tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26171380220547801312024-02-27T01:19:18.582-08:00Campaigns Playable . . . with paper and pencil and traditional legendaria . . .Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.comBlogger69125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-40530371427949137782023-08-24T08:52:00.003-07:002023-08-24T08:52:59.528-07:00Thanks for your comments, friends!<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="http://cdn7.thepennyhoarder.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Broken-Google.png" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0; text-align: center; "><img alt="" border="0" width="200" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="620" src="http://cdn7.thepennyhoarder.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Broken-Google.png"/></a></div>
Dear friends and followers of the blog,
Thanks for all your comments over the years.
When Google+ opened, I decided to jump on board. Everything got coupled together in Google-land.
When Google+ when belly-up, everything in Google-land kind of went funky.
What that means is that although I can moderate your comments, I cannot commment back on my own blog!
So please don't be offended if I don't reply. I just can't. If I accumulate enough questions, I may try to post a Q&A post to sum those up every now and then.
But if you can find me on Discord, or at ODD74, or the K&KA Forum, then reach out to me and ask me your questions there and I will for sure respond.
Again, thanks everybody.
Fight on!Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-86416770528446890872023-07-25T08:48:00.006-07:002023-07-25T08:48:49.365-07:00Gratitude<div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
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This Summer of 2023 marks my ten year anniversary of returning to Dungeons &
Dragons as a hobby. In the summer of 2013, I was on vacation with my family at a
beach house. I remembered playing the video game
<a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gauntlet_%281985_video_game%29"
target="_blank"
>Gauntlet</a
>
as a kid. I did some internet research on it.
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Then I remembered what it was derived from: Dungeons & Dragons. Then I went down
an internet rabbit hole of research. Back in 2013, the OSR was not quite over. I
would say, it was just on the other side of its hey-day. I was swept up, and,
because of the kind of person I am and because of waht fascinates me, I
discovered the original game. I have now enjoyed hours of joy, terror, fun,
play, entertainment as a player, and service to others as a referee.
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I have
something I share with my children, young in 2013, now almost out of the house.
We "speak" D&D and we have grown formed in its culture.
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I remembered an old
friend I had played D&D with back in my youth. We grew apart in high school, and
lost touch by college. I ran into him at his work place when moving back to my
hometown. By coincidence, one of my new D&D regulars new him from his work as
well. We invited him to play. After 30+ years, I was reunited to this old
childhood friend through this amazing hobby. Now I play D&D with him as an adult
almost every week. This hobby has breathed life back into a stressful world for
me.
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I am so thankful.
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Fight on!
Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-49152303618607288942021-07-19T07:26:00.004-07:002021-07-19T07:27:36.964-07:00Alignment and Lawful Clerics<p>This is the third in a <a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2021/06/law-in-perilous-realms.html" target="_blank">series of web log posts</a> where I describe what “alignment” must mean in the Perilous Realms, based upon our group’s tone and play-style, and its cumulative rulings so far.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEike3u1SjKCtIh_7UFgd2fFCoRoqt2ZQduaKY3fyDTu2lItxerFn2QUykIlQzBQapnCdecmEahVuJ6VfaM4-1dTDXOA-i4Fcyix_HrnWcIpxlVEekF8NwoCfZkJzmRw1dbdBzUrStD30dU/s958/Clerics.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="958" data-original-width="750" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEike3u1SjKCtIh_7UFgd2fFCoRoqt2ZQduaKY3fyDTu2lItxerFn2QUykIlQzBQapnCdecmEahVuJ6VfaM4-1dTDXOA-i4Fcyix_HrnWcIpxlVEekF8NwoCfZkJzmRw1dbdBzUrStD30dU/s320/Clerics.jpg" /></a></div><br /><b><br /></b><p></p><p><b>Lawful Clerics and Alignment</b></p><p>Lawful Clerics are members of the Church of Law who have made vows and joined some order of religious (which is to say, monastic) knights. Regular, everyday priests and prelates are not “Clerics,” in this sense. Should a Lawful Cleric willingly break any of the Laws of Noe his or her clerical powers would be removed until repentance and restitution are made. That said, those who become knights of religious orders (the so-called “Clerics” of the game) have additional rules they must follow as a part of the vows that set them apart and grant them their authority to call on miraculous powers. Willingly breaking these vows also result in the removal of their special authority until repentance and restitution is made. These are the Seven Vows of the Crusade of the Orders of Religious Knights (Clerics):</p><p>The Vows of Crusade</p><p>1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Worship the Most High alone</p><p>2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Observe Sabbat, fasting, alms, and prayers</p><p>3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>No shedding of blood</p><p>4.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Show honor</p><p>5.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Show mercy</p><p>6.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Shun falsehood</p><p>7.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Shun vanity</p><p>The first vow, monotheism, sets Clerics apart from their coreligionists. Other Lawful men may “worship” many gods, angels, and saints, including the offering of sacrifices and oblations, so long as these Powers are recognized members of the Council of the Most High and the rituals themselves do not involve the worship of idols. Clerics, on the other hand, may only engage in the ritual worship of the Most High, alone. That said, Clerical powers are mediated by saints and angels whom the Cleric adopts as a patron. But the Cleric does not worship such patrons.</p><p>The second vow commits the Cleric to certain religious and ascetical disciplines. These include a day of rest every week – Saturn’s Day, or the Day of Kronos. Kronos is closely associated with the Most High. (But there is debate as to whether or not Kronos is the Most High!) Weekly rest and daily prayers are necessary for the restoration of miraculous authority, Clerical “spells.” If a Cleric does not rest to pray once a day, and rest entirely once a week, Clerical spells are temporarily unavailable. In cases of evasion in the wilderness, this may prove dangerous to a party.</p><p>The third vow, no shedding of blood, is where we get the Clerical prohibition on the use of sharps as weapons. The blood is the life of the animal and belongs to the Most High. This means that Clerics are “vegetarians,” in the sense that they do not eat the flesh of mammals. Other animals and milk are not off limits. But won’t, you might ask, a mace “shed blood”? Well, yes. But here is where a little beautiful casuistry enters (and how could a game be “medieval,” without a little casuistry?). The shedding of blood by means of blunts is not necessary and is often a deleterious but unintended consequence of their use. But by fighting with sharps the means of subduing or killing an opponent depends upon cutting, and therefore the shedding of blood is inherent to their use. So: “no sharps,” but not “no killing,” see the commentary on the Fourth Law.</p><p>The fourth vow, honor, is directly related to obedience, something inherent to any form of monasticism or membership in a religious order. But it also includes the encouragement of subordinates and things such as respect for the dead by putting them to rest, etc. Clerics rarely tolerate the abuse of a corpse and must never participate. The Clerical war against the Undead is not that of corpse mutilation, but all attempts must be made to free the corpse from this unholy abuse and restore the body to rest through proper committal to the elements. This includes burial, proper, in the earth, but also burial at sea and cremation on pyres. When Clerics gain the authority to dispel the curse of Undeath, this does not cause the undead victim to disappear or disintegrate. It rather immediately restores the corpse to a state of rest, laid and in a position ready for committal to the elements.</p><p>The fifth vow, that of mercy, means that all Clerics are expected to do whatever they can to defend and, if necessary, provide for widows, orphans, pilgrims, the oppressed, etc. They are expected always to grant subdued foes the chance to convert to Law, repent and be saved. Fell races and Chaotic monsters are incapable of conversion and repentance, so mercy does not extend to them.</p><p>The sixth vow, the prohibition of falsehood, means more than simply not lying. It also demands that a cleric use no disguise, nor engage in any “sting operations” or subterfuge. Nevertheless, a Cleric may tolerate other party members who do so, they simply may not directly participate. If directly questioned in such situations, Clerics may, however, tell the truth in a “creative” way.</p><p>The seventh vow, the rejection of vanity, means avoiding the pomp of the world. As a virtue, this includes not coveting the wealth, title, or power of others. As a practice, it includes the requirement to tithe any wealth obtained through adventuring. This corresponds to the traditional monastic vow of “poverty.” It also includes the monastic vow of “chastity.” Remember, this is a medieval fantasy, so marriage in the medieval world was often a means of glory, the making of alliances, and the maintenance of worldly society. Think “trophy wife,” and you will get the picture. Although marriage is lawful and to be esteemed for those not involved in the religious life, for a Cleric, all spouses would be merely worldly “trophies,” for those who have answered the high call of Crusade.</p><p>Next: Alignment and Evil Clerics</p><div><br /></div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-23113769977425072502021-07-04T14:09:00.002-07:002021-07-19T07:28:48.821-07:00Chaos in the Perilous Realms<p><i>This is the second in a series of web log posts where I describe what “alignment” must mean in the Perilous Realms, based upon our group’s tone and play-style, and its cumulative rulings so far. The first was on the <a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2021/06/law-in-perilous-realms.html" target="_blank">Law of the Perilous Realm</a>s.</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ME__Gb3W0P4Pjw2ZQTT6xLp3LiURRXm8-SDzeVaY-IJ4yvrCpJF_IBGqD7kUkJ8pvCECBfmhe_7ChEcVcGwesmMLpvJKiy637cjnlWLLsJmKpoA0QrNnOyrc6dwLSzyoXqaaboMp4hg/s415/image002.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="293" data-original-width="415" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ME__Gb3W0P4Pjw2ZQTT6xLp3LiURRXm8-SDzeVaY-IJ4yvrCpJF_IBGqD7kUkJ8pvCECBfmhe_7ChEcVcGwesmMLpvJKiy637cjnlWLLsJmKpoA0QrNnOyrc6dwLSzyoXqaaboMp4hg/w400-h283/image002.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i><p></p><p><b>Chaos in the Perilous Realms</b></p><p>Okay, so a character is on the side of CHAOS. But what does that mean?</p><p>It means you defend <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_foundations_theory" target="_blank">moral sentiment</a> and <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume-moral/" target="_blank">basic instincts </a>as all that is necessary to guide behavior. It means you believe that human culture, customs, and traditions often subvert basic human sentiment and instinct and should thus be <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynicism_(philosophy)" target="_blank">shunned and overturned</a>.</p><p>The above sounds rather noble. And the highest philosophers of Chaos indeed hold the above in very high esteem and may wax rhapsodic about it from time to time. But mainly folks who choose Chaos just choose it because they don’t want to obey law, or perhaps just anyone at all, so Chaos suites them just fine, whatever its philosophers may or may not say. What are the basic sentiments?</p><p>The Seven Sentiments of Chaos</p><p>1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Honor</p><p>2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Loyalty</p><p>3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Reciprocity</p><p>4.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Affection</p><p>5.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Purity</p><p>6.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Pity</p><p>7.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Liberty</p><p>Honor may well be honorable, but it can also turn into a shame-based culture and an almost gang-like vibe of constantly worrying about and accusing others that they have “dissed” them. Think gangsters or the <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/UsefulNotes/The47Ronin" target="_blank">47 Ronan</a> story.</p><p>Loyalty can be honorable, but it can also turn to cruelty when the demands of the superior are not fair to the inferior, but the threat of accusations of disloyalty forces obedience.</p><p>NOTE: the combination of honor and loyalty means that, in the main, Chaotic parties, and even Chaotic members of a mixed party, may, generally, be expected to be helpful rather than harmful to the party. In other words, having your character behave poorly towards other members of the party because the player claims to be playing “in character,” as someone on the side of Chaos simply will not fly. So, no <a href="https://www.google.com/url?client=internal-element-cse&cx=006443654034974345143:kc4pt9dnkle&q=https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Troll&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwjYlvyYmcrxAhXXk2oFHTotCPUQFjAAegQIABAB&usg=AOvVaw3yUq9VzkREeDNa9rvo28Um" target="_blank">Trolls</a>, no <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Griefer" target="_blank">Griefers</a>, no doing it “<a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ForTheEvulz" target="_blank">Just for the Evulz</a>.” In the main, this includes even non-player characters, at least towards their own companions.</p><p>Reciprocity means fairness and justice, but it can just as well turn into a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-sum_game" target="_blank">zero-sum game</a> of retribution. Seeking one’s self-interest can always be justified as demanding justice in the form of mere retribution in the style of a moral “tit for tat.”</p><p>So, obsessive concern for the above can turn to their opposite. A sensitivity to dishonor and betrayal, together with a strong commitment to the demands of reciprocity (render as rendered) may lead to retribution and vengeance. This is especially intense as Chaos shuns courts of law as a merely human custom that gets in the way between two parties having the “freedom,” to “resolve” the dispute on their “own terms.” So, duels, feuds, assassination, and lynching are <i>de rigueur</i> for Chaos.</p><p>Affection can be a beautiful thing, like a mother’s love of a child or two fast friends. It can also be the affection a master has towards his slave, or, in turn, the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome" target="_blank">Stockholm Syndrome</a>” generated in the hearts of the kidnapped towards their captives.</p><p>Purity is an honorable sentiment, leading to the shunning of things that might degrade human dignity. It can also lead to self-righteousness, a sense of superiority, sexism, racism, bigotry –looking at another member of a free race – or even a free race as a whole – as if they were less-then. Cruelty can always be justified as simply following the human sentiment of “moral disgust” towards the “inferior,” or “vermin.”</p><p>Pity can lead to mercy, kindness and even defense of the helpless. Pity can also be condescending and humiliating. Pity is not necessarily compassion or empathy. Conan often shows pity and provides kindness and defense. He would not even know what “compassion” means, and “empathy,” would simply be meaningless to him.</p><p>Liberty cannot stand that free races should suffer any compulsion, but it can also just be a freewheeling, “don’t fence me in,” “get of my lawn,” attitude that justifies flouting any law that seems inconvenient in the moment. Liberty is often cited by the chaotic as the very reason why universal Law must be rejected. Universal Law is seen by the chaotic as a trick by which the “weak,” have figured out a way to limit the power of the strong and worthy (<a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StrawNihilist" target="_blank">think Nietzsche here</a>). (Lawful, on the other hand, sees the Law as the means to freedom. Lawlessness is dangerous and oppressive, not only to the weak but the strong as well. Law guides creativity and reasonable action, and thus true freedom.)</p><p>A note about the relationship of Chaos to being a “good” character:</p><p>You can certainly have a fundamentally “good” Chaotic character. But there are simply more evil Chaotic characters because evil folks will almost always choose Chaos as it can easily be manipulated to justify their lawless behavior.</p><p>Up next: <a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2021/07/alignment-and-lawful-clerics.html" target="_blank">Lawful Clerics and Alignment</a>.</p><div><br /></div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-53506235820565272542021-06-26T15:08:00.001-07:002021-07-04T14:10:04.227-07:00Law in the Perilous Realms<p>This is the first in a series of web log posts where I describe what “alignment” <i>must</i> mean in the <i>Perilous Realms</i>, based upon our group’s tone and play-style, and its cumulative rulings so far. I am coming to realize how essential to the game alignment is. It defines so many things: the cosmos, the setting, the characters, the classes, especially clerics, monsters who are intelligent, and whether they are free, language, and whatever counts as “religion” in a given setting. This shouldn’t be surprising, I suppose. It is a wargame, after all. And wars have sides.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Blake_Jerusalem_Plate_24_copy_E_top_detail.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="207" data-original-width="800" height="104" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Blake_Jerusalem_Plate_24_copy_E_top_detail.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p><b>The Law in the Perilous Realms</b></p><p>So, a character is on the side of LAW. What is the Law? Well, since you asked, they are the <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Laws_of_Noah" target="_blank">Seven Laws of the Prophet Noe</a></i>, revealed from heaven, through the great prophet who survived the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flood_myth" target="_blank">cataclysmic ancient flood</a> of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yam_(god)" target="_blank">Tiamat</a>.</p><p><i>The Seven Laws of The Prophet Noe</i></p><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><p>1. Thou shalt not worship idols</p><p>2. Thou shalt not curse the Most High</p><p>3. Thou shalt establish and hold courts of justice</p><p>4. Thou shalt not murder</p><p>5. Thou shalt not dishonor the wedding vow</p><p>6. Thou shalt not steal</p><p>7. Thou shalt not show cruelty</p></blockquote><p>The first law, no worship of idols, rules out a lot of behavior common to a lot of people and free races in a low fantasy setting. This limitation really stands out as something that distinguishes the Lawful from the crowd. The second law, no cursing the Most High, represents a kind of vague blasphemy prohibition that can be interpreted and enforced more or less leniently or strictly depending upon the local community, Church or otherwise Lawful leadership.</p><p>The third law, due process, is important and, in many ways, defines Lawfulness, setting Law in stark contrast to Chaos. Due process is essential to the Law. It is the key to establishing safety, order, and civilization. It forms an absolute prohibition against lynching, feuds, unlawful duels, revenge killings, and the like. Punishment may still be “cruel and unusual,” by modern standards. But they must at least seem to fit the crime. Duels may be authorized by the court as an appropriate means of settling a suit. But it must be court decreed.</p><p>An exception that is often, but not always honored by courts of Law (that is to say, by this referee) is that of “Wilderness Law.” In cases where adventurers find themselves far away from Lawful civilization, Lawful characters may declare “Wilderness Law,” and, well, let us say, “exact justice,” as the Lawful party understands it. In this case, the Lawful party (or the subgroup of Lawful members thereof) becomes a kind of <i>de facto </i>court of Law, likely to be recognized by the Church or a lawful civilization. So, for example, if it is dangerous to haul a captured Evil High Priest all the way back to a settlement with established Lawful courts, the party may just decide to “try, condemn, and execute” the “obvious offender,” right then and there. As the referee, I would usually uphold this if the reason were obvious and not simply a sham for making things easier on the party.</p><p>The fourth law, the prohibition of murder, may seem a little tough to uphold in a fantasy wargame. But note that what is prohibited is <i>murder</i>, not <i>killing</i>. Killing in defense of the defenseless and even in self-defense is not murder.</p><p>Capital punishment after due process is not murder. It is the removal of an individual from a corporate body, by that corporate body, through its authorized and Lawful leadership, to maintain safety and order for the whole. The court may just as well choose exile or gulag instead.</p><p>War, when declared just by the appropriate authorities, and conducted in a holy and chivalrous fashion, is about two people groups (or a people group against another free race) fighting one another. The death of individuals is a necessary and unfortunate by-product, not its goal. Thus, war does not technically count as murder.</p><p>Furthermore, you can only murder members of the free races: men, elves, dwarves, halflings, and intelligent lawful beings. Monsters, especially Chaotic monsters and fell races are not <i>murdered</i>, they are <i>exterminated</i>. Fell “races” count as monsters in the Perilous Realms. Remember, this is just a game – a medieval fantasy game based on the philosophy of Alchemy. Fell beings arise by abiogenesis. So, they don’t have spouses or children to worry about. Monsters are archetypes of our nightmares, ulterior motives, vices, passions, skeletons in the closet, etc. Try not to over think it or “<a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Deconstruction" target="_blank">deconstruct</a>” it.</p><p>The fourth law, honoring the vows of marriage, establishes the basic unit of human order, the family, and thus ensures the safety and rearing of the next generation. This would include most traditional mores around such things, as understood by most traditional human societies. But it also includes things like the defense of widows and orphans, etc.