There has been an update to the free PDF D&D Next rules. Looking at the file names, only the DM volume changed with version 2, but someone wrote that there were changes in the player’s volume even though the version stayed at 2.
With the DMG coming out soon, perhaps there will be a version 3 soon.
There was lots of posting about this the last week of October. I downloaded the new PDF(s), but have not had a chance to look at them.
I plan to mine them for ideas, not sure I’ll play or not.
I ordered a Dieties & Demigods with the Cthulhu and Melnibone mythos from Wayne’s Books on Wednesday evening, October 29th, and it arrived on my doorstep today, Saturday, November 1st! I am sure it made it to me so quickly is that I live in the lower penninsular of Michigan, which is the Eastern Time Zone, and Wayne’s Books is in Arizona, which is in the Mountain Time Zone, so a one or two hour difference. Wayne commented on my article that it was being shipped that same day! Excellent service!
Below I will have pictures of the unboxing, the contents, and a group picture with the DDG from my son. My son got home from work about two hours after I placed my order, and gave me a belated birthday present. We had a big laugh about that!
Below you will see what you can expect when you order something from Wayne’s Books.
The self-sealing box from the USPS was also well taped with packing tape. It wasn’t coming open without some effort, and care!
It was packed tight with cardboard and paper grocery bags, so it had no wiggle room.
Here’s all the packing material. It is obvious that it needs to come out before the book, so the book comes out easily.
The book is in a plastic protective cover that is taped shut then placed inside a UPS padded mailing envelope.
The book before the final layer is removed. This is kind of like those Russian dolls….
Taped to the plastic book protector is the packing slip with a handwritten note of thanks.
Inside the plastic protective cover is a business card with notes on this order. This is a very good idea! Others who ship things should do this.
At first I wondered if this was a catalog, but soon saw it was a module or something. Was this a mistake? I didn’t order this!
No, it’s not a mistake.
Woo hoo! Free stuff! I read a couple of the Elric books way back. I don’t recall details. This looks interesting and has some cool art. I’ll add this to my reading list.
Finally, my new books side by side. The one from my son on the right, and the one I ordered on the left. The quality of the book I got from Wayne’s Books matches what he advertised, and it is in noticeably better condition than the one my son got me, but the one my son got me had a kid’s name on the front and it was obvious that it had been used at the table, or at least was well read.
The one I bought is going back in the plastic sleeve, just in case.
I really liked the art of the Cthulhu and Melniboe mythos, plus there are some cool critters and ideas in there. I’m not sure I’ll ever get to use them in my campaign world, but you never know.
I have mentioned elsewhere the Water Damage Incident that destroyed most of my original AD&D manuals and other game things. My character notes and campaign notes survived.
Below I will show pictures of what I was left with and then the now end results.
Two manuals, my dice bag, my miniatures, and one half of my Dave Trampier DM Screens survived.
I also had two modules, the Player Character and NPC Record Sheets, and I photocopied the Combat Calculator from Dragon Magazine, rather than cut up my magazine. (I had all the Dragon Magazines from about issue 50 to about 150 or so. I needed money and gave them to my brother. He never gave me any money, and my parents had a water leak in their basement, and all the Dragons were mush….)
I only bought one Hexagonal Mapping Booklet. I still have 6 sheets left. I could make that 7, as one has a lightly pencil drawn star chart for my footsteps into Mega Traveller. I started building a campaign about 25 years ago, and that’s all I did with it. I still have the box for that and the manuals.)
I really wish you could just go buy these like in the good old days….
I only ever bought two modules back in the day. I bought Ravenloft for the cool 3-D style maps. I bought Village Of Hommlet for a low level adventure. I have never ran either of these. If I recall correctly I have played Ravenloft. I do have several of the classic modules in PDF from DriveThruRPG, etc.
What’s not to like about these maps. I think they are cool, and like most players of RPGs, I like maps!
The saddest part, was that one of the books was the Dieties & Demigods with the Cthulhu and Melnibone mythos. Several years ago, when I decided to rebuild my collection, I soon found most of the other rule books at my FLGS. All except the DDG. Then a few days ago, I ordered the DDG with Cthulhu from Wayne’s Books. About two hours after that, my son got home from work, and gave me one as a belated birthday present.
Below is a picture of my rebuilt collection with the DDG from my son, including a Dave Trampier DM screen.
I also added the Wilderness Survival Guide and the Dungeoneer’s Survival Guide, which I never had.
