D&D Essentials Kit

I like starter sets.  Maybe it's because I find the early adventures in a campaign the most exciting, or maybe it's just because I like buying things that are bundled together.  Sometimes it's an economical way of getting several PC-type miniatures at once, along with extra maps and dice.  In any event, I tend to buy every starter set D&D puts out.

While the D&D Essentials Kit doesn't include any miniatures, it still may be my favorite D&D starter set to date.

The box includes:
Abridged rulebook (64 pages)
Dragon of Icespire Peak adventure (64 pages)
Double-sided map (Sword Coast and the town of Phandalin)
4-panel DM Screen
6 blank character sheets
11 dice (1d4, 4d6, 1d8, 1d10, 1 percentile, 1d12, 2d20), translucent red with white numbers
81 cards (magic items, sidekicks, conditions, combat step-by-step, quests, initiative)
A box for the cards
Codes for D&D Beyond content (The included adventure, some follow-up adventures, and a 50% off coupon for the Player's Handbook)

The rulebook isn't much different than the free Basic Rules you can find on the official website.  It has instructions for building a character and advancing them to level 6.  It has four races (Dwarf, Elf, Halfling, Human), five classes (Bard, Cleric, Fighter, Rogue, Wizard) with two archetypes each, and five backgrounds (Acolyte, Criminal, Entertainer, Sage, and Soldier).

About the only significant new thing in the rulebook is the sidekick rules (which can also be found for free in Unearthed Arcana).  This is important, though, because it acknowledges one of the biggest barriers to getting a new group together - finding enough players to make a well-rounded group.

Dragon of Icespire Peak is one of the better starting adventures I've seen.  Not because it's a particularly memorable plot or anything, but because it's presented in such an efficient manner that they managed to cram a lot of content into a 64-page adventure book.

When you reach the town of Phandalin, you find a job postings board with three short quests on it.  You can complete them in any order, and after you finish a couple, more quests will be posted.  There are nine quests altogether.  Instead of experience points, the adventure encourages milestone-based leveling based on how many quests you complete.  These quests take place all over the surrounding area, so the PCs will really have a good layout of the land by the end.

Dragon of Icespire Peak will take the characters from level 1 up to level 6.  The included code unlocks three follow-up adventures on the D&D Beyond website, which bring the characters up to level 11.  That's a pretty good value for the price; it's enough to keep the players busy for several sessions.

The included cards are pretty cool, but kind of cheap.  They're not pre-cut cards, just perforated cardboard sheets you have tear apart yourself.  The card box is also thin cardboard that you have to fold into a box.  The quest, item, and sidekick cards make good handouts specifically for this adventure, and the rest of the cards are useful in any campaign, especially for beginners.

My only real complaint is the sidekick cards.  Each one shows a picture of the character on one side, and describes their personality on the back.  I would have preferred their stats being printed on the cards, with multiple versions of the cards for when they level up.  But it's a minor complaint.

The DM screen has some useful information on it.  The first panel has some basic rules - Actions in combat, things you can do on your turn, etc.  Panel 2 has conditions.  Panels 3 and 4 have miscellaneous charts like common prices, light distances, cover effects, sample DCs, and so on.  It's a handy reference, but I don't tend to use DM screens so I probably won't get much use out of it.

Overall, I think this is a great value for new players.  I plan to run Dragon of Icespire peak next time I DM for new players.  I do wish it had included a few minis or tokens and a combat grid, but it's still a good value.  If you're new to D&D and trying to decide which starter set to get, this is the one I recommend.

Pathfinder 2e vs D&D 5e

My personal history with tabletop RPGs goes all the way back to the early 80s, but my experience was sporadic and not very deep.  Back in third grade I used to draw my own mazes and populate them from the AD&D Monster Manual.  Then I would talk my friend through them over the phone.  I don’t think I ever heard the words “Search for secret passages” so many times in a single night.  I didn’t know the rules, but he did, and so he did all the math on his end.  Looking back at how ridiculously overpowered my encounters were, he probably cheated.

After that I played the occasional random D&D session, usually several years apart.  I didn’t really start to get into D&D until near the end of third edition’s life span, and I didn’t start playing it in earnest until Fourth Edition. 

4e gets a lot of hate, but I liked it for what it was:  A tactical combat board game with a plot.  As long as you understand that going in, it’s actually a pretty fun game.  Their only real mistake was calling it “Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition”.  If they’d just kept 3.5 going, and marketed 4e as a spin-off product, they might have been a lot better off.  They could have called it “D&D Heroes” or “D&D Tactics”.

But no, Wizards of the Coast abandoned 3.5, leading to the Paizo company using the OGL to release Pathfinder, which took 3.5 and ironed out the bugs, as well as adding tons of brand new, high quality content.   Fans of 3.5 flocked to Pathfinder in droves, and while D&D is currently experiencing a surge in popularity, a lot of those lost fans never came back.

Personally, I liked Pathfinder, but I also found it too complicated.  Creating a character was a chore for me, even when I tried using character creation software.  I liked that it had a lot of additional content, but it had so many options that I felt like I needed to read a dozen splatbooks to optimize my character.  I’m not much of a powergamer, and Pathfinder made me feel like I had to min/max just to keep my character alive.  Your Mileage May Vary on that one. 

