bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 8, 2013 0:49:00 GMT -6
I'd like to start a, hopefully, running discussion on peoples campaigns. I'm really interesting in how other people play and why. Which in and of itself is a pretty broad topic. To add some structure, I'd like if you would be so kind as to give a brief overview of your campaign, maybe in a couple of paragraphs. What is the setting? Why does that appeal to you? What sort of unique rules you employ and why do you use them? How do they change the result in play? What are your players like and how does that change or shape of your campaign? Lastly, what inspired or informs you dm'ing decisions during play? Is it adherence to a certain theme? Maybe more succinctly, what elements have shaped your dm'ing philosophy and why are they so important to you?
I really enjoy the thought or maybe fantasy of each campaign being uniquely built and would like something a bit deeper than play reports.
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Post by scottenkainen on Aug 8, 2013 7:43:04 GMT -6
(I'm going to assume you want OD&D campaigns and swords & sorcery retroclones only? Despite my deep interest in OD&D, I only currently run H&H and AD&D...)
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 8, 2013 9:08:41 GMT -6
(I'm going to assume you want OD&D campaigns and swords & sorcery retroclones only? Despite my deep interest in OD&D, I only currently run H&H and AD&D...) Not at all. I'm very interested in hearing about AD&D. What is H&H? I've never read AD&D but I'm under the impression that a lot of people use it to supplement OD&D. I think hearing and discussing widely in a D&D framework would be interesting and ultimately useful/helpful.
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 8, 2013 9:47:16 GMT -6
This is one of my favorite topics, and to me is a better reason than any to have forums like this. You should look into my thread from perhaps 6 months ago, in the Underworld and Wilderness ADventures subforum, entitled "How Do YOU Play D&D?"
I don't get to play much, due to living in a small town. My two players consist of my wife and my nephew. My interest the last year has been in trying to stick closely to the book (usually B/X D&D, but some OD&D as well) and recreating a fairly hardcore old school style of play. Most folks that I've known in my gaming through the years, including myself to a much lesser degree, threw the rules out. My 3E group, in which I was a player, ignored all the rules. It was the worst of all worlds; we had the incredibly complex character creation (which turned my wife off immediately, as well as the few other non-gaming women I introduced to the game), but then proceeded to ignore all the rules, and we all had ridiculous plot armor, which I always hated. To one level or another, every group I've ever played with has done this (ignore rules, PC's are invincible). My point is that my goal now, with B/X or OD&D is to really take the text seriously and try to see what the point of it is. I'm really sympathetic to the view expressed by some of my favorite folks on this forum that the game should be made one's own; don't be afraid to change this or that, etc. But it reminds me of when I was a kid and hated studying math or English. My mom would explain to me WHY it was important to learn those skills, and I'm glad I stuck with it. Likewise, I believe there is a good game in the D&D texts, and I want to honor it by playing it "right." I've played it my own way, and a lot of other people's way, and now I want to see what D&D is. I still feel I need to run a true hexcrawl and a true megadungeon (which is moving towards being playable, perhaps in a week or two).
So that's what we've beeen doing. And the result of it is... the game is very hard, very lethal. No one levels, everyone dies. My two players seem to really love it though. So far I mostly run smallish dungeons, but I do tend to engineer scenarios with multiple agents/forces at work, to let the players loose to figure out what is up and how to use the situation to their benefit. I do this in a "mini-sandbox" style. All my scenarios are open-ended, completely. In my last game, my wife and nephew killed an old woman, not understanding that she was totally harmless and not even mentally all there. She just happened to be a little creepy, what with a googly eye and not making a lot of sense, just some cryptic comments. They stabbed her and hid the body. Anyway, I like to keep the games somewhat amoral, with different agents interacting with each other, perhaps in drug/slave trade, seeking information/artifacts, etc, and the players get to go in and try to do the best they can, sometimes not realizing they are working for a fairly menacing employer.
The end result is they go into a dungeon, and sooner or later get killed.
I've always biased towards interesting scenarios and roleplaying (NOT VOICE ACTING, I'm really not into that... we alternate between in character talk and third person, but it is more matter of fact and less thespian - we did the thespian thing in the 90's because that's how we thought we were supposed to do it, but I don't like it). I don't much like combat. I think my players like my games because of the twisty scenarios. The combat is fine for them, but it is game-ending. They've been good with it so far, but I think they will get tired of it if they keep getting slaughtered.
The dungeons so far have been fine, but they are small. I plan to inflict my megadungeon on them, and I want to do it as well as I can, but I still suspect it will not be for us (though the concept is like crack). Not sure about the hexcrawl - I've never done anything like that before.
In the long run, I see myself keeping basic old school D&D concepts (levels, hit dice, etc), but doing much more like Geoffrey and others who very much do their own thing.
