DragonQuest Combat houserule

I got a comment on my last post, mentioning playing DragonQuest without a battle map. Personally I have nothing against miniatures with my rpg, unless it slows down play. If you count hexes or squares it will slow down play is my experience. Playing online I find it a bit fiddly. So, I always look if I can do without them.

Thinking a bit about DQ I realized that the big thing is if you are engaged or not, and if you can get engaged after doing a half move. With that in mind, and inspired by the classic Traveller rang band system for combat I present the following:

The dividing line down the middle is separating Team A from Team B, or Attackers from Defenders. Well, you get the idea.

All placed in the green fields are Engaged and play according to those rules for initiative and if you can Trip, Disarm and so on. If you are in the blue fields you are disengaged and far away. Here you can only do ranged attacks, and you need more than half of your TMR to engage. In the areas in between you only need to do a half move to be Engaged.

That sheet can be printed and laminated and you can write on it, or you can use actual pretty miniatures. But, you skip the analysis-paralysis of counting hexes.

I think this i how I would try to run DQ if I did run it online.

If you have any ideas or response, I'm all ears!

I bet I could use these rules for...

Longtime readers of this blog knows I am a nutcase when it comes to collecting some games. I have multiple copies of the 2nd ed. DragonQuest rules in addition to the 3rd ed. copy I own. It's a very old school game, quirky and fiddly like the best of them. I have been charmed by it since I first read it, but have yet to play it. One reason for that is the fact it's designed to be played with a hex map for tactical combat, and that is a bit of a hassle in a Hangout session.

Now I caught the bug again, since I took down my Kingdoms of Kalamar books. KoK is a fantasy world that is a bit like Greyhawk in that it's medieval fantasy without any special twists. There's nothing to get "weirded out" by like in Tekumel och Glorantha. Just plain fantasy. For some a bit too plain, even.

What would be better pairing then than to play it in that world using the down to earth and deadly DragonQuest system? I have now spent some days thumbing through books and pondering how it could be done. God knows if I'll ever be able to convince anyone to try it, but it was fun to think about for a few days.

So, this got me thinking.

How often have you encountered a book, a film och a tv-series and felt it just had to be turned into a rpg? Quite a few times I'd guess.

How often have you taken down an old favourite game, like that less than loved rules set you love that don't get the love on the blogs and on g+, and felt it should be cool to use it for, that thing? For me it happens all the time. My version of the classic gaming ADD is strongly connected to that behaviour. Last time I counted I owned 103 different rules system (counting separate D&D editions as different games), so that could be why.

Maybe it's just me being odd...

Getting hurt in different games

Since I recently played a game of FATE, I have been searching out other experiences of playing FATE, including listening to podcasts. At the same time, I have been re-reading Dragonquest, which a game quite different from FATE. Today I realized you could consider them side by side, based upon what happens when your character gets hurt in those two games.

In FATE you basically only have two hitpoints. You have two stress boxes for physical hurt, and two for mental hurt. Nothing happens when you tick them. Then you have consequences, which are things that last. I guess that's clear from the name, right? But, what I found intriguing is how those consequences are used.

Since they are Aspects, just like so much else in FATE, they can be invoked. That means they will affect the story and the narrative, and they wont just be points of damage. Now, how does damage works in Dragonquest? Well, you have your points of Fatigue, and you have your Points of Endurance. Depending on how severely you get hit, you dock some points off those. But, here's the thing. If you get hit real bad, you take a Grievous Injury. The interesting thing about them is that they are lasting consequences.

See? How about this. Grievous injury are stuff that will stay with you, and a smart opponent will invoke for effect, eh. I mean, utilize to their advantage.

If you were afraid of New School, don't be. It's all known stuff, eh?

Magic Items in a new light - the Investment ritual of Dragonquest

I have been charmed by all those who fondly talk about SPI's fantasy RPG, and with that glimmer in the eye mention it as the best game they've ever played. So far I have not yet played the game myself, but true to the odd kind of madness that sometimes descend upon me, I have bought not only one, but four copies of the rules! Now I'm reading them again, and began to think on how it differs from D&D.