When D&D 5e was released, I fell in love.  Character creation was so simple, even an idiot like me could build a character in five minutes.  The background options encouraged roleplaying, and the combat encounters were a lot faster than in Fourth.  Of course, optimized characters are still more effective in battle, that’s going to be true of almost any system.  But in 5e I never really felt the pressure to optimize my character, and I felt a lot more comfortable building my character around their background.

Now, some people complained that the monsters in 5e were too easy, but that never bothered me.  I’m not going for a high score here, I’m in it for the story.  For me, 5e struck the perfect balance between roleplay and combat, and it’s just about everything I’m looking for in an RPG.

Recently, Paizo released Pathfinder 2nd edition.  It makes a lot of changes to the system, most of which seem to be improvements, but also make the game a little complicated for my tastes.  Here's some of the rules that stood out to me.

Now a quick disclaimer:  While I played a couple of sessions of the playtest, I’ve only played one session so far of the final product, so these are just first impressions and I might be wrong about some details.  Also, I can’t always remember which rules are new and which ones are carried over from Pathfinder 1st Edition, so if I make something sound new that isn’t, I apologize.  Also, I covered a lot of this ground during my blog on the Playtest, but some of the rules have changed since then.

Character Creation: I have a love/hate relationship with the character creation.  I absolutely adore how you generate your stats now.  You start with all tens, then you get bonus points based on your ancestry, class, and background.  This is really how all RPGs should generate stats. 

However, I hate the overabundance of feats.  The game seems to have a heavy emphasis on them.  There are ancestral feats, class feats, and general feats.  The section for each class is around ten pages long, reminding me of D&D 4th Edition, except instead of powers, all those extra pages are full of feats.  Don’t get me wrong, I like feats, and I think they’re a great way to customize your character.  But it’s a chore reading through all those feats to pick the ones I want.  

Now that's partly own fault for being indecisive.  And luckily the handbook has some suggested templates for characters based on specific themes.  That’s a real time saver.  If you know what kind of character you’re going for, it takes less time to build a character than it did in 1st Edition.  At least, it did for me.  So that’s something.

Pathfinder 2e, which for the rest of this blog I’m going to call Patooie, now refers to “races” as “ancestries”, which is probably more accurate and more future proof.  I wish there were more ancestries to choose from, but then, knowing Paizo, we’ll have 37 new splatbooks by the end of the year.  I like that Patooie incorporates backgrounds into character creation, just like D&D 5e. 

Action Economy: The new action economy is… well, I *think* it’s easier to learn, but I’m so used to the “Standard/Move/Minor” variations most RPGs use that I have to unlearn what I know to relearn the new system.  In Patooie, everyone gets three actions on their turn.  Those actions can be for anything, movement, drawing your sword, attacking.  But some bigger actions use up more than one action, and certain actions have penalties if you use them more than once on a turn.

Encumbrance: The Encumbrance system is... interesting.  Patooie uses a “Bulk” system rather than have you add up each item's weight.  It tries its best to make this simple, but doesn’t quite get there in my opinion.  

Basically, you can carry an amount of Bulk equal to 5 plus your Strength modifier.  Large items are assigned Bulk values based on their size, weight, and how awkward they are to carry.  Smaller items are just labelled “Light”, and 10 light items equals one Bulk.  So a longsword would be 1 bulk, 10 daggers would be one bulk, a suit of plate armor is 4 bulk, and the Pathfinder 2nd Edition Players Handbook is 10 bulk.  Really small items, like shurikens, are weightless as far as the rules are concerned, which sounds like an exploit waiting to happen. 

Is this really easier than just adding up the weight of all your items?  Well, I hate to admit it, but probably. Once you get used to it, anyway.  I’ve never been a huge fan of encumbrance rules anyway, unless your party has one of those loot-obsessed players who try to carry away everything that isn’t nailed down.  

Math: Patooie uses a Proficiency system a bit like 5e, except they went the complete opposite direction on the math.  D&D 5e was built around the concept of “Bounded Accuracy”, which is a fancy way of saying, “We’re actually going to pay attention to the math this time.”  Some editions of D&D let the numbers get out of hand, and at epic levels you’d be adding such high numbers to your attack roll that the d20 barely made much of a difference.  Fifth edition reigned that in, and keeps the numbers much smaller and more controlled.  

Meanwhile, Patooie uses a proficiency bonus that includes your level as part of the math, which pretty much guarantees high attack roll bonuses as the campaign goes on.   I haven’t looked at a high level character sheet yet, but I bet it’s pretty scary.

Initiative: You don’t have a dedicated initiative score any more.  Usually you roll perception, but you might roll something else based on context.  For example, if your rogue was sneaking around when the fight started, they might roll their sneak skill for their initiative.  To me, this rule right here represents the essence of Patooie.  This is a rule that makes perfect sense, to the point that you may even question why RPGs did it the other way before.  But at the same time, it very slightly slows down the game, since some players will have to confirm with the DM which skill to roll. 

