Apropos of nothing much at all really, here are some examples of real-world D&D-style monk/mystics and why having them do huge amounts of damage with unarmed fists isn't really so fantastical.
Bear in mind Higaonna Morio, the guy in the first video, is over 70 years old. Also bear in mind that the guy in the second video is presumably wearing armoured gloves of some description. You get the drift.
This post is really an extension of this old one. Human beings (let's face it, usually the male ones) are really good at figuring out ways of efficiently killing each other. In a fantasy world we'd probably be really good at figuring out ways to efficiently kill non-humans too. Using tai chi on a dragon might be a stretch... But we'd probably come up with something.
Monday, 14 March 2016
Saturday, 12 March 2016
More Game World Building Reaction Tables
Following on from this recent post, I got to thinking a little more about how reaction tables can build the setting and serve as sources of greater interaction, not to mention contribute to achieving a certain mood.
Here's a sample. This is part of a table for New Troy, my pseudo-English folklore setting. One of the conceits of New Troy is that in certain parts of the map (particularly forests) PCs can accidentally stray into, or out of, the Faerie realm (and Faeries can do likewise into the 'real' world of the PCs). They will frequently do this without even knowing it. In such places encounters with animals in particular will have special significance.
This is a set of 'reactions' for encounters in Faerie with the most mundane creature I could think of - a slow worm. (For those of you in North America who can't be bothered to click the link, this is a small limbless lizard.) Ordinarily slow worms are so small and unobtrusive that humans simply don't really 'encounter' them. But that's ordinary slow worms. In Faerie things are different.
I've just provided one set of results for each reaction type; in reality there will likely be 3 or 4:
The idea, here, is that you would roll for a random encounter as normal, and the entry "slow worm" would direct you to its entry, where you then roll the reaction dice, As you can see from the above table, this then provides you with potentially three different things:
-The location of the encounter (on a steep slope or passing by a rock face in the case of an "attack" reaction; on an open rocky heath for a "cautious" one, etc.)
-An actual event of some kind
-Complications (getting lost in the forest for an "aggressive" reaction; possibly encountering a witch for a "neutral" reaction, etc.)
More information can also be packed into this very easily. For example, consider such a table for a standard D&D humanoid monster such as "orcs". An "attack" result might consist of "20 orc slave raiders searching for new blood". A "friendly" one might consist of "a single lost orc who obsequiously begs to be brought under the party's protection". So you get the number of creatures encountered included in the reaction table result. Other information that can be packed into the reaction dice in this way include distance - "attack" might mean that the monster is right on top of the PCs, whereas "neutral" might mean it is very far away - or even the surprise roll, with "attack", in the case of a predator, signifying surprise of the PCs, and "friendly" being the opposite.
This does require quite a bit of work, but it's worth it given the nature of the results, and it's part of the fun of creating the thing.
Here's a sample. This is part of a table for New Troy, my pseudo-English folklore setting. One of the conceits of New Troy is that in certain parts of the map (particularly forests) PCs can accidentally stray into, or out of, the Faerie realm (and Faeries can do likewise into the 'real' world of the PCs). They will frequently do this without even knowing it. In such places encounters with animals in particular will have special significance.
This is a set of 'reactions' for encounters in Faerie with the most mundane creature I could think of - a slow worm. (For those of you in North America who can't be bothered to click the link, this is a small limbless lizard.) Ordinarily slow worms are so small and unobtrusive that humans simply don't really 'encounter' them. But that's ordinary slow worms. In Faerie things are different.
I've just provided one set of results for each reaction type; in reality there will likely be 3 or 4:
Friendly
|
Neutral
|
Cautious
|
Aggressive
|
Attack
|
The Tail
of the Worm
A slow worm’s detached tail will bring luck for
its saviour. (The PCs come across a badger, fox or other predator attacking a
slow worm. If they chase the predator away, the slow worm leaves its detached
tail behind. This is a lucky charm if carried, allowing the wearer to avoid a
failed save vs death once each lunar month.)
|
A Plea for
Aid
A small, lithe woman dressed in brown leather and
with yellow irises asks for aid; she is being hunted by the three wildcat
familiars of a witch who lives deep in the forest and wants her for her
potions. If the PCs agree to help and kill the witch, the next morning they
will be visited again by the woman, who transforms into a slow worm and will
lead them to a trove of gold buried beneath a tree (300 gp).
|
The Blinding Creeper
In the old tongue, men knew of the slow worm as
the “blinding creeper”, because its scales are so dazzling in sunlight. On a sunny
day, on an exposed rock on a heath, the sun may catch on the blinding creeper
as it dashes for its burrow. (Randomly select a PC, who must successfully
save versus poison or be blinded for a day.)
|
The
Maternal Serpent
Occasionally a voice is heard in the forest,
calling out for help, giggling, crying, or singing. Its source cannot be
found, but it leads a traveller away from his path and strands him in the
forest. This is the doing of a mother slow worm, protecting her brood by
distracting threats. (For each turn the PCs spend following the sound, there
is a 1 in 6 chance they become lost.)
|
Born of
the Earth
Sometimes travellers climbing on a steep slope, or passing through
a ravine or by a rock face, are hit by falling rocks. This is the work of a
slow-worm, threatened by their presence. (1d4 damage to each PC; save versus
paralysation to avoid).
|
The idea, here, is that you would roll for a random encounter as normal, and the entry "slow worm" would direct you to its entry, where you then roll the reaction dice, As you can see from the above table, this then provides you with potentially three different things:
-The location of the encounter (on a steep slope or passing by a rock face in the case of an "attack" reaction; on an open rocky heath for a "cautious" one, etc.)
