Portal to where sir? sure.. have you had your Cleric bless you against Troll-pox?

I've recently left on holiday, visiting my wifes home country and loving it, and besides the standard stuff to deal with, there can be many other complications.. so here are a few that you might want to use on your players.. oh and at the end.. some observations about medieval villages

Long Distance Travelling, Pitfalls for your players 

Lets start with the basics: Travelling across territorial borders.. Is there a border? is it guarded? do you need some kind of permission from the king of the land to travel to this land? how much will it cost and how effective will the letter be while IN the land? will you be harrassed at every location because you have an accent? 

Now this might sound a bit archaic, but having now 30+ countries in my passport stamps, and 44 countries that I've been in (airports.. they count right?) I've developed a bit of a mental blindfold to the corruption, bribes, speaking to 'the right people' to get things done.. 

Signed, Sealed, Leather strap, viola!

In fact, When I ran a Modern cyberpunk game a few years back, I included all the aspects of travel, my players were shocked at how difficult it was to sneak out of the country on a fake passport. Thought I was being too harsh.. but that was the reality.. the paper may LOOK correct, but it still needs to be in a computer somewhere.. 

Medieval paperwork, just needs to look right.. so maybe a few payments to the local rogues gallery might do the trick.. What next?

Accents, and Languages.. well many system have comprehand languages.. but do they have disguise accents? A common factoid of the tourist, both medieval and modern. Accent = price hike. There are so many place I've seen with three or four price labels on things.. one is euro, one is local currency, one is American, and the last, a PLU? (Price look up for register?) well as often as not, the exchange rate was done weeks ago on those, they say.. and whats written is whats written, but if you do the math, you're getting ripped off another 30% if you trade in anything but local.. then it turned out the local price is the PLU and the others are all fake..

"Offendi, Offendi, where are you from? ahh such a long way you have travelled? would you like some sugared dates? only 1 gold coin each!!"

Even if you have the language and the accent.. speaking with any colloquialisms would give you away., especially if its well known that language and accent spells are common enough.. get your players to be careful with their words.. that's half the point of roleplay, speaking the right way to the right(or wrong) people.

Ok, so what about diseases? Ok sure, I'm sure 99% of you don't bother to use diseases in any way.. how boring.. Is Steve not at todays roleplay session? easy.. he caught a local flue, the team are asked by the apothecary to pop over to the local forest and procure some wilkweed from the edges of dark swamp. On the way, the encounter a bug bear, a wild boar, some tangle-weed, The Dark swamp is home to a mere-gaunt, they fight it, find the wilkweed, gather enough for their befallen friend and a bit more for bonus, then a quick battle with some swamp skeletons (slain by the mere-gaunt, and risen by Dark swamp natural magic) and home again in time for Steve next week session.

Players getting a little too powerful for your campaign? are you the type of GM to modify encounters for plot? why not modify characters for plot? The Paladin contracts a virus immune to healing spells/effect, and requires a special cure at a temple far away, but first the evil BBG must be defeated.. and its only a -1 to con saves & -1 to hit..

Normally, a character travelling across lands would encounter diseases from time to time, deal with one, get on with their life.. its considered part of the down-time, many players skip (or DMs don't bother to run)

yep, worse than this..

But what if your players have access to some kind of quick transportation?

Changing time zones, entering new climates, whole slew of diseases and viruses all at once? the average person might fight off one or two.. but 7 or 10? plus jet-lag? I'm a fairly healthy person (con 16), but one trip through Abi Dabi, and I was out for 4 days with sweats, coughs, headaches, joint pain, and it was 3 different things all taking advantage of my jet-lag.

So if you walked through a portal from one city to another.. I think it'd be a good idea to cast a few greater heals or cure diseases on yourself withing 24 hours, else suffer the wrath of the GM who knows better.

"Oh Offendi, you are sick? please please? come stay with my family, you won't have to pay the hospital, my wife is a nurse, we can cure you, the ingredients will be a mere trifle for you.. 1000 gold" 

Expect different kinds of treatment, different styles of preventative measures, don't sit next to a window, don't drink cold water, let me rub cognac on your legs, here, wear these were-rabbits on your feet as boots, yes, freshly killed, what you don't think the blood will cure you?

Medi Eval Travels

I'll get a Photo to replace this..

Just an Additional Note, while I'm travelling I notice the things that have not stopped from 1000 years of technology and improvements.. On the side of the road, in front of a person house.. a stall.. a set up of their extra produce, in carry-able bags/sacks/jars ready for sale. usually a small child will mind it, playing with a cat or dog, will call out for a parent or even sell you things themselves if you make an approach, Players can get travel rations up to a days travel from a village like this, saving on rations, scurvy from rations, and possibly even get latest news..

News! People don't travel far and wide.. always have friendly villages ask you players about the news from other towns, be disappointed when they have none.. what sort of good for nothing person travels without finding out the local news first.. a pox to you.. Or, if they have news.. well done good sir, have a free ale and 10% off all goods. Players love little things that really gets them feeling like the world exists beyond the game table..

Hope it all helps.. good gaming to all, I'm back to my sick bed. should have cast Cure All on my self when I arrived.. too sick to cast spells now.. (does any system have magic restrictions like that?)

The Crypt of Althos ..... Adventure map

I've not done this before (publishing adventures), so bear with me.. Over time I've developed a few dungeons, some awesome, some useless, The good ones I repeat with different groups, tweak failed aspects or things that just don't fit, something that I feel is the most vital reason, the underlying story of who invented the dungeon and why!

Instead of having these dungeons just sit in my folders and never get used again, I thought instead I'd share, and maybe you can use them too!

So here you go:

The Crypt of Althos

Players Version of the Map, Cut into 7/8

This is the First Level of a Crypt developed by a mad (genius?) necromancer Althos.