Probably everyone have heard about delves into the hole in the ground, from whence they brave adventurers then emerge carrying a +1 sword. It's so much part of the tropes of the fantasy rpg these days. As I was sitting with The Haunted Halls of the Eveningstar, thinking about how to run a game in that setting with the Dragonquest rules, I came upon the iconic +1 sword. Now, how would that be modelled in DQ?

Well, I quickly found a spell for enchanting weapons, and it increased the chance to hit, and the damage. Basic and standard stuff. What made me think was the fact that this was a one use spell, and like it always is, the sword in the module was a permanent item.

I dived into the rulebook, and found the Investment ritual. With this you can "invest" a spell into an item so anyone can use it at a later date. Sounds great, right? Now, this is not a permanent item. No, it has a limited amount of charges, and let me tell you, it's not 50 like it is in 3rd ed. D&D! No, the rank the enchanter has gained in the spell is the limiting factor. After looking at some NPCs, and generating some characters of my own I feel fairly confident to say that an item with anything near 50 charges will be so rare as to be almost unique.

So, are there no permanent magic items in this game? Well, in a supplement that was written, but never published called Arcane Wisdom (which can be found by searching around a bit), they included the rules for a permanent investment. I just skimmed it to see if it did what I though it did, and did not check for how expensive it would be to learn. Probably quite. Just the fact that the ritual to create permanent items is not in the core rules felt significant.

Now, some of you might claim that even in, say, AD&D, it was no mean feat to permanently enchant an item. True, but you have noticed that there a dozens of them listed in the DMG, right? They are there, and everyone expect them to be around for the taking.

Now, imagine a D&D game where almost none of the magic items are permanent, and those with a limited amount of charges are likelier to hold 5 charges than 50. You will get a pretty different game!

Just imagine, and maybe try it out. It will be fun to try to run this game one day.

How to not write a game

Last night I had some time to browse a game I have borrowed from a friend, Dresden Files the rpg. This is a game that have been talked about a lot, and most of it very positive. I did find some points of it so grating I had to put the book down. What do you do then? Gripe online!

In Dresden Files, the pages a very "designed". In my view, overly so. For example, some parts of the pages are designed to look like someone took a highlighter pen to some words and sentences. Personally I have never been able to use highlighter pens. For me they are of no use. I don't read like that. Sometimes I have read books bought second hand, and underlining or highlighting drives me up the wall. If anything, I take notes on a separate paper, never in the book I read! Having a thing like that in a printed book, by design, drives me nuts. It makes my eyes stop at intervals which are not natural to my way of reading. Quite jarring.

The other design element is sticky notes. Yes, they have small "sticky notes", with faux hand writing in the sidebars of the text! To me it just makes the text on the page drown in the clutter of notes. Adding insult to injury, the few times I stopped reading and glanced at those notes, almost all of them contained snarky remarks of a very annoying nature. I mean, if you add something to the text, add least make sure it adds information!

Since it's very easy to complain, I'm also going to say how I think it should be done.

The best game book I ever read is the 2nd ed. rules book for Unknown Armies. What's so good about it? It's clear and understandable. There are no witty quotes or snarky sidebars, just a clearly presented text with illustrations not interfering with the text. The text is different from the majority of gaming prose, though. It is not detached. Instead it is personal, and with a very clear author voice. For some that is a killer, and for those I direct you to SPI's DragonQuest, which is as formal as it gets.

But, I'd like to emphasize that in Unknown Armies, the voice never hinders the important function of the text, to get the information across on how to play the game. You can read one sentence after the other and the information flows naturally. The combination of all these factors are sadly quite rare, and one reason why I have sought out Greg Stolze's writing since.

Forgotten Realms Personalities - what levels are they again?

Everyone knows about Elminster, right? Lot of people have also heard of some dark skinned elf with some feline companion from some kind of novel or three, right? Mary Sue, anyone?

