Hex Stocking

P. Armstrong over at Ode to Black Dougal recently did a post about hex crawling and stocking (which seems to have been the popular topic), and of course, in a better late than never fashion, I have my fill to say of the hex stocking. There is a lot of good advice on the handling of hex crawling, but Mr. Armstrong's method of stocking is what I find to be the most brilliant gem of the bunch. However, I must say, I would change it just a bit to tweak for myself. And here I present how I would (and will) resolve the matter of hex stocking:

1. Take a hex sheet. Place a settlement in the middle of the map. This is the base of operations.

2. Map out terrain for perhaps no more than one week away from the settlement. You will need to decide a scale for the map, and a lot of people prefer either 5 or 6 miles per hex. I'd say 5 sounds good, and here it my suggestion: pick a scale, but the rules for travelling speed so that a party of relatively unencumbered characters moves 3 hexes per day. With this, the day is evenly split (morning, afternoon, and evening).

3. Roll a 1d6 for each hex mapped. Now, here is another important part where you have to think about how dense you want your map to be with encounters. I'd personally err on the side of a result of 1 to 2 (roughly 33%), although I could see one going as high as 50% (1 to 3). Whatever your chance is, on that result, that hex has an encounter.

4. For each hex that contain grasslands, farmlands, roads, plains, and other hexes that are conducive inhabitation by humans and is indicated as containing an encounter, roll 1d6 and consult the table below:

1 - 2: Human settlement

3: Ruins or monster lair (50% chance of either)

4: Guarded treasure

5: Unguarded treasure

6: Special (some sort of weird landmark or encounter, a la Wilderlands)

5. For all other hexes that contain an encounter, roll a 1d6 and consult the table below:

1: Ruins

2-3: Monster lair

4: Treasure (75% guarded, 25% unguarded)

5: Trap (as per Ode to Black Dougal, some sort of tricky terrain)

6: Special (as above)

I will have to try it out to see if the results are satisfactory, but at first blush, they seem okay. Only use and time will tell. If you have any suggestions, criticisms, or comments, let me know.

Review: Death Frost Doom

I'll admit that I didn't pick up Death Frost Doom when it first came out; in fact, I picked it up as the other half of an order for the Grinding Gear, based on the word of Jeff Rients. After reading Death Frost Doom, I will keep a closer eye in future LotFP releases, because not only does James Raggi the IV talk a mean game, but he also writes a mean module.

Death Frost Doom is a 28 page booklet. The interior module is unattached from the cover, which has a map of the crypt on the inside. I'll say this: better writers have described the module itself better than me, and I am not interested in giving away any spoilers, so let me praise the parts I really like about this module.

Let me start by saying that Death Frost Doom is a bit more verbose than I would like for a module; however, James Raggi does not mince words. Every piece of text is important information. And every piece of text is relevant to creating a sort of ambiance that I daresay is more successful than products who are so-called "horror" games and modules. But Death Frost Doom isn't about horror, it's a weird tale, and it's all the little parts that come together to make this module a memorable one.

As I read through the module, I can feel the tension that this module seeks to evoke. As you explore this adventure, the players should become tense and paranoid, and if they make the wrong mistake at the right time, they will soon be overwhelmed. It is a cruel end, but a fair one, as stated in the introduction.

What makes me happiest about the prospect of running this module is that it somehow fits perfectly within my current campaign. One of the NPCs who the players can meet would make a good re-occuring villain. The module itself fits perfectly within the current campaign area, and even the event in the module fits perfectly with events that have occured prior to my running of the module. It is a perfect fit.

In conclusion, in my opinion, the money you spend on this module is worth ever penny. If anything, you should buy this module to see how a dungeon crawl can be twisted in a way to be fresh and new and well done.

Google Wave

It is the thing people are talking about, and my roommate finally invited me, so if you want, you can reach me at oriondc at googlewave dot com.

