The Pitch: Crater Diving

The old folks say that when they were children the Empire straddled the continent entire, and that the Emperor sat upon a diamond throne in a shining city. Well, all that is gone since the five kings of the ancient kingdoms made war against the throne. The war raged for seven years. In the winter of that seventh year the Emperor was on the verge of defeat. Some say he summoned a great demon from Outside. Others say he slew his own priests and stole a weapon forged in darkness. Children and fools believe he became a ravening dragon. Whatever the truth is, the armies of the kings vanished at the gates of the Imperial City - along with the city itself. Instead a gaping wound was left in the earth and the land for miles around was left a wasteland.

The five kings allied in the war all suspected treachery in each other and, the armies destroyed and kingdoms impoverished by the expensive war, settled into an uneasy, inward looking peace while they rebuilt.

Curious types soon began exploring the crater where the Imperial City once stood and found it was riddled with mysterious tunnels and caves - as if the earth below the city had been rotten. When a group of delvers brought up a chest full of gold and jewels word exploded across the continent and treasure hunters, mercenaries, and cutthroats of all sort made pilgrimage to the crater to seek their fortune. Many of those who went down never came back up, but nonetheless many still make their way to this unhappy place. So many that a thriving boomtown was settled on the rim of the crater, catering to the wants and needs of the delvers.

Now people from across the continent make their way to the crater for information, magic, and hired-blades for there is no better place to find any of those precious resources.

The five kingdoms have rebuilt their peasantry and armories and eye each other hungrily across their borders.

And quietly, sages at the crater warn those who listen that the wound in the earth is growing.

You, a treasure hunter through and through, have journeyed from your homeland seeking your fortune at the crater.

on the modern game player

Holy crap, it's been over 7 months since I posted anything. I haven't been posting because I've been busy with work, life, and gaming! So I am content with that.

I've been running a lot of games in that 7 months including a nice sustained Swords & Wizardry game that lasted a pretty good while. Since then though the group has fallen apart and attempts to begin new games have been failures.

Last night I sat down with two key players and hashed around about why things weren't working and what we wanted to do about it.

Key points from the discussion: I find Pathfinder and most rulesy games obnoxious (for reasons I have posted about ad nauseum); Player A doesn't like OSR games because he finds character death upsetting and discouraging; Player B wants to play fantasy and doesn't want to get bogged down in rules adjudication.

We decided that I would run a series of one-shots with them and a few new prospect players to A) try get a group  and time established; B) try out some systems and settings and see what people like.

Then this morning I finally understood the modern game player in my group (Player A above) and I sent A & B this email:

After a good night's sleep I think I have an insight coming out of last night's discussion.

RPGs can be divided broadly into two categories: story games and traditional games. Story games have mechanics that can effect the narrative, in traditional games the narrative is totally the purview of the GM.

Within traditional there are modern and OSR (old-school) games. Modern games tend to be rulesy and tend not to include character death as a large part of play. Whereas OSR games tend to be rules-light and embrace character death. Until last night I was focused on the rulesyness as the main dividing line not thinking about the implications of the latter division.

The big difference I think is that in a modern game we are telling The Characters' Story, in an OSR game we are telling The Story - in which the characters are participants. That is why for me (and others who enjoy OSR games) character death is (while sometimes disappointing or frustrating) fundamentally not a big deal, because the larger story in which we are participating continues, and we get to continue participating through a new character. This can even be exciting.

Neither of these approaches is badwrongfun, but I think our discussion finally gave me insight in to the modern game player's preference.  Having permadeath on the table adds to tension, excitement, and ultimately the satisfaction in victory for the OSR player - because the OSR player is focused on the overarching game experience. For the modern player it is merely loss, because the focus is on the character in its individuality.

So for RP oriented players the rules heaviness may not be the important distinction at all.

I may run something other than Other Dust for the 1st one-shot game. It is most definitely an OSR game. So while it has awesome systems and lots of opportunity for sandboxing and RP there are mutants in the waste that want to (and can) eat your face.

-JD

Ancient Alien Power Source

Where do dungeons come from?

If you are swayed at all by Gygaxian Naturalism this is a serious question. While I enjoy games that have weird stuff in them I find that if things don't make some sort of sense, if there is not some reasonable verisimilitude, I find it hard to suspend my disbelief and invest my imaginative powers in the game.

So where do dungeons come from? Ruins, crypts, and caves seem to account for many of them. Well, why are they full of monsters? What percentage of such things end up being full of monsters? How do they supply themselves and where does their material culture come from? These sorts of questions lead to a Gygaxian Madness of maps full of lots of latrines, bedrooms, and kitchen. How many goblins to a latrine? How much grain do the giant rats need access to? The dungeon master can easily spend enormous amounts of time worrying over this sort of minutia that ends up being quickly forgotten flavor description. Basically not a good use of time worrying over, but if you are a logical sort of person who thinks about these things you will probably spend a lot of time thinking about why exactly some dead become undead, and why certain places are infested with this or that and others aren't. Some of these things are important back-story considerations and others (e.g. how many weeks of rations can you reasonably retrieve from the goblin storage-warehouse, and where did all of these barrels come from?) are just distractions.

How come all of these monsters have managed to exist, survive, and even thrive alongside humans? Humans may have become agrarian because they wiped out all of the mega-fauna they hunted in the paleolithic, so how come we have a world full of crazy beasties alongside professional monster-slaughterers? It is either a crazy game of evolutionary arms-race, or they must be coming from somewhere.

