Reconsiderations: Death and Resurrection

Needless to say, I've been very remiss in writing new posts for this blog, even within the context of the less rigorous schedule I proposed two months ago. I wish I had a better excuse beyond "I'm busy revising Thousand Suns for a second edition," except that's the truth. In fact. I've been so busy with that that I haven't even been posting as often at Grognardia Games Direct as I have been. On the plus side, the first draft of the second edition is nearly done, so I at least having something to show for my lack of attention here. With any luck, the first draft will be completed before September and external playtesting can begin in earnest.

Today, though, I want to return to my Reconsiderations series, since the first entry in it was very well received and generated a lot of good comments. My apologies for not responding to most of them, but, well, I've already explained that my attention was – and remains – elsewhere. 

Longtime readers may recall that the Dwimmermount campaign was predicated on several things, the most important of which was that it explicitly megadungeon-centric. At the time, which is to say the early days of the Old School Renaissance, there was a widespread belief that Dungeons & Dragons was born in the megadungeon – or the "campaign dungeon," as some preferred to call it – and that any attempt to play, let alone understand, old school D&D, as we were all attempting to do, required that you run a megadungeon campaign. And so I did, because I hoped that doing so would help me better understand aspects of D&D's history and design that had eluded me when I was a callow youth.

Another important foundation of the Dwimmermount campaign – and indeed my entire philosophy of coming to grips with OD&D – was the principle that "D&D is always right." By that, I simply meant that, despite the claims of its detractors over the decades, D&D's design was not haphazard but intentional. What's there in its rulebooks is there for a reason and we'd do well to understand this before tinkering with them unduly. This is not the same thing as saying that everything that's in D&D's rules always works to our satisfaction (or even the satisfaction of its designers), only that, before casting aside something about the game you don't like, consider for a moment the possibility that that something might, in fact, be a load-bearing wall.

That's why, during that campaign, I permitted the use of the spell raise dead, even though I was philosophically opposed to it. When I say "philosophically opposed," I mean that I initially accepted the idea, common in the early OSR, that old school Dungeons & Dragons was inherently and unalterably high lethality, with characters dying left and right. "Fantasy fucking Vietnam" was how it was sometimes described. Likewise, the renewed emphasis on pulp fantasy – strongly championed on this blog – was seen as requiring a style of play in which death was both omnipresent and permanent. 

Consequently, I wanted to embrace this ethos in the Dwimmermount campaign, but doing so contradicted "D&D is always right," so I, with some reluctance, allowed the use of raise dead. I vividly remember that there was some disappointment, among my readers that I'd "caved" on this point, since I'd previously written about my discomfort with the spell and how I felt it ran counter to the "mood" I was trying to bring to the Dwimmermount campaign. Even so, I permitted it, because the rules did and, as I already said repeatedly, I wanted wrestle with OD&D on its own terms – and, from the beginning, Dungeons & Dragons has had a spell that enabled the restoration of characters to life.

I adopted a similar mindsight when I refereeing my decade-plus Empire of the Petal Throne campaign, House of Worms. Because its underlying rules so closely mirror those of OD&D, EPT also includes several means to bring back the dead, including a spell accessible to player characters. During the course of the campaign, only one player character ever died – Aíthfo hiZnáyu – but he did so twice, which is certainly an unusual distinction! I permitted it, because the rules allowed it and also because the other players, knowing this, chose to make an effort to resurrect Aíthfo, in the process creating some very memorable adventures in Tékumel.

Still, I remained somewhat sheepish about all of this. My innate sense of consistency ensured I'd try to play by the principle ("D&D is always right") I'd laid down at the start of the Dwimmermount campaign, but I did so through gritted teeth. On some level, I shared the disappointment of readers who felt I'd "wimped out" by allowing the use of raise dead. Dwimmermount was, as I've noted, born out of my love of pulp fantasy of a particular kind that did not include easy resurrection in this fashion. Was I betraying its inspirations by being so casual about its use? At the time, I thought so. Even a few years ago, I groused about my decision.

Recently, though, I've come to accept my decision without any reservations. I've come to realize that I did the right thing in both cases by allowing the resurrections. My feeling increasingly is that there's altogether too much whining about how, on the one hand, "save-or-die is unfair" or "level drain is cruel" and, on the other hand, "healing is too commonplace" and "life restoration should be harder, if not impossible." My way of thinking nowadays is that these two extremes – which, to be fair, most players don't espouse – are mirror images of one another, each being founded in not taking Dungeons & Dragons as it is and has been from the beginning and instead substituting a different game in its place. 