It only adds a few seconds, but that’s my point… Patooie is full of rules that make a lot of sense but add an a few extra seconds to gameplay.  No single rule really slows down the game, but combined?  I mean, I probably shouldn’t say this until I’ve played it more, but it nickels and dimes you with tiny extra rules, until the whole game feels too complicated. 

Secret rolls: The DM makes certain player rolls in secret now.  So if the rogue checks for traps, the DM rolls the skill check for them and lets them know whether they think it’s safe.  This way PCs don’t treat high or low rolls as out-of-character knowledge.  For example, let’s say you roll to see if someone is lying, and the DM says, “Well, you think he’s telling the truth…”  In other RPGs, you might respond, “Yeah, well I got a 27 on my insight check, so I’ll trust my instincts.”  But in Patooie, you don't know what you rolled, so you don't know how confident you should be.

This rule makes a lot of sense, but at the same time I just don’t like giving up control that way.  Also, I can see it slowing the game down.  Before, if you rolled really low, you might ask another party member to check as well.  But if the DM rolls for you, then players can no longer be confident about these checks, and they might ask fellow party members to duplicate every secret check.

Besides, I’m not convinced the results of these rolls would actually be out-of-character knowledge.  I think most people, when they attempt something, know to some degree how well they did.  Roll high on your insight check, and you can say you’re almost positive he’s not lying.  Roll low and you can say that the guy has one of those faces that’s hard to read.  But if the DM rolls in secret, you don’t know how your character feels about their attempt.  But I’m probably making too much out of it.

Crits: You now get a critical hit not only by rollling 20s, but also if you roll at least 10 higher than the target DC.  Likewise, you fumble if you roll 10 or more lower than the target number, as well as when you roll a 1.  In addition to attack rolls, a lot of skills have extra effects that go off if you crit or fumble.  I think that’s a good system – I’ve always thought it would be cool if there were a difference between just barely hitting someone’s AC, and obliterating their AC.  But it also means you'll want to keep the Players Handbook nearby in case you forget what happens when you crit with a specific skill.

Opportunity Attacks: You provoke an opportunity attack if you move while in an enemy’s threat range.  This is reasonable, but it’s going to be hard for me because I’m used to 5e, where you only provoke when you leave their threat range.  But Patooie does allow you to step one square without provoking.

Diagonal Movement: By default, it uses the 1,2,1,2 method for calculating diagonal movement.  This is a huge pet peeve of mine, and I could probably do a whole rant on that one rule alone.  But to sum up, I prefer simple rules and ease of play over stark realism and simulationism.

Non-Magical Healing: Healing is a divisive issue for players.  Some people – usually old school gamers - prefer slow healing, because it turns it into a resource management game.  Does the party really want to risk going down another dungeon level when their hit points are down 25%?  Other players – usually the ones who grew up playing video game RPGs, prefer to recover all their hit points by resting after each battle.  This helps the game move along faster, and prevents you from going back to town every twenty minutes. 

I can see both sides of the issue, but personally I prefer fast healing.  At least if the campaign has a lot of combat in it.  A few years ago I was in a Pathfinder First Edition campaign, and my character got injured, and she had to stay in bed for several days while the rest of the party went out on cool adventures.  At first it looked like Patooie was going to be the same way. 

But then I learned about the skill “Treat Wounds”.  Basically, it allows you to make a DC15 check once an hour, to heal 2d8 hit points.  For a game without any form of healing surges, this is a game changer.  I can see this becoming a “must have” skill for any class that allows it.  I can see some DMs disallowing the skill, or at least restricting the number of times it can be used per day. 

Hero Points: Every system has some version of action points, inspiration, bennies, or whatever.  In Patooie, Hero Points are points you get that only last for the session, that you can trade in to reroll bad checks, or to keep you from dying.  Since they can save your life when you’re making death saves, it’s risky to use them up on anything else, and I imagine most players will always save one for emergencies.  Heck, it’s worth it just to avoid having to look up the Dying rules, which take up nearly two full pages in the Player’s Handbook.

To Wrap-Up: Patooie is a decent system, but I do have some concerns about its future.  Like I said earlier, the original Pathfinder’s fan base was made up of people who didn’t want to leave D&D 3.5 behind.  So, now that Pathfinder is no longer a clone of 3.5, are those fans still going to stick with it?  Or will they keep playing Pathfinder 1st Edition?  Or will some of them take this opportunity to give D&D 5e a try?  Only time will tell.

Some of Patooies rules seem… all over the place.  This is just my impression and feel free to disagree, but some of the rules don’t feel like they belong in the same RPG.  Every time I think the game it too complicated, I’ll come across something that’s been elegantly streamlined.  Some elements of the game are as simple as tic-tac-toe, while some entire pages read like tax code.  I never can tell if the PCs are supposed to be ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, or if they’re supposed to be medieval superheroes. 