-An actual event of some kind
-Complications (getting lost in the forest for an "aggressive" reaction; possibly encountering a witch for a "neutral" reaction, etc.)
More information can also be packed into this very easily. For example, consider such a table for a standard D&D humanoid monster such as "orcs". An "attack" result might consist of "20 orc slave raiders searching for new blood". A "friendly" one might consist of "a single lost orc who obsequiously begs to be brought under the party's protection". So you get the number of creatures encountered included in the reaction table result. Other information that can be packed into the reaction dice in this way include distance - "attack" might mean that the monster is right on top of the PCs, whereas "neutral" might mean it is very far away - or even the surprise roll, with "attack", in the case of a predator, signifying surprise of the PCs, and "friendly" being the opposite.
This does require quite a bit of work, but it's worth it given the nature of the results, and it's part of the fun of creating the thing.
Thursday, 10 March 2016
The Face in the Frost: Ur-D&D
Sick in bed and hallucinating feverishly, I today raced through Bellair's The Face in the Frost, as recommended to me by the inimitable (for so many reasons) Kent. It's only about 130 pages and a jaunty and enjoyable ride. I loved it.
What surprised me most about it was how closely its world resembles the default D&D of my youth. There are wizards everywhere and they use magic in a tool-like fashion. The setting is like the renaissance in terms of the technologies available and the way society is arranged. (It feels like somewhere in the middle of the Thirty Years' War.) Taverns are like hotels. There are mirrors, grandfather clocks and high street shops. It is medieval fantasy with the trappings of modernity, just like the world presented to us in, say, the Rules Cyclopedia.
It's deeper than that, though: the Face in the Frost also reads like a hex crawl, with an adventure locale always around the next bend in the road and random encounters popping up when inconvenient. This is not just a story: it's almost a very stylised account of a campaign.
Well worth reading as a core text of the game - far more so even that Vance's works in my view. There's no surprise it's in Appendix N. It should be top of the list.
Wednesday, 9 March 2016
Reaction Tables Which Create the World
So let's think a little about how to use reaction dice to make animal encounters interesting.
BECMI has the following reaction dice table:
2-3 Attack
4-6 Aggressive (roll again -4 next round)
7-9 Cautious (roll again next round)
10-11 Neutral (roll again +4 next round
12 Friendly
This works nice as a quick and dirty method but it could be elaborated on, particularly if you want to make interesting encounters with animals that are magical but not normally predatory on humans. It also occurs to me that you can actually communicate something about the totemic nature of animal species through the reaction dice table, or even change it on an encounter-by-encounter basis.
So for the sake of continuity let's think about shags. (Phwoar.) I like this idea of shags as being a kind of elemental spirit of the shore: a sort of sprite which is produced from the collision between land, wind and sea. A beast of stone and salty water and gale force winds.
Shags are never going to attack the PCs, nor really be "aggressive" towards them as you'd normally understand it. So if you have "shag" in an encounter table, you need to have the reaction dice mean something different if "attack" or "aggressive" come up. And you may as well do it for the other results too (because what exactly does it mean for a shag to be friendly? (Nice and slow, if you want to innuendo done for you)). For example:
Attack result: roll a d6 and consult the following:
1 - The shags summon a minor earth, water or air elemental (3 HD) to protect them
2 - The shags cause a wave to swamp the shoreline, causing PCs to fall over on a failed save versus paralyzation, which results in d3 hp damage in bruises, cracked bones/skulls
3 - The shags are the servants of a coastal warlock who collects flotsam and jetsam and lives in a nearby cave. He comes to attack the PCs and will arrive in d6 turns, clambering over the rocks with alarming speed.
4 - The shags croak aggressively and alert the other seabirds nearby, which bombard the PCs with their dung (PCs stink for the rest of the week unless they get a thorough bath, losing all surprise rolls automatically)
5 - The shags use their power over the earth to cause rocks to fall from the nearby cliff face: roll a d6 for each PC; on a roll of 1 her or she is hit for 3d6 damage
6 - The shags flee into the water and, through their magical power, cause the PCs to want to pursue; each must successfully save vs. magic or chase after them into the deep and cold sea
You get the idea - some of these may be a bit too tough.
Hopefully this communicates something of what I mean. The PCs encounter a group of shags at the bottom of a sea cliff. They get an "attack" result on the reaction dice and the shags summon a minor air elemental. They are revealed to have this power through the reaction table; the DM didn't predetermine this - he just created the potential for it to happen and the dice instantiate it. Maybe all shags have this ability or maybe it is just these ones, and the DM has the chance to think some more about his world. Similarly, the '3' result introduces some new opportunity to the adventure - probably the list could do with more such results - again deepening the DM (and PCs') sense of a living world.