That's not a unique sin; I'm as guilty of it as anyone. However, with the benefit of some distance, I've come to realize that many common complaints about D&D (or any roleplaying game) come from a failure in looking at the game design as a whole and instead fixating on only some of its parts. Is save-or-die really unfair? In a game where there are innumerable means of returning a character to life, I don't think so. In most cases, death in Dungeons & Dragons is just a setback and the rules provide a myriad of means by which to overcome it. Why not accept that?

That's more or less where I am right now on the question of death and resurrection in D&D and its derivatives and descendants.

The Kythireans

Over at Advanced Grognardia, I've got another post in which I provide game stats and a description of "monsters" from my Telluria campaign setting, along with some commentary on their origins. I've been writing a number of these posts over the past few months and it's been fun revisiting some of my early work and sharing insights into their creative origins.

The Ranine

Over at Advanced Grognardia, I've got another post in which I provide game stats and a description of a monster from my Telluria campaign setting, along with some commentary on its origins. 

The Iounians

Over at Advanced Grognardia, I've got a post in which I provide game stats and a description of a monster from my Telluria campaign setting, along with some commentary on its origins. 

An Old School (Essentials) Christmas Gift

Over at Advanced Grognardia, I've offered up a small Christmas gift in the form of a new version of an old monster from the early days of the blog. Enjoy!

Commentary

Commentary by James Maliszewski

Thinking about Presentation of a Different Sort

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Refinement

Refinement by James Maliszewski

Your Opinions, Please

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Three

While I'd prefer you to comment over at Grognardia Games Direct, your comments are very welcome here as well.

Three by James Maliszewski

Let Me Know Your Preference

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Unfinished

Unfinished by James Maliszewski

Pondering Abandoned Projects

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Into the Megadungeon: Mysteries

The first episode of Ben Laurence's new podcast, Into the Megadungeon, was just released and features your truly talking about my own experiences creating and refereeing a megadungeon-centric RPG campaign. Feature episodes will feature others who've done the same and I'm very interested in what they have to say on the matter. 

Notes to the episode can be found here, though they're geared more toward newcomers to the topic than the old hands I expect to be the majority of Grognardia's readers.

Into the Megadungeon

Ben Laurence over at Mazirian's Garden is working on a podcast called Into the Megadungeon that will explore the ins and outs of refereeing a megadungeon-focused fantasy roleplaying game campaign. The first episode will be released on Tuesday, August 8, and will feature yours truly talking about both my Dwimmerount megadungeon of old and the Vaults of da-Imer megadungeon that I'm slowly constructing as part of Dungeon23. 

Additional episodes will be released on biweekly basis. Ben intends to produce 10 episodes as part of the first season of the podcast, with each episode featuring a different referee who's created and refereed a megadungeon campaign for an extended period of time. I have no idea how long he can keep the podcast going – I doubt Ben does either – but I think it's a worthy topic and I look forward to listening to the episodes as they're released.

Dungeon23

Megadungeon for 2023. 12 levels. 365 rooms. One room a day. Keep it all in a journal. ⁦@LukeGearing⁩ let’s do this. pic.twitter.com/tCVgh8i1MF

— 💭 Sean McCoy (@seanmccoy) December 5, 2022

An old mantra of this blog has long been that "roleplaying games were born in the megadungeon." By this, I simply mean that most of the earliest examples of what we would today recognize as RPGs were played in the context of exploring an immense, subterranean locale filled with monsters, magic, and mysteries – Dungeons & Dragons, Tunnels & Trolls, and Empire of the Petal Throne, to cite just three examples, all assume that much of a campaign's action will center around delving into the depths. Obviously, roleplaying games can (and should) include so many more activities, but there's something satisfyingly primal about braving the mythic underworld and returning to tell the tale.

To be worthy of the name, a megadungeon shouldn't merely be vast in size, it should also contain enough to hold the players' attentions for a long period of time. Unlike smaller, more focused "lair" dungeons, like those typically found in published adventure modules, a megadungeon is a sprawling, rambling thing that isn't about any one thing, nor is it possible to "clear" it. Instead, it's a place to which the characters can come again and again over the course of weeks, months, or even years without ever fully exhausting. A megadungeon can thus be the centerpiece of a campaign, in the way that Castles Blackmoor and Greyhawk were in their respective campaigns and the Jakállan Underworld was in the earliest Tékumel campaign.