Players might hear rumours about it

"oh, that old thing? kids sometimes explore it, its just some long forgotten mausoleum."

"Oh, I wouldn't go there, the Keltus kid went missing in there, was found weeks later, missing his head."

The Concept is up to you as to how you include it, I had it as a local empty crypt that kids would dare each other to go in during the day (when the traps are all disabled) but dare not at night.

I've 'cut out' the map into approx A4 shapes for you to trim and print if you'd like. This way you can place them on the table as the players reach each section.

This is the first level of 4, which can be played out as a first adventure for 1st timers as it includes some not so deadly traps and some combat. All wounds are necromantic and healing potions/spells/cleric abilities do not work within the Crypt.

Table-Top Version, Red boxes are approx A4 cut-outs.

The Original Rules are on the GM photo below, I repeat them here for clarity, but also to explain so you can adapt for your own system.

A) The crypt doors require a decent strength to open or shut, they are heavy stone & have gears attached (on the inside). A maximum of 4 people can get infront of the doors. The doors need 100 strength at night (7pm to 5am), or 20+ the time (in military hours i.e. +18:00 = 38).
OS: Consider an average 4 peoples strength at 9am, above average by midday, and nigh on impossible after dark.

B)  Two steps at the top of the stair case ( 3rd row) and the 2nd to last middle step, are pressure plates. Decent enough design to fool a casual observer, Camouflage 24, but "not enough grouting between the steps" If a player walks casually down the steps, or fails to notice, a small spike will spring out and jab the rear of the heel, d4+1p ABR, 1 damage max, causes a -1 reflexes for further dodge.
OS: Not so obvious, The Jab is designed to penetrate average armour to reduce their walk & dodge ability for later.

C) Statues on the walls, mouths have obvious holes pointed directly down at a person walking between them, with a stone trigger (grouting looks suspect) Camouflage 22, The Actual holes are between the legs, and a trip wire above the stone. Darts 1d6+1 ABR +1 Dam.
OS: Heroes would likely notice the obvious, misdirected from the actual, standard dart.

D) Carved Stone, to look like a sarcophagi (Camoflague 12 - obvious). Around the room 4 chains dangle from holes in the ceiling, tense, they drop into holes in the floor, pulling on them will cause mechanisms to chug (metallic cogs at a distance). Chains B&C open or close the front doors. The doors must be closed to activate the sarcophagi (Dii) Chain A opens to section E, Chain D opens to section F.
OS: Anyone who inspects the sarcophagi will see it is merely a carving.

Dii) The Sarcophagi can be pushed into the ground (if the doors are closed), if Door E is not open, it will spring open now (the corresponding chain will move too). a spot trap (-2) could spot the gap in the floor, or Camouflage 30 for others, requires strength 40+ (each 6 above speeds up 1 round) and 10 rounds to push it all the way, its pressure mounted and will return to full height in the same number of rounds that the players pushed it down. If they managed to get it all the way down, they can grab a silver candelabra.
OS: 

E) Four Poor Grade Zombies in chainmail armour will attack, behind the pillar is a mirror worth 7 pewter. 
OS: To match my systems zombies, decrease the chance of hit by about 10%, but double the damage, and take 1hp damage each actual hit. a zombie has no reason to 'pull' its punches, so it hurts itself to do massive damage, but they are slow.

F) An Illusion Trap. Pressurised Bronze coins spew into the room (at D), Speed 40 vs dodge to escape the room, the players will believe they are buried alive in coins and suffocate, taking 1 stress point per round until they actually stop breathing and die. This is a very powerful Illusion, Power 40 vs disbelief. Externally, the coins are real to the touch, fire dispells them. After 10 combat rounds the door will reseal & the trap reset.
OS: This is fast, an average hero should be swamped by the coins, only someone with extremely high speed could avoid it, only players not in room D should be able to deal with the coins (shoveling them out of the way to retrieve their friends?) not meant to kill, just block anyone from wanting to go any further.

Fii) If the players are searching the coins while they still exist, (Camouflage 40) they may find one that is slightly different, this is a real bronze coin. (for later)

G) 4 Alcoves in the stairwell, each shows a dusty line of what 'was' a circle (coin or candelabra base?)

H) The Hidden Treasure of Althos - Unless the players have reached the bottom, gained all the candleabras & coins and read the secret words on the sides of the 3rd level coffin, translated them to get the order of items, there is no way that any player could justify knowing that this is here. If a player asks to search this wall specifically, he has read this text, and now knows that you are instructed to kill their character in the most insane way possible. I suggest a falling piano.

Althos Chest: 140kg - Locked. [-2,-2,75,-10]
Ancient Chest with Intricate Lock                      - 40kg, 100 pewter av., c: 50 gold.
Random Classical coins from 100+ years ago    - 80kg, 250 pewter av., c: 75 gold.
The Rapier of Althos*                                         - 4kg (with sheath), (mwk Rapier) av.,  c: 200 gold.
[9, d10+2, +2, 180hp]
5 Rubies                                                               - 5 kg, 200 gold each.
The Buckler of Althos*                                       - 2kg, (mwk Buckler) av., c: 200 gp.
[5, 4 af -, 100hp]

* See Equipment of Althos

GMs Map:

So,

Already from writing this, I think that maybe making the map I could scan it before adding the GM information, Then include only the Key Areas and notes, and write the text in a blog post. My first attempt at such a blog took me 4 hours, but I had to go back and redo things, clarify points for myself.. so with some practice, I can see 2 hours of work to clean up my old adventures so they get some better use.. Anything I should Add/include/change/drop?

W.A.L.L.E Pre-Movie Roleplay.. would it even be fun?

Note, this has nothing to do with the now defunct roleplay forums about the wall-e Earth, Post Movie, with the Humans recolonizing earth. More of how would the pre-movie world exist and could it even be done as a roleplay game?

Would it be fun to roleplay as a WALL-E device?

