tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21012204661811783822024-03-28T17:04:32.574-04:00How to Succeed in RPGs or Die TryingA blog about roleplaying. You probably shouldn't read it.S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.comBlogger681125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-45720586227252677592024-03-08T07:00:00.043-05:002024-03-08T07:00:00.137-05:00State of the Union<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1586" data-original-width="1600" height="396" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjVoLRqEBlIKZCHjIUGwgwxaIx20P-A12meW_H5Wem-E7gnRUzBlghxUiTYVMJGurUQqUY_Ihz-NzS8ZmnpiwdES2EAoWPhUPdkLs7opjRaL6-n8rhmFJ7NNNgGleXCgSr3T_YN_DLVEtevKclNLk4XQ_fljpMeiJTWHGrC_UFqfCJ4HXUGzXogAdTm7fc/w400-h396/Bush%20learns%20about%20RPGs.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Sir, a second state-run space research organization has released a tabletop RPG."</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p>It was inevitable.<p>We have seen idiosyncratic weirdos and megacorporations releasing RPGs for decades now, so it was only a matter of time before nation-states became involved in the role-playing game hobby.</p><p>A couple of bits of role-playing game-related effluvia have come to my attention over the past few days, both of which were released by national organizations focused on space research:</p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>Releasing earlier this week, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration released <i><a href="https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/multimedia/online-activities/the-lost-universe/" target="_blank">The Lost Universe</a></i>, an adventure clearly designed for <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank">fifth edition <i>Dungeons & Dragons</i></a> but simple enough to transfer to your analogue adventure game of choice. The adventure is designed to be educational, covering information about the Hubble Space Telescope and various cosmological phenomena.</li><li>Releasing sometime in the past six months (I found <a href="https://twitter.com/BiblioTheater/status/1707271417639694422" target="_blank">a tweet</a> from September about this game despite only hearing about it yesterday), the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan released <a href="https://prc.nao.ac.jp/publication/sandcastle/" target="_blank"><i>Sandcastle</i></a>, a full fantasy role-playing game system that they plan to use for outreach purposes while encouraging other organizations to do the same and likewise encouraging individuals to use the system for their own enjoyment.<br /></li></ol><p>What a difference fifty years makes, huh?<br /></p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-35887397573955699642024-03-01T07:00:00.030-05:002024-03-01T11:27:26.458-05:00The Leap Yeap<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.tumblr.com/yesterdaysprint/157723269809/evansville-press-indiana-february-5-1912" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="133" data-original-width="894" height="60" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbt-clSFIrMg1BeWl-nBzpunRsqIx9vpn4Tjjv3K_vXdapzugQ1dBi45YMsz1exuB5vWWkH_EdHxqUturUPr9HqoNsKIjR1NxqMxolYP_tU1j-Ni4DRLKvl1b6TxacFsfUDI0flPqWHZfFIOuQZRURdQX2zV0VQpraSpcseGy8VlJnCTHxken6qxohiamK/w400-h60/leap%20yeap.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Evansville Press, Indiana, February 5, 1912</td></tr></tbody></table><p>The leap yeap is considered native to the plains of the lush world of Varasla, although scholars have documented the creatures on other worlds. A leap yeap appears as a cross between a rabbit and a kangaroo, albeit the end result is as large as a Clydesdale. Although the creatures roam wild across the plains, they have also been domesticated as mounts and pack animals and so may be found in settlements outside their native range. (For example, although they are not native to the mountains, travelers have found them to make good, sure-footed mounts in uneven terrain. Some long-haired varieties have even been bred for colder climates and higher altitudes.)</p><p>Although they tend to be skittish rather than aggressive, the occasional leap yeap-related death is not unknown; their hind legs can deliver a powerful kick, and their claws are sharp enough to disembowel victims.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;">BECMI-style stats:</h2><p><b>No. Enc.:</b> 1d6 (5d6)<br /><b>Alignment:</b> Neutral<br /><b>Movement:</b> 180' (60')<br /><b>Armor Class:</b> 7<br /><b>Hit Dice:</b> 3<br /><b>Attacks:</b> 2 (1 bite, 1 kick)<br /><b>Damage:</b> 1d4/1d4<br /><b>Save:</b> F2<br /><b>Morale:</b> 6<br /><b>Hoard Class:</b> None<br /><b>XP:</b> 50<br />Leap yeaps are skittish animals, found both roaming in herds or alone as mounts. They can leap up to 30', and often do if frightened—a riot of stamping feet and screeching.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;">5e-style stats:</h2><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;">Leap Yeap</span></b><br /><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Large beast, unaligned</span></i><br /><b>Armor Class</b> 13<br /><b>Hit Points</b> 22 (3d10+6)<br /><b>Speed</b> 50 ft.<br /><b>Str</b> 13 (+1), <b>Dex</b> 17 (+3), <b>Con</b> 15 (+2), <b>Int</b> 2 (-4), <b>Wis</b> 11 (+0), <b>Cha</b> 7 (-2)<br /><b>Skills</b> Perception +2<br /><b>Senses</b> passive Perception 12<br /><b>Languages</b> —<br /><b>Challenge</b> 1/2 (100 XP)<br /><b><i>Standing Leap.</i></b> The leap yeap’s long jump is up to 30 feet and its high jump is up to 15 feet, with or without a running start.<br /><u>Actions</u><br /><b><i>Kick.</i></b> <i>Melee Weapon Attack:</i> +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. <i>Hit:</i> 6 (2d4+1) slashing damage.<br /><u>Bonus Actions</u><br /><b><i>Skittish.</i></b> The leap yeap takes the Disengage, Dodge, or Hide action.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-73721730078544489352024-01-26T07:00:00.004-05:002024-01-26T07:00:00.135-05:00FIGHTS WILL BE BATTLED<p><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgdesigner/13108/mike-mearls" target="_blank">Mike Mearls</a> started <a href="https://www.patreon.com/mikemearls/" target="_blank">a Patreon</a>, which of course reminded me of the majesty that is <i><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20070717150218/https://mearls.livejournal.com/123678.html" target="_blank">Fight Battle</a></i>. My friends and I have been laughing about <i><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20070717150218/https://mearls.livejournal.com/123678.html" target="_blank">Fight Battle</a></i> for over fifteen years, and now so can you!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20070717150218/https://mearls.livejournal.com/123678.html" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="688" data-original-width="525" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR_EVQTAEml76HtLvjEP8_S2IJGTLzGyDacTewhfx4z3wOQrqEob3cBjprDrGx2x4rqu2ck18nf-rpXkq7RfKSN9m97xmZoLBVIYwW634JhhVsDgEBy5OGOEDyWjgpaE0uutNzBYhopG7PHVZlm0FwYC8Im1Qy2awApdCK23sm_RqG8kefxEDRz7ZXFGik/s16000/this%20is%20your%20brain%20on%20FIGHT%20BATTLE.jpg" /></a></div>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-91852936999101534712023-12-25T07:00:00.175-05:002023-12-25T07:00:00.252-05:00Review: 2023 Unknown Armies Halloween Game Jam<p>Over at the Unknown Armies Fan Club Discord, <a href="https://bellenmred.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">mellonbread</a> organized a <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Gk7SCn3oA94yii2l4krKvIDwn2Doo_XOwDOI_ECiHDU/edit" target="_blank">2023 Halloween Game Jam for <i>Unknown Armies</i></a> and asked me to review the results on this blog. (Where stats appear, the entries assume the theoretical audience is using the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/40018/unknown-armies-3rd-edition" target="_blank">third edition</a> of the rules.) Whether or not that was a good idea is an exercise best left for the reader.</p><p>Three disclaimers before we get started:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>If you find yourself seriously using reviews to discern whether or not you will enjoy a work, you will achieve best results if you find someone whose writing you enjoy and whose values more-or-less appear to align with your own. Fortunately in the case of this game jam, you have plenty of choices: <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WErHGnzApMsGTXbWmvyv7Eo_5g_Qcx7d1BBgsO5bWl8/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Frahnk</a>, <a href="https://bellenmred.blogspot.com/2023/11/2023-unknown-armies-halloween-jam.html" target="_blank">mellonbread</a>, <a href="https://zomnodrome.blogspot.com/2023/11/unknown-armies-halloween-jam-2023.html" target="_blank">zomner</a>, and <a href="https://soundcloud.com/33point3fm/the-2023-unknown-armies-halloween-jam" target="_blank">33.3 FM</a> all have contributed reviews, and their style might better inform you whether you're going to like a given piece of art or not.</li><li>Reviews aside, you should read all of the entries anyway, because people worked hard on these and the longest is just shy of 1,333 words. Most are shorter than that.</li><li>If you are unfamiliar with <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i>, it's a game about power and responsibility, set in the modern world but taking place amidst the secret occult milieu behind our everyday world. As you might imagine, that's going to sometimes involve violence, sex, occultism, and fictions being presented as truths. I will try to call out specific things in some of the entries that I think people might want to know before they read them, but I will probably miss stuff because my own view of what is and is not distressing in art is no doubt different than yours. (For example: when recommending, say, horror movies to people, a frequent refrain is inevitably something along the lines of, "<i>Ah, fuck. I forgot about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostle_(film)" target="_blank">The Heathen's Stand</a> scene.</i>" So, tread carefully in these entries, in case there's something you find deeply distressing that I overlooked.)</li></ol><p></p><p>Without further ado, here are the 20 entries of the inaugural 2023 Halloween Jam:</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BTFxutgLIEXQi3emfygEZU25csa3cEHuzz6JxMNM_cY/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Four of Chimneys</a> by mellonbread</span></b><br />Every beggar knows that you put a little change in your begging cup before you go out on the street to entice people to give, so mellonbread starts the game jam with three entries to help facilitate the project. This first entry is a solid story hook including a cabal and a location. A classic of the genre, "Four of Chimneys" describes the standard "backroom occult poker game" schtick familiar to fans of <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Call_(novel)" target="_blank">Last Call</a></i>. As a bonus, the scale is left intentionally vague so you could put it in any game: it could as easily cater to the local sad sack losers as it could to a table of powerful high-rolling occultists. (As written, the entry implies that all sorts of people across the spectrum may be found here, but you could easily have it cater to only one crowd.) I would absolutely drop these guys into my game in a heartbeat with no changes. My only complaint is that I would change "splat" to "sourcebook," but that's a personal preference as time (and language) march on without me in the fast-paced world of internet discourse. Since I'm an easy mark, "Crassus Belly" made me laugh.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KhG70GsysuyrDmbLwBqpJB4C8met-ZBRhoZCYGG302o/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">The Greggs and the Graveyard</a> by mellonbread</span></b><br />A zombie survival horror scenario featuring grad school academics who have delved into forbidden secrets. While the writing is solid and surviving zombies is gonzo fun in any RPG, this feels more like an <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/59358/esoteric-enterprises" target="_blank">Esoteric Enterprises</a></i> story hook than an <i>Unknown Armies</i> one. (In the sense that this scenario has an OSR sensibility of "lots of stuff for the PCs to mess with" while ignoring the specific themes that really make <i>Unknown Armies</i> unique. You can use the game as a generic horror engine if you want, but I already had a couple of broad-spectrum occult horror games when I came to <i>Unknown Armies</i>, and I think the idiosyncratic setting sells the game.) Surviving mindless zombies in <i>Unknown Armies</i> doesn't really do much with the system or the setting that you couldn't do somewhere else. If Dr. Frost and Bell Breaker had ambitions beyond random mayhem, this might have worked for me, but as it stands, this is a generic horror scenario. (Stats for the zombies might also be nice, although I am sympathetic to the limitations of space.) On the positive side, I like that the instigators of this tragedy are a professor and grad students. <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/814/call-cthulhu" target="_blank">Call of Cthulhu</a></i> and <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/27917/delta-green-role-playing-game" target="_blank">Delta Green</a></i> get a lot of academic horror scenarios given <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._P._Lovecraft" target="_blank">the source material</a>, but <i>Unknown Armies</i> has been begging for more since the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/51941/unknown-armies" target="_blank">first edition core rulebook</a> included that example plot of a professor tangling with the First and Last Man, and since the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/45650/unknown-armies" target="_blank">second edition core rulebook</a> included that story hook about Professor Morbius and Lab Section Six.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/12SQDQjkdyKrNy1-NndFamb3OA5qGg8205MQ6IVGUmJY/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Darla Jean</a> by mellonbread</span></b><br />An NPC (often rendered as a "GMC" or "Game Master Character" in typical <i>Unknown Armies</i> parlance) for the canonical cabal known as the Sect of the Naked Goddess, Darla Jean typically acts as a bodyguard for members of the Sect. Since the Sect is a cult based around the worship of an ascended goddess who also happened to be a grindhouse porn star in the 1990s, Darla also has the skills one might expect of a sex magician. One of the limitations of the rulebooks and the typically-tight page counts of RPG books is that there often isn't enough space to include a full GMC write-up and plot hooks, so the comparative freedom of Google Docs gives you plenty of room for both. Darla is a little more Identity-heavy than I typically like my GMCs, but I also disagree with most conversations about character stats and rules in the Unknown Armies Fan Club Discord so take that critique with a grain of salt.</p><p>Also, since there are three more mellonbread entries at the end of this contest, this feels like as good a place as any to note that there's a certain quality to the authorial voice that I call, for lack of a better term, <i>'90s edge</i>. (Irreverent or flippant, often about sensitive or taboo subjects. You catch whiffs of it now and again in the first and second editions of <i>Unknown Armies</i>, and scattered throughout the various '90s <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgpublisher/464/white-wolf-entertainment-ab" target="_blank">White Wolf</a> books.) I honestly didn't notice it in mellonbread's work until I read the other fourteen entries and then read the final three entries, but if that's the sort of thing that grates on you like nails on a chalkboard (and the various online complaints about '90s RPGs seem to suggest that it will for some of you), you might find mellonbread's writing or attitude off-putting in ways I didn't.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1H6LT9x9k61phWuBb-57pLrr-pLEVt8Z9/view?usp=drive_link" target="_blank">Alexander Head and the Undercroft</a> by Traskomancer</span></b><br />This is a GMC that had something bad happen to him, but now finds that he can do something bad to other people in turn. Alexander is a solid character concept that is a pure wildcard: while he could end up as an ally to a player cabal, his prickly demeanor makes it likely that he acts as a minor antagonist, or even a major antagonist to a fledgling cabal. (Of course, if you're desperate to threaten someone but lack the gumption to do it yourself, you could probably hire him. Just make sure that he doesn't get turned against you later...) He reminds me a little of the journalist Carl Streator in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Palahniuk" target="_blank">Chuck Palahniuk</a>'s <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lullaby_(Palahniuk_novel)" target="_blank">Lullaby</a></i>, which of course endears me to him to no end. My one complaint is that the stat block includes a custom power that refers you to <i>another</i> document rather than just telling the GM what it does, but on the plus side, <i><a href="https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/216775/Me-Myself--You--Identities-for-Unknown-Armies" target="_blank">Me, Myself & You</a></i> (which describes the Terrorize supernatural Identity) is Pay What You Want at DriveThruRPG.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/13iOZH0eN5BnUX1q2FGPYFXmP72rdTXWn/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">STYX SUBWAY</a> by Indigo</span></b><br />Short and sweet, this is a travel ritual that can take you between any places that have subway stations, even in other dimensions (called Otherspaces in <i>Unknown Armies</i>). No GM can ever have enough functioning rituals, and this one is short and to the point. My one edit is that, given how travel (especially to and from Otherspaces) is usually considered a potent thing in Unknown Armies, I might make this ritual a significant ritual rather than a minor one, but that's more of a "vibe" thing than a "game balance" thing. And I imagine the escalating cost in material components is meant to counteract the fact that the ritual only costs minor charges. Good luck finding more silver dollars in Ricketyland...</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vTY2C6MlxsBe3UYN3SKhfwViGyCfAZTm4vMhv2qbFFnBAR62_dh1XGaylEnYKtfr2twADcDgM_i8FW-/pub" target="_blank">Otherspace Sickness</a> by Valiant</span></b><br />A mystical illness that afflicts people who delve too frequently into Otherspaces. I'm partial to diseases in general, and think that interesting consequences are always of value, but as the author writes in the penultimate paragraph, "Otherspace Sickness is extremely disempowering. Be aware of the amount of control that you're taking away from your players over their ability to affect the world. Or lean into it." To keep it fair, you would have to <i>heavily</i> telegraph its presence before springing it on a PC, and if a GMC is infected, then you don't need the rules, just the consequences. Assuming an inexperienced GM, this entry could benefit from some design notes describing how it is used.</p><p>Of note: shortly before editing this, I saw a comment on Discord that Valiant was inspired by the Carcosa stuff in <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/327896/impossible-landscapes" target="_blank">Impossible Landscapes</a></i> for <i>Delta Green</i>, which makes perfect sense. If you see Otherspaces as an eldritch infection that's spreading, this would be a perfect entry point to facilitate that.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v6M6aHyQ2swLuoPTAmoV5QV54H3-6cGEZEVF9_0KRCA/edit" target="_blank">The Secret Saints of the Cecilites</a> by tormsen</span></b><br />The title tells you exactly what you're about to read: a concise and evocative collection of heretical saints venerated by the Vatican's secret exorcist squad, the Order of St. Cecil. If you're looking to make the Order of St. Cecil more esoteric, this is clearly how you do it: add more secret histories, give additional options for church miracles, that sort of thing. (And while St. Cecil is fictional, many of the other saints described here were actual people, which I always think adds a lot of texture to a game.) My main complaint about the structure of this entry is that I don't think GMs need any special rules to describe Cecilite miracles: any recorded "church miracles" easily fit within the existing <i>Unknown Armies</i> paradigms of gutter magick, supernatural Identities, and avatar paths. (And the unofficial Cecilite sourcebook <i><a href="https://www.atlas-games.com/product_tables/AG6009" target="_blank">Thin Black Line</a></i> even includes a Christian adept school.)</p><p>Ultimately, this one fell flat for me. There's a perennial conversation in the Unknown Armies Fan Club Discord about making the Order of St. Cecil weirder to bring them in line with the more esoteric factions of <i>Unknown Armies</i>. And while I applaud any efforts to make a role-playing game one's own by hacking the rules or altering the setting, I think a lot of the "Order of St. Cecil is boring" discourse ignores the role the canonical Cecilites play in the game's ecosystem. I'll spare you the details on why I think the Cecilites are a clever subversion on par with the other occult horror deconstructions in <i>Unknown Armies</i>, as that's a little outside the scope of these reviews.</p><p>Obviously, if you're one of the people who thinks the Order of St. Cecil needs to be weirder, this is a good place to start. If you're not, give it a pass. (But maybe still steal the secret saints for a splinter sect, or another esoteric cabal of Christian mystics.)</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/18smYy1Hmpn_WL67tOq7LOsuaRH_8Hxrs4nTJn8b2et8/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Felix Kaufman, Not a Medium</a> by Ben</span></b><br />Felix Kaufman is a normal guy who imagines conversations with the dead as a coping mechanism. He's not a medium, but some people think he is because of how vividly he imagines these conversations. That makes Felix a great target for paranormal investigators who think he's just a medium in denial, and an even better target for cabals who know just enough to be dangerous and think he can help them talk to ghosts or demons. I am always a huge fan of mundane GMCs who are going to intersect with the occult underground badly, as well as potential hoaxes for player groups operating in the paranormal investigator mode. The writing is evocative, and the character is up for grabs. Is he going to become the subject of inquiry for a high-level cabal who sees occult symbolism everywhere? Is he going to be the (accidental, unwitting) push for a street-level cabal to fall into the occult? Will his coping mechanism explode into a full-blown supernatural power when he finally intersects with the occult underground? Some rumors or story hooks might be useful, but sometimes you just need a guy who isn't quite supernatural but might be interesting to someone who is.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ypXTibsMuyVuY9lRfjEtduRW9cSi65mQVYd_4RpdvGc/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">University Street</a> by Justin Miland</span></b><br />Those who know the secret paths can enter the secret Otherspace beneath the rail station at 3rd and University in Seattle, finding their way to an alternate Seattle where University Street is still part of the University of Washington campus. This was one of my favorite entries: clean, evocative prose describing an Otherspace with GMCs and story hooks! This is the sort of entry that should make a GM start scheming as to how they can get their players' characters to Seattle. Justin does a lot with the limited space, and this is practically begging for a full treatment as part of DriveThruRPG's Statosphere program. I want more, but such are the vagaries of a Game Jam. (And it's better to leave an audience wanting more than to tire them before they reach the ending.) </p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rz0DX5vsfSyyk9hnbShGkBzCOT5c8ErOBwvrESynEUU/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">The Cleaners</a> by Kate C and mellonbread</span></b><br />The PCs are shinkansen cleaners (and obsessive sorcerers based around cleanliness called Katharomancers) whose union is being undercut by a bunch of scabs working for some company called <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Mokusouji </span>based out of Tokyo<span id="docs-internal-guid-716def53-7fff-df0c-f198-d0ab1fbba867"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space-collapse: preserve;">. But the secret is that CEO Rin Maeda can afford to underbid the competition because his workforce are ghostly slaves pushed into earthly shells!</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space-collapse: preserve;">If you liked <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorry_to_Bother_You" target="_blank"><i>Sorry to Bother You</i></a> but thought the plot could use less gonzo science-fiction and more necromancy, you'll like this one. </span>While I think this is a clear candidate for expansion into a full pdf on Statosphere, it bites off a little more than it can chew as a humble Game Jam entry. There's nothing wrong with being ambitious, of course, but if the authors left this as "asshole manager and his weird necromancy scam" without turning it into a full-fledged scenario, I would probably want more in the good way rather than the bad one. An experienced GM can figure out stats for the dummies (I'd probably start with Phasma from <i>Book Two: Run</i>) and sort through the group creation of a cabal of Japanese Katharomancers, but including those dummy stats and pregenerated characters would make this complete and ready-to-run. (If the authors have to omit something, I could even live without Rin's stats, since in my experience, a GM is more likely to need the minions than the boss. Especially since he's just a rich guy with one supernatural gimmick; if I'm pressed for time, that's the sort of character who might not get full stats, only a couple of notes.) Given the limitations of space, the authors chose to include four different ways to differentiate the PC Katharomancers rather than include pregenerated characters, which is a nice compromise.</p><p>On Discord, mellonbread mentioned that the secret way to defeat the dummies would be culturally known to the characters and Japanese players, but likely obscure to players from other countries. (And of course, just volunteering that information gives away one of the scenario's secrets.) If one were to expand this into a full Statosphere thing, that's probably an important problem to solve, especially for inexperienced players; experienced players will probably either already know enough Japanese folklore, deduce that the clues are adding up to something and either do research or ask about it (which might prompt a Knowledge check or some other GM contrivance), or determine some other solution.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQxBEk-2stdC-IJH7gX3KSLWGdAwKBP04lyl4mNuMNbwvHH_DABqq5CltMsIiW2pvZSyf5vM1ZA2-rj/pub" target="_blank">Galatea</a> by Valiant</span></b><br />An AI startup in San Francisco has been training their large language model on occult texts and is getting some weird results.</p><p><i>Unknown Armies</i> has the occasional cyberpunk flavor, given the millennial timeframe and the focus on postmodern magick. From the books themselves, the second edition core book includes a story hook about the dot com bust that sounds similar to Galatea (or at least what will probably happen to them within the next couple of years), while <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/220486/unknown-armies-book-two-run" target="_blank">Book Two: Run</a></i> for third edition includes GNOMON as one of the factions. (And that ignores other cyberpunk elements like The Hacker from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/220485/unknown-armies-book-one-play" target="_blank">Book One: Play</a></i>, or the fact that Alex Abel employs a private army of troubleshooters like some sort of <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/337/cyberpunk-2020" target="_blank">Cyberpunk 2020</a></i> CEO.)</p><p>If you have space in your game for that sort of stuff, this is a solid fledgling cabal concept with plenty of story hooks to get characters involved. (Or you could just as easily take these notes and play the characters given, fleshing out their stats and backstories during your group's initial corkboard creation.) As you've no doubt noticed by now, I'm a big fan of wildcard GMCs and cabals who are ultimately clueless rubes about to unleash a serious problem beyond their ability to control. (And in this case, they clearly have some in-the-know dark money behind them, meaning they could tie into any other faction in your campaign.) My only complaint about this one is that I could use a <i>little</i> more: since the author is 400 words below the word limit, there is plenty of room to define the computer acronyms used, and anything that makes an entry easier to use gets it on tables faster. Likewise, that extra space could probably be used to give an additional detail or two for each character in the cabal to make them pop. (Although if a GM were to use this as the template for a character creation corkboard, less detail is likely a little better.)