I have a fundamental problem with the Players Handbook that is hard to put into words… but basically, the information I’m looking for is rarely where I would look for it.  It’s like the writers and I just can’t agree on how you should organize a book. I can only read the Player’s Handbook in small chunks, because my brain keeps getting full.   I kept finding rules that made me say, “Awesome!  But… I’ll never remember that option exists.”  It’s like being at a buffet full of thousands of delicious desserts, but you’ve already filled up on steak and couldn’t eat another bite. 

Overall, I think Pathfinder 2nd Edition is an excellent game with a lot of creative features.  However, I also think it’s a bloated system and unnecessarily complicated in places.  It would not be my first choice of RPG, maybe not even my fifth… but I would still play it, and probably enjoy it.

Bottom line: There’s a lot to like in the newest version of Pathfinder, but it’s far from perfect.  Personally I prefer D&D 5e, but Patooie is good enough that I’m happy to play it when I can’t find a 5e game.

Pathfinder 2e - First Session

Game Date: 9/29/2019

Earlier this year I played a couple of the playtests for Pathfinder 2nd Edition.  This was my first time playing the actual game.  There were eight of us in the group, mostly using pregens.  Because of the large group (a couple of whom were really great at hamming it up), there was a lot of time between turns and I really didn't end up doing much.  But we all had a great time and we learned a bit about the new edition.

The session started with a town meeting.  We were told that the town sage had been kidnapped by an Ogre, who was taking him to speak to Hannar, a former town citizen.  We accepted the plot hook and headed toward the Ogre's cave.  On the winding trail up the mountain, we fought the Ogre and his companions.

After the battle, the party Rogue was suffering from centipede poison, and we spent many turns trying to heal him.  We located the sage and untied him.  Investigating the area, we found a ritualistic circle of rocks, and played around until Hannar teleported in.  He ordered the sage to tell him the truth about his birth.

The sage revealed that Hannar was a real Son of a Witch (well, Hag), and Hannar threatened to destroy the town.  Our bard tried using diplomacy, and it was super effective!  The bard convinced Hannar to see the error of his ways.  It was a nice change of pace to avoid a boss combat this way.

It was a short session, so there wasn't much there to judge the game on.  However, I have read through the Player's Handbook.  I'll go over my thoughts in a future blog, but overall I think it has some great ideas.  Some of the rules are a bit too complicated for my tastes, and so far I prefer the simplicity of D&D 5e.

But it was nice getting to throw down some dice again; I don't get to play nearly enough these days.

My Fantasy D&D Group

I hear this question asked a lot: “What is your dream D&D group?  If you could play a campaign with any six people, who would you choose?”  Now, most people go over the list of known celebrities who play D&D, which includes such notables as Vin Diesel, Wil Wheaton, Felicia Day, Joe Manganiello, Judy Dench (seriously), and so on.

Other people would pick genre-specific celebrities, as in, people who are only famous in D&D circles, and/or famous specifically for playing D&D.  For example, Matt Mercer, the DM of the Critical Role web series.  Or any of the current D&D designers, like Chris Perkins or Jeremy Crawford.  If it’s a “living or dead” type of question, then they might go with D&D’s original creators, Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

Still other people might pick celebrities who have nothing to do with D&D, but who have skills that would bring something to the table.  How cool would it be to have your favorite cartoon voice actor as the DM, so they could do different voices for each character?  Or how about one of history’s greatest military generals, known for their unconventional battle tactics?  And how scary would it be to play a horror themed game run by a great storyteller like Stephen King or Clive Barker?

But for myself?  My dream D&D game would be all my closest friends.  My best friend from college, who lives too far away now.  My best friend from high school, who is so busy with family now that he can’t commit to a regular game schedule.  My best friend from junior high, who thinks D&D is boring.  My best friend from elementary school, who always thought D&D was a tool of the devil.  My best online friends, who prefer video games to pencil-and-paper.  And of course my best DM friend, who lives close by and runs games regularly, but who unfortunately doesn’t tend to like the same RPGs that I do.

They all have their own lives, and I’m happy for them.  I wouldn’t want to change them for the world, or do anything that takes away from their own interests and pursuits.  But if, in a parallel world, I could put all these people in a D&D group together, that would be the perfect game.

Background Challenge

Just saw this on Twitter:

D&D challenge: Give your characters a pleasant backstory. Give them a good relationship with their parents. Make their childhood idyllic. Make their need for adventure about them just trying to live their life. 

The funny thing is, some of my characters are like this.  Okay, most of them do have some sort of tragedy in their backgrounds, but who really goes twenty years to without some bad moments?  My characters are still far from the edgelords some people design.  Am I wrong?  Let me revisit some of my characters:

Dervish - Human Weapon Master, NeverWinter Nights
Raised by a single father and six brothers, she was a tomboy.  When her father tried to get her to be more ladylike, she left home.  Okay, the tweet has me there.  Guilty.

Sillia Aylomein - Human Bard, NeverWinter Nights.
Was expelled from music college, ran away from home so she wouldn't have to tell her parents.  Fine.  Guilty.

Brynwyn Elswyth - Elf Arcane Archer, NeverWinter Nights.
Left home because she blamed herself for not saving her brother from being killed by orcs.  Guilty.

