Another Lankhmar Update: Don't Forget Savage Worlds LANKHMAR!

Earlier this week, I shared my excitement that Goodman Games had acquired a license to release adventures that take place in Fritz Leiber's classic Lankhmar/Nehwon setting. Toward the end of the post, I mentioned that Pinnacle Entertainment Group's Savage Worlds role playing game was the only other game that I thought had the potential to capture the Sword & Sorcery feel of the setting. When I wrote that, I knew that Pinnacle was planning to release their own Lankhmar related products, but I did not know when that release would occur.

Now I do. The Savage Worlds setting book for Lankhmar: City of Thieves will go on sale April 14th. At that time, purchasers will be able to pick up copies of the PDF and pre-order the print copy of the book.

Pinnacle has also given us a glimpse of what the rules will look like with the "No Honor Among Thieves" rule.

No Honor Among Thieves

Betrayal is a part of life in the City of Thieves. Sometimes a companion double-crosses his mates over a few gold pieces. Other times he might cheat on a friend over the love of a woman. Most of these betrayals are met with a wry smile and a vow to reciprocate at some future date. There is no honor among thieves, after all.

Sometimes the betrayal is more personal. In Lankhmar, whenever a character is betrayed by a close friend or associate (a trusted ally or even another player character—Game Master’s call), he cannot spend a Benny to reroll any opposed defensive action.

If the betrayal is an actual attack (almost assuredly with The Drop) and the victim doesn’t Soak all the wounds and / or remove the Shaken, he must make a Vigor roll versus the damage or go unconsciousness per the Knock Out Blow rules on page 25). He may not spend Bennies on this roll.

This rule is an example of how easily the Savage Worlds rules set, and in particular it's ability to incorporate "Setting Rules," make it a good fit for the Lankhmar setting.

I do have one minor complaint though. The image of Fafhrd in the banner ad above doesn't capture the humor he is often expressed as having in the stories. Fafhrd laughs in the face of danger and is often boisterous in the face of adversity. To be fair, the image looks to take place after a particularly dire moment in the series (no spoiler, but rage would be an appropriate expression), but it is too rare that Fafhrd is show smiling. Thankfully, the Pinnacle website has what must be one of the first illustrations of a happy Fafhrd, made all the more enjoyable because he is too rarely illustrated this way.

Scott Taylor's THE FOLIO Looks Like the Best Fantasy Module Series in a Long Time

Move over Pathfinder Adventure Path. Move over Kobold's Midgard based adventures. There is a new kid entering the D&D compatible adventure market and this kid looks to knock it out of the park on the first pitch.

Mixed metaphors aside, I cannot be more excited than I currently am about R Scott Taylor's current THE FOLIO Kickstarter campaign. Over the years, I've backed a lot of Kickstarters and I've purchased a lot of Old School "feel" adventures for D&D...going back to Necromancer Games' CRUCIBLE OF FREYA. For those who read that and say, "oh yeah...that's not 'old school' because I own a first edition of Tegel Manor," let me say that FREYA was the first of the "old school feel" adventures. TEGEL MANOR is actual old school and there is a difference. One pulls the strings of nostalgia and the other establishes nostalgia.

R Scott Taylor's THE FOLIO looks like it might just do the impossible. It might simultaneously pull the strings of nostalgia while creating nostalgia. Scott's work as an art director really shows on the early design of the project, and I don't think I've been as excited about a new D&D product in a long time. I was excited about 5e, REALLY excited, but my excitement for this project makes my 5e anticipation look like passing interest.

 

I hope that THE FOLIO lives up to what it looks to be offering.

#RPGaDAY #5 Most Old School RPG Owned: Did you even have to ask?

The fifth topic of @autocratik's (aka +Autocratik ) #RPGaDAY list is the Most "Old School" RPG owned. Like most of the prompts in the #RPGaDAY list, this one got me thinking about what Dave Chapman meant by "old school." Did he mean Old School in the sense of the Old School Renaissance movement which used the OGL to create games that evoked play that echoed the way games used to be played, or did he mean the games themselves? It could mean either as sometimes when one refers to "old school" one is only talking about the metacognitve content that is referring to an older age and not to that older age itself. The material from that older age might be called "classic" while the modern material that evokes that feel might be called "old school."

I know that this may be a bit too pedantic, but since I am writing full blog posts rather than merely providing a one sentence reply, I reserve the ancient right of industrious pedantry. Michael J. Finch - author of Swords & Wizardry which happens to be an "old school" game for which I own the "white box" edition - writes in his "A Quick Primer for Old School Gaming" that for an old school game like Swords & Wizardry "just printing the rules an starting to play as you normally do will produce a completely pathetic gaming session -- you'll decide that 0e is just missing all kinds of important rules. What makes 0e different from other games isn't the rules themselves, it's how they're used."

To phrase it in a cruder and less flattering light, "Old School Games are games that are missing rules, but are cool enough to inspire you to make your own." That's not exactly what Michael is saying, but it's kind of what I think the Old School Games actually were. Original D&D was so vague in its mechanics that it lead to the creation of a host of other role playing games -- starting with Ken St. Andre's innovative Tunnels & Trolls (which I blogged about here). The game that best captures this "missing rules but great inspiration" is Superhero 2044. The game is incomplete as it is, but it influenced so many later games like Champions and Superworld as I discussed in this earlier post.

By this "missing rules but great inspiration" criterion, most of the successful OSR movement games qualify. Those that don't qualify lack the inspiration component of the equation, though there are a couple of OSR games that are more "Middle Age" School than Old  School and have more complete rules as the games of the 2nd age of RPGs tended to. Among the most successful of these OSR games - and these are all games I own - I'd list Swords & Wizardry, Adventurer Conqueror King, and Lamentations of the Flame Princess.

Having said that these games qualify as Old School Games, I'm going to revert to the easiest answer to the initial question and combine it with the new definition. I'll be answering what game from the 1st generation of RPGs I own is the "Most Old School" or best exemplifies the "missing rules, but great inspiration" mentality. I thought about Superhero 2044, but have decided against it.