So everyone knows that there are multiple high level personalities in the Forgotten Realms. Many of us feel that those long lists of people in the setting books are slightly intimidating. Is there any space for the stories of my character?

I decided to sum the level of the named personalities in the grey box for Forgotten Realms, FR1 Waterdeep and FR5 The Savage Frontier (all for 1st ed. AD&D) and see what the average level is of them. It might give you a hint of what might be the best books to use, and if FR is a place for your heroes to make their mark. The results are interesting.

Grey Box - 9
Waterdeep - 6.5
Savage Frontier - 13.333

What do you say about that? Considering the box is detailing a significant part of a whole continent, it's not surprising to have a few level 26 individuals in there. But, the average lands right in the sweet spot for "name level", which kind of makes sense if these are the people who are significant enough to stand out. They have begun to make their mark in the world, which with player characters happens at "name level". Maybe FR is not so filled with demigods after all?

Lets then look at the metropolis, Waterdeep. Considering this is the most densely populated place in the realms, you would imagine this is a place you are quite likely to find those big wigs.  Interestingly, there are some character in the upper teens, but not as many as I expected. The movers and shakers are described in vague terms, and the so called "Lords of Waterdeep" are actually secret, which makes it easy to slip in a player character or two in there.

Then, finally, we have Paul Jaquays. While I have a healthy amount of respect for the man as a dungeon designer, I think I know where I don't like his world building. In the Savage Frontier we have him fleshing out the wilds around Waterdeep and he adds a few high level personalities. By adding in his marvellous The Enchanted Wood adventure material for DragonQuest (which I happen to have an extra copy of, if anyone is interested), he manages to up the epic feel quite a bit. I remember someone posted that they felt FR5 was a bit much, when a section about random events mentioned two flying castles with dragons crawling over them passing overhead, locked in a wizardly duel. I think I agree. This book adds way to much. In my FR I think I will pass on it, however much I like Jaquays' dungeons.

I don't have many more of the earliest FR books for 1st ed. Since Ed Greenwood wrote the one on the Red Wizards, and they are all over the Grey Box as the big evil force, I feel tempted to to a similar analysis of that one. I have Moonshae, but it feels a bit separated from the rest of the world.

So, while it seems like the reputation FR has of a myriad of high powered NPCs is not totally unfounded, I think it is not found in all the sources. Personally I can't stand game novels, and I have stayed away from most of the 2nd ed. source books as well, since most of those are written after the novels started to flow out of TSR. If those are ignored, and some source books are screened, I think there are space left in the Forgotten Realms for your heroes.

A campaign which uses the Grey Box as a basis, adds Waterdeep and takes that Old West feel, might be a "Greenwood-ian" realms, and one wherein your adventures might not only fit, but also make an impact on the world. That's how I would run it.

Where to start a campaign in the Forgotten Realms?

It has been fairly quiet around here a while now. I have been playing some D&D 3rd ed. but it is summertime and the regular slow down when everyone is on vacation this or that week until September.

Like I wrote before, I have been reading DragonQuest and different Forgotten Realms source books, and nurturing some hope of combining the two. Today's question is where to place the "home base" and centre of adventures? I'm going to think out loud somewhat.

Ed Greenwood detail the Dalelands in the grey boxed set, and it's clear that that area and the kingdom of Cormyr is where his players spent a lot of the early years. I have the module FRQ1 Haunted Halls of Eveningstar, which is situated in Cormyr, but suitably close to the "wilderlands" and the "borderlands" or high adventure. Sure sounds like a nice place to start off, eh?

One good thing with Eveningstar is that there are enough NPC detailed for them to be fun to interact with without being drowned in them. Also, the average level is actually around 5-ish and that makes them "within reach" so to speak. Secondly, there's a dungeon near, and a small keep with traps and some badlands with monsters. A little bit of everything, wilderness, "city" and dungeon.

