Stuff Fancied by Eric - Dungeons and Dragons

Debunking skill challenges

Eric Maziade — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:49:00 -0500

I said it before: I find that Skill Challenges are hard to understand as a concept… As described in the DMG they seem to be anti-role playing.

I like to think of them more as a draft of how to use skills in an encounter with an NPC or a situation.

Instead of following a stricter script (or winging it entirely in improv) you get to use skill challenges to help you determine which way each interactions in the encounter go.

You determine how many "successful" interactions gets the players on the "easy road" and how may "failures" gets them through "harder road".

On paper, skill challenges seems rigid - but in fact, when played out they should feel rather organic.

I like to think of them as:

A rough structure to help you flesh out an encounter.
A tool to allow the PCs skills (and not the players’) determine how NPCs react to the PCs' actions.

Understanding skill challenges

Eric Maziade — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 18:21:00 -0500

I'm re-reading my previous attempt embryo at writing a skill challenge and comparing it with the skill challenge At-Will's author (mysteriously known as admin) sent me last week.

I think I'm starting to understand more about skill challenges...

See, part of what I do for a living is being an analyst and a software developer - I like to understand, I like rules and I'm used to sticking to rules.

As odd as it sounds, computers don't work any differently - they follow their rules to the letter and our human understanding is usually the thing that fails.

My point - for, gasp, I have one - is that I believe that the "rules" aspect of skill challenges, as described in the DMG has blinded me.

I looking at skill challenges as a way to completely orchestrate a non-combat event as some sort of a dice 'mini game' based on skills.

That's not exactly wrong, but even more so - not exactly right.

It pretty much had me sand-boxing and railroading players into a multiple answers gauntlet, in which the dice tell you if you had it right.

It felt odd because - to me - RPG is mostly about "thinking outside the box". And I was trying to build a bigger box.

Building my skill challenge, I was trying to figure out what was the story line I was going for and what my players were allowed to do.

Here is a recap of what I learned:

A Skill challenge's goal is not about letting you avoid improvisation - it helps you prepare for it.
Skill challenges are not just a 'dice mini game' - role play and creative thinking on the part of the player play a great role. The DM too!
Skill challenges force you to consider failure as well as success as an interesting outcome.
Planning cases for primary and secondary skills helps creating a more complete and fleshed out encounter.

Locate the Children Skill Challenge

Eric Maziade — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0500

I've been giving lots of thought to the skill challenge... I'll try to whip one up while writing the post.

Warning: I might not succeed - this might fail! How exciting!

Choosing the Basic Skills

There are three 'areas of expertise' I figure matches the scenario:

Interrogation. Players ask around town for clues about the children's whereabouts.
Tracking. Players look for clues such as footsteps or other tracks.
Investigation. The logics behind figuring out what happened. Sounds weak, but makes sense in me noggin'

From there, looking for basic skills to check should be easy...

Interrogation: Streetwise makes most sense. I assume that everybody willingly cooperates - its just a matter of finding the right person to talk to. This allows me to basically disregard diplomacy, bluff, intimidate and insight.
Tracking: Nature works best. They'll be able to find tracks. Dungeoneering could be interesting, but we're not in a dungeon, so I tend to want to disregard.
Investigation: Perception here fits good. Allows to spot elements. I could consider history as well. Maybe there are cases of disappearing children in the past or in nearby towns?

This gives me basic skills to start working with: Streetwise, Nature and Perception.

Failure vs success

Success means that the players figure that kobolds have taken the children away and get to the lair Failure means that the players don't find the traces - they get lost in the woods and get ambushed by kobolds. On one of the kobolds, they will find orders to find children and bring them to the lair with a crude map detailing how to get to the village from the lair... which players can backtrack.

Potential Skill Checks

Talking to people

Streetwise, easy DC. Will get you to know that the children usually play around the well.

Looking for clues near the well

Nature, hard DC. Will let you track the children's steps towards the nearby guard station. DC is hard, because there's too much traffic from someone else than an exceptional tracker to find anything.

The guard

Perception. Moderate DC. Notice a sleeping guard nearby. Diplomacy. Moderate DC. Get the guard to admit that he was sleeping at the time the children went missing. Intimidate. Easy DC. Get the guard to admit that he was sleeping at the time the children went missing.

Tracking in the woods

Nature. Moderate DC. Find children tracks near the guards' post. Nature. Easy DC. Find Kobold tracks near the children's tracks. Nature. Easy DC. Follow Kobold tracks all the way to the lair.

Issues

I'm missing material to get the players all the way to tracking the kobolds and I'm missing elements to make the actual tracking work... for this reason, I haven't yet figured out how many successes should be needed to succeed at the challenge. Maybe the two parts should be separate challenges?

Notes

What is certain is that doing this exercises is allowing me to expand the scene. The one thing that strike my imagination best is the possibility of failing at tracking... and it turns out that I find the fail situation rather appealing, even if it is less heroic.

Edit

Admin from At-Will has just sent me a preview of a skill challenge he built based on this situation and he gave me a lot of cool ideas to complete. Maybe I'll do so in a later post. He did split the challenge in two separate steps.

I'll link to his challenge when he puts it up.

Roleplaying and skill challenges

Eric Maziade — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 11:30:00 -0500

Skill challenges are something new for me... I haven't had much exposure to it besides what I read in the DMG, a few mentions in some posts by ChattyDM and the mysterious author of At Will who seems to really like them.

The concept seems cool, but it somehow is nebulous to me... how do you actually play these?

I usually handle situations covered by skill challenges by either skill checks based on the description of what the players tell me... or by plain deciding what happens.

For example, you might recall the premise of my first game with the kids: some children from the village have disappeared and the heroes must find them.

I played that scene twice: 1 test run played by my wife - which helped me flesh out possibilities, and the actually game with the kids.