There's no reason why you have to stop at animals with this, of course. Think of what you could do with, say, orcs. A list of potential 'friendly' results might be:
1 - The orcs offer money in return for the PCs attacking the nearby lair of a troll
2 - One of the orcs is a half-orc who bears a weird resemblance to a family member of one of the PCs
3 - The orcs are escapee slaves from a local mage and throw themselves at the mercy of the PCs
4 - The orcs are from a certain tribe who try as much as possible to dress, talk and act like humans, and want to 'ape' the PCs in precise detail...
&c. &c. The game world gets fleshed out simply through the PCs meeting things.
BECMI has the following reaction dice table:
2-3 Attack
4-6 Aggressive (roll again -4 next round)
7-9 Cautious (roll again next round)
10-11 Neutral (roll again +4 next round
12 Friendly
This works nice as a quick and dirty method but it could be elaborated on, particularly if you want to make interesting encounters with animals that are magical but not normally predatory on humans. It also occurs to me that you can actually communicate something about the totemic nature of animal species through the reaction dice table, or even change it on an encounter-by-encounter basis.
So for the sake of continuity let's think about shags. (Phwoar.) I like this idea of shags as being a kind of elemental spirit of the shore: a sort of sprite which is produced from the collision between land, wind and sea. A beast of stone and salty water and gale force winds.
Shags are never going to attack the PCs, nor really be "aggressive" towards them as you'd normally understand it. So if you have "shag" in an encounter table, you need to have the reaction dice mean something different if "attack" or "aggressive" come up. And you may as well do it for the other results too (because what exactly does it mean for a shag to be friendly? (Nice and slow, if you want to innuendo done for you)). For example:
Attack result: roll a d6 and consult the following:
1 - The shags summon a minor earth, water or air elemental (3 HD) to protect them
2 - The shags cause a wave to swamp the shoreline, causing PCs to fall over on a failed save versus paralyzation, which results in d3 hp damage in bruises, cracked bones/skulls
3 - The shags are the servants of a coastal warlock who collects flotsam and jetsam and lives in a nearby cave. He comes to attack the PCs and will arrive in d6 turns, clambering over the rocks with alarming speed.
4 - The shags croak aggressively and alert the other seabirds nearby, which bombard the PCs with their dung (PCs stink for the rest of the week unless they get a thorough bath, losing all surprise rolls automatically)
5 - The shags use their power over the earth to cause rocks to fall from the nearby cliff face: roll a d6 for each PC; on a roll of 1 her or she is hit for 3d6 damage
6 - The shags flee into the water and, through their magical power, cause the PCs to want to pursue; each must successfully save vs. magic or chase after them into the deep and cold sea
You get the idea - some of these may be a bit too tough.
Hopefully this communicates something of what I mean. The PCs encounter a group of shags at the bottom of a sea cliff. They get an "attack" result on the reaction dice and the shags summon a minor air elemental. They are revealed to have this power through the reaction table; the DM didn't predetermine this - he just created the potential for it to happen and the dice instantiate it. Maybe all shags have this ability or maybe it is just these ones, and the DM has the chance to think some more about his world. Similarly, the '3' result introduces some new opportunity to the adventure - probably the list could do with more such results - again deepening the DM (and PCs') sense of a living world.
There's no reason why you have to stop at animals with this, of course. Think of what you could do with, say, orcs. A list of potential 'friendly' results might be:
1 - The orcs offer money in return for the PCs attacking the nearby lair of a troll
2 - One of the orcs is a half-orc who bears a weird resemblance to a family member of one of the PCs
3 - The orcs are escapee slaves from a local mage and throw themselves at the mercy of the PCs
4 - The orcs are from a certain tribe who try as much as possible to dress, talk and act like humans, and want to 'ape' the PCs in precise detail...
&c. &c. The game world gets fleshed out simply through the PCs meeting things.
Tuesday, 8 March 2016
The Voice of the Earth
I like how this programme (The Last Seabird Summer?) presents an encounter with a seabird in an intelligent and thoughtful way. You get a sense of what it must be like to be a shag - living in a "slum hell-hole", scampering about the rocks, freely spraying shit wherever you feel like. (Look at the shag's face as it does that. Isn't there a look approaching pride on its face? Isn't it almost triumphant about the complete liberty it has to shit where it pleases?)
Our ancestors must have spent a lot of time thinking about animals, because their relationships with them were so intimate. And that doesn't just mean domestic animals - it includes creatures like the shag, which until fairly recently people living on the coasts of Northern Britain would gather to make into stew. It doesn't surprise me in the least that folk tales in any culture you care to name are almost obsessed with animals which can turn into humans and vice versa, animals which can talk, animals which are magical, and so forth. Imbuing animals with totemic significance is completely natural if you spend any time whatsoever interacting with them in their wild environment. It's only a small step from there to imbuing them with supernatural powers: a shag becomes not just a sea bird, but "the voice of the earth" - some elemental being produced from the collision between land and sea.
Animals are an undervalued resource in fantasy RPGs. They tend to appear on random encounter tables to cause trouble, or in lairs as "giant [x]". All the attention is diverted towards mythological creatures - the monstrous. There is something more interesting to me in the subtleties of animals presented not as monsters but as spirits of nature with significance and power - which, if the players think about hard enough, may be in some small way understood.