I was reminded of all of this for two unrelated reasons. First, as you'll know, I've been working on a science fantasy RPG I'm calling The Secrets of sha-Arthan. When I first conceived of the idea a year and a half ago, I called the project The Vaults of sha-Arthan. The Vaults of the title are megadungeons by another name – deep, ancient labyrinths reputed to contain the secrets of the deific Makers. From the beginning, I knew I wanted to develop one of these Vaults as the basis of a sha-Arthan campaign and have been slowly poking at the idea ever since.

Second, Sean McCoy, the creator of Mothership, proposed something that's come to be known as Dungeon23. The idea quite simple: create one room each day for a megadungeon throughout the entirety of 2023 and then share the results. I thought this was a great idea, if only because it took what might otherwise have seemed like an insurmountable endeavor and broke it down into a much more manageable form. Since I was already contemplating the development of one of the Vaults of sha-Arthan for use in a campaign, Sean's idea struck me as worthy of an attempt.

So, among other things, 2023 will see me attempt to flesh out the Vaults beneath the ancient city of da-Imer one room at a time. Since I already have a lot of ideas of what that fabled underworld might contain, I'm pretty confident that I'll be able to keep up the pace for a while. Of course, this is a marathon, not a sprint. The real test comes after a few weeks or even months, after the novelty of the exercise begins to wear off and the realization that a year is a long time to commit to a single project.

I'll undoubtedly have a few more thoughts on this, as I work on it over on my Patreon. For now, I only wanted to say publicly that I intend to pick up the gauntlet Sean has thrown on the ground. Wish me luck.

Computer God

Something I've observed is that, if you look at the totality of a creator's work, you'll sometimes notice patterns in their creations. By "patterns," I mean subject matter or themes that keep cropping up again and again. Sometimes, this is done deliberately, with the creator explicitly embracing this, while at other times, it's done subconsciously. There are plenty of exceptions to this, of course; not every creator is given to this behavior. Indeed, one could make a reasonable case that the best creators are those whose works are genuinely varied in their subject matter or themes. 

Yesterday, I posted a story about an "AI agent" that had supposedly become very adept at playing Diplomacy. In reflecting on it, I realized that one of the reasons the story so intrigued me is not simply for its connection to a game I enjoy, but because it connects to a recurring subject within my own creative endeavors: computers as gods. I was suddenly struck by the fact that, without my specifically intending to do so, I'd been playing around with this idea under a variety of different guises. Clearly, it's something that has fired my imagination, hence the prevalence of it in my works to date.

The initial intention behind my Dwimmermount campaign setting was to create a setting for D&D that was outwardly fairly ordinary and traditional but with a secret science fiction background. Part of this background is that the gods of the Great Church were, in fact, artificial beings created by technological advanced Men in the ancient past and whose civilization was ultimately destroyed as a consequence of their hubris. None of this was ever revealed in the course of the campaign, but it provided the intellectual frame by which I understand the setting.

In my House of Worms Tékumel campaign, the characters have spent a long time, both in game and in the real world, interacting with several strange cultures of the mysterious Achgé Peninsula. Among the many ways these cultures differ from those of the characters' homeland of Tsolyánu are the gods they worship. One of the most important is called Eyenál, who is generally depicted as a war god. Some months ago, while interacting with a device of the Ancients, the characters learned of the existence of "ANL/1043," described as being "a 301st generation strategic agent" – in short, Eyenál is some sort of artificial intelligence, possibly charged with Tékumel planetary defenses.

Likewise, in the Secrets of sha-Arthan, I've imagined many different artificial beings created by "the Makers" whose ruins are scattered across the True World. Some of these beings are mere automatons without much in the way of individual will or intelligence, while others are closer to Men. Others still possess vast and alien intelligence utterly unlike that of any other intelligent species. Some of these direct and guide cities or even entire nations, ruling them as gods, though, of course, few on sha-Arthan understand this. 

In each case, knowledge of the true nature of the gods as artificial beings is largely unknown within the setting. Naturally, I know the truth and occasionally the players (as opposed to their characters) catch on to what's really going on. The reaction has been universally positive, so far as I can recall. I distinctly remember the revelation about Eyenál being met with pleasure by several of the players, who felt it provided a clever and unexpected re-interpretation of many of the details they'd already collected about the Achgé Peninsula and its history. 

