/osrg/ OSR General - Bad Egg Edition

>>52653533
I always figured this is because low-level monsters are wandering little snots that shouldn't give you much exp in order to encourage you to avoid them or diplomance, while the higher-level ones like vampires are boss monsters that you might be there specifically to lay low.

>>52653696
>What's the worst module you've ever played?

Tomb of Horrors.

What was that one module that everyone made fun of because it had stupid lines like

>There are 2d4 bandits. They do not have any treasure. They possess no magic items. They are not wearing armor.

Hey guys, this guy >>52651115 is asking about Castles & Crusades. Any thoughts?

>>52653696
>What's the worst module you've ever played?
Keep on the Borderlands. It's not that bad but it's probably the worst I've ran.

>>52654299
What was bad about it?

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What do you guys think of Tales From The Yawning Portal?

It's got some old-school adventures like Against The Giants and The Temple of Tamichoaachooblessu... which were supposed to be great classics. Or so I've been told.

Each turn, a d20
1-8 are wandering monsters
9-10 are environment fx like noises or cues about monsters
11-15 light goes out (lamps have 4 'hits')
16+ nothing

Regular encounters and torch count are otherwise ignored.

Does this sound correct, in terms of chances for a BX game?

>>52654319
It's just kind of boring. It doesn't really carry an interesting aesthetic, and the caves didn't have much other than rooms with enemies and the occasional simple trap. I guess it kind of feels like I could make something similar myself without much trouble using a simple dungeon creator and some stocking tables.

>>52654387
>11-15 light goes out (lamps have 4 'hits')
Why would torches and lamps go out that quickly and often?

>>52654447
Woops noticed after posting. It should be:
11-13 light goes out (lamps have 4 'hits')
14+ nothing

>>52654343
>yfw against the giants isn't a disgustingly lethal meatgrinder anymore with like 50 giants at a time.

what are some solid modules for players completely new to the game?

>>52654501
The Jade Hare.

>>52654501
Which game?

>>52654501
B4 The Lost City.

>>52654526
Labyrinth Lord

>>52654501
I'll be 100% honest: your own.
First because you know your players, at least know their motivations to try D&D.
Second because 95% of TSR modules and 99% of DIY OSR modules suck way too much.
Third because you will run 300x better an adventure of your own making.
Fourth because it's A LOT more rewarding.

>>52654595
What are some guidelines for making a dungeon?
Where to start?
How do people think of so many crazy rooms and concepts?

>>52654484
>You enter a fiery cavern.
>There are [4d20] Fire Giants here.

>>52654343
>>52654484
Oh look, a new edition, guess we have to re-stat all the classics!
Wait, what do you mean we need original content? Why should we have to develop new material?!
Lol. You thought WOTC was a gaming company? No, no, no... we're a PUBLISHING company, we just need to print stiff so ppl buy it!

>>52654664
To be fair, they published 4 huge original adventure books before this compilation (contracted out to 3rd parties, but still).

>>52654595
>95% of TSR modules suck
I have to respectfully disagree with this, though I'll admit the number is probably 40%, and that 40% is solely in the later days of TSR.
FunFact: post Gary time of TSR is referred to T$R for a reason

>>52654595
Why must it be TSR?

Look at Judges' Guild adventures. Drop your party to the Tegel Manor. Have fun.

>>52654729
That's a fair point, to be sure.
Unlike most other oldfag grognards I don't shit all over anything that isn't 'muh BX/1e' genre.
I'm sure there's plenty of good adventures for all editions, and I'm really just glad ppl still get together to have fun

>>52654595
Going to throw in contesting some of the points here, if not the intent.

I've found modifying a module you find inspiring or evocative to be a good place to start. It lets you adjust to your players, keep the parts you like and ditch the parts you don't, gives you a good grasp of what all the moving parts are because you've read and changed them, and its also a very rewarding process to fill in ideas, use random tables, fuck around with a framework and then use it.

Also helps for when you're new to running a game. Gives you an idea of structure, how it works, what didn't, etc.

Other option is playing them by the book as written if you're into recreating experiences or authenticity or something. Not sure about that, has limited interest to me. ymmv.

>>52654613
Part 1, the most important, is ask your players what they want. Setting expectations and all that. Then:

Get a random dungeon map:
donjon.bin.sh
http://wizardawn.and-mag.com/tool_ultimate.php
They come with traps and monsters and everything. Refluff it / change bits with whatever you want.

Random dungs are boring so-
Puzzles:
http://goblinpunch.blogspot.com.es/2016/03/1d135-osr-style-challenges.html
Print this shit and cross them as you use them. Beware, most are stolen from old modules.

If you're lazy, there's also one-page-dungeon compilations in the trove, pick one and fluff/reskin/season to taste. They are generally bland or plain untested, so pick carefully.

Anything else?

>>52653696
>What's the worst module you've ever played?
Not OSR but I played in a Pathfinder game that the Adventure Path was called 'Iron Gods' and we only played like the first half of the first module before the GM flaked and quit. It had some 'Expedition of the Barrier Peaks' feel to it but it was not very good at it either, what with being Pathfinder and all.

Played a Barbarian who hated tech, so it was all 'smashy smash' since I guess the game would fall through anyway.

>>52654859
I think I tried that module too, barely got a few sessions in.

I feel like the only fan of sci-fi in fantasy and gunslingers and stuff was the GM.

>>52654823
>They are generally bland or plain untested
Untested - yes. Bland? NO. The one-page dungeon contest produced some outstanding, clever, unique and fun dungeons.

>>52654763
>I'm really just glad ppl still get together to have fun
I know I'm breaking all kinds of rules by quoting my own post, but whatever:

That's the major point of playing an rpg or any game really: have fun.
Who cares if it's the best adventure, or the coolest plot arc or any of that crap. I mean, of course you want those things but ultimately it's about having fun with your friends. Period.
Messed up that trap? So what
Fudged a die roll just for effect? Good
Threw out a rule you didn't like? Perfect
Everyone on /tg/ shits all over your idea, only to have fun playing it with friends? You just won

>>52654799
Pretty sure you want to reply to >>52654613 but imo, the main appeal of a module is running it as-is. Not for autenticity, just plain economy of brain juice.
You have no idea what to do, or no time, or no inspiration: grab a module and play.

As a learning experience, it could be. But times have changed a lot, and not every group has the time to grind 2 hours in empty corridors, fight monsters 5XP each until they reach their first 2000XP and roll a new hit point.
And lots of OSR adventures copy that same pattern.
On top of that, most TSR modules are 'balanced' for large parties (6-8), require hirelings/retainers (so, extra DM work). Better write your own wandering tables with toned down numbers.

Revamping modules is tricky. First because if they are good, you'll be butchering, most likely. If they are bad, you'd be better off stealing ideas into your own dungeon, rather than 'fixing' it.

>>52654953
True but-
>Fudged a die roll
Never. If you want something to happen, just say it. Why rolling otherwise?
Seriously, a lot of the fun in D&D is how swingy it is. If you want a more predictable game, there's conversions for playing with 2d6 instead of d20.

>>52655016
>Never. If you want something to happen, just say it. Why rolling otherwise?
I was leaning towards rolling for damage, pc would be dead, you so this:
>roll 12 damage
>PC has 11hp
You take ..... errrr.... 9 damage

>>52655078
I roll damage in the open, but most of the time there's still negative hit points or some other weird fudging that could keep them alive. Going below zero doesn't need to mean death.

That said, today a thief got brought to -11 by a lightning blast. He ded.

>>52655078
You have been rolling your morale, reactions and everything like a good boy. Players fuck up, they die. They learn a bit, become smarter.
You fudge rolls, players get a distorted idea of the real game, get confident, then die at some point shortly after you stop handholding them, lose a long-time character, get mad because 'unfair'. No-no.

>The orc attacks. It's aiming for your arm.
>It hits, you drop your weapon, or expose your arm and take damage?
>damage :)
>roll 3 damage in the open
>PC has 2 hp
>everybody in the table happy to see him die like he deserves

If you want a less lethal game, start at 2th level or houserule death.

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I like this.

>>52655220
Point very well taken. Guess I'm a softy sometimes.

Question for OSR folks:
Do you find yourselves running from encounters a lot?
Given the lethality of OSR games and the lack of 75 bazillion safety nets of later editions, I run away a lot it seems...
So how about you guys (and I assume gals?)

>>52655016
I was addressing points 1-4 specifically, in how you can do those things by modifying rather than building from the ground up. Especially if you're new. The first bunch of B is designed for you to change them/fill them in. It gives you an idea of how to make your own from scratch later.

It seems like a weird thought process to me of running modules right out the box but it does seem like a thing people do and enjoy. What people find engaging and rewarding as a dm is going to vary quite a bit I'd think.

Revamping is for sure tricky for sure though. Sometimes the thing I changed worked out, sometimes its less cool. Stealing ideas, fixing, etc. gets into a funny area of defining when it shifts from 'their' dungeon to 'yours' and I don't think I'm qualified to even touch that. If there's a map I like, I use it, or parts of it, or mix maps together. If there's an encounter table, trap, description, etc. Most random tables, maps and encounters are easy enough to cut out, change a bit and plug in where you want.