Monday, 7 March 2016
Random Encounters with Rooks
Rooks. Pale-faced, sword-beaked swaggerers, bundles of contradiction, cloaked raggedly in black feathers that gleam with luxuriant purple, and possessing eyes that are cruel but wise. At times they signify foreboding and foreshadow death. At others, they bring succor and protection of a kind.
The Solitary Rook in Winter
A rook encountered alone in winter time is almost certainly the servant of a witch. The witch lives within the distance of one hex at a suitable location, and is now aware of the presence of the PCs unless one of them is carrying a branch from a Rowan tree. She will seek to: 1 - Enchant them to act as slaves; 2 - Enchant them to perform a task; 3 - Sacrifice them to the devil.
A Mother Rook with Young
A mother rook with her brood is a portent of disaster - and rebirth. The next time the first PC to spot the birds (determine at random) has to roll a saving throw, he or she fails automatically. If the result is death, a tree grows where the PC is buried within one month. It bears three apples, each of which restores all lost hit points if eaten.
Rooks Flying in the Wind
Rooks flying on a windy day, celebrating the skill and strength and speed in their wings, summon storms which reinvigorate the weary. Within d6x10 minutes the storm begins. It lasts for d3 hours; during this time travel is impossible without fatigue and sickness. After the storm has ended, the clouds dissipate and the PCs lose existing levels of fatigue; spell-casters recover spent spells.
The Solitary Rook in Winter
A rook encountered alone in winter time is almost certainly the servant of a witch. The witch lives within the distance of one hex at a suitable location, and is now aware of the presence of the PCs unless one of them is carrying a branch from a Rowan tree. She will seek to: 1 - Enchant them to act as slaves; 2 - Enchant them to perform a task; 3 - Sacrifice them to the devil.
A Storytelling of Rooks
Rooks gather in the evenings in their dozens, hundreds or thousands - often close to a church or other holy site - to converse about the happenings of the day. Standing amidst them, surrounded by their cries in the gloaming light of the dying evening, a cleric or child can discern something of their discourse. Select a lair, adventure locale, or rumour the PCs have not yet discovered. This is what the listener hears about.
A Mother Rook with Young
A mother rook with her brood is a portent of disaster - and rebirth. The next time the first PC to spot the birds (determine at random) has to roll a saving throw, he or she fails automatically. If the result is death, a tree grows where the PC is buried within one month. It bears three apples, each of which restores all lost hit points if eaten.
Rooks Flying in the Wind
Rooks flying on a windy day, celebrating the skill and strength and speed in their wings, summon storms which reinvigorate the weary. Within d6x10 minutes the storm begins. It lasts for d3 hours; during this time travel is impossible without fatigue and sickness. After the storm has ended, the clouds dissipate and the PCs lose existing levels of fatigue; spell-casters recover spent spells.
Thursday, 3 March 2016
[Actual Play] Cruth Lowlands Campaign: Session 6 - Grand Larceny and the Murder of Gnomes
Session 6 of the Cruth Lowlands Campaign took place yesterday. For previous AP reports, see here.
PCs Present:
Last session had ended with the PCs just entering a dungeon within a glacier, in search of an "ice spirit" to bring back to the Three-Faced Wizard, so that he could transform it into a magical oil which would freeze an underground lake. This needed to happen for....complicated reasons.
PCs Present:
- Luke, playing Andy, a 3rd level Fighter
- Jason, playing Mixaham, a 1st level Magic User, and then Naghmeh, a 1st level Magic User
- Dan, playing Brother Ambrose, a 1st level Cleric, and then Sir Gareth, a 1st level Elf
Last session had ended with the PCs just entering a dungeon within a glacier, in search of an "ice spirit" to bring back to the Three-Faced Wizard, so that he could transform it into a magical oil which would freeze an underground lake. This needed to happen for....complicated reasons.
The party had found a stone door, which they quickly pushed open, revealing a passage carved from stone, heading down underneath the glacier and the cold rock below. They followed this passage for some 500 yards, before eventually coming across a door to their left. After getting this open, they were attacked by two dwarf skeletons dressed in strange and old-fashioned banded mail armour; they quickly dispatched these and explored what was apparently a guard room beyond. This contained lots of weapons - odd-looking glaives, mauls and cleavers - which they thought might be worth money, but too heavy to carry. They went back to the corridor and followed it onwards a short distance, where they came across a stone ladder heading down a steep incline. Brother Ambrose volunteered to climb down. As soon as he did so - emerging on a landing of some kind - he was attacked by a winged, clawed, humanoid ice demon which came swooping up from the darkness and breathed a cone of ice shards at him. He was rendered unconscious by this, but not quite dead. [DM's note: 0 hp is unconscious; -1 and below is dead.]
Andy and Mixaham, at the top of the ladder, saw this unfold. and surmised that this must be one of the ice spirits the Three-Faced Wizard had described. Mixaham had received a wand from the wizard, as well as a ring which was supposed to help control ice elementals. He zapped the ice demon with the wand. This withered it considerably, but did not weaken it completely, and it flew up and breathed another blast of ice shards. This killed Mixaham outright and badly wounded Andy. Andy decided to seize the ring from Mixaham and uttered the magic words ("I command thee!") which bound the ice demon to his will.