I presume regular return to the subject of artificial gods is rooted in my lifelong love of science fiction. Stories of "computer gods" or, at least, computers viewed as gods are commonplace in the genre. I wonder, though, if there's more to it than that and, if so, what it is. Clearly, I'm trying to grapple with something through the vehicle of my imagination, though I'm not yet sure what it is. Regardless, I find it fascinating that I continue to revisit this idea and wonder if others find that they return to the same ideas over and over within their own creations.

Rats!

This weekend, I pulled out my copy of the 1981 version of the Dungeon! board game -- I wrote an article about the game and interviewed its creator, Dave Megarry, a few weeks back, actually -- and sat down to play with my family. We had a lot of fun and it brought back fond memories of my first having played it in late 1979. As long-time readers of this blog no doubt remember, Dungeon! was my gateway to the hobby, which is why I'm encouraged that Wizards of the Coast has recently re-released the game. I think that, as it was for me, this game could serve as an entrée to the hobby for a new generation of gamers.

Anyway, when playing, I chose to be a Hero, one of four adventurer types available for play. "Hero" is, of course, a callback to the old Chainmail-derived OD&D level title (another type is a "Superhero") and, along with Elf, it's one of the weaker options. To compensate for its lesser degree of combat prowess, the Hero also requires less gold to amass in order to achieve victory -- a mere 10,000 gold pieces compared to the Superhero's 20,000 (or the Wizard's 30,000). Consequently, a good strategy if you're playing a Hero or Elf is to stick to the upper levels of the dungeon, where the monsters are weaker.

So, when my Hero was poking about on the 1st Level, what did he encounter?

Best of all? The giant rats were guarding exactly 250 gold pieces. What terrible game design!

Comments on this post can be made here.

Open Friday: Level of Setting Detail

The first published setting for Dungeons & Dragons I remember seeing was probably The World of Greyhawk, which was long my model of the "perfect" level of detail in a published campaign setting. Its entries are short -- a paragraph or two at most -- and provide just enough information to inspire the referee while not leaving him without a net, so to speak. In recent years, I started to become a lot more enamored of the terseness of Judges Guild's Wilderlands setting material, but, on reflection, I realized that something a wee bit closer to The World of Greyhawk might have greater utility. That's why I'm very fond of the format Rob Conley adopted in Blackmarsh last year, which seems to offer a happy medium between the two approaches.

Here are some examples of what I'm talking about (taken from the gazetteer of the area around Dwimmermount):

2806 Elphame

Population: Unknown; Alignment: Neutral; Ruler: Linwa Nirmalan, Elf 8, N; Resource: Market

Elphame is the elven “capital” in the north, a secluded, fortified settlement closed to most outsiders. Its precise population is unknown, owing to the secretive nature of the elves, but is reputed to be in the hundreds.

2911 Gloris

Population: 300 Men; Alignment: Lawful; Ruler: Mayor Gillet Hodemer, 0-Level, L; Resource: Farm

Gloris is a small community whose inhabitants make their living by farming and trading with the friendly goblins of the nearby Makrono Marsh (see above).

3413 Ghaz Droonan

Built into the side of a mountain, the mighty dwarf hold of Ghaz Droonan stood for centuries as an example of the great works of the sturdy Children of the Earth. All that changed when a plague of unknown origins swept through its halls and exterminated its population. The source of the plague has never been determined and a foul miasma lingers still, discouraging any dwarf from ever returning.

3627 The Outyard

The Outyard is an immense subterranean complex hewn out of the Thunderhome Mountains (see above) and populated by giants. In Thulian times, the giants were kept at bay, but, in recent decades, they have become more active, raiding the settlements of Men and dwarves.

4004 Castle Greenholt

Population: 200 Men; Alignment: Neutral; Ruler: Nycaize Ouyquant, MU 7, N

Caste Greenholt is home to a powerful magician who has set himself up as protector of the Greenholt Forest (see above). Some believe this is because the forest hides a secret of the Great Ancients, while others believe he entered into a pact with the elves of Elphame (2806). Whatever the truth, the magician and his men do their best to prevent anyone from entering the forest without his permission.

4221 The City Out of Time

Whether this city even exists is open to debate among scholars. Legends claim that, on certain nights -- naturally there is debate as to which ones -- an ancient city filled with treasure appears for a short time before disappearing again. Legends also claim the city has magical guardians that slay any who attempt to make off with its treasure.