Here's how it went:

Setup

Playtest

The players (all played by my wife) started by questioning the villagers. She rapidly figured out that the kids usually play alone by the well. So they went to the well, expecting that the children fell in there - I did that on purpose. Minor investigation revealed that they couldn't have fallen in there - the well is covered by a grid with a hole big enough for only the bucket. Hard to find footsteps as many villagers come in there daily.

The players then questioned the villages' guards and a few more villagers and they learned that one of the guards fell asleep on his shift.

So the players investigated the woods near that guards' post. They quickly found some fresh tracks of kids running around. Then, some evidence of lizard-like creatures hiding in bushes.

Then the kids' footsteps disappear and the lizard footsteps get deeper.

The players quickly figured out that the kids mus have been kidnapped by lizard people - most likely Kobolds, and followed the tracks to their lair.

Actual Play

The players questioned the villagers. Found out about the well, but were obsesses with the well up to a point where I decided that I had to let go of the investigation and use the well to please the players.

The broke into the well and had to swim through an underwater tunnel (hold their breath and walk for the characters in full armor) where they eventually found the Kobold tracks and were led to the lair.

Analysis

Both playthroughs ended up being very satisfying for the players. And besides new re-newbie stress of being circumvented and not feeling ready for it in the actual play session, satisfying to the DM as well.

But I am wondering how it would play as a skill challenge.

Without even thinking too much about it, I can see that a challenge could be made with ranger-like skills for tracking and diplomacy-like skills for interrogating, every success bringing you near to finding where the kids have been taken to.

I could see a failure bringing the players somewhere else - perhaps a trap set by other kobolds and they could find a map and note on them taking them to the kobold lair.

I've seen a few challenge templates in the DMG and on the At Will blog and I can see the parallels very well.

What I haven't seen enough of is actual play examples. The DMG has only one.

I have three possible interpretations:

1: Are the players picking choices given by the DM from the skill challenge?

To me, it feels like it would take away from the experience of role playing and move it too close to a multiple choice quiz.

2: Are they picking skills and trying to be creative in explaining their usage towards the challenge?

That's somewhat interesting, even though the role player in me wants to object... but it ain't really that different from picking powers in a fight, right?

3: Are they simply roleplaying and the DM maps their actions to the challenge?

That's probably exactly how I played it (besides the lack or skill checks)

I suppose I should experiment with #2 - it seems to be the appropriate compromise between #1 and #3.

Now, I just need some more time to play (and players)...

I want to play a genasi jedi knight!

Eric Maziade — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 10:00:00 -0500

While I recuperate from recent day's events (birth of a baby daughter), allow me to write a short post for my faithful reader(s)...

While resting somewhat comfortably at the hospital and being part of the support cast for my wife and daughter, I spent plenty of times peering through my DnD manuals, listening to RPGBloggers' GenCon Panel and thinking about Internet marketing strategies.

I cracked open my 4th ed Forgotten Realms player's handbook for the first time and skimmed through the new races and classes...

I was flabbergasted and overcome with glee when I saw the new Jedi class.

Okay, so they misspelled it and wrote "Swordmage" instead - but let this typo not fool you: this is the class to play to be a Jedi.

Extra coolness seems to abound if you also are of the elemental-related Genasi race.

So you are a melee fighter (which I really love in 4e - I never ever wanted to play melee classes in ADnD). And this fighter uses a sword... but... check this out:

You can use spells to add lightning to your sword (lightsaber!)
You can use skills to have a shield to deflect attacks (FORCE shield)
You can call your sword back to your hand from 50 feet away (THE FORCE! Man, the FORCE!!)

If that ain't a darn Jedi, I don't know what a Jedi is!

'Nuff said, I'll want to roll a Genasi Jedi Knight soon - even if its just an NPC.

Stories of yore...

Eric Maziade — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 12:49:00 -0500

With all the topics lately in the DnD blogosphere, I'm often being sent back to my memories of when I used play almost every week and DM regularly.

Let us plunge together you and I, my reader, in the cornucopia of memories that lie in wait in the bottom o' my noggin'...

First time I remember playing DnD...

I played quite a few times at high school. I liked it, but I don't have much memories of the stories we ran.

I remember friends and some of their characters - notably a (very) dumb warrior and his pet boar who charged brainlessly at darkness and who's first reaction when entering a room with a bloodied table was to... lick the blood. (yuck!).

Fun (odd) times.

Fondest memories

My fondest DnD memories were playing back in college. Back then (prepare your brain for geekness), I was one of the directing members of the school's science club. So we had a pretty cool room that we could use pretty much anywhen we liked.

I remember staying very late at school in there with my buddies, door closed trying not to make too much noise not to get caught by the janitor. Chips and beers.

Back then, we were tag-team DMing. Every session, the DM changed. We were running a huge campaign and we liked to mess up the previous DM's plot a bit (not too much) just to see how he'd pick things up on his next turn. The group shifted between 4 to 6 players. 3 of em DMs.

We built worlds, classes, spells. We weaved incredible stories. Raised an army to storm a stone castle (which became our home) overrun by regenerative trolls. Plucked weird ingredients from all over the world to cure the lycanthropic son of a paladin. Witnessed the rise of our party's first benefactor to ascension and godhood.

We ran this campaign for about 2 years. Then, some players graduated. We actually closed the story at a local pub, over beers, deciding how the dangling threads were getting closed.

These are the memories I want to remember and talk about in future posts.

Current memories

Once this group disbanded, I stopped playing for roughly 5 years, until I hooked up with by current DM and good buddy Steve. My roommate met this guy playing Everquest and eventually noticed that we lived in the same city.

We eventually met and learned that he was a DnD aficionado. My roommate never really played and I started remembering my fond memories of the past.

We started playing with Steve as the DM. Great times. Not quite as epic as my oldest memories were to me. He has a very different DMing style than what I was used to.