Nara Cavell - Human Cleric, Tantris Campaign.
I never really wrote out a backstory for her or mentioned her parents, but it was implied that she was an orphan that was raised by the church.  So Guilty, I guess.

Voranna Elun - Eladrin Ranger, Living Forgotten Realms.
I never wrote out a background.  She had spent years living in the forest, because that's what makes her happy.  I have no reason to believe her home life was unhappy, I'm going to plead Not Guilty on this one.

Aria Thatcher - Half-Elf Bard, Scarred Lands campaign.
Okay, she never really grew close to her stepfather, because she was the product of an affair, but overall she had a happy home life.  She left home because she didn't want to end up being a farmer.  I think this is pretty close to the Background Challenge itself.  Not Guilty.

Talindra Seryth - Razorclaw Shifter Avenger, Artifact Hunters campaign.
Her birth tribe abandoned her because they saw her unusual fur color as a bad omen.  Guilty.

Kryla Bloodfang - Dragonborn Sorceror, ToEE campaign.
Left home because her parents feared magic.  Guilty.

Calla Noble - Human Knight, ToEE campaign.
The daughter of a prostitute and a con artist... you know what?  I'm just going to stop right there and plead Guilty.

Vex Corman - Half-Elf Monk, Unlikely Heroes campaign.
Raised by a monastery, with no memory of her real parents.  Guilty.

Dalia Lockwood - Human Ardent, Unlikely Heroes campaign.
Had a wonderful childhood, thanks to her latent psychic powers making everyone like her.  Not Guilty.

Flora Oakwillow - Hamadryad Seeker, Unlikely Heroes campaign.
Presumably had a wonderful childhood as one of the Fey protectors of Darkmoon Vale.  Not Guilty.

Malta Klonk - Human Engineer, Traveller campaign.
She was clumsy, causing her parents to steer her away from physical activities, but it seems like they were supportive and she didn't have any tragedies until she was an adult.  Not Guilty.

Terri Bolton - Human Mechanic, Rifts 2112 campaign.
She was closer to her father than her mother, then her dad died while she was in high school.  Guilty.

Danica Branford - Human Inventor, Gurps campaign.
No childhood mentioned in her background, which means Not Guilty.

Raz - Human Sorcerer, Dragon's Demand campaign.
I rolled her background randomly, so this one's exempt from the challenge.

Bjertha Brawlbaker - Dwarf Fighter, Shattered Star campaign.
Also rolled randomly, exempt.

Val Ravensword - Half-Orc Paladin, OAWYM campaign.
Rolled randomly, exempt.

Welp, I'm a lot guiltier than I thought.

I dunno, though.  I think some sort of tragedy is a good way to get people out of the house, rather than complacently trying to follow in their parents' footsteps.  But the tweet has a point; it's weird that so many people have similar backgrounds.

On the other hand, "adventurer" isn't supposed to be a common profession.  It takes a very specific type of person to accept such a dangerous and unpredictable career, and that sort of decision may require a specific background.  For example, someone who feels they have nothing to lose, because they already lost their family or hometown.

The first movie I ever really remember seeing as a kid was Star Wars.  The Star Wars universe shaped a large part of my childhood.  Luke Skywalker's arc is probably a huge influence on my backstories.  He was raised by farmers, but always wanted something more.  He wanted to leave to become an adventurer (actually to "join the academy", but really he was looking for any excuse to get away), but his family wouldn't let him go.  Then there was the tragedy - his surrogate parents getting killed - and he barely even mourns them in his haste to get off planet.

My favorite DM seems to dislike it when people write out long backstories.  As far as I can tell, he prefers randomly generated backgrounds and/or level 1 characters being blank slates with no predefined personality.  I'll have to actually ask him about that sometime.  Maybe he's just seen so many similar backstories at this point that he prefers the variety of randomly generated ones.

Honestly, I think a backstory should be interesting.  It gives the player a chance to write, and writing is a wonderful hobby.  As long as the player doesn’t try to shoehorn in any crazy out-of-character abilities, or claim the character has already done big things (if they’ve already slayed dragons, how come they start with 0 xp?), I think a detailed backstory is great.  It gives the character life and dimension, so they’re more than just numbers on a page.  And a good backstory will contain some degree of tragedy.

I can see why it’s tedious, though.  When a new movie or TV show comes about, a lot of players get inspired to create similar characters.  Everyone who reads R.A. Salvatore goes through a Drizzt phase, and wants to build a Drow Ranger.  When the Lord of the Rings trilogy hit theaters, a ton of people rolled up Aragorn clones.  So it makes sense that even when they aren’t trying to emulate existing characters, they still use similar tropes to make their backstories.  It can be annoying for players/DMs who’ve already passed that phase to see a bunch of newbies bring the same tired archetypes to the table. 

But get over it.  Frankly, I think this is another case where players should be allowed to play what they want to play.  If you want them to get through that phase, you have to let them play it out.