Haven't had a problem with balancing encounters (lol). I just make them smaller if I have to, breaks into fractions easy enough. The group is into hirelings and the like. Who's fighting through corridors for xp?

>>52655484
My players have never run, nor ever needed to. They're pretty smart and lucky.

Occasionally they sneak or diplomance, but if a fight ends up being started they can usually finish it.

Does anyone have the Dyson’s Dodecahedron PDFs?

>>52655633
I'm smart enough, perhaps. Lucky though? Heh, no way

>>52655484
My players have run away a decent amount. Usually from anything really big or numerous. Sometimes it seems like a good idea from my end, sometimes they could have won but didn't realize. Less recently, they've levelled a bit and are getting cocky.

How good is Lairs & Encounters for non-ACKS games?

>>52654799
This is what I've actually been planning on doing. Was going to modify Keep on the Borderlands to the skeleton of the setting I have in mind.

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>>52656241
Do Keep on the Borderlands of the Wilderlands.

>>52655363
they can just roll up a new one!

Any good cursed weapon properties?

>>52655300
Source?

>>52656798
I learned to love the classic, thanks to nethack: it wields to your hand

>>52656902
I thought they all already did that?

>>52656621
fugg, sauce please

>>52655300
Sauce, looks interesting

>>52657178
They do, if you play strictly btb. But who does? does people really roll egos for swords and all that?

>>52657360
>does people really roll egos for swords and all that?
Your fuckin a right I do.

>>52656902
Nethack a shit though. PTSD from nethack is why crawl devs delete ten features for every one feature they add.

>>52654588
I'll agree with both these gents
>>52654518
>>52654572

>>52654664
To be fair, most of their "original" material sucked pretty hard. And it's not like it's unexpected: 3e's core setting was Diet Greyhawk and 5e's is FR.

>>52654730
>post-Gary modules
>bad

lol

>>52657184
Somewhere in here.... https://rule34.xxx/index.php?page=post&s=list&tags=madeline_fenton&pid=210

>>52658009
nope, checked all of them, not there

what combat rules would you recommend porting to B/X over from Ad&d for players who occasionally enjoy hack and slash?

>>52658478
That's strange. Fine then, here you go: https://ibb.co/byM3vk

Thoughts on making two-handed weapons (namely, greatswords, while keeping long polearms and blunt weapons at 1d10) 2d6/1d12?
I think, combined with a cleave rule, it would really improve fighter's ability against hordes of low-hit die monsters.
Perhaps give ogres and other big things larger hit die to compensate for the bigger damage on smaller enemies?

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>>52658654
None. Look at the Weapon Mastery rules from the Rules Cyclopedia and use those.

>>52654299
>Keep on the Borderlands.
Yeah, Keep is amazing for what it's designed to do, which is teach entirely new referees how to run wilderness and dungeon play, but that practically automatically makes it less than great if you already know how to do those things.

>>52656866
>>52657360
Not the guy who posted it, but it's either the Judges Guild Ready Ref Sheets, or in the CSIO: that's definitely their typesetting and it's vintage JG design (namely "this shit is still suboptimal but kind of a consolation prize if you rolled shit stats").

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How about this?

>Best module you ever played in/ran?

Pic related. Not OSR but fuck all it is good.

>>52661003
I've heard it was meh. What about it worked well for you?

>>52661040
It was just good, hard to explain. I mean, me and my party apparently went off rails hard according to the DM, but he ran with it and still managed to get us back on the story just fine.

Also, our fight with the Dragon was just plain awesome. We completely broke the module at that point in how we did it but it felt so, so good.

rule clarification for lotfp.

it looks like from the rule wording that if a wizard is attacked during a turn they cannot cast a spell, even if the attack happened before their turn comes up that round. or am I mistaken?

>>52661360

Yep, that's a standard D&D thing.

(It wouldn't be a very useful rule if spell interruption could only happen after you cast it.)

Speaking of dragons, which dragons do you like to use?

What's your favorite "obscure" (i.e. not chromatic, gem, or metallic) dragon?

What about non-OSR dragons?

>>52661399
let me clarify. i get that if the spell takes time to cast (example: if it activates at the end of the round) it will be canceled by smacking the wizard. but what if the wizard is hit before he even begins a spell?

Help Anon out:
>>52660774
>>52660774

>>52661360
Yes, if they're attacked in the round they declare they want to cast a spell, or anytime between then and when the spell is completed, the spell fizzles.

>>52661429

Some spells take effect on your turn; you declare you're casting at the start of the round, and the spell can be finished on your turn, but some spells will take longer.

>>52661429
When you enter a new round, everyone declares their actions. Those actions are locked into place, and then initiative is rolled.
If the wizard wins initiative, he can begin to cast and then cast the spell if it's a 1-round cast time. Any attacks that happen after don't affect the fact that the spell went off.
If the wizard loses initiative and he's hit, that means he started to cast, but was interrupted.

>>52661457
thanks for that. i hadn't realized everyone declares at start of round.

>>52661457
That's literally how I've always played it, even in 1e and 2e games... It's just simpler than trying to figure out what segment is what and who's doing shit, simultaneous attacks etc etc

>>52661492
i am one of those faggots who never played the real olschool stuff. Lamentations is the closest I've played similar to anything older than d&D 3.5

>>52661401
Giving myself a quick (You)

>have a tendency to avoid chromatics/metallics in favor of oddballs

>Forest Linnorms. More like MTG's wurms, will only eat "pretty" things. Likely to starve in a forest full of orcs/goblins/etc.

>3e's Obsidian dragons are a nice, edgy addition to the gem dragons. Also, PF's ghost-eating Umbral dragons.

>>52661509
I honestly digbthe quirkiness of 2e the best. The key is tossing out all the nonsense rules for rules same shit and keeping the core. The core is solid, and balanced out pretty well.
By balance I mean fighters are incredibly useful, as useful as a mage or rogue or cleric. None are really superior to the others, they all have drawbacks and bonuses.
There was a 2e thread yesterday I dumped some of my pdfs in... Just compilations of rules I use, spells, world of greyhawk (pre 3e) stuff like that, hopefully someone found them useful

>>52661682
Rules for rules sake shit*

Ever since my shit updated it's impossible to type anything... I hate nougat.
>inb4 phoneposter faggot
I'm in bed, and have no laptop, that's with the wife at the hospital

>>52661706
Sorry to hear your wife is in the hospital. May she recover quickly (or, if she is tending to a loved one, may they recover quickly).

>>52661764
Thanks anon
She has severe adult onset epilepsy. She's in for a long stay in the EMU (epilepsy monitoring unit). Basically they glue 56 probes to her skull, take her off all her meds, sleep deprive her and force seizures. Sounds barbaric, but they can then pinpoint where the seizures start and then do brain surgery... Just cut out a few cells and bam, no more seizures, ever.

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>>52661401
>>52661569
figure this article from Dragon Magazine will be useful

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>>52661810
God I love medical tech nowadays. How about that new research that Harvard released where they state that, quite possibly, they could reverse many effects of ageing? Like, they did this treatment on some lab mice and could not differentiate old mice from young after just a few weeks of treatment.
>Soon we can be immortals, devoting decades to campaigns in the same way we devote months to them.

Does anyone love the "hi, I have no skill of measurable worth and I'm walking into a dungeon, welcome to Jackass" feeling of low-level play?

>>52661943
More than you could possibly imagine

>>52661914
I really just hope everything goes well with her stay and surgery. It's weird when you actually get to marry your best friend. Taught her 2e (her only rpg besides 3e, which she hated) and she loves it.
>tfw our current campaign is 3 years in and going strong

>>52661943
I like it as a referee.

I'm generally not a fan as a player, unless there's something crazy going on with the iteration time.

>>52661943

>>52662016
What this guy says.

The problem is I know too much about dungeons and being a GM to fully fit into that role. If my GM asked me too, I would agree to play a dumb character.

One things I actually like about OSR, as a slight aside, is because it's so lethal and character generation so fast and easy, it's actually somewhat fun to be the dumb fucking idiot that triggers the mummy's curse or whatever. I know it sounds counter productive in a game all about it being 'hard', but this also empowers you to be that guy. There is just something about being the greedy asshole who takes the amulet off the mummy's neck and then gets his ass turned into dust by its evil magic is great, because it's a bit like playing the bad guy, but instead you're playing the redshirt.

So yes, I like the idea of being the Jackass guy, but I have to roleplay it.

>>52654343
I'm endlessly pissed off Expedition to Barrier Peaks wasn't in it. I have few fonder childhood D&D memories than taking over the land with a suit of powered armor.

>>52662479
Same. I'd also love to see a 5e remake of D1-3.

I'm switching to a linear-curve reaction roll and really wish my players luck. What if I use JG's Woman Disposition table for my reaction rolls.

1. angry
2. jealous
3. pensive
4. tired
5. tender
6. excited
7. ardent
8. erotic

Sounds a lot better (as in more evocative) than the default 'hostile! immediate attack!' and you can always turn #8 into a mad scary encounter.

Does B/X or any of its derivatives have any rules for playing as a monster character anywhere, or is AD&D the only one with that sort of nonsense?