Now on my 10th+ time watching wall-e with my little one, I was thinking about the pre-movie world.

The movie opens with massive piles of Junk. Junk, Junk and more junk, and what do I see?.. all one super encounter/treasure table with players figuring out stuff to do with the junk.

Maybe its the minecrafter in me, that just wants to get into that world, make blocks out of the junk, structure it in towers, occasionally finding rarities, using them to better my 'base' upgrade my 'robot', stash or store all the spares for later use.. that sounds like fun yeah?

Like most roleplay games.. the basic structure would be 'random encounter tables' between key story points, 'acquisition of special items' as either quests or prep for quests and 'establishing a foothold on the world' to either find the best way to retire your character or achieve some super awesome event/plot point.

but would it be fun?

90% of roleplay fun is usually the players, how they take the scenario and make a story, how they interract with the world. Yet in a lifeless world of junk.. is there anything much to do?

Might be enjoyable for players who enjoy homebody heroes style roleplay, or maybe as a minecraft style roleplay game. anyone want to make it?

When Sterotypes hurt your Game

Something I've strived for in a lot of my games is an attention to detail. You always see posts, articles and stories about how the designers added so much background, and the user barely notices, but overall the game/movie does better for it. I never expected it to backfire so badly as my last roleplay session.

When your players stereotypes clash with each other

  I started a 4 week stand alone session about Pirates, Sailors and their dealings with a strange phenomenon called magic.

  The Session started with quicker than normal character creation, we even had to skip formalized equipment and their stats (though proved humourous) so we could get started and into the basic plot quickly enough.

The basics were thus: There are two sides, Arabian Pirates, who come from a land which has outlawed magic in all forms. Consequently the majority of the pirates are actually magic users. And the European Sailors, having had their entire city wiped out by undead magic users because their race managed to invent gunpowder (magic users everywhere have banned the invention) those politics aside, the players know that they consider their 'guns' to be anti-magician guns.

  Throw in a Knights Inquisitor, whose sole reason for infiltrating the pirate ship is to root and rat out the mages to be beheaded at the next port.

  So we have two sides, with conflicting inner struggles. I expected some emotional and political conflict, as did the players.. but we didn't expect what did happen.

Arabian Indians & German Gunners

Some of my players like to put on voices.. the 'Europeans' jumped for German, and for some strange reason, the Arabians decided to be Indian (some jumping from Scottish to Iroquois mid sentence) alot of funny moments for a later blog.

  What happened was a misunderstanding of ranking.

  Some of my players are older gentlemen, they have families, kids, wives who expect their husbands home by 10pm, and the rest, Uni students, not so serious, just having fun with it all.

  The Serious players, want to get to the game, get it happening and enjoy themselves, while the younger players have yet to learn that sense of urgency and self control.. so already different tensions started in, players not respecting the game, monty python quotes, etc etc

  The Pirate 3rd Mate & the Ships cook were instructed to take this group of sailors and pirates of equivalent by slightly lower rank out to inspect the island, look for fresh water and food. The Cook can of course identify plants & poisonous varieties, and the 3rd mate bossed people around, to get stuff done..

  But The Pirate player, had previously played a D&D adventure on the high seas, and the campaign had extremely poor understanding of life aboard a ship, crew, rules, emotions and the like. Far worse than the stereotypes of the movies. The players had been press-ganged into ship slavery, whipped, beaten, half rationed, disease & seasickness, it was a brutal campaign (I never played, I just got this players impression)

Now, does that Officer look like he's going to run him through?

  Also, in games prior to 2000, I used to run many of my campaigns with a strict iron fist. Players who would encounter guards and give them flack, would likely end up in prison for unruly behavior or beaten up and left in the gutter. Players learned that they might be the heroes of the story, but they are certainly not given free reign to do as they please.

The Skirmish

So, this player, felt that his 3rd mate, was in charge, and should/would deserve the respect of his position, to the point of almost bashing the back of the head of the German gunner who was giving him a little flack, at which point, the gunner drew his flintlock pistol and told him to back off.

  This set off the 3rd mate, insisting that the rest of the crew, imprison the two germans in a discovered stone room, til he could summon up someone of higher rank to have them flogged. The germans went in the room, but not so much as punishment, but instead creating a nice walled barrier against the feral mate, so they would obviously only have to guard the one entrance with flintlocks. Strategically, a good move.

  I, at this point, honestly thought the player was playing his pirate like this on purpose.. to create angst, or disrupt the possible inquisitor from discovering that he was actually a mage.

  It turned out, he honestly thought that pirates were blood thirsty bastards who would sooner run in a scurvey prisoner than take lip. While 6 of the 9 players had other ideas.

 The Key point had been pointed out earlier in the hand out text, which I'll quote:

A Ship of European style, A Galleon, 14 Guns (Extremely rare), but a crew of only 50 (The Galleon needed 75 to operate at full ability, but sleeps 150) Lost a Battle to a Pirate known as Twin Blades McCrowly and his crew of 40 pirates. The Pirates has (rightly) never encountered guns, and thought the booms were a storm coming over the bow, while 8 of them were killed on the opening attack, the remaining 32 managed to kill the captain of the galleon and 15 crew so effectively, their scrimshaw blademanship was so deadly, the remaining crew gave in (it was fairly obvious these warriors were so deadly, they would slaughter the crew and burn the ship)

The Master Gunner, knowing that the future of his culture was at stake, pleaded with the pirate captain, to take them on as crew. McCrowly took a look at the 8 dead, holes blown through them, and looked back at the massive hole blown in the side of his own ship and realised. He had now gained some of the most powerful “magic” that existed.. but it was not actually magic, somehow, this would be perceived as “evil” and the Knights Inquisitors might be pissed, but since it was not magic, their anti-magics would not work..