Ancient Alien Power Sources:

In the before time, otherworldly beings visited, lived, fought wars, and died on the planet. The ruins of their technology can be found here and there, particularly if you delve underground where the ruins are protected from the elements. In these places one can find crashed starships, factories, and even cities built out of strange materials and exhibiting wondrous qualities. Most dangerously though one can also find the long-decayed power sources of their civilization.

These power sources, large and small, have lasted across the eons but have decayed and become uncontrolled. Their strange emanations twist the matter and energy of the universe itself. In their vicinity strange creatures roam and the earth itself can become deformed. Sometimes alien sites no longer hold any trace of their true nature other than the power of source. These places hold wondrous unearthly riches and terrible dangers. The power sources themselves, (which have through the ages mutated and changed into many forms) are a miracle and a disaster, bringing both power and corruption to those sorcerers and heroes who attempt to harness their powers.

Updated 0th level character sheet

I have updated the 0th level sheet, the new sheet can be found here.

My next DCC projects:

• Make a 1st/2nd level sheet. I am thinking it should probably be two characters per sheet.
• Make some sort of marching order tracker, maybe something as simple as little character nametags that can be pushed around as characters die change march order.
• Spells record sheet. Instead of printing out gobs of text about each spell I think a simplified cheat sheet for players to fill out would work well. One stop shop for all of the relevant information (mercurial magic, manifestation, brief summary of spell effects, etc.).

Religion on the Isle

Three religious groups account for most of the believers on the Isle: the Church of the One True God, The Holy Order of the Eternal Void, and the Righteous Path.

The Church of the One True God

Before the base world there was pure law, truth is law and all else is illusion and corruption.

The state religion of the Isle and by far the most popular. The Church is responsible for many good works around the Isle including insuring (comparative) safety on the roads and shipping lanes, charity to the poor, and the championing of righteous causes. The Church rejects the notion of other deities, denouncing other powers as devils and tricksters and stamping out other religious sects when able. Encountering the healers and holy warriors of the Church is a boon or bane depending on ones outlook as they are equally quick to help allies and destroy enemies.

The Holy Order of the Eternal Void

Before law and chaos was the void, pure, holy, and unattainable. Seeking the bliss of the void is the only true path.

In secret enclaves and remote temples one can find the Holy Order. Despite cultural, theological, and material encroachment from the Church, this ancient mystical order remains. They quietly and patiently seek out converts among the mystically oriented. The Order claims that they are a peaceful, intellectual sect, but the Church claims that they are in league with evil forces from beyond space and time.

The Righteous Path

Before the coming of the great powers there was only freedom. Freedom is power, slavery is death.

The Righteous Path has no organization or assembly but is rather a loose association of like-minded mystics. They believe that the purpose of the powers of law is to enslave and that the void is a mere shadow of law. Freedom is the true path of humanity. Some say though that the worshipers of the Righteous Path seek only their own freedom regardless of cost, consorting freely with terrible enemies from Outside. The Church hunts the Righteous Path with obsessive fervor.

The Horror at Ilio

As I add things to flesh out the Isle of the Unknown I will post a summary here along with the hex it is in. Generally I will post the descriptions, plot hooks, etc. but leave off the game statistics (unless there is a desire for game statistics?).



Hex 0506

On the southern shore of the bay sits the town of Ilio. The town relies heavily on fishing (along with vineyards and some farming).

Over the past few weeks a strange red ooze has been filling the bay corroding the hulls of ships. Some fisherman have disappeared. The ooze can be traced to a small cave along the shore. The cave can only be entered at low tide.

Behind the ooze lies Yapesh, a wizard who, having been taunted by his peers as a scrawny boy in Ilio now seeks revenge against his persecutors. He has sworn allegiance to a terrible brine demon in exchange for his wizardly and alchemical powers. The brine demon takes the form of a giant bipedal shrimp with a blue crystalline rhombus instead of a head. The demon attacks with a powerful psychic attack that enslaves those it does not kill outright.

Yapesh's cave is full of alchemical and magical traps of his own devising, along with the carnivorous shrimp-spawn of the brine demon, psychically enslaved fisherman, a dangerous brine elemental that takes the form of an enormous, iridescent snake, and treacherous portals to a watery extra-planar domain. Beware high tide.

DCC RPG 0th Level Character Sheet

Update: I have made some minor changes to the character sheet based on player feedback. Here is the new 0th level record sheet.

So, my few readers, the blog has obviously been not doing much since I started my new job this fall. Projects begun and largely abandoned. I am okay with this I think. I've run a fairly good Swords & Wizardry campaign, which I am now throwing overboard to begin a long awaited Dungeon Crawl Classics game. I am going to be running the game on the Isle of the Unknown to get me past the world creation point I always get completely stuck at: the basic map.

My resolutions:

1. Actually work on fleshing out my game world. I have always enjoyed this but have gotten flummoxed since my return to gaming with the whole map thing. Having removed the map from the equation I should have no more excuses.
2. Work on creating things that I wish I had access to. For example a 0th level character sheet for Dungeon Crawl Classics.
3. Post the crap I create for my game.
4. Post no more random ramblings.

I have wanted a good character sheet for funnel play in DCC. Full character sheets are a waste at this phase and you can go through a lot of index cards.

So I made one: 0th Level Record Sheet. Link updated 2/18/2013.

Feedback is welcome, this was my first time using Scribus (or any layout software for that matter).