Because I have to admit I find the standard races either boring and overdone (elves, dwarves) or bloody stupid (gnomes, halflings).

>>52655300
>>52660714
Found it , it's Judges Guild Ready Ref Sheets.
Repartee takes a full rounds, like a spell, and stops all melee/charhes within earshot for d6 rounds (secret roll). Success=d(cha+int)%
Repartees negate each other (even friendly ones).
Witicism makes everybody within earshot save (by rolling 3d6 under their Cha) or be "taken aback" for 2d4 rounds, paralyzed. If you saved, you only lose initiative to the Buffoon. Stealing from "taken aback" characters sobers them instantly.

I like this bard.

>>52663878
Yes. Take a Fighter and re-skin it.
The Dwarf already has XP table balanced for gaining infravision and other minor stuff, you can use it as a more accurate base.
As long as you keep it simple, it'll work.

Hobbits are the best, specially if your players like to RP - just poorly nerfed for no reason.

>>52663953
>just poorly nerfed for no reason

How's there no reason? Hobbits were pretty weak in the original text, too.

>>52664125
>>52664125
True, but having a character class that's objectively worse than all the others in nearly every way (especially without warning potential new players of it, like in the oldest editions) is a dick move.

>>52664160
Fair enough, though once again, if they've read the original text it should kind of be a given.

In this time and day they will certainly go to these older games knowing exactly what they're expecting: high lethality, sneaking around, thievery, and no heroism whatsoever. In that company, they'll surely expect their hobbit character to be weaker than the rest.

>>52664233
>high lethality, sneaking around, thievery, and no heroism whatsoever
Doesn't that basically just describe hobbits, though?

>>52663878
most of them do somewhere along the line, even if a lot of them stick it into a supplement or leave it to a third party to produce them, also many fall into the incredibly annoying trap of making races outside of the core 5 objectively inferior to play as from a mechanical basis

>>52664233
>high lethality, sneaking around, thievery, and no heroism whatsoever
despite me liking OSR systems a lot, I'll admit none of those have ever been all that appealing to me as either a player or a DM

but then my interest in the OSR is mostly due to ease of use in it's systems and it's modularity, many of the "philosophical" aspects to the OSR as a movement I honestly can't standl

>>52664125
First, Hobbits and D&D Halflings are different things.
Second, let's admit it - early D&D had a very fucked up way of balancing gameplay. Instead of making the classes equal and giving them unique options, they made them very different, then added some extra complications and quirks everywhere.

>original text
Yes, that explains that you need high Con and Dex to be a Hobbit, and that they have both Str and Dex as a prime stat. Also explains that they don't have infravision, despite living in fucking tunnels.

That's what I mean by "poorly nerfed for no reason" -> "Arbitrary"

>>52664265
>high lethality, sneaking around, thievery, and no heroism whatsoever
The first one is true at low levels / with newbie players, but otherwise depends of the DM.

>>52664352
>Also explains that they don't have infravision, despite living in fucking tunnels.
A hobbit hole is not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat. It's well lit.

>>52664352
>Also explains that they don't have infravision, despite living in fucking tunnels.

The hobbits lived on the surface. They had gardens and farms and shit. They just built their homes under hills.

anyone else backing the Blueholme Kickstarter?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dreamscapedesign/blueholmetm-journeymanne-rules/

>>52664300
>many of the "philosophical" aspects to the OSR as a movement I honestly can't standl
This is the third time I heard this phrase used here.

Searchable database of all the spells you'll ever need (AD&D)

http://save.vs.totalpartykill.ca/grab-bag/spells/Pangean_wizard_spells.html

http://save.vs.totalpartykill.ca/grab-bag/spells/Pangean_priest_spells.html

>>52665161
Okay these are pretty sweet.

>>52665161
That can't possibly be all of them. Adding in the Spell Compendiums, there's like a million spells out there.

Also, would really help if the priest spells were split by sphere rather than school.

>>52663878
https://pastebin.com/gZKSnUrV
List of all the officially created ones for BECMI.
Just doing a google for B/X classes will get you a lot of interesting fan made stuff.

What if I take B/X and let the elf cast druidical spells only?

I have no experience with AD&D (or druidical spells at all) so idk if it'll break the game.

>>52666500
b/x doesn't even have druids m8

>>52666587
Obviously, I'd be borrowing the spell list from Advanced / Holmes / whatever. That's why I ask if I'll break the game...

>>52666500
I don't have much experience with druids, but their spells should be weaker than magic-user spells on the whole.

How OSR is Advanced Fighting Fantasy?
If not in TSR-like mechanics, then playstyle and thematically.

Is there merit in attempting to take something like B/X and pare it down to something resembling AFF? Or would too many interesting mechanics be over simplified and make for a mechanically dull game?

Let's say a player wants to jump over a gap or a river, and I need to make a quick ruling for it. What is your prefered way to resolve that using dice? If I had to offhand it I would make the player roll over like a 12 with + their strength modifier, maybe minus their encumbrance.

This feels like it veers dangerously towards emphasizing the player stats, but I don't know another elegant way to do it?

We're assuming that most players have tops +2 in a stat, and very rarely +3.

>>52667448
To (You) myself for a moment. The "SKILL" attribute in AFF worries me.
In the original rules, you rolled all your stats, so it basically makes high SKILL characters better at everything all the time, since nearly every task in the game is checked on it.

In the 2nd edition they enforce a point buy, which eliminates the above problem, but does make for way less variety in character types (and is not particularly OSR).

>>52667497
Can an adventurer jump it? Not carrying treasure? Has help or tools? Then he jumps.
Hard jump? Carrying treasure or bulky stuff? Under stress, or someone hindering him?
>It's an easy task, but given the circumstances I give you a 4 in 6 chance to jump cleanly. Unless you drop that diamond sack or do that other thing. Sounds good?

If it's something minor -like tripping in a oiled stairs or lifting something heavy but not dangerous- I like rolling under ability scores.

This is all mentioned in the DM section of B/X, btw.

>>52667497
>>52667691
Oh and tangent, but I decided to use weapon damage as both tool durability and initiative order.
*You can use your dagger/sword/whatever as a crowbar or similar, but roll damage: a 1 means it broke.
*For individual initiative like a duel, roll damage-Dex - lower goes first.

>grab a 10-foot pole on character creation for trapfinding
>realize this is an aboveground campaign
>finally find use for it
>character swings wildly around in circles with it to detect an invisible hag (when the pole struck her, it broke, giving us an approximate location) that had sapped the barbarian down to STR 10
What are some creative uses for common dungeoneering tools that you guys have done?

>>52667824
I had a player use the 10 ft pole as a way to bridge a gap in a broken staircase and climb up using a rope

>>52667691
Hm, winging it with a d6 seems fair as well. And yes we're in the scenario where the jump is non-trivial.

I would probably still roll d20 because my players are used to stats mattering somewhat in that regard, but I'll make it a rare occasion.

>>52668118
It's not winging it, it's discussing it then rolling it.

For my next campaign (or even better, after th next TPK) I plan to let players rearrange one stat for another, simply because I want to *make* ability checks.
But if you are doing 3d6 in order, asking other than a roll-under is going to feel very unfair after a while. Just decide with common sense a binary outcome (success/fail) or a x-in-6 chance like the rest of the system (I'm guessing BX).

And think that even dwarves and thieves have only a 2/6 chance of finding architecture and hear noise, respectively.
This is a game that relies on giving bad chances to every roll, so players have to find ways to bypass them enterely by clever fictional position (aka common sense says success).
In BX, a knife to the throat while asleep means death. The end. It makes sense.
If you ask for surprise, initiative, attack roll, damage roll or whatever, you're playing it ""wrong""

>>52667448
>>52667561
Yes

>>52667561
>>52667561
So? You've answered your own question. It's a very simplistic system aimed at beginners, and it's just not very well designed. It doesn't accommodate both random character generation and anything remotely like balance. If you can't accept one without the other than I guess it's not a good system. You could try and redesign it around a wider variety of stats so high skill doesn't dominate the game but by that point you're almost certainly better off using a different system.

>>52664160
>objectively worse than all the others in nearly every way

But that's not true. With nice saving throws, decent hp, and the hobbit hiding ability, the hobbit's niche is being hard to kill. I've seen them escape from TPKs more often than any other class over the years.

>>52668698
Maybe assign some of the skills (as in, character skills and proficiencies, not the Skill stat) to Stamina and Luck instead? Magic might as well be entirely Stamina-based, for instance, since casting spells usually drains you physically. And you could easily justify all the sneaky stuff being under Luck.

One common houserule I also did was to flip around the number of skill points you got: normally, high Skill meant also a high number of points, but I instead had the lower Skill give you the most. That way you were either highly specialized, or jack-of-all-trades.

>>52668746
Probably the least "damage" you could do the system by fiddling with it would be to make Skill/Luck a single roll by which your Luck is always equal to 19 minus your Skill, but that's an understandably unpopular approach.

Hey, is the guy that did AD&D conversions of PF monsters still here?

Because I can't imagine draugr still isn't a monster in AD&D. It oughta be.