</p><p>The sixth law, prohibiting theft, ensures the basic property rights necessary to maintain a free and orderly (medieval fantasy) society. This is an imaginary world before the industrial revolution so there is no “Capitalism.” And if wealth is not defined as the means of production, then we don’t yet need some medieval fantasy version of Marxism informing us that “property is theft”!</p><p>Finally, the seventh law, prohibiting acts of cruelty, maintains the humaneness of Law. Although there are plenty of Lawful characters who rule with an iron fist, if they cross a certain line, they may no longer be regarded as truly Lawful. The prohibition on cruelty includes not only the usual things associated with cruelty but also a wider gamut of behaviors such as: no corpse abuse, no animal cruelty (the actual prohibition of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Laws_of_Noah" target="_blank">seventh law of Noah</a>, <i><a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RealLife" target="_blank">In Real Life</a></i>) and no eating meat without humane slaughter and thanksgiving rendered to the Most High for the animal’s life.</p><p>A note about the relationship of the Law to being a “Good,” character:</p><p>You can imagine an “evil” Lawful character, one who hides behind the law in cowardice, for false motives, or who imposes the Law on others with forced conversions and an iron fist. But, in general it is “good” folks who will choose law, because they can see its obvious benefits to the oppressed and also its general benefits due to its role in the development of human civilization.</p><p>Up next: <i><a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2021/07/chaos-in-perilous-realms.html" target="_blank">Chaos in the Perilous Realms</a></i></p>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-26057245219358905522021-06-19T13:27:00.000-07:002021-06-19T13:27:41.094-07:00Saving F'dech Fo's TombI've never been a collector. But this year at the NTRPGCon, I got really exciting about the Judges Guild. I bought a bunch of modules from a booth based, in the main, solely upon one criteria: the cover looked cool, or, even better, "totally metal." One of these purchases was F'dech Fo's Tomb. Note how totally metal the cover is:<div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f4/F'Dech_Fo's_Tomb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="359" data-original-width="277" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f4/F'Dech_Fo's_Tomb.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>I failed to read the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F'Dech_Fo's_Tomb" target="_blank">Wikipedia article</a> which states clearly that it received only bad reviews:</div><div><br /></div><div><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(32, 33, 34); color: #202122; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">Pulsipher commented that "Even at [a lower price], this booklet is a waste of money."</span></div><div><br /></div><div>I am sad for this, because most Judges Guild stuff is great. Before I discovered this, based solely upon the bad ass and totally metal cover, I decided to use the town of Dantell as one of the towns on the Outdoor Survival board I am running as a wilderness campaign for a group of mine. When I carefully read the module (assuming, since it was JG, that it was going to be filled with awesomeness) I was sorely disappointed. Perhaps I had made a mistake.</div><div><br /></div><div>But then I realized that what I was encountering was a series of missed opportunities. And that what the module offered me was an opportunity of my own: I could save F'dech Fo's Tomb.</div><div><br /></div><div>First, missed opportunity: the map of the Tomb itself sucks. Think of Bryce Lynch's<a href="https://tenfootpole.org/ironspike/?page_id=1201" target="_blank"> criteria for review</a>. Now think of a dungeon map with none of those things. That is F'dech Fo's Tomb, as presented. (Sigh.) I had to draw a new map of the Tomb itself. The tomb as drawn is a completely linear set of five rooms with no traps, no tricks, no secret doors, nothing.</div><div><br /></div><div>Here is my map of the Tomb:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0edgLrCCJExvzJXyDix-twjxgMiEcTKZXHfEdD9kMdzpUiVjSFwKp_gExuabwlMpYvXDcdm_T8iLWbFRnR6ty-QEU0IkgLVFOP1i5Nr3p8H7Q79tM67jv9weQ6UhKoBXqbGXrCICWQjA/s2048/IMG_2783.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0edgLrCCJExvzJXyDix-twjxgMiEcTKZXHfEdD9kMdzpUiVjSFwKp_gExuabwlMpYvXDcdm_T8iLWbFRnR6ty-QEU0IkgLVFOP1i5Nr3p8H7Q79tM67jv9weQ6UhKoBXqbGXrCICWQjA/s320/IMG_2783.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Another missed opportunity: how did F'dech Fo wind up a lich. the module just says that about a hundred years ago, pissed of that his once wandering nomadic tribe decided to settle down for the village life, got pissed off, went up on a hill outside of town, lifted up his hand, and green lightning totally burned him to a crispy black skeleton. That's it.</div><div><br /></div><div>So I made up that in his anger he called on the shadow side of his jaguar god to curse him as a lich so that he could take revenge on his tribe. His god's shadow side willingly obliged. Then a team of associated shamans managed to pray and sacrifice enough to the light side of the jaguar god to trap him while, nevertheless, giving him an honorable burial, for, as the module says, "the people still loved him."</div><div><br /></div><div>Next major missed opportunity: clues that help the players figure out the bad things to come. For example, the lich's inner crypt is guarded by a kind of "force field" that keeps him from unleashing his evil on the village. There is no reason given for this. It is no part of the legend anywhere else presented in the module, no NPC is said to know about any of this, the legend does not mention it nor even hint at it. No one in town knows about it. There are no clues. If they pass through the vaguely purplish veil, it comes down and he wakens and starts wreaking havoc. End of story. So I had to fix this.</div><div><br /></div><div>The ancient society of shamans prayed to their god to protect them from the lich's wrath with much sacrifice. Their answer was to provide this magical barrier. The current town shaman knows nothing of this, but I placed various nonverbal and even written clues as to the existence of a barrier and the danger in taking it down. For example, only offering incense in the shrine room will open the secret door to the inner crypt itself. When this happens, a voice will boom out, warning not to break the seal.</div><div><br /></div><div>I did not need half the descriptions of all the NPCs in Dantell. But I did need the chief and the shaman. But what about this dude, Ninax the Watchman of the Water, who lives just outside of this unwelcoming primitive town? So I decided, he had taken them on as a special project out of some kind of love for their simplicity. So I had him come out and greet the party as they arrived first of all. Through a series of bad reaction rolls, the relationship did not start off on a good foot. But they were warned of the villages troubles and general unfriendliness to strangers.</div><div><br /></div><div>The chief and shaman then greeted them as they neared the town. They were warned not to enter the town and to camp only on the outside. Then the shaman promised to meet them by night (in common, so his chief would not hear). That night, he related as much of the legend of F'dech Fo as he could remember.</div><div><br /></div><div>Another lost opportunity: F'dech Fo's medallion, is only a "golden holy symbol." Seriously? After defeating a freaking lich? No. So I made it a medallion of control lycanthropes. This will help with the were jaguar.</div><div><br /></div><div>Another lost opportunity: the module explicitly says that although the people think that their jaguar god of the jungle, Utigetcho, has recently become incarnate, he has NOT. It is only a were jaguar. But why is there a were jaguar at all? Seriously? Dumb. So sometimes I had to just do the exact opposite of the modules explicitly stated things. Of course Utigetcho is incarnate now! He IS the were jaguar. Duh. So unless they defeat the jaguar with F'dech Fo's medallion of control, any other "defeat" will result in the manifestation of Utigetcho himself! That should be fun.</div><div><br /></div><div>I know all this seems like a loss. Why use such a poor module? Why use a module I had to do so much work on to "fix"? Easy. A good module is like a Rorschach test. It provides contour lines and symmetry -- sources of imagined patterns. This allows my mind to free associate with some material already presented to me so that I don't have to produce from scratch but in dialogue with something in front of me. So, in the end, this bad module has turned out pretty good.</div><div><br /></div><div>Fight on!</div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-81192149218256327992020-08-06T12:26:00.001-07:002020-08-06T12:26:55.290-07:00Dungeon, exploration and the title: "Dungeons & Dragons"<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5lnqZuyC5fd_nB7rPEE_bazwSqRYX-1lhgzmfkcnY5a-HWf_W0ftt1fu7MZavJsNX-BjEQS8woJbPn45hglhj2EkMDTdcQ-Asrh8xFi044UzSSFC81paphmtX1ONpX5w6xjJQC-1mDto/s587/iu.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="587" data-original-width="474" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5lnqZuyC5fd_nB7rPEE_bazwSqRYX-1lhgzmfkcnY5a-HWf_W0ftt1fu7MZavJsNX-BjEQS8woJbPn45hglhj2EkMDTdcQ-Asrh8xFi044UzSSFC81paphmtX1ONpX5w6xjJQC-1mDto/w258-h320/iu.jpeg" width="258" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This is the second post in a two-part series of posts on the title of Dungeons & Dragons as a means to empower hobbyists to start their own medieval fantasy wargames campaigns.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The last post was on<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/scale-role-play-and-dungeons-dragons.html"> level of scale and the incorporation of role play</a>. This post is on how the one-to-one level of scale empowered character exploration -- giving birth to the supertitle, "Dungeons & Dragons."</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b><br /></b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Dave Arneson’s Blackmoor</b><o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b><br /></b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Before the publication of Dungeons & Dragons, its co-author, Dave Arneson, was already a wargamer involved with his group of friends in running wargames campaigns. He and came up with a wargames campaign for his friends that was a full-blown medieval fantasy wargames campaign that came to be called Blackmoor. </font><span style="font-family: times;">Arneson had already encouraged his players to look at their relationship to the wargame in a different way. Inspired by things like Diplomacy, and by Baunstein and other such campaigns before, Arneson encouraged wargames-style role-playing as a significant aspect of the birth of Dungeons and Dragons.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">The First Dungeon<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Dave Arneson stumbled upon a scenario over the course of his Blackmoor campaign where his players’ characters, while laying siege to the castle of one of their enemies, decided that they would mine, that is to say, dig under the walls to try to break the siege. <o:p></o:p></font><span style="font-family: times;">When Arneson moved the scale down to the level of skirmish so that each figure on the table was one to one in scale, then you have not just a soldier in front of you, but you have what is going to be called a character, and you're going to be playing not as the general of an army, but as that one character in a medieval fantasy setting.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This gave Dave Arneson an idea. And what he decided to do has made history. He set up a situation where once the players’ characters had successfully dug under the walls of the castle, they would suddenly find themselves tunneled right into the crazy labyrinthine dungeons underneath the tyrannical lord's castle. </font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Instead of just coming up in the castle yard, they found themselves down in the dungeons. And instead of the normal dungeons of history that just had normal prisoners, Dave Arneson populated this dungeon with the fantasy denizens of the underworld: monsters and creatures that the characters had to steer clear from so that they could come up, find the bad guy, take him out, and win the day.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Exploring the Unknown<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Arneson conducted this scenario such that the players’ characters did not know exactly where they were until they had explored the dungeon and created their own map of the dungeon. They could keep track of where they'd been, where monsters were to avoid. They were playing in such a way that they were not simply laying out a battlefield and playing a pitched battle with miniature figures on a one to one scale, but instead they were imagining exploring down in the darkness of a deep dungeon and they had to create a map of what they'd discovered as they were going along.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This is not unlike other games that were popular at the time and still are, such as Battleship and Stratego. Both Battleship and Stratego are simple games where something is concealed from the player, and through play you slowly begin to reveal what's concealed, and those revelations and guesses made on those revelations help lead the player to victory. So this was already a concept that existed in gaming, and Arneson was able to grab it and use it at a much more complex level of scale where instead of it simply discovering whether you've sunk someone's battleship, or whether you've found someone's flag in a battlefield, now you got a whole labyrinthine dungeon underneath an evil tyrannical castle.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Dave Arneson's players found this so exciting and fun that they said, "Hey, we've really got to do this again sometime." We now see the birth of the first dungeon for what would come to be called Dungeons and Dragons.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Everything in place for the Title: Dungeons & Dragons<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: times;">Arneson had stumbled upon the joys of dungeon exploration with his players. Dragons are the quintessential monster of medieval fantasy. At the time in the wargaming hobby community, there were a lot of “something & something” titles. Fill-in-the-blank and fill-in-the-blank titles were popular at this time of hobby wargaming. So there is a story that says that Gygax as sitting at his kitchen table with his daughter and a list of words. He would go through the list, adding two words together with an “and” in between. When the combo “Dungeons & Dragons” finally came up, his daughter said, “that’s it, that is the one.” And it has stuck ever since. At least that is the story!</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">So now with this post in this series, and with the posts of the previous series on the subtitle, we have in place what a wargame is. We have in place the tradition of Free Kriegspiel. We have in place what a wargames campaign is. We've talked about how things move down to the skirmish level or one to one scale of play. We've talked about role playing in early war gaming, such as the game of Diplomacy. We've talked about how Arneson added the discovery of hidden things through careful play, such as we find in games like Battleship and Stratego. When all of these things come together, then Dave Arneson together with Gary Gygax were able to put together the first published rules for setting up and conducting a medieval fantasy wargames campaign: Dungeons and Dragons.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Summary so-far</b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">So to sum things up, Dungeons & Dragons arises when we have a referee (F<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/rules-and-dungeons-dragons.html">ree Kriegsspiel</a>) with an extensive knowledge of both wargaming (hobby) and medieval fantasy literature (<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/medieval-fantasy-and-dungeons-dragons.html">fidelity to outside source</a>) who moderates a generally skirmish scale (<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/scale-role-play-and-dungeons-dragons.html">level of scale)</a> medieval fantasy wargames (<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/wargames-and-dungeons-dragons.html">wargaming</a>) campaign (<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/campaigns-and-dungeons-dragons.html">campaign-play)</a> that connects wargame sessions involving exploration of unknown spaces and areas (exploration) through skillful role-play (role-play). I would add, anyone playing a game with these elements in place, because they are playing a fantastic medieval wargames campaign, they are therefore playing "Dungeons & Dragons," as originally presented by the authors, whatever that particular group happen to call it, and whatever is currently being published with that name printed on the cover!</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Fight on!</b></font></p><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;">These two series of posts are now tied up. Now I can launch a follow-up series of posts where I will look at a couple of miscellaneous things that haven't quite fit into a previous post but that now begin to make sense in light of what we have discussed so far: things like Experience Points and gold, etc.</p></div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-35501981203481512292020-07-28T13:57:00.003-07:002020-08-06T12:27:48.015-07:00Scale, Role-play, and Dungeons & Dragons<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia17WU9WCRsbNRLKGFjTZm6MOY99HUSHO-1PxsxWH8EZXQ-bhcKgD88uAgty1xfYLApPeK9m3XA_d7xPGm7rnfspgKWTJPf5zBKVvcDCK3czGC9F1mSmCC-uPap3c0usRtgJx7GIF4K9Q/s474/iu.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="294" data-original-width="474" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia17WU9WCRsbNRLKGFjTZm6MOY99HUSHO-1PxsxWH8EZXQ-bhcKgD88uAgty1xfYLApPeK9m3XA_d7xPGm7rnfspgKWTJPf5zBKVvcDCK3czGC9F1mSmCC-uPap3c0usRtgJx7GIF4K9Q/s320/iu.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><font face="times"><br /></font><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">I recently published a four post series reflecting on the subtitle of Dungeons & Dragons to help make sense of the original publication. Here are those links:</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/wargames-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Wargames and Dungeons & Dragons</a></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/medieval-fantasy-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Medieval Fantasy and Dungeons & Dragons</a></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/rules-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Rules and Dungeons & Dragons</a></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/campaigns-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Campaigns and Dungeons & Dragons</a></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">With those reflections in place, I can now move on to reflect on the development of the supertitle itself: "Dungeons & Dragons"! In doing so I hope to empower hobbyists to start their own medieval fantasy wargames campaigns.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This will be the first post in a short two-part series of posts. </font><span style="font-family: times;">This post will be on level of scale and how the move to one-to-one scale empowered things such as the abstraction of hit-points and the ability to role-play.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Scale</b><o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Wargaming allows for play at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miniature_wargaming#Scale">different levels of scale</a>. So on a given war gaming table, an inch might represent 10 feet, 10 yards, 100 yards, etc. One miniature soldier might represent as many as, say, 10 soldiers, 20 soldiers, 100 soldiers, depending on the level of scale that you'd set up in the beginning. For most historical miniature wargaming, the level of scale is what is called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_tactics">tactical</a>. So tactical warfare is one given battle between two armies where two generals or colonels can direct the activity fairly obviously over the course of about one battle day.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This makes a lot of sense in, say, Napoleonic warfare, which is again, one of the reasons why Napoleonic warfare is so attractive to historical wargamers. But there are other levels of scale. If you jump up to a higher level of scale, you can have <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_strategy">strategic</a> wargaming. This is where you might start getting into what you call hex and counter wargaming, where you've got a map divided into many different hexagons, and those hexes might represent 5 miles, 6 miles, 25 miles of distance across. Instead of miniatures representing soldiers, or 10 soldiers, or 100 soldiers, you have a more abstract piece that represents an entire legion, battalion, or perhaps even an entire army.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">At the highest level of abstraction you have board games like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axis_%26_Allies">Axis and Allies</a>, or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_(game)">Risk</a>. Some miniature wargamers question whether those should count as wargames, because they're at such a high level of abstraction that they're not very far away from a game like chess or checkers. But the typical scale of war gaming for miniature wargamers is tactical. You can abstract it to a higher level like strategic. But you can also move down to a tighter level of scale.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Skirmish<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">You can go down to a level of scale called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skirmisher">skirmish warfare</a>. This is where you're really talking about individual soldiers, head to head with each other. In this case, each one of your miniature figures actually represents one soldier. So the ratio or the scale becomes one to one. Every miniature figure is exactly one soldier.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Chainmail, for example, has a section dedicated to skirmish or man to man combat for the resolution of this level of medieval wargaming. So its fantasy supplement had to address this level of scale as well: how would fantastical creatures and armies match up in not just tactical, but also skirmish level warfare.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Hit points as abstract<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One-to-one level of scale helps make sense of the roots of some of Dungeons & Dragons core mechanics, such as, for example, Hit Points. The rules of combat resolution have to be different at such a tight level of scale. The statistics, the way that you match results of combat up to dice, the things that a referee would need to judge all change when you get to that smaller, tighter level of scale.