For one, he knows his Forgotten Realms lore. This was fascinating to me. Back then, we made up everything on the spot. He has some pretty neat stories which didn't feel improvised. Improv was the cornerstone of our DMing technique. Magic items were everywhere! Back then, I think Moira (my character back then) got a bag of holding as a sole magic item during her whole career! We raised levels rapidly. My old DMing flavor had us gain roughly 8 levels in roughly 2 years of semi-weekly gaming. (!) We rebooted the storyline and characters rather often. At first I disliked that. But it allowed me to explore various characters and personalities (other than the Moira, the berzerking amazon warrior priestess)

I'm still playing with Steve as DM. We're trying to make this a monthly thing (if the players, myself included, can stop having babies every year).

We're also considering having Steve as a player. DMing has always been 'his thing' and I never wanted to step on that - lord knows that I already have too many occupations. But he opened the doors recently and I'm getting hooked on the idea.

We'll see where this goes...

Stay tuned as I try to open the floodgates of memories wider and reminisce of the world of 'Martor' and the tales of Moira, the amazon warrior priestess.

Light Character Sheets (training wheels for kids)

Eric Maziade — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 01:34:00 -0400

Testing my encounter alone, shuffling around with six full character sheets proved to be an arduous task - most of the fight's length was due to my trying to organize more paper than can fit one table side...

I figured that, for the second game, my party could graduate to 'light' character sheets.

I don't want to submerge them in rules, but they've proven they can handle more than I originally expected.

My goal is to give them numbers that they can use right off the bat - no need to do maths. If they look for the initiative bonus, I want them to see the number '5' - no need for "dex + 1/2 level + misc" - I've done that already.

Applying the same idea to the core stats they can use and removing all other information, I figured I could cram a condensed character sheet to about a third of a page and still make it so moving to the full, standard, character sheet will feel natural later on.

What I elected to keep is:

Character and Player name - because we need to know who the sheet is for!
Level, Total XP, Max HP, Current HP - level & xp are cool things to see it's the progress meter as well as the 'version number' of the character.
Initiative bonus, ability scores and mod - I keep the score because, on the first game, they really enjoyed looking at the scores and compare themselves to one another
Defense scores
Skill bonuses
Attack/power workspace

Turns out I can really place three such light char sheets on a single page. I even have some room to spare.

I haven't tested them and the second game is still weeks to come (I'm getting a second baby first).

Still, I'd love for you to take a look at it and let me know what you think: charsheet-light-page.pdf

Quendy's Log: That kobold problem...

Eric Maziade — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 17:31:00 -0400

Along the mess with the mirror, there was the horny imp. And then, there was that epic fight against the kobolds...

The paladin - and that predates her paladinhoodity - was plagued by the nightly visits of a horny imp.

Heh. I was working on the lyrics for that song before the music died. I wonder if I still have them somewhere?

Anyway, this nefarious and highly entertaining creature would pop out of nowhere and try to uhm... lets say satisfy its urges before vanishing.

We never managed to capture it and find out what the heck these episodes were all about. I remember trying to convince the then-cleric-now-paladin to actually allow the creature to bring his activities to a climax, assuming that it would make its capture easier. Can't remember if something came out of this (so to speak of).

Anyway, so, Bridget was in her room at the inn, alone with the oh-so-spooky mirror when the imp appeared again. She spotted him as he was holding the mirror and admiring its reflection.

The imp - which I promptly named "Spike", even though it said it already had a name - was wearing clothes, not attempting anything on the paladin and not vanishing into thin air.

Of course, this only fueled Bridget's belief that the mirror was magic.

Oh, look, the mirror summoned the imp! It was the mirror after all!

Well, nobody ever said paladins were made to help turn in a profit, right?

Spike denied having anything to do with the mirror (surprise!). He said we were the only earthbound creatures he knew (poor fellow) and decided to stick with us. When questioned about his earlier interactions with a certain member of our crew, he quickly apologized, explaining that he was summoned and bound by powerful magic and forced to do these horrible, yet enjoyable actions.

With the current situation - you know, with Mystra being dead and all that stuff - his captor no longer held any power over him. (Yeah, sure). And he never got to know the identity of the wizard who misused him. (How convenient).

Bridget, while holding no love for Spike, accepted this as truth.

I mean, sure, trust someone who basically tried to rape you that said "an evil wizard made me do it! I swear!" - but distrust 5 experts that say "this mirror is ugly as a bulette's droppings, has no magical properties whatsoever, but its worth a mint", on the basis that "the mirror might be used for evil!".

Lets sell the mirror. Let the evil ones use it.

They need the reflection.

Please don't kill me.

The next day, we brought Spike to the nearest person who could take him off our hands (or other body parts) and we made way towards the kobolds hideout we were hired to clean up.

Now, if they ever decide to write a book with the definition of all words known to man, besides "epic fight", you would not find mention of this fight.

However, the kobold equivalent might.

So we were in the woods, right, tracking kobolds when our potent tracker discovered a few of the critters, guarding an entrance to some kind of grotto.

Those of us not dumb enough to weight ourselves down with noisy pieces of metal pushed forward a bit to evaluate at the situation.

Two split groups. We could try to attract one group and embush them - with luck the second group wouldn't notice before our wizard could send a flaming ball rolling their way.

Great plan.

We readied our ranged weapons in a "corridor" of trees and our fearless wizard (I hear lack of fear actually means wisdom deficiency) magically attracted their attention through the creative use of sounds.

The kobolds sentry slowly came our way to investigate and was rapidly transformed into an arrow-pincushion.

So far so good.

The other kobolds actually heard us and started coming at us through the woods (oh no! a corridor made of trees is not a real corridor? really?). Turn out they weren't much to fear - we quickly dispatched them - we barely got injured.