>>52668799
It wouldn't really work very well with the whole pushing your luck thing, where your luck is reduced every time you test it.

>>52668843
Why? You still end up with 7-12 points.

In case it wasn't clear, I meant INITIAL luck. As in, in character generation, you essentially roll for Skill and then reduce that from 19 to determine your initial Luck. Further modifications to Luck wouldn't affect Skill anymore than in the current system.

>>52668821
Yep, I'm here. After looking at their summary on the PFwiki I've got to ask you what they bring to the table that Jolly Rogers and Sea Zombies don't.

http://www.lomion.de/cmm/jollroge.php
http://www.lomion.de/cmm/zombsea.php

An unique flavor? An interesting mechanic? Adventure seeds?

>>52669025
Still not quite the wonder cure, obviously, since luck is still less useful RAW than skill, which is in many ways your only relevant attribute. But like I said, any more significant change than that and you're already playing a game so far off from AFF you might as well just set your D&D or GURPS game in Allansia and be done with it.

>>52669060
I still think that flipping around the system of how many skill points you get would've solved most problems without really changing the system too much, and then maybe we could add your thing about luck on top of it... though that might paradoxically make -low- skill too good a thing to have. Or maybe not, I don't know.

Fighting Fantasy books is how I got my start at roleplaying, but these days, if I ever head to Allansia I prefer DCC.

>>52669030
Fair enough. Sea zombies are a bit too powerful to throw against lower-level characters, but I guess it'd be easy enough to ditch a couple hit dice off them.

I still think they should've made them draugrs instead of sea zombies in the first place, though. I wouldn't say draugr flavor is outright unique, but it would be a lot heavier than with the usual sea zombies. I can also imagine them having a ghost ship under them more easily. They're smarter, easier to believe them going out doing actual raiding, instead of just hiding in the sea and waiting for you to come to them. And the fat bloated sailor appearance just doesn't stick to me quite the same as a laughing jolly zombie pirate would.

As for jolly rogers, they're just crazy powerful. You can't throw a crew full of them against a low-level player party. Could have them be in charge of a draugr band, though.

>>52669030
>>52669288
Also, regarding adventure seeds, the first two of the three here don't really work so well with sea zombies, at least not for me:

http://dailybestiary.blogspot.fi/2011/12/draugr.html

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>>52669030
>lomion
>mfw pls no bully that I site ripped his entire MM to use offline at my game table

>>52663793
>the goblins are...
>*roll*
>erotic

Either hilarious or the worst session ever, can't decide

>>52666500
You won't break the game, but on the contrary the exclusive druidical spells are so few and so poor that it'll be a meganerf for the Elf to the point where it looks like a passive-aggressive not!ban. Personally I'd prefer it if you just banned the class from your table if you have trouble with it.

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>>52667448
>>52667561
Advanced Fighting Fantasy has a world that's OSR-as-fuck (with classic Russ Nicholson art to boot!) but the mechanics are modern, unbalanced and just not very good. As you said, SKILL dominates and point buy is not OSR-style at all.

It'd make more sense to tweak B/X or LOTFP and customize it for the World of Titan.

>>52667497
>What is your prefered way to resolve that using dice?
Roll under your Strength with a penalty equal to the AC bonus from your armor and shield.

There are various variants of this, like you could do an X-in-6 roll with your Str mod as a bonus and movement speed category as a penalty (e.g. 12"=no penalty, 9"=-1, 6"=-2, 3"=-3). I think a Strength check minus AC bonus is easy and straightforward, though.

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>>52663793

>>52669558
I don't have a "problem" with the elf, except how slow they level up and that they have the MU spells and could use something more flavorful.

They would advance as a Fighter or whatever. Kind of like a Druid+ with infravision and pointy ears but fewer weapons, no metal armor, and bound to protect nature.

A bit more interesting than the original elf, I hope.

I have a bunch of newer players in my game. We're using Rules Cyclopedia as the basis now, but a lot of players wish their class was more unique (think kits from AD&D 2e). Is there a different edition or retroclone that achieves this? Or is the best solution custom making a class?

>>52669933
Try ACKS. Sure, class packages are just specific equipment and proficiency choices, but it can still help out coming up with flavor.

>>52669496
tender would be far worse, but I'm seriously going to use this at the table.

idk about 'ardent', tho

>>52669689
>A bit more interesting than the original elf, I hope.
Most interesting elf I've seen was a homebrew someone posted here.

Had ads spell slots and spell progression, but could prepare a spell in a handful of turns.
Which is really just an interesting way to do MUs, for that matter...

>ads
*ass

Does D&D have the worst ever trolls and wights? Bouncy rubbery drooling clawing ugly misfits, and ghoul pluses, instead of the fairy tale forest folk and haunting barrow warriors they should be?

These two monsters were forever corrupted in the very beginning and I can't recall a single attempt in any edition, or OSR recreation, at doing them right since. It's like everyone's just accepted that they're shit.

>>52671043
>It's like everyone's just accepted that they're shit.
Not true at all, I'm waiting for you to post your version of them.

>>52670192
Sounds interesting, tho I don't like players micromanaging shit. I'd rather give them a cantrip before having them stop to rest, pause game, open inventory, navigate options and unpause game.
Any details about how that works?

>>52671043
>accepted that they're shit.
I very much like the BX/1e etc trolls.
If you don't like them, why not stat up your own version

>>52671153
>>52671182
Remove troll regeneration and fire weaknesses, add intelligence and varying weird powers, cover them in black hair.

You can plug some good wights from Warhammer. Just have them walk upright, shamble a bit slower, give them armor and a long cold blade, maybe allow them channel their energy drain through that blade.

It's not that hard.

>>52671667
Yes yes, but stat them. Write something both playable and interesting. It's easy to say "varying weird powers" but which ones? How frequently can be used? Etc.

In my game wights walk straight and wear armor and use longswords (just checked and my monster entry says nothing against this). What else?

>>52671909
>(just checked and my monster entry says nothing against this)

The energy drain only works on their claws, so why would they wield anything else?

>>52671043
I like trolls as is, something about aggressively ravenous monsters that are too dumb/angry to give a fuck about getting hurt appeals to me. But I ended up refluffing them a bit for the game I'm running, post-human alchemical (nanomagical) war hybrids made for the titanomachy. Big injectors of chemical wardrug cocktails mounted to their spines that makes them crazy and regenerates damage, makes them need to eat a lot of flesh.

I just used the stats in the monster manual. Worked fine. Terrifying and killed a bunch of people but that seemed right. Where's the rubbery part come from? Their description came across as more of a growths and body horror crawling limbs sort of thing to me.

>>52671153
>Any details about how that works?
I don't remember the exact details, but elf slots peaked at 2/2/1 IIRC?

Prep took a couple of turns per spell, more for higher level spells.
Can't recall if that was X turns or X-in-6 chance per turn, but I would go with the former.

The long and short of it was, "trade Wandering Monster rolls for spells."
>having them stop to rest, pause game, open inventory, navigate options and unpause game.
You're encouraged to do it while the party is preoccupied (out of combat, ofc), to cut down on extra Wandering Monsters.

>>52669288
>>52669309
So undead viking assholes good for low-level encounters? Alright, I'll try my hand at them.

>>52669362
It's good but unfortunately it isn't as complete as people think.

>>52661829
Very nice.

>>52671043
If you go to the inspiration for the D&D Troll (Three Hearts and Three Lions) then it's much more interesting. It just doesn't translate well to a game.

>>52672468
>isn't as complete as people think.
After 30 years of playing D&D, most as a DM, I think it's too many monsters, 90% I'll never use probably

ACKS has a system for giving treasure that seems pretty neat on the surface: count together all the experience given by the monsters guarding the treasure, multiply by four, then have the actual treasure be worth that much in gold.

Sounds about right to me, but are there any other methods that you prefer over this, and why's that?

>>52672489
Maybe so but I like Spider Dragons. And the Genie of Zakhara entries from Land of Fate are much better than than the genericized versions from the Monstrous Manual which lomion uses.

>>52672660
I totally dig it, I really do.
I end up making up most of the creatures that my group faces... It's hard to stump a pack of grognards with anything else

How do you create a dungeon or a lair (once) inhabited by a fighter, or a cleric, or a thief? It seems like just about every manor or tower or dungeon has a powerful wizard behind it.

And I get it, I really do - there's no easier way to justify all the monsters or magical bullshit than "The Wizard did it". But in no less than two campaigns I've run, player characters have fairly soon started to wonder about this, and gotten weary of being sent to a yet another fucking wizard lair to fight a yet another fucking necromancer.

Some variety is needed.

>>52672468
I missed a couple threads and therefore probably a bunch of monsters you made. Could you repost all but the first five?

I think frost fir's the last one I caught.

>>52672919
For a fighter I'd make a decent size Keep as a player would, make up why it got ruined and go from there. Have 2 factions, descendants of humanoids slaughtered by the hero come to desecrate the ruins and descendants of the hero come to reclaim them. Animated sparing partners, zombies in the moat, a griffin family that's moved into the top floor, ghost of the fighter's partner that killed themselves in despair, immortal butler who has gone senile and confuses players with their dead master. Maybe a hallway puzzle that you solve by lifting heavy shit. Art of themselves doing unbelievably heroic stuff.