For settings, I've thus far kept it vanilla fantasy with some weirdness thrown in (very much like what you'd see in the OD&D books...), but I am more interested in a blend of sci fi and fantasy, very post apoc. My wife and nephew are increasingly interested in sci fi, and I think I would prefer that as well. I think elves, dwarves, and orcs suck, frankly, though I'm using them now.
Let that conclude my life story for now.
TL;DR I'm on the sort of newb side with regard to old school D&D, but I'm giving it an honest go so I can see what it's about, playing very vanilla. Long term, plan to take the basic concepts and do totally my own thing.
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 8, 2013 9:55:06 GMT -6
One last thing about my worlds. Thus far, I don't create worlds. I create scenarios. That usually means the bottom up approach of town/surrounding area/ dungeon. I just create the bare minimum to have a playable game. PArt of this is because I can really easily get into analysis paralysis, so the more I keep it basic and somewhat abstract, the more I can get things done. I also have a hard time doing a more large scale world because I feel like, to a degree, the fictional concepts D&D imposes are not compatible with my vision (thus I very much understand why Geoffrey drops most of the contents of the game so he can do what he wants to do). I find it strains my brain too much to consider 190284109801 types of basically human monsters sharing the world, clerics from various religious orders all running around in platemail with maces, casting the EXACT SAME SPELLS, and so on. Yeah, all of it should probably strain one's sense of believability, but I think we all have our different tolerance levels for specific ideas.
So, like I said, I focus on the small picture, and create just enough to do what I need to do. I think this is why a hexcrawl has not got off the ground yet, but a megadungeon seems much easier to work on, somehow.
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Post by Finarvyn on Aug 8, 2013 15:51:55 GMT -6
For my early years (1970s-1980s) I ran one continuous campaign for years and years. I started with a dungeon, expanded to a local map with town for trade and resting, expanded to a regional map with nearby lords and barons, and eventually to a world map. Over the years the players just worked their way outward and I kept drawing more pages.
My middle years (1990s-2000s) I had a totally new group of friends and our style changed. We didn't have those marathon sessions any more but instead got together each week or maybe twice a month to play. At this point I spent my time doing mini-campaigns, each lasting 6-9 months or so. Sometimes campaigns would use the same rules, other times I'd skip around from OD&D to C&C or Amber Diceless or whatever game system seemed fun at the time.
The last few years have seen my own kids get really busy and I've had a harder time running games on a consistent basis. I've done a lot of modules because I don't have as much time to plan, particularly playtesting a bunch of DCC modules. My hope is to move back to my "middle years" model and run continuous games again soon. My current fad is 13th Age, which I've found to be a lot of fun and my players are enjoying a lot as well.
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idrahil
Level 6 Magician
The Lighter The Rules, The Better The Game!
Posts: 398
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Post by idrahil on Aug 8, 2013 18:42:09 GMT -6
I like to mine maps and such from the OSR modules that are out there. Free or otherwise. As for the world itself, Basically imagine a world pretty much like Middle Earth when Numenor first returned to Middle Earth after having lived on their island for so long. So the kingdom the players are from have in the last 100 years have crossed the ocean, returning to the lands they lived on thousands of years ago. The land is dark and brutal. Its not too complicated but its fun. They closed the last campaign by working together on establishing a Stronghold. Rather than each getting a domain, they all helped establish the "colony" that is the base of the new campaign.
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 8, 2013 18:49:04 GMT -6
There is quite a few interesting things coming up and alas I don't have time to follow up on everything, but I'll get around to it. I like to mine maps and such from the OSR modules that are out their. Free or otherwise. As for the world itself, Basically imagine a world pretty much like Middle Earth when Numenor first returned to Middle Earth after having lived on their island for so long. So the kingdom the players are from have in the last 100 years have crossed the ocean, returning to the lands they lived on thousands of years ago. The land is dark and brutal. Its not too complicated but its fun. They closed the last campaign by working together on establishing a Stronghold. Rather than each getting a domain, they all helped establish the "colony" that is the base of the new campaign. This sounds cool. What draws you to a Middle-Earthesque setting and is there any reason behind the uncomplicated set up, do you think complexity somehow detracts from your table's fun? It sounds like you follow the basic structure of D&D, working up to establish strongholds, but why did you decide to change focus from the individual to the collective? Did that achieve your desired result or did it not work out the way you had hoped?
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 8, 2013 19:11:27 GMT -6
Lately I've been thinking about world-building. Last week I secured a room in the post-grad department (I'm moving on up) and now I can successfully run a cohesive game rather than one offs. The problem is, the weight of my output. I can fill a notebook with brainstorms in a night and presenting that is so difficult. I've been thinking of building a campaign with 'specials', each designed to address a specific aspect, philosophy or theme. Has anybody done this successfully? Does it end up being somewhat haphazard and piecemeal; in other words hard to follow? What have been your experiences?