So what do you think? Is this too little detail? Too much? Just right? If these don't hit your personal sweet spot, what does? And how would you change these entries to make them more in line with your own philosophy of setting detail?

Multi-Level Mapping

When I first entered the hobby, I was greatly taken by the cross-section illustration of "Stone Mountain" (aka Skull Mountain) presented in the D&D Basic Set rulebook edited by Dr J. Eric Holmes. Indeed, it's not unreasonable to say that, for over three decades, Stone Mountain has been my mind's eye vision of what a "megadungeon" looks like. For those of you somehow unfamiliar with this illustration, here it is:

There's a similar, though, in my opinion, less interesting, cross-section in Tom Moldvay's 1981 Basic Rulebook that looks like this:

A much better cross-section appeared in another Tom Moldvay effort, The Lost City, and it looked like this:

What I like about these cross-sections is the way they provide context for a dungeon by showing how all the various levels interrelate with not just one another but also the surrounding environment. I think that's key to presenting a compelling tent pole dungeon for long-term campaign use.

Much as like these cross-sections, they do have one problem: they're very stylized. That is, they're more art than map. That's fine for helping one to visualize the dungeon as a whole but it doesn't provide the nitty gritty details that are vital to ensuring that all the dungeon's pieces fit together properly. That's why I had Tim Hartin put together several images where all the levels of Dwimmermount were piled on top of each other to show how they connected. Here's one that shows seven different levels (1, 2A, 2B, 3A, 3B, 4, and 5):

Here's another that shows four different levels (5, 6A, 6B, and 7):

Doing this was incredibly helpful, since it revealed a couple of minor errors in the cartography -- places where the connections between levels didn't quite work out as they were intended to. While easily fixed and relatively minor in nature, neither of us would have noticed the errors if we hadn't undertaken this exercise. More than that, I got a different perspective on ten dungeon levels than a cross-sectional illustration might provide. I still think cross-sections are useful tools for referees and players alike, but they do have limitations, no matter how attractive and inspirational they may be.

Rival Adventurer Detail, Take Two

After reading through the comments to my previous post, I went back to modified the description of the rival adventuring parties slightly:

Party #1 (0 Experience Points): The Five Delvers

The Delvers are a new adventuring party based out of Muntburg. Driven by equal parts curiosity and greed, they are not adverse to aiding other adventuers.

Asceline (Level 1 Neutral Female Thief) AC: 5 HP: 4

STR 10 INT 15 WIS 12 CON 13 DEX 17 CHA 13

Pick Locks: 17% Find/Remove Traps: 14 Pick Pockets: 23% Move Silently: 23% Climb Walls: 87% Hide in Shadows: 13% Hear Noise 1-2

Equipment: Sword, Dagger, Leather Armor, Backpack, Waterskin, Lantern, 4 Flasks oil, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole, 50' Rope, Thieves Tools

Personality: Asceline is bold to the point of foolhardiness. Her charisma makes her a natural leader.

Fortin (Level 1 Neutral Male Fighter) AC: 4 HP: 8

STR 13 INT 12 WIS 12 CON 11 DEX 9 CHA 9

Equipment: Chain Armor, Shield, Sword, Dagger, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole

Personality: Fortin is the “strong and silent” type; he keeps his opinions to himself and does what he is told.

Rique of Tyche (Level 1 Lawful Male Cleric) AC: 5 HP: 6

STR 7 INT 12 WIS 13 CON 13 DEX 13 CHA 13

Spells: None

Equipment: Mace, Leather Armor, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole, Wooden Holy Symbol

Personality: Like many clerics of Tyche, Rique is addicted to danger. He sees exploring Dwimmermount as a reward in itself.

Lorenz (Level 1 Neutral Male Fighter) AC: 2 HP: 5

STR 14 INT 12 WIS 12 CON 5 DEX 14 CHA 12

Equipment: Plate Mail, Flail, Dagger, Short bow, Quiver of 20 Arrows, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 50' Rope, Small Sack

Personality: Lorenz considers himself Asceline's “protector” and will do anything to keep her safe.

Thonyn (Level 1 Neutral Male Magic-User) AC: 9 HP: 3

STR 10 INT 16 WIS 13 CON 14 DEX 7 CHA 9

Spells: 1-Charm Person

Equipment: Dagger, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 50' Rope, Vial of Holy Water
Personality: Thonyn is the least trustworthy member of the Delvers; he would betray his fellows if he felt he could gain magical power as a result.