I own a copy of the White Box Collector's Edition of Dungeons & Dragons - as well as all of the supplements - and I certainly think that it is in the competition. The core 3 "little brown books" do not contain enough clarification on the combat system to make a completely playable game, add to that a lack of mechanics for a host of other situations, and it falls firmly in the "missing rules camp." The supplements like Blackmoor, Greyhawk, and Eldritch Wizardry added a rich inspirational flare - as did Gygax's prose - all of which make it a strong contender for the title.

But Game Designer's Workshop's En Garde! is a strong competitor. It is filled with tidbits of background and inspiration and yet is lacking in a number of mechanical areas. I say lacking, but let's face it a part of the OSR movement happened due to the fact that a lot of rules may not actually be necessary. I love En Garde!'s dueling mechanic, and I love that it is "dedicated" to Danny Kaye - among others. 

Fletcher Pratt's Naval Game isn't a role playing game, but since his Harold Shea novels (co-written with Sprague De Camp) and this game influenced the creation of D&D, I thought I'd list it hear as in the running. The game requires you to own Jane's Fighting Ships or similar book to properly play. 

Then there's the Fantasy Heartbreaker entry. The Complete Warlock is a product of the Southern California gaming scene and is an attempt to fill in some of those areas that were missing in the D&D rules set. There is a lot to like in Warlock and it is clear that it influenced J. Eric Holmes' writing on the Basic Set of D&D. It has critical hit charts, percentile based combat charts (by weapon), a spell point system, level based abilities for Thieves akin to 4e, Elves as a class, and a cornucopia of alternate ways to "play D&D." I'm desperately tempted to call this glorious book the "most old school RPG" I own.

In the end though, Original D&D wins out. I'm still not sure how to play this game. Have you checked out that initiative system in Eldritch Wizardry? Do you use it?

Special Self-Promotion Section

As a reminder, I am in the middle of a Kickstarter for a second series of Cthulhu Claus Holiday Cards. You can back it by clicking the link in the side bar. A picture of the first series is below.

D&D -- Manuals of Monsters and How They Have Presented Them OD&D to Present

This year marks the 40th Anniversary of the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game and the release of the "5th Edition" of the Dungeons & Dragons rules. Long time fans of the game will understand that there are scare quotes around 5th Edition due to the fact that there is room for discussion that there have been seven or more editions of the game, depending on how you count a new edition. I've enjoyed each edition of the game and have never taken sides in any of the edition wars. If you were to ask me what my favorite edition of the game is, I would answer with the Weem's rallying cry:

While I haven't taken part in any edition wars, I have noticed some things that I think have contributed to negative sentiments some players have regarding various editions of the game. For example, I believe that one of the main factors contributing to criticism of 4th edition D&D is quite simply the graphic design choices and "fluff" choices that the game designers made in the construction of that rules set. I believe that Robert Schwalb's observation are essentially correct . You can see an example of how Robert would have reformatted some of the information here. It's a little rough around the edges, but you can quickly see how 4th edition could have been formatted to look more like previous editions.

I also believe that many of the complaints people had about changes in the rules of 4th edition are actually due to their own house ruling of earlier games. For example, complaints about required miniatures use ignore the fact that 3rd edition's flanking and attack of opportunity rules made miniatures a vital component of that game. In fact, 3rd edition was the first time I ever used miniatures in any non-Champions game I'd played. This isn't to say that there aren't legitimate criticisms of 4th edition's combat system - it can bog down and take an hour plus to run a combat - just to say that some of those criticisms also apply to other editions as well. In fact, I would argue that the presentation of the rules in 4th edition is WHY so many people think the game is radically different rules wise. There is no fluff or context for almost anything presented in the rules. The abilities of the classes are presented in a Magic the Gathering style box, with Magic style text, but there is no sense of place in any of the rules. That is a killer and the graphic design hurt tremendously.

No where is this more evident than in the presentation of monsters. For over 30 years the Dungeons & Dragons game had been increasing the amount of "fluff" in its monster entries. Early editions of the game had minimal information scattered over many pages - or even a couple of booklets. By 3rd edition there was a combination of beautiful and useful statistic blocks combined with ample ecological and sociological data about the monster that was being presented. 4th edition - prior to the publication of the excellent Essentials Monster Vault: Threats to the Nentir Vale - completely reversed this trend. It returned to the earliest days of presenting monsters as little more than a set of numbers. I believe that this was one of the primary reasons players thought that 4th edition was less able to facilitate "role play" instead of "roll play" than earlier editions. I have often argued the opposite as page 42 of the DMG and the Monster Manual on a business card are almost everything a DM needs to run 4th edition. The DM can wing the rest and up the role play all day. I have argued that many times, and believe it to be true, but I cannot argue that the presentation of the monsters as mere lines of numbers doesn't convey the sense that "role play" was far less important in the minds of the designers than "roll play." 

I think the best way to demonstrate the history of monster presentations in D&D is not a discussion, but a demonstration. The following are stat blocks from the various editions of D&D selected to highlight how each edition added depth of presentation to the monsters...until 4th edition...and how 5th edition has restarted the tradition of more detailed entries with greater verisimilitude. One caveat. The entry for OD&D was pieced together by me from information contained on multiple pages in two booklets. Those booklets are Book II: Monsters and Treasure from the OD&D box set and the Greyhawk Supplement. I own physical copies of all the books featured in this article.

Original D&D

The OD&D Gnoll features very little information about Gnoll's as a creature and the illustration makes it difficult to visualize what kind of creature this actually is. The reference to "Lord Sunsany" (Dunsany?) not making clear what Gnolls are like only ads confusion to the reader. There is room for the Dungeon master to expand on the information, but there is no context for the creature and it is primarily being presented as a set of numbers that players can fight. The "number of attacks" and "points of damage" information come from the Greyhawk supplement as all attacks did 1-6 in the primary OD&D rulebooks.