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 8, 2013 19:29:14 GMT -6
Bexley, I'm curious to hear what you mean by a campaign of "specials" - could you elaborate on that?
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 8, 2013 19:39:58 GMT -6
Bexley, I'm curious to hear what you mean by a campaign of "specials" - could you elaborate on that? Certainly. They way I understand the term is that they are a more focused area or centrepiece in old dungeon modules. Since I am planning a mega-dungeon, I was thinking of turning whole sessions into focusing around these dungeon specials in order to convey a wider world, cosmology, and mythology. Oh, I should hasten to add that for me specials are not just one element within a room but a series of interconnected rooms. Mini-dungeons with a bigger dungeon. Dungeons with dungeons if you will. To try and clarify a bit more. Extremely focused adventures based around a high concept model in order to deliver detail to my players.
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 8, 2013 20:43:59 GMT -6
Redbaron, could you please clarify what you meant by your comment about megadungeons giving off an aroma of stagnation and repetition? I ask because I want to clarify if this is a general attitude you take to megadungeons, ie you just don't like them, of if you just don't think they are adequate for Bexley's purpose. No right or wrong answers here, I'm just curious to hear your thoughts. I think a lot of people do like to design megadungeons with themed areas in a manner like what Bexley describes. Some might even say it is essential. One idea I thought was cool was designing a megadungeon the "Moldvay way" ie design a bunch of smaller scenario dungeons as per the Moldvay rules, but then have them be smaller sections of a megadungeon.
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 8, 2013 20:45:07 GMT -6
By the way, thanks for sharing Bexley. Further thoughts would be interesting to read. You sound like you have some cool ideas.
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idrahil
Level 6 Magician
The Lighter The Rules, The Better The Game!
Posts: 398
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Post by idrahil on Aug 8, 2013 21:50:53 GMT -6
Hello again Ink,
I am a big lover of Tolkien and I guess I just wanted to run a campaign where there were Lawful people, advanced and enlightened, coming into a dangerous land to reclaim it. The land isn't 100% evil, it is chaotic. There are human kingdoms and demi-human lands but they are like the Dark Ages while the players come from a wonderful, benevolent kingdom (like Numenor or Camelot).
The campaign is simple but layered. Meaning, Since I play with my wife, a friend and my kids I have to balance simplicity with some complexity. So I don't get too convoluted but the world "lives". I make heavy use of rival adventure parties and Knights Errant who go forth and do good things so if the players get rumors or leads for say 6 adventures, they usually only get to do 3 or 4. Someone else claims the other. (Bounty, Magic Sword, etc.) This is cool because they spend time convincing each other to go after different things and it matters to them because they know it might not be available.
Instead of standard mega-dungeons, I run 1-3 level dungeons in (what I have come to learn is) a very Holmes-like way with long corridors, big rooms that are sometimes empty of monsters but I always try to make them interesting, even if empty (20x20 room with rubbish 2' deep in the corners. A skeleton with ruined equipment and a tarnished copper locket with an inscription).
The above room was just an afterthought by me. My idea was that an adventurer died in that room long ago and the locket was given to him by his sweetheart. The players spent quite a bit in there, debating about the relevance of it all. And levers that do things elsewhere in the dungeon....oh man they get caught up with that sort of stuff. Or, how to get their treasure past the 20' pit trap.
I dunno, My maps are just pretty simple and the ones I use from the OSR are the simple ones. But they seemto interest my players and we have alot of fun. I guess that's the point though. Just have fun!