Is this enough detail for the referee to hang his hat on? Or should there be more information about the party and the individuals who makes it up?

Rival Adventurer Detail

I've written about rival adventuring parties several times in the past. I've come to believe that this is an aspect of old school play that was lost over the years. Whereas OD&D in its various forms and even AD&D 1e included lots of examples in their rulebooks and adventures to reinforce the notion that rival adventurers were a common "hazard" of dungeon exploration, I can't recall a single example of such a thing from 2e on, though I'm sure that those with better memories can (and will) correct me on this point. That's why, when I started the Dwimmermount campaign, I made a specific point of creating NPC adventurers whom the player characters could encounter. At least two parties of these NPCs had an impact on the development of the campaign.

Over the last little while, I've been writing up these rival adventuring parties, along with some new ones, and I've found myself wondering just how much information a referee needs to use an NPC adventuring party, which is admittedly part of a larger problem of just how much detail is needed for any element of an adventure module/setting. I myself require very little detail. My personal notes are usually quite spare -- mostly words or phrases intended to jog my memory. In fact, I make up a lot of details on the spot, since this saves time and gives me more flexibility in play. I can't begin to remember the number of times I've changed my mind about things because of the roll of the dice, player decision, or even just whimsy.

However, I realize that not every referee plays like me. So, I'm trying to strike a good balance between too much and too little detail in presenting NPC adventurers. Here's an example of one such party, written in a very minimalist style:

Party #2 (2,035 Experience Points): Typhon's Fists

Jehan of Typhon (Level 2 Lawful Male Cleric) AC: 4 HP: 8

STR 12 INT 12 WIS 14 CON 12 DEX 11 CHA 14

Spells: 1-Cure Light Wounds

Equipment: Chain Mail, Shield, War Hammer +1, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole, Wooden Holy Symbol, 2 Small Sacks, 3 Stakes & Mallet, Steel Mirror

Ondart (Level 2 Lawful Male Fighter) AC: 1 HP: 12

STR 15 INT 14 WIS 12 CON 9 DEX 13 CHA 9

Equipment: Plate Mail, Shield, Sword, Dagger, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole, Potion of Healing

Helouys (Level 2 Lawful Female Fighter) AC: 3 HP: 8

STR 16 INT 9 WIS 8 CON 11 DEX 12 CHA 11

Equipment: Plate Mail, Two-Handed Sword, 3 Daggers, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 50' Rope, 2 Flasks oil, Potion of Heroism

Genevote (Level 1 Neutral Female Magic-User) AC: 9 HP: 2

STR 11 INT 15 WIS 15 CON 9 DEX 9 CHA 8

Spells: 1-Magic Missile

Equipment: Dagger, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 50' Rope, Vial of Holy Water

Enjorran of Typhon (Level 2 Lawful Male Cleric) AC: 5 HP: 9

STR 14 INT 11 WIS 18 CON 10 DEX 6 CHA 5

Spells: 1-Protection from Evil

Equipment: Chain Mail, Shield, War Hammer, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole, Wooden Holy Symbol, 2 Small Sacks, Scroll of Cure Light Wounds

Yurain (Level 2 Lawful Male Dwarf) AC: 1 HP: 8

STR 17 INT 9 WIS 10 CON 11 DEX 12 CHA 11

Equipment: Plate Mail, Shield +1, Sword, Light Crossbow, Case With 30 Quarrels, 6 Torches, Backpack, Waterskin, 1 Week Iron Rations, 10' Pole

As you can see, there's not much here beyond basic details. The NPCs have names but no descriptions, classes and equipment but no personalities or backgrounds. Likewise, the party itself has a name ("Typhon's Fists") but no details or agenda. Is that enough? For me, it is. The only things I  hate coming up with on the fly are game stats and, even then, it's not hard so much as something I don't enjoy, especially when you're dealing with mid to high-level NPCs. That's why I keep some pregenerated ability score arrays, names, spellbooks, etc, at hand in case I ever have to make up a NPC on the spot who requires more than a name and a vague personality. Other referees might feel differently, though, which is why I'm curious what these referees might add to this collection of game stats. What additional details are necessary to make these NPCs broadly useful should they be encountered as the result of a roll on the wandering monster chart?

OSRCon: Dwimmermount, Session 2

I'd intended to post the second of my OSRCon 2012 reminiscences sooner, but better late than never, I suppose. On the morning of the second day of the con, I ran Level 1 of Dwimmermount for a different group of people, including several fellow bloggers: Brendan S, Ramanan Sivaranjan, and Steve Connor, in addition to four others.