After reviving Brother Ambrose, the two remaining PCs decided they were in no shape to continue exploring these caverns, and in any case, Mixaham needed a proper burial. They also thought that since the ice demon was now their slave, they would keep him around, but punish him with a humiliating nickname. They decided on "Chucklefuck". Chucklefuck's first task was to carry as many weapons he could from the dwarf guard room stash, to be sold back in Riverfork.
They carried Mixaham's body, plus all the weapons, back to the surface, and descended the mountain in the night. The next morning they buried Mixaham with full honours, Brother Ambrose reading a special rite over the grave. Then they headed South towards Riverfork, abandoning their rescue mission of the river pirate, Hector, and leaving him to his fate with the kobolds. (See session 4.) They thought that the wand and ring, plus ice demon slave, were compensation enough for their troubles in the glacier caves, and, I think, wished they had never come on this wild goose chase up North. However, almost immediately they came across - by some strange twist of fate - Mixaham's sister, Naghmeh, who had come from Ylaurum to try to find her brother. Learning of his death, she decided to join up with these strange travellers.
Things took a turn for the worse on the way back to Riverfork. On the second night of travelling through the hills, they were disturbed while Andy was on watch by noises some distance off. Andy sent Chucklefuck to investigate and within seconds there were sounds of a fight. Andy and Brother Ambrose charged off to support their ice demon comrade. (By this point they had stopped resenting Chucklefuck and were treating him as some sort of weird pet.) They discovered eight dark, diminutive figures who Andy immediately assumed were halflings. At this point Luke, Andy's player, revealed some of Andy's back story: he had previously been involved in the Halfling Wars, or "Halfling Nam" (YOU WEREN'T THERE, MAN), and whenever he was confronted with a halfling had horrible flashbacks and aggressive responses. However, he then realised that these enemies were not halflings, but in fact gnomes. And in the ensuing fight, the party seriously suffered from a lack of infravision. Only Chucklefuck could effectively see the gnomes, and while he blasted them with ice and then ripped them apart with his claws, they managed to kill Brother Ambrose and seriously injure Andy. [DM's Note: We actually thought Andy was dead too, at one point, but then realised he had recouped a hit points or two from resting on the journey back.]
But eventually Andy and Naghmeh triumphed, with two of the gnomes surrendering. Andy quickly got it from these gnomes that they lived nearby in a series of caves in some ravines, and had come on a raid in search of goblins to kill. (The tribe called "The Quiet Ones" who the party had heard about before.) The leader of the gnomes, a female, said that in exchange for her life she would reveal the secret entrance to her people's tunnels, which would lead to the tribe's secret treasure. The PCs noted the details down and then killed the two captives in revenge for Brother Ambrose's death.
Back in riverfork, Andy, Naghmeh and Chucklefuck ended up back in Yokomosok's inn. (They fashioned a chain and leash for the ice demon to keep him secure in town.) Here, they met an old friend of Andy's from "Halfling Nam", an elf called Sir Gareth. Although an elf, Sir Gareth had renounced his racial heritage and chosen to live as a human. His aim in life was to marry into the human aristocracy and eventually have his own realm.
The bullywug bartender offered to give Andy some news in return for gold. This turned out to be a warning: armed men had come to the inn looking for him while he was away, and they were led by the hunter, Anacreon. Andy realised suddenly, with horror, that there were actually consequences to his and his comrades' actions. Anacreon, he remembered, was from the village of Lithakia. This settlement's population were in cahoots with the Cronus cult; this was the very same village whose priest had been murdered by Marm Jo'a in session 2 and the very same cult whose acolytes the party had massacred in session 3. Andy lapsed into depression at this news, and looking back over the course of the last couple of weeks. Was he cursed? All of his comrades kept dying. He began drowning his sorrows in Yokomosok's ale, before the conversation turned to what to do next.
The session ended with the party at a crossroads. They had visited at least three major cave systems: The Worm's Mouth, the tunnels under the Achelos Fort, and the glacier caverns near the Three-Faced Wizard's tower. But they had not explored them for any distance. It was also Andy's stated (and longstanding) aim to burn down the village of Lithakia, but there was also some notion to go on a grand campaign to the West against The Quiet Ones. First, however, the three PCs decided that they wanted revenge against the gnomes who had killed Brother Ambrose - and to get their hands on the diminutive humanoids' treasure...
Wednesday, 2 March 2016
The Mahogany Dungeon
In my earlier posts about the 'Fixed World' setting I described how, in the part of the world where it was always afternoon and always summer, you would get a kind of uber-rainforest: a jungle with trees the size of skyscrapers, full of giant insects and and exotic civilizations. Recently I've been thinking, why not go the whole hog? In those jungles, trees aren't just the size of skyscrapers: they are the size of mountains. There are vast distances separating one from another. And as a consequence you could base an entire campaign around the exploration of one, vast, tree megadungeon. Viz:
At the base of The Mahogany Dungeon are entire dungeon levels-worth of burrows, inhabited by vegepygmies, myconids, hook horrors, jungle gnomes, and similar. I also thought about re-imagining drow to inhabit such dark places in the vast root structures beneath such a tree: a race of dark-dwelling, mysterious elves who raise spiders and fungus, like an unholy mixture of Warhammer forest goblins, Drizzt, and Curupira. Neogi would live down there too with their umber hulk companions, trading slaves from root tunnel to root tunnel.