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Post by scottenkainen on Aug 8, 2013 22:41:31 GMT -6
(I'm going to assume you want OD&D campaigns and swords & sorcery retroclones only? Despite my deep interest in OD&D, I only currently run H&H and AD&D...) Not at all. I'm very interested in hearing about AD&D. What is H&H? I've never read AD&D but I'm under the impression that a lot of people use it to supplement OD&D. I think hearing and discussing widely in a D&D framework would be interesting and ultimately useful/helpful. H&H is Hideouts & Hoodlums. I've been running it on this messageboard since January. When I want to run fantasy, I usually wind up using 1st ed. AD&D because it's the system I've run the longest and know the best. Technically, I think Holmes Basic is the better-balanced game system, but familiarity always trumps perfection for me. And, really, I always wind up tweaking things with a longer and longer house rules document, even if I intend at the start to run the whole thing from the books as-is. More often than not, I'll use the World of Greyhawk as my setting. I love Greyhawk because it's a familiar-feeling framework, perfectly suited to AD&D, that leaves me plenty of room to design as much detail as I want. With my more ambitious campaigns, I wrote lots of pages detailing every city, town, village, major encounter area, major NPC, plus partial scripts to work from as I anticipate the narrative going. From my 10-year South Province campaign, I have folders and notebooks full of this stuff. I didn't use a lot of other people's stuff then except for maps, as it took me too long to draw good maps. Dungeons were different, though. Except for the first dungeon, I used published dungeons for the rest of the campaign. I feel I simply own too many of them not to use them. I'm running AD&D again now, but only online via chat with some of my old South Province players. I'm still using Greyhawk, but scaled down to the mini-campaign setting presented in Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth. Perhaps because I've been less ambitious this time, this is the longest I've run a game without tweaking any game mechanics. ~Scott "-enkainen" Casper
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Aug 11, 2013 16:09:33 GMT -6
Well, I am more a player than a DM, leading a oh-way-to-d**n busy life. All my D&D happens in "The Last Fantasy Campaign", an epic online campaign, continuing the story of Blackmoor with the blessing of many of the original players, and in "Mordred - The Last Adventure", my own take at an autonomous setting. My games, generally, are not very dungeon-heavy, and the LFC certainly cannot hide the influence by MERP, and Tolkienian storytelling in general. Mordred, in turn, way more influenced by "unconventional" fantasy, so to speak. As in, Earthsea, the Opar series, Thieves World... And the Bronte juvenalia. Right now, I am preparing a campaign in Mordred (the setting's name, "Summerland") that will go around "Cairn of the Skeleton King", by RJK, but likely be a very loose adaptation. Oh, and, of course, The Tempest...
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Post by The Semi-Retired Gamer on Aug 11, 2013 18:04:43 GMT -6
Interesting replies so far. I am actually starting a new campaign soon; actually, a re-launch & reboot of an earlier campaign in my world of Toldara. It began under 3E rules then eventually migrated to Pathfinder. I am getting a new group together that will be a mix of old school, new school, and even a brand new player or two so I am going for something a little easier to manage with Swords & Wizardry: Complete. I am pretty much going by the book but there are a few custom classes, races, & monsters unique to the world. I decided to take some stuff I had learned from the earlier campaign and mix it in with some new ideas and just go from there. Some of the main influences include books I enjoy like the Prydain Chronicles, Hammer Horror, and tidbits gathered here and there.
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 13, 2013 8:30:04 GMT -6
One last thing about my worlds. Thus far, I don't create worlds. I create scenarios. That usually means the bottom up approach of town/surrounding area/ dungeon. I just create the bare minimum to have a playable game. PArt of this is because I can really easily get into analysis paralysis, so the more I keep it basic and somewhat abstract, the more I can get things done. I also have a hard time doing a more large scale world because I feel like, to a degree, the fictional concepts D&D imposes are not compatible with my vision (thus I very much understand why Geoffrey drops most of the contents of the game so he can do what he wants to do). I find it strains my brain too much to consider 190284109801 types of basically human monsters sharing the world, clerics from various religious orders all running around in platemail with maces, casting the EXACT SAME SPELLS, and so on. Yeah, all of it should probably strain one's sense of believability, but I think we all have our different tolerance levels for specific ideas. So, like I said, I focus on the small picture, and create just enough to do what I need to do. I think this is why a hexcrawl has not got off the ground yet, but a megadungeon seems much easier to work on, somehow. So your scenarios don't share a continuity? Have you thought of just stripping everything out and building the rules as you build your scenarios? It just seems like a lost opportunity here. I think it would be an interesting experiment of building a campaign world/rules-set off of isolated scenarios. I do share your frustrations though, that's why I have a monotheism with magic more akin to Siddhis because it doesn't really matter how many clerics there are, there are only a set number of Siddhis. For monsters, why do you feel you must include so many? Does the thought of limiting these kinds of things (clerics/monsters) seem like they would restrict your fun? The last few years have seen my own kids get really busy and I've had a harder time running games on a consistent basis. I've done a lot of modules because I don't have as much time to plan, particularly playtesting a bunch of DCC modules. My hope is to move back to my "middle years" model and run continuous games again soon. My current fad is 13th Age, which I've found to be a lot of fun and my players are enjoying a lot as well. What draws you to 13th age? I assumed you'd be a big S&W guy. How does playing 13th age as opposed to OD&D-esque games inform your adventures? Redbaron, could you please clarify what you meant by your comment about megadungeons giving off an aroma of stagnation and repetition? I ask because I want to clarify if this is a general attitude you take to megadungeons, ie you just don't like them, of if you just don't think they are adequate for Bexley's purpose. No right or wrong answers here, I'm just curious to hear your thoughts. I'll second this. At it's heart, this is what I hoped the thread would be about. How and why you choose to do the things you do, so I think it would be an interesting post.