As with my previous session, all the players generated their characters on the spot, using the LBBs + Supplements. I really enjoyed this aspect of the session, both because it's fun to see newcomers try and make their way through the original edition of Dungeons & Dragons for the first time and because it's such a delightfully fast process. Generating OD&D characters at the table takes 5-10 minutes tops, even less if you streamline equipment selection through the use of utilities like this one. (That link leads to a blog post by Brendan Strejcek that, at the time, I somehow didn't connect with him, so it led to the amusing situation in which I recommended its use to its creator without realizing it).

One of the great aspects of rolling up characters at the table is that it helps players get into the proper spirit of things. I'm not, by nature, a high lethality referee (if my old school cred card hasn't already been revoked, this ought to do it), but I also don't shy away from killing off characters if that's what the dice dictate. Experience has taught me that this is a lot easier for all involved if characters are created using 3d6-in-order and character generation is kept simple so that rolling up a new one mid-game isn't an arduous affair. Plus, it leads to characters like this being played rather than discarded as untenable:

A joy unique to con play (and, to a lesser extent, Google+ hangout games) is watching different people explore the same stretch of the dungeon. The differences in play style and approach become readily apparent when you play sessions temporally close to one another, as I did at OSRCon. Whereas the Friday night group was rather cautious, even timid (with the exception of Ken St. Andre's berserker magic-user), the Saturday morning group was much more bold. Indeed, they seemed to relish poking, prodding, and generally trashing Dwimmermount in order to determine how everything worked (or didn't, as the case may be).

The differences between the two groups highlighted for me that dungeons (and adventure modules in general, I suppose) can't be used in just one way. Everyone approaches them from their own perspective, which makes the task of producing a "definitive" version of them difficult -- especially since I find that I adapt my own presentation of Dwimmermount (and even its contents in some cases) in response to the actions and expectations of the players. To one group of players, a room whose description -- if it has one -- reads "Former guardroom; wooden debris" is something quickly passed through and forgotten, but to another it's a source of endless fascination, investigation, and experimentation. For the latter group, I often make up details on the spot, details that, if I like them, eventually become permanent parts of the dungeon for future adventurers to find, should they ever make the effort of looking for them.

The other thing that stands out about the second Dwimmermount group is that they actually ventured down into one of the second levels of the dungeon (there are two). I purposely had the players in both groups generated 2nd-level characters in the hopes that, not only would they survive longer, but they'd be better positioned to take on lower levels. So, I was quite pleased when this group did so, since, fond as I am of the 1st level, I've run it a lot over the years, whereas the lower levels are much less well explored, even by my home group. Indeed, there's a lot of the dungeon no one has ever visited.

A final difference between the two groups is that the Saturday group discovered a pretty valuable magic item hidden behind a secret door -- a tome of clear thought. In my mind, I had confused the tome with the manual of puissant skill at arms, thinking that, instead of granting a +1 bonus to Intelligence, it increased the level of the magic-user who read it. Consequently, upon being discovered, the two magic-users diced for possession of it and then elected to leave the dungeon for a time to give the winner a chance to read it thoroughly. The rest of the group healed and re-equipped and they returned with a 3rd-level magic-user in their party. Aside from my obvious screw-up, this was interesting to me, since most con groups don't bother with leaving the dungeon for any length of time, instead forging ahead regardless of the cost. I found it a smart decision and so saw no reason not to allow it. Plus, it gave me a chance to use my dungeon restocking tables.

It was another good session and a reminder of the unique joys of playing with strangers, something I hadn't done since I was a youth, back in the ancient days when it seemed like D&D games broke out spontaneously whenever three or four kids were in the same place for any length of time. I highly recommend the experience, particularly for referees.

OSRCon: Dwimmermount, Session 1

Last Friday, I ran the first of two sessions of Dwimmermount at OSRCon here in Toronto. I'd done this the year before and, from that experience, I knew what worked and what didn't. One of the things that worked was doing all the mapping myself. I brought with me a dry-erase map to which I added details as the players explored the first level of the dungeon. I'm frankly terrible at giving out reasonably accurate map descriptions anyway -- I often wind up correcting the maps of my players out of shame -- so I felt this would save a lot of headaches at the table and ensure that things moved along at a brisker pace.