We pressed slowly forward towards the grotto - conveniently "hidden" behind a waterfall.

Then, from behind the waterfall a beam of light came straight at us, barely missing us and burning a patch of grass!

Stoically, the group fled the scene and ran to the village for help, leaving what I suppose was an old, single shaman that had used his only remaining spell for the day.

Epic!

Training encounter for kids

Eric Maziade — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:56:00 -0400

I'm planning on doing a 'training' encounter for the next session with the kids.

I played through it once to see how it could turn out and what I could realistically teach...

I originally wanted to do a training session with an instructor flat out explaining about flaking, charging and bull rush.

I quickly figured that a dissertation on basic field tactics wasn't going to fly or be effective - they'll forget most of it when the situation arise.

So I decided to have the training session ellipsed,

Over the span of a few days, Ralf Crusher, the chief of the village's guard gives you a few lessons that help you improve your combat tactics.

build the trainer as an NPC,

Crusher, Ralf Crusher, level 1 Warlord

and have the actual training in a "random" encounter while on patrol.

My group has 6 players - which, I'm finding out, is a bit much given that I still handle all of the character sheets.

So I built a 600xp encounter to give a lot of tactical opportunities.

2 Goblin Sharpshooters
2 Goblin Warriors
6 Goblin Cutters (minions)

The setup goes like this: Ralf steps on a trap, which closes on his leg and breaks it. Ralf is out of combat, but can still give "suggestions".

Goblin Cutters jump out from behind a rock and charge at the players - they aim for the surprised players if at all possible and do their best to flank.

Teaching opportunity: flanking. If minions succeed at flanking the players, Ralph is going to warn them "Don't let them surround you! Cut them down or push them away!"

Warriors and sharpshooters remain hidden behind rocks, out of view, waiting for their turn.

Warriors will dash away from the players, throwing javelins - they get damage bonus from moving at least 4 squares - and trying to lure the players for the sharpshooters.

Sharpshooters are lying hidden atop some boulders, waiting for the opportunity to snipe at the players. They're hard to spot and become really visible only once they hit.

Teaching opportunity: interact with the terrain ; get the sharpshooters down from the rocks. If they pull them down, bull rush the rock pile or whatever they can come up with that makes a minimum of sense, the sharpshooters will fall prone.

The combat wasn't easy and I had to make 1 or 2 DM Calls not to kill the PCs I preferred to leave a PC at a dramatic 1 HP.

Teaching opportunity: healing surges. This one, I think I'll have to explain beforehand. But Ralf's tips of 'get cover, try and catch your breath' and 'you can ask Moradin to help your friends who are nearing death' surely helped.

A few more concepts that I feel should be easily added:

Opportunity attacks. They occur naturally.
Choosing proper powers. Ralf will give a shout-out to remind the players that they have other powers. A dramatic 'split the tree' turned the tide of the combat during my simulation.

One tactic I didn't want to tackle, but couldn't resist was the sneak attack - after all, what's a rogue without that?

Good things the goblin was stupid when Ralf suggested to Brad : "the sharpshooter's prone on the floor, Adrielle is its immediate threat - stay hidden and surprise him" - otherwise he would've seen it coming.

All in all, an exciting battle, even if my wife thought I was going crazy talking to myself (practicing improvised narration), playing with plastic figurines in the basement.

After this battle, a scout will come by.

Master crusher - w received a report from another group that trouble is brewing at the kobold's keep. A scout heard that they were planning something big. We think they're preparing a ritual to bring the dragon back to life...

Oh yeah.

Preparing for the second adventure for my group of kids.

Eric Maziade — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 02:24:00 -0400

I don't know when I'll have the opportunity to play DnD with the kids again, but I sure am thinking about it.

Since I cut short on Kobold Keep on the first session, I think I should have them go back and finish the job.

I do have a storyline idea for the followup, but I do have a few things I'd like to do.

First, I'd like to bring in a few more elements. I've been light handed with the rules - allowing them a peek at more and letting their imagination go wild with interpretation.

There are many things I can add:

more powers (1 extra encounter power or one daily power)
open up the skills
more combat rules

From what I have seen last game, I don't think they're ready for more powers - they barely used the few ones they already had, always opting for the 'shoot' or 'hit' technique.

Showing them the list of skills is not something that I feel is necessary - they can already tell me what they want to do and I can translate that into skills myself.

More combat rules sounds good - I know a few of the kids are much into board games and they really impressed me with their strategy-based decisions on the first game.

But I don't want to teach them through a lengthy exposé.

What I am planning is to have them be trained by the captain of the guard from the village. I could ellipse the training session and send them into combat while on patrol.

Now, I could set up the combat and have their teacher "remind" them of their past lessons.

I would like to teach them things like:

flanking
cover
using the environment

The 'using the environment' part is the one that could open their minds to traps, bull rushing opponents, etc.

I could have them bull rush an opponent to have him trip and fall on a log, for example.

I could much more (sneak attacks, being prone, etc.) but I don't want this combat to drag on and I don't want to bore them with rules.

But I think this could make for an exciting part of the session and prepare them for the traps and sneaky Kobold tactics that is awaiting them at the Kobold Keep...

Dungeon Master Appreciation Day

Eric Maziade — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 17:43:00 -0400

Is there such a thing? I Googled it and didn't find much.

Closest thing I found was this thread saying that ENWorld put it on March 4th.

Interestingly (or sadly, or ironically - you get to choose your favorite adverb), it coincides with the passing of Gary Gygax...

NB: The date's proposition predates the passing of Mr. Gygax by 6 years!

I think its fitting, no?

But there's no need to wait for March 4th to show your master of dungeons some appreciation!

Show him some appreciation by giving him some proper constructive criticism.

Tell him what you like about his games - what's keeping you coming for more at his table!