Clerics would be a temple to their god that has fallen into disrepair. Why did the god forsake the cleric? What rival temple raided their library? Vampire or daemon or something nasty trapped in a circle downstairs wants out. Souls of followers of the faith who failed and weren't pious enough linger. A hermit monk trying to stay alive in the place despite the monsters.

Basically think like a player with too much cash and not enough common sense. Build what they'd build, then break it.

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>>52673268
I did five PF ones (Amanusya, Frost Fir, Uniila, Shabti, Cynosphinx) and two Mirrodin ones (Leonin and Nim) so the two that you're missing might not be your cup of tea.

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Does anyone have the 100 useless spells from a few threads back? I thought I had saved it, but it has mysteriously vanished. Perhaps that's one of the spell effects.

pdf unrelated, just a really cool dungeon.

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>>52673500

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>>52673529

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>>52673616
Thank you anon, these are a riot.

What's the best ability score array you've ever rolled on 3d6-in-order?

Someone mentioned earlier that they use visible traps and puzzles in their dungeon, how would I go about designing something like that?

>>52673616
They are not 'nearly useless' they are 'oddly specific' spells.

>>52673500
Oh, so I didn't miss much anything. Shame, really - would've liked to see more of your work.

>>52673700
13, 15, 12, 18, 13, 8. A perfectly fine wizard, but I instead made him a really clever fighter.

I also once rolled 9, 16, 16, 18, 13, 11 - but it was for an NPC and there were no witnesses, so I suspect it doesn't count.

>>52673772

"Invert socks" isn't nearly useless?

>>52673813
Do you use straight 3d6 or do you have a "drop the lowest" clause?

>>52673845
You can use it in a fantasy russia campaign to really fuck someone over if they have a cold

>>52669933
>Or is the best solution custom making a class?
I'd say so. Kits are basically just small customization changes that somebody already did for you and put in printable form, anyway. Better to get practice in at doing it on your own -- ask the player what kind of character he wants to play and how in very general terms he'd like it to differ, then (important!) design the mechanics yourself, don't let him choose, and tell him here are the rules.

>>52673868

It'll just flip their socks around the other way, they'll still be warm, but their toes might be pinched a little unless they're wearing reversible socks.

>>52673852
Most of the games I've got running right now roll 4d6, drop lowest, and arrange as desired, but that's mostly because they heavily involve players who're new to OSR or to RPGs in general, so I thought I'd go easy on them the first time around. If any of their characters die (none have so far), they'll get to try the old-school way for the rerolls.

One game uses 3d6-in-order, but allows some rearranging.

Both of the ones I posted here were however in the full old school way, with no rerolls or rearrangements or anything. Since I believe that was what was asked.

>>52673931

You left out an important step: post it here so we can look it over and call it "not OSR," figure out how to improve it, and/or steal it for our own campaigns! Likely all three!

>>52673959
But you can let them roll 3d6 in order? Scores hardly matter anyway. If you want to go 'easy' on them, just let them start with max hp or at 2nd level.
I might allow re-order, if players know what they want.

Oh and the best thing I ever did for my newbie players was ignoring class minimums and prime ability stuff.
I also keep classes 'unlockable' with each PC death. New players get F C T MU, then demihumans, then weirder shit. Takes a lot of time out of chargen, and THEY LOVE IT

>>52674092
>But you can let them roll 3d6 in order?

Oh, sure, if they want to. One guy did roll like that but unfortunately scheduling issues prevented him from joining after all.

>>52674092
>Oh and the best thing I ever did for my newbie players was ignoring class minimums and prime ability stuff.

I use both of those. All those special classes aren't -that- special in 2e, after all: paladins are just lawful good fighters with some special buffs, good enough that you can feel awesome if you manage to roll for one, but not so good that you'd grieve for not getting it.

>I also keep classes 'unlockable' with each PC death. New players get F C T MU, then demihumans, then weirder shit.

I do that, though. As I said, my players are pretty new to this, and didn't even know all the humanoids and other weird stuff are an option - and I of course didn't bother telling them. But if/when someone croaks, I'll let them know a few more secrets.

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>>52672468
>>52669309
>>52669288
>>52669030
>>52668821
>>52673813
Fresh off the grill.
And I haven't forgotten about huldra and pipefox either, but they'll be for another day.

>>52673956
>reversible socks
.... what?

>>52673868
>You can use it in a fantasy russia campaign to really fuck someone over if they have a cold

Wut

>>52673956
but all of the powdered mustard will fall out

>>52674092
>I also keep classes 'unlockable' with each PC death. New players get F C T MU, then demihumans, then weirder shit.

sounds great, actually. what are some of the weirder classes you use

>>52674974
1st edition assassins and monks, duelists and swashbucklers, all the fun Al-Qadim wizards (Sha'ir etc.), Council of Wyrms dragons, and other shit from setting books, obscure rulebooks, and Dragon magazines.

It's worth noting that my more experienced players have very rarely wanted to play any of these anyway.

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>>52674974
>sounds great, actually. what are some of the weirder classes you use

?

>>52674974
Alice, AD&D classes like druids and paladins, any monster-class. No monster has been picked so far - I miiiight replace them for the buffoon (see upthread).

>>52675028
pls stop

>>52675028

Man, I want to play one of these. "No torch for me, thanks, I'm an Exploding Death Man."
Feels like it should have lowered XP requirements, though.

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>>52675309
>pls stop

no u

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>>52672468
>Three Hearts and Three Lions
One of these days, I'll read it.

For now, spoonfeed me your reference.

>>52675028
I missed this the first time around, what's the deal with the inverted Vs. Magic saves? A side-effect resistance which dwindles as flammable humors build up in the body?

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>>52675837
Not that guy but you can do it anon. I'm getting my shit off 4chan for a bit to read too.

>>52672919
Barrows full of wights seem pretty "fighter": to me, in spite of all the undead.
You just need to justify "natural" magical phenomenon.

The run down thieves guild is full of deadly plants from the sprites and púca that used to frequent it for entertainment.
The goblins occupying the abandoned church have received an oracle from whatever Demon or Horror drove out the clergy.
Etc, etc.

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>>52675878
Pretty much. It's a class that starts off good and gets worse and worse as you level, until you eventually explode.

It was built as a counterpoint to the Leper in a Darkest Dungeon hack who gave everyone else a 5% chance per day to contract leprosy. The "Exploding Death Man" was a joke example character who was equally terrible for a group.

Then somebody made rules.

Now it gets posted to trigger other anons.

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Hey, all. Can anyone possibly point me to a PDF of Warriors of the Red Planet? Any adventures or supplements would be appreciated as well.

Please and thank you.

The OSR Trove has the cheatsheet for Campbell's "On the Non-Player Character," but not the PDF itself. Does anybody have it to supplement?

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>>52674974

>>52676560
>snails
>and bunnies?

Love that reference.

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>>52676560
Can I get a character image thing for any one of the following ideas?

-Wandering Ghost (possessing people)
-Flagellant
-Weaponized Depression Man
-Goatfucker

>>52676782
sure, gimme a minute

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>>52676799
Neat.

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>>52676782
>>52676838

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>>52677105
Excellent.

I suspect this is going to see a lot of play as a reaction image in these threads.

I do like regaining "spells" by crying yourself to sleep. Very nice.

>>52677105
>a singularly powerful ability had manifested. Depression

>>52677136
I'll be honest, I'm going to use it. I make a bunch of these weird classes as hirelings and dungeon denizens in my fuckshit, off-week pointcrawl campaign.

Most of them are never made into anything more than a margin-scribble in my notes, but I find it amusing to jam these things out and post them.

But yeah, it's a glorified reaction image that took me 15 minutes to whip up in mspaint, so it's not like I have high hopes.

>>52677105
Not >>52676782, but I'd like to request wandering ghost.
Not as a possession thing, just as a spook.
Ventriloquism, bed sheets, appearing behind people, recruiting someone's Fetch as a hireling... the works.
Maybe with some Shījiě xiān undertones, if you want to get fancy.

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>>52677175
You're doing god's work, anon.

But I do worry what your goatfucker interpretation looks like.

>>52677206
maybe gimme a minute.

>>52677226
thanks

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>>52677206
I'm not sorry.

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>>52677375
Even by your standards, that's pretty bad. It doesn't even have any medieval images.

But getting a ghost that Regenerates and access the spirit realm via Toothpaste is..

Ok, still terrible.

BUT OK.

Rolled 3, 2 = 5 (2d20)

>>52677375

>>52677414
By my standards it's perfectly fine. I def grabbed TWICE as many charts as I usually do and two pieces of clipart-esque things and included one extra reference. It's like the "Big Lots 50% More" version of my usual shit.

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>>52677432
You know those fat ladies you sometimes meet who think that being twice as loud as normal gives them "personality"?

Or those people that think that because it took them 3 hours to do something they automatically did a good job?

But anyway, tables. Those are definitely tables. And those are definitely clip arts.

>>52677464
I have no illusions about the terrible quality of my work. I already did a """real""" attempt at a character sheet tonight however, so any more requests that I honor will be beer-fueled jokes that make me laugh.