</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AmbpdgvdxLXZk8ob78FU9lyDG5inPs4j/edit" target="_blank">Bartlett and Sprouse, College Thaumaturges</a> by Traskomancer</span></b><br />This entry describes three rituals left behind when a budding college cabal violently imploded. Given that, let's start with my complaints about this one: the author really buries the lede, as my initial assumption was that this was going to be about two collegiate wizards rather than three rituals. The title and opening page describe two thaumaturges, but you don't learn until the end that one is dead and the other is missing, having left behind these rituals. (If I were editing this, I would probably start with the final paragraph letting the audience know that the pair is dead or missing, then put the rituals, and then give their backstory.) Aside from that jarring bit of authorial legerdemain, I liked this entry: one of my other biases is that I think no GM can ever have enough functioning rituals, and the thematic links among the three rituals are strong. (They're all based around college tropes.) I imagine the time dilation ritual (designed for studying, naturally) would get the most use, although that's probably more revealing about how I run games than anything else.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-7D50ZKi5nppzvfws2189eGFuRqObGrKrl1mZ3Clkcs/edit" target="_blank">Ultraflat</a> by Cliomancer</span></b><br />Sometimes, buildings with non-sequential numbers—like places that omit the number thirteen for superstitious reasons—grow an extra room. (But watch out!) This is a magickal trap, and while I'm often wary of traps because it's easy to telegraph them too little, I like this one because it does three things I enjoy: it gives the victim plenty of chances to realize something is wrong and escape (I would probably allow at least some of that without rolling, but I tend towards fewer rolls anyway); it does something cool with non-sequential numbers in buildings; and it's a pun! (Flat and flat, get it?) Besides, I ultimately suspect that it's unlikely that a PC would get trapped in here. It seems more likely to be used as a story hook: someone important to the PCs goes missing and they were last seen at the Sherry-Netherland Hotel...</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UL3kw0Ciy4v6GdDyAZraQoZqWr6XEpkzYId9SYaQDPQ/" target="_blank">CÁBALA DEL REY DEL INVIERNO</a> by Mechristopheles</span></b><br />Based out of Los Angeles, Oscar Fuentes is a refrigerator repair man who has also developed a way to trap <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Llorona" target="_blank">las lloronas</a> in old refrigerators. (Which is good, because the ghosts are a plague across the city.) Mechristopheles had the absolute gall to release a truly excellent Los Angeles story hook a mere three months after my seven-year-long <a href="https://cucullus-non-facit-monachum.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">Los Angeles game</a> ends. Tight, evocative writing with solid hooks <i>and</i> ties to existing folklore. (Unsurprisingly, this was one of my other favorite entries.) The entry even ends with a sample scenario that is <i>almost</i> ready to use. The only thing I would want out of this one is some structural stuff to make it a little more friendly to a new GMs: take another editing pass or three, because I bet Mechristopheles can cut some of the word count and make this even tighter; and then use that reduced word count to put the ghost the PCs are hunting into the scenario. <i>Unknown Armies</i> stats are simple enough that a sentence of background and a sentence for the revenant's Urge would make the included scenario ready-to-run right out of the box.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UfCP9j53ajte_SUouKQsv2vnE384GqySiyvN3zPz3FM/edit" target="_blank">Gert</a> by Dennis Kearney</span></b><br />There's a booze wizard who haunts the last train before the rail shuts down: give her a drink, tell her your troubles, and she'll unburden your soul. This is as simple as it gets: terse, tight writing for a GMC that could fit into any game. While I normally would ask that a short background on a GMC also includes stats since there's plenty of space, that feels hypocritical, since I might never actually give a character like this any sort of numbered statistics. I wouldn't say no to a bit more, though: What does she do with the secrets? What happens if someone takes a stress check for telling her a secret? (I guarantee there's someone who would take a Self or Helplessness check for telling their secrets.) But I also don't think there's anything wrong in this case with leaving that stuff for the GM.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1k1HrVmeFg2SYVW5vF6hQPKI62-4hYVf34WZ1zkTXhdY/" target="_blank">Urizen Shaft</a> by Cliomancer</span></b><br />An urbex tour guide in the London underground, Urizen Shaft is a hair's breadth away from the occult underground. By this point, you can probably guess that I liked this one, as it's another character who is just on the cusp of the occult underground, and so is likely to intersect with PCs at any level of activity. (Plus I'm a sucker for a GMC with both a William Blake reference and a pun in the name.) It's complete, it does what it's supposed to do, and it makes me wish I was running a game in London (or at least in a place with a ubiquitous subway system). Including a ritual in his stat block as "something this guy has seen several times but hasn't performed himself" is an excellent bit of color.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/10GoH83eGWb0MjQ7-uPpy8MOuK97TiEwVmfWqz08IdaU/" target="_blank">The Mascot</a> by Gatto Grigio</span></b><br />The Archetype of The Mascot. If "The Secret Saints of the Cecilites" is an entry that I thought was good despite not personally liking it, "The Mascot" is an entry that I personally liked despite thinking it needs more work and not even being sure if I would ever use it. Real talk: making an avatar Archetype or adept school is <i>hard</i>. With rituals, GMCs, story hooks, and maybe even simple scenarios, an experienced GM can probably eyeball them and expect them to work without much downstream processing. It's conceivable that you can develop them during the span of a week-long game jam. But Archetypes and adept schools really need time, lots of eyes, and playtesting to get the flavor just right, so dropping one for a game jam is a gutsy move.</p><p>(<b>An aside:</b> Although adept schools require much more work, I might argue that Archetypes are harder, because you're theoretically limited to concepts that are universally applicable, and getting folks to agree on those is a tall order. Of course, you have a little wiggle room: a given concept might always be deliberately placed into the Statosphere by a sufficiently dedicated wizard.)</p><p>So with that preamble, it's a decent concept and I generally liked the channels. (And connecting the modern mascot or fursuit to the <i>Commedia dell'arte</i> is a bonkers connection in the best <i>Unknown Armies</i> tradition.) I don't know that The Mascot is likely to appear in my own games, but I have a handful of changes I would consider if it did:<br /></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>That "never appear outside of the suit" taboo is too rigorous for an avatar path. Having to spend a certain amount of time each day in communion with the suit, or never becoming recognizable outside of the suit is a more reasonable taboo for The Mascot. If a GM loosens the taboo, I believe mellonbread suggested that the powers don't work outside of the suit, which is a good limitation.</li><li>I keep waffling on the "original character" only bit. That's <i>probably</i> right—there's a clear differentiation between, say, Gritty and somebody in a Mickey Mouse costume at Disneyland—but I don't know if that difference is enough for the Statosphere. Then again, it's probably just a question of dedication: if you're just putting on the Mickey Mouse suit for a paycheck, you're probably not dedicated enough to become an avatar of the Archetype anyway. If you're putting on the Mickey Mouse suit because doing so makes you feel different, it probably still fits.</li><li>I would tighten the wording on that first channel to make it clear that The Mascot can walk around in the suit without people feeling weird about it. The avatar still needs an invitation or a reservation or whatever, but nobody is going to tell you to take off the suit once you're there.</li><li>I would likewise tighten the fourth channel to be more in line with the coercion rules. Making the fourth channel something like, "You have to pay attention to the Mascot avatar or else take a Helplessness (9) stress check," feels more appropriate than eating a random Violence (9) check because SonicFox glared at me. (I would probably change the targeted meters from Violence and Helplessness to Helplessness and Self.) I'm also not sure about this channel only being used three times per day; a lot of fourth channel powers just <i>work</i>, or work with higher limits. I'd probably let it work indefinitely with a successful avatar roll. (But in such a case, the avatar would do well to remember that attention is not always good, so you don't want to use it all the time.)</li></ol><p></p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mz2QUGfL51JO8X14JXwL_LSAB_gxwCf0A0bycJOG5nI/" target="_blank">Samuel Pin Bone</a> by mellonbread</span></b><br />A GMC who owns a tribal lending company. Here we end as we began, with three more mellonbread entries. As noted back in the "Darla Jean" entry, after being away from mellonbread's writing for several entries, I only noticed The Dreaded '90s Edge™ when I returned to it. And I mention this because mellonbread's flippant tone about an indigenous hard-boiled loan shark might rub a reader the wrong way, so dive into this entry with your eyes open.</p><p>By this point in the narrative, my "GMC who is mundane but is positioned to stumble into the occult underground" bias is probably now well-documented. This guy isn't anywhere near the occult underground (apart from being marginalized, which admittedly describes a fair number of <i>Unknown Armies</i> characters), but he clearly operates in adjacent spaces—someone's scumbag player character probably benefited from a shifty payday loan scheme, and now this is the poor schmuck who came to collect. (Although it's easy enough to flip that script if the PCs are native, in which case they could easily be the people he calls when expecting trouble. "Cabal that formed after some really angry occultist appeared at the Steelhead Lending offices," has a lot of potential as an inciting incident.)</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EvyEe7Dv5OIknWbxlHE8T-dca1VmqJ4DcsE42xdz-K0/" target="_blank">Uncut Gems</a> by mellonbread</span></b><br />A genital mutilation ritual that enhances the caster's athletic prowess. This is the entry that reminded me that I should probably put some sort of warning on these, so once again: <b>this is the genital mutilation entry</b>. My well-documented bias toward functioning rituals—especially including rumors and story hooks—means this one was a winner for me. An onerous minor ritual is a good hook for any PC or GMC, especially since the benefits are potentially quite tangible for any party. (And I disagree that the timeframe is too long for a PC to see real results, but then again, I typically run long campaigns.) My only change is that I'd add a casting cost, probably just 1 minor charge.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-gk1_8ZblICYMTkEh69wDSHBP4KI68SS6M-i6l-gqC8/" target="_blank">The Midnight Screening</a> by mellonbread</span></b><br />This scenario describes a midnight screening of <i>Night's Templar</i> (originally described in <i><a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/rpgitem/57439/lawyers-guns-and-money" target="_blank">Lawyers, Guns, and Money</a></i>) that is likely to turn into a free-for-all with plenty of factions and chaos. This is the entry that reminded me to talk about The Dreaded '90s Edge, because I bet the glib, goofy tone of this entry will offend somebody—especially in the case of cabals like the Challah Cost Deniers and Living Zabiha Loca.</p><p>Nevertheless, were this entry sitting in my back pocket months ago, this is probably another scenario that I would have dropped into my overstuffed Los Angeles game. It's a solid premise with colorful GMCs and vibrating with potential energy, all the things one would expect from an <i>Unknown Armies</i> scenario. The more goofy or gonzo elements might not fit in your particular conception of <i>Unknown Armies</i>, but there's a consistent authorial voice and a clear target audience in mind, and so hopefully this will reach the right people. (And I guarantee someone reading these reviews is in that meaty Venn diagram overlap between "people who know <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kin-dza-dza!" target="_blank">Kin-dza-dza!</a></i>" and "people who know what The New Inquisition is.")</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-77496985337793390732023-11-09T07:00:00.171-05:002024-01-11T22:19:53.294-05:00Doxacon 2023 After-action Report<p>This past weekend (November 3 and 4, 2023) saw <a href="http://www.doxacon.org/" target="_blank">Doxacon X</a> in Arlington, VA. Despite the fact that <a href="https://wildeschilde.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Nicole</a> and I are still preferentially avoiding large groups in the midst of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic" target="_blank">the ongoing plague</a>, Kenneth Hite posted <a href="https://www.facebook.com/kenneth.hite/posts/pfbid0HJFCW6f1jtjcFgdaeDU6PjKvEKHVfa7mUUCffCe3AxP44utYuWmWPRxFS92KBTSsl" target="_blank">this</a> three months ago and found it impossible to resist the siren's allure:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/kenneth.hite/posts/pfbid0HJFCW6f1jtjcFgdaeDU6PjKvEKHVfa7mUUCffCe3AxP44utYuWmWPRxFS92KBTSsl" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="258" data-original-width="598" height="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFIUspPLIRpH9xuumF-HVD7TTU8srlBBItVXL6j2kduBJFcmV9i4MSSeGaeezUwu-3MxBTYv9h0HrW-_hZPEQ4i6wJDPXgBW0Kriucppb0d0IPVAyNQm_xqIqene_Z-dxpqKCj45nLZ7TZnNtZMttsB9hXBT3IzZ46mH6SD6yG16yn5mOxe_hmpKhIKyeV/w400-h173/ken%20hite%20and%20tim%20powers.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div><p>So off we went.</p><p><b>But first, a word about personal bias:</b> Assuming you clicked on the above link to learn that Doxacon is sponsored by the Protection of the Holy Mother of God Orthodox Church, and assuming you have read my previous blog posts like <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2022/02/grousing-about-alignment.html" target="_blank">this one</a>, you might surmise that Nicole and I are not quite the target audience for this convention. So interpret whatever I write with that in mind.</p><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vFHRdi5fQ5A?si=sABvxV3NGIenE3Cv" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe><br /></div><p>Also, it appears that Doxacon eventually puts its lectures online, and there was definitely recording equipment present. So whenever that happens, I will endeavor to link to the lectures here.</p><p>Doxacon is a small convention: this gathering had somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 attendees, although we hardly saw that number present. Since we were coming for <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Hite" target="_blank">Tim Powers</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Hite" target="_blank">Kenneth Hite</a>, we missed several of the lectures and didn't participate in the gaming block around lunch on Saturday. (In hindsight, I'm curious to see the full shape of a table-top RPG at a Christian fantasy convention.) I would ultimately estimate that we saw about a third to half of what the convention has to offer.</p><p>Having skipped Friday evening, Saturday morning opened with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akathist" target="_blank">an akathist</a> before Tim Powers' lecture. Tim Powers spoke about writing fantasy fiction as a Catholic, and how having a belief in the supernatural makes one's fantasy writing more authentic. Whether or not you agree with that point, I can find common ground with the idea that you have to believe on some level about the subject of your writing — I have previously said that I think my <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i> campaign <i><a href="https://ua-cure-violence.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">The Rule of Beasts</a></i> suffered because I never quite believed the antagonists' motivations.</p><p>In the afternoon, Kenneth Hite's lecture was about traditional morality in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._P._Lovecraft" target="_blank">Lovecraft</a>'s work and in <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/814/call-cthulhu" target="_blank">Call of Cthulhu</a></i>. He argues that while most RPGs are escapist fun (and there's nothing inherently wrong with that),<i> Call of Cthulhu</i> reinforces traditional Christian morals because it posits that player characters are willing to sacrifice themselves for the greater good of their community. Hite also connected this to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_(genre)" target="_blank">Western</a>, and deftly brought these themes into Lovecraft's work by pointing out that most of his stories with "happy endings" occur in his hometown of Providence, RI. Despite his nihilism, Lovecraft clearly also had things he cared about and an eye toward community.</p><p>While I'm not the intended audience for this lecture, I'm certainly intrigued by the assertion: he has a point that most games do not start with coalition-building as an explicit goal, and almost none of them encourage personal sacrifice in either tone or mechanics. (That stuff often appears as an emergent property of the group rather than something explicitly coded in the rules.) While noting that there aren't many games that encourage coalition-building as an explicit goal, he referenced <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/514/underground" target="_blank">Underground</a></i> and <a href="https://boardgamegeek.com/rpgdesigner/18557/avery-alder" target="_blank">Avery Alder</a>'s <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/20744/quiet-year" target="_blank">The Quiet Year</a></i> as good models in this paradigm.</p><p>I idly wonder if we'll see more coalition-building mechanics in the wake of renewed collective bargaining power over the next decade, but then again, who knows what the future holds?</p><p>The final lecture was a panel discussion among all authors about their writing process and about the role of fantasy in a secular world. Regarding the latter, Ken Hite's comments resonated the strongest with me: belief never left, as we always need stories and ghosts and fairies and continue to repeat them time and again even as proponents of the Enlightenment claim we have banished them. Regarding the former, Ken Hite contrasted what game designers do with what traditional authors do, noting that RPG designers really only provide setting, leaving plot and character to the individual tables, but that comes with the added difficulty of having to provide <i>lots</i> of setting as one does not know how those individual tables are going to engage with the material.</p><p>He also noted that the joy of game design is that nothing is wasted: if you have a concept that seems too niche to achieve mass appeal as a setting book, you inflict it on your home game instead. (His example was <i><a href="http://princeofcairo.livejournal.com/188333.html" target="_blank">Rex of the Old '97</a></i>, which I know for a fact would be eagerly purchased by tens of <i>Unknown Armies</i> fans.)</p><p>With that, we closed the book on Doxacon X, leaving Arlington before <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vespers" target="_blank">vespers</a>.</p><p>While there were no grand revelations from the lectures at this Doxacon, it was a fine time and very worthwhile. (I got something out of all of the lectures, and I think it is worthwhile to occasionally immerse myself into wholly alien cultures.) I cannot say that we would return any time soon, although depending on the guestlist in a future year, I would be loath to say we would <i>never</i> return. If you're a faithful Christian in the D.C. area with an interest in science-fiction and fantasy, you'll probably like it. Otherwise, you might feel a little like Dr. Gonzo at a narcotics convention.</p><p><b>Edit (11-09-2023, 11:52 AM):</b> <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ChaosiumInc/posts/pfbid02ZYjDWNQ5pLTaiFRSjfYUALUGQW9knj4nSkraWgob138beobF6qR9sVV6oijDnD4sl" target="_blank">Chaosium's Facebook page</a> shared an article from Catholic news site <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleteia" target="_blank">Aleteia</a>, which posted their own (much more thorough) <a href="https://aleteia.org/2023/11/08/doxacon-a-convention-for-christians-who-love-geek-culture/" target="_blank">overview of Doxacon</a>.</p><p><b>Edit (01-11-2023, 10:20 PM):</b> The <a href="https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/doxacon" target="_blank">recordings from Doxacon</a> are live. Tim Powers' lecture is <a href="https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/doxacon/fantasy_fiction_through_a_catholic_lens" target="_blank">here</a> and Ken Hite's lecture is <a href="https://www.ancientfaith.com/podcasts/doxacon/the_man_who_shot_joseph_curwen" target="_blank">here</a>. (If by some happenstance you're reading this in the far future, the recordings from Doxacon X should be dated Tuesday, January 9, 2024.)</p></div>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-82916823517013992902023-11-08T07:00:00.193-05:002023-11-09T17:02:27.548-05:00The Obligatory D&D Basketball Post<p>It was inevitable.</p><p>Long-time readers of the ol' hobby blog will no doubt recall previous write-ups of basketball wizards, both <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2019/04/rise-of-baller-wizards.html" target="_blank">for BECMI/OSR-type systems</a> and for <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2019/04/rise-of-baller-wizards-fifth-edition.html" target="_blank"><i>D&D</i> 5e</a>.</p><p>Fast-forward to four years later: one of my players from <i><a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Of%20Kith%20and%20Kin" target="_blank">Of Kith and Kin</a></i> is running his first game, and I'm playing <a href="https://www.dndbeyond.com/characters/107179616" target="_blank">a basketball wizard</a>. So of course, he includes a basketball encounter featuring <a href="https://www.patreon.com/posts/arena-of-35519170" target="_blank">a battle map from Neutral Party</a> and <a href="https://www.patreon.com/posts/basketball-54511360" target="_blank">Gab's basketball rules</a>.</p><p>We didn't care for Gab's rules.</p><p>In this era of ubiquitous internet, I assume it must be a rite of passage to excitedly grab someone's custom ruleset from a blog or other source only to have them fall apart during play. In this case, the rules feature six pages of rules that basically posit a new combat system — way too many rules to quickly internalize in play, especially given a new GM and two new players. (To compare: the entire combat chapter in the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/162994/players-handbook-dd-5e" target="_blank">5e <i>Player's Handbook</i></a> is ten pages long, and that includes edge cases that are unlikely to appear in every combat.)</p><p>Beyond being very rules-heavy, the system posits that each character gets three combat actions per round, so the system drags a bit. I suspect it would be good for small teams (the rules suggests 3-on-3 matches), or games where basketball is a constant feature, but not as just an occasional fun aside.</p><p>But you probably already see where this is going: I was inspired to create my own ill-advised <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank"><i>D&D</i> 5e</a> basketball rules. (My basketball wizard has a home world, after all, and <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/ADIN" target="_blank">my spelljammer players</a> might go there and shoot some hoops. Also note that there's a little precedent in my games: I have previously included a football/soccer encounter for my <i><a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Crux%20of%20Eternity" target="_blank">Crux of Eternity</a></i> players, using a <i>sphere of annihilation</i> as the ball.) For your convenience, I have included it below in pdf and html. Although it is still a little long — a full page, front-and-back in my .doc file — many of those rules are just reminding you of rules that already exist in the <i>Player's Handbook</i> and explaining how they apply to basketball. I could probably edit it further, but without further ado...</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://bit.ly/5e-b-ball" target="_blank">The Obligatory D&D 5e Basketball Rules (pdf)</a></h2><p>These rules extensively reference Chapter 9 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>, and make extensive use of the "Variant: Skills with Different Abilities" section in Chapter 7 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>. </p><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Abstracted Basketball Game</h3><p><span style="white-space: normal;">If you do not want to play through a whole round-by-round basketball game, you can simulate the entire game with group checks. Every player makes Dexterity (Athletics), and the DM assembles those results into a group check for each team. The team with the highest result wins.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: normal;">If you need to know the precise number of points won in a game, assume a team scores a number of points equal to its Dexterity (Athletics) group check × 5. (Smaller games might use a ×1 or ×2 multiplier.) For example, a team with a group check of 14 scores 70 points. The DM might want to add 1d10 to the winning team's points or subtract 1d10 from the losing team's points to avoid perfectly round numbers each time.</span></p><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Round-by-Round Basketball Game</h3><p><span style="white-space: normal;">If you and your table want to play a basketball game with significantly more granularity, run it like a combat encounter. Each player rolls initiative and otherwise follows the procedures described in Chapter 9 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>. A few points of interest are outlined below.</span></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Possession</h4><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Initial possession is resolved with a jump ball: select two players on opposing sides to make contested Dexterity (Athletics) checks. The winner's team is the starting offensive team and begins with possession of the ball. It is up to the DM whether possession alternates thereafter, or whether it is always resolved by contested Dexterity (Athletics) checks.</span></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Interacting with the Ball</h4><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Any attempt to shoot, pass, receive, or intercept the ball typically requires the Use an Object action. Attempting to shoot a basket requires a DC 15 Dexterity (Athletics) check. This check is at disadvantage if the shot is over 20 ft. away, and shooting a basket from more than 60 ft. away results in a loose ball. (If you're thinking in zones instead of feet, two-point shots are DC 15 and three-point shots are DC 15 at disadvantage.) At the DM's option, a character who can reach the basket with a high jump can make a Strength (Athletics) check at advantage to dunk the ball.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Passing the ball to a teammate is a DC 10 Dexterity (Athletics) check, although the character must be prepared to receive the ball with the Ready action. Passing the ball more than 20 ft. imposes disadvantage on the check, and attempting to pass from more than 60 ft. away results in a loose ball.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Conversely, if a character uses the Ready action to pass the ball on the receiving character's turn, the receiving character can interact with the ball freely during their move or action as described in "Other Activity on Your Turn" in Chapter 9 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Intercepting the ball requires the Ready action and a contested Dexterity (Athletics) check. The character must be within 5 ft. of the ball's trajectory to attempt to intercept it. If their Dexterity (Athletics) check is higher than the Dexterity (Athletics) check of the creature who was passing or shooting the ball, then they gain control of the ball. A tie results in a loose ball.</span></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Loose Ball</h4><p><span style="white-space: normal;">A ball that misses the basket or is otherwise dropped lands in the space it was targeting or in the place where its movement was arrested. Each round at initiative count 20, the ball rolls or bounces 5 ft. in the most logical direction. If a direction is unclear from a given maneuver, the DM can roll 1d8 to determine direction, and the ball continues to move in that direction until stopped by another force.</span></p><p><span style="white-space: normal;">A character can gain control of a loose ball either by interacting with it during their move or action, or by using the Use an Object action if they have already interacted with an object on their turn (see "Other Activity on Your Turn" and "Actions in Combat" in Chapter 9 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>).</span></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Other Combat Actions</h4><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Other actions described in Chapter 9 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i> might come into play. Examples include:</span></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Attack:</b> Attacking is almost assuredly a foul in any friendly game, although there are no doubt illegal underground basketball games that allow contact, injury, or even death.