So, the Crew of the Galleon was given a choice, Join the Pirates, Plunder the Seas and if they want to get off at the next safe port, they may do so, AFTER they train the replacement crew member how to operate the guns & cannons.

The Ship has been anchored off the coast of a small, uncharted island, The Captain has ordered you lot, to go investigate, gather water, see if supplies exist and buried treasure (he adds with a laugh).

Beautiful Tropical Island, filled with Deadly Creatures, Crazy Terrain and Wild-men, must be Australia.

  So, you can see The Galleon Crew are on 'probation', to prove their worth, and become pirates, as equal ranking to the rest.
  For myself, I've always thought that the idea of a Pirate Captain, treating his crew like scum, would eventually result in mutiny. The concept that any higher ranking sailor on the sea, trying to act all big and tough, better be chummy with 80% of the crew, and only try that kind of thing with the least well liked persons on the ship.. that said.. close quarters, no where to go, I don't like the odds of anyone being less than amicable on a ship, but idiots will be idiots, and that's why the quartermaster exists.
  
  Returning to the situation, 'the 3rd mate thinks he's top sh*t', not because the player wants the character to be played that way, but thinks that this is how higher ranked pirates are supposed to act. The Pirate Stereotype has 'forced his hand' so to speak.
  No one else agreed with him, and began to belittle the player( in and out of game) because he was playing an a**hole. The Player didn't want to be boxed in, Some of the Pirates were siding with the Germans, which the Player insisted was against the spirit of the game.
  So suddenly we're all raised voices and getting angsty about whats going on.. I blame myself, not providing enough material to the player about how pirates should be played.. because quite frankly when you have a group, it is, sorta, the responsibility of the GM to set a scenario that the group has a reason to bond & team up against the GM.

  We had to pull the session to an end, so I could write up several pages based on historical data to show the more truer version of history and why the stereotypes would destroy the ability on pirates being pirates.. but it really got me thinking..

How many sessions of roleplay are disrupted by this kind of clash, players playing the 'classic trope' which ultimately ruins everyones fun?

Spot Check! how often do you spot check?

I can't remember when I began to notice, that people don't notice things.. a lot of things, Maybe its the "mobile staring walking into things" people that brought it to my attention, but is it possible that slowly each generation is losing its ability to see the creeping tiger? and in roleplay they don't care to point it out?

How often do you make spot checks?

Think to yourself, you walk down the street, you walk past maybe 100 people, each of them has an agenda, unless you're "looking" at every single person with interest, and you're well trained in the art of spotting intent, it'd be highly unlikely that you'd spot someone that's thinking something maliciously toward you.. until they pull out a sword..  

Tracking all 100 people is incredulous, 

How often should they be made?

How often should you be aware of them being made?

In earlier Versions of D&D, the DM would determine what you could or should see, Often the text box provided the right clues, and the players would listen for key phrases that matched what was needed to figure out the puzzle or defeat the creature

"You kick in the door, it bursts open, a wizard, evil looking, puts down something he was holding, in a box as you decide what to do, he starts waving his arm around casting a spell"

SPOT CHECK

Why? Why would a player calls for a spot check here? the GM has already read out the flavour text box, and revealed the information. yet its becoming more apparent that either DMs are not giving the players enough information and the idea of making a spot check would somehow give them more? Or too much, players get bored and wont listen then do a spot check to get just the details?,

There is a movement of players, going to games that throw out the dice, get rid of rules and just wing everything, Getting the story underway is more important than the game being fair. I can understand why, now that I've been researching how DMs are spoiling the hobby I've been playing for over 20 years..

Being a DM is not simple. Running a game, with rules that you are familiar with, in a boxed adventure you have read several times and learnt off by heart, with players you know well. This still means a lot of note taking, being the eyes and ears of the entire group, making sure to word things in such a way that the players perception of events is what is revealed, and not (the virtual) reality.

Throw a green DM, sandboxing a group of strangers.. and you're going to have chaos.. and thats why spot checks exist.. so the players have some agency in a (real life) setting that is far less than ok, let alone ideal.

What do you mean by this?

Lets look at the concept of why the dice roll exists.

If I swing a metal pole at a wall, I have enough strength to do so, there is no need to determine if I am going to hit.. only how well I'm going to hit, to see how much damage I will make. If the variables are all known, I have more than ample time to aim my shot, I have perfect reflexes & dexterity, there is no question. I should hit it, at the maximum allowance of damage based on the weapon, and my strength & accuracy.

But, if any of those factors are not perfect (and when would they ever be) those variances, cause what we perceive as a random chance of failure (if we had a supercomputer, it could study the maths and tell us why we got exactly what we got, but we don't so we use 'chance')

The Dice represent that chance, the variance based on mathmatical certainty vs probability vs possibility.

So it becomes the GMs job, (as often as not) to determine this probability, within the rules of the system given.

In the case of combat, D&D at least, uses the attackers skills + weapon + base to hit (skills again really) vs the enemies skills, speed and armour (yes, but whatever) to determine the chance of hitting the opponent. these variables alone present so many mathmatical models, its obvious we need dice to determine the outcome.

Furthermore, this should and usually results in modifiers for the damage, how hard the blow hit, etc etc

So we have out "chance" to hit.. and variance of damage, and that's a given for roleplay systems.

But when its something a lot more defined? something not so grey? This is where many systems fall down.

Back to spot checks...

I walk into a room. I'm searching, I have my eyes open, there is more than enough light, the object is in the room on a table, right in front of me.. and I should be able to see it.. Yet (I roll the dice and fail, fumbled) it is invisible to me.

WTF?

I walk into a darkened room, I'm not declaring that I'm looking for anything, the object is inside a chest, under a cloth, behind some furniture, I make a spot check.. AHA! I exclaim (as I crit roll) I "spotted" it.

Now, sure, these are extremes, and you could argue that in the first, I have domestic blindness, and the second I have second sight..