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>>52677488
Excellent.

>>52677488
>beer-fueled jokes that make me laugh.
Solipsist-Illusionists who work their magic by getting drunk and *believing* want they want to project.

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What sort of creatures live in mirrors?

In the mirror realms?

And how do you get there? Sure, the quickest way is to saturate a person-sized mirror in octarine light and hop through, but that's a bit like a blind teleport spell. You're going /somewhere/, but it could be the sun, solid rock, or somewhere even worse.

So how do you control it? How do you choose your mirror realm? And what do you find there?

>>52678023
>What sort of creatures live in mirrors?
Bits of souls from people who stood between two mirrors. They form primitive societies, but practice cannibalism in an attempt to form complete souls.
Alternate versions of yourself that diverged from you every time you broke a mirror. They acquired the good luck you lost.
Loads o' Demons. Mirrors are the easiest, peasiest, lemon-sqeasiest place to banish things to.
A tribe of Doppelgängers, they aren't actually natives. A wizard put them in a mirror while trying to be clever.
A tribe of Fetches, they are actually natives. They can't stand the Doppelgängers, and war's a brewin'.
Ronald Sinclair, attorney for hire. Nobody knows why he lives in the mirror, and he's not telling.
>In the mirror realms?
Mirror selves of other travelers. No one has ever met their own mirror self.
The trapped souls of everybody who ever died without seeing their own face.
Just out of view, past the edge of each frame, live the things that the things you're sure sneak up behind you are sure sneak up behind them.
Upside down beholders.
Mirrored projections of anyone undergoing sleep paralysis.
The multiversal Illuminati is ostensibly based in the mirror realms.
Dandelions. Shit grows everywhere.

>>52678023

The mirror realm is a dark realm. The only light comes in from reflected surfaces, but that includes very dull reflections like metal, which are in the same place as in the real world.

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>>52678395

Veins of the Earth is out

>>52678023

I read an OSR blog thing somewhere about evil wizards trapped inside mirrors, I should have saved it because it was creepy and awesome.

I'm torn between two forms of cosmology for my fantasy campaign. One is having to travel through the Ethereal Plane also known as the Space Between to get to any other plane, and the Astral Plane and beyond exists in a higher dimension that ours, so 3d is 2d there and 4d is 3d. Basically Rules Cyclopedia cosmology but without the Elemental Planes.

The other is the world is not a sphere or globe, but a many faced shape in which all other planes intersect at their sides. One could said to the edge of their world and perilously sail into another, or travel far beneath the ground and come out on another planar face. This way they're literally planes. The Astral Plane is now the Sea of Night, which the world floats in, and you can sail on it by boat if you reach the horizon at dusk.

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>>52678023
For the few millennia of Creation, water was the only source of reflections, so the mirror realms are often lit by lake-reflected light, shimmering and grey. Sometimes, fish blot out the light.

Several centuries ago, the Prismatic Wizards of the Opal Tower worked together to cast a powerful levitation spell on a mirror the size of a penny. The effort consumed the resources of a small kingdom, but the spell launched the mirror (and its protective casing and sacrificial familiars) upwards at a hitherto-unknown speed.

The blast shattered the Opal Tower, but the wizards rebuilt it. The peasants conflate the blast with the disaster that followed.

The mirror, slowly tumbling through the void between worlds, brought visions of unbearable things. And the light of the sun, the octarine light that is absorbed/used by Heaven, hit the mirror full-on.

You can't approach the Opal Tower, or six miles in any direction, without feeling the warmth of the sun.

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>>52678737
Personally, I like cosmologies where every single "plane" can be walked to or sailed to or pointed out on a non-lunatic map.

You could find a really high mountain and, with a kite, get up to heaven. You can accidentally tunnel into hell. Cosmology that's too grand is too obscure for a lot of players. Who gives a flying fuck about the "plane of salt and acid, on the third layer of the second hell" unless there's a reason to go there, something to loot, or some pressing urgency to the plot?

>>52678853
Doesn't this make the planes banal instead of fantastic?

>>52678737
You should run a strict Dante's Divine Comedy type multiverse.
The afterlife is very real, but the same physical place as earth.
You can walk to or from any part of the mortal and immortal worlds, if you are so inclined.

Read up on Eculid's Elements and Plato's Theory of Ideas if you *must* put your other worlds in other spaces.
And make sure that all "planar travel" is the result of elevated (or lowered) states of consciousness.

>>52678918
Reaching Olympus or the underworld was possible for Greek heroes by traveling to points on the map, so no, its a tried and true classic.

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>>52678918
Possibly. But it also makes it easier to drive stories with them.

Descend into the afterlife? You don't need a fancy spell or an ancient gateway or a god. You need to find one of the many staircases carved by death-addled cultists or world-hating dwarves. You'll need a boat too. And you'll need to fight your way down and back up again.

Want to summon a fire elemental? They are all around you. https://coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2017/03/osr-nature-and-lives-of-elementals.html

>>52678975
>>52678960

So, other planes can be traveled to by perilous but ultimately mundane means?

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>>52678738
Rough night, Skerples?

>>52678960
What of the planes not connected to a semblance of the afterfile? Like a Plane of Shadows?

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>>52679004
How do you always know it's me, damn it?

>>52679001
Or by safe but ultimately fantastic means.
Orpheus reached the underworld by asking the ground to part for him, then impressing it by playing his lyre super well.

>>52679018
Sure. And the realms of the fairies, and the halls of the giants, and the underwater caves that spiral inward forever...

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>>52679104
That does seem like a very plausible thing to ask from the ground.

Of course, you have to be /hella/ good at the lute.

Stones don't like bagpipes or the drums. They've got bad memories of drums.

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>>52678244
All of these are excellent.

But this does raise the question; if Upside-Down Beholders can be found in mirror realms where the hell do Regular Beholders come from?

I'd assumed all Beholders were the reflections wizards who had gone blind.

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>>52679224
>Beyond that, you regularly ask a shit ton of questions in a vain attempt to drum up discussions.

I'm going to interpret that as a compliment.

I do line breaks this way from, if you'll believe it, the old days of IRC. I don't even have a Reddit.

And you were dead on for all 3 posts, you bastard.

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>>52679136
You've got a distinctive musing tone,
Beyond that, you regularly ask a shit ton of questions in a vain attempt to drum up discussions.
Also of note: You always come on right at the time of night when I'm starting to get tired.

You also

do your line breaks

like a redditor.

But the dead giveaways were:
>octarine
>Creation
>Prismatic Wizards of the Opal Tower

>>52679040
>always know
If it makes you feel any better, I'm still not certain about 2 of >>52612669

>>52679231
>where the hell do Regular Beholders come from?
Something, something, the depths if the dungeon (and their contents) are an anology for spooky shit?
I only added "upside down" as a "beholders don't understand mirrors" sort of joke.

>>52679256
>I'm going to interpret that as a compliment
My efforts to keep the thread alive are generally even less effective.

>the old days of IRC.
>old
Preeeeeeety sure~ internet relay chat is still thriving.

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>>52679257
Beholders don't understand mirrors because they don't appear in mirrors. If you see a Beholder staring at its reflection, that's actually 2 beholders separated by a pane of glass. Luckily, this is rare.

As the reflections of blind wizards, Beholders are, necessarily, insane.

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>>52679282
>Preeeeeeety sure~ internet relay chat is still thriving.

It's doing OK, but the glory days of 1998 will never return. That's fine though. The internet is much more useful these days.

>My efforts to keep the thread alive are generally even less effective.

Meh, it's not like this place is anything but a discussion forum, active or not. Your stuff's pretty good.

>>52678023
"In those days, the world of mirrors and the world of men were not, as they are now, separate and unconnected. They were, moreover, quite different from one another; neither the creatures nor the colors nor the shapes of the two worlds were the same. The two kingdoms -- the specular and the human -- lived in peace, and one could pass back and forth through mirrors. One night, however, the people of the mirror invaded this world. Their strength was great, but after many bloody battles, the magic of the Yellow Emperor prevailed. The Emperor pushed back the invaders, imprisoned them within the mirrors, and punished them by making them repeat, as though in a kind of dream, all the actions of their human victors. He stripped them of their strength and their own shape and reduced them to mere servile reflections. One day, however, they will throw off that magical lethargy."

"The first to awaken shall be the Fish. In the depths of the mirror, we shall perceive a faint, faint line, and the color of that line will not resemble any other. Then, other forms will begin to awaken. Gradually they will become different from us; gradually they will no longer imitate us; they will break through the barriers of glass or metal, and this time they will not be conquered. Water-creatures will battle alongside mirror-creatures."

"In Yunnan province, people speak not of the Fish but rather the Tiger of the Mirror. Others believe that before the invasion, we will hear, from the depths of the mirrors, the sound of arms."

-Jorge Luis Borges, The Book of Imaginary Beings

Using the standards for gold from the D&D basic, and ignoring any notion of "level appropriate", how much gold would a nation reward a hero who single handedly prevented the destruction of their capital city?

I always have trouble calculating how much cash should the NPCs give the players so they do a job for them in OSR systems.