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 13, 2013 9:21:30 GMT -6
Bexley, in answer to your question about why I don't build the rules up as I build the setting: The last year has seen me trying to play D&D more or less as is. This is because as a kid, DMing and playing, and as an adult just playing, everyone ignores most of the rules, regardless of edition. With the rise of the OSR, I saw a lot of neat discussion of the old ways, by the book, and it intrigued me. My goal has been to try to approach it as is, and then with that experience, once again return to doing it whatever way sounds good, perhaps having learned something.
In practice, my group is already moving back away from the game as is. Some of that is because of me and issues I have with the game (which I'm generally vocal about on this board), and some of it is my wife. Recently the wife was talking with me about it, and she voiced her dislike of GP=XP. Not because it doesn't make sense (she gets that it rewards adventure and careful gameplay), but because it doesn't reward a wide enough range of behaviors. She doesn't care about monsters = XP, but she likes the idea that the game doesn't HAVE to be about exploration and looting and constantly seeking money (or killing things, for that matter). She likes it to be about searching out ancient secrets, exploring strange worlds, etc. I, too, find it liberating to get rid of the XP=GP rule... now the game can be about anything, so long as it is adventurous and challenging (I like my game lethal... not too lethal, but lethal nonetheless). So we are going in the direction of Fin, Geoffrey, Zeraser, and others on this board who do a more or less free-form XP/leveling approach.
I think I am going to return to dropping the cleric and thief. I hate the cleric. The thief is cool, but I don't know if I like any implementation of it, and I'm not so picky that I can't stand fighters acting as thieves. I'm not too keen on elves and dwarves and orcs, but I can live with them sometimes.
More and more my philosophy is that it is best take the basic skeletal structure of D&D (hit dice, levels, attack bonuses, AC, exploration engine, etc), and build your own thing from the ground up. I think that there probably isn't a single one of us on these boards that couldn't, with the benefit of their existing knowledge, create something recognizable as some kind of D&D purely from scratch. It wouldn't even be that hard to do, if you weren't worried about polishing it for publication. It wouldn't be demanding, since you only need create what you need at any given session. Who really needs to look up stats for giant sea creatures or zombies or vampires? You know what they do, and you know how to make it work in your game.
As to scenarios versus more coherent worlds, that is also a lot to do with my laziness. I find it much more interesting to read what other people are doing in D&D than to actually hash out my own thing. I'd really rather be a player in a game run by someone who shares similar gaming philosophies (a lot of folks here would be great to play with). My last few games were totally improvised, because I couldn't bring myself to create anything.
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idrahil
Level 6 Magician
The Lighter The Rules, The Better The Game!
Posts: 398
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Post by idrahil on Aug 13, 2013 9:41:51 GMT -6
Not to answer for Rebaron, I would like to answer that question to give my reasons for not using megadungeons.
They are very repetitive in that they are many rooms jumbled into each other with halls ways and angled rooms and such. After a while, I see the same thing over and over.
Don't get me wrong, I see the maps posted here and in modules and I'm amazed! I just am not very good at running them (megadungeon maps) or making them interesting. The "blame" for not running adventures based in them falls on me. I like smaller maps (20-30 rooms) spanning 1-3 levels.
All that said, I do run with doors that must be forced open or unlocked by a thief. This is not the same thing though. Not all doors have a lock (and so must be force open). Doors that can snap shut behind the group, monster reaction (neutral or positive reactions lead to great RPing). Foes can see in the dark but the players cant. I like the underworld to be weird, just not so confusing (to me).
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 13, 2013 10:13:54 GMT -6
Not to answer for Rebaron, I would like to answer that question to give my reasons for not using megadungeons. They are very repetitive in that they are many rooms jumbled into each other with halls ways and angled rooms and such. After a while, I see the same thing over and over. Don't get me wrong, I see the maps posted here and in modules and I'm amazed! I just am not very good at running them (megadungeon maps) or making them interesting. The "blame" for not running adventures based in them falls on me. I like smaller maps (20-30 rooms) spanning 1-3 levels. All that said, I do run with doors that must be forced open or unlocked by a thief. This is not the same thing though. Not all doors have a lock (and so must be force open). Doors that can snap shut behind the group, monster reaction (neutral or positive reactions lead to great RPing). Foes can see in the dark but the players cant. I like the underworld to be weird, just not so confusing (to me). How do you build dungeons? Perhaps experimentation with doors would be beneficial. For me, everything in a dungeon needs purpose otherwise it becomes meaningless. Meaning through meaninglessness, as the tao would advise us, can be very poignant. A locked door is fairly mundane, meaningless, by itself and so it needs a bigger picture. Same for empty rooms. One should use empty rooms to give subterranean worlds form or act as a piece in a larger puzzle. Thus the meaningless has meaning. I think people see empty rooms and jumbled halls as limitations but they are there to bring balance to the dungeon. Don't waste such a valuable opportunity. Of course, I could be way off base with your specific troubles.