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">In a tactical level wargame, when two enemy troops come in contact with each other, generally, if one side is successful and the other fails, the side that fails is removed. If you have those rules exactly at a skirmish level, playing only one character, then every time you went into combat, your character might die the first time he or she was hit. This hit-equals-removal way of playing that works at a tactical level doesn’t directly map to a skirmish, one-character-per-player level of scale. So instead Gygax and Arneson developed hit points. Hit points are the number of points your character can take from successful hits before the character is finally removed. <a href="https://grey-elf.com/philotomy.pdf">Hit points are an abstraction</a> for the relative resilience of your character and so, in general, as your character increases in level, your character is going to increase in this resilience, represented by hit points.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Role-play<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One-to-one level of scale also helps us make sense of what the original players understood "role play" to be. Role-play existed before Dungeons and Dragons. Role playing is something that's done for example, at professional development training sessions, in training for therapists and counselors, or in other contexts where a mentor is trying to teach a student. A concrete situation with a client, or a patient, or even a more dangerous scenario, where you would say, "here is the situation. We're going to pretend that this situation is real, and we want you to role play what you think you would do in this situation."<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One of the chief examples of role-play in wargaming would be the famous game, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomacy_(game)">Diplomacy</a>. Diplomacy is a wargame at the highest possible level of abstraction that could still really count as a wargame. You have a map of Europe, right on the edge of World War I, and you represent one of the major European powers at that time, such as Italy, Germany, Great Britain, Russia and the like. You are going to play the military forces of this particular national power. And in each turn, you can move your armies or navies, and you can attempt to take over other regions. But the most important part of this game is in its very name itself, which is Diplomacy. In Diplomacy, in every game turn, there's a phase at which you are allowed to enter into diplomatic negotiations and form diplomatic relationships with other players. You might form alliances against other players such that it is almost impossible to win the game of Diplomacy if you are not talking to other players, forming alliances, breaking alliances, and the like.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">In Diplomacy, you as the player would ask yourself, “given this situation, and given the capacities that this nation has to achieve victory in this war game, how would I, as its leader or ambassador act? I want to play out what I would do to survive and achieve victory in this role within this situation.” Thoughtful role-play becomes a way to invest in the success of the game. Role-play in Diplomacy is a skillful means of engaging the game.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Role-play can work at any level of wargames scale, but it seems to draw-out at the more extreme levels of scale: strategic on the one end, with games like Diplomacy, and skirmish at the other end, with what is going to become Dungeons and Dragons. When you're playing a skirmish scale wargame, and where, instead of playing an officer over a squad you are playing only one figure on a wargames table, then you have an opportunity to role play that figure.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Understanding the wargaming roots of Dungeons & Dragons helps to make sense of the kind of confusion about what is going on in play between what is sometimes called "old school" styles of play and more recent Role-playing Games that emphasize the building of a story. What is clear is that role-play meant discerning what you would do in a given wargames situation if you were actually in this war and you actually had the capacities granted you by the game. Role-play meant playing the role of a leader in a war campaign. It did not, at the time, mean something like playing a part in a play or story - although plenty of players loved to ham it up, even from the beginning, if what I have heard is correct.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Next in this short series: <a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/08/dungeon-exploration-and-title-dungeons.html">Dungeon, exploration, and the title: "Dungeons & Dragons"</a>!</font></p>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-41998272497058497972020-07-12T10:01:00.002-07:002020-07-30T17:55:33.753-07:00Campaigns and Dungeons & Dragons<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><font face="times"><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjCH0act-oGhmrTU5yqdxUodTv-8jYb2qn3CAJ1-oEJ8xlQF094M6VvQ1Qcc1nYOPvsLWIsV4w_mlCLeVUfXSb0pkXb373jRj3UTjs_DwETNMTMwfpbi76L4kszL-XjlFibJdXiRXmIug/s1600/fullsizeoutput_128.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjCH0act-oGhmrTU5yqdxUodTv-8jYb2qn3CAJ1-oEJ8xlQF094M6VvQ1Qcc1nYOPvsLWIsV4w_mlCLeVUfXSb0pkXb373jRj3UTjs_DwETNMTMwfpbi76L4kszL-XjlFibJdXiRXmIug/w320-h240/fullsizeoutput_128.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><font face="times"><br /></font></div>This is the fourth post in a series of post where I explore the subtitle of Dungeons & Dragons as a means of empowering hobbyists to start their own Medieval Fantasy wargames campaigns.</font><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><font face="times">The previous post was on "<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/rules-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Rules</a>," this post is on "Campaigns," or, wargames campaigns.<br /></font><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Wargames Campaigns<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Napoleon didn't just fight one battle. The Napoleonic wars were not won by one battle. In actual warfare, often, many battles are pitched as part of an overarching war to attain victory. And not until many battles are fought does a victor emerge. A general, or a king, goes on a war campaign. And this campaign consists of a series of battles that are strategically designed and carefully operated in order to gain victory.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This series of connected battles, towards the end of winning the war, is called a campaign or a war campaign. Likewise, wargamers who are interested in playing out historical wars also become interested not just in playing-out one given battle but in putting a series of related, connected battles together where the outcome of one battle affects the setup of the next battle. They're going to string these battles into a campaign. And this is what is called a wargames campaign.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The key feature of a wargames campaign is that more than one battle is set up and run as a game. But these separate games are connected to each other and the conclusion of one wargame has an affect on the setup of the next wargame much like how, in a real war, multiple battles are pitched before victory is clear.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Wargames campaigns can be done at very high levels of abstraction or at a very detailed level depending on the interest, time and energy of the wargaming group. But wargames campaigns require a different set of rules than those needed to resolve battles with miniatures on a table. You need one set of rules for how to determine the outcome of one given battle on a table of miniatures. But in order to connect the outcome of that battle with the next battle you need an overarching set of rules that logically and coherently connects disparate battles together. You need a set of campaign rules.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Map Campaign<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">There are many different ways to set up a campaign but I'm going to explain one particular kind called a "map campaign." Map campaigns are one of the first and earliest forms of wargames campaigns. In this kind of campaign you take your wargaming table and let's say that it is four feet wide and eight feet long. And you use it on, say, a scale of one inch for 10 or even 100 yards. Then you get out a very large sheet of paper, and a ruler, and you divide along the top every four inches. Then you divide along the side, every eight inches. So you’ve divided this very large piece of paper into separate rectangles, four inches by eight inches. Then each four by eight-inch rectangle represents one battle ground on which you could set up a wargame.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Now you take this sheet of paper, that has been divided into four by eight rectangles and you either overlap that on top of an actual historical map, to scale, or you invent your own situation and imagine an area and some terrain.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">You might start one army in one town, and the other army in another town, and then the referee would ask the players for their orders. The players give very detailed written orders to the referee. This is a complex situation where ideally a given player is unaware of the other players’ orders until executed. This is a case where it not only helps but might possibly be necessary to have a referee. The referee reads the orders and determines for example, whether any two armies have sighted each other.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">If two opposing forces have met, then you set up your game table for a miniature wargames battle and resolve the conflict using the rules for a wargame that your group had already been using. Upon the conclusion of the conflict you note the outcome of the battle and decide what that means going forward as the campaign continues. This map, then, becomes the means for piecing together all of these different possible battles that could be pitched on your gaming table.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Dungeons & Dragons as a Map Campaign<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">In Dungeons & Dragons, in the third Little Brown Book, “The Underworld and Wilderness Adventures,” Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson suggest that you need a map of the immediate terrain surrounding the entrance to the underworld. That map of the overall area would have suggested to fellow wargamers something like a map campaign.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Keeping this in mind helps us to remember what the subtitle meant when it said that these were rules for a wargames campaign. The word "campaign," has taken on new connotations in the on-going growth of Role Playing Games (RPGs). But the original sense of the word was that of logically connecting wargame battles into a single campaign. The rules for the resolution of combat were one game. The rules for connecting the wargames together and including things like supply chain, economics, population, recruitment, leadership, political powers, espionage, diplomacy, and the like, were a different game or even set of games. Remembering this clears up some confusion for folks that come to the original rules only familiar with RPGs that see themselves as a single unified rule-set.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The rules for resolving an individual battle are different from the rules that connect particular battles to one another in a coherent campaign. If your group were conducting a wargames campaign, just as your group over time may have developed its own rules for resolving individual battles, so too over time your club might have developed rules for a campaign so clear and coherent and so seemingly realistic to the historical period you were trying to game, that you might think, "Hey, this is shareable too."<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">So sometimes wargamers would publish not just rules for resolving battles but they would also publish rules for how to set up a war games campaign. One of the most famous of these is by <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Donald-Featherstones-Wargaming-Campaigns-Curry/dp/1291779671/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=donald+featherstone+campaigns&qid=1593280546&s=books&sr=1-1">Donald Featherstone</a>. Another good example is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Grant_(game_designer)">C. S. Grant’s</a> Wargames Campaigns. One really famous set of rules for wargames campaigns relevant to the topic of Dungeons and Dragons is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Bath">Tony Bath</a>’s, "<a href="https://www.amazon.com/BathS-Ancient-Wargaming-Society-Ancients/dp/0557111803">Setting Up Wargames Campaign</a>." Tony Bath deliberately chose a fantastical medieval wargames setting for his campaigns for the simple reason of not having to worry about getting the history perfectly correct. Wargamers were used to these two aspects of their hobby, battle resolution and campaign organization, being published separately from one another.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Rules complete as rules for campaigning<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This is what Gygax and Arneson were doing when they first published Dungeons & Dragons. They were not publishing a comprehensive rule-set that included both campaign rules and combat resolution rules. They were publishing what it would take to coordinate other rules together into a campaign.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The booklets themselves often refer the reader to other rules, like Chainmail, or the boardgame Outdoor Survival. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson understood that any rule-set for resolving medieval warfare would do the trick. What Gygax and Arneson were offering were not so much the rules for running individual wargames battles, although some outlines of how to do so were suggested. They assumed that your local group had rule-sets available for resolving given wargames, so, instead, they were offering rules for how to string together a series of wargames into a campaign. The rules are not incomplete for a wargames hobbyist. They give everything needed to start one's own medieval fantasy wargames campaign as an amateur hobbyist.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">We now have everything in place to make sense of the subtitle: "Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns." I hope I have shown how helpful understanding the subtitle is to understanding what Gygax and Arneson were up to, and towards understanding what the original publication called "Dungeons & Dragons" has to offer -- and what it does not. I my posts inspire some readers to use the guidelines suggested in Dungeons & Dragons to launch their own, unique, medieval fantasy wargames campaign. </font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Now that I have concluder this reflection on the subtitle, I am set for a two part series on how we have come by the supertitle itself: <a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/scale-role-play-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Why "Dungeons & Dragons"</a>? Once we have this in place even more will start to make senes about the original published rules for medieval fantasy wargames campaigns.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Fight on!</b></font></p></div></div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-23211577280632835632020-07-05T08:07:00.001-07:002020-07-12T10:02:25.305-07:00Rules and Dungeons & Dragons<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiov4l_mD9Dro7FRzzhBnOMC55RR7TVH_IVG2QrachhcWlPYK4KPpQ4uSKK-C6GpFUrbeMhXuNjEAXMK579zfCUE_CM5ZzxCcPQExz8u1tpVv0G9P5VFe3HmfzzvVpFgYN7ZwHRhvVv5CE/s300/iu.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiov4l_mD9Dro7FRzzhBnOMC55RR7TVH_IVG2QrachhcWlPYK4KPpQ4uSKK-C6GpFUrbeMhXuNjEAXMK579zfCUE_CM5ZzxCcPQExz8u1tpVv0G9P5VFe3HmfzzvVpFgYN7ZwHRhvVv5CE/d/iu.jpeg" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><font face="times">This is my third post in a series of posts where I look at the subtitle of Dungeons & Dragons as a way to allow the rules to provide a launch point for one's own wargames campaigning.</font><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><font face="times">The last post was on <a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/medieval-fantasy-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Medieval Fantasy</a> and Dungeons & Dragons. This post will be on what "Rules" mean in the context of the original publication.</font></div><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Free Kriegsspiel and referees<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One significant tradition within wargaming goes back to the use of wargaming as actual training for young officers in 18th and 19th century Europe. This tradition was called, "Kriegsspiel," which is German for wargame.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One particular branch of Kriegsspiel that developed early-on and that influenced all subsequent hobby wargaming, was called, "Free Kriegsspiel." Free Kriegsspiel recognized that the circumstances of war cannot be covered exhaustively by written rules because reality is complicated, difficult to know, and the human mind is finite. You can't possibly map every thing that would go into a possible battle into a perfect rule-set. So in Free Kriegsspiel you would get somebody who had been in so many actual, real world battles, that they knew what combat was like and what warfare was like, such as some old officer who had seen many battles.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Then you would get these young officers in a room, and you'd have a map, and you'd have pieces of the map to represent different forces. And then they would divide up into two different sides and the two different sides would issue their orders to their soldiers, and then this seasoned officer, that was acting as a referee, would judge who he thought would be the successful party in this particular battle based on his actual lived experiential knowledge of how warfare worked. So in the Free Kriegsspiel tradition you trusted a veteraned officer to make a judgment call as to whether your orders were good. And then that old seasoned officer could coach you and say, "in future don't make that decision because you'd be flanked, or you'd be outnumbered, or you'd be outrun. Etc.”<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">In this way, Free Kriegsspiel provided excellent training and mentorship for future officers. This in turn influenced the wargaming hobby where, even though you might have some rules, such as dice mechanics, to give the feel of randomness and probability, nonetheless, in some cases, you would want to have a referee. The referee would be somebody who was so familiar with war that he could make judgment calls based upon described actions. The referee might roll the dice if he or she felt like he or she needed more information than just orders.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The person that you'd appoint to be the referee over your game would be somebody who had real expertise in the history of war, into historical wargaming, and had accounts of so many battles and so many different types of warfare that you trusted his or her judgment call in a game. The role of referee in wargaming depends upon real knowledge of warfare.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One obvious example of where you would need a referee in wargaming would be when you have too many for the players alone to manage all the information and play well at the same time. Or, trying to agree to the meaning of certain actions and rules may take so long to judge that play gets bogged down, and something that is supposed to be entertaining is turned into a bore. Or, you might need to have a situation where certain information is secret to other players to simulate the unknowns of war, such as espionage or scouting. So there's practical gaming reasons why you'd want to have a referee. The tradition of referees in Free Kriegsspiel gives the advantage of less rules to know and interpret together with a faster-paced game.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Referees and "Dungeon Masters"</b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The tradition of Free Kriegspiel referees lives on in Dungeons & Dragons. Later publications by the same name would introduce the term "Dungeon Master." But the original Little Brown Books knew no such phrase. The person to facilitate the session was a referee, just as in Free Kriegspiel. And just as in Free Kriegspiel, that person was expected to be expert in all the relevant areas of knowledge necessary to make the game "realistic," or, in the case of fantasy, as true to the sources, the literature of Sword and Sorcery. In the case of the wargame hobby, this "expertise," is amateur, not professional in nature. This goes back to the original sense of the word "amateur," as someone who just does it for the love of it. There are many cases where an amateur can know more than, or have much more facility with a topic than a so called professional. And that is the kind of expertise we are looking for in this hobby.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Rulings, not rules</b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The "rules" of Dungeons & Dragons follow this tradition of Free Kriegsspiel. Playing Dungeons & Dragons requires a referee. The booklets themselves encourage referees and groups to interpret the rules in different directions. Referees are encouraged to build their own rules. The building of local, hobby wargaming group includes the assumption that each hobby group, just as with the wargaming hobby in general, will wind up having its own peculiar, local rule set that works for them and that reflects the campaign they have developed on their own.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">In his <i><a href="https://www.lulu.com/en/en/shop/matthew-finch/quick-primer-for-old-school-gaming/ebook/product-1qm8y7m.html">Quick Primer for Old School Gaming</a></i>, <a href="https://swordsandwizardry.blogspot.com">Matt Finch</a> has coined the phrase, "Rulings, not rules," in order to try to catch, in a single pithy, easily memorable phrase, the pith of this approach. The point is that the referee is trusted to make good calls for each unique situation that arises, due to his or her expertise in medieval warfare, medieval fantasy literature, dice probabilities, traditional wargame mechanics, and the like. </font><span style="font-family: times;">Over time, these rulings would become a unique set of rules for each wargame club.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: times;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: times;">For contemporary ears to hear the subtitle of this game correctly, then, it should almost be changed to "Guidines," or "Ideas," or "Suggestions," "a Framework," or "Examples," "for Medieval Fantasy Wargames Campaigns."