Last year, I used pregenerated characters and gave the players an objective for the four-hour session, like "Find the rumored dwarf cemetery on Level 1" or "Locate the portal to Areon on Level 3," thinking this would provide some useful focus. This year, I abandoned both, allowing players to create characters on the spot and to wander about with whatever purpose they made for themselves. I think both decisions were wise, particularly generating characters at the table, since many players had never used the OD&D rulebooks before and it gave them a chance to handle and peruse them not as artifacts of a hoary past but as, well, RPG books that are meant to be used. I did allow players to create 2nd-level characters, since I wanted them to plausibly be able to explore the second levels of the dungeon if they so desired (both groups did).

My Friday night game had two "celebrity" players: Greg Gillespie of Barrowmaze fame and Ken St. Andre, creator of Tunnels & Trolls. Greg's presence was well known to me in advance and I really looked forward to having the chance to play with him, while Ken's appearance was quite unexpected. Shortly after I arrived at the con, Ken walked up to me -- he must have recognized me from my blog photos -- and asked if he could snag a seat at my game. I was more than a little surprised at this, since I was running D&D -- "That Other Game," as Ken calls it -- and didn't think he'd be very interested. Ken assured me he was interested, although he did express disappointment that I wasn't running "my" game, by which he meant Thousand Suns. I explained to him that attendees at OSRCon expected me to run Dwimmermount and he again asked if he could play. I said yes, knowing full well I was likely in for a ride, since Ken is well known for his impish personality, as well as his dislike of D&D and its rules.

In total, there were eight players at Friday's session and their characters consisted of a good mix of fighting men, magic-users, and clerics. There was a single elven thief, who was slain by a poison dart trap. He was replaced mid-game by a dwarf henchman (also a thief), who proved to be an unreliable scout, often claiming to have spotted no monsters up ahead when he really had. Needless to say, this led to chaos and hilarity at times. Two other characters ought to have died: a fighting man reduced to exactly 0 hit points but who was saved by the immediate application of a black sludge found in an alchemy lab that turned out to be a potion of healing and a 83 year-old magician who'd been carrying a slept gnome on his back. When a kobold spear struck the magician, his player asked if the gnome might have been struck instead. Quick recourse to the oracular dice yielded an affirmative and the MU lived to explore further.

Lots of things stand out about this session, most notably how cautious players become when they're playing in an avowedly "old school" dungeon. Likewise, there was a lot of creative spell use, particularly of charm person, which enabled the characters to take control of orcs on Level 2A and use them as guides, as well as cannon fodder. With the exception of the player of the dwarf thief and Ken St. Andre (about which I'll say more in a moment), the players worked very well together, forming a fairly cohesive team that not only relied on one another but worked to each others' strengths. Consequently, they managed to explore quite a lot of two levels in four hours and, I hope, had a good time doing so.

I called Ken "impish" above and that may be something of an understatement. Though the other players all created their own characters, Ken asked that I create his. I gave him a magic-user and that was probably a big mistake, since he continually balked at not only his spell selection but the very nature of D&D's magic system, attempting at many turns to get me to modify it to make it more like that of Tunnels & Trolls. When he saw that this was getting him nowhere, he took a different tack, turning his magician into a bloodthirsty combatant, leaping into battle and wielding his dagger with reckless abandon. Fortunately for him, the dice favored him and he didn't die, despite his foolhardiness. Later, he killed an orc, flayed it and wore its face as a mask, hoping to disguise himself as a monster. The tactic didn't quite work as he'd hoped, but neither did it hinder him, so he seemed content.

I can't deny that, in retrospect, I feel a little bad at how things unfolded with Ken. He and I have corresponded by email for a long time and I suspect he felt that, given our familiarity with one another, it was perfectly reasonable that he play as he did. He later remarked, on Saturday's panel, that he thought me a very good sport for the way I persevered under his constant barrage of wheedling. Of course, he also said that he felt it was the job of players to "give the referee opportunities to change his mind," but I wasn't in the mood to do that on Friday. The other players handled the situation well and didn't complain, even though it was clear at least a couple of them weren't pleased with what they, quite reasonably, perceived as a disruption. What saddens me most, I think, is that they've probably got a far worse opinion of Ken than they ought, but, given the circumstances, I don't blame them at all for feeling that.

All in all, I think my first Dwimmermount session this year was solid, but not as good as I'd have hoped it would be. On the plus side, I got the chance to meet a number of local folks interested in old school gaming and that's a victory no matter how you view it.