|
I ran some regular adventurers through A Wizard and a couple of them died, but they figured out very quickly it was a horror adventure and not a traditional dungeon crawl, and ultimately they triumphed over the evil bastard. Being mad that it's lethal is like being mad that a Call of Cthulhu monster kills investigators. I ran some Godbound through A Wizard and they shredded it. It was very satisfying.
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 08:47
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 04:08 |
|
|
I honestly think that the Basic D&D modules are a much better source of old school adventures than the famous AD&D modules.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 08:49
|
|
|
Angrymog posted:I honestly think that the Basic D&D 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 09:43
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:I ran some Godbound through A Wizard and they shredded it. It was very satisfying. Godbound's ability to just stomp on old mega-modules as beginner Godbound adventures is one of it's killer features.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 14:19
|
|
|
CitizenKeen posted:Godbound's ability to just stomp on old mega-modules as beginner Godbound adventures is one of it's killer features. Makes it feel suitable for running solo through modules too. Something I'd like to try, but still figuring out solo play with "real" games. I did at least get Thousand Year Old Vampire to work and posted about it in the solo thread.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 14:48
|
|
|
Asterite34 posted:Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh? I ran the 5e port of Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh and all the bugs in the house nearly murdered a 2nd level party. For a house that has people moving through it on a regular basis there sure are a lot of giant killer bugs.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 16:13
|
|
|
bbcisdabomb posted:I ran the 5e port of Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh and all the bugs in the house nearly murdered a 2nd level party. For a house that has people moving through it on a regular basis there sure are a lot of giant killer bugs. Everything about that house is murder. I'm sure it worked great in AD&D and there's a lot evocative about it but yeesh, nobody gave a single thought to converting it to 5E and stamping "Level 1 Adventure" on it. Wish it had gotten the Goodman Games treatment instead.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 16:17
|
|
|
There was an amusing anecdote in Playing at the World about Gygax at some early GenCon being flustered since he had basically killed every party that he ran for off with his traps and it wasn't even noon. No one was expecting it because they didn't play that way. Even in those early days, the meatgrinder style was not universal, and maybe not even common.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 20:21
|
|
|
I can confirm that A Wizard is super fun. I ran it as an endcap to my Esoteric Enterprises series and it went great. You can read about it here and here. I didn't notice any instant death traps. The big flaws I found are
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 21:29
|
|
|
EverettLO posted:There was an amusing anecdote in Playing at the World about Gygax at some early GenCon being flustered since he had basically killed every party that he ran for off with his traps and it wasn't even noon. No one was expecting it because they didn't play that way. Even in those early days, the meatgrinder style was not universal, and maybe not even common. As I recall they all ran like lemmings into the very first trap in the dungeon one after another.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2021 21:31
|
|
|
Are the RPGs on Humble any good?
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 00:55
|
|
|
mellonbread posted:I can confirm that A Wizard is super fun. I ran it as an endcap to my Esoteric Enterprises series and it went great. You can read about it here and here. But yeah if you fudge all of those to not be as deadly, interpret the stuff I read as game overs as just creating new complications, and decide the mutilation traps have no mechanical effect it stops being ultra lethal and just becomes arbitrary -or gets to the point that really you're not running A Wizard, you're running your own adventure that just used the concept as a jump off point. As for skipping the abyss, wasn't one of the complications from the door fight characters get launched into it? Coolness Averted fucked around with this message at 01:03 on May 26, 2021 |
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 01:00
|
|
|
super sweet best pal posted:Are the RPGs on Humble any good? Don't know jack or poo poo about Symbaroum, but Tales From the Loop is pretty good. I've only watched the first two or three episodes of the Amazon show, but the RPG seems a bit lighter in tone, though still in the same ballpark.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 01:18
|
|
|
mellonbread posted:I didn't notice any instant death traps. The big flaws I found are[list=1][*]There are a lot of places where the text says the wizard is watching the players "won't allow" something to happen, or will "punish" the players for something. There's no description for how he actually does this - as written he doesn't interact with the players at all until they reach his layer. Those bits are explicitly written “in-character” for the Wizard. They’re supposed to reflect the Wizard’s hatred for the PCs and his desire to see them fail, not any actual mechanical effect beyond what’s already in the dungeon.[/QUOTE] Coolness Averted posted:It explicitly names splitting up as an instant death, or rather "if a character is ever alone, the wizard swoops down and abducts them and you never hear from them again" And then it states afterward that any character snatched up by the Wizard is dumped in a room that is a difficult, but not inescapable death trap. It’s hyperbole to set up the terror of the scenario. Which is good! I like modules that build up tension even if the bark is worse than the bite.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 01:41
|
|
|