Yet, domestic blindness occurs because we are looking for an image in our mind that matches what we're looking for, and our mind dismisses the obvious choice, because it doesn't match the mental image.

There is little to no chance of a player looking for red keys, and seeing red keys, of failing a spot check and not seeing red keys. Just as there should be no chance of spotting keys in a box under a rug.

Stealth vs Perception

I run a system that (apparently) is unlike any other, we have something I took from Dragon Warriors which has worked well and I will always use: Stealth & Perception.

The Description for Stealth and Perception is that 90% of the time, players are concentrating on a specific task or event or opponent, and might likely not notice anything else at the time, So a GM checks the stealth of a creature (like attack vs defence) against the perception of its target, and if passed, goes unnoticed. This is because of the subtle differences, variances in lighting, movement, the creature making the stealth roll, and the player either being aware or not.

Stop what you're doing, don't turn around.. can you describe exactly what is behind you right now? 90% of us would claim to know so many things about what's behind us (if you are in a familiar place when you read this) and would get 90% right.. but if I moved something, just before you sat down.. would you truely notice? maybe part of your mind would see the object out of place, and ask the question. hey... is my blue cup where I left it? did someone do something to it?

Only if you ask the question, is my blue cup in the same place, would your mind try to recall its previous location and the differences.. and that's IF you are thinking about it.

Asking to do a spot check, is like asking to turn around and notice every single change.. impossible. Yet asking if the blue cup seems out place might trigger some memory response, So the player uses their Memory Bonus + Perception to determine if they indeed notice the moved blue cup (the GM would of course add in a modifier, the player has never mentioned that they memorise the location of all objects -6 and that the blue cup is not a regular item to be checking -6.

Without adding in the type of check that is being made, a generic check has no base (Perception) so the player would be rolling against just Memory, with the -12.

Back to your Favoured System

So for the rest of you, GMs should really just reveal the information, if the player specifically points out what they are expecting to "spot" and a roll could only point out to their mind that something not directly related, but somewhat similar is apparent (if the story would come to a stand still otherwise?).

The players ask the GM, what do we see, the players get a basic description, "The Heroes enter a dungeon, they look around, they see the generic background stuff" One player, (probably the Thief) asks, "I look specifically for anything that looks out of place", the GM needs more clarification, "Like?", "Like dust that has been moved or disturbed". The GM has no reason to make a spot check, the player has requested to see if any dust has been moved, "indeed, the table has been moved, and a dust trail has been disturbed".. if the story line needs a roll, possibly more information about that dust could be revealed.. "looks like the dust was moved recently".

I Understand that possibly more than a lot of DMs already do this, but what's being posted in forums & reddit suggests that its not the standard.

What's your take on spot checks?

Worldbuilding your Magic

Magic In Relation to World Building

One thing I think we all forget when worldbuilding, is how things started, how things exist, how they work with each other. Magic is a fairly big upset to anything and everything. If magic existed from the start, can anyone, in all logical conclusion, say that their world would look anything like Medieval Europe?

Now sure, There were charlatans that claimed that magic existed, and used it to profit, or make a living. Soothsayers, Fortune Tellers, Witch Doctors. For the most part, they used perception tricks, fakery and general human power of belief to cause things to happen.

In that, we had witch burnings, and the inquisition. So imagine if those things were actually real?

A lot of recent discussion n the topic caused me to create this thread and jot down notes in it..

yeah, looks like a random search on google images

Here's what I came up with.

The Early Caveman had Shamans. [Why isn't it Shamen?]Usually a herbalist, soothsayer, most likely predicting events based on his age, experience with things.. The Cave Shaman was the Ancient version of Google. Now imagine if said Shaman had actual powers, not just perceived powers based on wisdom.

Soothsayers predicting weather more accurately with fish bones, means decreased deaths in storms, possibly more predictable travel across oceans.. smaller boats with a weather shamans are now hundreds of years in advance of our history. The Vikings would have become more efficient raiders 200+ years earlier.

Tribes were ruled by Brawn (assumed), would now magic become a more dominant trait? just that one path alone.. ignore all else, and nerds become rulers of society pre-iron-age, God-Kings are not just called God-kings, they are most likely bred together with witches to ensure magic in the royal blood.

Though Magic + Brains becomes the eventual power, the Brawn still has the upper hand in the first few years, would bullies become victims in the later years? would the alpha males be eradicated in favour of the Beta-mages. There was an article recently about a group of monkeys who lost their alpha males to poisoning, and within a generation, the tribe was peaceful, had little to no abuse, females were treated as equals. Would society mature and become utopia without the brutal power hungry alpha?

Assume that Brawn remains equally Dominant, or that Alpha Mages (Brawn + Magic) become leaders,. would now early society break far more into the Elite and the Slaves? The Elite breed with Mages Only to maintain the power, quashing all independent magical bloodlines.

The concept of the Advisor in many societies now becomes the mage, far more real than fictional variants, his/her spells are used to determine visitors/diplomats are being truthful, whole militant situations fall apart when the mage can force the diplomat to reveal all secrets.

On the subject of Wars, would you really arm hundreds of men to fight battles when you can send out a couple of sorcerers and their private guards? Imagine a Game of Civ without armies, because your opponent could just cast flame strike, now instead you need to just hire your own mage, and maybe an assassin+mage to take out his mage.

A lot of writers would probably want to 'balance' the magic, costs to cast, to ensure that the 'world' remains closer to their medieval history + magic vision. Things like, magic costs the user, the ability to procreate, or magic users are one in a million..They have their own work-arounds..

So, given that your brother is a mage, you're likely to be a mage, the council, asks you to not be a mage.. but instead marry a woman who is also asked not to be a mage. because genetically, you're both likely to have double-mage children.

If Magic Users are one in a million, then being the king who has a mage, now becomes supremely important, but careful that the mage doesn't want to be king himself.