I've been thinking about putting together a submission for Fight On, and I think I'd like to tackle a psionicist class. Psionics has always held an appeal to me; for the longest time, it was a mysterious force that I had no knowledge of. Without the books with the rules, I could never get more than a glimpse of what psionics were like.

My first introduction to psionics was the 2nd edition Advanced D&D Complete Psionics Handbook, which I snapped up the moment I saw. I instantly fell in love with Psionics and the concept of wild talents, and in a way, those things are why I like Dark Sun, beside it's alienish swords-and-planet sort of feel.

I gladly incorporated psionics into my games. With the great wheel, multiple TSR settings, and all sorts of rules supplements, anything was possible and allowed. It was a great time in my life as I rolled with a different group than my high school friends, people who were into D&D as much as I was, maybe even moreso.

At any rate, I feel psionics belongs in D&D as much as magic does. Even if Gary laments the inclusion of psionics due the Blumes, D&D was and is about piece-mailing the game and inventing the heck out of it until you produced something you wanted to play. To say it doesn't belong in D&D is missing the point: it belongs where it's wanted and nothing more.

Wargaming and D&D

It's not all that rare for me to have an epiphany about the old school roots of D&D when I flit about the various OSR blogs on my list. Anyone could tell you that if you hang around long enough and peruse the gems that are the blogs of, say, James Raggi the IV or James Maliszewski, you're going expand your current mindset quite a bit. It is a bit of brown-nosing, I admit, but it isn't undue.

After digesting an article written by Chgowiz and posted on his blog, I have to say that this is one of the most eye-opening revelations I've had about D&D in the past few years. Let me repost a part in particular that I wish to focus on:

"When I read OD&D/AD&D/Holmes, I can see that lineage. When I read how the games were conducted, I can feel that direct influence. Dungeons were seen as the scenarios. Towns and NPCs provided resources. The clearing of the land and obtaining of treasure was a means to an end (holding territory) and a desirable objective so that one could move to up direct wargame scenarios. After all, why have a castle if you're not going to have followers and soldiers? Why have soldiers if you're not going to campaign on a vast scale."

It was as if a heavy burden was lifted from my consciousness, and suddenly, all these seperate things seem to come together. Scenarios. Dungeon, wilderness, and urban exploration. This is what James Raggi was going on and on about! Thinking of D&D not as just a dungeon crawl, while it can encompass that, it can also encompass scenarios. Several unrelated or maybe even related events that wait for the player characters to stumble upon them, or may even happen outside of their interaction. The world turns with or without the PCs, which gives it a sort of verisimilitude to it.

It may be obvious for everyone else, and I admit, not having been there and experiencing the old school ways when they were the mainstream, I am picking it up secondhand, albeit slowly. But this single article, that paragraph, for me, tied it all together. This, among other things I've learned, I will treasure for as long as I play D&D.

Plato's Allegory of the Cave and Gaming

Forgive the philosophical references: I'm taking such a class this semester. One thing that has been drilled into my brain from this class is the concept of bliks, or bliking. A blik, as best as I understand it, is a claim we make that we would not allow any amount of evidence to disprove. This is also similar to Plato's allegory of the cave, that in some way, we are all in a cave, and as such, we should not accuse others of being in a cave (in any derogatory fashion) when we are in one ourselves. Just as others blik, we blik too.

I say this because I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that I am in a different cave than my gamer friends; that is, the people in my cave who I thought to be my friends are not my friends, but wholly different people. My friends, it seems, were in another cave the entire time, or migrated to another cave that seemed more comfortable. Or, as it probably is, I have found a different cave and left them behind.

The cave of old school gaming. Like so-called modern gaming, it is a cave. It is a cave in which some have firmly entrenched themselves, but to say modern game gamers don't do the same it ridiculous. For example, one of my friends feels that he can't enjoy a game without feats and skills, and doesn't quite see the same sort of beauty in Labyrinth Lord that I do. He sees the slower advancement as a flaw (when I told him if they would just find more treasure, they'd advance faster). He wants more classes and prestige classes and the ability to make magical items rather than find them. I asked him, does he need all these things to kill things in a dungeon? He doesn't want to say it, but his answer is yes.