Also this past summer, I stopped by Table Top Game and Hobby, on my way to my baby sister’s wedding, and picked up the core book re-prints. (This is the 20th year of operation, and the owner, Phil Kilgore, who was a year or two behind me in high school, but we gamed together often back then, had customers roll a d20 for a percentage off. I rolled bad, a 2, and he let me re-roll and I got 8% off, I think. Phil said back in high school that he wanted to open his own game store, and he did.) I am keeping them in their plastic wrappers, just in case.
I also have another Player’s Handbook with the Dave Trampier cover. It is in near pristine condition, but I could not find it to include here.
I also managed to get most of the PDFs before WotC halted them. I got the Player’s Handbook, which is now unavailable since they started selling them again. I didn’t get the Oriental Adventures PDF, I don’t remember if it wasn’t available, or because I kept mis-remembering and thinking I had the book. I picked up Oriental Adventures last year, and the Fiend Folio this past spring.
Here is an inside shot, of my precious…. I mean, the birthday present from my son. Now my collection is restored and expanded.
Here is the “final” stack of my AD&D Manuals, less the like new Dave Trampier cover Player’s Handbook, and the Dieties and Demigods I order from Wayne’s Books, on Wednesday, October 29th. Of course, just after I finished uploading these pictures and putting my manuals away, the mail came with my new precious. I will write up another post with the unboxing.
AC, Money, Distance, and Monster Stat Blocks look to be the big ones to be concerned about.
For monsters, the simplest is to convert the same critter to the same critter just using what the other rules use. It is only an issue for unique critters or your own design.
I have seen some tables here and there about conversion, but did not make a note of it and don’t recall if some PDFs of rules discuss this, or I read it somewhere online….
The two ideas I managed to find were for AC conversion, fairly simple, and monster conversion. With the release of 5e/Next, the focus is on converting 1E stuff to 5E. I am more interested in 1E and 0D&D and converting between clones, when there are differences.
For the most part 0D&D and AD&D and clones are close enough that there is very little need for conversion, other than armor class. I’m just interested in collecting any such tools that might be out there.
Has anyone put together a spreadsheet to aid in converting money systems between rules/campaigns/house rules? I haven’t tried to figure out the math for that, it may not be as easy as I think it should be.
[EDIT] Thanks to Alex Schroeder, of Alex Schroeder’s RPG Blog for reminding me of the OSR Rosetta Stone on the Hack & Slash blog, by Courtney Campbell.
[EDIT: 11/17/2014 – The Updated OSR Rosetta Stone that adds 5e and ACKS.]
Others are interested in RPG system converters, so I will link the ones I have found via Google below:
Armor Class: (This is the most commonly mentioned conversion.)
Old School Armor Class Systems Comparison (Tables)
Is the Main OSR Division Descending / Ascending Armor Class?
D&D 5e: Backward Compatibility and Combat Math
Ascending v. Descending Armor Class
I wade into the greatest OSR fight ever, several years late
Converting from Descending AC to Ascending AC
MONSTERS:
Conversion of LotFP (OSR) monsters to D&D Next Final Playtest rules
Stan Shinn’s 1e to 5e Combat Tracker
D&D 1E/3E to 5E Monster Converter
Anyone done a Pathfinder monster conversion sheet?
MOVEMENT:
Old School Movement Conversion Table
VISIBILITY:
ENCUMBRANCE: (Not so much conversion of encumbrance, but a discussion of an alternative system.)
“Inventory Slot” system in a “Survival Mode” game?
CHARACTER/NPC:
Are there any systems or recommendations for converting existing characters and NPCs to other versions?
What is the best way to convert a character to a system that uses feats? How do you decide what feats they get?
THIEF SKILLS:
Placeholder for the article on a d6 mechanic for thief skills that I read recently and as I recall, it was a recent article and not something I stumbled on that is a few years old.
OSR COMPATIBLE/STAT BLOCKS:
OSR Compatible Standard (Discussion)
A Simplified OSR Stat Block – On the Quest For the Perfect Game
Is D&D Next is Compatible With AD&D 1e “Out of the Box” – Wizards May be Saying So
Swords And Wizardry Is The Rosetta Stone of the OSR (There’s that Rosetta Stone usage again….)
Previous edition conversion to Next? Have you done it?
BLOOD & TREASURE (Discussion, mostly general of his RPG that takes a bit from other RPGs)
Please let me know if there is an article on a listed topic that is beneficial to add to the mix.
Also let me know if there is a category I left off and a link to a discussion of converting that category between systems.
NOTE: I am more interested about moving between 0DD/AD&D and clones, than 5e/Next. However, if there is a link that ties 5e to a specific OSR product that will enhance the OSR conversion discussion, please share. I have a feeling that 5e may end up being the cross reference point for a lot of people.