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>>52679422
An appropriate amount to let him build a small castle somewhere far away, where he can be a hero and do nice heroic things that don't inconvenience people with /real/ money and power. Somewhere where he'll be too busy to start a revolution, demand a proper title, raise a militia, reorganize the financial system, or meddle with a guild.

Give him something more important than cash. Give him land.

>>52679463
>An appropriate amount to let him build a small castle somewhere far away, where he can be a hero and do nice heroic things that don't inconvenience people with /real/ money and power. Somewhere where he'll be too busy to start a revolution, demand a proper title, raise a militia, reorganize the financial system, or meddle with a guild.

Land is a good idea, but assuming the hero is a friend and loyal retainer of the current ruler and thus not actually considered an inconvenience, what else do you guys think is appropriate?
I mean I don't know if my player wants to have a castle yet

>>52679502
A brass coin inlaid with adamant.
Show it to any bar in the kingdom, and your drinks go on the king's tab.

>>52679521
Oh man that's actually a great idea
thanks anon

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>>52679502
>a friend and loyal retainer of the current ruler and thus not actually considered an inconvenience

Have you ever heard of Charles of Navarre?

The ruler has other friends and retainers. They might be jealous. They might plant an idea that /seems/ like it's a great favour, but really helps them.

And all players need castles. Terrible, half-ruined castles made of rotten logs and crooked stones, on top of a hill, surrounded by trackless wilderness, a few surly peasants, and 2d100 monsters of an average HD of 1d0, per square mile.

Plus, you know, the castle in the next hex over.

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>>52679521
King, like all kings, is perpetually in arrears.

Bartenders gang up to steal the coin.

So do the drunks guild, the thieves guild, and all the local students from the six wizarding colleges.

At the same time.

>>52679570
Well of course, Skerples.
Trinkets that don't spark adventure are simply vendor trash.

>>52675028
>Look, mom! I posted it again!

>>52679570
>>52679555
>>52679591
Well luckily for my players character he's not in a grimdark world nor are we playing LotFP or DCC so I'll just let him enjoy his well-earned reward instead of shitting on him for no reason

I was looking for a reward, not a quest hook. I have more quest hooks than I know what to do with.

>>52679502
could have him be offered marriage to the King's(or whatever his title is) cousin or niece, with said girl's father still healthy enough of body and mind to be able to continue to administer the land said marriage grants your player, so he remains reasonably free to adventure, although at the same time his new father-in-law will make it clear that he'll be expected to learn how run these lands himself in the relatively near future as well as be able to present himself in a manner worthy of his future title of high nobility

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>>52679609
Ah, but see, you can make land and a castle as excellent or as terrible as you'd like.

A few hilarious peasants, a lovely place to invest cash, and some local weddings to preside over are a decent reward.

Conversely, goblins around every stump and a castle that's a hill are excellent plot hooks.

"Just cash" isn't interesting, really. It's... just cash.

Give him 10 times the value of a cottage, plus a white horse and a fancy hat and induct him into the Order of the Trouser Leg or something.

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>>52679608
>Son, I'm proud of you. Those people on that kurdish herb-sharing board are properly mad now.

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>>52679652
>I have more quest hooks than I know what to do with.

>>52679667
It means I have too many ideas for quests, and not enough time in a single session to to play trough all of them

my players bite all the hooks
all of them

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>>52679667
>I have more quest hooks than I know what to do with.

Well, it's time to start condensing then.

Plot hooks start to link up. The goblins are bringing sacrifices to the Cult of the Red Right Hand. So are the drunks guild. It turns out the king's advisor is the polymorphed grandson of the dragon. That one random event six sessions ago? Turns out it's all connected.

Makes you look cunning as a GM, provided you don't go overboard.

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>>52663878
Orcs of Thar supplement

>>52679699
I did something like that
group of dudes kidnapped an archeologist
turned out to be cultist working for the same cult that had murdered an important figure, and the group of witches that was attacking people in a nearby village were also part of the cult
and the warmongering generals that were wanting to start a war (this time they were the ones that hired the pcs instead of being the target) were also cultists

Eventually the players discovered a massive conspiracy in the capital city that was trying to start a massive war to please the god of slaughter, and summon an avatar of that god.

>>52666587
But BECMI does.

>>52669689
Call this variant sub-race "Wood Elves."

Does anyone have the template page for LoftP classes?

>>52669558
Elves are significantly over-powerful as it is; they could use a nerfing.

>the exclusive druidical spells are so few and so poor
You can quibble over quality, but AD&D druids have 12 spells per level until 4th, and 10 spells per level thereafter. You could drop a third of the spells from each level and still have as many or more than clerics (depending on the level in question).

yo what if you made a campaign where it's not obvious at first but the players slowly realize that everybody in the world are cultists except for them

>>52679937
Are we talking one cult, or lots of different cults?
Former would be good, latter might take more work.

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>>52679937
See: Paranoia

But running a game of Not-Catholic Heretics could be excellent. Everyone has doctrinal choices to make.

>>52679937
Could be alright. Main question is: how the hell did that happen?

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>>52680073
Human nature.

One man is a schismatic. Two men are a heretical cell. Three men are a heretical cell... with a traitor in their midst.

>>52679708
shame that most of the Racial Classes in Orcs of Thar are objectively worse than most of the core BX/BECMI/RC classes

>>52679937
so Bloodborne then?

A character in my party got killed by breathing in yellow mold spores, but they carried him out of there and managed to bargain with a powerful cleric and his rather amoral wizard friend to get their friend raised. They need to go do a harrowing and morally-ambiguous quest to pay off their part of the bargain.

Unfortunately, they forgot to get rid of the mold spores inside their dead companion. In fact the spores didn't even come to discussion between him dying of them and him being raised. It was kind of a serious fuck-up.

What happens now? All things considered I don't just want to kill him off all over again - I could just be nice and make it so the cleric noticed them and cast Cure Disease on him first - but it seems like a set-up for something funny.

Thoughts on the new LotFP book? Veins of the Earth

>>52680649
It's full of new monsters, tables for generating caves, and nice art. I might write more about it after I've slept and read through the whole thing.

>>52680755
Any chance of sharing the pdf one day?

>>52680799
Maybe, but not while the body is still warm. Someone will probably share it before me though.

>>52680543
Here's my thought, though it's pretty disruptive to any other plans you might have

>Raised guy has reached symbiosis with yellow mold and now has a breath weapon
>Cleric is dead from spores, wizard is annoyed
>Party might die too if they don't figure out a way to stop McMolderson from constantly breathing deathspores

>>52680543
The character is now a moldman, a subform of the myconid. Coughing up spores can stun targets. He can live up to 1000 years. He fears yeast bread.

Any reason I should choose to run a retroclone instead of just straight B/X?

>>52681209
Theoretically speaking, retroclones address issues present in B/X and get rid of them, while improving in other matters, applying nearly forty years of gaming experience to make the base system the best possible.

In practice, no one can agree with what should be changed and how, and they all end up being kind of different from one another.

I personally favor ACKS.

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>>52681209
>Any reason I should choose to run a retroclone instead of just straight B/X?
There are reasons, sure. But there are reasons to stick with B/X too. It all comes down to what you value. Maybe you want ascending AC, split race and class, some variation on thief skills, all d6 hit dice, reworked saving throws, etc. Frankly, there are a number of things like this that I think could stand a different take. But then despite being divided between two books, I think B/X is relatively well laid-out and easy to find your way around. And it's the most common of common ground when it comes to OSR, and the basis for so many retroclones. It's also pretty easy to selectively import a few changes from elsewhere, running B/X, only with ascending AC and single-category saving throws, for instance. And many of the retroclones out there do something I really hate, like listing all the spells in alphabetical order, rather than dividing them up by level.

>>52681331
I've read an argument that starting clerics off with 0 spells at 1st level encourages them to learn other class roles like turning undead, supporting the fighter, throwing holy water, etc.

Cleric spells at 1st level do seem unnecessary to me, and if I do run LL I might just ask my cleric players treat themselves as 1 level lower for spells.

Hopefully they won't be too broken up about it.

>>52681331
Do you have a similar comparison with B/X and ACKS?

Anyone picked up the pdf for the new LOTFP release, veins of the earth?
It seems awfully expensive.

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>>52681368
Nope. The only other one I've got is this one for Basic Fantasy vs. Labyrinth Lord. I don't really know ACKS very well, and BFRPG, LL and B/X are very easy to compare because they're so similar.

>>52681384
how are thieves in b/x compared to LL and BFRPG? are they just fucky all around?

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>Lankhmar Kickstarter for DCC is already up and running
>$150 down to get all the new Lankhmar stuff + the Lankhmar stuff I didn't already have

>>52681441
LL thief skills are pretty much the same as B/X's aside from some minor tweaking for (I would assume) copyright reasons. I think thief skills in LL may start off about 2% higher on average, but at mid to high levels, they're probably 1% lower on average. But regardless, I'm not sure that an individual skill is ever as many as 5 percentiles off, so they're functionally the same in both systems.