The Dalelands then. There are lots of people to interact with in Shadowdale, but maybe a little too many. In the grey box there's a census report of every stead and its inhabitants! I'm vary of trying to fit a bunch of PC in there. Maybe it can be used as a blue print for another similar dale, but frankly I am a bit confused. What did TSR think you would use all that data for? The good thing is there are some small hills with nasty rumours, some holes in the ground and some intrigue. I'm not sure about the Dalelands, though. It feels like Harn in a way, and for me that is not positive. Who's pig is that again? How many silver does a farm hand need to be paid per fortnight? Anyone?

The third alternative is the city of Waterdeep. Now, that would mean no wilderness adventure, and the dungeons would in all likelihood mean Undermountain. That sound kind of intriguing. The myriad of NPCs is another thing to think about. How many movers and shakes do I want to juggle? A quick sum shows that interestingly enough, the average level of the named personalities of Waterdeep is actually just 6.5! Considering FR has a reputation of NPC demigods that is very interesting! I foresee many opportunities for players to make a difference in a not too distant future with that kind of competition. Suddenly Waterdeep looks like it just passed the Dalelands in my personal list of starting locales. There's enough going on, and you could easily find work both honest and more shady. Eveningstar is slighly smaller and manageable, though.

I'd love to hear if anyone has any experiences to share. The feel I got from the grey box of something like the Old West, with an interesting dichotomy between the wild and the civilized intrigue me, and I'm still pondering how to emphasize that, in whatever local I choose as a starting point.

Forgotten Dragonquest

I have gotten this idea, that I want to use DragonQuest for something. Since I have just been re-reading the grey box Forgotten Realms the first thought that struck me was to combine the two. Have anyone out there tried it?

Somebody, I have forgotten where I read it, wrote that the feel of that early FR is very much like the Old West. It's a borderland where civilization is slowly being established, and the daily experience of the encroaching wilderness. I happen to be a big fan of Westerns, so I'm totally buying that depiction of the Forgotten Realms. But, this also made me think about other settings where the "feel" have suddenly clicked for me. Forgotten Realms was never presented that way.

One day when I was browsing the setting book for Kingdoms of Kalamar, I suddenly realized that the schtick this setting had was not to be special at all! The special about it was that it was just a quasi medieval setting presented in as a clear and "realistic" way as possible. No oddities or specials like Talislanta or Tekumel. Take apeek at the books and you will find that was exactly what was described on the can. God knows why I hadn't understood that. This was kind of the inverse of the experience of FR.

I still haven't gotten that feeling for Greyhawk.

How about a new adventure for DragonQuest?

For those you don't follow the DragonQuest emailing lists, this is a heads up for a crowd funding effort to produce new adventures for the old game. I think it looks interesting, but sadly I can't afford to chip in until after Christmas. :(

Take a peek!

The madness continues - unabated

 

Remember that I posted before about games I own but haven't played? Well, the madness continues. I still haven't played DragonQuest.

But, now I own not one, not two but four copies of the game! Somebody save me from myself. By the way, I do have extra copies of Enchanted Wood, Blade of Allectus and Palace of the Ontocle if someone is interested.

I really need to play DragonQuest, don't I?

[DragonQuest] Shields will be splitered!

I found this reading DragonQuest yesterday:

[18.3] Grievous Injury may result if the successful Strike Check is 5% or less of the Modified Strike Chance. 
...
A figure who suffers a Grievous Injury while wearing armor has the Protection Rating of that suit of armor reduced by 2 until repaired. Optionally, a figure who is also carrying a shield can choose to have the shield cloven and spare his armor. A cloven shield is useless.

Shields will be splintered, eh? I really like the idea with ablative armor, like in older T&T editions. Try that one out with D&D and let me know how that works! Should drain some money from those rich coffers.

So, what do you do in this game?

I realized today, when I was looking at my collection, that there are a few of these games which don't answer that well the question in the title of this post.

Everyone who have followed the Steve Jackson Games line Transhuman Space, knows that one of the more questions about that game is "what do you do in this game"? While there are things to do, and they are even presented in the core setting book, it still seem to baffle people. Considering I myself have asked the question even after reading the book, I think they failed at presenting it like they should have. Now, imagine some other games and how they have handled that problem.