</li><li><b>Cast a Spell:</b> The DM ultimately determines whether magic is allowed in a basketball game, and what constitutes a foul. Of course, in basketball games featuring Slamaturges and other magic-users, magic is generally allowed, with only a few banned spells (usually involving injuring opposing players).</li><li><b>Help:</b> The Help action can significantly increase a teammate's chances of making a shot, pass, or interception. A shouted word of encouragement, interference with an opposing team member, or being in the right place at the right time are all excellent ways to justify use of the Help action.</li><li><b>Ready:</b> The Ready action is likely to be the centerpiece of these basketball rules, as characters try to strategically maneuver the ball downcourt. Consider the utility of using the Ready action to pass the ball to a teammate who has just moved within twenty feet of the basket.</li><li><b>Improvising an Action:</b> The catch-all action from Chapter 9 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>, this covers any potential edge cases you might encounter. A contested Dexterity (Sleight of Hand) check to steal the ball in mid-dribble? A contested Dexterity (Acrobatics) check to move through an enemy's space? A contested Charisma (Deception) check vs. an opponent's Wisdom (Insight) check to feint a pass?</li></ul><p></p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Customization Options</h3><p><span style="white-space: normal;">Obviously, these rules are far from comprehensive, and are always subject to a modicum of DM interpretation and adjudication. Some customization options and specific rules interactions you may want to consider include:</span></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Can characters make Strength (Athletics) checks rather than Dexterity (Athletics) checks to shoot or pass the ball?</li><ul><li>I might be convinced, especially with a good rationale or description as to how Strength applies to a given maneuver. As written, strong characters are better at slam dunks than shots and passes.</li></ul><li>How does the monk's Deflect Missiles feature interact with receiving passes and interceptions?</li><ul><li>I would probably let Deflect Missiles receive passes as a reaction, although as worded, it doesn’t strike me as though it would have any effect on interceptions.</li></ul><li>Do you have any special guidelines for the rogue's Reliable Talent feature?</li><ul><li>I do not. The most obvious defense against a high-level rogue is going to be one or two players constantly guarding them, using the Ready and Help actions to make an interception.</li></ul><li>Can the Interception Fighting Style also apply to basketball interceptions?</li><ul><li>I would probably allow it, although since the Fighting Style automatically assumes deflecting an object rather than catching it, it might always result in a loose ball. The fighter just swats the ball away as a reaction.</li></ul><li>Any weird magical variants?</li><ul><li>Many. My favorite involves using a <i>sphere of annihilation</i> instead of a basketball, although the risk to the players would no doubt preclude such activities in most places. (And you probably wouldn't need most of these rules to adjudicate a basketball with a <i>sphere of annihilation</i>!)</li></ul><li>If basketball is going to be a major feature of the campaign, what about using a custom basketball tool proficiency instead of Dexterity (Athletics) checks?</li><ul><li>Assuming basketball is the centerpiece of a campaign, I would consider it. If the DM does not give their players such a proficiency at the beginning of the campaign, a coach could easily grant the characters basketball proficiency after eight months of dedicated training, as per the Training rules under "Downtime Activities" in Chapter 8 of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>.</li></ul></ul><p></p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-10017833181255869962023-08-03T07:00:00.007-04:002023-08-03T07:00:00.138-04:00All's Well That Ends Well<p><br /></p><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/BXqPNlng6uI" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></div><p></p><p>Another year, another completed long-form campaign.</p><p>Last year, one of my player groups wrapped <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2022/05/it-is-finished.html" target="_blank">our eleven-year-long <i>Dungeons & Dragons</i> campaign</a>. Last week, we wrapped our seven-year-long <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i> campaign. As always, you can read <a href="https://cucullus-non-facit-monachum.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">the entire thing over at Obsidian Portal</a>.</p><p>After <i><a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Crux%20of%20Eternity" target="_blank">Crux of Eternity</a></i> and <i><a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2011/09/tales-of-guerilla-roleplayer-imperial.html" target="_blank">The Imperial City</a></i>, it comes in third in terms of number of years. Probably in the number of hours, as well: I would estimate maybe 300 hours, but who can say?</p><p><a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2016/05/unknown-armies-third-edition-actual-play.html" target="_blank">It started humbly</a>, as a playtest of the yet-unpublished third edition. (You'll note there that I call it a mini-campaign, not yet aware that it was going to last over seven years.) We largely stuck to the collaborative setting generation, but <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2021/05/anniversary.html" target="_blank">as with <i>Crux of Eternity</i></a>, I started with a handful of inspirations which were woven into the structure as appropriate:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>There's a rumor in <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/45650/unknown-armies" target="_blank">the second edition core rulebook</a> about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Morrison" target="_blank">Jim Morrison</a> still being alive.</li><ul><li>Being well-acquainted with the old rumors that he faked his own death, I decided a long time ago that he was probably The True King of Los Angeles.</li></ul><li>I read <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/49461/suppressed-transmission-first-broadcast" target="_blank">volume one</a> and <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/49463/suppressed-transmission-second-broadcast" target="_blank">volume two</a> of the collected <i>Suppressed Transmission</i> by Ken Hite.</li><ul><li>Specifically, there was an article about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feast_of_Fools" target="_blank">Misrule</a> that got the wheels turning in my head about an avatar of The True King symbolically being deposed in favor of an avatar of The Fool.</li></ul><li>Years ago, I wrote some notes about a potential game set in Las Vegas, featuring an apocalyptic cult leader in the mold of Tyler Durden from <i>Fight Club</i>.</li><ul><li>I realized this was an opportunity to tell his backstory, since I knew he was an annihilomancer who got a major charge at some point.</li></ul></ul><p></p><p>These elements combined to form the basic setup. While the players just knew that Hollywood producer Jasper Fitzroy was acting a little strange of late, the truth is that he was an unconscious avatar of The True King, baptized as a child to be the king of film actors by none other than MGM executive <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Schenck" target="_blank">Nick Schenck</a>, attempting to make the ultimate movie star. Magickal shenanigans prevented it from working as planned, but Fitzroy was destined to step into a kingly role no matter where he found himself, so he became a royal movie producer instead of an actor.</p><p>However, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Morrison" target="_blank">Jim Morrison</a>, The True King of Los Angeles, never wanted the job, but he also didn't want it to go to someone who might abuse the station. And he certainly didn't think a movie producer could avoid the temptations of a powerful occult position, so he tried to think of a way to rid himself of this rival king without killing him or informing him of the existence of magick.</p><p>The answer came in the form of Iggy Williams, an annihilomancer who left Los Angeles in the early 1990s but came back in the late-2000s. Jim Morrison recognized him, but knew that he didn't want him in town, either, so he hatched a plan to rid himself of both simultaneously by convincing Williams to get two major charges by leaving town and convincing Fitzroy to leave as well. This seemed like a pretty hard sell until Fitzroy's wife died, in which case it became easier to insert new people into his life during the upheaval. And that's the very unlikely set of circumstances by which Iggy Williams became Jasper Fitzroy's personal assistant.</p><p>Since Iggy Williams had never harvested a major charge before, he didn't know how much symbolic power he needed, so it was his idea to invoke the whole Misrule thing, introducing Fitzroy to an unconscious avatar of The Fool named Pamela Kruse and then slowly making it look like his predecessor cooked the books and Fitzroy would take the blame — but he could save the rest of his family by fleeing to a foreign country.</p><p>A convoluted and tenuous plot, but a symbolically resonant one.</p><p>Unfortunately, the player characters didn't unravel the plot in time, so Iggy Williams convinced Jasper Fitzroy to flee Los Angeles and put Pam Kruse in charge of his affairs. However, that misfortune kicked off the rest of the game's plot as the characters found themselves tangled in the local occult underground. (And I suspect that failure turned a short campaign into a long one, as they sought to unravel many mysteries and bring order to the city's chaos.)</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Obligatory After-Action Report</h3><p>While I have run a lot of urban fantasy and horror games previous to this one, this was my first time running <i>Unknown Armies</i> for more than a couple of sessions, and specifically my first time running <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/40018/unknown-armies-3rd-edition" target="_blank">third edition</a>.</p><p>Many of my complaints about the system remain despite the fact that it's a pretty good system, albeit one that feels more like an assemblage of parts than a cohesive whole.</p><p>It's a very sandbox-y game, which suits my style, but I think that player-driven goals can sometimes leave the players adrift, especially because of a pattern I've noticed across a couple of games. Having now run two <i>Unknown Armies</i> campaigns, I like to make them grounded and realistic, and the players instantly respond to this. They make backstories, introducing friends and family members and connecting with NPCs. But this also serves to make them play the game very conservatively, as they suddenly have jobs and loved ones they can lose. As such, nobody plays the sort of ruthless obsessives that <i>Unknown Armies</i> seems to really encourage, especially in previous editions, and that means that they approach Objectives with a lot trepidation and very little mayhem. And that limits their options.</p><p>Note that this isn't bad — more player buy-in versus more player mayhem is a choice rather than a value judgment — but it does make the Objective process take a long time as players try to determine the safest way to handle a problem. (The recurring joke during this campaign was that we were actually playing a <a href="https://whitewolf.fandom.com/wiki/Camarilla_(VTM)" target="_blank">Camarilla</a> campaign, given all the careful politicking.)</p><p>I also suspect that has something to do with relative power levels: both of my long-running <i>Unknown Armies</i> campaigns have begun more-or-less at street level. Sure, the characters might start with funky powers and weird experiences, but they don't know that there's an occult subculture out there, and they certainly don't know about things like the Statosphere or Invisible Clergy. And when you're new to the occult community, all you have is the stuff you brought with you: your career, your family, your friends.</p><p>Obviously, you don't want to lose that stuff.</p><p>But there is something very magical about a slow-burn occult campaign where you see the players go from clueless newbies staggering in the shadows of giants to people who feel comfortable solving their problems with ritual actions and weird artifacts. It's telling that we started the campaign with the player characters trying to unravel the mystery of a film producer's sudden shift in mood, and we ended with a ritual arson designed to assassinate a powerful wizard.</p><p>As for "the plot," as befits a sandbox, the campaign ranged all over the place. The campaign lasted long enough for the players to plumb most of the mysteries I plotted at the start, although as one might expect, each question yields half a dozen others. By the end of it, they are movers and shakers, having cut deals and installed their own True King as the symbolic monarch of Los Angeles, so the repercussions of this game will likely reverberate into any future <i>Unknown Armies</i> games I run. (Especially as the charitable foundation they created moves into other cities.)</p><p>This was also probably the most romance-heavy game I've run: everybody had some manner of romantic relationship, often forged in the fires of the secret wars of the Los Angeles occult underground. (And some characters had several romances during the game!) As noted in the <i>Crux of Eternity</i> after-action report, I always find that funny as I don't plan romantic subplots, but it often appears in my games, so the players clearly trust the process.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Final Thoughts</h3><p>As is usually the case, I'm running another campaign on Sunday, so I don't have time to mourn the passing of this one. It always feels a little weird to end things, but there are always more stories to tell, and time marches ever oneward.</p><p>Nevertheless, I expect I will continue to think about it for some time, wondering what might happen next in that <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCdkJG___ZM" target="_blank">city of tiny lights</a> by the sea...</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-46820765947105036022023-06-09T07:00:00.001-04:002023-06-09T07:00:00.134-04:00Advice Against Quantum Ogres<p>Meanwhile, on a Facebook <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">D&D</a></i> group, someone shared this meme:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/DnDRollers/posts/pfbid02Rv1fNBq1z1w6MdKbnCxeLgAVwjqvwtjbqJXJcgyeKYeKr9KU2hAySpxvfboVYMThl" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="691" data-original-width="1079" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIGcZkvOxRfni7dM7rdDTFvJ7uu0uz9rUR9t7xRGHc8kSBTddNPIu0WEUz6M8Q9JB7pIrgGVHKkA74KNzsFHasuAX-IbDEkp2shBaMQL3qOI0Z52y3okAH9rnClNuLP911cLqrepoCjH8Kgy0a7pmeGWv9YTEQibKc8YukSrBjDl0FtOorugiuv5j40g/w400-h256/350921959_988839092131232_7377218029917130983_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p>Accompanying the meme was the question, "What do you do if you are the DM?"</p><p>As you might expect, The Dreaded Discourse™ reigns, and there is a <i>long</i> conversation nested in the threads below the post. (And the original post was shared to other groups, themselves with long nested threads of The Dreaded Discourse™, so there are a thousand thousand such responses.)</p><p>Contrary to my instincts, I engaged. (I fall firmly on Team Anti-<a href="http://hackslashmaster.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-how-illusion-can-rob-your-game-of.html" target="_blank">Quantum Ogre</a>.) Most of the rebuttals were something to the effect of, "How do I run an epic game without offering the illusion of choice?" But in the midst of that, I think I gave the best advice I've ever given as a Game Master, and will probably ever give as a Game Master, so I repeat it here for you:</p><p><i><span style="font-size: medium;">The players are already on your side. You don't have to lie to them to get them to like you.</span></i></p><p>I'm only being a little hyperbolic when I say that 90% of GM problems could probably be solved by keeping this in mind. Even if you're gaming with total strangers, they're there to game. They <i>want</i> to play a game. It's not a job interview* and it's not going on your permanent record, so you don't need to impress anyone. Just make sure it's fun, and it will be memorable without you doing anything special.</p><p>(And obviously, "lying" in this case should be assumed to mean things like illusion of choice, or "protecting" certain NPCs, or other bits of behind-the-scenes chicanery. Most GMs keep hidden information, which falls under typical player expectations for traditional sorts of table-top role-playing games. Determining and calibrating how accepting players are about hidden conspiracies, secret NPC agendas, and the like makes a good Session Zero conversation.)</p><p>As for <i>how to run an epic game without offering the illusion of choice</i>, it's hard to fake the actual work. You basically have two choices in that regard:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Run a linear adventure path, and be up-front about it. Decide what you do when the players leave the rails before you get to the decision point. (If you don't have a meaningful choice in mind, why give them a choice in the first place?)</li><li>Run a sandbox, but make sure the players have enough information to make meaningful choices. (With the requisite caveat <a href="https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/8157/roleplaying-games/on-the-matter-of-quantum-ogres" target="_blank">from The Alexandrian</a> that choosing to not do research, or failing to find information, are also choices that should be honored.)</li></ul><p></p><p>Outside of those options, be prepared to improvise if they make choices you didn't expect, or just be honest with them. You can get a surprising amount of mileage out of, "This is what I have planned tonight," although you have to be prepared to roll with the punches if you want the world to feel immediate and infinite.</p><p>And honestly? Speaking from experience, the most interesting game tidbits tend to happen when the players go completely outside of your expectations and into no-man's land.</p><p>But remember: no matter what else happens, <i>the players are already on your side. You don't have to lie to them to get them to like you</i>.</p><p>* Okay, so if you're a professional GM, it's a bit like a job interview, but "impressing" those players tends to come more from actual work than shortcuts. And as with a home game, you tend to impress players the most when you validate their choices — when the players see that their choices matter and that their decisions have an impact on the world, <i>that's</i> when they pay close attention to your game.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-24541036405734579442023-05-03T07:00:00.029-04:002023-05-03T07:00:00.137-04:00Why Is This Item Cursed?<p>On a post about cursed items, someone wrote, "I have never liked cursed items. Why would someone make one?"</p><p>I responded with a brief table. If you want to know why a given cursed item exists, roll 1d8 and consult the table below:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>Failed magic item project of an ancient civilization's wizarding grad school equivalent.</li><li>Evil wizard or unseelie Fair Folk crafted item as a magical trap or revenge piece.</li><li>Mundane object infused with fell magical energies as a side effect of a magical catastrophe.</li><li>Magic item granted as part of a poorly-worded <i>wish</i>.</li><li>Functional magic item corrupted by forgotten decades in an evil lair or by infusion with wicked sapience.</li><li>Perfectly normal magic item in extremely alien and forgotten culture. ("We use <i>bags of devouring</i> to solve our trash problem!")</li><li>Curse is an unintended side effect of the item's creation, and was overlooked by the creators.</li><li>Item belonged to a famous hero who offended a god, archwizard, or other powerful entity and cursed their favored magic item.</li></ol><p></p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-64185206959901703262023-03-24T07:00:00.235-04:002023-05-02T01:11:43.467-04:00RPGs as Art: A System Matters Metaphor<p>This tired old debate* rears its ugly head with alarming frequency, and every time, I am left wanting from the answer.</p><p>Whenever someone complains about a system being "misused" — which is to say, not used for its intended or supported purpose, like using the <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">Dungeons & Dragons</a></i> game engine to run an <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Crossing" target="_blank">Animal Crossing</a></i>-style game — a version of the debate that I frequently encounter is that RPGs are tools, and you wouldn't use the wrong tool for a job. You wouldn't, say, use a hammer to try to turn a screw, as you're liable to ruin the thing you're attempting to build or fix.</p><p>This metaphor has never sat right with me.</p><p>For starters, table-top <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/RPGs%20as%20Art" target="_blank">RPGs are art</a> and are tools to make art. That's a bit different than attempting to use a screwdriver when you need a wrench; some of the most compelling art uses nonstandard components, like that one of the industrial robot trying and failing to clean the blood pooling around it. You know the one:</p><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4ooVr6RZ_nw" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></div><p>Beyond being short-sighted from an artistic perspective, it also ignores what a large swath of role-playing games do. Many games aren't tools, but <i>toolboxes</i>; the creators certainly hope that you'll take them, use them, and enjoy them, but once it's in your grasp, it's up to you to figure out how to use it. A lot of hacks, custom systems, and mini-games come from here: add the Objective rules from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i>; the fishing rules from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/61642/rod-reel-fist" target="_blank">Rod, Reel, & Fist</a></i>; and the narrative rules from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/48439/let-these-mermaids-touch-your-dick-maybe" target="_blank">Let These Mermaids Touch Your Dick Maybe</a></i> into <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/814/call-cthulhu" target="_blank">Call of Cthulhu</a></i> to get the Frankengame of your mad dreams!</p><p>(I don't know <i>why</i> you need rules for organizational agency, fishing, and thirsty-ass mermaids in your hypothetical Gothic cosmic horror game, but I assume you know your group better than I do. Maybe you want the game to be a little more player-directed than your typical <i>Call of Cthulhu</i> game, and you want to add options for SAN refreshes that include fishing and mermaid-mediated sexual healing. But I am here to tell you that if someone on the internet said you're playing wrong by making the eldritch horror fishing and mermaid seduction game of your dreams, they can go pound sand.)</p><p>And of course, I will again bang my drum that <i>RPGs are art</i>. Pretending that RPGs are tools ignores why people actually like a particular game, which often has a lot to do with the myriad (and often subconscious) reasons people like art. Is it accessible? Do your friends like it? Does it fulfill some need within you? Is it especially resonant with your background?</p><p>All this to say: the tool metaphor always rankles me when I see it, but I only recently realized why.</p><p>RPGs aren't tools. They're <i>cars</i>.</p><p>If you're not in the United States, allow me to set the scene: everywhere is too far to walk, and public transit is often underfunded, so that means you basically need access to a car to live. So cars are ubiquitous, but I suspect most people buy, rent, or borrow cars for very prosaic reasons: you had access, you could afford it, it suits your needs, whatever. For the vast bulk of people, they just need something that will get them to work and the grocery store.</p><p>These are the equivalent of the vast hordes that indie gamers mock when they wonder why someone is hacking <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank"><i>Dungeons & Dragons</i> 5e</a> to make an unofficial <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncharted" target="_blank">Uncharted</a></i> RPG. Such people may neither know nor care about other RPGs that would do what they want more "efficiently," they just want a game that will handle some action, is somewhat familiar, and has lots of online support in case they get stuck.</p><p>The bog-standard American car consumer just needs a car to get from point A to point B. If the brakes work, it's good enough.</p><p>Then there are <i>the car guys</i>.</p><p>These are people with Opinions™ about cars. A car isn't just a convenient way to get from place-to-place, it's a statement. A lifestyle. They study the breeds of car, they know their natural habitats and ecological niches. This one is built for speed and needs premium petrol and hood clips. This one is built for hauling and can add a trailer hitch and a tow reel in the front.</p><p>In this extended car metaphor, that's the sort of people who collect RPGs and dissect them. If you're reading this blog entry, chances are good you're the RPG-equivalent of a car guy. We know where the different breeds of RPG live and like to graze, and we will invent new taxonomies to explain why we know them better than anyone else.</p><p>The elaborate taxonomy of cars might be interesting to a car guy, but it isn't as helpful to the kid who just started driving to her part-time job. Likewise, the elaborate taxonomy of RPGs is probably overwhelming or boring to someone who isn't obsessed with this stuff.</p><p>That's all right. If they're interested in RPGs, they'll come around to it in their own time.</p><p><br /></p><p>* As you might surmise, my overall view of the "system matters" debate is, "It depends." Certain systems give you certain tools to do some things more easily than other choices, but my experience teaches me that most GMs tend to run games the same way no matter what system they're using — and that they often bring their assumptions to a new game without familiarizing themselves with it. Once again, the book is less important than the thing that happens at the table, and that is the thing that ought to be judged.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-38584623034257107202023-03-10T07:00:00.002-05:002023-03-10T07:00:00.357-05:00No Prep Is Wasted<p>If you run games long enough, higher-order patterns begin to emerge without your direct input. A campaign setting is a thing better <i>divined</i> than <i>made</i>.</p><p>I have <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/ADIN" target="_blank">previously posted</a> about <i><a href="https://f-and-m.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">Arctic Death, Infinite Night</a></i>, my "arctic <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/534/ravenloft" target="_blank">Ravenloft</a>" campaign. (If you want the basic setup, <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2019/12/a-land-of-frozen-horror.html" target="_blank">this post</a> has all the details.)</p><p>Well, that section of the campaign has wrapped, and as they say, <a href="https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x269pjp" target="_blank">the slime's coming home</a>. They killed the darklord, did the obligatory bookkeeping, and now the wizard has built a <i><a href="https://spelljammer.fandom.com/wiki/Spelljammer_Helms" target="_blank">spelljamming helm</a></i> and they have acquired a vessel in the hopes of returning to the home they fled via the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/249271/gardens-ynn" target="_blank">Gardens of Ynn</a>, essentially causing most of the issues in the campaign to date. As for the Domain of Dread of Isiksivik, when they slew the darklord, the whole realm fell back into the world it left centuries ago.</p><p>But which world is that?</p><p>I've been ruminating on that particular question for months now, but then I remembered <i><a href="https://what-luck-betide-us.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">What Luck Betide Us</a></i>. Many years ago, some friends asked me to run a <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/190/dungeons-dragons-4th-edition" target="_blank">4e</a> campaign, and I did a lot of work on it before we started. Like, I made a map of a region a million square miles in size and filled in the settlements with procedural generation <i>before the campaign started</i>. (To contrast, the <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2015/09/revised-map-of-sorrowfell-plains.html" target="_blank">Sorrowfell Plains map</a> for <i><a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Crux%20of%20Eternity" target="_blank">Crux of Eternity</a></i> is still mostly empty, with landmarks only going on the map as they come up in play.) While a fun exercise, I wouldn't recommend trying to build a campaign setting from the ground-up like in <i>What Luck Betide Us</i>, and I certainly wouldn't have the time to do it now unless someone were paying me.</p><p>Well, as with most campaigns where you front-load much of the work, that game died a horrible death after only a couple of sessions. So it goes.</p><p>But that just means that there's an unused campaign setting just sitting in my notes, one that I know fairly well because I made it up. Isiksivik can easily sit to the far north of the region from <i>What Luck Betide Us</i>, and what's more, the dwarf's sketchy backstory fits nicely with the overall aesthetics of the dwarven theocracy of the Farhelfik Commonwealth and the elvish magocracy of the Lanirilis Protectorate. She can just as easily be from the same world!