Advanced D&D Monster Manual

You can clearly see a radical shift in emphasis between OD&D and the Monster Manual. Gygax not only describes what the Gnoll looks like, but provides sociological and ecological information. We know where Gnolls live. We know a little bit about their social  structure. We also have a better illustration of the creature.

Moldvay Basic Set

The Moldvay Basic Gnoll is very similar to the one presented in the OD&D boxed set. This is likely due to the introductory nature of the rule book. It should be noted here though that the presentation here is cleaner than in OD&D and that there is some description of appearance and mannerism. It isn't as complete as the Monster Manual, but it is still a step up from OD&D.

Second Edition Monstrous Compendium

By Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2nd Edition, TSR was providing a great deal of information about their monsters. This Gnoll entry takes information from the earlier MM and organizes it into a more cohesive order and provides some roleplaying information about Gnoll behavior. This is a very useful stat block.

Third Edition Monster Manual

The 3rd edition Gnoll has excellent art, but after the 2nd edition Monstrous Compendium's single page per monster layout the need to flip between two pages to get the information is less than ideal. The description provides a number of interesting bit about society and appearance. There is also a good section on how to use the monster in combat. Notice here the inclusion of factors like "reach" which comes into play for the attacks of opportunity. This has the best art so far. The 3.5 rulebook is similar with added information regarding level adjustments and Gnolls as characters. The stat block section is considerably larger in 3.5 due to the inclusion of information regarding "touch" and "flat footed" armor classes. All of which is done to speed up play in a tactical game by removing from the DM the need to do math on the fly.

4th Edition Monster Manual

First, let me say that there is some cool stuff in here. There are multiple types of Gnoll, each with distinct attack types. The art is more cartoony than 3rd, but I really like it. If you want to run combat, there is good advice. If you read the "Gnoll Lore" section, there are some interesting tidbits. BUT...everything is presented related to some mechanic. The Gnoll Lore is given in increments based on skill checks. It isn't narrative fluff, it's "stuff you roll for." Encounters are set up including terms like "level 8 brute" which means almost nothing to the new gamer and makes it seem like you are putting together a Warhammer Fantasy Battle or Warmachine group. And that's the crux of the ire right there. The entry focuses on the mechanical and miniature wargame elements of D&D. Is there stuff that makes for good role play here? Sure. Take this quote, "slaves who show strength and savagery might be indoctrinated into the gnoll vanguard." That's pretty cool, but it requires a DC 25 to know. Huh? The DC to know set up was something that I largely ignored in 4th edition, just like I ignored "segments" and "weapon vs. armor type" in AD&D (though a recent issue of Gygax Magazine demonstrated that at least Lenard Lakofka uses them in his games). 

What About 5th Edition?

It looks like they've returned to - and taken a step further - the presentation style they used in 3rd edition and merging it with the ease of use of the 2nd edition presentation. This post at Critical Hits shows the Bullette and this one from Dread Gazebo shows the Umber Hulk.  Wizards of the Coast has been kind enough to provide us with the Sphinx.

If you want to know why I'm so excited about 5th edition. This is why. There is a full page of narrative description of sphinxes that also includes an inset of the riddle from a classic AD&D module. The art is very good and the layout is wonderful. The stat block tells you a lot about the new D&D edition. Check out that Armor Class. It's only 17 for a Challenge 17 monster. For a 4e player, who is used to AC increasing by one per level or for a 3rd edition player who is used to Fighters adding +1 to hit every level, this must seem quite low. In fact, it isn't for 5e. Yes, the monster is likely to be hit fairly frequently by appropriate level opponents - but the 199 hit points will help it stick around. Also examine that section on Legendary Actions. This is a modification of one of my favorite developments in later expansions for 4e, monsters taking actions during an opponent's turn. In this case at the end of an opponent's turn. The stat block also isn't as reliant on miniatures based mechanics as the 4e block. I've written a couple of posts on "Zones of Control" for this blog that demonstrate that D&D has always been a miniatures war game, but it has typically been one where one can ignore that element and move on with game play. 3.x and 4e made that more difficult than earlier editions, but we seem to be moving back toward a nice balance.

#RPGaDAY #3: First RPG Purchased -- Tunnels & Trolls 5th Edition

It happened approximately one month before the Great Sweet Pickles Bus War of 7th grade. My friend Mark and I had been competing over who could purchase the most Michael Whelan covered Elric novels and who could purchase the most obscure role playing game. Given the number of game stores in Reno, NV at the time and the purchasing power of 7th graders, the phrase "obscure roleplaying game" is better defined as "a game not published by TSR."

Mark struck first with his purchase of the Tunnels & Trolls 5th edition rules from Flying Buffalo. I was really impressed when Mark showed me his copy and I knew that I had to find my own copy - and get some of those "solo dungeons" that used the Tunnels & Trolls system. It didn't take long for me to find the rules and copies of Arena of Khazan, City of Terrors, and Beyond the Silvered Pane. Before I knew it, I was enjoying hours upon hours of role playing fun. I had a file card case full of combatants for Arena of Khazan, and a handful of characters who survived long enough to become precious to me.

While there are some detractors of the Tunnels & Trolls game system, I have always thought that the game was not only enjoyable but also innovative.

1. Liz Danforth's art and editing in the 5th edition of the game set it apart from many other publication of the era. The 5th edition is a truly professional edition and prior to the soon to be released "Deluxe Edition" it has been my go to edition of the game.
2. Ken St. Andre's version of the Saving Throw as presented in T&T has had a deep influence on the gaming industry. Where D&D at the time had saves for "spells," "poison," and "rods, staves, wands" T&T had a system that used a character's attributes against a target number. It took D&D several generations before they adopted something similar with the 3rd edition rules set, and completed the transition with their own 5th edition. Prior to 3.0, stat checks in D&D were typically "roll stat value or less on d20" and 3.0 changed that to roll d20+stat modifier vs. target. T&T's system uses a simple formula [15 + (level of challenge x 5)] - Statistic = Target Number on open ended 2d6. Dan Eastwood does a nice statistical breakdown of the system here.
3. The concept of exploding dice was new with T&T and though T&T explodes on doubles where some other games explode on largest value, it isn't hard to see the influence of T&T.