From 1981 to 1996 would Call of Cthluhu be a game where you often spend time doing things your character could barely afford, for reasons which only made sense to the player. At least that's the way it might sound when a fan of Delta Green gets going. Even though that many years and editions indicate that the problem might not be that serious, there is a disconnect between what makes sense to most CoC investigators and their players. Trail of Cthulhu solves it by introducing psychological traits, Drives, that suddenly put the reason for adventuring down on the character sheet.

How about a game like Pendragon? It has game mechanics for Glory, which makes it advantageous to behave like an Arthurian knight. I guess the theme of the game is advertised enough in the book as well.

My problem child, the game I have never managed to work for me, Traveller is another interesting piece. In that game there are three classic paths to walk, or travel if you'd permit me saying so. They are the path of the merchant, the mercenary and the sleuth. For me the biggest problem have always been that it's a big universe and the path is not as easy to discern in starlight as I had imagined. I seem to wander.

Of these four games, two can be considered oldies. But, I'd suggest that that matters little since if we compare CoC and Traveller to D&D and T&T we will find that in the latter it's easy to find out what you do. Explore, loot, kill and level up. Lather, rinse and repeat. Compare that to DragonQuest and you once again have a game that while it's very similar to D&D/T&T again it more open and less focused.  At least it seems that way from my reading it.

It could maybe be argued that games with a strong, focused setting (like Pendragon) have an easier time answering the question. Let's dodge THS and ponder Stormbringer/Elric! and Fading Suns. What do you do in Stormbringer? Planewalk and be the chess piece of the gods? I see, hand me the dice. No. Then there's Fading Suns, which have a central mystery and a structured society to play in. It should be easy, just find out why the suns are fading! Well, except that there are quite few examples of how that is done, since the reason have never been published!

Where am I heading with this? Well. I think one reason why it's harder to make some games sing is that you will have to create the reason for adventuring, and the buy-in, yourself. I never tried to do that for Traveller, and maybe that's why it didn't work for me. Maybe there is a lesson here for game designers as well as GMs. If you don't include a clear hook in game, the game should contain some clear advice on how to make it work for you, or at least point out there need to build upon what's been given. I think there are a few interesting conversations to be had about games designed from that point of view.

A few DragonQuest adventures, a rant about the need for supplements

The question showed up on a DragonQuest list if the Judges Guild produced supplements were worth hunting down. For those who wonder, after the latest hubbub about the game, this what I replied:

I actually took them out and thumbed through them.

The one called Magebird Quest contains some deckplans for a couple of boats and an inn or two. Apart from that it seems to be only a small section of travel speeds by boat which might be of interest as far as rules and crunch go. I think I spotted a new monster as well.

The Starsilver Trek contains more specific crunch. It has a description of the Prospector skill and stats for magically irradiated creatures. Also, probably a new monster but I don't know the DQ monster list that well. The cover illustration is depicting a fight between dwarves and lizard men. What is there not to love? :)

 Now every completist out there knows there is a new skill to get!

Another supplement with characters, to be used as NPCs or whatnot, was summarized as follows (not by me this time):

I seem to recall that Heroes & Villains had a lot of "rules violations". That is characters ranked in weapons they didn't meet the requirements for and similar issues.

That made me thinking... (Rant ahead!)

Back when I was hanging out on the Necromancer Games forum, I remember how I was saddened, and annoyed, when people moaned about "rules violations". You see, NG had put out their first adventures when the SRD was not finalized, and they worked from a draft and the rules they had used from older editions. Naturally this meant that there was quite a few instances when the stats wasn't really "by the book" or maybe some game mechanic referred to some procedure which wasn't like that any more. I thought it meant you as the DM just had to be creative.