I'm similarly amazed to find two occurrences, which I find related to the people rather than the games: when we played Labyrinth Lord and Pathfinder with the relatively same group of people, they both had to take time at the beginning of the session to finish their characters. It didn't matter how complex the system was, they still required time, up to an hour.

I suppose it an isolating experience when your tastes in gaming change, and your gaming group doesn't go along with it.

Free Will and Determinism in Dungeons and Dragons

I confine this discussion in to D&D because there are preconceived notions that I want to dispell about the Dungeon Master as a sort of deity which is, incidentally, an arguement used often against the OSR community. I doubt this will be a popular piece of exposition, but perhaps it will aid in understanding the position of the DM, and help shift the title from DM to Referee, which is a more consistent and applicable term.

The crux of my arguement is thus: the player characters are not free agents with free will. Their actions are deterministic, decided and arbitrated ultimately by the dungeon master. Thus, ultimately, control of the character rests within the hands of the dungeon master and not the player.

Consider this: when you as a person, in your daily lives, wish to move your arm, unless you are in extreme conditions (paralyzed, amputated, or bound), your arm moves because you decide to move it and it does so. However, in Dungeons & Dragons, your characters actions are filtered through an interface known as the Dungeon Master, who has the ultimate ability to declare your actions as success or failures, and to even deny you the actions you wish to perform. In essence, you have no control of your character, because you submit to the control of the Dungeon Master.

That sounds heavy handed, yes? However, consider it: you abide by his restrictions when creating a character, and sometimes, you might not even create a character at all if he wishes (he might hand it to you). To say that the fate of your actions is determined by the dice is a fallacy, as it is the Dungeon Master who is the interpreter of all random results, and whom is free to ignore the rules or use them as he sees fit. Although you may desire to perform certain actions, the Dungeon Master does not have to comply with your desires, and may even in some circumstances, deny them (such as under magical or non-magical compulsion).

In short, you have no control of your character. Whatever control you have, is on lein from the Dungeon Master. You do not interpret the results of your actions, and you must rely on an interface (in the form of one or more persons) to interact with the game world.

This is a good thing. It is this model which has worked for decades of play, and despite indie innovation, it continues to be the norm of tabletop role-playing. The greatest barrier to accepting this is ego, but once it is cleared, the player can see that the Dungeon Master, as he was meant to be, is not a all-powerful deity, but a Referee.

When you adknowledge the Referee at the ultimate judge, arbiter, and interface, it is easier to accept the power that he actually uses. A good Referee will allow his players as much control as they are entitled to through their "physical abilities" and abilities gained through their class and race. A good Referee is consistant with his judgement, and is very good at setting consistant and fair parameters for his games and worlds. The Referee's primary goal is to provide challenging entertainment to the players. But in order to gain the maximum effectiveness of the Referee, the players must surrender all ego and arrogance, and accept that they have no control. That is not to say that the Referee will fill in the blanks for the PCs like a robot, but he will set up the scenario and let the PCs do as they wish as they can, falling into the background and coming to the foreground as needed.

I might have rambled a bit, but my point still stands: to gain the maximum effectiveness from a Referee, you have to surrender to him completely. However, you shouldn't game with a Referee who abuses his power; simply refuse. Any tip in the balance of power will destroy entertainment value.

It seems to me that if the members of the OSR community want to cleave to the ideals of that era of gaming, it is best to reclaim the term Referee and abandoned the title of Dungeon Master, if for no other reason, that it is more accurate a title.

Playtests?

Would anyone be interested in playtesting Badass Presidents or Of Men and Jackals in exchange for a free booklet of the game they playtest? Email at talath [at] comcast [dot] net.