Further up the trunk, if the PCs had the equipment to climb, they would discover giant ant burrows in the bark of the tree which comprise newer and more dangerous dungeon levels. Some of these burrows would house the original inhabitants - giant ants of all kinds, some peaceful leaf-cutters; other ferocious raiders. Some would be abandoned and taken over by tasloi and grimlocks lurking in the depths and living off sap - or myconid civilizations with vast populations meditating away from the light of the sun. Here also there would be mini-dungeons formed by giant insect grubs, perhaps now housing wyverns, flying serpents, human cults, ettercaps, or were-jaguars.
As they climbed higher, the PCs would encounter huge vines with outgrowths stretching out into the great abyssal gulf of open space. On the huge, smooth, green leaves might be towers of archmages, nests of couatl or green dragons, or gloomwing egg clutches full of tenebrous worms.
Further up still would be massive holes carved into the trunk of the tree by birds such as giant hornbills - the rocs of the jungle. Their nests would be labyrinths of dirt, moss and twigs to be explored, populated by ravenous giant lice and fleas - maybe even intelligent flea-people dwelling in the stinking half-light. And there there would also be giant beehives which, when abandoned, would become inhabited by those seeking secrecy and protection - liches, demons or millennial sects.
Finally, though, higher-level PCs or expert climbers would find their way to the canopy, and the sunlight. Up there, there would be entire tribes of grippli, tasloi, tabaxi and other intelligent jungle beings - and humans too, of course, living in tree-house towns spread between branches, twigs and leaves. Wars fought and lost, trade networks spanning from one branchtip to another, and the sun shining down on it all eternally - except for the mighty rainstorms which would swell from the sweltering air every 24 hours, thus marking the passage from one day to the next.
At the base of The Mahogany Dungeon are entire dungeon levels-worth of burrows, inhabited by vegepygmies, myconids, hook horrors, jungle gnomes, and similar. I also thought about re-imagining drow to inhabit such dark places in the vast root structures beneath such a tree: a race of dark-dwelling, mysterious elves who raise spiders and fungus, like an unholy mixture of Warhammer forest goblins, Drizzt, and Curupira. Neogi would live down there too with their umber hulk companions, trading slaves from root tunnel to root tunnel.
Further up the trunk, if the PCs had the equipment to climb, they would discover giant ant burrows in the bark of the tree which comprise newer and more dangerous dungeon levels. Some of these burrows would house the original inhabitants - giant ants of all kinds, some peaceful leaf-cutters; other ferocious raiders. Some would be abandoned and taken over by tasloi and grimlocks lurking in the depths and living off sap - or myconid civilizations with vast populations meditating away from the light of the sun. Here also there would be mini-dungeons formed by giant insect grubs, perhaps now housing wyverns, flying serpents, human cults, ettercaps, or were-jaguars.
As they climbed higher, the PCs would encounter huge vines with outgrowths stretching out into the great abyssal gulf of open space. On the huge, smooth, green leaves might be towers of archmages, nests of couatl or green dragons, or gloomwing egg clutches full of tenebrous worms.
Further up still would be massive holes carved into the trunk of the tree by birds such as giant hornbills - the rocs of the jungle. Their nests would be labyrinths of dirt, moss and twigs to be explored, populated by ravenous giant lice and fleas - maybe even intelligent flea-people dwelling in the stinking half-light. And there there would also be giant beehives which, when abandoned, would become inhabited by those seeking secrecy and protection - liches, demons or millennial sects.
Finally, though, higher-level PCs or expert climbers would find their way to the canopy, and the sunlight. Up there, there would be entire tribes of grippli, tasloi, tabaxi and other intelligent jungle beings - and humans too, of course, living in tree-house towns spread between branches, twigs and leaves. Wars fought and lost, trade networks spanning from one branchtip to another, and the sun shining down on it all eternally - except for the mighty rainstorms which would swell from the sweltering air every 24 hours, thus marking the passage from one day to the next.
Monday, 29 February 2016
[Actual Play] 5th Edition in Pre-Medieval Japan: Session 1 - The Three Mysterious Weirdos
In the cedar halls of Prince Uesugi-no-Mishiri at Kawa-no-Kuchi, a small coastal settlement on the frigid shores of the Northern wilderness of Michi-no-Oku, three visitors from the civilized South met Prince Mishiri and his retainers. These three - Monomi, a shugenja from an obscure sect, Goro, an onmyoji of refined tastes and attitudes, and Terasu, a kannushi who recently inherited the position from his father - had come to the lands of the Emishi to settle various philosophical arguments which had escalated beyond their control. On meeting with Prince Mishiri, they discovered that this young scion of the Uesugi clan intended to gather stories, items and treasures from Michi-no-Oku to take them with him to the Emperor the following spring on a visit to Heijo-Kyo in the civilized South.