And there’s always the risk that your backstory will be the most interesting thing that happens to your character.  It’s like when you watch a movie that has some sort of introductory flashback in the beginning, and you realize, “Wow, that would make a better movie than this one.  I wish they’d filmed that story instead.”  So that’s another good reason to concentrate on family issues.  If these characters haven’t gone on any epic adventures yet, then of course the most significant events are going to be more personal and related to their friends and family.

As for myself, I’m going to make an effort to make my next character with this challenge in mind.  Loving family, great upbringing, no tragedies, I just wanna slay dragons.  Seems a little boring, but I suppose the backstory isn’t supposed to be the most exciting part of your character’s life.  It’s whatever happens next that matters.

The Importance of Agency

As far as I'm concerned, D&D is a game about living out your fantasies.  It gives you the opportunity to control a character in a fairy tale, and allows you to tune out real life problems in favor of fictional problems for a few hours a week.  Considering how difficult it is to arrange a time each week that all the players can make it to the game, it's important that each player is having fun and is playing a character they really want to play.

I've already mentioned this subject in past blogs, most notably my rant about rolling stats.  TL;DR version:  If that's how everyone at your table wants to generate characters, great, but I personally prefer allowing players to have more creative control in building their characters.

But today I want to talk about campaign ideas that remove agency.  For the record, I'm using the following definition of agency:

"In social science, agency is the capacity of individuals to act independently and to make their own free choices." - Wikipedia

Every DM lies awake at night trying to come up with brand new, creative ideas for campaigns.  Unfortunately, a lot of them come up with the exact same "brand new, creative ideas".  One that I see tossed around a lot is amnesia-themed campaigns.

In a typical amnesia scenario, the DM builds characters for all their players, who don't even know what race or class they will be playing at the beginning of the campaign.  The PCs typically wake up with no memories, knowing only what they see in front of them.  They fill out their own character sheets one discovery at a time.

I look like a human?  Write that down.  I'm good with a lockpick?  I must be a Rogue, write it down.  By the end of the first session, you'll probably have most of your character sheet filled out, and can start working on the campaign's true plot - finding out why you lost your memories and getting your life back.

Yes, it’s an interesting idea, and it would make a pretty fun one-shot.  But after the initial session, you’re left playing a character you didn’t design.  Now, a good DM might know their players well enough to build characters they’ll enjoy.  If you’re reading this and considering running such a campaign, ask your players in advance which races and classes they like most.  Then build characters with that in mind.  Once they’ve assembled their entire character sheet, allow them to make minor changes if they don’t like your choices.  I’m not much of a powergamer myself, but min/maxers deserve to have fun just as much as the rest of us, and should be given a little leeway.

One DM I know is bothered by players who always play the same characters.  He says he wants to run a campaign where, once everyone has created their character, they pass their character sheet to their left so that everyone plays a character they didn’t design.  Now, I want to stress that this DM is a good friend and I love him.  But if he pulled this crap on me at the start of a campaign, I would walk the fuck right out, and he knows it.  Not only would I be playing a character I didn’t create, but in such a scenario, it would feel like I was playing someone else’s character.  I’d have trouble making decisions as that character, because I wouldn’t know if I was playing the character the way the original author intended.  Basically, I want my character to feel like an extension of myself, and this scenario makes me feel further detached from my character.

Although, switching character sheets around could be fun for a “body swap” story, where the PCs get their minds switched by an evil wizard.  The story could have them searching for the wizard to get themselves switched back.  But this story works best in an existing campaign, where the characters’ personalities are well established, so that the switching has more impact.  If you do it to brand new characters, when they’re still just numbers on a page, there’s nothing really to “switch”, it’s just making the players play different classes.  I also think this side story should only last two or three sessions before they go back to normal, so the players can get back to controlling the characters they designed.

Honestly, I don’t get why some DMs care so much what their players play.  The PC is the one part of the story the player controls.  Everything else in the world is DM’s choice – setting, NPCs, technology level, whether magic is common, all the way down to whether the local butcher is left handed.  I just don’t understand DMs who also want to control the one part of the game that’s supposed to be up to the players.  It seems greedy.  Might as well roll their dice for them too, and make all their decisions.  Heck, might as well not even bother meeting up, and just write a book instead.

I know a guy who almost always plays the same character.  Not just the same race/class, but even the same name, personality traits, and facial disfigurement.  I’ve seen him play this character in several campaigns, taking place in different universes.  And you know what?  It’s never caused us any problems.  It’s never pulled me out of the game.  Is my friend missing out by not experiencing what other classes might offer?  I doubt it; he’s been playing D&D a lot longer than I have.  He probably tried all the classes and races long before I ever met him, and now he has his favorite.  I can’t fault him for that, any more than I can fault someone for always ordering their favorite flavor at Baskin Robbins.  If a DM forbade him from playing that character, he’d probably go find a different group.

Maybe you think it’s good for your players to get out of their comfort zones.  But you know what?  That’s not your job.  You’re not their psychiatrist, you’re their dungeon master.  Your job is to create interesting worlds for them to explore, design powerful villains for them to fight, and craft intricate plot hooks for them to ignore.  Unless a player wants to play a character that doesn’t fit the theme of your campaign, then it’s none of your business what kind of PC they play.  Actually, even if a player wanted to play a race that doesn’t exist in my universe, I’d probably work with them to make it happen.   Maybe they fell through a wormhole or something.  An out-of-place character generates some cool roleplay scenarios.