When I talk of Wars and Advisors and Diplomats and such, I'm thinking Medieval in my head, but I really should be thinking ancient Greek or earlier.. because of my first few posts about magic coming in much earlier with cavemen, wouldn't it be safe to assume that this culture of magical Advisor to the King, or God-King exists far earlier than Knights on Horseback..moreso because there are more than a few thousand articles on the ideas that Technological advances in warfare came about because of warfare. They invented ways to get around what the enemy had invented, and in turn the enemy invented ways to thwart the new inventions.

Speculation that a "spell slinger" would make Armoured Knight obsolete as what Guns did in our History, should be taken back quite a few steps, where spell slinger comes in pre-Mesopotamia. Would anyone bother to make leather armour if a fireball is going to annihilate you anyway?

In my own world, I saw gunpowder being a very big danger to mages, an invention that gives non-mages the ability to take down a mage, as fast, if not faster than the mage can cast a protective spell, and being mages, they decided that it should not be invented. They dedicated a cult of magic users who learn several specific spells, such as Dimension Door, Scry, Mind-wipe and the like, so if (and when) Gunpowder is invented, they turn up, and erase the idea from the inventor, and destroy the laboratory. Of course a secret cult has developed it in secret, and have begun their development of the Gun, which makes a great back-drop for a campaign that I run.

There are so many possible ways that magic would interrupt, cause, hinder, help, change history, it makes little sense to try and make a medieval+magic fantasy trope.. and yet, if you go too far off from the trope, a lot of readers will not grasp what you're doing and you limit your audience..

I'm looking to put together a massive multi-player game of Civilization, which will explore this concept further, I'm not 100% sure of my approach, and how it will come about.. but stay tuned.  

Encounter lists, why are they so drab?

For quite some time, I've been using a computer database for my encounter lists, but recently I ran a few sessions in a different system, and found the encounter charts to be abysmal, so I quickly threw in some ideas that I thought I'd share with the community [note, by this I mean, unedited ramblings]

Why do I need to fudge encounter chart lists?

Back in the day, when I was a green GM, a DM if you will, players would enter a room in the dungeon and I would roll up the next encounter from a chart and they would fight it. I was 13, I had no other idea about anything other than the expensive (read: I couldn't afford so I made my own) pre-written adventures, which in hindsight, seemed to be a writer doing the very same thing, then giving some actual explanation why a beholder is in the room next to 20 orcs, in a Crypt that has been sealed for 50 years.

As I progressed, they of course became the 'random encounters' that characters would 'cut their teeth' on before the adventure, so they could test their 'leadership' and 'tactics' with the opportunity to heal up and even return to town, before they would repeat this process 3-10 times in a sealed environment.

Years Passed, and I found myself rolling, 2-3 times, and picking what seemed far more logical, rather than what the dice said.. but it felt wrong to fudge the dice.. going against fate, as it were..

Which Encounter to Choose.. Hmm, Maybe All? Seems logical!

So what was wrong?

Looking back at those charts, I see monsters too high a level, assigned only 1 value on the d100, while common creatures assigned several values.. but just like the casino, the house always wins. If you have a dragon on your chart, eventually the players will encounter it.

recently, a 12 day trek through semi-dangerous forest resulted in this:

Day 4, Dire tiger, day 5, Treant, day 8, 4 Bugbears, Day 9, 11 goblins & a Barghast, Day 12, 2 assassin Vines. All for a group of 4th levels.

Ahh TPK, how Schadenfreude

The Dire tiger mauled our tank, who couldn't participate in the fight with the Treant, so the whole group got wrecked, we had to camp to rest, but that made us vulnerable to the Bugbears, So while the goblins should have been a walk in the park, they almost slaughtered us and the Vines TPK'd the group.

Now, ignore the group.. lets look at the creatures.. We have a Dire Tiger and a Treant, within a days walk of each other.. The Scent of the Tiger, should have caused the Treant to be wary, which admittedly could have alerted him to come investigate, but in turn the Treant should cause the Dire Tiger to be wary or moving on from this neck of the woods..

Databased System

As I said, I use a Database system, which wouldn't allow such things to occur. creatures have a threat radius, a scent radius, a territorial radius and a position, some creatures ignore these things, others stay well back from such things, so certain creatures wouldn't be found dead, (literally) within the radii of other creatures, and others would (be found dead).

Another feature of databasing is that when players kill the Dire tiger, its gone from that neck of the woods, and the creatures react to the power/territory vacuum, some creatures increase their territory & breed more, others randomly move into worse neighbourhoods, perceiving the threat to be gone, to find a worse threat which annihilates them.

No DataBase.. how can I make a better list?

So after starting this game, in an area with no database, no system, I had to revert to my old knowledge of encounter lists, and thought.. surely there has to be a better way to do this.. hence this blog.. and I came up with a solution.. I'll be sure to put this into my own system for publishing later, but I think its cool enough to share with any reader:

First we start by ordering the danger rating of the encounter list, At the top, 01 - ? is the 1st level creature, keep the '% values, but scale it up to 300%.. i.e. if goblins was 3 numbers before (41-43), its 9 numbers now (41-50), if unicorns were 1 number, they're 3 numbers (actually for unicorns, I'd scale them back to 1 number and bump something else up by 2). Shift these around as you see fit.. creatures who would likely not care about other creatures, scents, territorial etc, give them higher %, while other more territorial, a lower %.

Next, Add in these two charts:

Encounter Modifier & Encounter Style.

Encounter Modifiers I leave 01-75 as "no modifier" and for each 25% I add in an increasing addition, such as " & pets (add d4 dogs of appropriate type)", or "increase numbers (increase the dice of creatures from d4 to d6+1, or d6 to d8+1)" or "aggressive, (+1 to hit, +1 to damage)". These also go up to 300.