Asterite34 posted:I still love the apocryphal story of some convention tourney running Tomb of Horrors and one of the players putting the cursed crown on Acererak and touching it with the wrong end of the scepter to insta-kill him, and the GM had to go consult Gygax himself to determine if that would actually work, with him ruling that the Tomb's death traps were so bullshit that even Acererak himself wasn't immune to them. That was the module artist and it was Gygax GMing. He thought that was intended to be the final puzzle of the module and was a bit surprised when the printed version banned it.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 01:43
|
|
|
super sweet best pal posted:Are the RPGs on Humble any good? Symbaroum I remember reading portions of the Core Rulebook. I can't speak to the mechanics but I really liked the lore and the setting. Symbaroum portrays their forest wilderness sort of like a post-apocalyptic badlands, where there are ancient ruins everywhere but there are hazard galore. Also their elves are pretty interesting if I remember correctly. The elves have different physical stages of maturity not unlike insects. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nh1TL7kXJ-E Helical Nightmares fucked around with this message at 02:24 on May 26, 2021 |
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 02:21
|
|
|
For anyone looking for random dungeon layouts for an adventure, the developer of the free roguelike Zorbus has released a generator that exports dungeon map pngs. http://dungeon.zorbus.net/   Also I'm really quite a big fan of Zorbus and if you are interested in roguelikes I encourage you to read through the thread. Zorbus is still under development (although a full game) and the dev added several new mechanics such as tracking and scent in it's latest release a couple days ago. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3926278
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 02:51
|
|
|
Gatto Grigio posted:Those bits are explicitly written “in-character” for the Wizard. They’re supposed to reflect the Wizard’s hatred for the PCs and his desire to see them fail, not any actual mechanical effect beyond what’s already in the dungeon. See, I personally really dislike muddling fluff and mechanics. It leads to loggerheads like this, where we interpret the hunted paragraph very differently. "If a character is ever alone in a room with the wizard, he picks them off. Describe something running at them very fast, being yanked up into the ceiling, dragged through a vent, etc. Then move on. there is no need to worry about them anymore " I read the mention of vents there as fluff and one example of how the wizard disappears them. You read the rest as fluff. I read the section about getting tossed into the bath as a result of the ropes pulling them through vents in the ascent area. Especially since that's the right near the bath and specifically mentions the vents in something we agree isn't fluff. I also read "if the characters slaughter [the wizardling] the wizard will do the same to them" as an instakill on whoever does it (if not a tpk). As fluff it's pointless; "Oh that means the wizard is mad at the end and tries to kill the players!" Which is literally the only thing the wizard was going to do anyway. It's not like the office drone section of the abyss where the player behavior actually shifts what happens, with talking to HR turning the drones hostile, and killing HR spawning scarier monsters.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 03:15
|
|
|
Coolness Averted posted:I also read "if the characters slaughter [the wizardling] the wizard will do the same to them" as an instakill on whoever does it (if not a tpk). Coolness Averted posted:But yeah if you fudge all of those to not be as deadly, interpret the stuff I read as game overs as just creating new complications, and decide the mutilation traps have no mechanical effect it stops being ultra lethal and just becomes arbitrary -or gets to the point that really you're not running A Wizard, you're running your own adventure that just used the concept as a jump off point.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 03:26
|
|
|
Yes, I could also insert loot, storyhooks, make it so the player actions have consequences, change some of the wasted setpieces to actually do interesting things -Like the statue that hypnotizes characters or the trophy room- and ignore about half the book/the abyss then I've probably put together a pretty cool adventure and could maybe reuse the premise and the map.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 03:46
|
|
|
super sweet best pal posted:Are the RPGs on Humble any good? I am a fan of Symbaroum, but the game itself is fairly middling mechanically. It's a D20 roll under system, though the GM doesn't roll, that feels like a mix of BRP and D&D. It is notably possible to make starting characters that are basically impossible for enemies to hurt, and apparently PCs become too powerful for most enemies fairly quickly. The setting and art are very cool and evocative though, and the bestiary is great for lore. The adventures are quite linear (with probably too much combat) and are meta-plot heavy, but there are some neat ideas. The setting and art are the main draw, and you can easily use a different system. Shadow of the Demon Lord is a pretty easy conversion, from experience, and I believe Trophy was designed with inspiration from Symbaroum.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 04:03
|
|
|
Hey TG chat thread! I wouldn't normally pimp my own subforum but the fairly badass (but lazy) T-rex came up with this prompt and I suspect it's up your alley. Tyrannosaurus posted:So I've been running a weekly super homebrewed, freeform D&D-like game for my partner and our two friends and we recently wrapped up a long, long, long campaign. They’ve now rolled new characters and we’ve starting fresh which is cool but I’m also mentally exhausted. Work is picking up. Covid still sucks. Yadda yadda yadda. Doesn’t matter. By the power of the blood throne, I am declaring this week: To sign up just go to that thread and type 'in'. If you feel saucy, then note you're from TG and you will get a wicked hot gangtag if (and only if) you can trounce our homegrown nerdlords.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 09:20
|
|
|
super sweet best pal posted:Are the RPGs on Humble any good? Seconding That Old Tree, Tales from the Loop is excellent and you'll get more than your money's worth from that alone.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 09:28
|
|
|
lmao @ "if you run the interesting, flavorful adventure in an interesting, flavorful way rather than just copying old Gary Gygax GM advice columns, you might as well play something that isn't the interesting, flavorful adventure. you RUBE. you absolute MORON."