</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;">Next in the series: "<a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/campaigns-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Campaigns</a>"</p></div><div><br /></div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-40729124691203395552020-06-28T10:36:00.001-07:002020-07-05T08:09:36.469-07:00Medieval Fantasy and Dungeons & Dragons<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRgW1_20-fMsGCNqhNk1gzPQG_RyNrxujU2SspaFuEtdLQwnHWoxYcKRoEvOmw3rtwIF5jvGgOWhl44s3X-xUN748MHoUoGmACaH0frXGASSt22CUYZqZu9OwImHFAJFwmZ45iBVmopmM/s1200/fireandice.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="861" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRgW1_20-fMsGCNqhNk1gzPQG_RyNrxujU2SspaFuEtdLQwnHWoxYcKRoEvOmw3rtwIF5jvGgOWhl44s3X-xUN748MHoUoGmACaH0frXGASSt22CUYZqZu9OwImHFAJFwmZ45iBVmopmM/w230-h320/fireandice.jpg" width="230" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><font face="times">This is my next post in a series of posts that looks at the subtitle of Dungeons & Dragons in order more readily to launch our own hobby campaigning from the original publication.</font><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><font face="times">Last post, I wrote about "<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/wargames-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Wargames</a>." In this post I will talk about the phrase, "Fantastic Medieval," in the subtitle, or, as we would say it now, "<a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StandardFantasySetting">Medieval Fantasy</a>." </font><span style="font-family: times;">"Fantastic Medieval" sounds like something medieval that we thing is just awesome: that is fantastic! But that is not what the phrase meant at the time of its publication. </span><span style="font-family: times;">For contemporary ears to hear the subtitle, correctly, it should be changed to something like "Rules for Medieval Fantasy Wargames Campaigns."</span></div><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Medieval Fantasy</font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: times;">Wargaming was and is a hobby for folks that dig the study of history. History includes the middle ages and ancient civilizations. So another area of interest that quickly developed for wargamers was medieval and ancient wargaming. It would not be long before wargamers were willing to move beyond the walls of the historical and engage the literature of fantasy.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">At the time that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Perren">Jeff Perren </a>and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Gygax">Gary Gygax</a> published <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17010/Chainmail-Rules-for-Medieval-Miniatures-0e">Chainmail</a> as a set of rules for resolving medieval wargames, Gary Gygax had already developed an interest not only in the historical western middle ages, but also medieval fantasy literature. Gygax added a fantasy supplement, to the end of the Chainmail rules for folks that were interested in adding to their wargaming hobby medieval fantasy troops like elves and hobbits, dwarves and gnomes, orcs and goblins, and monsters like giants, dragons and the like.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Gygax added to what was already the base rules of a fairly realistic historical medieval wargame, ways of resolving the possibility of a dragon showing up at one of those battles. He did this for the same reason that historical wargamers would play-out battles that already existed. Just as the historical wargamer would study actual battles from history in order to understand how to set up rules and judge games as a referee so too if you were interested in medieval fantasy literature, you might want to completely redo a battle from one of your favorite pieces of medieval fantasy literature.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">The Chainmail Fantasy Supplement list, for example, the Battle of the Five Armies at the conclusion of The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien. So Gygax suggests that if you take the Chainmail set of rules and add to it this supplement for medieval fantasy, you can engage an actual fantasy battle as described in the relevant authoritative literature. When you feel like you'd developed enough knowledge of how fantastical battles worked out you might then try your hand at your own hypothetical medieval fantasy war game battles.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Fidelity to the literature<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Just as historical wargamers worked to make sure their game was as faithful to what might have happened on an historic battlefield, so too, fidelity to medieval fantasy literature in general and Sword and Sorcery in particular, formed a significant part of this new aspect of the wargaming hobby that Dungeons & Dragons introduced.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">A referee would know how to judge whether something was possible, in this medieval fantasy world because they were so familiar with the medieval fantasy literature they were gaming. A key part of Dungeons & Dragons is the love of becoming an amateur expert in medieval fantasy literature. High fantasy, low fantasy, especially sword and sorcery, urban legend, classical mythology, Arthurian legend, Carolinian cycles, Nordic sagas, all form part of the expertise needed to set up and play in a medieval fantasy role playing game.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">But, in the main, the particular style of medieval fantasy literature that influenced Dungeons & Dragons was what <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/FritzLeiber">Fritz Leiber</a> named "<a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SwordAndSorcery">Sword and Sorcery</a>." This is important to know because Dungeons & Dragons is built better to play in this kind of fantasy world than in others. Later editions of games called "Dungeons & Dragons," have shifted from this original base towards more <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HeroicFantasy?from=Main.MedievalFantasy">heroic</a> and <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HighFantasy">high fantasy</a>. So sometimes the original game is confusing to folks coming from newer RPGs. Learning about Sword & Sorcery and reading some of its core texts helps in understanding Dungeons & Dragons and helps the amateur hobbyists to build his or her own campaign.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "times new roman", serif; margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><span style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif;"><font face="times">"The general line-up”<o:p></o:p></font></span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "times new roman", serif; margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><span style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif;"><font face="times"><br /></font></span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="">What I've written about so far helps us to understand certain aspects of the game. For example, the taking of sides, or what would come to be called "alignment."</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face=""><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="">When you are playing a wargame, you need to know the sides of your battle and that's exactly what's going on in the Chainmail fantasy supplement with its “General Line-up.” This gets reiterated in Dungeons & Dragons’ <i>Men and Magic</i>. You have the alignment table to give you sides. The big battle is between law and chaos. Some creatures are on the law side and some creatures are on the chaos side and some can go either way. Then there are some creatures that just opt out of it altogether. They're not on the side of law or chaos, they're just for themselves and these because they don't really want to wage the war between law and chaos are called neutral, like Switzerland and its diplomatic neutrality. So if you're setting up a war game table, one side is chaos and one side is law, in this medieval fantasy war game context.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face=""><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="">These categories are derived from medieval fantasy. For example, they are implied in Tolkien's Middle Earth around the War of the Ring. But these terms, "law," and "chaos," are explicit in Sword and Sorcery literature, especially that of <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/PoulAnderson">Poul Anderson</a> and <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/MichaelMoorcock">Michael Moorcock</a>. So, again, we have a fidelity to the literature they were trying to game.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b>Race</b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><b><br /></b></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Finally, briefly, we can understand where the use of the term "race," came from. Race was a term already used in medieval fantasy literature to distinguish human characters from other intelligent beings that were not gods or spirits. Especially there would be the fay races, such as elves and dwarves, and the fell races such as orcs, goblins and trolls.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This is not how we use the term "race" in contemporary parlance, so it can throw people off. This is not about supposed differences in human groups. If the fantasy rules were put together today, someone might have chosen "species." Although, even that is misleading in a fantasy context, where a word like "species" would sound to empirical and scientific. So this terminology has stuck and is a part of the shape of medieval fantasy wargame campaigning.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Next in the series: "<a href="https://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/07/rules-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Rules</a>," free kriegspiel and refereeing.</font></p></div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-48225768243124630632020-06-21T07:31:00.001-07:002020-06-28T10:36:37.881-07:00Wargames and Dungeons & Dragons<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div>This is my first post in what will become a series of posts that I hope will be helpful for folks trying to understand <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/28306/ODD-Dungeons--Dragons-Original-Edition-0e">Dungeons & Dragons</a> as a hobby and especially the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_%26_Dragons_(1974)">original published rules</a> that empowered hobbyists to launch their own campaigns.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Introduction to the series</b></div><div><br /></div><div>The subtitle of a published work is always the real title. Studying a subtitle, when provided, will often tell you more about what the author understands the work to be about than the main title.</div><div><br /></div><div>The original subtitle for the first published edition of Dungeons & Dragons is:</div><div>Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns.</div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">The real title, therefore, is "Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns." A lot of the misunderstandings or confusions about Dungeons and Dragons* comes from not understanding what the publication really is. In order to understand what the first "little brown books," or, LLBS were really offering, one needs to know what a wargame is, and, better, have some contact our hours of actual play. One needs to know what a wargames campaign is, which means one needs to understand war enough to understand that it is a campaign comprising a series of battles, not one battle. One needs to understand what was considered "fantastic medieval" at the time of its publication. Finally, one needs to understand how hobby wargammers understood "rules" to work and what they meant and how they used them.</div><div><br /></div><div>Once these things fall into place, Dungeons and Dragons suddenly starts to make a lot more sense and to become much more accessible as the launch point for one's own hobby. So let's start with the central word of the true title, the word that all the others build-off of or modify, the word "wargames."</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPQ7a13DAOTWDNXzCLi5tsL6XRGZs1XnN9RioROeGcmBRaqvkiVVMINvW5RzHrpeDayd2A3yd0J5pz3zyG55vhSqvSx5I3n9wwYviAK3JLJFsUNDqmJ_t7eaV_2uGyuhcyRYR181q-Amg/s1600/iu.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1064" data-original-width="1600" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPQ7a13DAOTWDNXzCLi5tsL6XRGZs1XnN9RioROeGcmBRaqvkiVVMINvW5RzHrpeDayd2A3yd0J5pz3zyG55vhSqvSx5I3n9wwYviAK3JLJFsUNDqmJ_t7eaV_2uGyuhcyRYR181q-Amg/w320-h213/iu.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Wargaming<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">At the time that Dungeons & Dragons first appeared, the hobby called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wargame">wargaming</a> had gained fair popularity. The hobby consisted of casting or collecting miniature figures of soldiers of different military eras, painting miniatures, preparing large tables with scenery and terrain, etc. You would then conduct a wargame where you would, perhaps, relive an historical battle or maybe even perform a hypothetical battle, a battle that could have taken place but that actually did not.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">So what is a wargame? Well, it is first of all, a game. Like most games, you have players, you have goals and victory conditions, you have pieces, you have a setup, and you have rules to the game. Wargaming is about war. So it's a game that's particularly focused on trying to play-out, to varying degrees, combat or warfare of an historical period.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><i><font face="times">Wargaming as History hobby<o:p></o:p></font></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><i><font face="times"><br /></font></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">One of the things that wargamers really love is history. To be a good wargamer you had to know war, and the history of war. To know the history of war meant you had to research and study. One of the major parts of the hobby of wargaming is historical research. It is the research of historical facts, knowledge, information, that is part of what's fun about the hobby to historical wargamers.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><i><font face="times">Hypothetical possiblities<o:p></o:p></font></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><i><font face="times"><br /></font></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Now, in some historical wargaming, what you're really trying to do is set up all the conditions of an historical battle that actually happened and that you knew existed. Then a group might decide, "Well, what if other battles were fought that were never recorded in history? Or what if we just made up a battle that would be fun to pitch and see what that was like? We're going to use the same soldiers, the same groupings of soldiers and the same statistics matched to dice rolling. We'll play out what would happen in this hypothetical situation."<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">For example, one particular historical period that a lot of wargamers like to focus on, among many, is the Napoleonic era of warfare. There's something very attractive about Napoleonic warfare for various reasons. One is that the troop structure was quite organized. It was one of the first set of wars where lots of records still exist that were kept meticulously and mathematically. Someone can do mathematical analysis on Napoleonic battles and learn the probabilities of one army defeating another army.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><i><font face="times">Dice Mechanics</font></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">This meticulous information is really fantastic for wargamers, because what wargamers figured out pretty early on in the hobby was that the chances and vagaries of warfare could roughly be emulated by rolling dice. A single die will turn up random chances. But when you start rolling combinations of dice they roll up in probability curves. If you can find a probability curve in a combat situation, you can find a matching way of rolling dice to simulate that probability. So with all of the data that existed from Napoleonic warfare, wargames hobbyists can, fairly well, emulate the outcomes of an actual battle.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">What we have discussed so far can already help us to understand some of the terminology and approaches of Dungeons & Dragons.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Alignment Table<o:p></o:p></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times"><br /></font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Having some understanding of Dungeons & Dragons wargaming context helps make sense of some of the presentation of the rules that might otherwise seem confusing. For example, I used to wonder why there was an alignment table in Men and Magic separate from the monster table and stats in Monsters and Treasure. If you're playing Napoleonic wargame, you need to know which side of the table to place Napoleon and which side to place Wellington and then set-up those armies. If you're doing a map campaign, you need to know where is France and the central cities that grant resources to the French army and where is England and where are the central cities that grant resources to the English army and navy.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">You need to know the sides of your battle and that's exactly what's going on in the Chainmail fantasy supplement with its “General Line-up.” This gets reiterated in Dungeons and Dragons’ Men and Magic. You have the alignment table to give you sides. The big battle is between law and chaos. Some creatures are on the law side and some creatures are on the chaos side and some can go either way. Then there are some creatures that just opt out of it altogether, like Switzerland. If you're setting up a wargame table, one side is chaos and one side is law, in this medieval fantasy war game context. So right up front, in the first book, you've got a list of the sides and who might not take a side.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><b><font face="times">Classes</font></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Dungeons & Dragons has fairly strictly defined classes for characters because Gygax and Arneson applied this notion of classes of troop-types from their hobby of historical war gaming.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Let's look at Napoleonic warfare again. You're going to have classes of troops, types of troops, so in the classical Napoleonic context you are going to have infantry, cavalry and artillery. If you want to make it even more complex level of detail in order to try to snatch a little added realism, then you're also going to have dragoons, light infantry, heavy infantry, light cavalry, and heavy cavalry, heavy artillery, and light artillery for a greater level of scale of detail. But each of these types of troops are different classes. You know exactly what artillery can and can't do, you know exactly what infantry can and can't do, you know exactly what cavalry can and can't do. You know what their attacks are like, you know what their defenses are like, and you know what their movement rates and capacities are like. This enables you to develop your strategy by having clearly defined classes on your battle table.<o:p></o:p></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Gygax and Arneson were used to this approach to things. They developed the fighting-man, the magic-user, and eventually the cleric. And these became character classes. As in Napoleonic game you would have artillery, cavalry and infantry where each of those classes of troops have clearly defined the capacities of movement, attack, and defense, so too then the fighting-man, the magic-user, and the cleric have different capacities, abilities and liabilities that define the way that they will be played and will influence the way in which they can come together as an adventuring party to be successful together.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times"><br /></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><font face="times">Wargaming didn't have to just be Napoleonic, for hobbyists interested in war history. So wargamers would also try to set up situations where they could emulate, historical or hypothetical, increasingly more modern warfare like World War I or World War II era warfare. Eventually, wargamers would get interested in ancient and medieval warfare. And from there, to "fantastic medieval" warfare!</font><font face=""><o:p></o:p></font></p></div><div><br /></div><div>Next in the series: "<a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2020/06/medieval-fantasy-and-dungeons-dragons.html">Fantastic Medieval</a>"</div><div><br /></div><div>Fight on!</div><div><br /></div><div>*A note about "Dungeons & Dragons": <font face="times">There have been many products professionally published bearing the name “Dungeons and Dragons.” At the time of the release of this post, we have what Wizards of the Coast call the Fifth Edition. In this blog series, I will not refer to an edition number when I say, “Dungeons & Dragons.” Rather, when I say, “Dungeons & Dragons,” I will be talking about Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson’s rules for how to put together medieval fantasy wargames campaigns that were first published in 1974 by TSR. This is what some people call the original rules. Sometimes these rules are referred to as, “Original Edition Dungeons & Dragons,” "Original Dungeons & Dragons," or, "OD&D." Sometimes people will abbreviate it as, "Oe", meaning, "Original Edition." Or even "Zero-e," meaning, "Zero Edition."</font></div><div><font face="times"><br /></font></div><div><font face="times">Bibliographical Note: Much of this post and any posts I share about the history and historical context of D&D is based upon the book <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Playing-at-World-Jon-Peterson/dp/0615642047/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&hvadid=3484103217&hvbmt=be&hvdev=c&hvqmt=e&keywords=playing+at+the+world&qid=1592317489&sr=8-1&tag=mh0b-20">Playing at the World</a></i> by <a href="http://playingattheworld.blogspot.com">Jon Peterson</a>.</font></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "times new roman", serif; margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-72931696514407088122020-06-12T09:06:00.001-07:002020-06-12T09:06:53.945-07:00Mike's Dungeons, a brief review<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJHcW_xJ_PMAkxdwfOXesMxy4v85ofyBDVYoGFvRFmdKI5fBPEQ43I2_UPjKlKBMq6rNhxNOFRUIvugAhGVL11Zj7FAvNiMOHbT6yxhVaybgRbLPdoly0zqLzwHKfTAzRQO78fukFGJ_w/s182/295151-thumb140.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="182" data-original-width="139" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJHcW_xJ_PMAkxdwfOXesMxy4v85ofyBDVYoGFvRFmdKI5fBPEQ43I2_UPjKlKBMq6rNhxNOFRUIvugAhGVL11Zj7FAvNiMOHbT6yxhVaybgRbLPdoly0zqLzwHKfTAzRQO78fukFGJ_w/w244-h320/295151-thumb140.png" width="244" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Brief Review:</div><div>Mike's Dungeons</div><div>Geoffrey McKinney</div><div><br /></div><div>I ran this module twice for Table Top Events Convention of Champions. The players covered most of the first level and some of the second level. So please keep this limited exposure to running this module in mind as per this review.