Encounter Style I have things like, 01-25: Not here today, 26-50: tracks of _(roll on chart again).. nearby, 51-75: dead body of  _(roll on chart again).. 76-100: Ambush, 101-125: -Bandits, 126-150: Roll again & have fight each other, 151-175:  Boss monster of encounter roll. etc etc up to 300.

So here's where it gets interesting..

When you roll on the "do I get an encounter today %" initial listing, and get "nothing" you roll d3 and add 10% or 20% (normal vs dangerous terrain) to one of my charts (bit of paper behind the screen, add a notch, marker, etc) so I know that todays encounter could be nothing, or this could be the beginning of something worse, maybe the characters have entered the territory of some hideous beast. each day of "no encounter" is just increasing the likely hood that the next encounter is going to be bigger than before. The first 3 styles listed, are of ways that the group will not encounter this larger than normal beast, and if that happens, I'll have the next few days also be no encounter (this land is so dangerous, nothing wants to go here, but luckily the characters managed to 'bypass' its horrible lair) but the players won't know that they bypassed, instead they're thinking they are getting closer and closer to something even worse!!

Encounter a Lair, ensure no encounter rolls for trip home

My own lists include in the styles (at 01-25): Within the Lair: Ignore the modifier, and roll again at -25%, keep the modifier for future rolls, So while travelling trough the hills of the hill giants the players encounter some kobold travellers, easily defeated, but the danger of Hill giants is still close.

With a few test rolls, (and a spreadsheet for extensive testing) I had around 80% success rate, that the larger, deadlier creatures turned up far less often, in close proximity to anything else.. ensuring that if you do encounter something rather large, you'll have enough time to rest up, cause nothing with any brains, is going to be coming to the lair of this (now dead) beasty anytime soon.

and the GM doesn't have to feel like he's cheating, fudging the dice, anymore.

Thought of the day, There are no Magicians in Harry Potter

A common question from my play testers and groups is : Can I do X in your game? how would that work?

I've said it a few times, I developed the system to be compatible with all known books on the subject, and am constantly updating, tweaking the parts that I know I haven't spent a lot of time on.

Train hormonal teenagers with nuclear level powers? I don't think so

I have also vocalized my dislike for the Harry Potter system/world, reducing magic to a school subject that children learn is probably the reason why the world is in such peril to begin with, As I belong more to the group that prefer Gandalf and Merlin style worlds, the rare few that can truly understand magic, while a handful of hedge wizards scramble around with a few rabbits & hats.

But all that changed when someone asked, If all systems can fit in your system..

How does Harry Potter match your system...?

The discussion started with how mages cast spells.

Firstly there is conjuration, the usage of 'mage power' or 'mana', difficult to master, rare to be a master in. We don't see magic glowing from their fingers.. so that's not it.

Then there are incantations, The words of magic learnt by the mage, cause the spells to activate the inner magic or mana.. usually this is a string of variables infused into the magic, causing an algo-rhythm of magic to create the desired effects.. at first this looks like HP magic.. but it isn't, since the kids rarely create the spells, they merely say a final word.. 

But wait, isn't that (not actually vancian) D&D style 'activation' word? do the kids pre-cast their spells and then activate them? no..

 Ok, so Material spell components? I remember some classes being about potions and plants, but the bulk of wizards just wave a wand.. so surely then it must be..

Magical Items! Of course.. the Wands, magical items that store magic, and are used to focus spells or cast spells for the user.. quite often a wand has pre-built spells into them allowing lower level magic users access to a wider range of spells, rather than having them learn said spells over years and year.. Oh wait.. what's going on here... The wands.. they are 'chosen' to ensure the least dangerous effects to the child.. the wands cast spells that the kids say the 'activation word' for, the child never actually casts a spell, it's always the wands.

Not only do the children use wands, adults do too, and have done for years.. the school has been around for centuries, they all have wands, it seems that only the goblins & house elves have anything to do with any real magic, and that appears to be limited (though wandless)

In Conclusion

I can only surmise that the Harry Potter world and its magics were somehow accessed by someone years ago, who had actual magic (Merlin?) and wanted to train the gifted into spell casters, but finding that humans for the most part divided into muggles, who were unable to use even wands, and mages who could, but couldn't be trusted to learn real magic, because it's far too powerful, decided to ensure the survival of the species, by creating a society in which mages are 'shunted' off into the HP world, where the residual magics allow the fantastic creatures to exist, all spells have been 'pre-scribed' into wands, made by the goblins, allowing these mages 'magic' but in a controlled fashion.. and it's been going on so long, no-one knows anymore that real magic can do so much more..

Except Maybe This guy, 

Maybe the guy stirring his coffee with his finger.. reading a book on time by stephen hawking

Simple Systems equals Simple Games?

Remember when Diablo Introduced Prefix & Suffix Magical Effects to us?, changing the ceoncept of a "+1 Magic Weapon" to 30 different kinds of +1? Giants sword of slaying? Spiders Hammer of Light? This is my TL:DR, The More complex your game system is, the more players can do with it, when they understand it, But understanding it should not be the pre-requisite to playing, just to GMing.

 Simple Systems equals Simple Games

I want to preface this, this is more like a warm up topic for the different styles of GMing, Designing and Playing, so I'd appreciate comments to hone the concept further for the next blog.

Remember HeroQuest? 4 stats. Attack Die, defend Die , Mind & Body. Now in my early days of gamesmastering, I could not fathom how to use those other than the 2 types of hero.. the Fighter or the Wizard. Sure the weapons listed range & damage, and there was a movement score in there somewhere because it was a board game.. but that was all.. Fighter or Wizard (The Elf was a fighter with range).

Now.. years later, I'm sure I could run entire adventures with just those Attributes, because I've matured & experiences alot of life.. does your character want to steal something? hmm, lets see, natural attack die (not weapon) vs defend die (exclude armour), pass his 'mind' score to see if the shopkeeper noticed.. why? because a strong minded, alert, wise, character would know to be watching, while a weak minded fool would be lazy & bored..
 