Shout out to Biz-Daddy Funk Master Steve (I decided a few weeks ago that every DM must have a DJ name - subject of a later post).

Love your creativity - you created some very cool storylines over the years and catered to all of your player's taste. Word!
Love your knowledge of lore - you've shown me Forgotten Realms and you seem to know just about there is to know about it. Your knowledge impresses me. Word.
Love your commitment and apadtedness (that's not a real word - adapt to it). You were a much more serious gamer when we started playing. You learned to relax and we learned to (sometimes) goof around less while playing. And we've been at it for years. Word!
Didn't we meet you because you were someone my roommate met in EQ back in the days? Word!

I think I'd make a piss-poor pasty white-faced chubby rapper.

Bling bling, y'all. (whateff?)

Writing adventure logs.

Eric Maziade — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 15:15:00 -0400

I felt like writing an adventure log from the perspective of my character (Quendy) for a long time...

That's what my quarter baked post from yesterday was all about.

You can guess by now that I feel lukewarm about it.

Edit. After re-reading it and a few minor tweaks, I think its better than I originally thought... good for me

Quendy's Log: Tracking Douven Staul

Eric Maziade — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 02:10:00 -0400

Quendy here. Or should it be Quendie, now? I'll never get the hang of that being a woman stuff.

I can barely remember why were were looking for the old man. Then again, my memory isn't much to behold.

Suffice it to say that we were hired to find the man.

So we finally did. As expected, the guy was investigating a rumored dragon cemetery.

We found a nearby burial site with little trouble and were greeted by what seemed to be an odd group of archeologists. Needless to say, they were nothing more than grave diggers. Their greeting was a trap and, once again, we were forced into battle.

Battle is nothing like the fights of yore. Back in the days, I could grab my lute and inspire my group to perform heroic deeds. Back in the days, I could dazzle my foes with my wits and charm.

But the music died.

What I felt is some kind of detachment. And a dull dizziness. But I was far for numb.

One of the grave diggers let loose some sort of dog-like lizards on us.

"Aa'lle kaivo lirilluva ve'lithie no'sina talan!" - I cursed at them.

I barely understood the words that came out of me. It is as if something had whispered them in my ear and they fell straight out of my mouth.

A chill went through my body as dark flames gathered through my wand and launched at one of the creature, hitting it full force. The beast paused its advance and was soon felled by a volley of arrows coming from my allies.

We made short work of the rest of the group and forced them to flee - but not without them seriously injuring our paladin friend. What was her name again? Brigit? Maybe I can still remember a few names, after all?

So, we rescued Douven, who rewarded us with some loot he found on the site and we all anticlimactically went back to town together.

But Brigit was restless - our "prize" for rescuing Douven felt more like grave robbing. And the loot itself - a mirror with a dark frame, encrusted with small skulls, felt rather ominous.

She managed to convince us to have it checked out by various specialists - was it enchanted? cursed? was it used as part of a dark, gloomy, sinister ritual?

Everyone told us that no, it is a valuable piece of jewelry - of questionable taste, perhaps - but valuable still.

I figured we could sell it and try to score some equipment with the resulting funds. Lord knows I needed the funds to try and learn more about the fey people. Books were few and far between in these parts of the world. And they were not exactly cheap.

But noooooo. Lady Brigit was so convinced that the mirror was more than met the eye, that she decided to have it locked in a vault at the temple - until we can figure out what makes it tick.

For a second, I wondered if I should lock her in a vault - to see what makes her tick.

But this age is the age of diplomacy.

"We can never be too careful", I agreed, trying to hide the sneer from my voice.

Ah, these careful people. It a wonder anything interesting ever happen in their lives...

House Rule : Lost ammunition

Eric Maziade — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 01:34:00 -0400

We've approved our first official house rule in our gaming session today: retrieving ammunition.

The player's handbook isn't too wordy on what happens with ammunition. Page 221 says:

Ammunition is used up when you fire it from a projectile weapon.

Our ranger didn't feel this was right and we agreed. Surely some arrows can be find an some can be reused, right?

House Rule: Lost Ammunition

If the target hits, the ammunition is used. We keep it in line with the core rules. Maybe the projectile shattered on impact. Maybe it can't be removed from the creature without breaking it. Maybe the creature ran away with the projectile. Its lost. Get over it.
If the target is missed, you have 50% chances of retrieving the projectile. Roll 1d6. 4, 5 and 6 gets you the projectile back at the end of the encounter - provided you didn't flee.

We've played with this rule for a second time now and everybody seems happy with it.

Describing attacks

Eric Maziade — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 17:39:00 -0400

I had some sort of technique, back in the days, when it came to describing how an attack failed or succeeded.

I kind of fell short of creativity when describing attacks and blows with the kids last weekend.

Let's try to reflect on why and if I can remember how I used to do it...

For starters, I was rusty. My lexicon of hits, misses, crits and fumbles was far away. I was also nervous.

I also put in there a dragon that had more HP that I was prepared to handle... this is where my narrative started to fall flat and sound repetitive.

Luckily, I had elements to save me: I was gaming with children who are blessed with a love for silliness. And they were vocal about their likes, anticipations and were ready to propose descriptions when I was falling short.

A bit of practice will bring the lexicon back... but I half-remember a technique I used to use.

"Rule" 1

I suspect a lot of DMs do it that way - the farther away you are from the target, the most spectacular the hit or miss. That's an easy one.

"Rule" 2

What makes a die roll and a defense score is more complex than the silly number that represents it. For me, it feels especially rich in 4.0.

The die roll modifier (I almost wrote "thac0" - my lexicon is resurfacing) is a combination of experience (half level), abilities (ex: strength), feats, characteristics. The die roll is luck. Same with the defense score - experience, ablities and feats.

I try to layer them by importance.