The three philosophers struck a deal with the Prince that they would explore the lands nearby and share with him whatever they discovered, in return for his help and support. On the basis of this agreement, the Prince gave them a description of the lands nearby and the nature of the local Emishi peoples. He directed them to four Emishi villages in particular:
Okoppe, half a day's journey South down the coast, whose inhabitants were known to be friendly.
Niseko, half a day's journey inland up a nearby river, whose inhabitants were known to be friendly but had ceased all contact during the winter.
Bihoro, two days' journey up a river to the North West, which was mysterious and not well known.
Konakai, further south from Okoppe, whose inhabitants were known to be hostile and dangerous.
Prince Mishiri also explained that, although the Emishi might sometimes be hospitable and willing to offer aid to travellers, they might also change their behaviour from season to season or even with the turning of the moon, and that the rude barbarians could not be trusted in the manner of those from the civilized South.
The three philosophers decided to visit the village of Niseko to investigate what might have befallen the inhabitants. There, in the depths of the dark forest, they discovered that the hamlet had been abandoned except for crows and mice; the villagers had apparently left in a hurry, except for two men who had been killed in the most brutal fashion. Deciding that they ought to uncover the fate of the missing Emishi of Niseko, they found nearby a small bear figurine, carved from a deer bone, next to a trail leading South. Terasu, communing with the kamuy of the area - the spirits inhabiting the trees, rocks, river and earth - discerned that the Niseko Emishi had been subject to great violence, and forced away by invaders. The three philosophers decided to follow the trail South immediately, despite the imminent onset of twilight.
In the crepuscular light of the forest they came across another river, cutting across the trail. In a quandary as to whether to continue, they were forewarned about the presence of a bear by the shriek of an owl. Hiding, they watched the beast approach the river from the opposite bank - but, they also noticed that, despite the presence of salmon, for some reason the creature did not wish to enter the water. Monomi distracted it and it headed off upstream; after waiting, the philosophers decided to cross the river - but quickly ascertained that the trail disappeared. They surmised that the Niseko Emishi, and their assumed captors, must have travelled upstream. This was confirmed when they found another trinket - a flint arrowhead - dropped by the bank a hundred yards up the river. Goro also established a possible explanation for the bear's mistrust of the river - whenever he touched it, his patron deity seemed to cause his fingertips to tingle with an odd and distasteful sensation.
They camped for the night in the forest and as dawn broke, under clear skies above the trees, they followed the river onwards - coming across another dropped arrowhead as they did. Believing they were definitely on the trail of the Niseko Emishi's captors, they pressed on.
The three philosophers struck a deal with the Prince that they would explore the lands nearby and share with him whatever they discovered, in return for his help and support. On the basis of this agreement, the Prince gave them a description of the lands nearby and the nature of the local Emishi peoples. He directed them to four Emishi villages in particular:
Okoppe, half a day's journey South down the coast, whose inhabitants were known to be friendly.
Niseko, half a day's journey inland up a nearby river, whose inhabitants were known to be friendly but had ceased all contact during the winter.
Bihoro, two days' journey up a river to the North West, which was mysterious and not well known.
Konakai, further south from Okoppe, whose inhabitants were known to be hostile and dangerous.
Prince Mishiri also explained that, although the Emishi might sometimes be hospitable and willing to offer aid to travellers, they might also change their behaviour from season to season or even with the turning of the moon, and that the rude barbarians could not be trusted in the manner of those from the civilized South.
The three philosophers decided to visit the village of Niseko to investigate what might have befallen the inhabitants. There, in the depths of the dark forest, they discovered that the hamlet had been abandoned except for crows and mice; the villagers had apparently left in a hurry, except for two men who had been killed in the most brutal fashion. Deciding that they ought to uncover the fate of the missing Emishi of Niseko, they found nearby a small bear figurine, carved from a deer bone, next to a trail leading South. Terasu, communing with the kamuy of the area - the spirits inhabiting the trees, rocks, river and earth - discerned that the Niseko Emishi had been subject to great violence, and forced away by invaders. The three philosophers decided to follow the trail South immediately, despite the imminent onset of twilight.
In the crepuscular light of the forest they came across another river, cutting across the trail. In a quandary as to whether to continue, they were forewarned about the presence of a bear by the shriek of an owl. Hiding, they watched the beast approach the river from the opposite bank - but, they also noticed that, despite the presence of salmon, for some reason the creature did not wish to enter the water. Monomi distracted it and it headed off upstream; after waiting, the philosophers decided to cross the river - but quickly ascertained that the trail disappeared. They surmised that the Niseko Emishi, and their assumed captors, must have travelled upstream. This was confirmed when they found another trinket - a flint arrowhead - dropped by the bank a hundred yards up the river. Goro also established a possible explanation for the bear's mistrust of the river - whenever he touched it, his patron deity seemed to cause his fingertips to tingle with an odd and distasteful sensation.
They camped for the night in the forest and as dawn broke, under clear skies above the trees, they followed the river onwards - coming across another dropped arrowhead as they did. Believing they were definitely on the trail of the Niseko Emishi's captors, they pressed on.
By noon, they entered a narrow ravine through which the river flowed. The three philosophers progressed cautiously, Monomi wading through the water, the others proceeding up the bank. Soon they spotted a lookout in a tree and Monomi crept up on him, using all of his shugendo techniques, with the others behind; the monk then drew the man's attention with his shakuhachi for long enough to Goro to reduce the man's brain to liquid with a softly spoken word.