As far as BF goes, 3 of the skills (open locks, remove traps and pick pockets) start off 10 points higher, one (move silently) is 5 points higher, one is the same (hide), one is 3 points lower (30% listen/hear noise instead of 2-in-6), and one (climb walls) is 7 points lower (80% rather than 87%). That's about 4 points higher on average, I by 2nd level, BF are already a point ahead in climb walls (instead of 3 behind), and they're overall more functional in any case because the low-end skills are boosted (except for hide), while it's climb walls, which is far higher than all the other skills, that takes the hit.

>>52681633
But once you hit 7th level, B/X thieves are starting to pull ahead of BF thieves, and at 14th level, B/X skills are literally 20% higher on average than the BF skills (with most of the B/X skills at 99%, while the BF skills are more like 80%).

>>52681573
Do the books have anything of worth if you don't care for the setting?

>>52681894
Alternate DCC rules for a more pulpy/Fafhrd & the Grey Mouser-like game and a ton of adventure modules.
Aside from that there's a City book and a DM guide for the setting.

Specifically (all this is from the KS page):
The Compendium of Secret Knowledge: Rules Options for DCC Lankhmar
The Judge’s Guide to Nehwon
Lankhmar: City of the Black Toga
No Small Crimes in Lankhmar (level 1 adventure)
+ achieved stretch goals:
A new Lankhmar adventure module.
Larger poster map.
A second Lankhmar adventure module.
A third Lankhmar adventure module.

Currently it's at around 106k and the remaining stretch goals are:
$110,000: A fourth Lankhmar adventure module
$120,000: A fifth Lankhmar adventure module.
$130,000: A sixth Lankhmar adventure module.
$140,000: We will add a supplement called "A Dozen Lankhmar Locations," which will provide information, maps, and floorplans on setting adventures in a dozen famous Lankhmar locales (including the Silver Eel!).
$150,000: A Lankhmar-themed three-panel Judges Screen.
$170,000: We will add a supplement called "Random NPCs in Lankhmar," which will provide tables and information for generating random NPCs that your PCs can encounter in Lankhmar.
$200,000: A cloth map in the boxed set.

There's also options to add extra stuff from Goodman's catalogue (including some earlier published Lankhmar modules)

Man, I'm reading some of the old Adventure Modules and some of the stuff in them is kind of bullshit.

Specifically I'm reading Keep on the Borderlands right now. I actually love the idea of the Priest, but like, the Medusa? How in the fuck are you supposed to deal with that at levels 1-3? Like, you open the door and wham, you're fucked. Even when you bargain with her and free her, she still turns on the party and potentially petrifies the lot of them. What do you even do with that?

>>52682346
This is why you had parties of ten PCs, minimum, back in the day. Give every player two or three characters to run with if you can't otherwise meet that quota.

Then it won't be so big a deal when a guy or two gets stoned.

>>52682371
I'm new to the whole OSR thing, do forgive me if anything I say sounds stupid, but I'm eager to learn.

If the party were to say, get hirelings before they went to the Caves of Chaos, and one of the characters were to get killed, would it be reasonable to give that player control of one of the hirelings, assuming any remain? Would it be better to just, say, have them find an imprisoned adventurer, let them roll up a new character, and go on with the game, or would it be reasonable to have the player sit out until they return to the Keep, at which point they can meet their new character at the Tavern and go on more adventures with the rest of the party?

As a DM, I'd be fine with any of those options, but would introducing a new character in the middle of a crawl alleviate too much of the danger of a TPK?

For context, my players and I are switching over from later editions (which we've played for years) to B/X, and some of the players are new to D&D entirely (they saw D&D in Stranger Things and thought it looked fun as fuck and are eager to try). We're all good friends and I've warned them that player death and TPKs are much more common in this edition - they're all a bunch of reasonable guys and girls, so they won't bitch about any of the above options. I'm just wondering how you guys handle player deaths in the middle of dungeon crawls.

>>52682460
>If the party were to say, get hirelings before they went to the Caves of Chaos, and one of the characters were to get killed, would it be reasonable to give that player control of one of the hirelings, assuming any remain?

Yes.

>Would it be better to just, say, have them find an imprisoned adventurer, let them roll up a new character, and go on with the game, or would it be reasonable to have the player sit out until they return to the Keep, at which point they can meet their new character at the Tavern and go on more adventures with the rest of the party?

Depends on the case. If it looks like there could be a guy imprisoned somewhere nearby, they could take over. If they've got hirelings or henchmen, they can take over those guys instead. Occasionally they're high enough level to raise him almost on the spot. It's fairly rare in my games that they'd need to sit out an entire session or more before they get to reroll.

>As a DM, I'd be fine with any of those options, but would introducing a new character in the middle of a crawl alleviate too much of the danger of a TPK?

I don't think TPK should ever really be a threat. There are a lot of other things already threatening the party, and their own precious characters dying is bad enough without dangling the possibility of everyone being killed over them.

Like, sometimes it happens anyway, but it shouldn't really be an important factor to tension.

>>52682460
>would it be reasonable to give that player control of one of the hirelings, assuming any remain?
100% reasonable
We used to do that. You just roll the stats up on the spot and the rather vaguely defined hireling gets more personality.

>>52681378
The physical copy is 70$. Stuart and Raggi have been joking that LotFP will go tits up if Veins doesn't sell well.

>>52682346
>>52682371
I remember reading a play summary (they were using ACKS, not that it matters) of this exact moment, she stoned a couple of hirelings but, somehow they managed to actually befriend the medusa and were down to a roll to see if she joined them or not. She didn't and went her own way at the end, would have been interesting if it went the other way.

This is the kinda thing that makes me enjoy the OSR.

>>52683387
So what happened to the hirelings?

>>52682346
The medusa isn't immediately hostile. Its captured, you can negotiate with it. Normally reaction rolls, roleplaying encounters with humanoids and not trying to murder everything they see is important. Keep On The Borderlands can end up having a more try to kill everything, scripted hostile encounters are the norm sort of adventure. Doesn't have to though.

>>52683039
I'd love to grab one, if it wouldn't end up costing nearly 200 bucks here with taxes, import costs and additional online banking fees.
PDF it is.

What does surprise really means? Reading S&W I got the impression that it means simply 'surprise! lose a round'. Something you would roll when combat starts. A sucky mechanic. (and I remember reading something like 'and you drop your weapon on a x/6 chance! very cartoony)
But reading B/X I think it's more about being aware of the other group before the encounter happens. Something you would roll when the turn starts, to present the PCs the other group from afar, giving them more options. Amazing mechanic.

>>52684747
I always find surprise rules hard to use. PCs rarely bumble into a room without very carefully checking it out from the doorway first, so monsters have to actively hide for it to be a surprise.

>>52685135
Pretty sure that's how it's meant to do. If both sides are just there minding their own business, then they'll know the other party is coming well in advance and can prepare. Only if one side is being especially quiet and careful might they gain the effect of the surprise.

>>52681573
>>52681957
Lankhmar is a WotC property. Are you sure this is even legal?

>>52684747
I generally treat it as the former,
>you are unable to properly defend yourself when caught off guard
>a surprise round is typically 10-30 seconds, but stings as bad as a ~60 second round
>you still do *something,* but all it does is bring you down to 1 round's worth of damage (instead of worse)

The latter is all fine and dandy, but can handled through arbitration. No need for rules.

>>52684413
Yeah, I am waiting for Noble Knight to get a stock, and will order through them. The shipping and tax are insane - that is the main reason why I don't own as many Lamentations products as I would like.

>>52685135
Oh my players are newbies so they make lots of 'suboptimal' things (they compensate by being smart af sporadically).
I've started to roll surprise along with encounters - if there's an encounter this turn and enemies will be surprised, I can foreshadow a bit, give cues like footprints, noise and stuff. I don't roll surprise for the party unless they are unaware of the enemy.
Not sure if this is the best approach, tho.

>>52685236
That's the most obvious reading, but it's also quite boring. I like giving tactical choice, not taking away agency -- it feels like a videogamey intro: "the goblins rush in and attack! ...no, you can't skip this cutscene... take this and that damage"

>>52685300
>I like giving tactical choice, not taking away agency

There's always times when you can't do anything, for whatever reason, even in the real world. I find it perfectly reasonable to be so stunned by an ambush that you miss a round.

An actual cutscene would be directing the story where the DM, or the game developer, wants it to go. Instead of some goblins just jumping in and rolling a few attacks, a true cutscene in this scenario would be the goblins throwing some nets on the players and clubbing them unconscious, succeeding in doing so without any rolls at all.

>>52685222
Pretty sure Lieber owns Lankhmar.

The D&D Lankhmar supplements were licensed as well.

Does anyone here have experience running Yoon-Suin?

If so, do you have any advice on how to run it? Other supplements I should check out that helped you with it? Even short tables possibly.

Plus if there are any modules that you recommend dropping in?

Thanks!

>>52687184
I am reading through Yoon-Suin myself, and preparing to run it. My approach, and advice, is to focus on one area. There's plenty of adventures and hooks in any given area to keep a group of players preoccupied for a while.

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>>52687443
>>52687443

>>52654664
>the single largest complaint about 5e is that content isn't coming out fast enough for people with nothing else to do
Complainers, plz