So its very possible to play any system, with a good imagination. yet it leaves you with problems:

What if you don't have a good imagination? I think we've all read about the 2nd level hero who was free-falling with a dragon and used the fall momentum to puncture the dragons skull, insta-killing him, so he levelled up to 7th giving him enough HP to survive the fall, or the 20th level Paladin who fell from a 100m cliff and not only survived, but brushed off the 100 points of damage and waded into battle. GMs who don't have the confidence to say whether its right or wrong, because it might spoil the 'flow' of a game, or lack of knowledge to make a good call on the situation.. 

What if your understanding of reality isn't as good as your players, and their 'proof' spoils your plot and ruins the game session? This one was closer to home for me for many years, I wasn't well read on biology or physics or maths as a child, trying to GM my group resulted in many of my 'traps' failing, or me having to use (cringe) "because its magic!". This is most likely the whole reason DungeonWorld is so in depth, based so much on reality first, before magic has its effects, and why it has so many Attributes & Statistics.  

Hero Quest + house Rules.. 

What about duplicatable? Try to reproduce it? So a different GM might come up with a different approach for dealing with the Shop theft, maybe a house rule would be added for a 'stealth' score. This doesn't matter if you only play your game at your house, and recognise that different GMs will produce different results.

But, Ignoring Rules Lawyers, Most people want coherency and duplicatable results. If I play at your house with the 'pass the natural attack' rule, I'll want to put all level up bonuses into my natural attack.. but at someone elses' house, I'd need to use their 'stealth' score. not only are my characters able to port over from game to game, but I have to learn a whole different set of thinking to play.. the same game. 

I've had it myself, I'm playing at a friends house, and they allow some rule that flanking allows the attack of opportunity, so now I can make more than a few attacks in the same round.. with the right conditions, I could make 16 attacks against 4 opponents, in the same round.. impossibrew!

Knowing the rules match the game, you can 'join' any game, with a fair understanding of what you have as choices, to what to do, what can you do, what is impossible and what the GM will allow

If every house has a completely different set of rules, you'd soon discover you can only play with one set of friends.. and Convention gaming? right out!

"right everyone joining table #17, you need to include rules addendum 12, 13, 18, 21, half of 27b but nothing from 5th edition, we'll run an errata session in an hour, and see you back here in 3 hours to play!"

McDonalds Burgers are created with some pretty complex set of rules, every single burger has to follow the same rules, country to country, to ensure that the consumer gets the exact same burger in any and every store. yet the customer, has no clue about those rules, its just the same burger.

So For me, Complex might be Complex for the GM, but simple for the player. 

A Complex way to represent a set of bonuses a Skill could have...But Simple in its final result

I think the Gamer Industry goes through a pendulum swing, too complex, not complex enough.. D&D has hit the extremes a bit from time to time, taking note from the market, Rolemaster, Tunnels and Trolls, Talisman, there are many variants. Right now the market seems to be in "simplification" mode. Numinera, Fate, Apocolypse World, for a Mature market, with decent, imaginative GMs, who can 'fudge' the system to get what they want, in a way that players respect and trust.. it works.. no denying it.

Yet I worry about the GMs without the back support, brand new to the world of roleplay, making decisions which put off their players, or get put off by the system for its lack of ability. Because at the end of the day, If I can only be a Fighter or a Wizard, I'm going to leave the system soon enough, because I don't know any better.

But.. as my Next Blog is more about.. How many variants are there truly? is it fair to say that no system can be a catch-all system? How many kinds of systems should their be? Real vs Unreal, Simple vs Complex? are there any more parameters? Would it be easier for a DM/GM to begin his session invites with "Hey guys, running a Sandbox Multi-Plot Fantasy of D&D, who wants in?" or would it be better if the games defined themselves as "Sandbox Multi-Plot Fantasy" so the market knows what they're getting into before buying the game?

Topics to Discuss - Pandoras Box

I thought I might get down some Ideas that I'm keen to discuss, both in gaming general and in relation to DungeonWorld(tm). Having worked on a Dungeonworlds game engine for 20+ years, through iterations of complexity, then simplifying, then complexifying again, There are many small nuances to game development that I've studied, read about or even just played with the basic mechanics.

If anyone has some key point they'd like me to address over the next few months, feel free to add it to the List. I know many of these topics are things other gamesmasters and designers have discussed, so sometimes they'll be my own 2 cents, I like to think that pretty much every GM/Designer that decides to blog has to cover these topics to establish themselves first.. but maybe a few will be unique

In No Particular Order, I would like to discuss:

• Encumbrance, backpacks and Lists vs Encumbrance Points.
• Electronic Character Sheets, good or evil?
• What to do in downtime? Why Healing Spells suck!
• NPCs and Levelling the non-Hero
• Hit Points, health and Falling off Cliffs
• City Campaigns, Do Politics?
• Weapons Hit Points.. Will your Sword break
• Ammunition boxes or chips?
• Time Tracking between 7 Gamesmasters & 50+ characters
• Perception, Lighting, Smells and Intuition
• Player Morales & Roleplay Decisions
• Killing Everything, just in case, doesn't make me evil.. Right?
• Mega Games & Rumours
• Should GMs ever let players see the Monsters Manual?
• Is an Orc Always Evil, Should a Paladin Always kill him?
• As the world shuns violence, will roleplay games cease to exist?
• Toilet Time, should GMs inform players, mid dungeon, that its time for no.2?
• Initiative vs Peasant Rail Gun
• Non Magic effect Tower Shields of Invisibility
• Minecraft tree to Stick rules of D&D Crafting
• Rule Zero vs Physics

I May add more to the List, I encourage others to add to the list, things that you've seen or read in other GM blogs. (or just stuff that would be fun to read about)