</p><p>(The characters in <i>Arctic Death, Infinite Night</i> subsequently met <a href="https://f-and-m.obsidianportal.com/characters/serlei-yaltark" target="_blank">the major campaign villain</a> from <i>What Luck Betide Us</i>, because they fit well with her agenda in the service of Chaos.)</p><p>Years ago, I also teased <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2019/02/sharpened-hooks-tower-at-end-of-world.html" target="_blank">The Wizard at the End of the World</a>. I didn't know anything more about this entity than I put into the blog post, but I figured the rest would sort itself out in the fullness of time. In trying to solve this problem, I also solved that problem: The Wizard is indeed the second iteration of a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_%26_Dragons_Immortals_Rules" target="_blank">BECMI-style Immortal</a>, originally from the Sorrowfell Plains but now ascended after some time shenanigans, and <i>What Luck Betide Us</i> features the world she made during her first ascension. (I already knew she made a world, I just didn't know that it was clearly this one. But it nicely explains a couple of things I never quite figured out during the course of <i>What Luck Betide Us</i>.)</p><p>(The characters in <i>Arctic Death, Infinite Night</i> subsequently met this Immortal in her guise as <a href="https://f-and-m.obsidianportal.com/characters/lueliten" target="_blank">the elf Archdruid Lueliten</a>. She has ties to the dwarf's backstory and clearly has some future knowledge about what has happened and will yet happen.)</p><p>If there's a takeaway from all of this, it's the advice I gave at the start: leave gaps in your campaign creation where interesting things might go. The players don't need reams of epic backstory to jump into a game, so you don't need to make them. However, if during the course of planning or play, you determine interesting connections between your disparate, intriguing details, give them context and make them matter. (<b>Remember:</b> nothing the GM does matters unless it emerges at the table. This is why the other players ultimately have more power than the GM, because every decision they make matters.)</p><p>It's the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Powers" target="_blank">Tim Powers</a> design principle, but applied to one's own writing: in a couple of places (I'm citing <a href="https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/nonfiction/interview-tim-powers/" target="_blank">this one in particular</a>), he references doing research for his latest book, giving this anecdote, "Half the time, if it's very late at night, I find sometimes when I open some new research book, it'll appear to confirm my fictional theory, and I’ll think, 'Oh my god, Powers, you’re not making this up. You've stumbled on the actual story here.' Except in the morning, I'm sane again." Leave gaps, interrogate those gaps, and then divine your own campaign setting from what you find.</p><p>Now the only way to truly recycle all my ancient prep is to find a way to re-use plot points from my aborted <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/242/spelljammer" target="_blank">Spelljammer</a></i> campaign from ten years ago...</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-57910484768026379252023-01-05T07:00:00.127-05:002023-05-02T01:09:10.384-04:00RPGs as Art: On Sincerity in Art<p><i>"Don't do fashionable science."</i> — Max Delbrück</p><p>A mantra for 2023.</p><p>Wandering around the lonely corners of the internet in this foul year of our Lord two-thousand twenty-three, there's a repeated piece of advice that feels <i>intensely</i> counter-intuitive to me. Whenever someone is thinking about writing something for publication — often on one of the <a href="https://www.onebookshelf.com/" target="_blank">OneBookShelf</a> community content sites like <a href="https://www.dmsguild.com/" target="_blank">DM's Guild</a>, <a href="https://www.storytellersvault.com/" target="_blank">Storyteller's Vault</a>, or <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/browse/pub/408/Atlas-Games/subcategory/28003/Statosphere" target="_blank">Statosphere</a> — the most common piece of feedback I see is to write something that the author thinks will be popular. Or I see people soliciting their slice of the community for ideas, putting up a poll or open thread about what sort of thing the community wants to see next.</p><p>It doesn't surprise me that lots of those projects never materialize.</p><p>I can't speak for anyone else, but I can say that I am way more likely to finish something if I'm passionate about it, and I'm more likely to be passionate about it if it was more-or-less my idea. <i>My idea</i> is a relative concept — it might be a collaboration or even someone else's skeleton that I sketched out — but the key is that it's something that lit my brain on fire and I had to put it somewhere. If I produce it for public consumption, I'd rather produce a weird piece of art beloved by ten people (and perhaps hated by a hundred more) than a milquetoast piece of art that is passively enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of people and then abandoned when the media cycle changes.</p><p>(In fact, the most melancholy version of the crowdsourced art trend is seeing someone abandon a passion project because they arbitrarily decided no one was interested in it. I still dream about the guy who was thinking about doing a Statosphere supplement about archery. Archery hasn't appeared in my modern horror games, but if someone is passionate about it, I want to see what they do with it.)</p><p>On the consumption side of things, the RPG products I enjoy and get the most use out of are things I never knew I wanted in the first place. Of the <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i> offerings on Statosphere, everyone talks about big, ambitious products like <i><a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/354948/One-Shots-American-Dreams" target="_blank">American Dreams</a></i> or <i><a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/314400/GOAD-333-Campaign-Frame-Ideas-for-Unknown-Armies" target="_blank">GOAD</a></i> or <i><a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/411973/Special-Orders-RITE" target="_blank">RITE</a></i>, but I've gotten the most direct use out of <i><a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/388581/Three-Miles-Of-Bad-Road" target="_blank">Three Miles of Bad Road</a></i>. (I'm not even running a car-centric campaign!) I haven't had a chance to slot <i><a href="https://johnbattle.itch.io/the-sun-kings-palace" target="_blank">The Sun King's Palace</a></i> into a fantasy campaign yet, but I'm definitely going to do so. I keep returning to it, tasting it in my dreams. I certainly didn't ask for a d100 horror sci-fi game, but <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/48770/mothership" target="_blank">Mothership</a></i> continues to beckon me. (And there's a sentence or two in the beginning of <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/285654/pound-flesh" target="_blank">A Pound of Flesh</a></i> that features some of the best game advice I've ever read.)</p><p>All this to say: everyone has a story in them that only they can tell, in a medium of their choosing. Even if it's a lousy story, clumsily told, it will resonate with someone. Make your weird, idiosyncratic art and you will find like-minded people to play with you. Don't try to make the art you think people want to see, and don't try to make art because the topic is trendy. If you find yourself rushing to make something so you can release it while it's still topical, you've already lost.</p><p>So when you're staring down the gun barrel of your next RPG project and you don't quite know what to do, don't turn to focus-testing to tell you what to do. Brainstorm, try stuff, put your weird art out into the world. Consider this your permission to get <i>real fuckin' weird</i> with it.</p><p>(And astute observers will note that this applies to all art, not just role-playing games. I've watched a lot of mediocre film and television over the past month, things that were clearly focus-tested to death or tried to have Important Things To Say™ rather than <i>honest</i> things to say. Tell a story only you can tell.)</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Obligatory Addendum</h3><p>Since the above screed largely talks about the individual (-ish) process of making art, let's talk about the uniquely collaborative activity of role-playing games themselves. (As I say repeatedly, RPGs are what happen at the table, and the rest is but smoke.) Even though the above post addresses the individual artist, it also applies to the group as a whole. If you're a Game Master, don't ignore your group's good ideas because they don't jibe with The Very Important Story You Have To Tell™. If you're a fellow player, don't ignore your other players' ideas because they don't fit your conception of this collaborative exercise.</p><p>The RPG table is going to be weird, messy, and collaborative. Your job is to enable that collaboration and have fun. (Please don't forget that games are supposed to be fun.) Everyone's favorite moments in a role-playing game are invariably when everything is chaotic and in total freefall. Lean into that, otherwise you could be writing a novel.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-33284507543749979602023-01-03T07:00:00.057-05:002023-01-04T11:30:19.483-05:00The Obligatory Dungeon23 Post<p>In case you haven't heard the good word, there's a community project this year. (Already in progress!)</p><p><a href="https://seanmccoy.substack.com/p/dungeon23" target="_blank">Sean McCoy posted about this on Twitter and his Substack</a>, but the gist is that you make a megadungeon by writing one dungeon room per day. At the end of the year, you'll have a twelve-level megadungeon with 365 rooms.</p><p>I've seen a lot of folks doing a bunch of pre-planning for this project, but <a href="https://seanmccoy.substack.com/p/slow-down-youre-doing-fine" target="_blank">as Sean himself says in another post</a>, keep it simple. Divine your megadungeon via random tables and free association. (And in my personal experience, front-loading too much of the work makes it seem unattainable.) This is a brainstorming exercise more than anything else, so get ready to get weird with it.</p><p>Personally, I'm excited to see what develops. Hopefully everybody takes this opportunity to figure out how a megadungeon is put together and what they like to see in dungeons.</p><p>I don't plan on writing about my own <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/dungeon23" target="_blank">#dungeon23</a> project too much on the ol' hobby blog, but I plan on keeping up with it. My dungeon is tentatively called The Crucible, although I don't know what it will become with the fullness of time. For starters, I don't think "The Crucible" is what the locals call it; they don't know that the nearby cave systems are actually connected into a megadungeon complex. (In fact, I'm not even sure anyone — including the inhabitants — has ever discovered the main entrance!)</p><p>In the meantime, here are a handful of additional community discussions around dungeon23:</p><p><a href="http://maziriansgarden.blogspot.com/search/label/Dungeon23" target="_blank">Ben L.'s dungeon23 tag on the Mazirian's Garden blog</a></p><p><a href="https://www.tumblr.com/betterlegends/tagged/dungeon23" target="_blank">Better Legends' #dungeon23 tag on Tumblr</a></p><p><a href="https://zedecksiew.tumblr.com/tagged/dungeon23" target="_blank">Zedeck Siew's #dungeon23 tag on Tumblr</a></p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-73341197526444786192022-12-22T07:00:00.192-05:002022-12-22T07:00:00.231-05:00How to Keep Players Returning for a Thousand Hours<p><a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2022/05/it-is-finished.html" target="_blank">As noted elsewhere</a>, I've run a lot of long campaigns. (I don't currently have an ongoing game that has lasted less than three years. My longest campaigns lasted eleven and eight years, respectively; one of my current ongoing games has continued for six-and-a-half years.)</p><p>Bearing that in mind, one of the most common complaints I see on the internet is about Game Masters attempting to wrangle players and force them to enjoy the GM's nonsense. To answer those complaints, here's a short list of advice, in many ways a coda and distillation of the advice I gave at the bottom of <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2022/05/it-is-finished.html" target="_blank">this post</a>. Enjoy!</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Don't cancel.</b> If the players have to cancel, that's one thing. But in my experience, if the GM habitually cancels, everyone assumes the game isn't a priority and their attention wanes. Stay home if you're sick or there's an emergency, but otherwise, do your best to make the game a priority and your players will do the same.</li><ul><li>If you have to cancel, give as much notice if you can. Otherwise, even if you're feeling unprepared, this might be a great opportunity for a breather session.</li><li>If you can establish a regular schedule, that's even better. Don't break it unless you absolutely must.</li></ul><li><b>Listen to the players and make their choices matter.</b> Table-top role-playing games have two big selling features: players can try anything they want (as long as they're willing to live with the consequences), and it's the only activity in this cyberpunk hellscape where a participant is guaranteed an actual living human's individual attention (as a reward rather than a punishment). So give it to them: let them try whatever they want and live with the consequences as long as you telegraph the consequences in advance.</li><ul><li>You don't have to tell them exactly what will happen, but "if you fail this jump you'll fall" and "you don't know what will happen if you mix those potions together" are good starts.</li><li>Also, let consequences echo throughout the campaign. Players love it when a dangling plot thread from a year ago makes its triumphant return.</li><li>You can do this even if the characters aren't "important." The cashier at the corner store notices that you haven't been around in a couple of weeks; that establishes the character's place in the world and suggests that <i>someone</i> cares about what they're doing.</li></ul><li><b>Establish real stakes.</b> A series of 300 scripted fights might be fun as a tabletop combat sport, but it makes for a boring longform campaign. Dig into why the characters are doing what they do, and play antagonists as intelligent characters in their own right. Everybody wants something, and has stuff they're willing to do to get it. What does that mean for the NPCs? What does that mean for the PCs? Even if the players are no-backstory dungeoneering chumps engaging in 1974-style fantasy adventuring to get gold to gain XP to build a domain, that's a plot detail that should probably come up before Level 9, right?</li><ul><li>On a smaller scale, not every encounter with hostile forces should lead to combat, and those that do should feature creative use of equipment, terrain, traps, tactics, and even more ephemeral things like positioning and time limits. A fight even against weaker opponents is more interesting if they have hostages, while <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/48246/hidden-shrine-tamoachan" target="_blank">C1: The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan</a></i> increases the difficulty by giving the players a time limit while delving the dungeon.</li><li>Even if events become world-shaking, always bring the game back to the player characters' scale. They're not saving the world, They're saving the people in it. They probably even know and like some of them!</li></ul></ol><div>That's basically it. You should show your players all the courtesy you want a friend to show you, and they'll keep coming back to find out what happens next.</div><p></p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-14489902484166432122022-12-15T07:00:00.122-05:002022-12-15T07:00:00.226-05:00Don't Punish the Players<p>A couple of months ago, <a href="https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/48414/roleplaying-games/1dd-the-5e-skill-system-is-bad" target="_blank">The Alexandrian made a post</a> about OneD&D in which he took issue with "<a href="https://dungeonsdragons.fandom.com/wiki/Bounded_accuracy" target="_blank">bounded accuracy</a>," the idea in <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank">5e</a> and some older <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">D&D</a></i> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_School_Renaissance" target="_blank">OSR</a> variants that the character's statistics for attacking, skills, and the like are going to remain within a narrow range throughout a character's development. (Contrast with a game like <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/221/dungeons-dragons-3rd-edition" target="_blank">3e</a>, where a character's statistics can theoretically scale infinitely such that lower-level threats do not meaningfully concern higher-level characters.)</p><p>Among his other points, Justin Alexander argues that bounded accuracy is a myth, that certain abilities in the game break it by making characters too good at certain activities. I'll let him explain:</p><p><i>"The more fundamental problem is mechanical: There are a handful of class abilities which trivially — but hilariously! — break bounded accuracy.</i></p><p><i>"The rogue, of course, makes an easy example here. <b>Expertise</b> doubles proficiency bonuses, changing a range of +2 to +6 into a range of +4 to +12. Combined with ability score modifiers, this almost immediately turns most reasonable DCs within the system’s bounded accuracy into an automatic success for the rogue, and it gets worse from there.</i></p><p><i>"<b>Reliable Talent</b> then comes in for mop-up, making the rogue’s minimum die roll 10. The rogue is now auto-succeeding on every proficient check, and in their chosen Expertise any DC that could challenge them is probably impossible for every other PC.</i></p><p><i>"Of course, those are </i>exactly<i> the DCs these hilariously broken abilities pressure the DM to assign. Partly because they want to challenge the PCs. Partly because it just makes sense that these PCs should be able to achieve things the PCs without the hilariously broken abilities can’t do."</i></p><p>This, in turn, reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend years ago, in which he was talking about running <i>D&D</i> and worrying about the fighter's armor class and hit points. He posited that one has to ensure the monsters are tough enough to routinely hit said character's high armor class so that they deduct hit points, otherwise the players are not properly engaging with the rules system.</p><p>But I don't think those approaches are the right way of looking at things. It's perfectly acceptable — and likely even good — for player characters to be good at certain things. If the rogue can pick almost any lock with a single action, or if the fighter routinely doesn't have to worry about being significantly challenged in melees, that's fine. As a Game Master, if you seek to "challenge" your players (whatever that means to you), making the numbers scale infinitely is the laziest way to do it.</p><p>You can only begin to challenge the players when you establish real stakes for success and failure. <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Crux%20of%20Eternity" target="_blank">My oft-mentioned high-level <i>D&D</i> game</a> could defeat any fair challenge I throw at them (and quite a few unfair ones!), but they could still be challenged with stakes: retrieve an item, save the prisoners, delve the dungeon on a time limit. Your rogue can pick any lock and disarm any trap, but can she disarm the traps and pick the locks before the room fills with water? The fighter can stand tall against any challenger, but what about a distant wizard lobbing fireballs and mind control sorcery? Your diplomat can talk his way out of any situation, but can he stall the unfriendly cultists long enough for your allies to arrive before the cult starts executing hostages?</p><p>What if one of the hostages is a beloved and trusted hireling?</p><p>I have had plenty of Game Masters in the past who seem to like to punish players for their choices: they invalidate your character abilities, steal your resources, threaten every ally you have, and turn every victory into ash in your mouth. And while that sort of game can be fun with appropriate buy-in — <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/186373/black-sun-deathcrawl" target="_blank"><i>Black Sun Deathcrawl</i></a>, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/814/call-cthulhu" target="_blank">Call of Cthulhu</a></i>, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/27917/delta-green-role-playing-game" target="_blank">Delta Green</a></i>, and <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/192129/ten-candles" target="_blank">Ten Candles</a></i> all come to mind as fun games when you learn to embrace the catharsis inherent in nihilism — that often turns a fun, engaging game into a grimy slog. (Incidentally, that's usually about the time when I lose interest. Always winning is just as much a bland and uninteresting railroad as always losing.)</p><p>Don't punish your players for smart choices they made, and don't make a hard game harder for everyone. If a character is good at something, you know you're only going to target that thing with luck or by making the game unfair. Instead, challenge something else. Employ distractions, challenge multiple abilities simultaneously, play foes as intelligent and reactive forces who adapt to changing circumstances.</p><p>Establish real stakes, then build on what you've established. Character stats don't make mistakes, but players certainly do when the clock starts ticking.</p><p>You might be able to support yourself and maybe even your allies, but can you accomplish your goals?</p><p>Can you save everyone?</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-10916156209093935652022-11-10T07:00:00.128-05:002022-11-10T07:00:00.217-05:00What Happens When I Eat the Corpse Cake?<style>
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<p>In the <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Khaldun" target="_blank">Sorrowfell Plains</a>, the locals often call confessors or counselors, "sin-eaters." As with many terms, the origin is obscure to the average pseudo-medieval peasant, but scholars recognize that the villages of the western Sorrowfell Plains still maintain traditional funerary rites*, including leaving an offering upon the decedent's body which is then consumed by the mourners.</p><p>While this is often a celebratory practice, hoping that one will gain some of the positive qualities of the deceased, there is another aspect to the ritual. Those families who worry that their loved one's sins will cause them to rise as undead, or who have heard the heretical claims that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outer_Plane" target="_blank">the dead (called "petitioners") spend their afterlives in the Astral Reaches</a>, will often feed this bread to a priest or other confessor, hoping that such a person will be able to take their loved one's sin and purify it. Other families or villages, cleaving more to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scapegoat" target="_blank">scapegoat</a> model of morality (or lacking a local priest), may instead pay a poor person or a traveler to eat it in the hopes that they will go elsewhere and take the sin with them.</p><p>(Astute observers will also note that this trend is repeated across many such times and places. Interested parties are directed to examine <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin-eater" target="_blank">sin-eating as practiced in historical Europe over the past few centuries</a>.)</p><p>This sounds like the perfect excuse to put a funeral on your "What's happening in this random village?" chart, and have the locals try to sell the funerary bread to the adventurers passing through town in the hopes that they will take the sin with them. Locals are unlikely to offer much for this service: the traditional pay in Wales was six pence, and while I expect pseudo-medieval peasants and their ilk to not offer more than a gold piece for such an act, nobles might be willing to offer outrageous sums to travelers willing to eat the funerary bread.</p><p>If your system of choice offers XP-for-gold, it's up to you whether you grant XP for the gold given. I probably would, given that there's risk involved and since the money is likely to be low: a concerned and desperate noble will ensure your room-and-board for the night and might be willing to pay up to 100gp. It is unlikely that they would pay more unless they are certain the decedent's sins are truly grave, but what are the odds of someone doing something that horrible <i>in private</i>? Unless the characters are foreign and so are completely ignorant of the decedent's reputation...</p><p>So what's the harm? A free meal and ten gold pieces for your trouble? Why would you say no?</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">What Happens When I Eat the Corpse Cake?</h3><p>Each player who partakes rolls 1d20. (The GM may prefer to roll, since a lot of these changes aren't immediately obvious.) Being under the effects of a spell like <i><a href="https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/protectionFromEvil.htm" target="_blank">protection from evil</a></i> completely prevents the following effects, which is why clerics are often preferred as sin-eaters.</p><p>
<table style="width:100%">
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<th style="width:10%">1d20</th>
<th>Effect</th>
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<td><center><b>1-12</b></center></td>
<td>No effect.</td>
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<td><center><b>13</b></center></td>
<td>Roll a save vs. spell (<a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/389/basic-dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">BECMI</a>) or a DC 13 Charisma save (<a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank">5e</a>). If you fail, your alignment inverts: Lawful becomes Chaotic (or vice versa) and Good becomes Evil (or vice versa). Neutral stays the same.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><center><b>14</b></center></td>
<td>Roll a save vs. spell (BECMI) or a DC 13 Charisma save (5e). If you fail, your alignment changes to Evil, although the Law vs. Chaos axis remains the same. (If you're playing something like BECMI with only Law vs. Chaos, your alignment changes to Chaotic instead.)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><center><b>15</b></center></td>
<td>You now detect as Evil/Chaotic/fiendish/bad for the purposes of spells and effects such as <i><a href="https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/detectEvil.htm" target="_blank">detect evil</a></i>.</td>
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<tr>
<td><center><b>16</b></center></td>
<td>If there's a Bad Place™ to go when you die, you're headed there. Resurrection spells and other such effects don't work on you unless your party figures out how to get your soul out of cosmic impound first. (<i><a href="https://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/psionicRevivify.htm" target="_blank">Revivify</a></i>-style magic still works as long as the soul hasn't departed the body yet.) An appropriate purification ritual or quest can also free you from Hell, but since this corruption has no outward sign, you might not know until it's too late.</td>
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<tr>
<td><center><b>17</b></center></td>
<td>A small fiend — an imp, a quasit, or even just a regular animal with some weird demonic traits — starts following you around, serving you as a familiar. It hates you and wants to tempt you into evil acts, both to increase the net evil in the world and to condemn your soul when you die.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><center><b>18</b></center></td>
<td>The decedent's sin pools in your head, giving voice to the worst, most self-destructive parts of you. (If this sounds similar to <a href="https://whitewolf.fandom.com/wiki/Shadowguide" target="_blank">Shadowguiding</a> from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/425/wraith-oblivion" target="_blank">Wraith: The Oblivion</a></i>, you know exactly how to play this.) Your bad side can consult with you telepathically and offer you advantage on any roll (roll two dice and take the better result), although it is under no obligation to do so and you are under no obligation to take the advantage. Once per day, it can attempt to possess you, controlling your actions for one hour: make a save vs. spell or DC 13 Charisma save to resist. The difficulty of the test is modified by the number of times you accepted advantage that day. (So if you accepted help twice, you're at a -2 to resist possession.) Smart evil sides do not volunteer this fact and do not attempt possession often. Your evil side can potentially be exorcised by appropriate spells (such as <i><a href="https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/dispelEvil.htm" target="_blank">dispel evil</a></i>), abilities, quests, and the like. It will attempt to pressure you into performing its own agenda, which may be your worst impulses and secret desires, the original decedent's worst impulses, or a mix of the two.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><center><b>19</b></center></td>