As I mentioned earlier, Moldvay Basic was the first rpg game system I owned, but T&T 5th edition was the first edition that I spent my own allowance on. It was my first purchase, and it is still one of my first loves. I might just crack open that file card case this evening.

#RPGaDAY #2: First RPG Gamemastered -- Sieging the Keep of the Borderlands and Advanced Dungeons & Monty Haul vs. Actual Gamemastering

What was the first role playing game I Gamemastered for anyone? This may seem like a simple answer at first. After all, the first game you Gamemaster is the first one where you serve as the individual "running" the game right? I'm not sure that is true. Whether or not someone has actually "Gamemastered" a game depends upon what one means by Gamemastered.

• Does it mean the person who hosted the game, refereed the rules, read box text, and took on the role of NPCs an monsters? 
• Does it mean the person who facilitated an entertaining narrative experience that included the above listed hosting and refereeing?
• Does it mean someone who has achieved what Gary Gygax called Gaming Mastery? 

If I use the first category of Gamemastery, then there are two games that vie for my first game. I co-Gamemastered Moldvay Basic with my friend Sean. I mentioned in the first post in this series that Sean and I had done a mash up of Broadsides and Boarding Parties and Moldvay Basic, but that's not the game we co-Gamemastered. The mash up of B&BP/D&D was a 2 player competitive game with campaign rules. The first game that we worked together to run for each other was the famous module Keep on the Borderlands. Neither one of us had read the module cover to cover before deciding to adventure in the Keep and its environs, so our first adventure is best named "The Great Siege of Castellan Keep and Sacking of the Caves of Chaos." Sean and I rolled up a number of characters, probably around 10 each. My characters had names that ranged from Darg to Jamis Kelton depending on how "balanced" the stats of the character were. The aforementioned Darg had an 18 Strength in Moldvay Basic no less, but had very little else to offer statistically and thus had a name worthy of his intellectual capacity. Sean and I took those rolled up characters and began the siege of the Keep. We weren't fools. We had our characters attack at night and had the Thieves climb the walls to eliminate the guards before they could raise the alarm, but if I am to be completely honest our efforts to have life at the Keep "dynamic" were minimal and the mayhem we caused from one building to the next were largely unnoticed by neighbors. Unbelievably so. After slaying all within our path in the Keep, and taking their sweet loots, we headed out into the wilderness and the caves.

I'm quite surprised it never occurred to us that the city might be there as a place of rest and basecamp, but it didn't occur to me until a month or so later.

Still using the first category of Gamemastery, but making it a case where I am the sole person running a game for others, my first foray as Dungeonmaster was running an all night session of AD&D for some friends at a sleepover. The module we played that night was...the Monster Manual. I'm sure there was some bizarre thread that I attempted to maintain to have the evening make any kind of sense. For example, I'm sure the adventure started in a Tavern. After that though, things get fuzzy. From what I remember, the players essentially got into a series of fights wherein monsters teleported in a random or the PCs instantly transported to the monster's location to engage in life and death struggle. The battles started small with a couple of kobolds or goblins - treasure was rolled from the tables in the back of the book - but by morning time the players were taking their high level warriors and wizards to the 1st level of Hell to combat Tiamat. They won. It seemed exciting at the time, but in memory seems both ridiculous and dull. I am actually embarrassed to share the story...except for the fact that the idea of a band of adventurers riding Apparatuses of Kwalish and toting Portable Fortresses of Dearn while wielding Holy Avengers, Staves of the Magi, and the Sword of Kas as they venture into the 1st layer of Hell to kill Tiamat still sounds a bit awesome to me in a perverse way.

It wasn't the kind of play that would have engendered long term stories and fostered friendship though. To get to that kind of Gamemastering, I have to shift over to the second category above. And when it comes to fulfilling the entertaining narrative experience definition of Gamemastering, then I'd have to say that DC Heroes was the first game I ever truly Gamemastered. By the time I ran that game, I had played in campaigns run by several excellent GMs. My friend Sean was the first of these as his running of Ravenloft stressed the importance of setting the stage, my friend Rob who ran excellent Villains and Vigilantes and Basic D&D adventures, Ron who's sense of adventure and pace were extraordinary, Matt for infusing character, Roger for downplaying the role of dice, and several Champions groups who "role" played more than roll played. With experience as a player, and with the knowledge of several systems, I ran a couple of DC Heroes campaigns. Prior to my current group, they were the best time I had ever had playing an rpg. My players immersed themselves in their characters. The rules were loose enough to allow almost anything to occur, and I think I was able to construct some entertaining banter between the players and the NPCs.

Of course in that description of my journey there was that bit about knowledge of several systems, and that is what Gygax talks about in his two books on Gaming Mastery. So maybe it takes a bit of Gaming Mastery...and a willingness to make a fool out of yourself while making funny voices...that really makes a good Gamemaster.

#RPGaDAY #1: First RPG Played -- Dungeons & ... Boarding Parties?

I'm a couple of days behind schedule with my first #RPGaDAY post, but work and vacation took priority. It's my hope that I'll be able to do one of these a day for the next month and answer all of the questions posted by @autocratik. I don't often participate in list-memes, but this one has more of a blog carnival feel to it.

I've been playing role playing games for a long time and most of the friends I have today are connected one way or another with game play. Mirroring that sentiment, I was first introduced to gaming by one of my dearest lifelong friends Sean McPhail -- or rather he and I were introduced to gaming by one of his older brothers. I have discussed my first gaming session on this blog before when writing about "Pants Issues." In that post, I use the image of the Moldvay edited Basic Set to represent the version of Dungeons & Dragons that Sean and I "played" on that occasion.