I believe in player agency.  It’s part of what makes RPGs appealing, as opposed to more restrictive board games.  And it’s a large part of the reason I play. 

Dungeon of the Mad Mage

There are two kinds of Dungeons.

Type A: Dungeons that make sense.  These dungeons take into account the function of the structure, as well as the ecology of the denizens.  There will be a theme to your foes: If it’s a goblin cave, you will mostly fight goblins, their pet wolves, and their hobgoblin bosses.  The layout will be functional: You’ll find sleeping areas, kitchens, storage rooms, and so on.  Traps will be minimal and will only protect valuable areas, such as the room where bandits store their loot.  If you’re exploring a Type A dungeon, you may not even have to clear out the entire thing.  A sensible hideout is easy to navigate, so you might break in at a point closest to your goal, clear out a few rooms, grab your MacGuffin, and head back out.  Type A dungeons are efficient and realistic, but potentially boring.

Type B: Kitchen Sink dungeons.  You never know what to expect in a Type B dungeon.  You could clear out a room full of manticores, then open the next door, and find yourself facing a room full of orcs.  Then you turn a corner and come face-to-face with a bugbear, a vampire, and a harpy.  You may find yourself wondering how these monsters get along, what keeps certain ones in their rooms, and who feeds them.  You’ll encounter traps that are designed to kill explorers, rather than to protect treasure.  You’ll complete complicated puzzles just to open doors to what look like high-traffic pathways.  Do the orcs that live here have to solve this “pour the right amount of water into the basin” puzzle every time they visit the kitchen?  Type B dungeons are less believable, but also less predictable, which makes them exciting.

Some Type B dungeons actually do have an explanation.  (Note, this paragraph contains possible spoilers for classic modules.)  The Tomb of Horrors is full of crazy traps, because the demilich Acererak likes collecting the souls of dead adventurers.  White Plume Mountain houses an unlikely menagerie of monsters, but the entire dungeon turns out to be a test of heroism, designed by an evil mage who requires a true hero for a blood sacrifice.   Dead in Thay has the Doomvault, a bizarre dungeon designed for magical experiments... or something; that module has never made sense to me.

Many dungeons are a mix of A and B.  The Temple of Elemental Evil is a pretty good balance of the two.  Each of the elemental-themed areas has their own reasonable ecology, but having it all so close together makes the dungeon as a whole seem pretty random.  I would have to say that the best dungeons are the ones that can straddle that line, by giving you a unexpected encounters while maintaining a consistent theme.

Dungeon of the Mad Mage is a bit of both.  The Undermountain’s dungeons were obviously designed by a lunatic (hence the title), but there is some logic to the denizens.  Different areas of the dungeon have been taken over by certain organizations or monsters, so there’s a lot of variety, but it’s not like each room has a completely random monster.  Given the popularity of this dungeon, the party will find a lot of the early areas have already been picked clean by previous adventurers, which is a realistic touch.

The ecology of each level usually makes perfect sense, but moving from one level to the next can feel like an entirely different module.  Why do the monsters and factions respect the concept of "dungeon level"?  All that divides this level from the one before it is a slanted tunnel, why do the kobolds suddenly get replaced with kuo-toa?  

A few levels down, you start finding unusual environments for a cave: cities, enchanted forests, floating castles, and so on.  A couple of levels are actually 5e conversions of older modules.  Sometimes you will often find keys on one level that unlock doors on another, so there is some connection between levels.  Occasionally someone will give you a side quest, and you’ll find the MacGuffin three levels later. 

This dungeon is big.  Probably the largest single dungeon published for 5e, at least by WOTC.  It goes down 23 levels, and even has a few hallways that lead nowhere, in case you want to add your own expansions.  The 320-page book devotes 289 pages to the dungeon, making it one of the largest dungeon-to-lore ratios I’ve seen.  

I honestly can’t imagine taking a party through the entire thing.  I think they would develop “dungeon fatigue” after a while (and a vitamin D deficiency).   The good news is that it’s designed so you can leave and come back, with lots of teleportation portals for quicker travel.  So some parties might keep returning to the Undermountain between other adventures.

While the book does contain a few plot hooks, it doesn’t need them.  This is the infamous dungeon beneath the Yawning Portal, and adventurers need no other reason to delve it than “because it’s there.”  But once the party starts exploring the passages, they will find other small quests to keep them busy.  So it’s not just “let’s kill all the monsters and find all the treasure”, though it certainly can be if that’s all the party wants.

Dungeon of the Mad Mage is a great companion to Waterdeep: Dragon Heist, but you don’t need either one to enjoy the other.  There is no strong plot connection between the two.  Grab Waterdeep: Dragon Heist if you want the lore of the area, and grab Dungeon of the Mad Mage if you just want a big ol’ dungeon.