<td>Corruption takes root in the flesh. Roll a save vs. paralyzation or a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or gain a mutation from the GM's favorite mutation table. (I personally recommend <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/217061/metamorphica-revised-edition" target="_blank">The Metamorphica</a></i>, <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgseries/3751/realm-chaos" target="_blank"><i>Realm of Chaos</i></a>, or <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/46208/tome-corruption" target="_blank">Tome of Corruption</a></i>.)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><center><b>20</b></center></td>
<td>No obvious change, but at midnight, a powerful fiend comes to tempt you. It can offer you anything the GM considers appropriate. It ultimately wants to purchase your soul, but might be willing to settle for less if it thinks it can goad you into corrupting someone or making future purchases later.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><center><b>21</b></center></td>
<td>I don't know what qualifies for a +1 on this chart — maybe you ate all the funerary cakes by yourself, or the decedent was a <i>really</i> wicked dude, or you made a real ass of yourself at the funerary meal and someone surreptitiously cursed you — but if you somehow roll this, you die at dinner. A fiendish creature (again, maybe a fiend on the GM's demonic list of choice, or a weird mutant animal) bursts forth from you <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1flrUTItNPE" target="_blank">like the xenomorph</a> to start terrorizing the countryside. (Or maybe you turn into a <a href="https://evildead.fandom.com/wiki/Deadite" target="_blank">Deadite</a> or something. Any option is fine, so long as it births a new monster from your flesh.) To add insult to injury, your soul is probably consigned to whatever bad corner of the afterlife exists in this world, and your flesh is so corrupted you can't be resurrected.</td>
</tr>
</table>
</p><p>* According to the scholars, these funerary traditions were adapted from <a href="https://ghwiki.greyparticle.com/index.php/Olman" target="_blank">Olman</a> rites into their current form. Contrast with the folk of the Feywalk Woods: the Maiavainrua elves are known to use magical rites to keep their dead around as counselors and honored ancestors, so many of the local villages in and around the wood maintain traditions involving prolonged mourning practices and embalming. <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/224291/weird-befell-drigbolton" target="_blank">Drigbolton</a>, found on the northern edge of the Feywalk Woods near the elven town of En'amanisrahd, is cited as one of the most starling examples of these practices, at least to outsiders.</p><p><b>Developer Commentary:</b> The general idea is that the characters get a free bed, a free meal, and some pocket change with a 40% chance of getting what is hopefully a weird and interesting curse. If you want to make <i>D&D</i> cosmology more present or turn this into more of an enticing gamble, expand this table into a 1d24 chart with eight additional entries for Good, no effect for Neutral, and the entries for 13-20 representing Evil. (Or expand the chart to your heart's content. Maybe true Goodness and true Evil are so rare that it's a d100 chart with only eight entries on one end, eight on the other, and eighty-four nonentries in between.) Also, in case it needs to be said, this assumes the generic, <a href="http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2008/12/implicit-christianity-of-early-gaming.html" target="_blank">Gygax-style vague Christianity</a> endemic to <i>D&D</i> and its imitators. If your setting or fantasy elfgame of choice has different assumptions, this will likely be tonally dissonant with the rest of your setting. (Unless you decide Hell is real, but only to the residents of this <i>one village</i>, which sounds delightful. "Hell is real, but only in Gawkes Mere," is a fun potential plot hook.)</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-25075975246043446202022-11-03T07:00:00.006-04:002022-11-03T07:00:00.219-04:00Classic-Style Fantasy Elfgames: A Summary<p>To grossly misappropriate one of my favorite quotes about dungeon-y, dragon-y games, "<a href="http://jrients.blogspot.com/2010/05/on-swords-sorcery-dungeons-dragons.html" target="_blank">You play Conan, I play Gandalf. We team up to fight Dracula.</a>" In that spirit, I saw this picture <a href="https://comominimo.tumblr.com/post/693877856725565440" target="_blank">on Tumblr</a> which also captures the appropriate vibe:</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CAS5WLcBaVG/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1144" data-original-width="797" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOTAei4RkwLv1HSOOYUnnJDRLbEWdWGdDnX_W5k7edmQECq1w6XYZoT2XvCg-yTORwvrqwKjk9JcyVcCn-qcn63hKRsJ-ZT2QlXMiPloOStrr70_qwlrrH_n-1y9gZI6Yqs-_JZ8sUAzzjDh6YTh_C-t9OFXzdLGEhM0gGqyBZq4UxRYCl31Fw6LGvjg/w446-h640/cheshire%20xenomorph%20by%20mathewjacksonillustration.jpg" width="446" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">As always, click the picture for the original artwork</td></tr></tbody></table>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-14843231203713763232022-09-02T07:00:00.437-04:002022-12-12T15:33:18.422-05:00Review: Spelljammer: Adventures in Space (and D&D 5e)<p>I wasn't going to write this review.</p><p>Despite recently running a lot of <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank">fifth edition <i>Dungeons & Dragons</i></a>, I don't have an overwhelming urge to talk about it much here on the ol' hobby blog. I may publish the occasional piece of 5e content here, but the actual rules and the culture around the game has been analyzed to death elsewhere. The scene certainly doesn't need <i>another</i> voice muddying the waters and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wizards_of_the_Coast" target="_blank">Wizards of the Coast</a> has no need to benefit from either my praise or scorn, so I keep doing the stuff I like with or without them.</p><p>However, two things spurred me to write this review:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>I love <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/242/spelljammer" target="_blank">the Spelljammer setting</a>, as the tags <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Spelljammer" target="_blank">Spelljammer</a> and <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/SPELLS%20WILL%20BE%20JAMMED" target="_blank">SPELLS WILL BE JAMMED</a> might suggest.</li><li>Most of The Dreaded Discourse™ surrounding the new Spelljammer release has been of even worse quality than usual.</li></ol><p></p><p>So, this is perhaps less a review than a rebuttal. If you happen upon this review, consider this a message in a bottle: if someone on social media told you how horrible the new Spelljammer box set was and how you need a bunch of third-party content to make it playable, I'm here to more appropriately calibrate your expectations. (<b>In short:</b> the rules are perfectly acceptable, being neither excellent nor terrible, and you don't need anybody's homebrew to "fix" the new rules.)</p><p>However, this review will be a bit long, because it is (in my mind) impossible to discuss an official fifth edition <i>D&D</i> release without talking about WotC's design goals in making <i>D&D</i> 5e. (And you can't talk about those design goals without discussing what came before.) As such, this is a partial review of fifth edition itself. These reviews won't be especially in-depth, but they will hopefully be helpful.</p><p>If you're only here for a specific section, refer to the table of contents below.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Table of Contents</h3><p><b><a href="#history">I. The History of D&D (and Table-Top RPGs)</a><br /><a href="#5e">II. Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition</a><br /><a href="#spelljammer">III. Spelljammer: Adventures in Space</a></b></p><p><a id="history"></a></p><h3 style="display: inline; text-align: left;"><a id="#history">I. The History of D&D (and Table-Top RPGs)</a></h3><p>If you remember your history pretty well, you can safely skip down to section <a href="#5e"><b>II. Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition</b></a>. Conversely, if you <i>really</i> want to delve into the thick of RPG history, authors like <a href="http://grognardia.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">James Maliszewski</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/BenRiggs_" target="_blank">Ben Riggs</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/docetist" target="_blank">Jon Peterson</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/Appelcline" target="_blank">Shannon Appelcline</a> do great work in this sphere. (Although as with so many things in the hobby, their focus is often on <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">Dungeons & Dragons</a></i> specifically, leaving some of the less-renowned-but-still-influential aspects of the hobby unexamined.)</p><p>But the short version is that <i>D&D</i> starts in 1974 as a game exploring site-based and event-based adventures — pulp heroes wandering into the wilderness, facing danger in dungeons, and gathering the treasures therein (typically to fund their own personal projects).</p><p>Within a decade, more narrative structure emerges in game scenarios, exemplified by the investigation- and skill-heavy <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/814/call-cthulhu" target="_blank"><i>Call of Cthulhu</i></a> in 1981 and <a href="http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2008/12/scrappy-doo-and-hickman-revolution.html" target="_blank">the Hickman revolution</a> starting with 1982's <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/48983/pharaoh" target="_blank">I3: Pharaoh</a></i>. Money stops becoming a vital resource and starts becoming a supplement: 1989's <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/244/advanced-dungeons-dragons-2nd-edition" target="_blank"><i>Advanced Dungeons & Dragons</i> 2e</a> does away with XP-for-gold (although it remains as an optional rule), instead focusing primarily on fighting monsters, while 1991's <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/421/vampire-masquerade" target="_blank">Vampire: The Masquerade</a></i> completely abstracts character wealth as part of the Backgrounds system and assumes it is not a primary goal.</p><p>By the end of the 1990s, the transition from site-based or event-based adventures into plot-based ones culminates in the ascendance of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaplot" target="_blank">the metaplot</a>: an overarching story that runs in the background of published game materials, such that collectors can read the books to put together the puzzle and players can interact with big events in the background of the setting. Many of the big games of the era have a metaplot revealed during the line's development (<a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/335/cyberpunk" target="_blank"><i>Cyberpunk</i></a>, <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/438/deadlands" target="_blank"><i>Deadlands</i></a>, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/27917/delta-green-role-playing-game">Delta Green</a></i>, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i>, and <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/371/classic-world-darkness" target="_blank">World of Darkness</a></i> all come to mind), and while <i>D&D</i> as a whole avoids a metaplot, most of its campaign settings have them. (<a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/387/dragonlance" target="_blank">Dragonlance</a>, <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/196/forgotten-realms" target="_blank">Forgotten Realms</a>, <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/535/planescape" target="_blank">Planescape</a>, and <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/534/ravenloft" target="_blank">Ravenloft</a> certainly all had metaplots.) The metaplot is simultaneously remembered fondly by fans as an interesting serialized story in its own right, while also being reviled as a bloated gimmick to sell books.</p><p>When TSR collapses and Wizards of the Coast takes over the game, they put their own stamp on the game by combining the <i>Advanced Dungeons & Dragons</i> line with the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/389/basic-dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">BECMI</a>/<i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/46114/dungeons-dragons-rules-cyclopedia" target="_blank">Rules Cyclopedia</a></i> era-D&D line into simply <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/221/dungeons-dragons-3rd-edition" target="_blank">Dungeons & Dragons</a></i>. A few of the popular games at the time followed suit, relaunching in the early 2000s with slick new editions and largely abandoning the metaplot structure in favor of increased accessibility. However, this is an era in which a lot of games design more explicit rulesets (relying less on GM rulings), and also replace the metaplot subscription structure with a emphasis on "character builds" — the game line is now a vehicle by which to build an optimized character. While <i>D&D</i> 3e exemplifies this with its so-called <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20080221174425/http://www.montecook.com/cgi-bin/page.cgi?mc_los_142" target="_blank">ivory tower design</a>, you see it in lines like <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/1108/exalted" target="_blank">Exalted</a></i> and <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/442/chronicles-darkness" target="_blank">new <i>World of Darkness</i></a>.</p><p>While game lines become more bloated, desktop publishing and forums like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indie_role-playing_game#The_Forge" target="_blank">The Forge</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPGnet" target="_blank">RPG.net</a> allow for the creation and proliferation of smaller, more focused indie RPGs. While some of these games are short-lived, as befits a smaller and more narrow play experience, a lot of them are read by other game designers and introduce more mechanical concepts into the RPG ideaspace.</p><p>After an eight-year development cycle, Wizards of the Coast finally takes what it learned and rebrands D&D again into the wildly-polarizing <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/190/dungeons-dragons-4th-edition" target="_blank">fourth edition</a>. This continues a lot of the game design trends of third edition, taking them to their logical conclusion by further emphasizing combat as the focus of the game. Combat procedures are explicit, repeatable, and largely in the players' hands. (Instead of GMs making rulings on things the players want to try, most of what a character can do is located on the character sheet.) The game's encounter design also lends itself to largely linear adventure paths of straightforward plots broken only by the game's setpiece battles.</p><p>While the game still sold well, the backlash online was fairly intense, taking two interesting forms:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>The grognard bloggers who stuck with BECMI or <i>AD&D</i> during the third edition era start swapping design notes with the arthaus punk bloggers, forming the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_School_Renaissance" target="_blank">OSR</a> largely by accident.</li><li>WotC ends their contract with Paizo Publishing, the contractor who published <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgperiodical/1221/dragon" target="_blank">Dragon</a></i> and <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgperiodical/1225/dungeon" target="_blank">Dungeon</a></i> during the third-edition era. Since they now have a lot of experience writing third-edition content, they make their own third-edition retroclone called <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/49883/pathfinder" target="_blank">Pathfinder</a></i>.</li></ol><p></p><p>The backlash and increased competition for dungeon-y, dragon-y adventure game design space results in fourth edition <i>D&D</i> having one of the shortest development cycles of any <i>D&D</i> edition. After only four to six years depending on how you count it, WotC takes these disparate pieces of information — the stuff happening in the storygames sphere, the stuff happening in the OSR sphere, and the fan response to <i>Pathfinder</i> — and returns to the drawing board to release "D&D Next" for the game's fortieth anniversary.</p><a id="5e"><h3 style="text-align: left;">II. Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition</h3></a><p>While I read some <i>D&D</i> books and played a single, hazily-recalled game around 2006, fourth edition was my first edition of the game I ran and played beyond one session, <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2022/05/it-is-finished.html" target="_blank">starting in 2011</a>. (As noted <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2011/08/start.html" target="_blank">elsewhere</a>, <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2011/09/tales-of-guerilla-roleplayer-imperial.html" target="_blank">I mostly ran <i>World of Darkness</i></a> before coming to <i>D&D</i>.) As such, fifth edition is the first version of the game that I have followed largely as it released, instead of piecing it together in hindsight. I don't know if that makes me especially qualified to write what follows, but now you understand my background on the subject.</p><p>Forty years of game design brings us to this. During the mid-2010s, I recall someone calling fifth edition, "everyone's second-favorite edition of <i>D&D</i>," and that sounds about right. I recently described most of the fifth edition releases as "a C+ essay." (As with most things in the universe, I often describe it as, "Not as good as the fans say it is, but better than the haters say it is.")</p><p>If you play <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Smash_Bros." target="_blank"><i>Super Smash Bros.</i></a>, <i>D&D</i> 5e is <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JackOfAllStats" target="_blank">Mario</a>, excelling in no particular area but robust in all of them. In the immortal words of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Costanza" target="_blank">George Costanza</a>, 5e is "right in that meaty part of the curve: not showing off, not falling behind."</p><p>In short: it's good. (But not great.)</p><p>A lot of the things that drive its popularity include its prevalence (as it acts as a sort of <i>lingua franca</i> in the RPG hobby), its thriving play culture, its dominance on livestreaming RPG shows, and the fact that it more-or-less does what it advertises. If you want an adventure game that lets you go on adventures about exploring strange locations, interacting with interesting NPCs, fighting monsters, recovering treasure, and becoming more powerful while doing so, it handles all these things.</p><p>If you want a flatter power curve; a less number-heavy experience; something that focuses less on resource management; an experience that more consistently reflects a specific genre rather than "whatever breed of fantasy happens at the table tonight;" something that takes place in a more modern setting; an experience that actively dissuades combat; or a setting with no magic or different magic other than the pseudo-<a href="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Vancian_magic" target="_blank">Vancian</a> model, you probably want to look elsewhere.</p><p>As noted on this blog, I operate in a lot of indie spaces, and they tend to complain about <i>Dungeons & Dragons</i> at length. (So much so that allegedly anti-<i>D&D</i> places are where I sometimes get significant news about official <i>D&D</i> releases.) But those complaints are often incoherent, and clearly represent some personal issue with the game. In my mind, there are only three legitimate complaints about fifth edition <i>D&D</i>, and they're unlikely to change any time soon:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>It's corporate art. And like a lot of corporate art, it's designed to be as inoffensive as possible. It's bland and it doesn't really do anything innovative.</li><li>The rules are complicated. It's very number-heavy and worries about fine details like positioning and resource management. If you have difficulty tracking a lot of variables, if you have a disability that makes it difficult to keep numbers in your head, or if tedious note-taking doesn't sound like your idea of fun, this might not be the game for you.</li><li>The culture overshadows the game at the table. Strictly speaking, this isn't the fault of the rules, but it does lead to a lot of trouble online. <i>D&D</i> is incredibly widespread, and people are overwhelmingly likely to learn the game from a mentor. As such, everyone <i>thinks</i> they know what the rules are, but almost no one actually reads the books cover-to-cover. (And even if you do, the rules are complicated. Nobody can keep all of the rules in their head at once.)</li><li>A phantom fourth argument that is partially true is that the game is pretty expensive. That isn't totally true: while there might be marketing pressure and peer pressure to spend money on it, the basic game is technically free. You can download the <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/what-is-dnd/basic-rules" target="_blank">Basic Rules</a> for free (or use the Basic Rules on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%26D_Beyond" target="_blank">D&D Beyond</a>), use an online dice roller, and find enough free content online to run the game for the rest of your life without doing any work. I suspect the thriving community around the game and the free rules are two of the many factors that maintain the game's popularity.</li></ol><p></p><p>But to understand why WotC has made the design decisions it made, one must understand that this represents forty years of game design and fifteen years of Wizards of the Coast corporate analysis. Fifth edition is a fundamentally <i>reactionary</i> edition, responding to all that came before and combining aspects from the previous eight or so editions of the game into something that tries to please everyone. The overall trend is one of retaining some of the most popular rules and incorporating bits of design from other games while also simplifying concepts from previous editions: multiple spells are condensed into aspects of a single spell, floating modifiers are condensed into advantage/disadvantage, monster stats are simplified from their third edition counterparts and all relevant information is found reliably in the stat block. (Recall that, during the BECMI and <i>AD&D</i> era, valuable statistical information like special abilities and spells were often hidden in the monster descriptions, usually-but-not-always in the same place.)</p><p>Also recall that, while a lot of the design of previous editions has proven quite popular, analysis suggests it maybe wasn't sustainable. Ahead of his recent book, <i><a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250278050/slayingthedragon" target="_blank">Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons & Dragons</a></i>, Ben Riggs made a handful of posts on Twitter and elsewhere about TSR sales figures, and they paint a bleak picture. The classic <i>AD&D</i> 2e box sets are fondly recalled but apparently didn't sell terribly well. Likewise, we know that third edition was popular and is well-regarded by the fans, but that edition had a punishing release schedule with an enormous game line. We don't know much about WotC sales figures, but it seems reasonable to surmise that they developed fourth edition because sales were flagging.</p><p>(I would also be remiss if I ignored the fact that fifth edition is also designed around the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPGA#D&D_Adventurers_League" target="_blank">Adventurers League</a> organized play program and the community content on DM's Guild, which is part of the complex mélange of factors that drives the game's popularity. The game can only be but so outlandish, otherwise it would interfere with the open table policy of the Adventurers League. Likewise, any content that fans really want to see can easily be made by the community and posted on DM's Guild for pay — which per DM's Guild policy, still monetarily benefits Wizards of the Coast. That's pure passive income for them.)</p><p>In short, the unified design and staggered release schedule for fifth edition indicate that Wizards of the Coast has learned from its business mistakes. They're not constantly churning out content every month, they're not establishing expansive metaplots, they're not trying to innovate while also risking failure. (The streaming space also provides a constant stream of free advertising for the game without WotC having to put out anything new. At this point, they don't <i>need</i> to churn out new content every month, and it's easier to catch press for the new release when it's a big one every quarter or so.) It's all very safe, focus-tested, and conservatively-designed. Whatever else someone's opinion of <i>D&D</i> 5e, these trends all suggest that this was a very conscientiously-designed edition of the game. (The feedback from the ongoing open playtest of the game no doubt guides some of its development and contributes to the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qImHuiYnVQ0" target="_blank">smooth, inoffensive</a> nature of it.)</p><a id="spelljammer"><h3 style="text-align: left;">III. Spelljammer: Adventures in Space</h3></a><p>Which brings us to the actual point of this post.</p><p>You have a new edition of the game that also tries to be a legacy edition, supported by a continuous open playtest of the rules and a burgeoning fan community. While the original fifth edition release in 2014 focused on the popular Forgotten Realms as the game's implied setting, fans have been clamoring for old content like adventures and campaign settings to be re-released under fifth edition. Wizards of the Coast started releasing legacy content fairly quickly, beginning with <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/172901/eberron" target="_blank">an Eberron playtest</a> in 2015 and an official release of an expanded version of <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/48949/ravenloft" target="_blank">I6: Ravenloft</a></i> (entitled <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/192136/curse-strahd" target="_blank">Curse of Strahd</a></i>) in 2016. Fan requests for additional updates continue across social media, and WotC continues to publish it.</p><p>Hearkening back to the <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/49771/spelljammer-add-adventures-space" target="_blank">Spelljammer: AD&D Adventures in Space</a></i> box set, Wizards of the Coast releases <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/361551/spelljammer-adventures-space" target="_blank">Spelljammer: Adventures in Space</a></i> in 2022. As with most of their other products, the production values are decent, the art is lovely, and the organization is as expected. It's a C+ essay — it promises rules for spelljammers, space-themed monsters, and an adventure, and it delivers exactly what it promised.</p><p>Interesting tidbits from the new setting include:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>In contrast to the original 2e setting, there is only one kind of spelljammer helm, and it no longer requires your spell power to use it. (This last fact is even a change from the <i><a href="https://www.dndbeyond.com/magic-items/342879-helm-of-the-scavenger" target="_blank">helm of the scavenger</a></i> published in 2018's <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/255389/waterdeep-dungeon-mad-mage" style="font-style: italic;" target="_blank">Dungeon of the Mad Mage</a>.) Every spelljammer is roughly as maneuverable as any other, and there is no longer an upper limit to the tonnage of a ship.</li><ul><li>Spelljammer helms can still only be used by spellcasters, though. You just don't have to turn spell energy into motive force anymore.</li></ul><li>They don't include all the ships from the old material, but again, it's pretty easy to convert old material to the new system. As it stands, the new set includes a lot of old designs and adds a few new ones.</li><li>Spelljammers are very accessible in this edition. You can probably get one, helm and all, for about 25,000gp or so. (In 2e, spelljammers were <i>expensive</i>, especially the helms. While a spelljammer is a good place to invest one's loot after many expeditions, it's also fun for players to be able to buy one relatively early in the game.)</li><li>The phlogiston from 2e is gone, replaced with the Astral Plane. I actually like this change, as it means that even low-level characters might have the resources to voyage into other worlds: journeys are now unlikely to take more than two months' worth of supplies, as the Astral Plane doesn't require rations or air. Of course, the trade-off is that the Astral Plane is way more dangerous than the phlogiston. (Not counting the inherent risk of setting your whole ship on fire in the phlogiston, of course.)</li><ul><li>Also in keeping with the Astral Plane, there are no space lanes, star systems have a tendency to move like bubbles in a sea, and you automatically orienteer in the direction of something by thinking about it. In short, they've made it easy to get around by leaving those details up to the Game Master — you don't need a map to get from Krynnspace to Realmspace, and the trip is as long or short as the GM decides it is.</li></ul><li>You can never go wrong with more monsters, and the included <i>Boo's Astral Menagerie</i> has plenty:</li><ul><li>A lot of <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/395/dark-sun" target="_blank">Dark Sun</a> monsters appear in this version, such as braxat, b'rohg, gaj, psurlons, and ssurrans. (The thri-kreen also appear as a playable race in the <i>Astral Adventurer's Guide</i>.) A leaked map even indicates that "Doomspace" in the included adventure <i>Light of Xaryxis</i> was originally going to be called "Athasspace." As it stands, Fyreen in Doomspace certainly sounds like a post-post-apocalyptic <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Sun#The_world" target="_blank">Athas</a>. WotC also has a habit of teasing future products in current ones, although such references are just as likely to be fanservice. (But they've previously suggested that they'll do Dark Sun... sooner or later. Maybe.)