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 11:28
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:lmao @ "if you run the interesting, flavorful adventure in an interesting, flavorful way rather than just copying old Gary Gygax GM advice columns, you might as well play something that isn't the interesting, flavorful adventure. you RUBE. you absolute MORON." That is decidedly bad writing, though. On a read-through, I had assumed that character did instantly die if they were left alone in a room with the wizard (although the wizard is not automatically present if a PC is left alone), but not that they were instantly killed by killing a wizardling (although the argument that "..the wizard will kill them" is not a statement of future intent since he was always planning to do that anyway is understandable). It always strikes me that in these conversation people focus on the lethality of Tomb of Horrors, ignoring the fact there's at least two less-lethal reprints and ignoring why people do seem to like it, which is that it's a filler-free funhouse dungeon with lots of exploration potential. No corridors full of empty storerooms, for example.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 11:50
|
|
|
hyphz posted:That is decidedly bad writing, though. On a read-through, I had assumed that character did instantly die if they were left alone in a room with the wizard (although the wizard is not automatically present if a PC is left alone), but not that they were instantly killed by killing a wizardling (although the argument that "..the wizard will kill them" is not a statement of future intent since he was always planning to do that anyway is understandable). Nobody is forcing anybody to run A Wizard, much less run A Wizard the specific way that the book (allegedly) demands. If you don't like it and your brain can't find a workaround for the parts you don't like, run something you do like instead. Nobody "ran it wrong" because they didn't get married to the rules as written.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 11:55
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:Nobody is forcing anybody to run A Wizard, much less run A Wizard the specific way that the book (allegedly) demands. If you don't like it and your brain can't find a workaround for the parts you don't like, run something you do like instead. Nobody "ran it wrong" because they didn't get married to the rules as written. Fair point, but the author's responsibility for the playability of what they have written is non-zero. It's also worth bearing in mind that a big positive factor of Tomb of Horrors was the shared experience.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 12:22
|
|
|
hyphz posted:Fair point, but the author's responsibility for the playability of what they have written is non-zero. It's also worth bearing in mind that a big positive factor of Tomb of Horrors was the shared experience. I mean I'll have it both ways, in that I think most people are arguing that A Wizard is both well-written and playable, and that Tomb of Horrors is also that because it's specifically intended to be like it is and is a massive departure from almost every other scenario written at that time, much like A Wizard is. For all that gets touted about the ubiquity of nega-dungeons, it seems mostly that LotFP makes them. Hell, A Wizard AND Tomb of Horrors probably aren't nega-dungeons, there's a way to win them and more ways around them than simply "show up, get hosed up by the """"plot""", then die, probably having made the world worse".
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 12:51
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:For all that gets touted about the ubiquity of nega-dungeons, it seems mostly that LotFP makes them. Hell, A Wizard AND Tomb of Horrors probably aren't nega-dungeons, there's a way to win them and more ways around them than simply "show up, get hosed up by the """"plot""", then die, probably having made the world worse". So "nega-dungeon" means things along the lines of Death Frost Doom?