Thinking back about that first gaming session though, I don't think that is correct. My parents did purchase me a copy of the Moldvay set for Christmas after I came home and conveyed how exciting my introduction to D&D had been, but I didn't own the boxed set at the time. My friend Sean owned some of the AD&D books and had rolled up 1st level characters named Gandalf and Aragorn. When the friend of one of Sean's brothers said he knew how to run a D&D game, Sean loaned me Gandalf and the adventure was on. BTW, the fate of Gandalf is discussed in the Pants Issues post.

The "game" that Sean and I experienced had very little relation - as far as I can remember - to Sean's description of the AD&D rules, but it was definitely some form of D&D. It was D&D that was highly adversarial in its player to DM relationship and it was so free form and abstract in its description of combat that I think I can claim that my first gaming experience wasn't Moldvay Basic. Though Moldvay Basic with its rich introduction is the reason I continued playing. It most certainly wasn't AD&D. There was no talk of segments, modifiers against armor type, or any of the particularities of that rules set. I think that Sean and I were introduced to White Box OD&D...though as the Pants Issues post makes clear I wouldn't say that I actually got much of a chance to play it. 

And if I didn't get much of a chance to play it, then what was my actual first RPG played?

That would be something that my friend Sean and I put together ourselves. We had been playing a bunch of Broadsides & Boarding Parties and we loved everything about the game...except the hand-to-hand combat and campaign rules.

So we decided to use the rules from Moldvay Basic as our combat system. Thus began a couple of weeks worth of piratical adventures with Fighter, Thief, and Wizard ship captains, and thus began the first of many house rule adaptations in my role playing game career.

Dungeons and Dragons: 5th Edition and "Zones of Control"

Back in 2012, I wrote a blog post discussing how every edition of Dungeons & Dragons had miniature use as a part of its default mechanics assumptions.

Let me repeat that in clearer language. Every edition of Dungeons & Dragons is a miniatures based tactical role playing game.

As I wrote in the earlier post, this doesn't mean that those playing without miniatures were "playing the game wrong." I've played in at least one adventure in every edition of D&D and there are plenty of rules my gaming groups have either ignored or added to make our own experience more fun. Here are just a few ways my groups have modified game play:

1) None of the 1st Edition AD&D campaigns I've played in has ever used the Weapon Speed Factors or the Modifications for Armor Class.
2) I've played in 1st Edition games that used "Spell Points" for spell casters.
3) As a Game Master, I've disallowed non-Lawful Good Paladins in 3.x and 4e.
4) I had a DM who used Arduin's Damage System in his AD&D Campaign.
5) I've never used the initiative system from Eldritch Wizardry.
6) I give every race a second wind as a minor action (Dwarves get it as a free action) to speed up play.
7) One campaign I played in had us set our miniatures on the play mat in "Marching Order." No matter the shape of the room our characters were attacked based on that formation in Bard's Tale-esque fashion. We could have been in the center of a room 100' x 100' and all of the melee attacks would have been targeted at either the front row or the back row without anyone attacking our Magic Users in the middle.

Every one of the games I played with these groups was fun and thus none of these groups was playing "wrong." None of these groups played games to the rules as written either. No one - with the exception of organized play - should play to the rules as written. Role playing games are written to be adapted to play for your local gaming group. There are two key elements that allow for this without "breaking" the game. First, there are no winners and losers in D&D. The only way to win is to have fun and changing the rules for your local group is one way to create fun. Some changes are fun for a short time before they create more boredom than fun - in general - so there is room for advice regarding power scaling and Monte Haul campaigns, but the aim is to maximize fun. Second, most role playing games - excepting a couple of innovative Indie games - have a Game Master who moderates the game and who has absolute authority in rules interpretation in the local gaming group. So long as the Game Master is fair and focuses on keeping the game entertaining for the players in his or her group, then what rules are included or left out don't matter much.

Man...that's a lot of prefatory information. You can read the older post to see how each edition of D&D has implemented the use of what are called "Zones of Control" or "ZoCs" in great detail in the older post. The short version is this:

Original Edition (Chainmail): Once engaged in melee a unit was stuck until death or a failed morale check.

Original Edition (Alternate Combat): Not locked in combat, but adds "flanking" rules in Greyhawk Supplement. Swords & Spells supplement adds attacks of opportunity.

D&D Basic (Holmes): Attack of Opportunity against those leaving combat.

D&D Basic (Moldvay): Adds "Defensive Withdrawal" similar to "5 foot move" or "shift" in later editions.

1st Edition AD&D: Attack of Opportunity for withdrawal and Rear Attack Rules (Page 69 & 70 of DMG)

2nd Edition AD&D: Similar to 1st (Pages 81 to 84 of Revised DMG)

3rd Edition D&D: See image below.

3.5 Edition D&D: See image below.

Pathfinder: See image below.

4th Edition D&D: See image below.

Each of these editions demonstrates the influence of tactical wargames on the combat systems of each edition. It should also be noted that each edition of the game adds new layers of complexity regarding what affects whether you are in a Zone of Control and whether you are flanking an opponent. Pathfinder, 3rd Edition, 3.x, and 4th edition all have creatures with reach that expands their Zones of Control and each of those games has specific rules regarding how conditions influence your ability to flank other combatants. If you read the earlier article and examine the pages of the 1st Edition DMG you will see that there are rules similar to those implemented by later editions, but you will also wish that the earlier edition had created cool graphic representations like those of later editions.