</li><li>A couple of BECMI-era monsters from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystara" target="_blank">Mystara</a> also appear, like the brain collector/neh-thalggu and the feyr.</li><li>In addition to some classic Spelljammer setting monsters, like arcane/mercane, dohwar, space swine, and zodar, there are also a handful of unique monsters in this edition, like space clowns and vampirates.</li></ul><li>The included adventure, <i>Light of Xaryxis</i>, is typical Wizards of the Coast fare: a linear plot crystallized around a couple of good ideas. It's looks fun to play and easy to run, but there isn't much in it that makes me <i>excited</i> to run it.</li><ul><li>Compare and contrast: John Battle's recent offering <i><a href="https://johnbattle.itch.io/the-sun-kings-palace" target="_blank">The Sun King's Palace</a></i> is a little messier than <i>Light of Xaryxis</i> and looks like it might take a not-insignificant amount of preparation to run without messing up the presentation, but <i>The Sun King's Palace</i> is so much more evocative than <i>Light of Xaryxis</i> that I'm way more excited at the prospect of preparing it and running it.</li><li>However, in the defense of <i>Light of Xaryxis</i>, I thought the hook was clever: it is a deliberate homage to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Gordon#Film_serials" target="_blank">the Flash Gordon serials</a> of the late 1930s as well as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Gordon_(film)" target="_blank">the 1980 movie</a>. It even has genre-appropriate cliffhangers between chapters!</li></ul></ul><p></p><p>Apart from the proliferation of Dark Sun monsters and the clever design to the included adventure, there aren't any surprises here. What you see is what you get.</p><p>However, as noted at the start of this review, the impetus for this review is to clarify some of the criticism online. Most of it is misleading and represents a different product from the one I read. We'll go through a few of the recurring criticisms I have seen:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li><b>"They didn't include [insert my favorite spelljammer monster or ship type here]!"</b> This one's easy: if you're an old fan, you probably still have your books, or you bought pdfs from DM's Guild. Adapting old material is easy; Wizards of the Coast even gives you <a href="https://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/DnD_Conversions_1.0.pdf" target="_blank">conversion guidelines</a>. Specifically in the case of monsters, <i>D&D</i> 5e doesn't often publish fifteen variations of a single monster anymore. The guidelines in the <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/162996/dungeon-masters-guide-dd-5e" target="_blank">Dungeon Master's Guide</a></i>, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/162995/monster-manual-dd-5e" target="_blank">Monster Manual</a></i>, and <i>Boo's Astral Menagerie</i> are pretty clear: if you want a weird version of a monster, take an existing one and give it different traits. <i>Boo's Astral Menagerie</i> gives guidelines for this process to make wildspace-dwelling versions of normal creatures.</li><li><b>"They didn't include the tables for making solar systems, or the subsystems for determining orbits!"</b> They weren't going to. Remember, a major idea behind 5e is <i>simplification</i>. For determining orbits, they just tell you to calculate the distance between planets mathematically. They assume that you're going to use the included adventure as inspiration for other star systems you make, rather than relying on random tables. If you want the old subsystems, they're still in the 2e books, waiting to be used. (Also, those subsystems were all <i>optional</i> rules anyway.)</li><li><b>"They didn't tell you how to determine how far away you have to get from a planet to reach spelljamming speed!"</b> In keeping with the (comparatively) more narrative focus of fifth edtion, they probably figure that's "however long the GM wants it to take." According to the old box set, on average it takes forty minutes to an hour to escape a planet's gravity well, more if it's windy, so I would use that as a guideline. I usually go with an hour; an hour is enough time for a single random encounter check, so that sounds good to me.</li><ul><li>If you want a more official ruling on this, the <i>Astral Adventurer's Guide</i> defines the air envelope of a planet extending out to a distance the same as the planet's diameter. That's... actually about right for Earth, but that distance describes the outer edge of the exosphere, which is too thin and too exposed to space to support actual life. Chapter five of the <i>Dungeon Master's Guide</i> describes terrestrial life typically ending above 20,000 which is also reasonably accurate; Earth's troposphere ends at about 40,000 feet, beyond which the atmospheric density is only one-thousandth of its value at sea level. While the gravitational pull at that altitude is about the same as at sea level, "the place where breathable air ends" is probably good enough for RPG games and occult symbolism. Twenty thousand feet is just under four miles, which most spelljammers can reach in a half-hour to an hour.</li></ul><li><b>"The Astral Plane makes travel between systems too easy! Characters can't get lost in the Astral Sea!"</b> I suspect that's part of the point. (But as noted above, the Astral Plane is often scarier than the phlogiston. I don't think there were astral dreadnoughts in the phlogiston...) Once you get to the Astral Plane, the GM decides how long the journey takes and what you encounter along the way, and all of this is in keeping with the procedures for GMing a game these days. If you want to make it more complicated and less certain, then do so.</li><ul><li>I would also remind anyone who thinks that you can't discover something by accident that the star systems move. You can take a five-month-long return journey to Realmspace only to find that another star system has bobbed into your path along the way. Likewise, since you can only travel to places that you know exist, learning that a specific star system exists so you can fly to it sounds like a pretty good adventure hook to me.</li></ul><li><b>"They left out the rules for ship combat!"</b> This is actually the critique that spurred me to write this review. Whenever I see this complaint, I re-read the "Ship-to-Ship Combat" section in the <i>Astral Adventurer's Guide</i> to make sure I didn't imagine it, and every time the rules are still there. They give guidelines for ship-to-ship combat, but they assume that you will remember the rules for combat, objects, and vehicles from chapters eight and nine of the <i>Player's Handbook</i>, and chapters five and eight of the <i>Dungeon Master's Guide</i>.</li><ul><li>A much more valid critique is that they ought to have provided a reference reminding you of where to find the relevant rules, or have provided a summary. For example, I had forgotten the rules for object saving throws until I went looking for them. (In D&D 5e, objects automatically fail all Strength and Dexterity saving throws, but succeed on all other saves.) That's why you need to read chapter eight of the <i>Player's Handbook</i> for spelljammer purposes; heaven forbid they would be in the "Object" section of chapter eight of the <i>Dungeon Master's Guide</i>.</li><li><i>"Why are the rules for ship combat spread across five chapters in three books?"</i> is an exceedingly valid critique. Does your game need hundreds of rules spread across several rulebooks in 2022? (<i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/23882/odd" target="_blank">Into the Odd</a></i>, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/48770/mothership" target="_blank">Mothership</a></i>, and <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/18462/world-dungeons" target="_blank">World of Dungeons</a> all come to mind as short RPGs that could support years of play, not to mention the hundreds of one-page RPGs floating in the digital aethers.)</li><li><i>"You need to get this fan supplement to make the rules playable!"</i> is not a valid critique in this case (and really just sounds like someone's gimmick to sell more DM's Guild content or to bring you to their blog).</li><li>As always, I would recommend using the procedures as defined in the core books before deciding it doesn't work for your group and adding third-party rules into the mix.</li></ul><li><b>"They didn't use the expanded vehicle rules from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/273848/ghosts-saltmarsh" target="_blank">Ghosts of Saltmarsh</a></i> or <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/280957/baldurs-gate-descent-avernus" target="_blank">Baldur's Gate: Descent Into Avernus</a></i>!"</b> Remember, those are <i>optional</i> rules, and the developers have a lot of ground to cover in this book. (And again, the keyword of this edition is <i>simplification</i>. I suspect that they're moving away from optional vehicle rules because they weren't as popular as people on the internet suggested, or they're trying to streamline things for <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Editions_of_Dungeons_%26_Dragons#One_D&D" target="_blank">One D&D</a></i> in 2024.) The basic vehicle and object rules are in the <i>Dungeon Master's Guide</i>, and they're perfectly serviceable.</li><ul><li>If you want to use the more detailed vehicle statistics from <i>Ghosts of Saltmarsh</i> or <i>Baldur's Gate: Descent Into Avernus</i>, nothing is stopping you from doing a conversion, although converting sixteen ships to the more complex <i>Ghosts of Saltmarsh</i> system and running spaceship combat in it with multiple ships sounds like a nightmare.</li></ul><li><b>"The adventure sucks!"</b> As noted above, <i>Light of Xaryxis</i> has problems, but they're pretty consistent with the problems of other fifth edition adventures. (Too plot-focused, too linear, stakes are so high as to be totally abstract.) I suspect, however, that most people are reacting to the structure of the adventure, and they completely ignored the part where the authors say that it's a love letter to pulp adventure movie serials of the early 20th century. If you've seen the hokey plots and <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AssPull?from=Main.ShockingSwerve" target="_blank">shocking swerves</a> of a Flash Gordon or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commando_Cody" target="_blank">Commando Cody</a> serial, you'll understand what the authors were trying to accomplish. (And despite the adventure's flaws, I feel like they succeeded.)</li></ol><p></p><p>So, if you happened to find this after hearing that the new rules are unplayable, I'm here to tell you that they're perfectly serviceable. They may lack a lot of the flavor that made Spelljammer so beloved in the 2e era, but they're a good starting point. If you're looking for a rehash of the Unhuman Wars; the complicated subsystems for celestial mechanics; the granular ship mechanics; and a setting line comprising over two dozen products spread across box sets, books, <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgseries/1100/mc-monstrous-compendium" target="_blank">Monstrous Compendium</a></i> binder pages, and magazine articles, you won't find it here. (And Wizards of the Coast didn't take your old books away. Use them!)</p><p>However, if you want a stripped-down, back-to-basics version of the setting for fifth edition, you get exactly what you are expecting here and not a jot more. Honestly, if you read what they did with <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/334302/van-richtens-guide-ravenloft" target="_blank">Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft</a></i>, you shouldn't be surprised here: in that book, they reset the metaplot such that you don't have to follow the old books to use the Domains of Dread in fifth edition, but you can absolutely include stuff from the old books if you like. It may not be innovative game design or provocative art, but it makes good business sense: include something interesting enough to draw in new fans while leaving enough gaps and references to legacy materials to avoid alienating old fans.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Edit (September 3, 2022):</h3><p>After all that talk of Wizards of the Coast attempting to make their new edition as inoffensive as possible, The Dreaded Discourse™ continues apace. In the fifth edition <i>Spelljammer</i> adaptation, the <a href="https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Hadozee" target="_blank">hadozee</a> were given a backstory wherein they were small, lemur-like creatures who were <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uplift_(science_fiction)" target="_blank">uplifted</a> by a wizard to be used as workers and slaves before the wizard's apprentices helped liberate them.</p><p>If you know anything about Western history in the past five hundred years or so, you probably already see the problem. (A relatively comprehensive account of the scandal appears on <a href="https://techraptor.net/tabletop/news/wizards-revises-dd-hadozee-race-following-controversy" target="_blank">this TechRaptor post</a>.) For the record, I thought the backstory was a little weird, especially given how much of The Dreaded Discourse™ revolves around the long arm of the transatlantic slave trade, but I casually assume every big company hires a sensitivity reader these days and so promptly forgot about it.</p><p>After this fact was discovered and discussed on Twitter, Wizards of the Coast has issued <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/statement-hadozee" target="_blank">a statement and errata</a> and has already altered the race's description on D&D Beyond, removing the offending sections and slightly altering the hadozee's gliding ability. (However, some users have taken umbrage with the "Hadozee Resilience" trait, suggesting that it also reflects negative stereotypes against real-world ethnicities. As of yet, WotC has not issued a change for that.)</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Edit (September 4, 2022):</h3><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">Current WotC drama validates my boring opinion that mythological fantasy is simply too foundationed on ancient regressive philosophy (things like inherent evildom, platonic purity vs corruption, cruelty manifesting as physicality) to satisfy modern moralities. 1/4</p>— kirin (@koboldstyle) <a href="https://twitter.com/koboldstyle/status/1566122416207581186?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 3, 2022</a></blockquote><h3 style="text-align: left;">Edit (December 12, 2022):</h3><p>After grousing about how players can't read, it is with a heavy heart that I must admit that I can't read, either.</p><p>In my refutation of point #3, <b>"They didn't tell you how to determine how far away you have to get from a planet to reach spelljamming speed!"</b> I made an error. A recent re-read of the <i>Astral Adventurer's Guide</i> reveals, "A spelljamming ship automatically slows to its flying speed (discussed later in this chapter) when it comes within 1 mile of something weighing 1 ton or more, such as another ship, a <b>kindori</b> (see <i>Boo's Astral Menagerie</i>), an asteroid, or a planet."</p><p>For some reason, I (like every other loudmouth on the internet, apparently) thought the "1 mile" rule didn't cover planets for some reason.</p><p>So by that math, escape velocity is much easier in 5e than it was in the 2e days; rather than an average of 40 minutes, most ships reach spelljamming altitude in 15-20 minutes. (The fastest ships like damselflies and shrikes reach spelljamming speed after a seven-and-a-half minute ascent.)</p><p>Remember, kids: reading is fundamental.</p> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-84497162499025076172022-06-15T07:00:00.035-04:002022-06-15T07:00:00.191-04:00The Head of Vecna<p>A week or two ago, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wizards_of_the_Coast" target="_blank">Wizards of the Coast</a> released a new design for <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">D&D</a></i>'s Archlich <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vecna" target="_blank">Vecna</a>, back before he was betrayed by Kas and still had two eyes. He looks like this:</p><p></p><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">Vecna<br />.<br />Here is the final full bodied concept design for D&D’s Vecna. I was tasked with putting together a final look from designs by Ian McCaig, Steve Prescott, Wes Burt and myself. <a href="https://t.co/P6U5Sqey2J">pic.twitter.com/P6U5Sqey2J</a></p>— Kieran Yanner (@kieranyanner) <a href="https://twitter.com/kieranyanner/status/1535350008173580288?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 10, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><p></p><p></p><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">Vecna<br />.<br />Final portrait concept design for D&D’s Vecna. The awesome talents of Ian McCaig and Steve Prescott were also core to concept development of the project. <a href="https://t.co/7P46xYglXO">pic.twitter.com/7P46xYglXO</a></p>— Kieran Yanner (@kieranyanner) <a href="https://twitter.com/kieranyanner/status/1534992004014174208?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 9, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><p></p><p>As you can imagine given the sharp cheekbones and strong chin, the internet-at-large was very normal about it.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/dndmemes/comments/v970nv/i_dig_the_new_vecna_design_but_it_is_ripe_for_a/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="656" data-original-width="500" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9gCEjYKKKURPBIhfCWQUXG39qfIutpHNRCjn5Dv9uj1QWzbjqkm8uP_iNtU99uXRK4Id3fg1hczLfHs2uzMieaP4chscQ57ptPo_KZ-av0O41uaOZfh1WEdjS75Y6cUpTwysO0yd315aIp4xNrPRM5VCcVQYeaB0kXUBhY7t0GX4kag83N-MUdc_kjA/w305-h400/vecna%20from%20reddit.jpg" width="305" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vecna featuring <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/46004/book-erotic-fantasy" target="_blank">The Book of Erotic Fantasy</a></i>.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Continuing with that train of thought, when <a href="https://wildeschilde.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Nicole</a> saw it, her comment was, "They yassified Vecna..."</p><p>And her comment led me to create this monstrosity:</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglWRASBPNjvfPjHs5Dn1KyuXHzkKQr_4qc1CccGXKYj6NGH902l13zWOkv9uiB01s8F7d4v4fA89ztRy1fA0kBZpkPAIovWTmku7mIp06JQu1BjBwJOLablRYKe6y0Xo-lmeIFp4ca2lv0X1oOEdSFyJkIIp0WwBqqnKQ8okDGcmGrs5oXkFTQERV3ng/s1018/5e%20Vecna%20FaceApp.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1018" data-original-width="800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglWRASBPNjvfPjHs5Dn1KyuXHzkKQr_4qc1CccGXKYj6NGH902l13zWOkv9uiB01s8F7d4v4fA89ztRy1fA0kBZpkPAIovWTmku7mIp06JQu1BjBwJOLablRYKe6y0Xo-lmeIFp4ca2lv0X1oOEdSFyJkIIp0WwBqqnKQ8okDGcmGrs5oXkFTQERV3ng/w314-h400/5e%20Vecna%20FaceApp.png" width="314" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I think I met this guy at the club one time.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Which then prompted this edit of Vecna from the classic <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/49864/die-vecna-die" target="_blank">Die Vecna Die!</a></i> cover:</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQwcMWpCIAvSsjmEJI8hiH1H2F0NAeUvh-3N_fkOGsjbr6HPUQ05uXwGMeDDwn4siU4blhaYiszV9yA3TsAK2UCd1Z4tHkDqV62S0a97yiH0xCWIDZH6or5OuUYnmYVRY03IjoSguIrfX2OspySdnmZYE28goaUNv8Tf2Z7ZepCvOgv4FLKabRPpB70A/s1019/2e%20Vecna%20FaceApp.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1019" data-original-width="815" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQwcMWpCIAvSsjmEJI8hiH1H2F0NAeUvh-3N_fkOGsjbr6HPUQ05uXwGMeDDwn4siU4blhaYiszV9yA3TsAK2UCd1Z4tHkDqV62S0a97yiH0xCWIDZH6or5OuUYnmYVRY03IjoSguIrfX2OspySdnmZYE28goaUNv8Tf2Z7ZepCvOgv4FLKabRPpB70A/w320-h400/2e%20Vecna%20FaceApp.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A friend said he looks like an <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Are_You_Afraid_of_the_Dark%3F" target="_blank">Are You Afraid of the Dark?</a></i> villain.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>And of course, since people were confused about Vecna because of <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stranger_Things" target="_blank">Stranger Things</a></i>, that led to whatever this is:</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDIa7mu_--V3B_jMRucxiZ5JVDBcwYKz03ot7gWQ6ZMH2amluj9-5qwdZe7Gs9zTptBwrOL8n65DiMsYtKXTYmLYz9A-y6cvOwCT1Yzc8GyyvH4Y3piSsJ9PbnnpdQ_JkQeHyttJkI6ICc_WsKbrnuUtYdr_inpKYAXbQsVpmjBAyvRx16SC-OTKLc3Q/s1018/Stranger%20Things%20Vecna%20FaceApp.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1018" data-original-width="815" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDIa7mu_--V3B_jMRucxiZ5JVDBcwYKz03ot7gWQ6ZMH2amluj9-5qwdZe7Gs9zTptBwrOL8n65DiMsYtKXTYmLYz9A-y6cvOwCT1Yzc8GyyvH4Y3piSsJ9PbnnpdQ_JkQeHyttJkI6ICc_WsKbrnuUtYdr_inpKYAXbQsVpmjBAyvRx16SC-OTKLc3Q/w320-h400/Stranger%20Things%20Vecna%20FaceApp.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This anime protagonist needs moisturizer.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>A friend also mentioned <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Greyhawk_characters#Acererak" target="_blank">Acererak</a>. Acererak the demilich or the regular ol' lich sadly doesn't have enough skin for FaceApp to recognize his face, and the <a href="https://db4sgowjqfwig.cloudfront.net/images/3111856/Acererak02.jpg" target="_blank">one human picture of Acererak</a> I was thinking about is too low-resolution for the filter to make his face look right:</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhEgBLI0H5J3xQmwpzqIf5XPoJiV3o5jvGQYREYr_-TzpLVnG-Xt0VOU3aZeQ9XZgeQ0L5WBCt0N4fEbxSKveo_gW7o2m2fAELa6KTVOdxUfN7O4ebk3H290dODAmMNmwqEop0-GWOWnYP7doxNrnINyG_Bk-1pAWgugwJHbrtwAK9mkcKm8_U-2U0QA/s1012/Acererak%20FaceApp.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1012" data-original-width="814" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhEgBLI0H5J3xQmwpzqIf5XPoJiV3o5jvGQYREYr_-TzpLVnG-Xt0VOU3aZeQ9XZgeQ0L5WBCt0N4fEbxSKveo_gW7o2m2fAELa6KTVOdxUfN7O4ebk3H290dODAmMNmwqEop0-GWOWnYP7doxNrnINyG_Bk-1pAWgugwJHbrtwAK9mkcKm8_U-2U0QA/w321-h400/Acererak%20FaceApp.png" width="321" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">He looks like a <a href="https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/spongmonkeys" target="_blank">Spongmonkey</a>.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>To end this very stupid post, I'll leave you with a friend's ultimate comment about the Vecna redesign:</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUwFIV41N2eVoHci9OXwq8TnvtinLggmobiDf4DY1DwEZcHKHWt1wHWjXkmWtIM6XeQrGlK7yX7A-_yTYWAlu6yfizASybNuH4VGIqHZMhzkmeD6e3Ay_XVkUc1S_cJaIL28i-OHO6BxDRekBs34itk17pgzqY6xpkQXblwNXEEbf6UX-xSn6MgUCLvA/s827/little%20pumps.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="611" data-original-width="827" height="295" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUwFIV41N2eVoHci9OXwq8TnvtinLggmobiDf4DY1DwEZcHKHWt1wHWjXkmWtIM6XeQrGlK7yX7A-_yTYWAlu6yfizASybNuH4VGIqHZMhzkmeD6e3Ay_XVkUc1S_cJaIL28i-OHO6BxDRekBs34itk17pgzqY6xpkQXblwNXEEbf6UX-xSn6MgUCLvA/w400-h295/little%20pumps.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Happy Pride, everyone!</td></tr></tbody></table>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-79301294006970142042022-05-26T07:00:00.351-04:002022-11-03T15:20:45.121-04:00It Is Finished<p style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2Upx39TBc1s" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></p><p>It is done.</p><p>After eleven years, we finally wrapped the <i><a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Crux%20of%20Eternity" target="_blank">Crux of Eternity</a></i> campaign last Saturday, May 21, 2022. If you want to read the session reports, you can find <a href="https://crux-of-eternit.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">the whole thing at Obsidian Portal</a>.</p><p>It's certainly the longest campaign I've ever run in terms of the number of years. Even though there were some significant breaks, I would still estimate the whole campaign at around 800 hours, which is probably about how much we would have played if we played regularly for eleven years. (Assuming roughly once every two weeks at three hours a session.) In contrast: my next-longest campaign is the occasionally-mentioned <i><a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2011/09/tales-of-guerilla-roleplayer-imperial.html" target="_blank">The Imperial City</a></i>, which lasted about eight years. We played irregularly, but very often — I expect we were gathering roughly twice a week at the height of that game, so in terms of hours, it likely blew <i>Crux of Eternity</i> out of the water. Rounding out the other completed campaigns are <a href="https://bread-and-circuses.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank"><i>Bread and Circuses</i></a> at just over two years and <i><a href="https://false-in-some-sense.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">False in Some Sense</a></i> at about a year-and-a-half.</p><p>I have talked about <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2021/05/anniversary.html" target="_blank">the origins of this game elsewhere</a>, but the key points are that we started in May of 2011 in <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/190/dungeons-dragons-4th-edition" target="_blank">fourth edition</a>, updating to <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank">fifth edition</a> in December of 2015. The humble seed of this campaign sprawled into my typical nonsense: an elaborate cultic criminal conspiracy corrupts the heart of the largest city in the region, and it is poised to spread if the player characters can't stop it. I didn't know then at the time that we were going to spend eleven years fighting slavery and delving the dangerous wilds of the Sorrowfell Plains, but here we are.</p><p>Since then, that game has spawned many others and has ranged across several different systems: in addition to a couple of one-shots and side stories and budding campaigns, we have explored <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2014/09/dungeon-world-bread-and-circuses.html" target="_blank">a tale of escaped gladiators trying to find their way in the world</a>, <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2021/12/no-seriously-enchanters-and.html" target="_blank">a conspiracy tale about high-level enchanters doing... something</a>, and <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/ADIN" target="_blank">a tale about poor wanderers trapped in a land of arctic horror</a>. I'd love to run a proper old-school, open-ended hexcrawl with, say, <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgseries/10263/dungeons-dragons-boxed-sets" target="_blank">BECMI</a> or <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/58009/old-school-essentials-retro-adventure-game" target="_blank">Old-School Essentials</a></i> one of these days, but most of my players respond way better to concrete objectives, so we keep riding the fine line between new-school and old-school.</p><p>(Although I can't tell you how badly I want to run a BECMI campaign that runs all the way from level 1 through <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitemversion/6536/box-set" target="_blank">the <i>Immortals</i> box set</a> twice until the players ascend past the Immortals tier. A massive undertaking, but one that I imagine would be very fun with a dedicated group.)</p><p>While I'm always worried that my players aren't enjoying themselves, they kept returning after eleven years, so I suppose we made something we could all enjoy. They certainly seemed to find the final battle against the Khan of Nightmares dramatic; the umbral blot was a terrifying opponent, and the Khan's personal hound turned half the party to stone before they finally managed to defeat the Khan and take over his <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgsetting/9708/coliseum-morpheuon" target="_blank">Coliseum Morpheuon</a>.</p><p>And then they fade into the mists of history to fulfill their own agendas and inevitably return as NPCs in some future game...</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">The Obligatory After-action Report</h3><p>This was my first time running fantasy in general or <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">Dungeons & Dragons</a></i> in particular, and since it lasted over a decade and spawned many spin-offs, I have to assume it was a rousing success.</p><p>I have to assume the players were engaged if they stayed with this game for so long. For all my uncertainty, they certainly seemed like it; it wasn't as anarchic as <i>The Imperial City</i>, but every month or two, I would get a message in my inbox from someone who wanted to do something on their own time.</p><p>Having played both extensively, I vastly prefer fifth edition to fourth, and ultimately think it's a decent game. (As with most things, it's better than the haters claim it is but not as good as the fanatics seem to think.) It's certainly more suited to the sorts of games I like to run than some other editions, and not as focused on combat as third or fourth edition. If I could have run this entire campaign in fifth edition, it definitely would not have been as linear and structured.</p><p>However, I also tend to prefer old-school play to new-school play. As noted above, I wish I could have done more what I did with <i><a href="https://of-kith-and-kin.