Then WotC put out the revised 3rd ed. Everyone was scrambling to "update" their stuff and for ages after that people kept asking Bill and Clarke to publish a revised edition of the flagship monster book Tome of Horrors. At this I more than once posted some urgings for people to be creative and just fix it on the fly or sit down and do it themselves. The steam had began to cool in the 3rd ed. engine by that time and I knew that no revised printing of ToH would come. You can maybe still find my post where I heckle and tease people for their lack of creativity and ask how they became DMs with that attitude.

If you want to call me arrogant and maybe even a bit rude I wont argue the point. But, it brings into focus the "problem" with Heroes & Villains mentioned above. How much will it bother you to have a supplement miss a few facts about a monster, or a NPC?

The reason we buy supplements is that we as DMs don't want or can do the work, and thus pay somebody to do it for us. Frankly, if you have the rules of a game you really never need to buy anything. Considering how many freely available games there are, you never need to buy anything! But we do, and for some pretty good reasons.

Is it then ok for those supplements to not be perfectly "legal"? As you can guess, I think it might be ok. For me it don't work as well when I write it all myself. I'm not a world builder, plotter, NPC designer and dungeon digger. I am duck tape, patching together things behind the screen, rolling dice and saying "yes". My last 7th Sea game showed this again to be true.

Now, I see the point that having bought something you expect it to be worth your money. But, being worth it for many seem to mean they get annoyed when it don't pass the legal review. Why do you even bother to get agitated? Spend that energy to design your own, right? I think, especially looking at those Judges Guild booklets in cheap newsprint, that today we have probably forgotten the level of amateurism that have ruled this hobby for most of its life. Today we expect professionalism, or at least glossy paper and colour on our maps. What's you money worth?

I still think that a DM worth his or her salt should be able to take something and combining it with some of that other stuff over there. Hey, isn't the platonic ideal the DM who writes everything by herself? I have met more than once who boast of that proficiency. Maybe it's not for everyone, but if I can patch half decent stuff back into playable games with player enthusiasm as glue, then I think anyone can do it! I'm not that special.

DragonQuest "retroclone"?

I guess quite a few of my readers have heard of DragonQuest. A certain blogger just these last few days posted about it, and I have gotten some interesting news about the game I decided to share. 

Just a few days ago James Sutton, managing director for RedBrick LLC announced to the DragonQuest community that he have have started to investigate the possibility to try to "retroclone" DragonQuest back into print. He have been in contact with Eric Goldberg, once the lead designer of the game, and he seemed to like the idea as well.

James post was a call for volunteers, and this heralds some interesting times for the game. I will be watching the developments with interest. Since WotC have shown their disinterest in the property by letting the trademark slide, this opens up possibilities.

Bad writing and a personal style in game book writing

A while ago, my oldest FLGS shut down. It was sad to see them go, but at least I got a few good deals from the shutdown sale. One of the books I bought was the WoD game Hunter. I got it for a song, which was as much as I was prepared to give. Conspiracy and horror are two themes I'd like to incorporate in my gaming, and Hunter was for me an attempt to do something remotely interesting in the moribund World of Darkness. Reading it I discovered something about the medium of game books, the text, and its qualities or lack thereof.

To put it simple, I felt the text in Hunter was badly written. Being on a conspiracy/horror trip, I also re-read some of Unknown Armies, and realized how amazingly well written that game is. It made me think of the voice of the author.

For those of you who have not read UA, I can only say that this is the game that made me scared. It didn't tell me how to run a scary conspiracy-horror game, it made me cringe. Very good stuff. Now, if you like your game to be unpersonal, and just a textbook, you will hate it. It's a game where the voice of the author is very clear.

Contrast that with DragonQuest. It's very matter of fact, even dry, and with the SPI case system it feels methodical to the point of being absurd. It's very precise, but maybe not that engaging. I think this is the style that most gamers prefer, especially in the old school camp.


Hunter was, for the lack of a better way of putting it, waffling. Many things are said over and over again. It lacks some focus and feels more like it's trying to describe a feel than either trying to evoke it or help you evoke it.

So, how do you want your game?