</div><div><br /></div><div>This is a perfect dungeon module in terms of format. Each map is on one page and almost all the key fits on exactly one page opposite the map so that it can lay open on the table for the referee. Perfect. The room descriptions are short, curt, concise, and to the point, empowering straightforward fast-paced play.</div><div><br /></div><div>It is important to note, however, that NPCs are referred to by level title, so, if you do not have level titles memorized, you will have to look up what level that NPC is. And no monsters have any stats or special descriptions. The module assumes grounded knowledge in the standard D&D monsters and that you have easy, ready access to monster descriptions in rule books.</div><div><br /></div><div>I did not enjoy having to look up some levels based upon titles for NPCs. It seems to me easy enough to say, "2 Warriors (FM2)," or something like that. But I had no problem with missing stats. It cleaned up the key and enabled it to all fit on one page. I have refereed for some time, I have many standard monster stats memorized, or nearly so, and I can, in general, run most encounters on-the-fly with little to no look-ups. So this absence of presentation did not slow me down, much. Others may find this annoying, so, in order to run the module smoothly, you many need to write in monster stats, say, for three levels ahead of the players, before each session, to make sure you feel like you can keep things running at a good pace.</div><div><br /></div><div>As McKinney urges, this is a module to be played, not studied, and I can confirm this from my own experience. What content there is, is rock solid. This is a "funhouse" style dungeon in the sense that there are very few rooms entirely empty of content and most of the content has no concern for so-called "ecology." This is, for me, a bonus to be commended. But if you like "ecology," be forewarned.</div><div><br /></div><div>In the main what we have is monsters, some with treasure. There is very little treasure unguarded by monsters that might otherwise be hidden or trapped. There are no descriptions of motivations, little indication of how monsters will react to the characters (but some) and no description of the relationship between monsters. This is not a problem for me. In fact, I welcome this sparseness. I enjoy making those things up for myself. But, again, if you like "factions," and those kinds of things, you are going to have to make them up for yourself.</div><div><br /></div><div>What I will say, however, is that, for me, I had to add content to make this feel right and provide a full "old school" session. There are virtually no tricks (wonderful things that require interaction and problem solving) or traps at the initial entry levels, and the treasure is very sparse. I have not studied beyond the ninth level (hey, it is for playing, not for studying, remember?), but this is the case for me through the ninth level. I added a pit or deadfall trap in a corridor per level. I added hidden and trapped treasures, especially in dead-ends. I added false doors, teleportation points, etc., also in dead-ends. I elaborated certain decoratively described rooms in order to turn them into tricks or wonders that gave players something to interact with and solve. I added clues to these traps and tricks. I added clues to the monsters and treasures that were already there. I elaborated on description. Etc.</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, I loved doing this extra work. This is exactly the kind of module I love, because it leaves much room for me to fit it into my campaign setting and add my own creativity. It gives me boundaries within which to work, and empowers my own imagination. This extra work, however, may not be everyone's cup of tea, so just be aware that, for many, this module will need some work in order for it to play like the kind of old school dungeons we usually enjoy.</div><div><br /></div><div>I had fun running this and I recommend it.</div><div><br /></div><div>Fight on!</div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-89588407640843614692020-06-07T11:16:00.001-07:002020-06-08T13:07:32.351-07:00Wishes<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsAv4W9krKK2XgvrlhQCDZzT39moo6jd2O9lZsLa-RXE11HHxUvqPGKc4v_1zakxB_6EACpLsuVLnWYZzECtbgvemXZBDoqZ30KEa6_5HCiHG-cLuWjLZj6H63zvlXDfDsft-4vArBh3w/s1000/pennies+in+fountain+wish.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="750" data-original-width="1000" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsAv4W9krKK2XgvrlhQCDZzT39moo6jd2O9lZsLa-RXE11HHxUvqPGKc4v_1zakxB_6EACpLsuVLnWYZzECtbgvemXZBDoqZ30KEa6_5HCiHG-cLuWjLZj6H63zvlXDfDsft-4vArBh3w/w320-h240/pennies+in+fountain+wish.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><br /></div>Okay, here is my first pass at some rules around wishes for my Perilous Realms campaign. These are inspired by the Judges Guild Ready Ref Sheets.<div><br /></div><div><b>Wishes</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><div>First, note level of granter:</div><div><br /></div><div>Granter</div><ol><li>Object</li><li>Well/Fountain</li><li>Rainbow</li><li>Moon, full, midnight</li><li>Star, first seen</li><li>Spirit</li><li>Djinn/Efreet</li><li>Power</li><li>Spell</li><li>Item</li></ol><div><i>Objects</i> include but are not limited to:</div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Wishstone</li><li>Wishbone</li><li>Found single copper piece</li><li>White horse, first sight</li><li>Talisman</li><li>Statue</li></ul></div><div>Major gems are special <i>objects</i> with their own granter value.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Grant-level:Gem-value</i></div><div>1:5,000</div><div>2:10,000</div><div>3:25,000</div><div>4:50,000</div><div>5:100,000</div><div>6:500,000</div><div>7:1,000,000+</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Well/fountain</i>, in general, any given character gets one wish per instance.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Spirits</i> are elemental and otherwise neutral powers, especially, e.g., elementals themselves, and also sometimes sylvan beings of the classical variety, such as dryads or centaurs, or of the gothic variety such as pixies and unicorns.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Powers</i> are cosmic spirits of either lawful or chaotic alignment such as gods and goddesses, angels, demons, and the like.</div><div><br /></div><div>The Wish <i>spell</i> is a 7th level arcane spell that can only be found through research.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Items</i> are magic items with wishes like rings and swords.</div><div><br /></div><div>Next, discern level of intent:</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Intent</i>:</div><div>2 Trivial</div><div>3 Selfless</div><div>4 Altruistic</div><div>5 Mutual</div><div>6 Greedy</div><div>8 Selfish</div><div>9 Malicious</div><div>10 Give/take life</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Trivial</i> indicates that no one directly benefits and there is no possible harm.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Selfless</i> indicates the wisher benefits from the wish in no way.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Altruistic</i> indicates that one or more parties benefit from the wish but the wisher benefit only indirectly.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Mutual</i> indicates mutually beneficial to wisher and one or more other parties.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Greedy</i> indicates the wish is only for material gain, and / or that there may be one or more other parties that benefit, but only indirectly.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Selfish</i> indicates that the wish is only beneficial to the wisher.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Malicious</i> indicates harmful intent.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Give/take life</i> indicates wishes to kill or restore life, including restoration from flesh turned to stone.</div><div><br /></div><div>Next, determine likelihood of granting, together with likelihood of repercussion upon wisher and splash on any beneficiaries. Divide Granter by Intent for percent chance granted. Subtract percent chance granted from 100 for percent chance of repercussion for the wish. Roll for repercussion whether wish is granted or not. If granted, halve the chance for repercussion for percent chance of splash on others who benefit from the wish, if any.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>d100:Repercusion</i></div><div>99+:Death</div><div>97-98:Insane</div><div>94-96:Blind</div><div>90-93:Reverse</div><div>85-89:Geas</div><div>75-84:Quest</div><div>60-74:Disease</div><div>45-59:Curse</div><div>25-44:Charm</div><div>00-24:Sleep</div><div><br /></div><div>Roll d100 for repercussion. Roll d50 for splash back. For both repercussion and splash, add 10 for malicious or murderous intent, subtract 10 for selfless or life-granting intent. Less than zero indicates no repercussion or splash.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Charm</i> indicates wisher or beneficiary charmed by person place or thing related to the context of the wish and/or the situation of the granting. Referee determines.</div></div><div><br /></div><div>Fight on!</div>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-81223483109385401282019-12-29T15:04:00.000-08:002019-12-29T15:04:49.525-08:00Sacrifice in the Perilous Realms<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://pm1.narvii.com/7126/44194c86d405904088eabe5e5e3ab7e27d14255fr1-460-293v2_hq.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="293" data-original-width="460" height="253" src="https://pm1.narvii.com/7126/44194c86d405904088eabe5e5e3ab7e27d14255fr1-460-293v2_hq.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Characters sacrifice consumable goods to gods and demons. Characters specify a particular recipient of sacrifice. Characters must find a suitable altar - usually at the temple of the given entity, duly offered by recognized priests consecrated to the entity. Best to sacrifice on an auspicious occasion.</div>
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Consumable goods include vegetable (resin, incense, oil, wine, grain), animal, monster and sentient beings.</div>
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Sentient beings:</div>
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Fell beings equal XP earned in a kill.</div>
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Fay beings and lawful monsters equal 1K XP per HD.</div>
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Human beings equal 2K XP per HD.</div>
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Double the above for each of the following conditions:</div>
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<ul>
<li>Young</li>
<li>Female</li>
<li>Innocent</li>
<li>Willing</li>
</ul>
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Multiple creatures can be sacrificed over the course of the same festival.</div>
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Most auspicious: cross-quarters +2</div>
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<li>Candlemas/Imbolc, February 2</li>
<li>May-Day/Beltane, May 1</li>
<li>Lammas, August 2</li>
<li>Samhain, November 1</li>
</ul>
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Auspicious: quarters +1</div>
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<li>Yule, December 22</li>
<li>Liberalia/Hilaria, March 22</li>
<li>Midsummer/Litha, June 22</li>
<li>Harvest-Home/Mabon, September 22</li>
</ul>
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Least auspicious: full (night of the 14th) and new moons (day of the 1st)</div>
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Inauspicious: all other times -1</div>
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Entity finds sacrifice acceptable on a reaction check. Apply modifiers based upon how auspicious the occasion is (above). Apply suppliant’s charisma modifiers. Offerings particularly abominable or favorable to the entity may modify as well. Table:</div>
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2-3 Curse</div>
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4-5 Enmity (-1 to future sacrifices)</div>
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6-8 No answer</div>
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9-10 Acceptance</div>
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11+ Favor (+1 to future sacrifices)</div>
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Sacrifice grants XP = value of sacrifice in gp.</div>
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<li>Instead of XP, sacrifice may grant:</li>
<li>Magic item</li>
<li>Knowledge (divination)</li>
<li>Ethereal servant</li>
<li>Undead servant</li>
<li>Monster servant</li>
</ul>
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Magic item equivalent to gp value of XP. Only grants items within entity’s realm of authority.</div>
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Divination like “commune.” Clerics receive additional questions: 9-10: 1, 11+: 2.</div>
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Servants have 1HD per 1Kgp value of sacrifice, not to exceed 16HD. Servants obey for a year and a day.</div>
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Sacrificing to an entity moves a character one alignment closer to that of the entity per sacrifice. So, a lawful character who sacrifices to a chaotic entity becomes neutral. A second such sacrifice would make that neutral character chaotic. Etc.</div>
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Any blood sacrifice on the part of a baptized member of the church of law makes that character chaotic, regardless of whether or not the entity is lawful.</div>
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Any blood sacrifice on the part of a lawful cleric renders the character chaotic and the character looses clerical powers until restored by repentance through the fulfillment of a quest or until received by a chaotic order.</div>
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______</div>
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These rules explain how certain magic users and clerics gain in life-energy without much adventure. It also explains the source of many magic items and magical powers where magic-users are not present.</div>
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<i>The above is inspired by Courtney Campbell's On Down Time & Demesnes. Thank you, Courtney!</i></div>
Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-41566240767713344432019-11-05T10:36:00.001-08:002019-11-05T10:36:40.540-08:00Pig Languages for Zany Fantasy Settings<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5rZ3dxXE5ATm6FdS43Ga8iJO-xbfwa_RmW4a6Rc_GnHESqCzxbwBm0XdJ4D3ceA62DPnGQzHHLebMJuRsJvBCDIiGxTUwQFV6WndV6dLYCK4URTI0WUgzZoHU6cOwM83Cg3QhlSef8tUr/s1600/piglatin-blog.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5rZ3dxXE5ATm6FdS43Ga8iJO-xbfwa_RmW4a6Rc_GnHESqCzxbwBm0XdJ4D3ceA62DPnGQzHHLebMJuRsJvBCDIiGxTUwQFV6WndV6dLYCK4URTI0WUgzZoHU6cOwM83Cg3QhlSef8tUr/s1600/piglatin-blog.jpg" data-original-height="912" data-original-width="550" height="320" width="192" /></a></div>
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I devised the following Pig Fantasy Languages for my Wildlands of Yawon Con Campaign I am developing. (Ran it at our Camp Allen Mini Con and will run it again at the NTRPGCon.)</div>
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In this sub-setting of the Perilous Realms there is common plus 8 other languages.</div>
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1. Ancient (human)</div>
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2. Barbarian (human)</div>
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3. Elvish</div>
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4. Dwarfish</div>
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5. Fell (orcs, goblins, etc.)</div>
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6. Chthonic</div>
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7. Elemental</div>
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8. Celestial</div>
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No “Alignment languages.” I've replaced them with Chthonic, Elemental and Celestial, respectively.</div>
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With regards to some of the instructions below, note that sometimes I move entire first syllables, and not just first letters, to the end, to make the word sound more like a real language or to avoid every word starting with a vowel.</div>
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I found Pig Elvish, first, with a google search. Can’t tell who first came up with it so I can’t give proper credit. Sorry! From Pig Elvish and good old Pig Latin I have imagined the rest.</div>
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Enjoy!</div>
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<b>Pig Ancient</b> (Human)</div>
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Igpay Atinlay</div>
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<b>Pig Barbarian</b></div>
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Drop articles</div>
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Drop pronouns</div>
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No auxiliary verbs</div>
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Reduplicate first syllables of nouns</div>
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1 syllable words and verbs: append “um”</div>
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Orthography: ALL CAPS</div>
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<b>Pig Elvish</b></div>
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1st letter to the end</div>
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3 letters or view: append “en”</div>
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4 letters or more: append random vowel</div>
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Change all Ks to Cs</div>
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Add umlauts to end and accent at will</div>
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<b>Pig Dwarfish</b></div>
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1st letter to the end</div>
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3 letters or fewer: append “(z)ad”</div>
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4 letters or more: append “(‘)ka”</div>
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Change all Cs to Kh</div>
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Add apostrophes at will</div>
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<b>Pig Orcish</b></div>
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As Pig Barbarian, above, and</div>
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appending and prefixing "(n)ash,” “(g)osh,” or “(g)ash” at will</div>
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Change all Cs to Ch, all Gs to Gh, Ks to Kh</div>
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Add apostrophes to separate excessive consonants</div>
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<b>Pig Chthonic</b></div>
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1st letter to end</div>
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3 letters or fewer: prefix “(n)az”</div>
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4 letters or more: infix “(gh)ül”</div>
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Cs to Ch; Ks to Kh, Gs to Gh</div>
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Umlauts at will</div>
<div>
Add apostrophes wherever necessary or fun</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Pig Elemental</b></div>
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As Chthonic but</div>
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Prefix “(bo)ra”</div>
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Infix “rüm”</div>
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No other letter changes</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Pig Celestial</b></div>
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As Chthonic but:</div>
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Prefix “La”</div>
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Infix “oo,” or “ü”</div>
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Use apostrophes to separate excessive vowels</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Fight on!</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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(Image from link to: http://www.incidentalcomics.com/2012/08/pig-latin.html)</div>
Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-50441378367708221042019-08-09T08:10:00.001-07:002019-08-09T09:07:56.068-07:00Few have the inclination or patience to fight under rules they did not compile<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
. . . little attempt has been made in this book to lay down rules for specific periods of military history, assuming that the wargammer will have obtained or formulated rules for the type of warfare in which he is most interested. To this must be added the well-established and acknowledged fact that <i>few wargamers have the inclination or patience to fight under rules that they did not compile themselves</i>.</blockquote>
--Donald Featherstone, <i>Solo Wargaming</i> (emphasis mine)<br />
<br />
This really incapsulates what differentiates the (original) Dungeons & Dragons category of play from the larger category, "old school," in which if falls.<br />
<br />
Are you playing a wargames campaign that happens to be set in sword and sorcery? Or are you playing a role-playing game and following its published rules.<br />
<br />
Fight on!Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-25172723302148655662019-07-05T08:30:00.001-07:002019-07-05T08:30:47.978-07:00Setting-up a Medieval Fantasy Wargames Campaign<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
In a <a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2019/07/understanding-original-dungeons-dragons.html" target="_blank">previous post</a>, I made the point that Dungeons & Dragons (original) is an approach to setting up medieval fantasy wargames campaigns. Back in the day, folks within the miniature war-gaming hobby would share their rules for how to resolve individual combats. In addition to that, they would also sometimes share rules for how to string together a series of table sessions into a coherent war campaign. In these documents, they would not focus on rules for the wargames themselves -- they assumed they were writing to wargamers who already knew such rules and probably already had their own house rules as a local, hobby, gaming group. Instead, the focus was on how to make the games link to each other, reasonably, in order to game a "realistic" war campaign, and not just individual, disparate battles.<br />
<br />
As I thought about these things while writing that post, I began to imagine what their pamphlets might have read like if Gygax and Arneson had written them in a more colloquial style that showed very clearly that they were talking to other wargamers about what had worked for them, what they had found to be fun. Because that was in fact what they were doing. It is just that it can be lost on many of us when we come backwards to the pamphlets from complete-rules-style RPG books rather than forward from their actual wargame hobby context. I offer my imaginings, below. The actual work would be a bit more detailed, but still short enough. I leave a lot that would be fleshed out as parenthetical summaries of what I imagine they would include in the actual text. Who knows, maybe someday I'll write this whole thought experiment up?<br />