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">Of Kith and Kin</a></i>: start the characters in a town, seed a couple of adventures, and see what direction they go. Some players respond better to that than others, but I preferred the sprawling, open-ended game <i>Crux of Eternity</i> became rather than the plot-driven quest it was at the start.</p><p>The game went largely as I expected, for better or worse, although we had a couple of side-quests that took me by surprise. (The battle against Kiaransalee and the Khan of Nightmares were both largely or wholly player-driven activities.) We've also done enough world-building that this game will no doubt spawn several others for as long as I care to run fantasy games and my various gaming groups care to play them.</p><p>My only regret is that we didn't have a more open table. We had a handful of guest stars over the years, but I like the energy that new people bring to the table. A possible consideration for future games. (Then again, I'm thinking of eventually following this up with a <a href="https://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/" target="_blank">West Marches</a>-style <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/26952/blades-dark" target="_blank">Blade in the Dark</a></i> game, so then I can accommodate a truly sprawling number of players.)</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">And Now: Some Advice</h3><p>This game has been marked by me becoming more active in the RPG internet hobby space, and so I see lots of comments, complaints, and critiques about long-running games. (Or trying to organize games in general.) Mainly, prospective Game Masters seem mystified as to how to get a group together and to keep them interested. I find that getting a group is the hardest part, especially if you live somewhere that's a trifle remote, but keeping them around and engaged isn't especially challenging. Trawl hobby spaces, be active, talk to people: the usual stuff you do to make friends in this wide world of ours. Beyond that, contemplate these tips:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Don't get discouraged if your player group isn't interested in playing your favorite RPG. Compromise is part of life, and the rules typically aren't as important as the culture at the table. If you build a rapport with your group, you can eventually convince them to play any game you like. But you have to put in the work first to build trust.</li><li>Be excited. Even if you're, say, a <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17173/monsterhearts-1st-2nd-eds" target="_blank">Monsterhearts</a></i> GM who is stuck running this vanilla fantasy <i>D&D</i> game, put stuff you like into the game. There's plenty of room for queer romance and interpersonal drama even in the hardest sci-fi dogfighting game. I cut my teeth on <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/371/classic-world-darkness" target="_blank">World of Darkness</a></i> and fell in love with <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i>, so my <i>D&D</i> games are full of secret societies, Gothic horror monsters, obsessive wizards, moral ambiguity, and de-emphasized combat. There is a lot of room to explore the sort of stuff you like; traditional games usually have room for all sorts of campaigns in them, so there's room for the stuff that excites you.</li><li>It's pretty easy to challenge high-level <i>D&D</i> characters: give them real stakes, follow through on your threatened consequences, and put them in impossible (but open-ended) situations. The real magic is when players surprise you. (This is good advice for any game, by the way. Most traditional sorts of pen-and-paper RPGs assume characters become more powerful as they age, so there's likely a "high-level" option for your favorite RPG, as long as it isn't too esoteric.)</li><ul><li>One of the reasons why good published high-level adventures are so rare is because high-level games seem to grow logically out of the consequences of your players' actions. Also, what might be a suitable challenge for one group might be too easy, too boring, or too difficult for another. The variables are so great that it's difficult to predict that sort of thing.</li></ul><li>Don't punish the players for good ideas. Throwing a bunch of qualifiers at them or making every outcome negative really hurts player morale. Every character choice is a vote for what players want to do and be good at doing in a game, and you shouldn't invalidate that.</li><li>The players are the stars of the show, and what they choose to do in the game is a vote for what they want to see. If they fall away from certain challenges or characters, don't force them to interact with them. If they hang out with certain NPCs more than others or gravitate toward certain places, encourage them to do so.</li><ul><li>As an example, I'm not a romance-heavy GM, but my games often include romance because many of the players seem to enjoy exploring it. Give the people what they want.</li></ul><li>Make the players' choices matter. Good or bad outcomes are less important than agency, and the players are going to remember the puppy they saved or the tavern that was named after them more than the big, epic set piece battle with the Dawning Lord of the Nine Suns. Saving the world isn't half as cool as when the tavern server remembers your drink order.</li><ul><li>Although you can make saving the world matter when the world reacts to it. If people tearfully thank your players for saving them, or hide them when they're in trouble, then their choices mattered.</li></ul></ul><h3 style="text-align: left;">Final Thoughts</h3><p>As I write this, it still hasn't really hit me that it's over. Admittedly, it's not really over for me: I have a session of <i>Of Kith and Kin</i> on Sunday, so my head is still very much in the Sorrowfell Plains.</p><p>In a very real way, this blog only exists because of this campaign, so if you've ever enjoyed anything you have read here, you can thank this sprawling epic and the dedicated players who saw it through to the end. I learned a lot from running it, and those lessons will hopefully inform whatever happens next.</p><p>I'll hopefully also have more time to curate the blog and write stuff as some of the existing campaigns wind down. That's always the dream, anyway.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitvckjr_DummUCFJSXlW9AjYNaWrgS1r3_7rt99AvCZOy-UjkcydgjL1GMjPo3M785VQIjk_lM8bRNEnWuFivSensQWvO2e_pCQFLxF_tHRzkYSwxDNv1UVrOGbgZk7iq_4-Reai4OlpIBIAfD51-ylW8JuP9FDC-9BnNZEmQavRP3LqunXrf5EQEJTA/s398/seeing-you.gif" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="298" data-original-width="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitvckjr_DummUCFJSXlW9AjYNaWrgS1r3_7rt99AvCZOy-UjkcydgjL1GMjPo3M785VQIjk_lM8bRNEnWuFivSensQWvO2e_pCQFLxF_tHRzkYSwxDNv1UVrOGbgZk7iq_4-Reai4OlpIBIAfD51-ylW8JuP9FDC-9BnNZEmQavRP3LqunXrf5EQEJTA/s16000/seeing-you.gif" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Be seeing you.</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-25903828623150266402022-05-19T07:00:00.001-04:002022-05-19T07:00:00.194-04:00REVEL AT ION<p>I've learned a lot about myself during this ongoing pandemic of ours. For instance, at the beginning of the pandemic, I was in ten role-playing games, and running six of them.</p><p>I've learned that you should never, ever do that.</p><p>(These days, I'm at a more reasonable six games, and only running five of them. You should never do that, either. I suspect I'd be happiest running two or maybe three.)</p><p>I've also learned that I'm not a big fan of running one-shots. They're fun to play, but I find it takes roughly as much work to craft or prepare a one-off game as it does to start a campaign, and then I might as well just run the campaign. (An endless series of one-shots requires roughly the same effort every time, but campaigns have a break-point where what I get out of them <i>vastly</i> exceeds the work I put into them. Plus, most games are complicated enough and many players are addled enough that there isn't really time for character creation and a game session, meaning a one-shot is two sessions, or I have to make the characters, which adds to my planning load.)</p><p>Of course, the track record among my circle of friends probably speaks to that. I have a modest number of completed campaigns under my belt, but to date, I have only played in <i>one</i> campaign to completion, and even then the GM scrambled to wrap everything up before he lost interest. Campaigns otherwise usually fall apart, or the GM gets bored, or the character sheets get lost, or whatever.</p><p>I vastly prefer to run RPGs than play them. (But you probably guessed that from the content on this blog.)</p><p>Most importantly, I think I've learned what my ultimate, Platonic ideal of a campaign would be.</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">Serious, Stupid, Spooky</h3><p>You need the mix of all three in roughly equal proportion. To keep things interesting, the tone needs to drift over time. Perhaps an example will explain what I mean. My ultimate game would go something like this:</p><p>The player characters are trapped in a town during a zombie outbreak. (Did they arrive during the outbreak? Were they in town and the dead rose? It probably doesn't matter, although the latter makes more sense.) It's the standard zombie setup familiar to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_A._Romero" target="_blank">Romero</a> fans and <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resident_Evil" target="_blank">Resident Evil</a></i> players: the town is under quarantine, zombies are wandering the streets, easy escape is unlikely, and help isn't coming. The zombies are scary: there are a lot of them, they never sleep, and maybe there are a few variants and mutants here and there. Even if the players are hardened horror fans, you can still overawe them through numbers and graphic description. [<b>Spooky</b>]</p><p>There are a lot of residents, and they all need help. And you can meaningfully help them, should you choose to do so. (What I mean by this: while choosing to help someone in the middle of a natural disaster is a difficult choice, it shouldn't backfire. You probably only get one guy in the opening act who is secretly nursing a zombie bite, and you don't get any tricks like "the PCs escort the NPCs to the safe haven but it's full of zombies and everyone dies." Your choices should be difficult, but meaningful.) People need food and escort to safe havens, disparate family members want to be reunited. Not everyone is going to survive, and the player characters will likely fumble their plans a couple of times, but the meat of the scenario is the tense character drama as the player characters interact with NPCs and argue with each other. [<b>Serious</b>]</p><p>Also, for some reason, there's a talking dog. The dog is helpful, but is mostly there for comic relief and so I can do a silly voice in an otherwise grim scenario. Apart from being able to talk, the dog isn't supernatural in any meaningful way. He can probably do a couple of useful things if asked like find lost objects or sniff out zombies a block away. The PCs probably think the talking dog is weird at first, but they probably grow to love him. [<b>Stupid</b>]</p><p><i>Then we boil the frog.</i> Change the parameters of the test over several sessions until the campaign looks like this:</p><p>The player characters are pretty inured to the zombies now, so you tend to play them for dark comedy more than anything else. A zombie wrapped in a chain link fence who can't get free. One pinned under a car, snapping its jaws at the PCs' approach in the most amusing way possible. They don't stop being a threat, exactly, but you start playing up the slapstick elements. Zombies make weird noises designed to disarm the tension. [<b>Stupid</b>]</p><p>Of course, zombies aren't the real threat anymore. It's the people. (Maybe it always was.) It's been A Week™ for everyone in town: a week of raw terror and shattered nerves. Nobody has had a hot bath in that time, or a hot meal. Tensions are high. People are starting to get desperate and make bad decisions. And most importantly, the player characters aren't doing enough. As the campaign continues, the townsfolk become angry at them. <i>You're the most capable people here. Why haven't you solved this yet?</i> It probably doesn't take too long before some townsfolk reach the only logical conclusion: the "heroes" engineered this crisis. They're manipulating us. The torches and pitchforks emerge soon thereafter. [<b>Spooky</b>]</p><p>Towards the climax of the adventure, the talking dog dies. It's probably very heroic. The dog's body is recoverable. [<b>Serious</b>]</p><p>I could never run this as described, of course. Most of the elements I enjoy are things that emerge naturally over the course of a campaign. I like to be surprised.</p><p>It's a collaborative medium, and determining too much in advance spoils the fun. Even if I'm running an "adventure path" for real '90s-style traditionalists, the path is just an outline. If the players go somewhere else, that's fine. The surprise keeps me as an engaged player, too.</p><p>But the above scenario describes all the things I like in the course of a campaign. There should be something dramatic and sad, a tragedy the player characters can possibly prevent or solve or just watch unfold as they pursue their personal interests. <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/421/vampire-masquerade" target="_blank">Vampire: The Masquerade</a></i> drew me into this hobby, and it still represents a lot of the things I like in stories and RPGs. If possible, I like to include a nerve-wracking and horrific threat. (I also lump thrillers in with horror, so sometimes the "spooky" element is simply the hidden: a mysterious serial killer, a lurking mastermind, an "ally" who knows too much.) And finally, I like there to be something a little dumb and fun to act as a release valve when the other elements are too much. Something with a silly voice, or some harmless eccentric as a bit of local color. My <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i> games include a handful of scary wizards among a sea of obsessive (but ultimately friendly) weirdos. <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2021/12/no-seriously-enchanters-and.html" target="_blank">My arcane thriller</a> about a secret wizard cabal has a ninja turtle in it.</p><p>While I can't usually plan the twist, those sorts of things happen naturally. Characters introduced as bits of color become important, central characters. The mood shifts as the player characters become more competent and their investment in the world changes. Things that were once threatening become mundane as greater or hidden threats emerge.</p><p>You know, the usual stuff.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-79494853540806312812022-04-28T07:00:00.233-04:002022-04-29T14:12:29.974-04:00Artifact April 2022<p>Seven years ago, I posted <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2015/05/artifact-april-table-of-contents.html">Artifact April</a>, a month of theme posts whereby I posted one magical item every day in April across various RPG systems. I was hoping to do that again this year, but it never materialized.</p><p>However, some Artifact April is better than none Artifact April, so here's a selection of seven magic items. I'm running a lot of <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/17181/dungeons-dragons-5th-edition" target="_blank">fifth edition <i>D&D</i></a> these days, so stats (where available) will primarily reference that edition, but I'll provide some notes on other editions because I convert material with abandon. Anything here should be easy to convert to your game system of choice.</p><p>(But just to make everything more confusing, <i>Hekanhoda's Bane</i> and <i>Straight Razor</i> are both made for <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/10737/dungeon-crawl-classics-role-playing-game" target="_blank">Dungeon Crawl Classics</a></i>.)</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span>Cage</span></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://swordsmen.co.nz/product/black-scimitar-bagdad/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1232" data-original-width="1632" height="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPyvAi6YMqDkF2jSCvjaBN9G0ym2k292YroKqAOFc6zWJW6WG9Kv7MZbZxjLcS-Uss5mMPA-SzbdF_U4w_7SgI0xklVk2hLN8MyHdjA-SZojXnZw0kd8QVV34WFVuxD8NE_KQXLAAFchQ1B5cNSr-gWpSnO2D2i8gskegARIjcptjwY2lJFqw_59hFSA/w400-h303/my%20body%20is%20a%20cage.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It probably looks something like this.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>This sapient blade is a greatsword, appearing as a scimitar sized for a giant (or an efreeti, in this case). It is always warm to the touch. The black iron blade bears glowing runes in the language of fire elementals, while the shagreen wrap on the handle bears binding spells in the language of dragons. The pommel is a small, black iron cage in which a single red ember floats.</p><p>That red ember is the efreeti noble Padishah Nurhan Solak, bound in the blade. (He bestowed that title on himself, so he's likely not as powerful as you think he is.) When he speaks — and he often makes demands in imperious whispers — his voice emanates from the ember as it glows and crackles. The ember flares when he is angry.</p><p>Trapped in his own sword by a vengeful wizard, the sword now has the statistics of a <i><a href="http://5e.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/magicItemsAToZ.htm#luckBlade" target="_blank">luck blade</a></i>. (Interested parties can also find <a href="https://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/magicWeapons.htm#luckBlade" target="_blank">3.x statistics</a>. The <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/244/advanced-dungeons-dragons-2nd-edition" target="_blank">AD&D</a></i> version of a <i>luck blade</i> gives +1 to saving throws and contains 1d4+1 wishes according to the <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgseries/1380/encyclopedia-magica">Encyclopedia Magica</a></i>.) This particular blade contains 3 wishes, powered by the bound efreeti. When the last wish is cast and the blade loses the Wishes property, the efreeti is released. He almost assuredly returns to the elemental planes and begins plotting his revenge against every previous owner of the blade, whom he has perceived as exploiting and wronging him in some way. (However, he may be gracious to an owner who uses their first wish to release him from the blade, possibly even offering them a free wish. As a lawful evil entity, however, any wishes he offers are of dubious quality.)</p><p>In true <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Follows" target="_blank">It Follows</a></i> fashion, Nurhan probably works his way backwards, starting from the most recent owner until he eventually plots his epic revenge against the wizard who bound him in the first place.</p><p>Unlike most sapient swords, <i>Cage</i> cannot initiate an ego battle as the sword is the genie's prison. However, nothing prevents the Padishah from talking, constantly trying to convince the sword's wielder of the benefits of using a wish in this particular situation. Since he wants to escape the sword, he's even less capricious than a typical genie, fulfilling the spirit and letter of any wishes he grants. (At least for the first two wishes. He probably perverts the intent of wish number three as a final "fuck you" to his wielder before he leaves and plots his vengeance.)</p><p>If this sounds a bit like recommended Shadowguiding techniques from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/425/wraith-oblivion" target="_blank">Wraith: The Oblivion</a></i>, then you know <i>exactly</i> how to play the Padishah.</p><p>In addition to the standard properties of a <i>luck blade</i>, the sword's wielder can speak and understand the language of fire elementals while they carry the sword, and they are unaffected by extreme heat. (Up to 120 degrees Fahrenheit. That's about 49 degrees Celsius if you use metric.) The user can use a bonus action to cause the ember in the pommel to brighten, shedding bright light in a ten-foot-radius and dim light in a further ten-foot-radius.</p><p>The sword loses these properties if the genie is released, although it keeps the bonus to saving throws (and to-hit and damage for 3e and 5e versions and the Luck property in 5e).</p><p>Although it can't initiate conflicts, the sword's statistics might still be useful. It is lawful evil; has an Intelligence of 16, a Wisdom of 15, and a Charisma of 16; can hear and see (with darkvision) out to 120 feet; and can speak, read, and understand Common and Ignan.</p><p>If you're using 5e, <i>Cage</i> is a legendary magic item that requires attunement.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span>Dunce Cap</span></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/DnD-Dice-Jail-Accessories-Miniature/dp/B09J6QDTDD" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="992" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIzXofxnxa_I148r4TvTk-JrBoGd4ihj80Z4bW40hfyoUd0vSsrM2WMj1Ov0M8NNBOGrSVP-yPoSUwG0LBlCKfDNQsRV99P7sgrJuP1lkZjvOcqPr4qyvoljaKmpuwkMZOIfcN-Ny1Ql1fzt3gsMWHiK1GLXlxMUYBagEN8QwozqusrNoeS7Nf3M80HQ/w265-h400/dunce%20cap.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nobody makes kids wear these anymore, right?</td></tr></tbody></table><p>A standard paper dunce cap, albeit decorated with strange writing on the inside. While worn, it makes it hard to think but also makes the wearer less noticeable as a threat: people tend to ignore the wearer, and enemies target them less often.</p><p>For fifth edition, I'd probably give advantage on Charisma (Deception) checks to seem unobtrusive and Dexterity (Stealth) checks to remain hidden. The downside is that this item grants disadvantage on Intelligence checks, attacks, and saving throws.</p><p>This is likely a rare item that probably requires attunement. Assuming it requires attunement, it grants disadvantage on Intelligence rolls while it's attuned, but only grants the bonuses while it's being worn. Tricky, eh?</p><p>It's paper, so it folds away easily but is also easily damaged. If you'd like, maybe it's made out of something more durable, like leather.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span>Green Sash</span></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://fickes.tumblr.com/post/657798915569090560/bright" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="434" data-original-width="640" height="271" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhw3vD8D3Y7imiDQvDj_dGCdp-dgjEVXM0RaKv4rHglm8V382SoRZTAwNFwxVzRkCAHCl3wDLmitdU-fo8C8anCOD4ExnRfBoLJomL0_rb2NjI4O2tiGkwgj5JCVIQ4qRfQpLPyRlt9Os8gGADpgxFlp91DlzwSzzjDD7GVxLOcrGeKh6Mo3Uvp3ViiCA/w400-h271/what%20is%20there%20to%20do%20but%20tie.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A gift from the Fair Folk always comes with strings attached.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>You probably know this one already. Lady Bertilak gifts such a sash to Sir Gawain for his confrontation with the Green Knight.</p><p>There aren't any tricks with this one: the wearer gains immunity to slashing damage, but a critical hit from a slashing weapon cuts the sash, dealing full damage and rendering it useless. (If your system of choice doesn't include critical hits, assume it is cut on a natural 20. You might also decide a called shot can sever the sash, but you should make that decision based on your system of choice.)</p><p>While there aren't any tricks with the item itself, it is a sash of fairy make. There is a possibility that having the sash itself causes trouble, such as in the case of Sir Gawain.</p><p>For the fifth edition crowd, this is another legendary item requiring attunement, although I think it's a more interesting item if it <i>doesn't</i> require attunement.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span>Hekanhoda's Bane</span></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.artstation.com/artwork/vQ9va" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWcgkBh7FgWJJgOTbM2JIDoFWZhAYoiXObgun4DguAoCGdNszNLVjysKmOb9pZC3GxGVBFdo6QzfPfQBV-4SWZujX300iVN5k8ZP7n7p0HWN5LmsDZ5kQWuyAhw8KXVZjbUs10tIP4RB2IzpQPmRkNt8UyvlcNtcMo2ddFIuwKqnh9sz8QfIq2pojiDw/w400-h400/alsiel-azul-tampos-11.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It looks a little something like this.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>If you've read <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/153662/intrigue-court-chaos" target="_blank">Intrigue at the Court of Chaos</a></i>, you already know Hekanhoda, Lord of Grotesques. (I believe Hekanhoda also appears as a patron in the <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/284836/dcc-rpg-annual-1" target="_blank">DCC Annual</a></i>.)</p><p>Hekanhoda's Bane is a powerful sword of Law dedicated to slaying Hekanhoda. However, this sword has great ambitions, as it has plenty to do before killing the Chaos Lord.</p><p>This Lawful <i>+1 long sword</i> has Intelligence 11, and can speak and communicate telepathically. In addition to killing Hekanhoda, the sword also wants its wielder to uphold the Law. It has several banes:</p><p></p><ul><li>Thieves: the wielder gets a +1 bonus to attacks and damage against thieves.</li><li>Wizards: any wizard successfully struck by the sword is banished. The wizard must make a Will save against the sword's roll of 1d20+10 or else be banished back to its native plane or lair.</li><li>Earth Elementals: the sword detects any earth elementals within 100 feet, even if they are invisible or concealed. The sword can overcome magical defenses with an effective Will or spell check of +10.</li><li>Dragons: as with thieves, the wielder gets a +1 bonus to attacks and damage against dragons.</li><li>Sphinxes: the sword acts as a spotter, making it easier for allies to attack. Allies can fire into melee between wielder and bane at no penalty and with no chance of hitting the wielder, and allies attacking bane with missile fire within 100 feet of the sword receive a +1 attack bonus.</li></ul><p></p><p>In addition, the sword has several powers. It can detect gold within 1d8 × 10 feet, it can <i>locate object</i> twice a day, it can shed light in a 20-foot-radius at will, it drains 1d4 XP with every blow in addition to its other damage, and the wielder heals 3 points of spellburn each night without rest, or 6 points each night with rest.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span>The Princess' Ring</span></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AJzP13f0bs" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="827" data-original-width="1100" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbqA1Gyx2J0WlGAhesYh3l2sUpzv6JjzcEVruwXu9sGOkbrct40Aw11xZM7JwGsAOlTAze1LI6vI4pn1GXM_vKcOE2umMOqdM9tPL5GBD8Qon4HeNNXMXKsQ_lwSpOW-cCR2SjHhNucTH9pDCGZpWmme1IqbPLNaz2F2NWMvnJan3y0obnbAd7Mw-xig/w400-h301/the%20princess'%20ring.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Using magic from lost kingdoms is like unearthing uranium.<br />It could power or destroy a city, and there's only one way to find out.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>While the origins of this ring are lost, the story attached to it is that the princess of a lost kingdom owned this ring, which she used to sneak around the castle and even beyond its walls. This is often told as a cautionary tale, as she was executed or exiled for witnessing something she ought not to have seen. Others say that the magic in her ring somehow destroyed the kingdom. Some even say her ghost haunts the ring, providing an unpleasant surprise for anybody who uses the ring's magic.</p><p>This item is simply an ornate ring that, when completely covered by the hands, transfers the user to the Ethereal Plane as per the <i><a href="http://5e.d20srd.org/srd/spells/etherealness.htm" target="_blank">etherealness</a></i> spell. Depending on the tales, you can either use it three times per day or as often as desired, but it does require the user have both hands free. As such, it probably takes at least an action to use it.</p><p>If you're doing the full 5e thing, this probably works as a very rare item, although it likely doesn't require attunement. Watch out for thieves! (You might want to make it legendary if the wearer can use it at-will. Then again, you might feel that being able to do nothing other than hold the ring is balancing enough. It's ultimately your choice; I'm a blog post, not a cop.)</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><b><span>Straight Razor</span></b></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Monk%27s+Flameblade" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKvcAy1zTO374dIKrZfQ1qu9w9v03V-cAoN1tPHw1OGJhHfyue_kFHZpr2S0qiKPyuZJ0-HNvg1MVNdF-xpgqTjuGgkSNFrnKvEOruhPrWfsDKPKiz4MFTFZYQ8boOCVm5PamixJYzM6-iHtSLSK_CdK6BAaO5ODcRkBH6oxDh86iiVgojFlXXouxCxQ/s16000/monks_flameblade_elden_ring_wiki_guide_200px.png" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It looks similarly impractical.</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Diametrically opposed to the monument of Law that is <i>Hekanhoda's Bane</i>, <i>Straight Razor</i> would see civilization reduced to rubble and ash. This Chaotic <i>+1 long sword</i> has Intelligence 10 but only communicates through simple urges. It seeks to build a monument to Chaos from the rubble of civilization and to punish interlopers and those who interfere.</p><p>The sword hates water elementals, sending its wielder into a berserker fury against them. When facing water elementals in combat, the wielder must succeed on an Ego check against the sword or else gain +4 Strength and Stamina for 2d6 rounds, and then become exhausted at -4 Strength and Stamina for 1d6 turns thereafter.</p><p>On the other hand, <i>Straight Razor</i> grants its wielder the ability to speak and understand thieves' cant, and it can shoot out a tongue of flame once per day. The flame jet is shaped like a cone, 40’ long and 10’ wide at end. All within take 2d6 fire damage and may catch on fire. They can avoid this damage with a Reflex save against the sword's roll of 1d10+10.