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Post by inkmeister on Aug 13, 2013 13:19:24 GMT -6
I was, and am, genuinely interested in having RedBaron expand on his position on megadungeons. His statement was so strong and provocative, it could only be interesting to hear more about it.
I think I see where he is coming from, and I can well understand why the megadungeon (and indeed, the idea of dungeons in general) is not for everyone. For me, the concept is like nerd crack, and I love reading about them and I have a good degree of fun designing my own (mixed with frustration, dissatisfaction, analysis paralysis, etc).
One good point I think RedBaron was making is that having an epic dungeon is a little like having your eggs all in one basket. Of course that's not literally true. Benoist has done an amazing job showing his approach to megadungeon creation, and he makes it really clear in various posts that his dungeon is there if people want to explore it, but that they are free to go and do other things; the choice is theirs. But I think it is still tilted in such a way that if you are building a megadungeon, your game is going to tend to be invested in that. Not that it has to be, but that it will tend to be. If you go the other route of smaller dungeons, perhaps Idrahil style, it seems easier to encourage traveling and exploration of the wider world. I could be wrong, but I genuinely suspect most players, while perhaps willing to experiment with the megadungeon game, would prefer something else with more variety; more overland travel, more town based shenanigans, many different types of dungeons and ruins to explore, and so on. Most folks I've known don't even like dungeons at all (but this is roleplayers in general, not old school D&D types).
Anyway, there is no reason you can't have all the weird, exotic places be in the centrally placed dungeon, but why not have the lich fortress be over the mountains there, and the fungi forest under ground here, and the weird alien spaceship somewhere in the dark forest?
I think the reason Gygax emphasized the megadungeon - and I could be wrong - is that I think he was a man of details, and wanted an objective world to present to his players. I don't doubt he was expert at improv, but I think he probably prefered details. I understand he really detailed his towns, too, whereas a lot of people won't bother mapping a town. Given that he was creating the hobby, and didn't have tons of resources to fall back on like we do now, he went ahead with the most obvious choice; a big ol' dungeon. It's a practical thing to do. I think that's where the standard model of dungeon-town-wilderness comes from.
I think gradually people got more comfortable running outside the dungeon, and a lot of players prefer it. Why delve the same hole when you can go all kinds of places and do all kinds of things?
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Post by Red Baron on Aug 13, 2013 15:03:03 GMT -6
I was, and am, genuinely interested in having RedBaron expand on his position on megadungeons. Adventurers go on adventures. They don't spend their (short) lives in one town and one hole in the ground. Players should be allowed to explore an unknown world with the wonders of every genre of fantasy, horror, and science fiction. Dozens of little locations make each game an adventure. Preparing to slay the vampire that lives in that tower on the hill, discovering a magical pool with an intelligent naga to talk with, or walking past the glowing fluid tanks in an ancient spaceship makes the game about a series of adventures on which the heroes go.
I'd rather players try to climb a mountain or go into the spooky woods to discover what lies within than make the same trek back and forth from the dungeon week after week. If the heroes steal a boat, make up an adventure about buried pirate treasure or a sunken ship. If they climb the mountain, invent a mystic hermit who'll answer their queries about the meaning of life and the nature of the universe or maybe there's a ladder on the summit leading straight up to cloudworld. Let your players act on their whims and go where they will and destroy what they wish.
Megadungeons are just very confining. If you can pass off the underworld as an infinite labyrinth filled with endless wonders and magic and hazards, and keep the game fresh and unconfining then do so. I just feel that most Judges, myself included, don't have the creativity and endurance to churn out hundreds of new and mystifying oddities for players to poke at in a single setting, especially one that's already been as thoroughly exhausted as the dungeon. Its a lot easier to come up with a really cool and inventive location based on something in that dark kung fu movie you just saw or the book on dinosaurs you gave to your cousin's daughter for her birthday. New ideas catch you all the time so make use of them. Let players get out there, go adventuring, and see what fantastic new thing they'll find this time.
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 14, 2013 12:34:35 GMT -6
Fair points all. The way I visualise adventure is fairly different. For me, the dungeon is not just a hole in the ground but a series of fantastical locations which provide mystery and exploration. I have a need to create unified mythos and this is the dungeon's strength. I can't see where you guys feel they are confines rather than infinite possibilities.
I view the above ground as a place for living, where peoples can be free to build societies and this is anti-thetical to adventure in my mind. Societies need the mundane to grow, a world filled with myth encroaching on living spaces just seems like one filled with nomadic peoples. It wouldn't make much sense to stay in one spot which was prone to other-wordly troubles. I mean, humans are bad enough not to mention pilling on top all the other beasties and their motivations.