Additional Content for Of Men & Jackals

Clarification: Exchange

An exchange is the progression of the steps to resolve deadly combat. An exchange begins before Step 1 and ends after Step 5. Thus, the completion of Steps 1 to 5 is one exchange. If, at Step 5, there are opponents who still wish to fight, the current exchange ends and a new one begins.

Rule Insertion: Healing

If a character has one or more Kills inflited upon him in deadly combat, that character must rest to regain lost Kill Value. Once a character begins resting and not engaging in strenuous activity, roll 1d6; this represents how many days of resting pass until the character regains 1 point of Kill Value. If the character has not reached his normal Kill Value, repeat this process until the character reaches his normal Kill Value.

Optional Rule: Positioning

At the start of deadly combat, every combatant must roll a Vagary roll against their Athletics. Those who succeed announce the result as their Position. Those who fail have a Position of 6.

In combat, a character can only attack someone within 1-step of his Position. Thus, a character at Position 2 could attack a Position 1 or 3 character.

If a character wishes to change his position at the expense of attacking, he may make a Vagary roll against his Athletics, which is resolved as above, or he may instead modify his Position by 1.

A Simple Swords & Sorcery Game

Of Men & Jackals

by Orion Cooper

How to Create A Character

1. Roll 3d6 for the three attributes: Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution.

2. Each of the following Vagaries starts at 1: Athletics, Awareness, and Thievery. Add 1 to any of the three Vagaries.

4. Record your Level as 1. Record your Experience Points as 0. Record your Attack Dice as 1. Record your Kill Value as 1. Record your Save Value as 16.

3. If your Strength or Dexterity is 15 or higher, add 1 to your Attack Dice. If your Constitution is 15 or higher, add 1 to your Kill Value and subtract 1 from your Save Value.

4. Name your character.

How to Resolve Deadly Combat

1. Each player selects one opponent. Each character controlled by the Referee will also select an opponent.

2. Each player rolls their attack dice (six sided dice). For each die result between four and six, those dice are called Kill Dice. Keep all Kill Dice and remove the rest. Each opponent will also roll their attack dice in similar fashion.

3. Each player compares the number of Kill Dice they rolled with their opponent's number of Kill Dice. Whomever has the highest amount of Kill Dice inflicts a Kill on their opponent.

4. Each opponent who has suffered a Kill subtracts 1 from their Kill Value for each Kill inflicted. Anyone with a Kill Value of 0 is either dead or in deadly peril, as determined by the opponent who inflicted the Kill.

5. Anyone left standing who wishes to fight, may do so: go back to Step 1 and repeat until no one left wishes to fight.

Deadly Peril: This is a situation in which the character is close to death; a few breaths or inches more and he will die. This usually used to take prisoners or slaves. If the tides of battle turn in some significant fashion, the character can escape Deadly Peril, adding 1 to his Kill Value.

How to Improve Characters

Characters become more powerful by gaining levels, which they gain by accumulating and spending treasure. How they acquire it is not important so much as that they have it, and they spend it on frivolous things. Drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling - these are the vices that mark a character of wealth and power.

Characters earn 1 Experience Point for each Gold Piece they acquire, as well as earning 1 Experience Point for each Gold Piece they spend.

The number of Experience Points required to achieve the next level are described below.

1st Level ..... 0 Experience Points

2nd Level .... 1,000 Experience Points

3rd Level ..... 2,000 Experience Points

4th Level ..... 4,000 Experience Points

5th Level ..... 8,000 Experience Points

6th Level ..... 16,000 Experience Points

7th Level ..... 32,000 Experience Points

8th Level ..... 64,000 Experience Points

9th Level ..... 128,000 Experience Points

10th Level ... 256,000 Experience Points

For each level past the first, characters receive 1 additional Attack Die, add 1 to their Kill Value, and subtract 1 from their Saving Roll. The player may also add 1 to one Vagary of his choice (to a maximum of 6).