I know that for some people the idea of a narrative voice in a game is the first step towards the kind of game where Story is king and player initiative is stifled.

On the other hand there are indie games where the designer is very clearly present in the text and at the same time it's clear that the game is yours now, and otherwise it wouldn't work.

Reading Unknown Armies I'm beginning to feel that a strong voice in a game both helps me get excited about running the game, and it helps me connect to the rules and their intent. Slipping into the first mode of heavy handed attitude is bad writing. Maybe gamers who hate, say, White Wolf games would actually like it if bad writing weren't so common.

I'd love for more games to be like Unknown Armies, creeping me out and making me dying to give that game a spin and creep out my players.

Still, I think I will try to slog through Hunter and make something out of it, because there are good ideas buried in there.

My Paul Jaquays collection grows, but with a sad realization

Yesterday I got a package in the mail. It wasn't a White Box, but it was very cool, namely The Enchanted Wood by Paul Jaquays! Since it is considered his best work by himself, and he is a very well regarded adventure designer I was quite keen on getting hold of it. The last time it showed up on eBay it was very expensive, so I got lucky.

Since I have quite some time to spend every morning on commuter trains, I took the scenario with me and read some of it. The parts I have read closely are very good. The parts I have just skimmed look very good. All well that ends well, right? It would make a short post if that was the end of it.

The bad news is that the very cool idea behind this adventure is the very same I have been developing myself, for an adventure I was going to release later this year! Personally I was so proud of that one. It had the proper sense of wonder, and also some atmospheric and moody setting pieces I had hoped would blow your socks off. Now it's already done.

Well, nothing really is new under the sun, is it? Now I wonder if this means I should let my project slide into oblivion. Paul is a way better adventure designer than me, that's for sure. The Enchanted Wood is not exactly widely read (is it?) and is out of print, so I am thinking that maybe it can be redone. The question is of course how much it can be like his adventure with it all looking silly and derivative. I will have to think on that one.

Quite annoying, but fun as well! Great minds think alike, eh?

Collecting games, or playing them?

A few days ago I got a package in the mail. It was my second copy of DragonQuest. Yes, I have bought a second copy of a game I have not yet played!

This even got me thinking. You could imagine that if you were playing some games fairly frequently, you would like to have another copy for the collection. Sadly, that's not the case. These are the games I have multiple copies of.

• AD&D1 PHB
• Menzter Basic D&D
• B/X D&D
• Rolemaster 2nd ed. Character Law/Campaign Law
• Savage Worlds Explorer's Edition
• DragonQuest 2nd ed.

So how many of these games have I played?

Well, one session of AD&D, two or three of B/X D&D. Yes. That's it.

There are some games which I have played and for which I have multiple copies. Oddly enough they are all just different editions. Looking at that list you find games like Stormbringer, Fading Suns, Call of Cthulhu, Mage: The Ascension, Tunnels & Trolls and Traveller.

From that list I have played FS once, CoC multiple times, Mage a few sessions and T&T I've played a lot and still do. Stormbringer even used to be my main frpg. But, the games I have multiple copies of the same book are games I would like to play, but haven't. This realization made me sad.

Some observations regarding DragonQuest and Tunnels & Trolls

I have not had any luck getting any gaming done this week. My T&T game got rescheduled for next week, and the campaigns in preparation are not ready to go live yet. So, I have read some old games instead, like DragonQuest.

Now when I have re-read selected parts of it again, I feel it have a few things in common with T&T. If you attempt an action, the normal thing to do is to roll against your stats (modified for difficulty by multiplication). Looks a lot like T&T. Also, the magic system have this idea of Active Resistance where your Willpower is reduced from the skill level rolled to loosen the spell. Once again I think of T&T and the Kremm Resistance rules of 7th ed.

Those of you who have read what I've written on that subject before know that I'm not that fond of Kremm Resistance. For me it seem way to binary. Actually, DQ made me think that maybe there is a good way to actually use it, kind of like the Active Resistance.

One way of doing it would be to let it be specific action. You can resist the spell, but then you wont do anything else. Then you have a few ways to handle it.