An old saying, “Old age and treachery beat youth and skill.” I didn’t spend enough time on Google to find who said that originally. I did see that there is evidently a Waylan Jennings song either by that name or with that line.
My boys and I have wrestled since they were little. It has been a long time since I could wrestle them both at once, but one at a time I can also still out wrestle them. Not bad for a fifty year old bald fat man who once broke his back. Although my youngest is built like a linebacker and probably equals my weight, he’d be a challenge. My oldest is a bean pole that I have at least 50 pounds on him, so I can move him and pick him up as needed.
I haven’t taught them all my moves, and they didn’t really wrestle and get into the fights like my brothers and I did. What’s the other saying, “I taught you everything you know, I didn’t teach you everything I know.”
Magic users and sages will guard their information jealously. Sages are more likely to part with their knowledge for mere coins, but more likely for more information to add to their knowledge. Wizards and illusionists will want to add to their spell books or acquire items that will help them. If mages need money, they will make that seem like they are making an exception to take a larger chunk of coin since the character(s) don’t have any magic they want or can use. Wizards and their apprentices would not be on equal terms until the apprentice nears parity with the master. If the player characters become wizards, will the former 7th level master also advance? In my campaign, I have the classed NPCs gain levels unless I have determined they have retired from adventuring, and their earning of experience is very slow.
Thieves, assassins, monks, druids, and some fighters might have techniques and skills that they reserve for use when they are moving up the hierarchy, assuming AD&D 1st edition rules. I don’t know the newer editions and if they had the same combat to advance rules.
Rangers and Paladins would tend to guide and train each other, but could hold back some skills for personal or personality reasons.
Good Clerics would only hold back mysteries that their fellows were not ready for. Evil or chaotic clerics might hold back information that threatens them being the most powerful cleric of X in the land, world, universe.
I don’t know specifics of how I would use this idea in my game, so far, not a table or some mechanic like that. I have vague ideas of personality quirks, like the guy at work who won’t share what he knows because he thinks he’ll lose his job if others know how to do it.
What ideas does this generate for you?
My thoughts lately are on RPGs and their design. It occured to me that there are certain aspects that need to be accounted for in such games.
Genre – This should be in some ways, perhaps most ways independent or not the major driver of the rest of the game mechanics. The mechanics should provide a clear and relatively simple way to convey the various “standards” of the genre that require game mechanics. The flavor or story for the genre should be independent of the mechanics. For example, one can use any fantasy rule set to play a dungeon delve.
Parameters – This is the guts of the game. How does one represent the reality of the world, the situations, the crowds, and the abilities of the characters?
Characters need to have ways to interact with the physical world, such things as strength, dexterity, constitution, charisma, and movement. Can you move something? Can you do it gracefully? Can you take a hit? Can you influence others? Can you run away, or catch someone?
Then their is the internal world, of intelligence, wisdom, knowledge, etc. that influence what you know and how well you can express or use it in the game.
Will the game ever need combat? I can’t think of any RPG that I have played that didn’t have some sort of rules for combat. How detailed do they need to be? Does combat make time stand still and it take hours of real time to determine what happens in a few minutes?
Will the game strive to mimic certain aspects of reality and to what degree?
Will role playing be used as a cornerstone to get past the need for rules on every little thing? Can the game be played and enjoyed without a serious commitment to sticking to your character role playing?
Will an in-depth example/instructions be needed to explain how to play this game?
How will actions that are not a given be resolved? Coin toss, drawing from a deck of playing cards, standard six sided dice, or the usual trope of various types of dice?
Will characters advance in power, abilities, or levels? How is this to be determined?
Will the rules be simple enough that anyone can quickly grasp them, or do they need a serious understanding of the game world and have multiple books to make a session even feasible?
Most RPGs rely on the same structure, abilities, levels, combat tables, dice, etc.
I have read many various discussions of RPGs and rules of newer RPGs, some go the lightest of all possible rules, like Risus; while others seem to go for making a roll out of everything and take the need for any role playing or creativity out of it.
Fantasy games have magic and so forth. Science fiction has exploration, nuclear or other apocalypse, etc. Horror, like Cthulhu has everyone going crazy. There can be westerns, spies, superheroes, or any other literary or movie genre that you can think of.
The best rules are ones that your gaming group can get behinds and use to make the experience of a game session fun, enjoyable, and worth repeating. I started with Blue Book Holmes Basis D&D back in the spring of 1978. It got us started. When Advanced D&D came out, we understood that it was better than mere “basic”. I have learned over the last few years online, that there was a lot to Basic D&D that I missed out on, mostly ideas and so forth. It really isn’t that different than AD&D. There are a lot of rules in AD&D that I ignore, especially relating to combat. In general, if it doesn’t make sense, or unnecessarily complicates things, I avoid it, or come up with something simpler. If it is all about paper shuffling and consulting the rule books, it gets old fast.