How to Make Different Rolls

Saving Throw: A saving throw is a roll to determine of a character succumbs to an attack of a supernatural nature. Usually a failed roll means death. The player rolls a twenty-sided die and compares the result to his Save Value. If he rolls a result equal to or greater than his Save Value, he succeeds. If he rolls less than his Save Value, than he fails.

Vagary Roll: A Vagary Roll is a roll to determine of a character is successful in an activity involving one of his Vagaries. The players rolls a six-sided die and if the result is less than or equal to the Vagary in question, he succeeds. If the roll is greater, than he fails.

Encounters

Your character will face many dangers, many of which are beyond the scope of this small collection of rules. Regardless, the most common opponent the players will fight will be men - human beings.

The Referee may make an Encounter Roll at any time he wishes, or he may make them on some sort of consistant frequency, such as one per game hour or three times per game day. Regardless, if the Referee rolls a one, than an encounter is indicated as occuring. The Referee than may decide the nature of the encounter or roll two-six sided dice to determine the nature.

Result

3-6 Hostile

7-11 Neutral

12 Friendly

If hostile is indicated, or if the players are hostile towards neutral characters, a melee may erupt; consult the rules posted above for combat resolution of a deadly nature.

What and how many is encountered by the referee is his sole discretion, though usually, they will be, as said above, Fighting Men.

Fighting Men: These men have Attack Dice of 1 and a Kill Value of 1. If there is more than one Fighting Man present, represent the group by having them have a Kill Value equal to their number, attacking only once against one opponent in each exchange. Thus, 10 Fighting Men are treated as one opponent with an Attack Dice of 1 and a Kill Value of 10. For each Kill inflicted on a group of Fighting Man, one man from the group dies.

Last Notes

It is the sole discretion of the Referee to craft dangerous circumstances with enticing reward in such a fashion that will advance the power level of the characters in a way which pleases all parties involved, keeps them excited and eager to play, and giving the impression of fairness and impartialness in all matters of game adjucation.

With such little detail, it is also the responsibility of the Referee to tailor the game and the game world in such as a way as to tangle them in such a fashion that the two cannot come apart without seriously damaging either element. With such advice in mind, should the Referee wish to include or create supplemental rules for his game, he should do so in a manner which pleases him most. The game belongs to those who play it, after all.

My Group, and My Insights

Let me talk about the players I have gathered for my Thursday night Labyrinth Lord group, and discuss a little about their backgrounds with gaming and their reactions to my campaign as far, with some of my own commentary thrown in.

Aaron M. is a friend of mine from early 2005 whom started playing D&D with 2nd edition. As such, he has been exposed to games with strong narrativist elements, and generally, enjoys his games that way. He was involved with a long running Exalted game, and it really has colored his gaming experiences (in mostly positive ways) afterwards. Aaron has played 2nd editio, 3rd edition, and 4th edition D&D. This is his first time playing an edition (despite LL being a retro-clone) that is pre 2nd edition.

It took me a while to articulate my thoughts and reasonings for wanting to play a Labyrinth Lord game. We started off talking about 1st edition, but after some thinking, I decided I wanted to do a B/X game, because it was the D&D I first started playing. He could see my reasoning, and with his invaluable help, we gathered the rest of the gamers we have in the group now. It was his ability to gather people, as well as his trusting in my choice of game, that made the LL game possible.

Charles F. is a gamer I met last year when I posted an ad for a 4th edition game and I took to him readily. He is a funny guy and cool as a cucumber. I know he has played 3rd edition ad 4th edition D&D, but of anything else, I am unsure. He is pretty sharp and often picks up on cues and clues before others do.