For an attach score of 17, we can have a hit:

10 from the dice, for luck - "you just got lucky".
3 for strengh bonus - "you hit so hard you pierced the armor"
due to training - "he blocked your hit, but anticipating his parry, you pivot on your left leg and score a hit"
due to experience with this or another opponent or situation - "kobolds always dodge on their left first. dumb farts"

Already a nice palette to narrate a hit. The narrower we hit the DC, the more the hit goes towards the "luck" end of the spectrum. The higher we beat the DC, the more I go towards the training and experience end of the spectrum.

Misses can use that same scale, but we can do the same thing with the defense score. AC could be 18:

Basic 10 - "you stand still, but the attacker misses" ... or just use the attack score scale
3 for the armor - "his axe hits you straight in the chest. You step a few steps back, gasping for breath. You reach for your chest - your armor has taken the hit. And someone must pay."
5 for a dex bonus - "his flail is coming straight at you. but you're not there anymore".

"Rule" 3 - Preparing a bit in advance

It's hard to use just like that without pausing and thinking about what constitutes the scores... but if you are prepared a bit in advance, you can have a general idea of how the various scores are composed - especially your players' scores.

I suspect we could devise a little hit/miss table that could be filled for each character and that gives descriptions for hits or misses based on how far the attack score is from the target DC.

Hmm... I like this idea.

"Rule" 4 - Practice

I'm a total designer geek and like to build rules and structures around things. It makes them simpler for me... but it sometimes makes them feel more complex and difficult for others.

A few practice rounds with have you get the gist of it... and you probably don't need anything more.

Except, of course, if that table idea from tip3 pans out...

hmmm...

Kobold Hall for Kids Part 3 - Kobold Halls

Eric Maziade — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 11:00:00 -0400

The heroes found their own way to the halls. As night was near, they decided to camp in front of the halls to explore them when daylight come.

But our fearless DM had a fumble in store... but for whom?

To my amazement, the heroes - without prompting from wizard dad - decided to camp the night out and take turns keeping guard.

The last guard heard some noises and quickly and silently awoke the rest of his group.

They followed a Kobold sentry all the way to the entrance of the Kobold Halls.

Let us take a break from the narrative to relate a playtesting story.

When I playtested this room, the group nearly got wiped. Man, these kobolds are tough. I'll make sure to roll behind my DM screen to help the kids out when we play it for real.

I also had a nagging feeling in the back of my head that the kids would strategize less and just run into the Kobolds and beat them to a pulp before they become a nuisance - something that experienced player seem to do less.

I won't do a play-by-play of the fight.

Suffice it to say that I forgot everything about Kobold tactics. I just remembered the "ambush" part and I had one Kobold try to get the players to come in the room and be mugged by multiple Kobolds.

But the melee players held back and the ranged fighters took out the kobold before he had time to do anything worth anything.

And my players advanced cautiously.

And, for some reason, the kobolds only came at them in pairs. DM fumble and wiped... his party of kobolds.

So they made short work of that and the kobolds did not get a chance to use they flanking and mob strategies.

So I did the best thing I thought. The remaining kobolds fled through a secret door I just invented outside of the player's sight. The players just saw them leave through the room in the back and heard the chief's kids scream - to let the players know they were on the right track.

Now, at this point, the kids have been playing for roughly 1hour and a half (excluding rules explanation). So I thought, I'll give them a small boss fight and end this here. I was ready to put in some tougher kobolds in the back of the room.

But I looked at my players. They were still focused and engaged. I thought - lets give them epic. Let's jump to the last room and give them an epic fight against a... dragon! After all - the game is called dungeon and dragon! They've seen dungeons, its only fair they see a dragon.

So, being wise enough to figure out that the kobolds didn't just vanish, they managed to find a secret door and go downstairs to... room #2.

Room #2 is the altar room with the caskets and traps everywhere. Let us forget the traps. There are the chief's kids tied to the bloodied altar. There are two badly wounded kobolds - the dragonborn hero has been holding his fire and I wanted him to have multiple kills with his breath weapon... and ... a big green frost dragon. He was green because that's the mini I have. It still is a frost dragon because I never planned on fighting a dragon and didn't prepare stats for a level 3 solo green dragon.

And here, again, ChattyDM's "let them run the story" rule made this section magical.

The heroes rushed the dragon - who seemed impervious to harm (with its 232 hit points!).

In the meantime, the rogue and warrior-princess went straight for the kids and bee-lined for the second set of stairs, presuming that they would lead to the flight of stairs they had seen in the previous room.

The dragon resisted the heroes' attacks, while the wizard and the dragonborn burned the remaining kobolds.

The dragon ignored the heroes when he noticed that his "lunch" was about to escape him.

This is when I noticed that the stairway was too small for the dragon to follow throug. I started wondering how he even got in that room. That's what I get for just deciding to put the dragon three rooms in advance

Ignoring the dragon, Adrielle and Brand escaped through the stairs. Since they wanted the next room to be the first room, I gave them just that.

But they were blocked by a gate. Adrielle used her strength to bend the bars and Brand escaped with the children.

Meanwhile, the dragon was clawing and spitting and biting at our heroes who were starting to think that they were not having any effect on the dragon.

One of the players mentioned that if the dragon was hurt, he should be starting to loose his armor or scales or something. Probably referring to some video game.

Basically, my narrative was not encouraging them - they didn't see that they were having an effect on the dragon. And I wanted them to beat the dragon. But I didn't want to just dumb the dragon down too much.

Taking hints from my players, the dragon started sweating, loosing scales and teeth. They were having as much fun trying to get the dragon naked as they had trying to neutralize him.

Still, they managed to get the dragon bloodied - so he spat his icy breath on them. And kept on clawing, biting and doing all sorts of dragony stuff.

(Now my player's dads and moms were arriving at the house to pick them up - the game was supposed to be over an hour ago and my players all negotiated extensions to their game time with the powers that be).