<br />
________<br />
<br />
<i>Dungeons & Dragons, or</i><br />
<i>How to Set-up a Medieval Fantasy Wargames Campaign</i><br />
<br />
These booklets are a set of ideas for how to turn an ordinary wargames campaign into a Sword and Sorcery wargames campaign! As with any suggestions for setting up a wargames campaign, these brief booklets give some ideas and descriptions of what has worked for us in our own campaigns. Experiment with it and have fun. Always make it work for your local group.<br />
<br />
As with any wargames campaign, you will need to assign sides. In simple fantasy, it is usually good enough just to have "good guys" and "bad guys." But, following Anderson and Moorcock, and hints at such in Tolkien, we have named our major sides "Law" and "Chaos." Monsters, fantasy figures and characters in general fall along such lines. Of course, brute beasts don't fall along any particular line and characters may choose to "opt out" and remain neutral. (Here would follow the list of fantasy creatures by line up, or what would come to be called "alignment.")<br />
<br />
Choose rules for resolving combat and figure out a way to factor in the fantastic. We recommend Chainmail, especially with its fantasy supplement and man-to-man rules. We tried to make combat rules and fantasy creatures match up by having monsters and characters act equivalent to a certain number of figures in a typical wargame battle. We talk in terms of "hit dice," to make sense of this. Since we assume that you are already an experienced wargammer (since you are interested in reading pamphlets about setting up an entire campaign), we trust that you are familiar with this way of thinking of these things, so you get the point. But, real quick, here is an Alternative Combat resolution to consider (here they present the "<a href="http://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2018/10/pre-publication-d-and-target-20.html" target="_blank">Target-20</a>" method they introduce by means of the "Alternative Combat" tables and the concept of "Armor Class" borrowed from naval wargaming).<br />
<br />
Okay, now here is a fun new idea: what if players not only played as "generals" over armies, but actually played individual characters within the game-world? Characters can fall into different "classes," much like then different classes of troops in a typical wargame. Make sure they are different from each other, with clear cooperative properties, so that they can work well together as a Sword and Sorcery style adventuring party.<br />
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Here are some ideas for character classes: Start with the proverbial fighting-man. Next would be magic-users. Gygax doesn't much like the idea of magic-users being playing characters, since they are usually the bad-guy in Sword and Sorcery. However, some players may want to play chaos. And you could have "good" magic-users in your campaign. So you may want them to be a character class as well. Also, we had someone who wanted to play a "Van Helsing" type character, so we introduced the "cleric." They are kind of like a crusader. They can force undead to check morale (usually, as they are "undead," they would not check morale). We call this "turning." Clerics also have some of their own kind of spells that are a bit more religiously miraculous, like healing.<br />
<br />
Don't forget standard fantasy races such as elves, dwarves and hobbits. Give them descriptions that match what you like from fantasy you have read and that you would like to incorporate into your campaign. Here is what we've done. (Here would follow race descriptions.)<br />
<br />
Here is another cool idea: when you play as a general of armies, you usually start with a point-buy system for hiring your starting armies. Then, through play, you can gain more points to buy more troops, thus increasing your army, etc. Well, we thought of a cool way to make this work with players playing characters at a one-to-one scale. We call it "experience" and we measure it in "experience points." Just as armies have tactical goals, Sword and Sorcery characters have the goal of treasure extraction and "looting." So we have developed a way of matching the value of a treasure safely extracted by a character to a character's "experience points." Successful victories also grant some experience. These experience points then accumulate and grant the character advancement in the game-world. We use the term "level" to describe this game-world advancement. Each time a character gains a level they gain in the respective capacities and advantages of their particular class, just like armies growing more powerful in a regular wargames campaign. Here are some ideas. (Here would follow the tables for advancement, XP, HD, spells, etc.)<br />
<br />
Now here are some ideas about how to incorporate magic-users and their spell-casting abilities into a wargame context that keeps things fair but still "wonderful." You will find your own way to work this stuff out for your campaign. (Here is where spell lists and descriptions would go.)<br />
<br />
Oh, and to make sense of non-combat related eventualities, Arneson borrowed from Naval Wargaming the mechanic of "saving throws." Much like determining how much hull-damage a ship has taken from, say, an underwater mine, you can use saving throws for resolving how much damage a character takes from, say, falling down, drinking poison, or being hit by a magic-user's fireball! We have also found it useful for determining if a character or creature has been affected by a spell or not. As characters advance in level, eventually their chance to save increases as well.<br />
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Another thing that we discovered to be really fun is what came to be an emphasis on the more exploratory aspect of the game. Since we have allowed a 1:1 correspondence between player and in-game character, we can set up scenarios where characters explore an unknown, usually interior and often underworld environment. Think of this in terms of Stratego or Battleship, but even more complex and fascinating as the players will need to map a potentially elaborate underworld setting. This could be maze-like or labyrinthine. Or you could have secret spaces only discovered when they have circumnavigated it.<br />
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There are a lot of possibilities here. You can set up standard things from Sword and Sorcery that often fall outside the purview of standard wargames. For example, you can have tricks and traps and puzzles that the players can solve by means of their characters interacting with the environment. Really the sky is the limit here.<br />
<br />
We have found that the combination of the 1:1 scale and an emphasis on underworld exploration has been absolutely amazing in giving our campaigns a real Sword and Sorcery feel!<br />
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Here are some ideas for monsters. We take advantage of the use of Hit Dice to represent relative fighting power and ferocity. Other natural and magical capacities can then be factored in. We describe below what we have developed for ourselves. Again, look at our examples and then work out what would work best for you in your campaign. (Here would follow the monster list and descriptions.)<br />
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Here are some ideas for treasure. Look to our examples and work out things for your campaign. (Here would be the tables for deterring treasure, magic items and their descriptions.)<br />
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Many wargames campaigns are "map campaigns," and that is what we suggest here. The scope of the game is infinite, but just for starting out we recommend a map of a local area with several opportunities for treasure hunting in dangerous and "underworld" environs, perhaps with one big dungeon nearby. This dungeon would comprise many subterranean levels that the players can easily begin exploring before branching out into the wider world.<br />
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Start with at least three levels to this main dungeon (in case they decide to go pretty deep from the start). As they explore, you can continue to add more levels to the dungeon and expand your map to include wider kingdoms and wildernesses -- even a whole fantasy world, eventually, if you want to.<br />
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Oh, and if you find your players suddenly want to strike out into the wilderness for an off-hand adventure, Arneson has found it really fun and easy to use the Outdoor Survival board (Avalon Hill). Here are some ideas for random encounters and what to do with some of the symbols on the board in order to render them a bit more like exploring in a <a href="https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bx-230B8tqxvMmFrNGJFU3hGNnM/edit" target="_blank">medieval fantasy wilderness</a>. (Here follows the suggestions for castles, random encounters, jousting, etc.)<br />
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Be sure to keep things fresh. This is fantasy so go crazy! For example, players might think that they have "cleared" an area only to see that a bunch of orcs or goblins have made their home there -- perhaps, very thankful for their newly cleared-out digs!<br />
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Most importantly, keep it fun and make it your own. Let us know what you come up with! We always improve as referees by hearing about what other referees are doing with their local clubs.<br />
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Fight on!<br />
_________<br />
<br />
If you have a medieval fantasy wargames campaign that sounds like something inspired by the above -- no matter what mechanics you are using for resolving encounters -- you are playing "original" Dungeons & Dragons. So, again, I will say:<br />
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Fight on!Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-50266884193325460252019-07-04T11:23:00.000-07:002019-07-04T11:23:15.184-07:00Understanding Original Dungeons & Dragons<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I've seen some posts on reddit and other fora asking questions like: what counts as (original) D&D, how do we know that it<a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/odnd/comments/c5hxeh/when_is_it_no_longer_odd/" target="_blank"> isn't (original) D&D anymore</a>? What are the <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/odnd/comments/bl546r/advantages_of_odd/" target="_blank">advantages of D&D</a> to later editions using that name? Etc.<br />
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Here is my answer: (original) D&D is an approach, not a set of rules. It is an approach to a hobby, called "wargaming." It is an approach to a particular interest of that hobby: the wargames campaign. It is an approach to giving that hobby-interest a "Sword and Sorcery" feel.<br />
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It is not a product designed to be consumed. Repeat: not a product made by experts to be consumed by an unprofessional public. It is a set of suggestions for fellow hobby-ists, who have a rich amateur knowledge and interest in their avocation. And those suggestions were sold at a price to make the effort worth it for the fellow-hobby-ists who did the work to put it out there for you.<br />
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So, don't get me wrong, obviously, in one sense, it was a product -- Gygax and Arneson did publish and sell it. But what we need to remember is that back in that day the market for such pamphlets was small and highly specialized and understood to be a way to get ideas out and shared with some minimum compensation -- no one got into publishing about miniature wargaming so that they could quit their day job! (This is something so easily do-able because of the internet and part of the DIY vibe of some of the best "OSR" stuff that is out there. We can share today in a way that the hobby-ists of 1974 couldn't have dreamed.)<br />
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Later "editions" move more and more towards "product identity" and changing the very semantics of the name "Dungeons & Dragons" from referring to three little pamphlets that suggested how to set up a medieval fantasy wargames campaign, itself intended for an audience of other wargamers, towards more of a product making money for a particular company from a non-expert set of consumers.<br />
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Thus these companies become increasingly concerned about their rights over this "product" -- and taking ownership for its development out of the hands of the consumers. This really changed the nature and vibe of things. Remember, for quite some time Gygax simply could not understand why any fellow-hobby-ist would want to by a "Dungeon Masters Kit," or "module." Why borrow someone else's creativity? The point is to have an outlet for your own! (Then he saw the cash available in it! I do not blame him for this. It was a smart, and, probably, the right business and even hobby-supporting move. I'm just giving this as an example for the subtle shift in things.)<br />
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Why do I keep putting "original" in parentheses? Just exactly because of the above. The three little brown books are <i>not</i> an edition. They are suggestions from hobby-ists, to fellow hobby-ists about a particular area of interest: wargames campaigning in a medieval fantasy setting. This is not an "edition," of a "game," with a unified mechanic and defined setting.<br />
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To many of us who play (original) Dungeons & Dragons, the other "editions" of Role Playing Game rules with the title "Dungeons & Dragons" look to us like many various house-rule variants of these suggestions for medieval wargames campaigns. (But, in this case, it often feels like someone else is telling us that their house rules are now the RULES, period.)<br />
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So AD&D is Gygax' tournament house rules made official.<br />
3.5, 4, and 5 are Wizards of the Coasts house rules made official.<br />
All the retro-clones are cool house rule variants, shared for the rest of us.<br />
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And good for them! In fact, thanks for sharing! They are all, also, D&D! But we don't have to use their house rules, we can make up our own. And we certainly don't have to view them as "official."<br />
<br />
So, Dungeons & Dragons (original) is an approach to setting up medieval fantasy wargames campaigns. Back in the day, giants of the miniature war-gaming hobby would share their rules for how to resolve individual combats. But sometimes they would share rules for how to string together a series of combats into a coherent war campaign. In these documents, they would not focus on rules for the wargames themselves -- they assumed they were writing to wargamers who already knew such rules and probably already had their own house rules as a local, hobby, gaming group.<br />
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So, for example, they were in no way interested in a "unified mechanic." They wanted mechanics that made sense for the type of thing they were trying to resolve, at the appropriate level of scale. (Not everything scales up and down well, like, say, a fractal. More like the cube law, sometimes things need to change to work well.) This alone explains a lot of misconception about what the original little brown books were trying to do and to offer. Folks would do better, and understand original D&D far more, if they compared the three little brown books to other books on setting up wargames campaigns, rather than to later books that came to be called "role playing games."<br />
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Here are the three I would suggest anyone interested in understanding (original) Dungeons & Dragons:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Tony-Baths-Ancient-Wargaming-Including-ebook/dp/B01N2HI27I/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=wargames+campaigns&qid=1562262285&s=gateway&sr=8-4" target="_blank">Tony Bath's Ancient Wargaming including Setting Up a Wargames Campaign</a>:<br />
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<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Donald-Featherstones-Wargaming-Campaigns-Curry/dp/140928266X/ref=sr_1_11?keywords=featherstone+donald&qid=1562262437&s=gateway&sr=8-11" target="_blank">Donald Featherstone's Wargaming Campaings</a>:<br />
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<br />
<br />
And, finally, <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wargame-Campaigns-Charles-Stewart-Grant/dp/0952514605" target="_blank">Grant's Wargames Campaigns</a>.<br />
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But I would especially emphasize Tony Bath's book.<br />
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Another big difference in the slow transformation from a small, wargames hobby to a large, consumer role-playing game product is the vibe of play, and what the goal of play is. And this is, in many ways, far more important for understanding the difference between "original" and later "editions" of D&D -- but that is for another post.<br />
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Before I write that post, my next post will be a kind of imaginary example of what D&D might have been worded like if it had more of the form of some of the above classical examples of wargames campaigns books.<br />
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To conclude this post, I will say, if you are involved, as a fellow hobby-ist, in a local medieval fantasy wargames campaign that, through play, has developed its own vibe, feel and corresponding house-rules, then you are playing Dungeons & Dragons, whatever other name you call it.<br />
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Fight on!Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-53042702803312866432019-06-27T14:59:00.000-07:002019-06-27T14:59:51.854-07:00Elves of the Perilous Realms<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Born in the <a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2019/04/ages-of-perilous-realms.html" target="_blank">Golden Age</a>, rulers of the Silver Age, the elves of the Perilous Realms, though diminishing, are nevertheless a force to be reckoned with. The elves were born under the gracious rule of the triumphant celestial Powers after their imprisonment of the chthonic Powers in the depths of the earth.<br />
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With the fall of the Golden Age, due to the broken watch of the Powers, the fell races rushed in, autochthonically, as part of the re-ascendence of the chthonic Powers. (From ever on the fell regenerate themselves through abiogenesis, but more on that later. We must know some of the fell to tell the tale of the elves.)<br />
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The elves experienced the loss of the safety of their Powerful rulers and fell into the disarray of fell attacks. Thus the elves organized themselves and in the name of the Powers they still loved and thus they fought off the fell and established rule throughout the Perilous Realms. This was the dawn of the Silver Age.<br />
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But they did not simply conquer the fell, they also enslaved them. Cultures, languages and bloodlines intermingled. It was at this time that men were born into the world. Just as the elves had basked in the rulership of the Powers, so now, in their youth, men rested in the benevolent rule of the elves. So long as they were their loyal subjects and grateful vassals, the elves enjoyed the company of men.<br />
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But the time came for the fall of the Silver Age as the elves fell into opulence and decadence. Thus we come to the second dark age. At this time the undead first appear and lycanthropy escapes from twisted alchemical laboratories. Men find themselves in an analogous position to their elven lords. Just as they lost the protection of the Powers, so too now men found themselves without the glorious Silver Age civilizations.<br />
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And, just as the elves had fought back and won their own empire, so too men formed the empires of the Bronze Age. As men increased, even the elves that did not retire to the uttermost West began to diminish in both magic and in number.<br />
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During this time, Some elves sided with the men as the only way to survive and the obvious heirs to their previous glory. Happy for the protection and friendship of the newly formed empires of men, these entered into loose alliances and maintained simple pastoral ways as deer herders dwelling in woodland villages high upon enchanted flets. These became known as the Wood Elves. The Wood Elves are on the side of the Law.<br />
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Most of the elves, however, fled into the wildernesses of the world into a forlorn life of hunting and gathering. As human hunter and gatherer societies usually consist of a few extended family groups meeting occasionally as entire tribes, elven hunter gatherers walk completely solitaire, meeting occasionally in small family groups. Their dwellings are stumps and ancient trees which only they know how to open and close. These became known as the Sylvan Elves. The Sylvan Elves take no sides any longer but their own. They are Neutral.<br />
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A few elves, however, resented the rise and ascendence of men. They refused to relinquish the former glory of the Silver Age, or even admit that it had ended. These elves dwell in enchanted castles and keeps, waylaying human travelers and imprisoning them. They try to continue to live lives of opulence and excess and to convince others of the same. These became known as the Gray Elves (either for their grave countenance upon meeting men, or perhaps due to their typical gray cloaks or, again, perhaps for the grayness of the stones of their castles -- when visible, whichever no one knows). The Gray Elves disdain human law and the ever increasing tide of human rule which they claim encroaches upon their rightful inheritance. They are therefore on the side of Chaos.<br />
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Now, with the Bronze Age Collapse, in this Age of Adventure, when parties explore the wilder lands of peril, they may be waylaid or may discover the hidden homes of any of these kinds of elves. But woe to those who fall into the traps of the Sylvan Elves, and even more so to the enchantments of the Gray Elves.<br />