5th edition (in the Basic Rules) takes a big step away from the trend and is even more abstract than the earliest editions of the game with regard to flanking. I would argue that 5th edition is the first edition with takes "no position" with regard to miniatures and carefully crafts descriptions so that combat can be run either way without house rules or dropping rules -- though it does still refer to "squares" from time to time. The new edition still includes Opportunity Attacks - a firm Zone of Control concept - as described on page 74. But instead of listing a specific amount of distance moved as in Moldvay, 1st AD&D, and later editions it merely lists the need to use the "Disengage" action. The Disengage action can be used with a tactical map, but doesn't require one as it is more narrative in its description than the older "Defensive Withdrawal."  The Rogue class on page 27 hints at the flanking rules for 5th edition which does not seem to entail a good deal of examining to see if combatants align properly on opposite sides of an opponent in a way that require illustration. Under Sneak Attack, the Basic rules state that you can deal extra damage if you have advantage OR "if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it, that enemy isn't incapacitated, and you don't have disadvantage on the die roll." That's a pretty big shift toward simplicity and away from map use. While it could be argued that the 5 foot rule implies the use of maps, one could easily assume that a creature engaged in melee has an enemy within  feet. If this replaces needing opposite sides for advantage, this is a boon for mapless gaming. It is easily adaptable regardless. So what does this make 5th edition's Zone of Control rules based on the Basic Set?

5th Edition D&D: Attacks of Opportunity (strong ZoC) and potentially with Flanking if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it. 

The Tiger, The Princess, Monty Hall, and Probability

Every now and then I encounter a book that changes the way I think about the world. Sometimes a book has one insight and sometimes it has several. In the case of Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow, I've lost count of the ways it has forced me to re-evaluate my perceptions. This is partly because the book covers a wide terrain of psychology and partly because it presents so many interesting observations. One of my many take aways from the book was how we don't think intuitively about statistics. Let me restate that in a paraphrase, while our mind is great at seeing patterns in nature (even sometimes when they are not there) our mind is not great at seeing the patterns that underlie probabilities and statistics.

This is an important observation for game design and game play. We've all seen the player who has rolled several low scores on to hit rolls in a D&D session who says "the odds are getting better of me rolling a 20" or the player who has rolled 6 "aces" in a row in Savage Worlds who picks up the dice and says "the odds of me acing again are 1/(some huge number)." In both cases, the individual is wrong. While it is true that given a sufficiently large draw that the die rolls of a player will tend toward the mean, prior die rolls have no influence on future die rolls. As an extension of that, the player who has already rolled 6 "aces" has exactly a 1/6 chance (assuming a d6 is being rolled) of acing on the 7th roll. The prior rolls have no influence over the initial roll. The answer would be different if the person had stated before rolling at all that there chances of acing 7 times was 1/(some huge number) but it isn't true after the person has successfully aced 6 rolls and is now rolling the seventh roll.

When I was a 21/Craps dealer as an undergrad in Nevada, I saw how this kind of flawed logic could have real financial consequences.

"Wow!" The player would say, "there have been a lot of 7's rolled in a row, so it's time to 'buy' the 4 at a 5% vig." Their underlying assumption is that prior rolls affect future outcomes in die rolls. They don't.

Interestingly, when players are in situations where prior decisions DO affect future outcomes they are just as prone to intuitively come to the wrong conclusion. A great example of this phenomenon is the Monty Hall problem where a player is given three choices, shown the results of one of the selections they did not make, and then asked to either switch or keep their original choice. The correct answer to this question - because prior choices DO affect outcomes in this case - is counter intuitive. I'll let the good folks at Khan Academy explain why.

Think about how this dilemma will affect game play in hidden information games that you design and play. And let this be a reminder that understanding how a probabilities work can make you a better player, designer, or game master.

Would You Like to Play a Game? -- Hasbro's Original D&D Collector Box is a Part of a Corporate Vision

The new Original Edition D&D Premium Reprint from Wizards of the Coast is truly a wonder to behold, and it gives the buyer a good glimpse at Hasbro's D&D corporate strategy moving forward.  I'll discuss this a bit more in a minute, but first let's just have a look at the box.

The original three D&D booklets were sold as a part of a collector's edition which featured either a woodgrain box (super rare) or a white box (the version I have at home), and this new edition comes in an engraved wooden box that I found to be pretty spectacular.

One of the nice little features that stood out as a real highlight for me was the reflective image on the inside of the box top. Wizards/Hasbro could have let the wood alone speak for the product, and that would have been great, but this Wizardly image really sets a nice tone.

Here you get a glimpse of what the box looks like when the booklets are stored within. Notice the red ribbon? That ribbon will allow you to remove the 7 paper saddle stitched books without damaging the edges, this is a nice bit of design that like LORDS OF WATERDEEP demonstrates a significant amount of thought has been put into both presentation and utility.

The box itself contains the original 3 booklets as well as all four of the eventual supplements that were published for the original D&D game. This new edition provides new cover art for all of the booklets. The Eldritch Wizardry cover that freaked my neighbor out so much when I was a kid is no longer present, instead there is a picture of a Wizard summoning tentacles. This would probably still upset said neighbor, but it is a less controversial image. And the old cover is one that would stir up some serious discussions on my Facebook feed where the battle lines of some Lamentations of the Flame Princess fans would do virtual battle with some of the Athena Anthology supporters would debate its appropriateness. I won't enter that fray as I am a fan of LotFP and of many of the Progressive game design that has been created over the past few years. Regardless of anyone's thoughts on the Eldritch Wizardry cover, the Greyhawk cover is a beauty.

Covers aside, there is plenty to discuss regarding the interiors of the booklets which are unchanged from the original -- or largely unchanged. Part of me thinks this is endearing as it lets gamers see the art that inspired a 40 year old hobby. The other part of me thinks that if they were going to redo any of the art, they might as well have replaced the interior art. There are talented artists who could have done chiaroscuro work that was an homage to the old art, but didn't look like doodles that ...well...I drew. Then again, that might just be the point. Anyone is a good enough artist to draw visual monsters for their home campaign. All you need is suspension of disbelief.

There is no inclusion of the Chainmail rules set here, so you will have to play D&D using the "optional" combat system presented in the first booklet. Thankfully, that system was the basis for the modern d20 engine and can be easily learned by the modern gamer. Or, rather it can be created rather easily by the modern gamer as this game is nigh unplayable by itself without some interpretation and house rules. This is why there were articles written and an explosion of alternate RPGs. The modern gamer has 40 years of interpretation, precedent, and house rules to work with so we can actually use these rules, but I do warn you that they are a bit different from what you might be used to.