The dragon, being non-stupid, saw that the combat was not going its way and the heroes freed his lunch anyway. So I decided to have it flee... through a hole in the ceiling... that didn't just bring him in the room just above - suspend your disbelief.

As I was doing this, I though : 'what a lame way to end an epic experience!'

All range-enabled heroes started firing at the dragon. I hoped someone would hit it (they figured the dragon's AC by now) - I could have its wing broken and he could fall down.

But they missed.

So I decided that the dragon just grew a bit weaker and couldn't fly as fast, giving them the opportunity to manage to bring it down and beat it to an inch of its life.

The rogue arrived, running down the stairs to help his friends after having freed the kids. He stepped in the room and threw a shuriken at the dragon.

And felled the beast.

Treasure was found with no interest from the heroes - I failed to mention that the heroes gain experience, levels, skills and can use the weapons on another game, should they choose to play again.

But who cares? the dragon was beat. The children saved. And their parents were waiting.

Within a few minutes I was alone with birthday boy and his dad.

"I kinda liked that", said birthday boy. "Maybe we'll play again some day?"

Quest complete.

DM get 1000XP and gains a level.

Kobold Hall for Kids Part 2 - Role Playing

Eric Maziade — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 11:00:00 -0400

The basic rules were set and we were ready to play.

I've been a good DM back in the days and we'll see if its like riding a bike.

I put them all in an inn, ready for dinner... and ready for my first DM blunders of the day...

Too much choice is like not enough choice and my intro to role playing ended up being a little rough.

I was planning on using the material from 'Kobold Hall' in the DMG, but I wanted to use my own hook. The 'Inn' setting was a no-brainer, but my 12 years of DM inactivity started to show right off the bat.

I sat them at the Inn and asked them: "ok, so now what do you do?"

For a few seconds, there was silence. Then I started to wonder : "Eric, what the heck are you thinking? You should have narrated that they got this and that mission from this and that person and just jumped in the action!"

See, what I love about DnD is the role playing. The tactical fights of 4.0 are fun and all, but pretending to be this or that character is - to me - the spice of things. I feared that Kobold Hall was too hack-and-slashey and would rob my game from what I loved.

But I under-prepared my startup scenario.

My original plan was to have them fight rats in the basement before going through the 5 rooms in Kobold Halls. But play testing showed that this was taking too long, so I scrapped my intro and did not prep anything else.

I had to take them out of their incomfort zone - the void in which they were all hanging where the angst of the "you can do everything you want" now felt more like a burden than a claim for freedom.

I had Augustus, the Inn Owner greet them with a thick Quebec accent. Augustus is a fountain of info and would hook them up with something to do... but first, he had to hook them up with something to eat - just initiate a mundane dialog and get the kids to act in character for a few minutes.

Good plan, right? RIGHT?

Augustus: "He guys! What'll you be having for lunch?"

"Great man, what prose! What style!", thought the DM.

The kids started goofing off - I want a large pizza with fries! I want a poutine and a Coke! I'll take a sandwich!

"Oh my", the DM thought, "that is not quite era-appropriate... I don't believe that they have soft drinks in the forgotten realms.... even less poutine...." Then, the voice of ChattyDM was heard in the DM's head: "let them run the game".

Its amazing how ChattyDM's voice sounds like DM's voice in DM's mind. Then again, doesn't all Internet voices sound the same?

Augustus went in the kitchen to make some gravy, fries and mix them with cheese curds while the DM was wondering how the heck he was going to get out of this Inn with all his players intact.

See, players "in the know", would ask Augustus about what's happening... or ask the DM what they are seeing. DMs "in the know" would probably just flat out tell them that they notice something.

But I was having the same problems I had when I started DMing - I had a plan in my head and my players were supposed to follow it. This is my story... not theirs... Right? RIGHT? Who's with me?

Figures.

So while they are waiting for their food and not taking any actions and not being imposed any actions or observations, this mysterious stranger waltzes in the Inn, all dusty and tired from running through the woods and go straight to the band of adventurers.

"You guys adventurers?", asketh the dirty man? "Yes", role-playeth Adrielle Lindelea, undercover-elven-princess-who-should-be-learning-magics-but-prefered-the-way-of-the-sword. "You head about... uhm... the town chief's kids?", improviseth the diry man, desperately trying to tie into the (single) prepared hook for the story. "No", role-playeth Garven Steelfist, cleric of Moradin. "... You guys looking for work?", inquireth the dirty man. 'No", blurteth Brand Wortreen, rogue-but-not-a-real-criminal-more-like-robin-hood "... You guys busy?", wondereth the dirty man. "No", explaineth Erevan Melcoran, archer-because-its-easier-to-explain-than-ranger.

Not necessarily wanting to prolong this monosyllabic exchange of valuable information, the mysterious man just flat out gave out the plot: the chief's two kids have disapeared. The chief is in another village... doing... uhm... chiefly things... and the kids' mother is just crying herself dry. Everyone in the village is too geriatric to do anything about it. You are our only hope.

With that, the players acquiesced and anketh of Augustus that he provideth their meals to go. Meals were on the house, because DM didn't want to bother with inventory.

So I had them out of the inn and looking for the disappeared children.

My plan was to get them to think that the kids fell in the well, notice that this was not possible. Not find any legit footprints, but notice that one of the town's guards fell asleep and didn't see the kids wonder out town - where they were swiped by evil, dragon-worshiping Kobolds. Queue in dramatic music.

Then the ranger was to have his "moment" as he tracks the Kobolds all the way to the Kobold Halls.

But my party was hypnotized by the well. I made it very secure. A grid prevents someone from falling within the well. But what use is a well then? There is a hole big enough only for the bucket. in the grid. Maybe the kids fit in the hole? Hmm.. I don't think so. I try and break the lock with my warhammer.