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<i>In terms of mechanics, the vast majority of the remaining elves within the Perilous Realms are the hidden and secretive Sylvan Elves. But just exactly because they are so well hidden, they are the least likely to be encountered. So, 1:6 chance that a random elven encounter in the wilderness is with one of these. If so, it means that the encounter happened at night.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>The greatest minority of elves would be the Gray Elves. But just exactly because they are so militant against human rule, they are always the elves encountered when a stronghold or castle is elven. Or, if randomly encountered, 1:3 chance that it is a party of Gray Elves.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Finally, a significant minority of the remaining elves within the Perilous Realms are the friendly and lawful Wood Elves. Whenever discovering an elven village, it will be Wood Elves. And most of the time, 5:6, if there is a random elven encounter in woodland regions. Otherwise the chance of encountering a party of Wood Elves is 2:3.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>In terms of playing-characters, the kind of elf you play would be based upon your choice of alignment. A backstory could quickly be spun about how you choose adventure and the company of men, etc.</i><br />
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<i>This allows me to blend rather seamlessly Tolkien-style, Anderson-style and folklorish elven source material. I intend this to contribute to a rich, interesting, but still thoroughly vanilla fantasy setting -- one of the main goals of the Perilous Realms campaign!</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Fight on!</i>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-6475665616530738622019-04-22T08:16:00.000-07:002019-04-22T08:16:43.102-07:00Ages of the Perilous Realms<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Eleni_Asouti/publication/322508486/figure/fig9/AS:614081748811789@1523419906476/T-shaped-pillars-from-Enclosure-D-at-Goebekli-Tepe-images-courtesy-of-the-late-Klaus.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="422" data-original-width="800" height="210" src="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Eleni_Asouti/publication/322508486/figure/fig9/AS:614081748811789@1523419906476/T-shaped-pillars-from-Enclosure-D-at-Goebekli-Tepe-images-courtesy-of-the-late-Klaus.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>I am more a rules-imaginer than a setting-imaginer. But I'm getting more into exploring my campaign setting than ever before.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>There are multiple overlapping ages of rise and collapse of mighty civilizations that define the Perilous Realms and the kinds of ruins, underworlds, treasures, magic items and artifacts that may be found. </i><i>Here is the myth, or legend of the various apocalypses and dark ages that led to the current state of the Perilous Realms, my campaign setting.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Diamond Aeon</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
In this age, the archetypal powers were young and playful children of the Most High.</div>
<div>
They knew their place, and, although childishly mischievous at times, obeyed the will of their Father.</div>
<div>
They reigned over the cosmos like living stars.</div>
<div>
In the end, the archetypal powers come of age, and conflict ensues.</div>
<div>
They rebel against their Father and are thrown into the chaos of war.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>In terms of the way we think of things now, we are talking about billions of years ago. Thus this loosely corresponds to “big bang” through cooling down of the universe. In Tolkienesque terms, this is like the Valaquenta. The key to this fall narrative is REBELLION. So whenever we see rebellion in the campaign setting it links somehow to the Powers.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Golden Age</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Law and chaos draw their lines for the first time.</div>
<div>
The Celestials seek to establish the joy of the Diamond Aeon through Law, and often fall into rigid legalism.</div>
<div>
The Chthonic powers seek to empower the unbridled joy of the Diamond Aeon through following the passions of the underworld and often fall into the cruelty and whim.</div>
<div>
Many powers opt out and hide as spirits of nature and life ("neutral" elemental powers).</div>
<div>
The war shapes much of the terrain of the Perilous Realms.</div>
<div>
Ultimately, the Celestials drive the Chthonics under earth and imprison them there, only to serve for fertility and virility.</div>
<div>
The Celestials establish a Golden Era of light and genius upon the earth — with unparalleled cyclopean edifices and artifacts!</div>
<div>
At this time, the fay races are born into the wonder of direct contact with their fascinated rulers.</div>
<div>
But the Celestials become too confident in their victory, and their watches fall into indiscipline.</div>
<div>
In the end, the earth cannot contain the chaos that errupts.</div>
<div>
The final war leads to total apocalypse and a dark age ensues.</div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span></div>
<div>
<i>In terms of the way we think of things now, we are talking about millions of years ago. Thus this loosely corresponds to a kind of smashing together of the mesozoic and its great meteoric (heavenly) and volcanic (chthonic) apocalypse together with the monolithic stone age. This nicely gives us cavemen with dinosaurs! This era gives a chance to engage the Lovecraft Mythos. The key to this fall narrative is COMPLACENCY.</i></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Interlude: The Age of Darkness</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The fell races are born and run free but unorganized.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Silver Age</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Out of the shadows of the Age of Darkness, the Fay races form an alliance, consulting what Powers still remain in their weakness and sorrow.</div>
<div>
With the advice of their cosmic elders, the fay together stem the tide of the spawning hoard.</div>
<div>
The elves rise to power over all other fay.</div>
<div>
They establish a Silver Era under the light of their matron, Mother Moon.</div>
<div>
They enslave the fell races, especially the orcs, to do their bidding — and on their backs they build mighty cities, towers, and palaces unrivaled by any save the powers themselves.</div>
<div>
But the orcs and their fellow fell never forget their enslavement.</div>
<div>
At this time, Men arrive, the fay know not from where — nor do the men! They are in awe of the elves.</div>
<div>
But the elves in their assumption of opulence grow fatuous, weak, superficial, degenerate — and their civilizations fall into decadence.</div>
<div>
Thus they become easy targets for fell rebellion — if they are not dragged down by their own petty divisions and meaningless wars of trumped up honor.</div>
<div>
The collapse of the elves is a slow and painful decline, leading, ultimately, to a second dark age.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>In terms of how we think now, we are talking about several millennia ago. Thus this roughly corresponds to the great pre-historic civilizations of myth. This era allows me to smash together Tolkien's and Anderson's elves. The key to this fall narrative is </i><i>DECADENCE.</i></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Interlude: The Second Dark Age</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Pacts with the chthonic power, Necros render the first Undead. Alchemical and medicinal warfare fabricate the disease of lycanthropy. Monsters proliferate.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Bronze Age</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The bronze age is the first age of Men.</div>
<div>
In the memory of the elven empires of old, and in devotion to, and under the patronage of what remains of the mighty Powers, men erect fabulous temples. Around these temples, cities grow up — Ur, Babel, Byblos, Shangri-La, Hamunaptra, Aqaba, Thebes, Indus, Eddo, Techlan, Cyprus.</div>
<div>
These temple-cities become the center of mighty and diverse empires in trade with one another of both goods and philosophies.</div>
<div>
At some point, men cannot remember how or why these great empires all suddenly (with decades of one another) fell into complete collapse.</div>
<div>
It is not likely that the collapse came about either because of internal disputes or because of external wars, although these played a part, but from the evidence it seems the “gods” (Powers) no longer favored them and removed their blessings of abundance.</div>
<div>
This is the great Bronze Age Collapse.</div>
<div>
The human population was decimated and the survivors fled to hills and mountains to survive.</div>
<div>
The “Ancients” left behind powerful ruins, tombs, sepulchers and crypts — of frightful aspect to the fragile humans who remained.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>In terms of how we think now this represents several centuries ago. Thus this is a fantasy version of the actual Bronze Age Collapse. This allows us to engage classical mythology and legend. The key to this fall narrative is divine ABANDONMENT.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Now: The Age of Adventure</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Now is the age of adventure!</div>
<div>
Now law and chaos reenter their struggle for vast civilizations of lawful glory or unbridled passions and dominion.</div>
<div>
Now mighty fighting-men and Amazons rise up to pit their thews against the dying of the light!</div>
<div>
Now over-confident users of magics seek their own through initiations into the mysteries of the arcane.</div>
<div>
Now the church proclaims a gospel of universal order under a king of heaven and sends out crusaders (“clerics”) to establish Law: by word or by fist.</div>
<div>
Now fearless — or foolish — adventurers commit to mighty peregrinations into forgotten wildernesses and yawning openings of the mythic underworld.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>In terms of how we think now, this represents about the last millennium. The Perilous Realms campaign begins in an imaginary year 990. In a sense, this is a Third Dark Age. It roughly corresponds to a mash up of the Iron Age and both the Western and Eastern Middle Ages. This age engages Leiber's universe of Nehwon. The key narrative here, is, of course, WAR and ADVENTURE.</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
All of these previous beings remain: powers, fay, fell, lycanthropes, undead of the bronze age— each slightly weaker than before. Each remembers and grieves the loss of their once great status. But now they are lost in wildernesses and trapped in nightmares of the underworld.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Adventurers may stumble upon all of these different layers of civilization, languages and artifacts:</div>
<div>
Powers: celestials, elementals, chthonicoi and their physical manifestation as giants and sylvan monsters</div>
<div>
Fay: elves, dwarves, gnomes, and, after a fashion, even the hobbits</div>
<div>
Fell: kobolds, goblins, orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls; and</div>
<div>
Ancient men: Aegyptian, Anatolian, Levantine, Etruscan, Mycenean, Assyrian, Hittite, Wotan, Indus, Nod, Jomon, and more.</div>
<div>
Their stories give clues to one another and nest within one another.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Fight on!</b></div>
Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-6311180565224256502019-03-04T14:34:00.001-08:002019-03-04T14:34:55.610-08:00More on the General Line-up<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
Alignment came from wargames. It was about knowing what side of the battlefield to place the troops. There were the good guys (law), the bad guys (chaos) and those who wanted to try to keep out (neutral).<br />
<br />
What does this mean?<br />
<br />
Here is how I understand it now.<br />
<br />
Alignment is descriptive, not prescriptive. Alignment changes based upon behavior. Example: if a chaotic person does something to serve law once, she becomes neutral. If a neutral person does something to advance law she becomes lawful. And vice versa.<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Law = Human law is good for everyone</li>
<li>Neutrality = Human law is good for human beings</li>
<li>Chaos = Human law isn't any good for anyone</li>
</ol>
<div>
<b>Law</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Human law is good for everyone. It is good for every human settlement. It is good for elves and dwarves and hobbits too - whether they know it yet or not. It is good for fell creatures such as orcs - which usually means they are dead orcs.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This is because human law is consonant with the laws of heaven or the cosmos. Thus human law is universal and should be performed and judged the same across all geographic regions, with some wiggle room for local variation and culture.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
In actual practice, there are many schools of law, all arguing with each other as to who has gotten it right, but still basically recognizing each other. So, for example, there are the philosophers of the Forbidden City who proclaim that the law of heaven and of men is the same and we must find its Way. Then there is the Church of Law who believe the King of Heaven has revealed the one true law. They alone have Crusaders (clerics) actively spreading universal human law as they understand it.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Neutrality</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Human law is good for human beings. Every human settlement should have laws in place for the good of its people. It is not good for human beings to live lawlessly. Human laws, however, ought not to be expected to apply to creatures that are not human.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This is because human law is something that arises naturally from human beings through accumulated custom. Custom is unavoidable and ought to be respected for the life it brings to human groups. And although laws are natural and not entirely arbitrary, nevertheless they do not enjoy anything like a one-to-one correspondence with the laws of the cosmos. So one ought not to expect different human groups to have similar customs and laws.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
There are many local cults and philosophical schools who adhere to something like the above. They are not willing to fight for anything they perceive to be purely local and customary. They will fight for human life. Needless to say, there are no churches or crusaders for neutrality.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Chaos</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Human law isn't any good for anybody. Human settlements must be liberated from such oppressive local customs and traditions. Elves and dwarves and hobbits - even fell races such as orcs - actually live closer to a truly liberated existence.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This is because human law is merely by convention and therefore purely arbitrary. Laws are imposed by the strong on the weak. Laws arise among human beings out of fear of living truly free like animals following their instincts, or fay or fell races following their intuitions. Basic moral sentiments such as loyalty, disgust, respect, affection, retribution and reward are all that are necessary to live a truly human life.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Most of the cults and philosophical schools who adhere to something like the above find that they must maintain relative secrecy for their own protection. They will fight for freedom of sentiment for themselves and on behalf of others when they perceive they have an overwhelming advantage - a real chance for success - for they know the wrath of Law that will rain down upon them should they fail. Among the multitudinous cults there are many who fashion themselves "churches." These sometimes recognize each other and are willing to work together for practical reasons. They all attempt to infiltrate the Church of Law to over throw its tyranny from within. These churches have anti-crusaders (anti-clerics), sometimes openly so, sometimes acting under-cover as Crusaders (clerics), actively spreading freedom of sentiment as they understand it.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>How they understand each other</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
This of opposite alignments see the other as deluded and dangerous.</div>
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Neutral folks find Law and Chaos fanatical, over-worried and perhaps a bit hokey.</div>
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Chaos and Law find Neutral folks wishy-washy, noncommittal and perhaps obstructive.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Conclusion</b></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
I hope this is clearly different than the way that alignment is sometimes described. Please note that none of these folks are deliberately immoral, but all can fall into some form of immorality. Chaos can be moral simply freely following basic human sentiments and passions like affection, loyalty and disgust. Chaos can be immoral when any of those affections become extreme and cruel. Law can be moral by bringing safety and peace to free races. Law can be immoral when that law is imposed with fear, micromanagement and oppression. Neutrality can be moral by respecting both sentiment and local mores. Neutrality can be immoral through complacency, claiming they ought not to get involved so as not to meddle in, or impose upon others, merely local custom.</div>
Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-88956664981165504912018-10-13T11:37:00.000-07:002018-10-13T11:37:00.342-07:00OSR Questionnaire<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDuesB8-jt0sLFToN37DKbQVWT3t340LMBZGn_6b1OEGKJ_y4wLGmnJoLX3inotsBx_mrSc9S4KSd7Cmok3qNOvXFnajot93S6WNEuMXTLIruoehSSkRKwFm8p7tMHBte1khUtJ2jLxUdH/s1600/otus6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDuesB8-jt0sLFToN37DKbQVWT3t340LMBZGn_6b1OEGKJ_y4wLGmnJoLX3inotsBx_mrSc9S4KSd7Cmok3qNOvXFnajot93S6WNEuMXTLIruoehSSkRKwFm8p7tMHBte1khUtJ2jLxUdH/s1600/otus6.jpg" data-original-height="522" data-original-width="400" height="400" width="306" /></a></div>
<br />
When I first became aware of the OSR, I was excited about it and learned as much as I could. After discovering Dungeons & Dragons (original) and the communities that support it, I no loner feel like I am "a part of" the OSR in a straightforward way.<br />
<br />
It seems at first the OSR was about a return to the original, wargame style of play at the time of the birth of D&D as a hobby. Part of this included a return to a more DIY approach, both in terms of setting (not relying upon someone else's published, professional, setting) and "rulings not rules" (realizing that the local referee, group and game play itself was more important for developing both the rules and the shared setting than strict adherence to a professionally developed set of rules and settings).<br />
<br />
In other words, the OSR represented to me a return to D&D as a <i>hobby</i>, rather than a <i>consumer product</i>. The hobby approach empowers creativity. The consumer approach makes passive clients. As a hobby it comes with a hobbying community of idea-sharing and mutual support. The internet facilitates such a hobby community in a large and broad way.<br />
<br />
Much of what I have seen the OSR become since I got back into gaming in 2013 is a proliferation of small-scale or semi-professional game-resource publication. There is a lot of really good stuff out there. But, just exactly because of my more hobby-based, localist approach, I do not find myself using other people's modules very often, however professionally slick or "old school."<br />
<br />
However, much of the stuff published as "OSR" falls into the current cultural zeitgeist that "creative" indicates, or is equivalent to, being edgy, troubled, dark, or "morally ambiguous." A lot of talk out there is about how we need to eschew "tropes" of fantasy in order to be "truly creative." In some cases it seems that the goal is to be as edgy as possible while still playing in a new school, story-game style. "Mapping sucks." "Challenge people with a moral dilemma." Etc. I find none of this attractive.<br />
<br />
The following questionnaire comes from a big OSR personality named Zak. I do not follow his work much, honestly. But I stumbled across the questionnaire from other folk's blog posts and google+ posts where they filled it in in interesting ways. That is a good gift to the community, so, thank you, Zak. So if you are still reading, here goes:<br />