Ferret-Legging

You step through the tavern door, and are immediately overcome with the smell of cheap ale and the sound of raucous laughter.  Some sort of competition is going on in the back, near the fireplace.  You see two men standing on a table, with pained expressions on their faces.  They seem to be dancing around uncomfortably, and you see squirming movements in their burlap trousers.  The crowd around the table cheers them on, while passing around money and betting slips.  Finally, one of the competitors shouts, “I give!  I give!”  Half the patrons let out victory cheers while the rest curse.  As the competitors climb down from the table, they loosen their pants, and each of them pulls out a pair of ferrets.  The ferrets are taken by handlers and put into cages. 

Seeing you newcomers, one of the ferret handlers shouts, “Hey, new blood!  Want to give it a try?”

I like keeping some quick tavern games at the ready, preferably ones that are heavy on the flavor and light on the rules.  Thanks to this cartoon, I have recently learned of a real-life activity called “Ferret-Legging”.  I don’t know about the ethics of this “sport” in real life (as far as I know, the ferrets are unharmed, though I haven’t done much research).  But it sounds like a fun bit of flavor to liven up your D&D tavern. 

The rules:

Each contestant sticks two ferrets in their pants. 

The pants are tied tight at the ankles and around the waist, to keep the ferrets from escaping.

Whoever can stand it the longest, wins.  

Contestants are allowed to give up at any time.  

The pants must be loose enough to allow the ferrets to move from one leg to the other.  (In game, the PCs might be supplied with a special pair of burlap trousers.)

You may not wear underwear or any other clothing underneath your pants.

For each participant, the DM rolls a d20 to represent the ferrets’ movements.

1-9: The ferrets tickle a lot this turn, but the contestant toughs it out.

10-19: The ferrets bite, and the contestant must make a CON save vs the number the DM rolled.

20: The ferrets bite hard, and the contestant makes the CON save with disadvantage.

After each contestant gets a turn, the next round starts.  If a contestant fails three CON saves, they can't take it any more, and are out of the competition.  The player who lasts the longest wins.

Optional Rule: If the player rolls a nat 20 on a CON save, they have advantage on their next CON save.

Notes:

The contestants can be PCs or NPCs.  The fewer contestants the better, but it requires at least two so they can try to outlast each other.

It doesn’t matter what order the contestants go in, as everything that happens in a round is happening at the same time.  If the final two contestants lose the game in the same round, it’s a tie.

The odds on the CON saves are in the contestants' favor, since they get to add their CON bonus versus the DM’s unmodified roll.  This is intentional, because it’s an endurance test, and because the players are competing with each other more than they’re competing with the DM.

Why exclude numbers 1 through 9 from the CON saves?  This is just to speed things up a little, since the players would most likely make those saves anyway.  Plus I wanted to add some flavor, by having rounds where the ferrets tickle but don’t bite.

As in battle, a round represents 6 seconds.  This means the minimum a match can last is 18 seconds.  According to Wikipedia, in 1972 the world record was 40 seconds.  However, the current world record is over five hours, so clearly this is a sport where a lot of variation is possible.  If you want to change the length of a round, that’s up to you.

Usually, the last contestant standing is immediately declared the winner and can let their ferrets out.  However, a PC might want to keep going just to see how many rounds they can last.  A tavern might have its own record of longest times that the PCs can try to beat, and possibly even a reward for those who break the record.  I suggest the standing record being about 3 minutes (30 rounds). 

This sport is mostly played by men, and winning is considered a macho thing.  There is a female version, called "ferret-busting", that involves blouses instead of pants.  But it isn't nearly as popular.

Flavor:

Describe the tickling (roll 1-9) or biting (10-20) in detail.  Some sample descriptions:

1 “The ferrets don’t move much this turn.”

2 “The ferrets move around a little, but it doesn’t bother you.”

3 “The ferrets run up and down your legs, which tickles a lot, but you manage to keep a straight face.”

4 “A ferret licks the back of your knee, making you giggle uncontrollably.”

5 “A ferret runs up and down your leg, tickling like mad.”

6 “The back of your legs feel like you’re being attacked by feather dusters.”

7 “You can’t help but laugh as both ferrets circles around your legs.”

8 “A ferret squiggles past a particularly sensitive area, tickling you in a way that you find disturbingly pleasurable."

9 “The ferrets nibble on your ankles, but it doesn’t hurt.”

10 “One ferret bits you lightly on the kneecap.”

11 “A ferret bites you.  It feels like getting jabbed with a knitting needle.”

12 “You feel a ferret clawing at your ankles, trying to find a way out.”

13 “A ferret bites you.  It hurts like the dickens.”

14 “A ferret bites you in the hindquarters."

15 “A ferret bites your right thigh.  It hurts a lot.”

16 “You feel a stabbing pain in your left calf.”

17 “Both ferrets bite you at once.  It’s not a pleasant feeling.”

18 “A ferret bites you hard…” (If save) “…but you can take it.” (If fail) “…causing you to shriek like a child.”

19 “A ferret bites you extremely hard…” (if save) “…but you wince and persevere.” (If fail) “….causing you see spots for a few seconds.”

20 "A ferret bites you in the worst possible area, causing you to double over in pain."