Which brings me to the point I hinted at during the opening paragraph. This product points to Hasbro's new corporate strategy -- or rather a better tactical application of their long time strategy -- they want to have "a D&D experience for every gamer at your table." They make this abundantly clear with an advertising flier containing that very quote. In the past, the tactic used by Hasbro to advance the strategy of "a D&D for everyone" was an attempt to create a "perfect D&D" that was balanced, appealed to old gamers, and was hip for new gamers. This was what 4th edition was trying to be, a D&D for everyone. That tactic failed. It insulted some gamers and further fractured the customer base.

The new tactic is very different and is what Hasbro should have been doing all along. That tactic is to provide products with D&D Intellectual Property and Brand that match the needs of various gamers.

Want old school games?

Cool. Hasbro will release old rule books in collectors editions and pdfs. You can play D&D as it was originally played.

Want to play 2nd through 4th edition? 

Those are being supported too in different ways.

Interested in D&D Next our new rules set that is a combination of old and new school design and fairly easily converted between editions?

That will be coming out this year.

Are you a Eurogamer?

Have you seen LORDS OF WATERDEEP?

Wargamer?

Have you seen CONQUEST OF NERATH?

Casual RPG/Board Gamer?

Our Ravenloft, Ashardalon, and Drizzt game is just right for you.

New to gaming?

Try DUNGEON out.

The same is true for video games etc. and I think that this is a wonderful approach by Hasbro. The games they have been designing to support their IP have been excellent. RAVENLOFT and LORDS OF WATERDEEP have been played several times by my group over the past two years and the digital app version of WATERDEEP is looking pretty compelling to me.

So how about it? Would you like to play a game?

Game Mastering Advice from AT&T...Yes, AT&T

I am a big fan of the "interviewing the kids" ad campaign being run by AT&T. Actor Beck Bennett does a great job of interacting with the kids in these largely unscripted videos. Bennett gives the young actors prompts and then responds in humorous fashion. Watching the Wildcard NFL games today, I have seen a great deal of the "Pool" episode and it hit me how perfect this is as an instructional tool for Game Masters everywhere. GMs are often afraid of the indie "just say yes" mantra, but this is the kind of magic you get when you follow it.

That's right, Dinosaurs who can transform into robots who Karate chop the water. If your games aren't featuring moments that awesome, then you might take a cue from Beck and just let your player's imaginations flow.

I also think that Beck would be an ideal GM for introducing gaming to younger kids.

Dungeon Roller -- Tranforming Random Tables into Tabletop Fun

In March of 2012, Paul Hughes of blog of holding launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund his illustrated rendition of the old "random dungeon" charts from the original Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master's Guide. The Kickstarter was successful and raised close to $28,000. The additional funds allowed Hughes the time to create rules for a quick and easy Dungeon Crawl board game based on the poster and to begin work on a flash based version of the game called Dungeon Robber that would be hosted on the web and free to play for anyone who wanted to experience a narrative "rogue-like."

That game is now available and it is everything one could hope for from such a game. Players begin with very limited choices of career...they can only be Dungeon Robbers. New character classes, items, and the ability to recruit henchmen are unlocked with the successful retirement of past Dungeon Robbers. Do you want to be able to purchase food, and thus be able to heal at certain spots in the dungeon? Then you need to have a character retire as a Yeoman. Do you want to hire henchmen? Then some lucky sap needs to adventure long enough to become an innkeeper.

The game is tough and quite arbitrary due to its random nature, but it is fun in the classic Ken St. Andre way. Life is cheap and death is just around the corner. Going down a level in a dungeon is almost certain suicide unless you're of high enough level. Game play is similar to older text based games like Zork, but the results of the interface are more akin to playing a game of Dungeon Hack or another rogue-like. The game is good fun and I recommend playing the game on the website (just click the image above). If you like the game as much as I do just buy a copy of the poster and make sure that Paul gets a couple of ducats for his trouble.

Little Geek Girls: Don't Say Superheroes are "Just for Boys"

On Tuesday, Kirk Hamilton at Kotaku shared a music video by The Doubleclicks entitled "Nothing to Prove."  I'll be honest and say that the song itself doesn't do much for me and sounds a bit like a song that would be performed by Carrie Brownstein on an episode of Portlandia, though I guess comparing a song to a song by a member of Sleater-Kinney isn't exactly an excoriating review. The aesthetics of the song notwithstanding, it was the visual content of the music video that really resonated with me. In particular the woman holding the "Don't tell my daughters that Lego, Robots, and Superheroes are for boys."

That sentence struck me like lightning and with almost perfect timing. As regular readers of this blog know, I am the father of two young girls I call History and Mystery in my blog posts and who are the two "Twin Princess Superheroes" referred to in the right sidebar. To give you a picture, this is them on a "Fancy Day."

As you can see, they are wearing Fancy Nancy-esque clothing with sunglasses, domino masks, and History is holding forth a Captain America shield. This is them at their "Princess Superheroiest," well accepting when they where their Bell and Aurora dresses kitted with Merrida bow and arrow and Iron Man masks and "Boomers." All of which is to say that they have acquired many of their mom and dad's geek obsessions. I cannot express how much fun it is imagining playing D&D with the twins when they get older. I'm giddy right now thinking about it.

As you might guess, my daughters live a pretty happy life. They have parents who share their interests and who play are willing to play any game or support any interest. But that's not to say that these young innocents haven't already faced the dreaded "you aren't allowed to be interested in that" assertion by some of their peers. There was one student at their school - a student that History had a crush on no less - who saw that History and Mystery were wearing superhero tennis shoes (Cap and Iron Man) and who took it upon himself to point out to my daughters that "Superheroes" are for boys. What's more, the boy also pointed out the "Blue" is for boys too.

Blue.

BLUE!