<br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;"><b>1. One article or blog entry that exemplifies the best of the Old School Renaissance for me:</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwi50pbi74PeAhXhc98KHRQGA9gQFjAAegQIBRAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.grey-elf.com%2Fphilotomy.pdf&usg=AOvVaw2ZSgoRDgIZLJQDsLFcs8Ts" target="_blank">Philotomy's Musings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><br style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333;" /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>2. My favorite piece of OSR wisdom/advice/snark:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">My own pithy zen-like saying in the spirit of <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=16&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjFwI66hITeAhWid98KHWM4CMEQFjAPegQIAhAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fchannel%2FUC8fkxEWNCphZNiZBo9cpwpA&usg=AOvVaw3Vfysz2BRlOHUR9-W-USwi" target="_blank">Matt Finch</a>'s "<a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjFwI66hITeAhWid98KHWM4CMEQFjABegQIABAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lulu.com%2Fus%2Fen%2Fshop%2Fmatthew-finch%2Fquick-primer-for-old-school-gaming%2Febook%2Fproduct-3159558.html&usg=AOvVaw1pigUWt6SobMNMXZb0zsHY" target="_blank">Primer</a>":</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Amateur hobby, not professional product.</span></span></blockquote>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Medieval fantasy wargames campaigning is a hobby, so dive in for amateur fun. Stop expecting "professional production quality," and go for the joy and </span>creativity<span style="font-family: inherit;"> that comes from a community of amateurs sharing ideas and swapping stories -- </span>hobbyists <span style="font-family: inherit;">who do it for the fun of it, not for profit. Don't </span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">passively</span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"> receive wargames campaigning as some product rendered to you as a mere consumer of what "</span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">experts" say you are supposed to like or agree upon as standard. Instead, Fight on!</span></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>3. Best OSR module/supplement:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/jimm-johnson-and-lawson-bennett/tomb-of-the-sea-kings/paperback/product-23531103.html" target="_blank">Tomb of the Sea Kings</a></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>4. My favorite house rule (by someone else):</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">"Crits" & "Fumbles": "Natural 20" does full (not double) damage. Don't do fumbles. Fumbles punish everyone with </span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">unfun. Both rulings come from Philotomy (see above).</span></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>5. How I found out about the OSR:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">In 2013 I was surfing the web and remembered D&D then I plunged into what was going on and found my way to the OSR and, through them, to the original rules for medieval fantasy wargames campaigns.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>6. My favorite OSR online resource/toy:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Mr. Josh Bear's <a href="https://mrjoshbear.net/odd-referee.html#" target="_blank">ODD Referee Tool</a>. I use it every session.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;">7. </span><span style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;">Best place to talk to other OSR gamers:</span></b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: georgia, "times new roman", serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;">Because of what I mean by "OSR," as a return to old school, war-gaming style of play, together with, but not limited to a DYI <span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">attitude:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Finarvyn's <a href="http://odd74.proboards.com/" target="_blank">ODD74 proboard</a>, and</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">The <a href="http://www.knights-n-knaves.com/phpbb3/" target="_blank">Knights & Knaves Alehouse forum</a>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: georgia, times new roman, serif;">These are old-school internet formats that actually encourage conversation and not disappearing content:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: #fcfae7; caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;">This is the weapon of a Jedi Knight. Not as clumsy or random as a blaster; an elegant weapon for a more civilized age.</span></blockquote>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>8. Other places I might be found hanging out talking games:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">My own blog (you are here). I just don't post very often or very consistently. Sorry about that. (I hope that it is due to the fact that most of my hobby energy goes to actually gaming weekly.)</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">I also hang out and talk about games with real-live people that I know. Once a year I get to go to the <a href="https://ntrpgcon.com/" target="_blank">North Texas Role-playing Game Convention</a> and I get to talk to even more real live people about the game.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">I followed folks on google+ but just used it to share my blog posts. It is now going the way of the dodo. We will see what happens with the migration to MeWe.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>9. My awesome, pithy OSR take nobody appreciates enough:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">It is not my own, but <a href="http://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Delta</a>'s <a href="http://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2009/07/what-is-best-combat-algorithm.html" target="_blank">Target 20</a> combat and save resolution, combined with my own <a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/p/house-rules.html" target="_blank">house-ruled</a> hit-dice approach for distinguishing classes from one another. This has recently been "<a href="http://playingattheworld.blogspot.com/2018/09/why-did-armor-class-descend-from-9-to-2.html" target="_blank">historically justified</a>" by none other than <a href="http://playingattheworld.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Jon Peterson</a> himself!</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>10. My favorite non-OSR RPG:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomacy_(game)" target="_blank">Diplomacy</a>.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>11. Why I like OSR stuff:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">The OSR stuff that I like, when I like it, is stuff that has come out of someone's loving, amateur DYI hobby that is full of archetypal fantasy, full of interesting puzzles to solve, and </span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">immediately</span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"> usable at the table (= good, easily readable, well-keyed maps).</span></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>12. Two other cool OSR things you should know about that I haven’t named yet:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Wayne Rossi's <a href="http://initiativeone.blogspot.com/2013/05/od-setting-posts-in-pdf.html" target="_blank">The Original D&D Setting</a>. Just so good.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Paul Gorman's <a href="https://devilghost.com/publications/magicswords.pdf" target="_blank">Magic Swords</a>.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>13. If I could read but one other RPG blog but my own it would be:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Please, </span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">don't</span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"> read mine if you are only going to read two RPG blogs! I don't have nearly enough content. So, I get to name two. Since I have already mentioned <a href="http://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Delta's D&D Hotspot</a>, Jon Peterson's <a href="http://playingattheworld.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Playing at the World</a> blog, and Wayne Rossi's <a href="http://initiativeone.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Semper Initiativus Unum</a> blog, above, then I get two more:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><a href="http://jrients.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Jeff's Game Blog</a>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><a href="http://hackslashmaster.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Hack & Slash</a>.</span></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dyson Logos' </span><a href="https://rpgcharacters.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Dodecahedron</a><span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">should</span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"> get an honorable mention. His mapping skill and artistry is only improving. Unfortunately, for me, the actual gameable content of the maps has become increasingly blah and unusable over time. Dig back into his earlier stuff. Less pretty (perhaps, I </span>still think<span style="font-family: inherit;"> it is great), but far more usable for old school play: lots of overlapping rooms and corridors, secret hatches, passageways, doors, traps. Just more interesting and inspiring for my style of play.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Finally, Bryce Lynch's </span><a href="http://tenfootpole.org/ironspike/" target="_blank">Ten Foot Pole</a><span style="font-family: inherit;"> should receive another honorable mention. I agree with his <a href="http://tenfootpole.org/ironspike/?page_id=1201" target="_blank">module criteria</a> about 80%, and that is about as much as any mature adult can expect to agree with another mature adult if they are not members of a cult. My main points of disagreement are where he tends towards "realism" and "ecology," whereas I enjoy a more "funhouse" approach.</span></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>14. A game thing I made that I like quite a lot is:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333;">My own cumulative setting and house rules. I mean not just <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/nathan-jennings/a-supplement-for-perilous-realms/paperback/product-22563565.html" target="_blank">The Perilous Realms </a>supplement I published or the <a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/p/house-rules.html" target="_blank">simplified version</a> I have as a page on my blog, but all of the cumulative rulings I've tracked due to actual play in the campaign. I have it all compiled in a readable but loving imitation of the <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/932/Ready-Ref-Sheets-1978?it=1" target="_blank">Judge's Guild Ready Ref Sheets</a>. I call it "Campaign Aids and Inspirations." It is where I put all my generative charts, tables, and decision trees. I haven't shared that document and I may never. The point is for you to develop your own settings and rulings.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>15. I'm currently running/playing:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/nathan-jennings/a-supplement-for-perilous-realms/paperback/product-22563565.html" target="_blank">The Perilous Realms</a>, a medieval fantasy wargames campaign. I use my own campaign world based upon <a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/2018/02/perilous-realms-campaign-world-map.html" target="_blank">an anachronistic mash up of our own medieval and ancient past</a>. Each </span></span><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">particular</span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"> wilderness is the <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1511/outdoor-survival" target="_blank">Outdoor Survival</a> board set in such a way that the river flows to the nearest major body of water. The particular wilderness right now I call the Hollow Lands. They lie underneath the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caspian_Sea" target="_blank">Mazandarin Sea</a>, the nearest major city being <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qumis,_Iran" target="_blank">Hecatompylos</a> along the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road" target="_blank">Silk Route</a>. I use my own <a href="http://campaigns-playable.blogspot.com/p/house-rules.html" target="_blank">house rules</a> built upon <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/28306/ODD-Dungeons--Dragons-Original-Edition-0e?term=original+edition+dungeons+and+dragons++&test_epoch=0&it=1" target="_blank">Dungeons & Dragons</a> (the original rules for fantastic medieval wargames campaigns).</span></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>16. I don't care whether you use ascending or descending AC because:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">If I am at your table, I trust you will </span></span><span style="color: #333333;">tell me if my attack was successful. If you are at my table, I will tell you if your attack was successful. Thank you, Dave Arneson.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><b>17. The OSRest picture I could post on short notice:</b></span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Please see above.</span><br />
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="caret-color: rgb(51, 51, 51); color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Fight on!</span><br />
Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-32261395447817292252018-09-01T09:53:00.001-07:002018-09-01T09:54:53.347-07:00Armor Class, Movement, and fiddling with the archetypes<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/23/27/9b/23279bd5b1353422d0a31e524864a746.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="446" height="320" src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/23/27/9b/23279bd5b1353422d0a31e524864a746.jpg" width="237" /></a></div>
<br />
<b>Why would I buy a two-handed sword if it still just does 1d6 damage?</b><br />
<br />
Because, although you cannot wield a shield with it, it acts as a shield itself.<br />
<br />
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<br />
<b>Why would I wear anything less than full armor class 2 as a fighting-man?</b><br />
<br />
Because decreasing armor class increases encumbrance and thus slows movement.<br />
<br />
<i>AC, Encumbrance, MV table</i><br />
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<i>AC<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>Limit<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>Move<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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9<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
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900p<o:p></o:p></div>
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800p<o:p></o:p></div>
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700p<o:p></o:p></div>
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6<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
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600p<o:p></o:p></div>
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9”<o:p></o:p></div>
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5<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
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500p<o:p></o:p></div>
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4<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
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400p<o:p></o:p></div>
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3<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
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300p<o:p></o:p></div>
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2<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
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200p<o:p></o:p></div>
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6”<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br />
We use the four M's for our combat round cycle:<br />
Missle<br />
Magic<br />
Mêlée<br />
Move<br />
<br />
If your MV rate is better than that of an opponent, you might get an extra attack during the movement phase of the round.<br />
<br />
Formula: difference greater than 3 = success. Difference 3, opposing check on 1d6, +1 to the party with the higher rate. Equal rates, opposing check on 1d6.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7e/Conan9.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="330" data-original-width="296" height="320" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7e/Conan9.png" width="287" /></a></div>
<br />
But I'll throw in a bonus side affect for you: you get to be a fighting-man that looks like Conan the Barbarian.<br />
<br />
Recall that I allow both shields and helmets to decrease AC by 1. They just can't do so cumulatively such that you would go below your class limit.<br />
<br />
I'll even throw in something extra for you: ring mail costs and functions the same as leather. So you can wear a big ring-mail shirt, a horned helmet and wield a two-handed sword and function at armor class 5. (Or look like the above picture: no helmet but shield and regular sword. Whatever. You get the point.) You get the benefit of attack during movement phase. You are welcome.<br />
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<b>Why can't elves wear regular armor?</b><br />
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Recall that, because of the nails the crucified the King of Heaven, all iron is hallowed, stopping all (non-clerical) magic.<br />
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But elves can wear bronze armor, it costs and functions the same as chainmail. Most magical armor is ancient, thus already made of bronze.<br />
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<b>Then why couldn't magic-users wear, say, at least leather armor?</b><br />
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Silly. Don't you remember that, in order to cast spells, magic-users must utter the words of power and engage the somatic gestures that resonate the spell across planes? Armor would weigh down and block the somatic resonance. Everybody knows that.<br />
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<b>Fight on!</b>Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2617138022054780131.post-80036492617630320302018-07-23T15:44:00.000-07:002018-07-23T15:44:17.800-07:00Cantrips<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I am one of those D&D (original) players that looks askance at "new-fangled" things like "cantrips."<br />
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I was reading an <a href="http://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2014/06/spells-through-ages-spells-in-sup-i.html" target="_blank">excellent post on the new spells of the Greyhawk supplement by Delta</a> and, especially his point about spells that seem to weak, I thought: maybe this is what "cantrips" could look like in original edition play.<br />
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I think it adds to the Sword and Sorcery vibe and feel. I think it sets up good role-play opportunities at low-levels. I think it solves the "my magic user can only cast one spell" whine. (I disagree with the sentiment but it is sometimes easier to throw a bone than argue a point).<br />
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I'll list the cantrips and their descriptions. Then I'll give a little commentary and ask for your thoughts.<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
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<b>Cantrips</b></div>
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
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All magic-users cast cantrips without spell books or memorization; # cantrips per day = # memorized spells capable of caster; additional cantrips cast at cost of memorized spell</div>
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<b>Explosive runes</b></div>
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Runes explode; destroy parchment; 1d6 damage; Duration: caster negates at will; MU detects 1:2, negates 3:4</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Hidey-hole</b></div>
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Invisible, immovable inter-dimensional space exact size of caster; duration: caster’s lvl + 1d6; + Prestidigitate: Hang rope in air = Rope trick</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Ignite</b></div>
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Combustion equivalent to ignited tender</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Magic mouth</b></div>
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Up to 25 word vocal message issues from target object upon designated trigger condition</div>
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<b>Prestidigitate</b></div>
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Perform any number of the following:</div>
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Catch arrow</div>
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Card trick (also: win gambling until discovered)</div>
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Cups & balls</div>
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Detach digit</div>
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Dis/reappear (small object)</div>
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Escape bonds (requires speech and sight of bonds)</div>
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Float pen (or similar object) b/w hands</div>
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Hang rope in air (+ Hidey-hole = Rope trick)</div>
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Link rings</div>
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Restore cut-rope</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Mesmerize</span></div>
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Charm willing subject</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Pyrotechnics</b></div>
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Alter shape and color of fire or increase and color smoke</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Read person</b></div>
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Divine side, class, race, relative life-energy (normal/heroic/superheroic, etc.), close relations, core motive or goal of willing subject by means of one or more of cartomancy, scrying, palmistry, numerology, etc.</div>
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<b>Suggest</b></div>
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Agree with or to any one complete statement or command that does no obvious harm; successful save negates; Duration: 1 week</div>
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<b>Ventriloquy</b></div>
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Voice issues elsewhere; Range: 6”; Duration: 2 turns</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Thieves</b>: Prestidigitate; Mesmerize; Read person; Suggest</div>
</blockquote>
I nerfed "explosive runes," in terms of damage, to make it fit into the "zeroth level" spell that a cantrip is supposed to be.<br />
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"Hidey-hole" lets a magic user hide for protection or snooping, but is not as powerful as invisibility as it is immovable.<br />
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"Ignite," and "Pyrotechnics," have always seemed like something all magic-users ought to have, automatically, without needing to burn a spell. Gandalf setting the pine cones on fire in the Hobbit gave me the inspiration for describing ignition as being like burning tender (so, more than just a spark, but not kindling and certainly no explosion!). And pyrotechnics in general is a Gandalf-thing.<br />
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"Magic mouth," and "Ventriloquy," and why not?<br />
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Okay, so I know what you are thinking. "Prestidigitate"? How lame? Who needs it? I see this as a part of the Sword and Sorcery feel. The new magician is invited into the court of the over-lord -- he wants some proof he has a real magician and the magic-user doesn't want to burn a memorized spell to prove himself. Some prestidigitation should do the trick. But, isn't all this just slight of hand? Is any real magic used? You decide. But I like the idea that a magic-user could join rings and use that as something really handy in a pinch! Gygax said, in the intro to D&D "and the magic is real." So there you go.<br />
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Okay, so, I know what you are thinking. "Willing subject?" Who would willingly submit themselves to a magic-user's whim with "Mesmerize" and "Read person." Well, judging from the real-world, quite a few raise their hand when the illusionist says, "can I get a volunteer." Imagine a Sword and Sorcery setting: the magician has been invited in to prove himself. He does some prestidigitation and impresses everyone in the court, even the high-lord. So, charmingly, he says, "Great Lord, would you like me to do a reading for you?" How could he refuse? He looks at the lord's palms, he lays out his tarot cards, and he finds out some choice information. That night, he reunites with the party, camping out in the woods out of sight and ear-shoot. He delivers the information they need to seal the attack. (Or did he? Well, the party will find out soon enough!)<br />
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"Suggest," allows for a kind of Obi-Wan-Kenobi "these are not the droids you are looking for" kind of effect.<br />
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Thieves, a la the Grey Mouser, can pull of some of these cantrips as well. Is his prestidigitation just a trick, while the magic-user's is real? I don't know. Why don't you ask him? I feel sure he will tell you the truth.<br />
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So, what do you think?<br />
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Fight on!Tetramorphhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07253316716885460459noreply@blogger.com0