I think there are three basic ways to do it. You have to compare the WIZ scores between the Caster and the Target, and then you can use that for either affecting the INT to cast the spell, affect the level of the INT SR or lastly to affect the WIZ cost.

For fans of 5th ed, where there is no INT SR to cast a spell (which some have complained about as a nerfing of the Wizard without realizing that the extra AP gained evens it out), I think the last option is the way to go. That is, if you want Kremm Resistance in your game.

For us who use 7th ed, I prefer the option of affecting the INT score. Trying to get a number in a sensible range to affect the level seems harder. So, I present this suggestion.

Reduce the INT rolled for casting the spell the amount the WIZ score of the target surpasses the caster's score.

e.g. Caster with INT 16 and WIZ 16 cast a spell on Target with WIZ 20, so the Caster rolls his INT SR with an effective INT of 12 (20-16).

That way rolling doubles might still penetrate the defences, and since it will have to be actively resisted it might not be an option for every time and place.

I don't want to go the way of rolling saves or resistances all the time, it just wouldn't be T&T. This way the changes to the regular rules are minimal, and the binary nature of the rules as written is avoided. I never liked the way magic became so "scientific" and sure when you had the "you can't go there" sign of a high WIZ opponent.

You feel the WIZ drain effect is missing? Well, I think that will happen anyway. Just watch that Wizard working over time casting spells and throwing WIZ around. Survive a few rounds, or be smart and tempt him to waste some and then punch him. Otherwise I'm sure there's some way to re-engineer that one in as well.

Let me know what you think.

Skills in Lords of Creation and DragonQuest

Last night I had intended to work on my modules, but fretted and paced to no avail and wrote nothing. Today I was dead tired from not having slept enough (not easy while fretting and pacing), and decided to take a look at Encounter Critical for Jeff Rients' competition. Guess what, I got sidetracked and got down Lords of Creation from the shelf instead. Yeah, that focused.

Did you know that there are actually skills in this Tom Moldvay design? I took a gander at the skills and their descriptions, and there was an illustration which caught my eye. On page 11 there's a lady, clothed in a ankle-length cloak. But, she is holding it open exposing a body which is either painted too look like stars and planets, or is actually a gate unto the void. I'm not sure if it's supposed to be seductive or scary. It is weird. Imagine what impression that would have left on me if I'd gotten this game at a more impressionable age. Gaming illustrations are weird sometimes. Hmm. Focus.

Back to the skills. Let's see how they work. Just like DragonQuest, these are nothing like any skills I recognize (BRP experience talking). In DQ a skill is something like a whole profession, or a class. Putting more experience into the skill unlocks new abilities, not to dissimmilar to class abilities. I thumbed through the character generation chapter in LoC, and there are skills in there! I saw a odd looking chart and decided to read up on how it worked. So, in this game you put points into a Skill, which have levels and are actually called a profession. Just like DQ you also multiply the level with some funky number (yay! arithmetics!)  to get a percentage of success. Hmm. I wonder if Mr. Moldvay knew of DQ? LoC is published in 1984, so I guess it's possible, since 2nd ed DQ was published in 1981.

I will probably not write a module tonight either.

Ars Magica and DragonQuest, same kind of fantasy?

I today sat down and read through the "Fourth book of DragonQuest" AKA Arcane Wisdom. It once again brought forth the feeling I had when I read the 2nd ed rulebook, that this game is made for some more faery tale fantasy. Don't ask me why, but for some reason I get the vision of dark woods, gingerbread houses and monstrous animals when I read DQ.

One reason I once liked Ars Magica was Mythic Europe. The idea of a mediaval Europe where all the legends were true sounded like an excellent world of adventure. Having generated dozens of characters for everything from 2nd to 5th ed, and playing a few sessions I realized that Ars Magica is a game that bores me to tears. It sounds good but is unfun. I still like the idea, though.

I wonder if DragonQuest could be a game that could do Mythic Europe justice? Hmmm.