Chris B. is a guy I have known since I was in High School. I know for a fact Chris has played in dungeon crawls, though I do not know if they are like the one he is in now. I know Chris has the Rules Cyclopedia, and possibly the Mentzer Red Box, but I doubt he has anything older (I once had the Holmes booklet, but I have since found it impossible to find). I'm not sure if he has played 1st edition, but I know he has played every edition from the Rules Cyclopedia and onward. I would best describe Chris as a swashblucking bravo, the kind of player who revels in having a perceived character style, and one that is dashing and exciting. He often tip toes the line between danger and caution, and sometimes, for me, it's hard to predict what he will reasonably do.

Luke P. started on 3rd edition and played some 4th edition. Luke is a bit on the quiet side, and seems to favor the melee kind of character, but you can count on him. He is a solid foundation on which you can build a group of players, a plan, a party, or anything else that requires cooperation. He isn't as expressive as some people, and sometimes I can't tell if he is enjoying the game or not, but his continued patronage leads me to believe he continues to enjoy the game.

Matt H. is another individual I met last year for the 4th edition game. His wife is the friend of Aaron's wife, and thus they met and, as it turned out, they both like games. Matt first started playing D&D with 4th edition, and thus this must be quite a new experience for him, but he seems to enjoy it.

These five and me gather on TokBox and the Dragonsfoot chat room to play each Thursday. Now, I have said before I'm not old school, and don't consider myself in the least. What I have learned, and have noted with high interest, is that, in a way, we are playing out the evolution of the experienced player and referee. This being the first mega dungeon I've really constructed beyond one level, and this being the player's first mega dungeon (according to my knowledge), there has been a shift in the player's paradigm towards the dungeon environment.

In the past three sessions, the players have begun to use tactics that do not require a direct mechanic interface. For example, they bolt and bar doors to prevent escape or entry, or have used chokepoints based on the layout of the dungeon. In the last session, they even used various mining tools to break through a dungeon wall to bypass a room they knew to be a trick / trap.

Meanwhile, on my side, having designed 2 levels of the dungeon so far, I have tried to come up with various tricks and traps to foil them. They are astute, and thus, these 2 levels will be the litmus test for what they solve, what they have problems with, and what doesn't work at all. As I said, they are changing their tactics and style to deal with the tricks and traps I have used as far, and as they get smarter, so will I.

In such a way, I realize that the player versus the dungeon is the case of the mouse and the mouse trap. The trap is simple at first, but as the mouse learns, so must the trap become more advanced to foil the mouse. It becomes a matter of dangerous escalation, one of which I am sure the players will be up to the challenge when it comes.

In this way, I think this is the failing of modules when used incorrectly. As a referee, it has become appearant to me in this short time span that a referee must have an intimate knowledge of what his players are capable of. Making your own dungeon, or changing a publicated one, allows one to suit the challenge to the players. And thus, we come to one of the intrinsic values of the OSR and OSR related gaming: challenge the players.

Of course, I am always learning as I go on, as they are. As I look back, I can see where I err, and how I can use cues and clues to avoid being in err again. Another quality of OSR types of games seems to be show, not tell. I will demonstrate how I plan to execute this principle in my future sessions: say there is a goblin lair. Several rooms connected with a lair of goblins. As the characters approach this area, I can use various sensory clues that are consistent with what they have encountered before. Perhaps the goblins have a malodorous lair, and it extends in the halls around it. Perhaps they toss trash outside of the lair in the halls themselves. Perhaps the players hear chatter at the door.

At this point, one must be sure they have encountered a lair, rather than a simple room filled with goblins. With such information, they could make an informed decision as to whether they should charge in, and perhaps suffer defeat, or some other tactic of their devising.

This comes from the players saying (almost demanding) more information, more expositional reward for their investigative excursions into my dungeon. I agree with them. It is my job to challenge them, and thus, to challenge them, I must give them the information and tools to be challenged. If I do not give them these things, then they are blindly waltzing from danger to danger, which is not challenge, but more suicidal incidents.

And that is what I learned from 3 sessions of Labyrinth Lord.