I think this is why the mythological and the mundane have always had a clear separation throughout imagined history, at least in non-animistic societies and even then in animism mythological creatures are usually there for support, to draw power from, and just be generally useful. In days of yore, fairy forts were away from settlements because people didn't move around as freely as we do today and thus the spatial myth grew. One could even argue that such myths were used to restrict movement or at least discourage the kind of exploration we take for granted in modern history.
Anyway, perhaps I am less whimsical than you guys or maybe we see the same thing in contradiction.
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terrex
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 108
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Post by terrex on Aug 18, 2013 21:13:42 GMT -6
My group plays AD&D 1e. We quickly "graduated" from what we called the Blue Basic Book to AD&D in about 1980-81. We rejected 2E on sight, and didn't even consider 3E, 4E, etc., etc. Right now, we have a stable of about ten players. Four of us played together as long ago as 81' or so. Most of the others came around in 89' or so. All of these guys, including me, have only played AD&D 1e nearly exclusively. Three of the ten have DMed recently. The other seven are gamers enough to own some books and dice, but would be very unlikely to vist an rpg forum, etc. AD&D 1e is the language we all speak and I don't think we'd ever consider changing.
The current setting is somewhat generic and not overly developed -- just a regional map right now. I think the setting feels quite a bit like Greyhawk. For a long time we used the Greyhawk map and LOOSELY used notes from the folio. But, recently we haven't been using the World of Greyhawk map and there's not even a world map at all. One thing that might differentiate our setting, is we highly leverage the AD&D Deities & Demigods in play. Most clerics, PC and NPC, are agents of the various historical-based pantheons. I'd say clerics probably are more common and play a bigger role in our campaigns than I've seen/read about other campaigns.
The theme of play has changed a lot over the years. We used to use Unearthed Arcana. Something about the employment of the cavalier and barbarian classes kind of took us out of the dungeon in the 90's early 00's. But, recently we re-booted things eliminating Unearthed Arcana (and edging back toward more of a by-the-book focus). The current campaign has been much more dungeon-oriented. Fight On!'s Darkness Beneath megadungeon has been one of the major attractions in the latest campaign. This is actually the first time we have used a megadungeon in play.
In regard to my DMing, I really try to get the biggest bang for our buck when we play these days. Time is so short and valuable for busy adults. I try to be very prepared. The players agree to an objective a week or so before the game and I prepare accordingly. Our games are kind of intense due to the fact that we crank out 6+ solid hours of play when we are able to get together. Everyone knows we're there to play AD&D.
There's a lot more to say, but hopefully that's good for a start.
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bexley
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 104
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Post by bexley on Aug 20, 2013 19:28:24 GMT -6
Most clerics, PC and NPC, are agents of the various historical-based pantheons. I'd say clerics probably are more common and play a bigger role in our campaigns than I've seen/read about other campaigns. I find most people don't want to deal with any sort of religion in this kind of detail. Are all your players of similar world-views? Does the tighter focus on clerics create more tension in terms of dogmatism or dogmatic characters? This is quite interesting. What do you think it is about those classes which caused you to play more holistically? I can't say I can think of anything off the top of my head which makes those two classes any more or less dungeon-y than Clerics or Wizards. Did you find the UA play experience fun or do you prefer the segmented play that develops from a megadungeon? I like the idea of setting a goal before hand, especially if it leads to intensity. Do you think this is causal though? Intensity could also be symptomatic of time restraints. Would you be able to expand on your preparation process? For instance, how exactly do get the biggest bang for your buck? What do you focus on and what do you find is inessential?