Again, ChattyDM's voice in my head: "let them control the game..."

Okay, I said to myself. They want the kids to have fallen through the well? Let's make them happy - let's make them right.

So the lock broke, they opened the gate and the haling rogue climed down the well (using the well-fastened bucket rope) to see what was down there.

Turns out there's a tunnel underwater.

Without hesitation, all the heroic, leather-clad heroes jumped in the water and swam through the tunnel until they find a grotto.

To my player's delight, the dwarven cleric - all clad in chain mail - sank to the bottom of the well like a rock.

Holding his breath, he walked all the way to the tunnel where the rogue dove to give him a rope.

Esharn, the dragonbord warrior was holding the other end of the rope and pulled the cleric out.

That was exciting and heroic!

And that's when I started to feel that I - that we - were finding our game...

(to be continued)

Kobold Hall for Kids Part 1 - Introducing the game

Eric Maziade — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 00:57:00 -0400

Well, its done - I've DMed my first game for kids... and the results are in...

I have put a lot of work in there to try and make this entertaining and engaging for the kids.

I built mini character sheets - a cool picture, a little intro text and some basic stats.

I built "power cards", which are basically streamlined description for the character's powers: a cool description of what it does, what dice to roll and number to add to make an attack, same for damage. The idea was to have the kids engaged in the basic rules without fiddling with where the bonus came from - level, skills, proficiencies, feats and whatnot were already calculated.

I prebuilt all characters, very stereotyped: a dragonborn warrior, one cleric, one ranger, one bard and two special characters - 1 wizard (for birthday boy's dad) and 1 elven princess fighter (for birthday boy's sister).

My party consisted of 4 tea year old boys, 1 eight year old girl and one adult boy.

I made only one woman character (custom tailored to the lady's taste) and kept the more complex wizard for dad.

I wanted to get into the game as quick as possible and not delve into the rules too much. But, since no one but me around the table ever played a role playing game (what did I get myself into?), I still had to to a brief intro and rules summary.

So I explained a bit about role playing, about how we're all cooperatively telling ourselves a story. I explained about the core rule of d20 system (this is 1d20, you roll it, you add this number - which is based on your character's statistics and abilities, and you must beat my secret magic number for your action to work - and I get to describe what happens.

I had planned to explain about rounds, and turns and combat, but I felt that I was almost loosing them. So I just moved ahead to the characters.

I explained the characters and their powers (reduced to basic attacks + 1 at will attack + 1 encounter attack) and gave the 4 boys 5 minutes to decide who was playing who (a trick inspired by ChattyDM - again).

I loved hearing them debate and compare the characters. As I mentioned earlier, ability scores and defense scores were all on the sheets, but I didn't explain anything - they just picked it up by themselves, deciding which ability meant what and comparing to see who had the brightest character, who had the strongest, etc.

I expected all the boys to want to play the dragon, but they divvied up the characters in a matter of seconds with no infighting - we were almost ready to roll.

Which means I had to introduce dice. As usual 1d4 was an instant curiosity (how does that work? its the number on the bottom? the number on top? why don't they all make it the same)? And a bit of confusion in differentiating between 1d8 and 1d10.

Then, I gave them each 2 "magic stones of luck", which they could use at anytime, should they wish to reroll a dice roll they didn't like.

All in all - roughly 30 minutes of prep and we were ready to play...

(to be continued)

DM for kids in 4.0, part 2

Eric Maziade — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 22:35:00 -0400

For the past few weeks, I've been preparing to run a game session.

An introduction to DnD for a few 10 year old kids.

I haven't been DM in about 12 years and - obviously - never using 4.0... which I've only played once.

Armed with a basic knowledge of the rules, I roamed on the Internet to find information and wisdom about DMing for kids

The kids-rpg Yahoo group has been a great source of information.

I've learned what I should be expecting about attention span from the youngsters and what frustrations they normally encounter.

It caused me to streamline what rules I wanted to present to the children, the duration of the scenario as well as the 'mulligan token' mechanism.

A new source of inspiration is the Chatty DM. I've had the pleasure of receiving a few great tips from the Chatty DM himself.

He suggested that I keep the rules explaining to a minimum.

Which basically means: "The d20 dice determines if something works or not. The bigger the number you roll, the better".

He suggested that I streamline the powers - less choices, less confusion.

Basically: only one "at-will" power and one "encounter" power.

But the golden rule he gave me is probably the one that has the best chance of ending up pleasing the kids: let them control the story.

If you hear them speculate, give them what they are expecting. "If they say 'I bet you there's a Kobold behind that door' - put a Kobold behind the door".

Rings true to my ears.

With these pearls of wisdom, I only need to chop my scenario down to one room and update the power sheets I prepared for their "kid friendly" version.

Hopefully they'll like their first RPG experience...

'Mulligan Tokens'

Eric Maziade — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 16:15:00 -0400

I have been pointed to an article by Wil Wheaton by the fine guys over at the 'RPG Kids' group.

Wil talks about a rule he uses when playing games with his chiildren that allow re-rolling dice.

Basically, he gives them three 'mulligan tokens', which allows them to reroll a roll they didn't like.

I love this concept!

It removes a lot of frustration from multiple bad rolls (we feel it too - some of us just handle it better). The child is empowered - he decides when to reroll. There are still consequences and strategy - the number of rerolls is limited, the child needs to choose what to reroll wisely.

I'll be incorporating this mechanism in my introduction scenario - I'll be giving every player three magic stones of luck (haven't looked for a better name yet), that they'll be able to use to reroll rolls they don't like.

Only small setback is that some of the character's powers already work that way (I'm thinking about 'elven accuracy', for instance - supposing I remember the name right).

I figure that the gains far outweigh the losses here - the elf's power ends up being a bit less special, but the possible nipping in the bud of dealing with reactions multiple fumbles seems like its worth it.