and then force them to become minions. Honestly, I love it. I'd prefer it if players kept turning enemy NPCs into their henchmen. The caveat, of course, is that when the PC dies, the monster henchmen all desert.
Friday, October 4, 2019
Random dungeon generation for solo play
Is almost exactly like homework. In fact, using dice for all content generation and action resolution requires you to write notes in a log to keep track of it all, an exercise that’s mechanically indistinguishable from doing actual paperwork. Playing D&D solo leans heavily on the “theater of the mind” play style, which necessitates the need to record everything. As a solo RPG player, you take on the role of the DM, player, and as many PCs and NPCs as exist in the game, and managing all that with pen and paper is tedious. The bookkeeping killed solo RPG for me.
So I looked to board games, miniatures, map tiles, and any other tactile player aids I could use to eliminate the massive overhead of solo play, and more accurately emulate a live session of D&D, where nobody records anything but everyone is following along.
I accomplished this by limiting the scope of the game. Instead of the freewheeling open nature of a full RPG, I restricted it down to just dungeon crawling and hex crawling. The AD&D 1e rules are very comprehensive on the topic of dungeon crawling, and while its wilderness travel rules aren’t the best, they are extensively detailed. These rules can be supplemented and in cases replaced by the more elegant, streamlined rules from the BECMI sets.
Randomly generating an endless dungeon or wilderness becomes boring in short order, but the BECMI books have a crucial bit of advice that’s completely absent from the AD&D text, which is to first create a goal for players entering the dungeon. This is also an idea lifted from the D&D adventure system games - create a goal room, and add it to the random generator table. The point of the game then becomes to adventure until the goal room is reached.
The Basic rule book admonishes to choose a scenario first when creating a dungeon, but the 5e DMG has the most comprehensive list of options, and even tables for story content and plot twists that can occur during the game. These story game charts can add an extra dimension to the otherwise staid dungeon crawling.
And the easiest way to replace dice rolling on a table is to transfer the entries onto cards, then after drawing a card, replace it into the deck and reshuffle it.
So I looked to board games, miniatures, map tiles, and any other tactile player aids I could use to eliminate the massive overhead of solo play, and more accurately emulate a live session of D&D, where nobody records anything but everyone is following along.
I accomplished this by limiting the scope of the game. Instead of the freewheeling open nature of a full RPG, I restricted it down to just dungeon crawling and hex crawling. The AD&D 1e rules are very comprehensive on the topic of dungeon crawling, and while its wilderness travel rules aren’t the best, they are extensively detailed. These rules can be supplemented and in cases replaced by the more elegant, streamlined rules from the BECMI sets.
Randomly generating an endless dungeon or wilderness becomes boring in short order, but the BECMI books have a crucial bit of advice that’s completely absent from the AD&D text, which is to first create a goal for players entering the dungeon. This is also an idea lifted from the D&D adventure system games - create a goal room, and add it to the random generator table. The point of the game then becomes to adventure until the goal room is reached.
The Basic rule book admonishes to choose a scenario first when creating a dungeon, but the 5e DMG has the most comprehensive list of options, and even tables for story content and plot twists that can occur during the game. These story game charts can add an extra dimension to the otherwise staid dungeon crawling.
And the easiest way to replace dice rolling on a table is to transfer the entries onto cards, then after drawing a card, replace it into the deck and reshuffle it.
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