As I say often, if it isn’t fun, you’re doing it wrong.
This is cool. I want one!
http://www.wired.com/2010/11/2000-year-old-roman-multi-tool/
Last week, in response to various postings about the Delving Deeper on Lulu at less than $5.00, I ordered it. I don’t recall the day I ordered it, but it shipped on the 21st, and was waiting for me in the mailbox when I got home today, the 28th.
The box is much larger than the book itself. When I opened it I found out why. Instead of being packed to bursting with newspaper or packing peanuts, it was wrapped in a piece of thin Styrofoam and that was shrink wrapped to a piece of cardboard so that it would not move. The cardboard is sized for a snug fit in the box. This was my first book ordered via Lulu. I must say I am impressed with the method of packaging and the fine condition that my new book arrived in. I am also impressed by the book itself. I am now much more interested in ordering books of other rules sets, like Swords & Wizardry and OSRIC, to name a couple. The softcover is very good, I’m almost afraid to read it so I don’t damage it.
So far I have only skimmed it, but I did read through the free PDF, from Immersive Ink. I also looked at several articles and followed along with the week review of Delving Deeper by Adam Muszkiewicz. There is also a Delving Deeper G+ Community.
I like the simplification of the original basic rules. It boils everything down into one book of 130 pages. The print is easy on the eyes, and I look forward to reviewing the whole thing in depth. I like some aspects of these rules. I can see this as a basis for introducing players to the game. I’m not a dig deep into the statistics kind of person, but I like that the author, Simon J. Bull, knows OD&D and Chainmail, and took the time to correct the combat tables to be more statistically balanced. I’m not the kind of DM that gets that deep into the rules to know all the kinds of details and many would consider trivial. When I play a spell caster or a multi-classed character, I look more in-depth at the rules to see what I can do with a character, but still not to this level of detail.
The cover is also much more impressive and clear than the image in the PDF. It is a pen and ink drawing, which is fitting for the name of the publisher, Immersive Ink, and is also dark and does not photograph well. My picture of the cover below looks better on my monitor in a photo viewer. It did not scale cleanly when I did a test preview of this post. The cover is full of action, and you can’t fully appreciate it without having a copy in your hands to peruse closely for hidden gems, like in many of Dave Trampiers ink drawings in the TSR rule books and modules.
I am curious to see the next iteration of these rules. If nothing else, there are lots of little tidbits that I can use to inform my own style of play.
Both preparing for a major area of a campaign, or parts of an adventure, or developing something to publish, or as part of a collaborative project, can encounter a lot of inertia.
Getting the initial ideas together, whether bullet points, semi-detailed notes, sketches, or miscellaneous bits and pieces can often be the easy part. Yet, for me at least, finding a big enough block of time to make sense of it and compile all the pieces into an easily usable whole is challenging.
I can wing stuff in a game, but some things take just a bit more time to plan out. For example, I placed an NPC in my campaign that sells treasure maps. His caveat to customers is that they are real maps to real treasures, but he can’t guarantee that any treasure is still there. He goes to markets and bazaars far and wide and generates a collection. He then disappears to rebuild it, when it gets thinned out. I made the brilliant decision to let him have 39 maps (a randomly generated number), most for the general area when the players are running around with a few for the ruins of the ancient city nearby. The rest being scattered far away, and a couple for Ogre Island, the home of a famous archmage who really only wants adventurers coming there if they have slain ogres. The players bought all the area and ancient city maps, and the couple to locations on Ogre Island.
I then had to figure out details about these maps they bought. I made them pay quite a bit for them, but not so much to stop them from buying A LOT of maps. I like the d30 Sandbox Companion, and a couple other resources I tracked down for this. I came up with the size and condition of the maps, the landmarks around the treasure, whether the treasure in whole or in part was there, or if it was buried nearby, and the skill of the cartographer and the language it was written in. That was not too difficult. I then had to figure out where to place all the maps. Finally, I had to sketch out the maps.
I spent several hours on this and ended up with extremely rough sketches of maps. I figure that I could just describe them and go from there. I still have some ruins and a couple dungeons to plan.
After all that work, the players were focused on other things and haven’t tried to find one treasure.