</p><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span>The Widow's Ring</span></h2><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.cgtrader.com/3d-print-models/jewelry/rings/ring-medusa-10393" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="551" data-original-width="600" height="368" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib9_Uo58DyLzNz4Y9zTAVpGydGdCqSis6eZIfAyYpGmuc6e16eMM6qREvemKIrmg1L5WBzNKEb45Q0YN4r4lTqMBO_-TXphMPprKPApZh3DViO91015QBfyqSK2UjD4ml3VYExlPcO3YDlxYJ_ZGXV7t_Php3zIAqcCbv1kESleN4kac7HCxE-2eT0ug/w400-h368/the%20widow's%20ring.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just what I always wanted: a ring that hates me!</td></tr></tbody></table><p>Old tales speak of the maedar, the male versions of medusae. One particular tale speaks of a maedar who found a mate very late in life, but was as devoted to her as any other maedar is to his wife. In fact, he was so devoted to her that he ensured he would never leave her.</p><p>When he felt his life coming to an end, he undertook the ritual that maedars sometimes undertake to become a glyptar, a maedar's consciousness remaining in stone. Maedars are said to go mad if they become trapped in gemstones, but this particular maedar willingly projected his consciousness into amethyst so that he could remain with his wife until the end of her days, and could continue to guide and protect future generations of their family. Before death, he made arrangements to have the amethyst fitted into a ring, delivered to his wife, so that they could spend eternity together.</p><p>And so the glyptar spent generations with his descendants, at least until some group of adventurers murdered them and took the ring.</p><p>As you might imagine, the glyptar is very displeased with this state of affairs.</p><p>Any medusa can use <i>the widow's ring</i> to gain a burrow speed equal to her walking speed, even allowing her to move through solid stone. Three times per day, she can turn stone to flesh, either ending the petrified condition on a creature or turning an area of stone as large as a 10' cube into meat. (If you're using an older edition with a proper <i><a href="https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/stone-to-flesh/" target="_blank">stone to flesh</a></i> spell, just use that instead. If you want the classic glyptar experience, old-school maedars can technically use their <i>stone to flesh</i> power every 30 minutes. In <i>AD&D</i>, the spell mentions turning stone golems into flesh golems, but since 5e stone golems cannot be altered in such a way, we'll skip that particular detail.)</p><p>Humanoids and other folk might be able to use the ring's powers as discussed above, but they have to convince it of their intentions first. The original adventurers who stole the ring probably won't get it to cooperate, nor will any adventurer who kills a medusa and lets the ring know about it. (Even hearing a rumor that the wearer killed a medusa might be enough to prevent <i>the widow's ring</i> from cooperating.) In fact, such users find the ring is basically cursed: the glyptar will attempt to take control, leading the wearer into suicidal situations. However, wearers who seem sympathetic to medusae and are willing to help local medusa populations will likely receive the ring's aid. (Although it might just ask for them to deliver it to a proper medusa, unless it thinks it can better aid medusakind by staying with the current wearer.)</p><p><i>The widow's ring</i> is lawful evil; has an Intelligence of 12, a Wisdom of 13, and a Charisma of 15; can hear and see (with darkvision) out to 120 feet; and can speak, read, and understand Common. (If you're using an old-school system, the ring can also speak the languages of medusae. It also has the equivalent of a <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/1652/labyrinth-lord" target="_blank">Labyrinth Lord</a></i> psyche around 15 or so, to give you an idea of what sort of Ego rating you should give it in whatever system you're using.)</p><p>For 5e, this ring is probably legendary and definitely requires attunement.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-31815710827334783242022-02-03T07:00:00.243-05:002022-05-18T09:42:37.100-04:00Grousing About Alignment<p>I've been ruminating about this for several days. (A month or two, maybe?) I expect it was sparked by some passing discourse or other, but who can say?</p><p><b>But first, a word about personal bias:</b> As <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2020/06/rpgs-as-art-danger-zone.html" target="_blank">noted</a> <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2020/06/the-orc-problem.html" target="_blank">elsewhere</a>, I believe it's important to understand an author's inherent biases, so here is one of mine: I don't believe in an objective, explicit, cosmological idea of morality, sin, or evil. If you reduce all energy and matter in the universe into the finest dust, past the level of atoms or quarks or superstrings, you will find no modicum of good or evil in your sieve.</p><p>Good and evil can exist as personal concepts and frameworks, but not as large moral structures.</p><p>As such, I tend to disagree with The Dreaded Discourse™ about how alignment is problematic and ought to be excised from fantasy games. For me, <i>alignment is the goofy, escapist fantasy</i>. The universe is ethically grey and politically complicated, and sometimes it's nice to imagine a world where moral issues are (comparatively) simple. (I say "comparatively" because invariably every Game Master throws in a weird, moral conundrum independent of alignment. Sometimes, people do good things for bad reasons or bad things for good reasons, even in objective moral systems.)</p><p>I know it is not an escape for everybody — and more power to you if you excise it from your games! — but for me, alignment is one of those things that <i>only</i> makes sense in a fantasy world or as a learning tool. And, gee whiz, wouldn't it be nice if the world were simple sometimes?</p><p>Hopefully, this nearly explains why I don't typically worry about alignment as much as some Referees do. I suspect a lot of people conflate in-game moral assumptions with real-life moral assumptions and invariably talk past one another.</p><p>At any rate, we have now come rather far afield of the main point I wanted to make with this post. Ask me to elaborate on my thoughts about morality sometime if you want to get into a long, boring conversation about it.</p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;">And with that aside complete, onto the main post:</span></b></p><p>While my engagement with fantasy class-and-level games is comparatively recent, the arguments about alignment have existed since the beginning of the hobby. It's the standard problem: art creators have certain assumptions that everyone has the same background, the subculture around the art grows, the background conditions change, and almost nobody has the originally assumed commonalities anymore.</p><p>Growth is often painful.</p><p>But I suspect the problem with alignment isn't so much a disagreement as a lack of common definitions. (As with most problems, this issue is broadly applicable to life outside table-top role-playing games.) When people talk about alignment, they are often discussing one of three related concepts:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Alignment-as-personality:</b> I suspect this is what most modern gamers think about when they're contemplating alignment. When you make a <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/192/dungeons-dragons" target="_blank">D&D</a></i> character, this is probably what you're putting on your character sheet: an alignment that represents your fictional character's moral center. In this regard, it is similar to Nature and Demeanor from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/371/classic-world-darkness" target="_blank">World of Darkness</a></i> or Virtue and Vice from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/442/chronicles-darkness" target="_blank">Chronicles of Darkness</a></i> or Obsession from <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i> — it's a phrase on your character sheet so when you're stuck and wondering, "What would my character do?" you can reference your sheet and maybe get an idea. It's not a rules thing so much as a reminder to yourself.</li><ul><li>Incidentally, this is where some of the thorniness over "what constitutes acting within your alignment" emerges. Right and wrong operate somewhat independent of morality — an immoral person can do the right thing, and a moral person can make stupid decisions. So it is with law-vs.-chaos and good-vs.-evil: you can probably make a case for any given individual action with any given alignment. However, you can probably make a reasonable expectation that a character's actions over time will more obviously cleave to one side or the other.</li><li>This can also be confusing because individual players might consider this more subjective or objective depending on their preferences. Being "lawful" might constitute literally following the law or just having a strong personal code. Being "chaotic" might mean might-makes-right or being a free-spirit or just being random. That's something you might want to discuss during character creation.</li></ul><li><b>Alignment-as-affiliation:</b> This is more of the classical, Moorcockian view of alignment you might expect from earlier editions of <i>D&D</i>. (Cynical readers might also consider this the default for people who, say, preach certain moral frameworks to which they do not abide.) In this schema, alignment is less of a personal moral framework and more of a political affiliation (or sports team allegiance, if you prefer that analogy). The <a href="http://jrients.blogspot.com/2010/08/black-hobbits.html" target="_blank">black hobbits</a> described by Ken St. Andre and Jeff Rients also reside in this paradigm. (Weirdly, <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpg/190/dungeons-dragons-4th-edition" target="_blank">4e</a> also asserted this as the "default" moral framework for that edition, although I don't know how many people used it.) Characters using alignment as a political affiliation might have any sort of morality, but they throw their support behind a particular cause. Anybody who is "just following orders" could probably be seen to have this sort of alignment. If you have ever been baffled by someone who seems very nice but holds weird, backwards views about the world outside of their narrow band of existence, you might have encountered someone with this sort of relationship to alignment. As in real-life, though, I expect that if you follow a particular affiliation for long enough, you'll begin to adopt its values, sooner or later. (And probably sooner.)</li><ul><li>This is another source of confusion, because it's possible to imagine someone whose views are initially incompatible with their alignment until you dig deeper. The nice little old lady next door who supports the Dark Lord because he makes the trains run on time could easily have a Chaotic alignment even though her life and outward demeanor is seemingly orderly.</li><li>In a lot of ways, this is the most alien form of alignment to those with heavily-internalized, cultural Calvinism, because "good" is always bound with "right" and "evil" is always bound with "wrong." It is difficult to imagine someone who hypocritically holds both, even though most of us do it all the time. (We just don't like to examine it too closely.)</li></ul><li><b>Alignment-as-physiology:</b> This is the realm of the supernal and the extradimensional. Angels and demons are always going to be Lawful and Chaotic, respectively, and changing their alignment probably changes the base creature. The long tradition of supernatural creatures in mythology and literature means that this is the easiest to understand and also the least morally challenging component of alignment: zombies are mindless and always antagonistic, so there is no moral challenge or consequence to killing them.</li><ul><li>Of course, this causes a lot of the confusion in the other categories as people conflate this type of alignment with the other two types. <i>Detect evil and good</i> often only detects supernatural forces rather than someone's personal alignment, for instance. Likewise, this is where a lot of the debate about "always chaotic evil" creatures arises, as people assume game designers mean this (orcs are evil and always will be no matter what their environment is like) when they often mean one of the other two things (orcs are Chaotic because most of them have thrown in their lot with Sauron and were never given a moral choice, for example).</li></ul></ul><p></p><p>So there you go. The next time the inevitable alignment debate arises at your table, you now have a framework to start interrogating what the players mean. Do you think the alignment is a fantasy Meyers-Briggs type, or your political party, or an inherent and unchangeable thing?</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-38555605581086603462021-12-23T07:00:00.198-05:002021-12-23T13:40:22.207-05:00No, Seriously, Enchanters and Illusionists Rule the World<p>Over four years ago, I alleged that <a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2017/10/enchanters-and-illusionists-rule-world.html" target="_blank">enchanters and illusionists rule the world</a>.</p><p>And finally, there is proof!</p><p>My players in <a href="https://of-kith-and-kin.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">the Sunday night game</a> are on the cusp of learning <i>The Awful Truth™</i>: a secret cabal of enchanters has altered their memories to obfuscate the fact that the player characters accidentally stumbled upon their operations a few months ago. (In fact, <a href="https://of-kith-and-kin.obsidianportal.com/characters/dominic" target="_blank">the cleric</a> has already cast <i><a href="http://5e.d20srd.org/srd/spells/greaterRestoration.htm" target="_blank">greater restoration</a></i> to restore his own memories, and so has already learned this secret. He currently plans on doing it to the rest of the party the next time they get to rest.)</p><p>They have previously received hints of this conspiracy:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>They keep finding <a href="https://of-kith-and-kin.obsidianportal.com/wikis/a-mysterious-symbol" target="_blank">the same symbol</a> everywhere they go. It usually appears on articles of clothing or jewelry, and on one notable occasion, as a tattoo.</li><li>They received a picture from an oracular dwarf girl depicting <a href="http://goblinpunch.blogspot.com/2014/09/false-hydra.html" target="_blank">a creature none of them could perceive</a>. (They managed to determine this because the henchmen in the party seemed a little weird when confronted with the picture, so then they started asking everyone they met about it. Once they determined that their description of the picture differed from everyone else's, they started interrogating the problem further.)</li><li>The campaign's <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ArcWords" target="_blank">arc words</a> are, "Are you forgetting something?" (In fact, this and other secret messages appear if you Select All on <a href="https://of-kith-and-kin.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">the campaign's front page on Obsidian Portal</a>.)</li></ul><p></p><p>Currently, we don't know <i>why</i> the characters' memories were altered, but next session, we're going to do a brief flashback to find out the sordid details. (We'll be using a more narrative system for that to cover the fact that they clearly can't die in the flashback. And then we'll return to the present, in the midst of a deeply complicated standoff — roughly half a dozen factions are involved with some trying to enter the <a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/48556/temple-frog" target="_blank">Temple of the Frog</a> and others trying to repel them. It's a glorious mess that I am very excited to run.)</p><p>The only information the player characters currently have is that one of the cabal's agents is currently attempting to retrieve the <i>Book of Salientian Hours</i> I mentioned in <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2021/11/the-lost-epoch-of-khaldun.html" target="_blank">a blog post</a> last month. This artifact has only just been introduced, but the players currently know that it is the Froggies' prayer book and that two other factions also want it: <a href="https://crux-of-eternit.obsidianportal.com/characters/ansrael-amshar" target="_blank">an unknown elf</a> who claims it was stolen from him, and the warlock's patron who has not yet been identified as <a href="http://thecampaign20xx.blogspot.com/2016/11/dungeons-dragons-guide-to-grazzt-dark.html" target="_blank">Graz'zt himself</a>. (While the players are aware of the aforementioned facts, the characters don't yet know this information, because only the warlock knows this as part of his patron's secret agenda. Graz'zt has promised the warlock the staff of a powerful wizard if he can retrieve the book ahead of the other factions.)</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/oh-yeah-its-all-coming-together" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="378" data-original-width="680" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh_6AiMbjXvygToxuGsWmqn-glpCA5iVxwzD1aQ-K_VvdU29u9N0AVtDPYVkypXTHhLzCHZW7GUJoakCpU7lS4QSj2fL2SBWOcFeP2iB2UY_5oel3WJ0DWUi6oTqJXReSOKrHTtuyK0mRE6XmtFCRP-nKuSGxBCYW3wjJ1joYhinSCOJyiX-lSbcsQXlQ=w400-h223" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPQlXNH36mI" target="_blank">I love it when a plan comes together.</a></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Once again, my bog-standard sandbox-y fantasy game turns into a sticky morass with plots and intrigues and secret histories.</p><p>As for what this secretive cabal of memory manipulators seeks with the Temple of the Frog's prayer book — not to mention their other nefarious plans — remains a mystery. For now, anyway. (Although readers may take note that <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_(TV_series)" target="_blank">Dark</a></i>, <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopia_(British_TV_series)" target="_blank">Utopia</a></i>, and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Reach_Trilogy" target="_blank">the Southern Reach Trilogy</a> had outsized influences on this thing, even though I watched and read them after the game started heading in this direction. Hopefully this thing will take shape with the fullness of time.)</p><p>As for the other games I run in <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/search/label/Khaldun" target="_blank">Khaldun</a>, this secretive cabal has only directly interacted with one other group of player characters, although they didn't know it at the time. But there is always the possibility that other groups will follow...</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2101220466181178382.post-84727733931492454832021-11-25T07:00:00.345-05:002021-11-25T07:00:00.189-05:00On Prophecy<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/N-FKBmI5Wl0" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></div><p>A couple of weeks ago, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkVdb9Yr8fc05_VbAVfskCA" target="_blank">Matt Colville</a> published a new video about prophecies, both talking about the concept and soliciting feedback from the community as to whether anyone has ever successfully included prophecies and visions in their games. (For the record, he hasn't ever gotten it to work.)</p><p>I'm not in the habit of spraying my opinion across the internet, so I'm sharing it here.</p><p>I don't watch Colville's videos religiously, but I'm always a little surprised by them when I manage to watch them because I usually agree with about fifty percent of his content. (Let's say 40%-70%, probably depending on my mood.) He runs a very different game than I do, and so a lot of his discussion and advice isn't particularly applicable to my table. (He also doesn't seem to play or run terribly often, so I get the impression that his games are way more planned and plotted than mine. I'm embarrassingly running five-ish games right now on a baroque, rotating schedule, so I frequently have to be comfortable with a good answer now rather than a perfect answer derived from five hours' planning.)</p><p>Colville tends to see role-playing game scenarios as an alternate form of literature akin to short stories or novels: linear plots with plot points, themes, moods, etc. These things are all knobs that the author (in this case, the GM) sets and constantly tweaks in response to player action. Astute observers will recognize the core of '90s game design, with its metaplots and linear adventures, probably traceable back to Maliszewski's so-called "<a href="http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2008/12/scrappy-doo-and-hickman-revolution.html" target="_blank">Hickman Revolution</a>" in the early-to-mid-1980s.</p><p><a href="https://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2011/08/start.html" target="_blank">My initial and anarchic foray</a> into RPGs way back in the late 1990s may have started with White Wolf, but I quickly surmised that their Storytelling advice wasn't going to work for me. How can I establish a theme and mood for the game without knowing the energy the players are going to bring to the table on any given night? They have a say in how the game runs, too, and they're probably not going to explicitly tell me what they want.</p><p>In retrospect, it's hardly surprising that I fell in love with old-school play. Playing to find out what happens, the "story" of the game is the emergent story at the table, and all that.</p><p>Which brings me back around to the point: I think Colville's approach to prophecies and oracles failed because he was still thinking about role-playing game sessions like novels and not <a href="http://psychicmayhem.blogspot.com/2019/04/rpgs-as-art.html" target="_blank">as their own genre of art</a>, as I will argue again and again in this corner of digital real estate.</p><p>In a novel (for example), a prophecy usually serves two purposes: it acts as exposition and foreshadowing. If a prophecy is somewhat vague, as most of them are, then the audience might get the shape of it — enough to know that something big is coming and maybe even with some idea of what shape that thing is going to take — but readers won't know the outcome until later in the story. The more explicit the prophecy or the more deft the writer, the greater the likelihood that the audience will be "rewarded" by figuring out what the foreshadowing means ahead of time.</p><p>Contrast with role-playing games. Prophecies and visions serve a similar purpose, but the audience and the participants are usually the same people, so visions have a very different weight: they're clues. Clues don't have to be planned ahead of time — astute players in an investigative scenario are going to interrogate environmental details that the game master didn't <i>explicitly</i> plan, but can surmise based on what they know of the larger shape of things — but they do need to be deliberate and included with purpose. More importantly, the game is <i>always</i> about what the players do at the table. So, as with any clue, the game can't come to a screeching halt if the players aren't interested or don't understand the prophecy they receive.</p><p>What does all this mean? In my experience, prophecies, oracles, and visions all work pretty well, but the game master needs to be deliberate about their placement, and the game has to be able to continue running if the vision is ignored. I'll give you a handful of tips and examples:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>In the above video, Colville indicates that he included a vision almost as an afterthought: no preamble, no warning that the players were going to receive it, and most tellingly, he probably planned it only a session or two in advance. (Having watched some of his liveplay stuff, he seems to turn the plot on a dime as cool ideas occur to him. Protip: use your cool ideas, but make sure they're well-integrated with your existing game.) Even if a prophecy is about something minor, being able to tell the future is A Big Deal™, and should be both well-telegraphed and thoroughly considered in advance. How will this impact things? What happens if the players interfere? What happens if they ignore it? (Always assume your clues are going to get ignored. What happens next? Usually, ignoring a vision means that things escalate.)</li><ul><li>As long as we're talking about giving players oracular abilities, there is an alternate method to giving a player a vision. I did it sometimes in <a href="https://bread-and-circuses.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">my <i>Dungeon World</i> game</a>, and it is one of the recommended methods for some oracular powers in <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgfamily/2811/unknown-armies" target="_blank">Unknown Armies</a></i>: give the character an in-game bonus (a reroll or whatever), and then when they use it, ask the player what they saw in their vision earlier in the day. While it is a much more narrative way to solve the problem than giving the players a puzzle to solve every time you give them a vision, it gives them a little more agency when it comes to how they use their oracular abilities. Of course, as with trying to use oracles in the first place, that won't work for every game, either.</li></ul><li>In <a href="https://cucullus-non-facit-monachum.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">my Los Angeles-area <i>Unknown Armies</i> game</a>, things were ramping up, and the player characters heard there was an Oracle in Las Vegas. They talk to the Oracle and receive <a href="https://cucullus-non-facit-monachum.obsidianportal.com/wikis/prophecy-of-the-delphic-oracle-6-23-2011" target="_blank">the following poem</a>. Unsurprisingly, the players didn't understand most of it, but it did reinforce that <b>Something Big</b> is happening, and that the player characters needed to interfere or else something bad is going to happen in Los Angeles. (This was further reinforced by the fact that many members of the occult underground left the city, evidently having divined that some sort of big trouble was on its way.) The core purpose of the prophecy was to let them know they were on a timer; any other clues they could derive from the prophecy were just icing on the cake.</li><li><a href="https://of-kith-and-kin.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">My Sunday night <i>D&D</i> game</a> keeps encountering weird signs: a picture they can't perceive properly, a mysterious symbol they've found unobtrusively on at least one person in each town they've entered, various people asking them, "Are you forgetting something?" A merchant once claimed he met the characters before, but when they were insistent they had never encountered him before, he said he must be confused. (He's from the Underdark, so maybe he doesn't have a great memory for the faces of surfacers.) The cleric has received a couple of strange dreams featuring the player characters, his goddess, and a dwarven woman they've never met before. The players still don't know what to make of it, which is perfectly fine: it lets them know that something is happening in the background that they don't fully understand, and each weird clue or creepy vision just informs them that a clock is running down to an unknown revelation.</li><li><a href="https://f-and-m.obsidianportal.com/" target="_blank">My arctic Ravenloft game</a> has two prophecies: a <i>tarokka</i> reading telling the characters where to find key elements to oppose Khan Yemur (a deliberate homage to <i><a href="https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/48949/ravenloft" target="_blank">Ravenloft</a></i>'s <i>tarokka</i> reading for treasure placement), and a prophecy. (Both the <i>tarokka</i> reading and prophecy may be found <a href="https://f-and-m.obsidianportal.com/wikis/the-prophecy-of-the-accursed-eight" target="_blank">here</a>.) They've been dutifully seeking elements from the <i>tarokka</i> reading, but they have a little less information on the prophecy itself. Again, that's perfectly fine: the prophecy is vague, and its main purpose is to let them know that they are important and that their destinies have been "claimed" by the Dark Powers of Ravenloft.</li></ul><p></p><p>In every case, I fully recognize that the players aren't going to guess all the elements on the first try. Instead, these are sources of tension: each one lets the players know that their actions are important, that there's probably some sort of clock running in the background that they should be considering, and that there is some sort of confrontation coming that will relate to each prophecy. The more clues they uncover ahead of time, the more likely they are to have some warning for the coming event, but they don't need to perform any particular actions to enact the prophecy.</p><p>That's probably the key: don't treat prophecies as something you have to force the players to do, instead putting them there as additional sources of clues so the players can figure out what's about to happen. And if the players miss the prophecy date or misinterpret the vision and head in the opposite direction, so much the better! Whatever terrible thing they foresaw and failed to stop now gets to happen in their absence, and they can deal with it in the aftermath. Or not; maybe they decide to flee instead. If the continent is doomed, why is it always their responsibility?</p><p>Remember: the game is whatever the players decide to do at the table. Everything else is just fluff.</p>S. P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/18219512413362952481noreply@blogger.com0