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terrex
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 108
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Post by terrex on Aug 21, 2013 10:59:13 GMT -6
I find most people don't want to deal with any sort of religion in this kind of detail. Are all your players of similar world-views? Does the tighter focus on clerics create more tension in terms of dogmatism or dogmatic characters? We've never had any problems from a real-world religious point of view in regard to using historical real world deities in our D&D games. Our players vary widely in religion and politics. But, nothing about D&D has ever inflamed those differences. In fact, it's probably done more to bring us to common ground. I'll answer your second question with an example. One of my most recent characters was a human cleric. His deity was Catequil, Incan god of thunder and lightning (and desirous of claiming the sphere of war). My 1st level character's short-term goals were in line with everyone else's: adventure and win treasure. His intermediate goals were to ally himself with strong fighter and earn a strong reputation in the region. And his long term goals were to establish a temple/oracle. He documented the party's exploits on a khipu (an Incan thread-based language) and had his eye open on acquiring land that had been struck by lightning. None of this type of thing creates tension. In fact, we're more likely to run into tension with the paladin and druid classes (and the barbarian and cavalier when we used them) than with the cleric operating in this fashion. I think the AD&D Deities & Demigods book put us on this path in our youth. And, like most everyting in the first four AD&D books, we stuck with it. Just as the character classes are derived from useful historical/fictional archetypes (Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thieves), in our campaigns the deities are usually archetypes based on real-word deities many can usually immediately relate to. The idea is the various pantheons of gods are vying for influence in worlds throughout the multiverse. This is quite interesting. What do you think it is about those classes which caused you to play more holistically? I can't say I can think of anything off the top of my head which makes those two classes any more or less dungeon-y than Clerics or Wizards. Did you find the UA play experience fun or do you prefer the segmented play that develops from a megadungeon? We played the cavalier class, by the book -- "with great power comes great responsibility". Given his power level, his code, and implied social/monetary backing the cavalier tended to drift toward the central figure in our campaigns. Role-playing the cavalier's status and his responsibilities increasingly took us down a path of feudal rivalry/politics. Couple that with the mounted-focus of the class and we gravitated more and more to above-the-dungeon play. It didn't have to be this way, but that was our experience and I suspect there are other campaigns that were effected similarly. The barbarian class created their own strains on traditional dungeoneering, too. AD&D barbarians are not supposed to associate with magic-users, they're expected to destroy magic items, etc. The class seemed to work better in the outdoors with more room to breathe. Of our ten current players, three DM at least some of the time. I DM the most often and I was the one that decided to remove UA from the table and purposefully emphasize the dungeon again. I've enjoyed the change immensely. I think most of the players have, too. Although, there are those that would like to return to more town/outdoor adventuring than we have done of late. I like the idea of setting a goal before hand, especially if it leads to intensity. Do you think this is causal though? Intensity could also be symptomatic of time restraints. Would you be able to expand on your preparation process? For instance, how exactly do get the biggest bang for your buck? What do you focus on and what do you find is inessential? Setting a goal before hand has been a useful reminder for all that the players control their actions, decide what they do, and when they do it. The email pre-planning is something we never did in any form back in the day. But, now, the pre-planning is sophisiticated at times which helps on several levels. The players are a bit more immersed and imaginative in terms of determining objectives and how they want to carry out operations. In regard to my DM preparation, I've been mainly using OSR product for dungeons, lately. If I use a product I read it thuroughly and make brief notes for most rooms. Once I know where they are going and trying to accomplish, I re-read that applicable sections right before the upcoming session, adjust the dungeon and wandering monster tables based on previous sessions results, time elapsed, etc.
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Post by aldarron on Aug 30, 2013 19:05:35 GMT -6
My campaign has been set in Blackmoor, but not at the time off the DA series or even the FFC. My campaign takes place circa 840 on the Blackmoor timeline; that's about 180 to 200 years prior to the time of the FFC heroes or the age of King Uther and all that. It is set when the Northern Marches are ruled by three major factions of wizard kings at war, and the town of Blackmoor itself is in the hand of the most ruthless and powerful wizard king, Raddan Goss. My players have never ventured near the place. Instead they wander the wilderlands of what will eventually become the Duchy of Ten, often following leads and treasure maps and trying to stay one step ahead of the cult of Id, who would like nothing better than to have their heads on a platter.
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Post by Fearghus on Aug 31, 2013 7:47:23 GMT -6
I run a couple of campaigns, but none are ODD. One uses the Pathfinder ruleset in the Forgotten Realms. It is a bit ridiculous as it is a campaign that started in 2nd edition and migrated through 3.0, 3.5, and now PF.
The other I run is a PBP using the Labyrinth Lord and Advanced Edition Companion rules. It is a very localized campaign inspired by Lord Dunsany's The Fortress Unvanquishable. I started it as a means to flesh out Allathurion and the surrounding grassy space and woodlands. The intent of course being to play through the coming of comet and nightmare state on Allathurion, the hunt for Sacnoth, and then the confrontation of Gaznak at the fortress. As I read more Dunsany stories I flesh out other areas (at the 10,000 foot level atm). Unfortunately I have no other ideas once the battle with Gaznak ends, and I am rushing to present materials for the players to pave the way from 1-7 or so to actually play the end part. I enjoy it.
My next one will be put some effort into various Clark Ashton Smith settings and then write scenario's and adventures surrounding his stories.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Sept 3, 2013 11:00:36 GMT -6
One of my most recent characters was a human cleric. His deity was Catequil, Incan god of thunder and lightning (and desirous of claiming the sphere of war). My 1st level character's short-term goals were in line with everyone else's: adventure and win treasure. His intermediate goals were to ally himself with strong fighter and earn a strong reputation in the region. That's possibly the coolest cleric I have ever heard of.
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