Another example is the ancient city. I had a name and a vague idea of a layout in my mind. I dissuaded the players from going to the ancient city by having a trusted NPC tell them that it is very dangerous. I would have been fine if they went there, but they realized they needed a bit more experience. Especially when random undead traveled north along the ancient road to the large town/small city with their base of operations. So I took time to plan out some details of the city and figure out which locations where described by the treasure maps of the ruined city.
Again, after all that work, not near as much as for all the treasure maps, we have not played.
The good news, I have a lot planned and can deal with most situations, and have several ideas if the players decide to do something else.
I know that I shouldn’t plan too far ahead of my players to avoid burnout, but I like the design. It is fun to figure out certain details, however, it is the most fun to watch the interactions of my players with the ideas I present to them.
Working on a collaborative effort in cooperative sandbox design, I want to do my best so that my part is not the weak link in the whole.
As with general preparation as a DM, finding enough time in a large enough block to do more than nibble around the edges can be a challenge.
The lessons I have from this are manifold:
DM prep for my own game can be snippets that I can wing as needed. Often only a name for an NPC, a location name, and perhaps details of spells they have are usually enough. Many details can be generated on the fly.
Tables to help fill in the gaps. Good, bad, or indifferent – you can wait until they discover a treasure with gems and jewelry to roll what it is. It can make the players wait a bit, and can result in some enormous gems – if you let the results stand.
Maps only need to be good enough for me to know what is going on. If you play old school with theater of the mind, you don’t need miniatures and terrain maps. I haven’t made the players do mapping, and so far they have not been in a scenario where it makes sense for them to be lost. They have yet to find a ruin big enough to be a classic dungeon.
Players tend to want to know names of people, locations, taverns, businesses, and stories behind magic items. In addition, personalities of NPCs and monsters are needed so they are not all the same. More effort in these things can avoid delays at the table coming up with a new name. NOTE: I generate several NPC names and cross them off when I use them in game. I haven’t generated enough names to feel like I should re-use them. Tables and online generators can help with this.
I have a few memorable NPCs that the players most encounter. I have different city guard personas, some are matter of fact about their job, “just the facts”, ma’am types. Others are more laid back and just make sure things are not too far off from the rules. There is one who points at people with his spear and swings it around when pointing at the next person he talks to. I haven’t named all the town guards, just the captain and lieutenant. The players haven’t asked for lots of names, I just say, this guard acts thus and so, and if they need a description, I give it. The guard that waves his spear was a fun twist I came up with on the fly, and the players loved that twist. I rotate them, and understandably, the other guards don’t want to have to work with the spear swinger.
All of the things that work well to make a campaign that I can run effectively and give enjoyment to the players are usually far less detailed than required for either an online game, where time is usually more limited than an in-person game; and obviously not what is required for something that is part of something to be published for use by others. While game prep can be done in a pinch, preparation of something to share for others as a basis for an adventure or add-on area in their campaign requires enough detail that the DM only needs to tweak it for use in his game, and not spend hours trying to figure out what you mean or what pieces were left out.
As with a school paper, or other similar project, a collaborative OSR project or something you wish to publish can be done in smaller snippets of time, unless there is a hard and fast deadline.
I think we might all have dreams of making and publishing our own materials and selling to the world of fellow gamers. Many of us know we don’t have the skills, some know that we have the skills but not the drive to finish what we start. While one can use their campaign as a basis for a published project, one should make sure anything they publish is polished.
After reading about failed or terribly botched and nearly totally failed Kickstarters related to RPGs, this has come to mind. Who wouldn’t want all the money that goes with a hugely successful Kickstarter? Most don’t realize the true level of detail involved. In addition, the tax implications and record keeping required are far beyond what the average person expects.
If you want to do a Kickstarter, get your feet wet and participate in a collaborative effort and see how well that goes. Dare to publish some tables or a module and make it available for free. If it is done well and hits the target market, then maybe you have the knack to share something to sell. I’m no expert on the how to do it, as I have not done these things, but I have seen what other people have done. Some obviously have a knack for cranking out good stuff consistently. However, I have also seen a lot that I could do better slapping it together, some of it for sale. I also would be hesitant to risk negative criticism that comes with such things, so thick skin is probably helpful.
So I dabble and continue to share my thoughts on my little blog. It is nice when others recognize my small contributions, but I get more out of it as I get in my writing, and crystallize my own ideas. That is more valuable than money, but if anyone wants to send me a Dieties & Demigods with Cthulhu and Elric, et. al., I’ll let you. Cash also is the perfect gift, since it always fits. 😉
After filling with ten tons of cement and moving 40 tons of earth an ant nest covering 50 square meters and 8 meters deep is revealed.
Use this to help plan your next nest of giant ants.