The three philosophers could now look down into the river from the ravine top, and saw two cave entrances in the opposite side - and another lookout, on a small pebbly inlet. This man was reduced to fragments by Terasu, channeling the power of the kamuy of the rocks and water nearby - but not before he raised the alarm with a whistle. This set off dogs barking somewhere in the caves. Realising a frontal assault from this direction would be ill-advised, the three philosophers headed upstream and doubled back on the other bank. Monomi entered the caves first - slipping inside and dispatching two men in the semi-darkness with his shugendo attacks. Goro followed, just as three dogs appeared from a side tunnel to attack. In a sharp exchange, Goro was badly savaged by one, but the others proved just as powerless against the assault of Monomi's fists, kicks and staff. Three more men attacked with shortbows, but once Monomi had brutally dispatched another by smashing his nose back into his face, the others surrendered.
The two men babbled in some dialect of Emishi, which none of the three philosophers could understand. But Goro possesses the power to communicate directly with the minds of men and intelligent beings; doing so, he was able to establish that their captives were men who were under the sway of something they called the River Oyster God. This God demanded sacrifices at a waterfall deeper into the forest, and these men were somehow involved in that process.
The three philosophers also discovered that these caves extended further down into the earth, but were completely flooded just a dozen or so yards in. Their captives told them that these tunnels had been created by people they called the Lichen Men, who had been in these lands since the dawn of time, before even the Emishi had come here, and long before effete foreigners from the South such as the three philosophers had even been heard of.
Monomi, Goro and Terasu began planning to investigate the fate of the Niseko Emishi at the lair of the River Oyster God. But that is a tale for next week.
The three philosophers could now look down into the river from the ravine top, and saw two cave entrances in the opposite side - and another lookout, on a small pebbly inlet. This man was reduced to fragments by Terasu, channeling the power of the kamuy of the rocks and water nearby - but not before he raised the alarm with a whistle. This set off dogs barking somewhere in the caves. Realising a frontal assault from this direction would be ill-advised, the three philosophers headed upstream and doubled back on the other bank. Monomi entered the caves first - slipping inside and dispatching two men in the semi-darkness with his shugendo attacks. Goro followed, just as three dogs appeared from a side tunnel to attack. In a sharp exchange, Goro was badly savaged by one, but the others proved just as powerless against the assault of Monomi's fists, kicks and staff. Three more men attacked with shortbows, but once Monomi had brutally dispatched another by smashing his nose back into his face, the others surrendered.
The two men babbled in some dialect of Emishi, which none of the three philosophers could understand. But Goro possesses the power to communicate directly with the minds of men and intelligent beings; doing so, he was able to establish that their captives were men who were under the sway of something they called the River Oyster God. This God demanded sacrifices at a waterfall deeper into the forest, and these men were somehow involved in that process.
The three philosophers also discovered that these caves extended further down into the earth, but were completely flooded just a dozen or so yards in. Their captives told them that these tunnels had been created by people they called the Lichen Men, who had been in these lands since the dawn of time, before even the Emishi had come here, and long before effete foreigners from the South such as the three philosophers had even been heard of.
Monomi, Goro and Terasu began planning to investigate the fate of the Niseko Emishi at the lair of the River Oyster God. But that is a tale for next week.
Sunday, 28 February 2016
More Thoughts on Fifth Edition
I ran 5th edition for the first time today. I'll do an actual play report tomorrow, probably, but thought I'd jot down some comments on the system itself.
The first thing is that, in play, the whole thing is quite simple and actually feels quite a lot like Basic D&D - at least, the way I ran it. It wasn't fiddly or annoying. Put another way, I found that I could just wing quite a lot and it didn't seem to matter. I liked that.
The second thing is that it takes a little while to get your head around the way things work because it uses terms like 'proficiency', 'spell slot' and 'hit dice', which existed previously, in a different way. That was an odd choice, I think, although actually the way skills and proficiency works is fine.
The third thing is that, as expected, the way hit points are abstracted is quite jarring. In the session, one PC was attacked by a dog and lost all but 1 hp. It is hard to think of a dog attack as being anything other than: it savages your leg. Yet because of the way the system works, the character was practically back to full hp after the combat was over because of having an hour's rest. Now, look, I know hit points have always been abstract. I know you shouldn't think of them strictly as being health. But still, "I've been badly savaged by a dog... But I feel a whole lot better thanks to having a nice sit down!" just doesn't feel right to me.
The fourth thing is that, Christ, 5th edition PCs are tough. The three PCs in my game basically made mincemeat of all opposition because of the sheer power and versatility of the new magic system and the (it seems) deliberate attempt to make it easier to get hits in combat at low levels. Not that I'm complaining - it just is radically not the D&D I'm used to, and requires a different understanding of what a starting PC actually is: they're not vagrant wanderers who are just starting out; they're already established heroes.
The fifth thing is really that I'm pleasantly surprised. There are aspects of the system I dislike, and I don't think it would ever be my default, but it's simple, smooth, and easy to blag, and really, what more could you ask for?
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