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 12:58
|
|
|
hyphz posted:So "nega-dungeon" means things along the lines of Death Frost Doom? I that's pretty indicative of the form. Monolith Beyond Time and Space also counts, I think.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 14:05
|
|
|
I don't think the "nega-dungeon" is actually a coherent concept beyond LotFP justifying itself.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 14:18
|
|
|
Halloween Jack posted:I don't think the "nega-dungeon" is actually a coherent concept beyond LotFP justifying itself. It has applicability outside of LotFP, since it’s describing a particularly Lovecraftian approach to a dungeon (where winning is arguably worse than dying.) It also applies to Black Sun Deathcrawl and hell even some FR dungeons.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 15:27
|
|
|
Black Sun Deathcrawl is an interesting curiosity but like...LOL at the authors talking in interviews about how they were inspired by Ligotti. Like they just made a ludicrously grimdark scenario where everything dies. (The best part is the recurring villain traveling backwards through time.) I can't wait for the OSR to fully grow out of sketching death metal album covers on its notebook in class.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 15:37
|
|
|
Halloween Jack posted:Black Sun Deathcrawl is an interesting curiosity but like...LOL at the authors talking in interviews about how they were inspired by Ligotti. Like they just made a ludicrously grimdark scenario where everything dies. (The best part is the recurring villain traveling backwards through time.) I can't wait for the OSR to fully grow out of sketching death metal album covers on its notebook in class. Does it really need to? Can't we just have cool RPGs about fun crazy things such as death metal? I want to see more stuff like Mork Borg - we can have extreme metal RPGs that are fun and interesting and evocative without the racism or misogyny of LotFP.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 16:10
|
|
|
You are legally allowed to like stuff that I think is played out and boring, sure. You don't need my permission.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 16:37
|
|
|
I've always enjoyed dungeons that have an in-universe explanation for why such a place would ever exist, ala the kaers (and Parlainth) in Earthdawn, or the Stone Thief in 13th Age. It's just easier for me to get into the spirit of the thing if there's a logical reason a huge labyrinth filled with traps and treasure would exist other than 'I dunno, wizards be crazy, yo'. In the case of the former, it's that people built bunkers to survive the magical apocalypse and set booby traps to keep out the monsters (kaers) or tried to protect their city by turning it into the magical Event Horizon by trying to hide it in another dimension and make everyone forget it existed (Parlainth), or the dungeon is literally a huge sentient sandworm that rolls around gobbling up random magical places, and you're exploring his guts trying to get to his brain (Stone Thief).
Imagined fucked around with this message at 20:46 on May 26, 2021 |
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 20:38
|
|
|
Imagined posted:or the dungeon is literally a huge sentient sandworm that rolls around gobbling up random magical places, and you're exploring his guts trying to get to his brain (Stone Thief). Yea, "there are literally living creatures that form themselves into random dungeons" is pushing it a bit as an in-universe explanation!
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 21:42
|
|
|
hyphz posted:Yea, "there are literally living creatures that form themselves into random dungeons" is pushing it a bit as an in-universe explanation! Why? It's no more fantastical than "there are giant winged reptiles that breathe fire" or "reading hard enough lets you bend the laws of reality over your knee" or "gods are real and grant you magic powers"
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 22:02
|
|
|
Whybird posted:Why? It's no more fantastical than "there are giant winged reptiles that breathe fire" or "reading hard enough lets you bend the laws of reality over your knee" or "gods are real and grant you magic powers" Yeah, like despite my gripes about A Wizard's execution and presentation, the concept ain't one of them. I applaud any attempts to do something funky. Also 13th Age is a setting where a dragon is keeping the gates of hell plugged winnie the pooh style, so I hardly think a dungeon that's in the belly of a giant monster is stretching credulity.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2021 22:33
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 04:08 |
|
|
Imagined posted:I've always enjoyed dungeons that have an in-universe explanation for why such a place would ever exist, ala the kaers (and Parlainth) in Earthdawn, or the Stone Thief in 13th Age. It's just easier for me to get into the spirit of the thing if there's a logical reason a huge labyrinth filled with traps and treasure would exist other than 'I dunno, wizards be crazy, yo'. In the case of the former, it's that people built bunkers to survive the magical apocalypse and set booby traps to keep out the monsters (kaers) or tried to protect their city by turning it into the magical Event Horizon by trying to hide it in another dimension and make everyone forget it existed (Parlainth), or the dungeon is literally a huge sentient sandworm that rolls around gobbling up random magical places, and you're exploring his guts trying to get to his brain (Stone Thief). I think I've posted this either in this thread or a previous edition before, but these two articles give my favorite explanations for the Dungeon as Living Entity; http://gameswithothers.blogspot.com/2013/06/other-frontiers-dungeons-megadungeons.html http://gameswithothers.blogspot.com/2013/07/gnosis-logos-and-esoterica-magic-users.html it's a shame he vanished from the internet back in 2015 cause this whole blog is full of gold
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2021 00:01
|
|