Are you kidding me?! This kid tried to lay claim to a color? Ugh.

Back to the story. This young boy's attack upon their preferences was the first time that my daughters had been told that something was outside their purview. Sure, Jody and I have told the girls that we cannot afford certain things or that they have to wait until they are "bigger kids" to play Advanced Squad Leader with dad, but we've never told them that any given entertainment was reserved for a particular subset of society. Jody and I find that concept to be absurd on its face. No one is going to stop me from DVRing REAL HOUSEWIVES (OC and Jersey only), and certainly no one is going to tell Jody she cannot watch JUSTIFIED or THE AVENGERS because she's a woman.

So after this boy attacked my daughter's love for superheroes Mystery comes home weeping. She's upset that she's no longer allowed to like Captain America - who has fought off more Closet Monsters than I care to imagine - because he's for boys. Needless to say, it didn't take me long to inform my daughter that Captain America is for everyone and to give Mystery several real world examples of the women in my and Jody's life who are fans of "Steve." After which we watched a couple episodes of EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES and called it good. My daughters seemed satisfied. Heck, History started wearing blue (Mystery's favorite color) in solidarity with her sister.

But the story doesn't end with having a supportive mom and dad who have supportive friends. Sadly, this little punk has already sown the seed of a mental weed that must be constantly pursued and extracted as quickly as possible. I've already had History ask me if there REALLY are any female race car drivers and heaven knows what the next moment will be. One thing I do know, I'll have to be vigilant. It's no longer enough to just share the things I'm passionate about with my daughters. I now have to be prepared to help my daughters defend their enjoyment.

I'm happy to do it, but it's something that shouldn't have to be done. Stop attacking "Fake Geek Girls." Some of the kindest, warmest, and giving people I know are Geek Girls (yes I'm talking about you Jody, Susan, Shawna, and America...and many others). There is nothing fake about them.

And for those of you who spend the time "vetting" to see if a "Fake Geek Girl" is actually a real geek. You know that vetting time would be far more enjoyable if it was just a normal conversation where you both geek out right? Sure, you might end up fighting about whether Alan Scott or Hal Jordan are the better GL or how big a jerk Dan Didio is, but I guarantee that you will be more likely to leave that conversation with a friend than you will if you begin your "conversation" with an oral exam in which you scrutinize even the slightest error.

Siri as D&D Dungeon Master

As might be guessed Siri is a "killer DM." I think she ran a Call of Cthulhu adventure for me at an old DundraCon (it's in Apple's backyard).  On a serious note, check out the copy of Gary Gygax's ROLE PLAYING MASTERY on the table. That is a significant easter egg, especially given the kind of DM Siri turns out to be.

 

And yes, I own a copy of ROLE PLAYING MASTERY. I also have a copy of MASTER OF THE GAME.

Cancelling AD&D? RPG Rumors Circa 1986 -- Different Worlds #44

I'm a big fan of Tadashi Ehara's now defunct gaming magazine DIFFERENT WORLDS. Over its tenure, the magazine was published by a couple of companies including Chaosium and Sleuth Publications. According to a pre-publication solicitation letter (available here), the magazine was originally slated to be entitled DM. The change was likely due to concerns over TSR's trademark of DM/Dungeon Master. Regardless of the reason for the change in title, I think that DIFFERENT WORLDS better suited the content of the magazine than DM ever would have. The magazine was a gem. Like Steve Jackson Games' magazine SPACE GAMER, Ehara's magazine covered the entire roleplaying game hobby. As I've written before, issue #23 of the magazine is maybe one of the most important magazines ever written about the origins of Superhero Roleplaying games. For those who want to understand the history of RPGs, DIFFERENT WORLDS, SPACE GAMER, and ALARUMS & EXCURSIONS are three of the most valuable resources that the aspiring historian can find. They really help to cut through a lot of the community gossip about a transitional era in the hobby.

Speaking of Gossip, DIFFERENT WORLDS featured an excellent gossip column written by the pseudonymous Gigi D'arn (clearly a Gary Gygax/David Arneson reference). I've written speculation about the identity of this columnist before, and I'm still pretty sure that she was a real person and that the Chaosium staff added to her actual letters. There are just too many little tidbits of SoCal culture, which was booming at the time as an RPG hub, for me to believe otherwise. The column was filled with a great deal of speculation, some true, some pure fiction, and all fun to read.

There are a couple of pieces of gossip/rumors in issue 44 that stand out and need attention. In fact, they are rumors that I'd like to hear more from the gaming community at large about, and I'll be asking around to see if there is any merit to them.

First and foremost - actually quite shocking - really is a claim about ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS. According to Gigi, "Rumour thinks TSR is unhappy with the ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS game line and is considering dropping it. GARY GYGAX meanwhile is starting his own company, Infinity Games, in New Jersey. Will he take the license with him?"

I wonder if this is true. 1985 saw the publication of UNEARTHED ARCANA and ORIENTAL ADVENTURES for the AD&D game, but the mid-80s was also the era of the publication of the Basic, Expert, Companion, Master, Immortals rules for D&D. It was a time when the D&D brand was divided among two sub-brands and a time when there was great potential that one brand was cannibalizing the other. From my experience, the D&D brand was putting out a lot of great material at this time. According to GROGNARDIA 1986 saw the release of a number of BECMI products and 1987 saw the production of the first Gazetteer products for the D&D brand - some of the best products ever released for D&D.

If I were to guess, I'd say the rumor was true and that core rule book sales for AD&D had dropped. I would argue that this is why we saw a 2nd edition of AD&D released in 1989. An edition that may not have happened at all if not for the success of the Forgotten Realms Setting. My thought is that the Forgotten Realms setting, written for AD&D, was so successful that management decided to do a new edition of the game for increased sales. I'd like to know if this is correct or not though.

The second interesting piece of gossip/rumors is that J.D. Webster, the creator of the Finieous Fingers cartoon strip, was a carrier fighter pilot. This is apparently true.